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Paul Laffoley (b. Cambridge, Massachusetts, August 14, 1940), American artist and architect.

Biography

File:Orgone motor paul laffoley.jpg

The Orgone Motor (1982)

Laffoley was born to an Irish Catholic family. His father, Paul Laffoley, Sr., the president of the Cambridge Trust Company, was also a lawyer and taught classes at Harvard Business School. Early in life, Laffoley, Sr. also did on-stage performances as a medium.

By Laffoley's account, he spoke his first word ("Constantinople") at the age of six months, and then lapsed into 4 years of silence. He attended the progressive Mary Lee Burbank School in Belmont, Massachusetts, where his draftsman's talent was ridiculed by his Abstract Expressionist teachers. After attending Boston public schools for a short time, Laffoley matriculated at Brown University, graduating in 1962 with honors in Classics, Philosophy, and Art History. Laffoley has written that, in his senior year at Brown, he was given eight electric-shock treatments.

In 1963, he attended the Harvard Graduate School of Design, and apprenticed with the sculptor Mirko Basaldella before being dismissed from the institution. In a search for expanded opportunities, Laffoley came to New York to work with the visionary Frederick Kiesler, and was recruited for late night TV viewing for Andy Warhol. Following a dismissal by Kiesler, Laffoley worked for 18 months on design for the World Trade Center Tower II (floors 15 to 45) with Emery Roth & Sons under the direction of architect Minoru Yamasaki. Following his suggestion that bridges be constructed between the two towers for safety, he was summarily fired by Yamasaki and returned to Boston.

Returning to Belmont in 1965, he completed the first paintings of a mature style in the household basement against the wishes of his father. Christmas (1968), after a quarrel with a first studio partner, Laffoley was in immediate need of a studio and living accommodations. Having only one day to relocate, Paul found an empty room on the second floor of a downtown office building at 36 Bromfield Street in Boston, and immediately moved in. This studio would become infamously known as the Boston Visionary Cell (formally incorporated in 1971 as a non-profit art association encouraging art and architecture of the visionary genre).

Now clearly following his path as a painter, he began a highly original approach to the construction of the painted surface. Based on extensive hand written journals documenting his research, diagrams, and footnoted predecessors to various theoretical developments, Laffoley began to first organize his ideas in a format related to eastern mandalas that had captivated his interest in the spiritual. This format quickly developed into Laffoley’s three sub-groupings of work: Operating Systems, psychotronic Devices and their related Lucid Dreams. Conceived of as “structured singularities”, Laffoley never works in series, but rather approached each project freshly, and individually.

Working in a solitary manner, each 73 ½ x 73 ½ inch canvas can take one to three years to paint and code. By the late 1980’s, Laffoley began to move from the spiritual and the intellectual, and evolved to the view of his work as an interactive, physically engaging psychotronic device, perhaps similar to architectural monuments such as Stonehenge or the Cathedral of Notre Dame and their spiritual aura. As a confirmed “utopian”, Laffoley may be the most advanced visionary artist working today.

Since 1966 to the present, Laffoley has exhibited on a regular basis now totaling over two hundred shows including the Ward-Nasse Gallery until 1984, then with the Stux Gallery (Boston/New York) in 1985, and since 1988 at the Kent Gallery, New York. In 1989, Kent Gallery compiled and published the first monogram on Laffoley entitled The Phenomenology of Revelation. Laffoley also obtained his formal Architectural License in October 1990. His first museum retrospective was in 1999 resulting in the publication of the second Laffoley monograph entitled Architectonic Thought-Forms: Gedankenexperiemente in Zombie Aesthetics: A Survey of the Visionary Art of Paul Laffoley Spanning Four Decades, 1967-1999, to the Brink of the Bauharoque.

After the destruction of the World Trade Center towers on September 11, 2001, Laffoley was one of a number of architects who, in 2002, submitted designs for the competition to plan the Freedom Tower. Laffoley took his inspiration from the work of Catalan architect Antoni Gaudí. His conception was to plan a gigantic hotel in the style of Gaudí's Sagrada Familia church in Barcelona.

Works

File:Dimensionality.jpg

Dimensionality: The Manifestation of Fate

As of 2004, Laffoley claims to have executed over 800 works. His work over the last forty years is a dizzying mix of precise architectural-quality painting and ideas (both societally accepted and far on the fringe) from ancient times to the present. Laffoley has called his work a blend of the purely rational, Apollonian impulse and the purely emotional, Dionysian impulse.

British writer Michael Bracewell, in his collection of essays, when surface was depth, has made some particularly eloquent observations about his work, such as:

'If Laffoley's work within the Boston Visionary Cell can be said to have one principal preoccupation - a common denominator of his eclectic scholarship and practice - then that preoccupation would be to understand the process by which one goes from becoming to being.'

And:

'The Boston Visionary Cell, as a concretized manifestation of its inhabitant's work and preoccupations, describes the way in which a chaos of data - no less than a chaos of marble - can be sculpted by research to release the perfect forms within it.'

He works in many types of media, including oil, acrylic, silkscreen, and pen-and-ink. His works are often square, and run the gamut in size.

Among his major works are:

Get Thee Behind Me, Satan (1974-1983)

A Human-Powered Vehicle (1976)

The Orgone Motor (1982)

Color Breathing (1983)

Thanaton III: Extraterrestrial Communication Portal (1989)

Geochronmechane: The Time Machine from the Earth (1990)

The Alchemy of Breathing (1992)

The Fetal Dream of Life into Death (2001-02)

After Gaud�: A Grand Hotel for New York City (2002)

Pickman's Mephitic Models (2004)

INTERVIEWS

2001 Thanaton III produced for Channel 4. (original broadcast January 28, 2001). interviewed by Richard Metzger

1999 Pseudo.com Online Network interview with Richard Metzger of The Disinformation Company

1998 The Mystery of Genius (two part series) produced for the Arts & Entertainment Channel produced by Robert Fiveson. (broadcast in 1999). interviewed by John Metherell

1997 Paul Laffoley on the Time Machine Strange Universe (original broadcast September 10, 1997). interviewed by Alisyn Camerota

Sources

http://www.miqel.com/visionary_art/paul_laffoley_intro.html Gallery of Laffoley paintings

http://www.Laffoley.com Official Paul Laffoley site created by Rustbelt Films and Topsy Turvy Productions, producers of a documentary titled "Laffoley's Odyssey"

http://www.kentgallery.com/LaffoleyCatalogueindex.htm Examples of 'Thought-Forms' and Images from Laffoley's upcoming Catalogue Raisonné

http://myspace.com/paullaffoley Paul Laffoley myspace page. Images, biographical information, news, articles, Laffoley quotes and interviews

http://www.brainsturbator.com/catalog/index.htm Extensive gallery of Laffoley paintings, including large, legible scans and Laffoley's "Thoughtform" essays to accompany each piece.

http://www.paranoiamagazine.com/mephiticmodels.html Interview with Laffoley (focusing on H.P. Lovecraft, the nature of evil and many other topics)

http://www.fusionanomaly.net/paullaffoley.html Short bio and a few images

http://kentgallery.com/lafspu.htm 'Utopic Space', A Lecture by Paul Laffoley

http://www.paranoiamagazine.com/paulsleg.html Article about synchronistic events relating to Paul Laffoley's leg-breaking fall in 2001

Bibliography

Laffoley, P. (1989). Paul Laffoley: The Phenomenology of Revelation. Boston: Kent Fine Art.

Laffoley, P. (1999). Architectonic Thought Forms: a Survey of the Art of Paul Laffoley 1967-1999. Austin, TX: Austin Museum of Fine Art.

@@ Line 8: / Line 8: @@
 By Laffoley's account, he spoke his first word ("Constantinople") at the age of six months, and then lapsed into 4 years of silence. He attended the progressive Mary Lee Burbank School in [[Belmont, Massachusetts]], where his draftsman's talent was ridiculed by his [[Abstract Expressionist]] teachers.  After attending Boston public schools for a short time, Laffoley matriculated at [[Brown University]], graduating in [[1962]] with honors in Classics, Philosophy, and Art History. Laffoley has written that, in his senior year at Brown, he was given eight electric-shock treatments.
-In [[1963]], he attended the Harvard Graduate School of Design, and apprenticed with the sculptor [[Mirko Basaldella]] before being dismissed from the institution.  Thereafter, he moved to New York to apprentice with the visionary architect [[Frederick John Kiesler]]. He was also hired for the design team of the World Trade Center, but was soon after fired by the chief architect, [[Minoru Yamasaki]], for his unconventional ideas. In [[1964]], Laffoley began work in an eighteen- by thirty-foot utility room to found the Boston Visionary Cell, where he has produced the large majority of his work.
+In [[1963]], he attended the Harvard Graduate School of Design, and apprenticed with the sculptor [[Mirko Basaldella]] before being dismissed from the institution.  In a search for expanded opportunities, Laffoley came to New York to work with the visionary Frederick Kiesler, and was recruited for late night TV viewing for Andy Warhol.  Following a dismissal by Kiesler, Laffoley worked for 18 months on design for the World Trade Center Tower II (floors 15 to 45) with Emery Roth & Sons under the direction of architect Minoru Yamasaki.  Following his suggestion that bridges be constructed between the two towers for safety, he was summarily fired by Yamasaki and returned to Boston.
+Returning to Belmont in 1965, he completed the first paintings of a mature style in the household basement against the wishes of his father.  Christmas (1968), after a quarrel with a first studio partner, Laffoley was in immediate need of a studio and living accommodations.  Having only one day to relocate, Paul found an empty room on the second floor of a downtown office building at 36 Bromfield Street in Boston, and immediately moved in.  This studio would become infamously known as the ''Boston Visionary Cell''
-During a CAT scan of his head in [[1992]], a piece of metal 3/8 of an inch long was discovered in the occipital lobe of his brain, near the pineal gland. Local [[Mutual UFO Network]] investigators declared it to be "an alien nanotechnological laboratory." Laffoley has come to believe that the "implant" is extraterrestrial in origin and is the main motivation behind his ideas and theories.
+(formally incorporated in 1971 as a non-profit art association encouraging art and architecture of the visionary genre).
+Now clearly following his path as a painter, he began a highly original approach to the construction of the painted surface.  Based on extensive hand written journals documenting his research, diagrams, and footnoted predecessors to various theoretical developments, Laffoley began to first organize his ideas in a format related to eastern mandalas that had captivated his interest in the spiritual.  This format quickly developed into Laffoley’s three sub-groupings of work:  Operating Systems, psychotronic Devices and their related Lucid Dreams.  Conceived of as “structured singularities”, Laffoley never works in series, but rather approached each project freshly, and individually.
-In the summer of [[2001]], Laffoley fell from a 20-foot ladder and broke both legs.  His right leg subsequently became infected and was amputated below the knee. He documented some of his theories about why his fall occurred in the oil painting ''The Fetal Dream of Life into Death'' (2001-02).
+Working in a solitary manner, each 73 ½ x 73 ½ inch canvas can take one to three years to paint and code. By the late 1980’s, Laffoley began to move from the spiritual and the intellectual, and evolved to the view of his work as an interactive, physically engaging psychotronic device, perhaps similar to architectural monuments such as Stonehenge or the Cathedral of Notre Dame and their spiritual aura.  As a confirmed “utopian”, Laffoley may be the most advanced visionary
+artist working today.
+Since 1966 to the present, Laffoley has exhibited on a regular basis now totaling over two hundred shows including the Ward-Nasse Gallery until 1984, then with the Stux Gallery (Boston/New York) in 1985, and since 1988 at the Kent Gallery, New York.  In 1989, Kent Gallery compiled and published the first monogram on Laffoley entitled ''The Phenomenology of Revelation''.  Laffoley also obtained his formal Architectural License in October 1990.  His first museum retrospective was in 1999 resulting in the publication of the second Laffoley monograph entitled ''Architectonic Thought-Forms: Gedankenexperiemente in Zombie Aesthetics: A Survey of the Visionary Art of Paul Laffoley Spanning Four Decades, 1967-1999, to the Brink of the Bauharoque''.
 After the destruction of the [[World Trade Center]] towers on [[September 11, 2001]], Laffoley was one of a number of architects who, in [[2002]], submitted designs for the competition to plan the [[Freedom Tower]]. Laffoley took his inspiration from the work of [[Catalonia|Catalan]] architect [[Antoni Gaudí]]. His conception was to plan a gigantic hotel in the style of Gaudí's [[Sagrada Familia]] church in [[Barcelona]].