new image

It's been a while, and Lisa's seen these. I just felt reinvigorated talking to Ann-Maree today. I don't want this blog to be high maintenance or an obligation, but I do want to stay connected to my art sisters. Here's an image of the other "nest."

Poetry schmoetry

Hey girls! So I am wanting to post some art soon, but I wanted to comment first. Ann-Maree, yay! And why are you intimidated about poetic? Seems like you have your own poetic thing going on. There is something poetic, comic, and truly human (a universal experience) about miscommunication or failed attempts at things, whether it be enhancing the mind or body. I really like the simplicity of your illustrations. I went to a couple of the NY art fairs yesterday, and it seemed like there was this vein of illustrative type work, lots of work on paper. I feel I am more drawn to work on paper than on canvas sometimes. Not sure entirely why. Anyway, I want to see more! Are these going to eventually be sculptures? Have you considered sound as part of an installation? I think it might work really well, with drawings or sculptures. Did you have models with your sculptures in your thesis, some kind of performance? I am trying to remember what Tori told me of it.
Also, can we vote on adding members? I know we got the green light for Eleanor from Tori, and I am for adding Luccia, but I want us to be unanimous if we add people. Should we still keep it small? Would six be too overwhelming? Ok, more art soon (I am thinking of doing notecard drawings just to get myself thinking, and then posting them like mental snapshots, till I can make some larger work -- scanning and posting them should be easier than larger stuff). Ok, take care, talk to you guys soon!

Yay Annie-M!

I love the illustration. I think these drawings are so funny in their simplicity, while asserting a slick cheekiness. This is great! I'm glad you're narrowing to "modern love" right now. And I'm chuckling at the close representation of you and Jason. Are these guache or watercolor? It really is lovely.

How's the new studio? Take a pic when you get it set up. I'm feeling lame as my wasp nest didn't get accepted into a "Women in the Arts" show here. I saw the gallery, and they had a lot of junk up. Rrg.

I added a links section for artist opportunities. Sometimes I stick my head in the sand, not wanting to know what deadlines I'm missing-- but these are here if you want them. One is a call for a group show-- Lis, I'm thinking we could tailor our works to something group themish? It's not open to TX, but you could claim an Arkansas presence?

Gotta run-- more later.

Hey ladies I am running late, but I have comments, so they will have to wait till tonight. Suffice to say for now, I am so happy to see posts in the morning, and yes invite Luccia! I would love to see her stuff -- anyway, I think that only makes 6 of us right? If eleanor and Lucc are there? That is manageable. Let's do it! More later. Love, Lisa

Sorry, I have been putting this off for awhile.....also intimidated by the wonderful, poetic works you ladies are doing compared to my simple illustrations.....

I am just about to move into the Lemp Brewery, into my first real artist studio!  I am excited but also cowering under the pressure of having my own studio (that means responsibility to my calling right?).

I am about to embark on another series of objects that I hope will accumulate into a larger installation, that at this moment I have entitled "Love Postures".  It will be an investigation (as Tori knows) into Modern Love.   Each of the works (like my past works) will involve accessories for the body that are intended to act as a kind of prosthetic or enhancement for the body/mind....but ultimately fails (like the communication device shown here).  I'll post more once I have had more time to think through the ideas....I've got to go to bed now.  

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Invites and Musings

Yay, invite Eleanor. I kind of want to invite Lucia too. Is that okay with you guys? I'm just afraid of it getting so big that people stop responding to each other.

And Mori, you've got great observations. Your motivations for creating may be different. (I feel like my career hangs on what I create.) I agree with Lis-- it doesn't have to be visual. But maybe it would help you to post some tune/ scales you play with and pair an image with it-- something you're drawn to or think of as you play. I'm thinking of those birds you filmed...

I listened to a great This American Life from '96... (I think I've listened to every episode from the last 5 years). The theme waas simulated realities. The show began with a reference to an Umberto Ecco essay I hadn't read-- a/b simulated worlds as particularly American. For the essay, Ecco went to oddles of wax musems and saw about 7 representations of Da Vinci's "Last Supper." Anyway, Ecco comments how simulating and re-presenting other worlds/pasts to the minutest detail is particularly American because
a) We equate significance (and I might argue, comfort) with lavishness, "no expense spared" aesthetic
b) As a country, we have a recent history and anchor ourselves by trying to authenticate other, more rooted/longer historied pasts (ex: Medieval Times)

Without going into endless depth, the show made me think of my MFA show and how in a sense, I was re-presenting other places, including specific details in order to recall or authenticate an individual's experience of that place. But i wasn't concerned with re-inacting or creating a microcosm of another place/experience. I don't want simulated experience. I wanted a sample of an individual's experience but without confusing or presuming to know exactly how that individual interpreted these places...

So, what I'm trying to process is whether my piece was very American... how to distinguish b/w simulation and paying homage (?) to another's experience of place... (I'm thinking this as I finish my wasp nest-- which is more of a reference to other's homes... still not sure what to make of it?)

art!

Mor, don't feel pressured to do a visual piece. Do what makes you rest in that place of creating. It could be as simple as playing scales. The exploring is the important thing! It is the means to the end. I would love to hear a recording, even if it is a blank video. Who knows, maybe we could start kicking installation/ sound installation ideas around. If you know adding more things makes you scattered instead of inspired, do what you can focus on. Sound is art. I don't think this blog is limited to visual art. An idea is an idea! So go with what you got that gives to your life and doesn't take away and make you feel stressed.
Also, as an update, Eleanor is putting her press on her back porch (which she is getting glassed in), so that is exciting!! I am hoping I can go hang out with her on weekends and print sometimes. Ok, girls, I gotta go eat. My brain feels like it's running on trash or something. Need some protein.

i feel like more of a voyeur than an artist. should i ban myself from this forum? the closest thing i'm doing to "art" right now is writing letters, and playing viola. i don't know why i think those things don't "count". i think i still get stuck in that school mentality where everything has to mean something and exploring is just the throw away stuff.

i will try to do something postable this week. we'll see. sometimes i think it's just not where i am right now, and sometimes i think everything we do could be "art" in some sense...i have learned that i tend to only focus well on one thing at a time so i don't want to get so caught up in "making" that i don't get my studying done.

was that just a list of excuses? sorry. does anyone know how to post sound? i might have to do it as a blank video, which just seems silly...

i love seeing what you guys are doing though. tori, it adds such an extra dimension to hear you talk about what inspired that locust piece, and i love that it's something that people are drawn to whether they know the inspiration behind it or not.

lisa, i really like the ones with the scaffolding. you managed to take something so mundane and industrial and make it kind of dreamlike. it's funny that you found those similar shapes to the ships you were doing before. there's a nice flow to that.

okay i am assigning myself something like homework so i can hopefully join in the fray. goodnight.

Drawing detail.

Here is a detail of a drawing -- hopefully I will post the full drawing later. The scanner just wasn't big enough to accomodate, and I didn't feel like getting out the camera. Used rice and water color, pen and graphite. This is from Dec. I think. I started drawing with rice and watercolor, and took the rice off later so that the color would pool around it and create washes. I was thinking about sadness and winter and Persephone, her eating the seeds of the pomegranate (?) in Hades, and locking herself into staying there for a certain number of months. I have to go back and look, but I think it was really Demeter, her mother, who bargained to get her out of there for part of the year. Not sure how this connects to the other stuff, but sometimes disparate work eventually starts to inform the other, so I'm puttin' in out there. I am so happy about this blog, by the way!

additional member?

Hey guys, I was wondering if you guys would be open to another member on the blog . . .my friend Eleanor. I haven't asked her yet, I wanted to run it by you guys and see what you thought. Mori, where are you?

yeah, the city weights

Yeah, the pics do feel very heavy to me. They were taken on a an overcast day (most of them) and printed on gray rives bfk, so that could have something to do with it. Part of it could be that sometimes the city does make me feel heavy. Also, color choice -- muted, washed out. I don't feel like the images want to be light, as far as in the photos, but I do feel that when I start drawing them a lot, they will start to lighten up. The thing I love most is the fabric, which is really a black mesh. I like standing on my roof and seeing it blowing against the scaffolding of the school. They pretty much only work on it at night and in the evenings, I guess so as not to disrupt classes. The hand-drawny looking shapes in colors were monoprint. The graphite y-shaped spiky things were drawn after I printed out the image from the printer onto the monoprints. These pics are kind of what I have been feeling like, on and off lately. Not super light. I vascillate. Place does really determine how we delineate space in our artwork. When I lived in KNoxville, I was making these big open landscape-y drawings, things falling into space. Here, things are much more cramped and urban. I am wondering if the two will collide when I get back to Dallas. More art coming soon!

Oh yeah, and I did go to Blackburn for about 2 hours yesterday -- printed some drypoints -- not great, but it's good to get something on paper and maybe use it later.

a little more

Also, I wanted to say with these new images, I was thinking about images in the city, want to use images from my time here. I have noticed above some doorways and windowsills that there are these little y-shaped spikes, and I think they are to keep the pigeons away. I started using a similiar mark in some of the prints. I also read (In Uncle John's Bathroom Reader), that pigeons mate for life. I was thinking how people think they are gluttonous and a nuisance, when really they are committed and resourceful. I don't know about actually using pigeons in the work, but I was thinking about them (interesting how this ties in with the locusts) and how they are generally considered somewhat pesty and ubiquitous. But I think it really got me that they mate for life. That's cool.

Images loaded from last week

So I think, hope, pray these images loaded. It took me awhile. I had to do them one or two at a time. These are photos I took and then worked a little bit on in photoshop and printed over monoprints that I worked on at Robert Blackburn. Mainly I printed on the ghosts. I am not crazy about them, but love the fabric and scaffolding, so those images could be integrated into drawings and paintings eventually when I get set up in Dallas. I think I have some printer lines. Also the fabric had these orange cords running through it at regular intervals, which, when printed looked like a printer malfunction, so I also painted on top of the images with watercolor.

Oops, it cut off some of the lines of the locust installation.

And Lis, I want to see pics of your prints! Did you print your drypoint at Blackburn the other day? Your photos are interesting-- what are the individual elements on your plates? Is that rice?

Annee, have you started your gold foil eggs?

And, raise your hand if you think Mori should make something. (Mine's up. High).

New Art... Finally.

Yay! We're on!

Sorry I haven't posted anything yet-- I've been making art! First time in a while, so I desperately need your honest feed back. I apologize for the poor quality of the locust photos. I need Photoshop. Boo.

This piece brought in a nice little cash prize. I'm thinking one could make a decent living applying to juried shows in small towns. :) My carpet is littered with pieces of these little guys. Anyhoo, the inspiration came from reading Mark, about John the Baptist. I was fascinated how the earthiest of earthy guys (honey in his veins, bug-munching) was the first to welcome God in flesh, to prepare the way for His message. And we know how (or Annie does) I love telephone wires... you know lines of communication, blah blah... Then, (Lisa will love this) I read how locust are drawn together in times of crisis as they release seratonin (the happy chemical). I love this innate need they have for each other. And I love the how they're gross bugs, but they totally fueled this tres necessary guy, John the Baptist.

I love writing informally like this! Do I make sense?

'Kay, the other pic is of my wasp nest made from the dryer lint that you lovely folks gave me. I think it needs a few more layers/ fine tuning. The balloon is still in it. I'm afraid it shall collapse when I pop it. We'll see...

And here's my statements a/b the nest (I had to submit one for a show entry). I don't like the title, so I'm open to other suggestions.

My most recent work examines how our physical location shapes our concept of home. Thus, I became interested in wasps’ communal process of building a nest in which they gather decaying elements of their surrounding environment to form a shared habitat. I mimicked this process as I collected cast off dryer lint from friends to create a nest. The nest hangs from an electrical cable, referencing technological constructs upon which we depend to maintain relationships. I find this connectedness to both people and locale vital to a sense of home, ephemeral as it may be.

pooh! I have been trying to upload pictures but the blog doesn't seem to be letting me. Maybe I will try again later or tomorrow. I made some art today . . .or tried anyway.

thought

I've been getting some cool (I think) ideas, and am really ready to have a studio, stretch some canvases, and just let 'er rip. Holding all this in is not great, I am just so excited to have a studio in 6 weeks! Not that this has much to do with what I am doing -- which isn't much. C'mon girls, post, post, let's see some images!

Readings

I think if the readings are online, you can just post a link. If not, maybe we could agree on a reading, and then do it together? I think that would be a great idea. I think I could really use some art discussion, and a community of women artists. Which readings were you thinking?

Readings and such.....

Hello All!  I finally made it onto my first blog and I am very excited.  I hope we can all inspire each other to spite the dampening effects of post-grad school, day to day grind. 

I am going to attempt to attach two readings that I have been wanting to embark on (sorry Tori if you have already read these in your soft sculpture class).   Read along if you like or I'll just post more information about them soon. '

Actually....does anyone know how I can attach the readings for us all to get to?  Or can I even do this? 

 

Art blog!

Hmmm, first let me say thank you to the invite, and what a great idea! Here is some stuff I am thinking about. The first two are just shots from my room that I think would be fun to blow up into a large photo, the next ones are watercolor monoprint plates that actually looked cooler as plates. I wasn't so crazy about the actual prints, though it was nice to see the layers starting to break down as I kept printing the ghosts, which created some lovely passages that while nice on their own, can't hold the print by themselves. Still working on that. I am hoping I can redeem the actual prints by drawing back into them. This process has been great, since it allows me to work at home and then take the dry plates to the shop and print them.