Guitar

Tony loved his guitars. All of them. He used to say that there is but one song for a specific guitar sometimes. He played also the banjo and the harmonica. This is an easy drawing, pen & ink, probably late sixties, early seventies. Hear his song...

Angels

Once in a while we all needs angels. When Tony did, he just drew them or took his guitar and sang to them. This is one of the easels in the corner house in Hoboken. He had three there, all rather big. He often worked at two pieces at the same time , usually in very different styles, but with the same basic palet.

The horsewhisperer

Tony often wrote stories and illustrated them. He was a painter first and foremost. These illustrations are done with airbrush. You have to love the horses! Tony knew horses, he rode, as a 14 year old he worked in a very famous stable. Didn't really like him since one of the horses was really ornery. I think it is an early seventies piece when many of his best stories originated.

Gentleness

This gentle 1993 pen and ink drawing washed with water is done in Chloride. Tony must have been in a melancholic mood. He often was. He craved recognition as a great artist - which he is in my mind - yet never got the breakthrough other, sometimes less interesting, artists made. Doug Lyon would come and visit us in Chloride every time we were there and he would bring Jeffrey. It were good and happy times. Doug would also slip Tony some money when it was obvious we were 'impecunious and without funds'. Thanks again.

Lovers in landscape

Lover in a landscape with a view on the horizon. there in the distance there seem rest and peace and the mystery on not knowing what is. Note the whimsical loose tree and the barely suggested figures. this etching is probably from the early seventies, done on the press Doug Lyons and some other friends bought for Tony. I know of three presses having been bought for Tony. The two other ones were bought in Belgium.

Place de L'Ancienne Synagogue

Staying in a hotel at the Place de l'Ancienne Synagogue, I thought of some of Tony's quick scetches of people he saw in the streets. These are feltpen drawings with sure lines, probably stemming from the late sixties or very early seventies. Amsterdam or Antwerp may have inspired him to to these. He lived in Antwerp in the 'Lange Herentalse Straat', right in the Jewish orthodox quarter. He was intrigued by the hair and beard, the dress, the people...

Birds

These birds, at first glance they seem to be pigeons; they are a lithograph. When in Paris Tony did several lithographs. Once again: no date or signature on the photograph but seen it is in the series of work from the early seventies in Los Angeles. I know Robert K. owns some of those. Do you see the lady with the red hat?

Nude oil

This is a sweet pastel nude. Once again the picture isn't perfect: no signature, no date, but nice pinks around the nipples. I think it is part of a larger painting done early seventies. A lovely lady...

Love

This hippie couple probably dates from the late sixties/early seventies and was more than probably painted in Los Angeles. The blond lady must have been Ann, his then wife. Flower power rules in this painting. Good message.

Fuq hate

'Fuq Hate' and 'Love' in the background, I guess this qualifies as a political painting. It must still have been in the Vietnam war years. Note also the typical fish on the head. Tony used to put them in many paintings. I am not sure whether there was a Christian connotation or not. Enjoy the gentle colors and the sure lines.

Boards

Sometimes Tony would paint on boards when he wouldn't have any canvas or good paper. This oil painting could well be a portrait. I don't have a date yet I am pretty sure it stems from the seventies and also that is was painted in Los Angeles

Erotica

Well here is Pan and a nymph in action. As far as I can tell it is an oil from the sixties. Figurative but with hidden figures and areas of abstractions. Enjoy.

Bullfight

In 1969 he did this charcoal drawing. He painted there for the gallery of Françoise Besnard. That was a few years after Tony Mafia had spend several months in Casares in Andalusia. His stay there has deeply influenced his later work. We revisited Casares in the late nineties and the town was eerie to say the least. Here the human protagonists of a bullfight is shown.

The need

The need to draw, to paint would suddenly grip Tony. Pen and ink, felt pens, pencil anything would do. I think it was because when the hand is drawing, it is the hand thinking and not the head. The need to draw brought relief from his inner turmoil.The top drawing was probably done '66/'67 in Amsterdam.

Peace

On this Easter day, may there be a resurrection of peace. Tony did this small Chinese ink wash and drawing in the sixties... His message still holds.

red times of some

This photograph catches the essentials of this painting: the embrace and just a few words: red times of some and possessions... There is a large oil where the male figure is similar, so I would place this drawing in Veyle, Denmark late sixties, seventy... It was all love and peace in those years, no possessions... Life must have been good, yet hard.

Toreador

See the sword in the background? This is a continuation of the bullfight theme. I spoke to a friend of Tony Mafia who has actually seen the bullring he painted in Tijuana. It was indeed done probably late fifties and splendid and special. It was still in good shape in 81. So is doubly sad I never got to see it. There were also facades of houses in Tijuana Tony put murals on: two stories high in magnificent colors. Here it is pen and ink and probably a sixties drawing...

Bullfights

This bullfight scene in an arena reminded me of something Tony told me. I am not sure when but the story goes that he painted the whole bullring of Tijuana. In Tony's rendering it seemed to be in the fifties maybe later. He had several colors of oils on his pallet, a few buckets of paint which he threw on the stuccoed wall of the bullring. The Major got angry till the moment Tony with his brushes pulled out the figures and brought the painting to live. The Major is quoted as shouting: 'Viva el maestro pintor!' I have never seen it, since when I was in Tijuana a long time ago the bullring was closed. It is probably lost by now.

Circushorses

Keeping a promise by doing this blog about Tony's work has brought some surprises. Total strangers have send in their work, others have shared their experiences and memories. Some have given their views, either in the blog itself or in the comments. So Tony's past, which isn't my shared past, will come up once in a while. Many stories have been told by him to me and that is what I have been posting and of course, part of this is also my story about him. I hold no definite truth about Tony. He was multifaceted, like magical lantern reflecting what you projected onto him. He was all horses: an Arabian race horse, a war pony, a painted pony, an elegant circus horse or a huge Flemish Brabander, some special type of draft horse... You get to chose what horse he is to you... You get to choose the lesson's his work brings.

The flag

Tony was seen as many things, always as an American, also when he didn't agree with some of the war mongering that went on during his life. I would like to paraphrase Pascal Mercier: The stories that others tell about one and the stories one tells about oneself: which ones come nearer to the truth? Is it clear that it are our own ones? Is some one for oneself an authority? Or is the real question whether there is a difference between true or false? Is the soul a place of facts? Most information I pass on are the stories as told me by Tony, as I heard them. If I checked for dates or places, he would get angry. He then felt hemmed in. Some stories I tell are mine because I lived them with him, but I also lived the stories as he told them... The drawing is a monoprint with pastel and problably from 1970.