On the final evening of Artfest everyone brings their work together in one place for a group show. It’s a great way to see what people were doing in other classes. I think it also helps people decide on classes they may want to consider the next time they attend Artfest. It was really crowded in the hall, and the lighting wasn’t so great, but I did manage to take a few pictures of some of the work.
I have more photos in an Artfest 2009 set on Flickr.
I have a long blog post about my experiences at Artfest hanging over my head. I had planned to start writing up something today but when I finally got through my other projects for the day I just wasn’t into writing a blog post. I think it’s going to be a weekend project, along with uploading my photos to flickr. Maybe I will also tweak this blog theme because there are little things about it that are driving me batty….
Instead I give you my horoscope for this week from Free Will Astrology:
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): French President Sarkozy’s best friend, advertising mogul Jacques Seguela, has an unusual way of measuring success. If you don’t own a Rolex watch by the time you’re 50, he says, you’re a failure. I’m inclined to propose the opposite: If you *do* have a Rolex watch, no matter what age you are, you’re probably a failure. To be attached to such a conspicuous status symbol is a sign that your values are dominated by the transitory trivialities of materialism. Where do you stand on the matter, Leo? It’s a good time to think about it, because you’re in a phase when clarifying your definitions of high achievement is important.
On Wednesday morning I’m leaving for an artist retreat taking place at Fort Worden in Port Townsend, Washington. The event, Artfest 2009, is something I’ve been looking forward to since I first registered back in September. I’ll be taking a series of workshops over the course of my time there. I’m really excited about learning new techniques, getting inspired, and meeting other creative people. I’ll be taking a camera or three with me, along with my journal and sketchbook. I haven’t quite decided on the whether or not I’ll bring my laptop yet, because sometimes it’s nice to take a break from regular internet access.
One of the things participants needed to do in preparation for the event was create an artwork around the theme of "Sea Monsters, mostly of the eight-legged variety." There will be a group show of everyone’s work created for the event, and it should be interesting to see the variety of ways the theme has been interpreted. I decided to create the collage piece (featured above) using an illustration of an octopus I found and other elements of undersea life I had in my collection of ephemera. I don’t think it’s my best work but I am satisfied with it, and I was glad to work outside the limitations of my usual collage sketchbook.
For the last couple of years I’ve been organizing an evening to provide friends with the opportunity to work on creative projects. I started doing it because I kept hearing so many people express a wish for more time to [insert neglected project here] and felt this way myself. I think this is because the things we most often want to do tend to go by the wayside when life is busy. The idea for the event evolved out of the concept of a stitch n’ bitch and has become known as “Art Night”. It happens about every two to six weeks depending on schedules and interest. The projects people bring to work on range from things like knitting, crocheting, drawing, painting, collaging, and more recently, cooking and baking. Food is always a big part of the evening, and so is conversation.
We’ve recently begun to work on group projects on these evenings, which is something I’ve had in mind for ages. A few weeks ago James and Monique hosted the evening and came up with the idea of creating a mixed tape of songs based around the theme of a “great silence”. Each person brought a song and all were played throughout the evening. At the same time Kirsti and Darren brought along a box of old plastic letters and a digital camera set up for everyone to take turns shooting stills for a stop motion film. It made for a fun evening and I really loved how both projects had everyone’s creative juices flowing.
For our most recent Art Night I asked everyone to bring twenty photos taken while traveling. Each person took a turn showing their photos and telling the story behind each one. It was an idea inspired by something Boris wanted to do and I thought it needed to happen. It was lovely to see the photos, hear the stories, and contrast and compare what each person chose to share about their travel experiences.
I’m sharing all of this because maybe it will inspire other people to have an Art Night of their own, and get even more people breaking out neglected hobbies and projects. There can never be enough creativity going on in the world, and the same goes for sources of inspiration and collaboration. Just make sure you have good food.
These are two recent portraits that are favorites of mine of two of my favorite people.
I want to shoot more portraits again, and try to apply the level of creativity I use in my self portraits to portraits of other people. It’ll be tricky because the ideas for my self portraits tend to come spontaneously, and are shot that way too. It’s a harder to do this with another person, so I’ll have to work at coming up with a new process for shooting creatively.
Yuuki had his second paid modeling gig a few weeks ago that I’m sure is certain to lead to superstardom for him. Hendrik needed a colourful subject to showcase the abilities of his latest iPhone app, ColorSplash, and to use in a banner image at the iTunes online store. Hendrik shot both myself and Yuuki to use in the banner, but I didn’t make it past the (Photoshop) cutting room floor. I told Hendrik I cannot compete with Yuuki’s level of cuteness. I’m just not small or yellow enough.
Please check out Hendrik’s ColorSplash app in the iTunes store, or at Hendrik’s own website for the app. At the moment it is one of the top photography applications for the iPhone.
Apparently the opening was a big success for the 2nd Annual Plastic Camera Show I’m in at RayKo Photo Gallery in San Francisco. I wish I could make a trip to San Francisco to see it… Thankfully the gallery has provided thorough photographic documentation of how things look, and I even spotted my own work in amongst everything else. The shot included in this blog entry is the one that was accepted into the show.
Here’s the slideshow of shots taken by RayKo’s PR photographer Tim Rollins.
The tulips used in this self portrait a week and a half ago were on their last legs yesterday. As I tidied up and prepared to toss them away I stopped to take the above shots of their lingering, dried out beauty.
This week from Free Will Astrology:
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): An American residing in Berlin had leukemia as well as AIDS. Doctors did a bone marrow transplant to cure the leukemia, obtaining stem cells from a healthy donor. The operation was a success — the leukemia disappeared. As an added and surprising bonus, the HIV also left the patient’s body. He has been free of both diseases for two years. I predict a psychological version of this double cure for you in the coming weeks, Leo. The healing you receive for one type of suffering will unexpectedly heal another kind, too.
This is a collage that almost doesn’t look like a collage. Last week I wanted to make something really busy, crazy and colourful. I went through some of the old magazines I have tucked under my couch (for just such a purpose) and tore out anything colourful and patterned. It was fun to layer these together and create this crazy eye-blasting composition. The bit of text I included, “the only constant is change”, is from a book of slogan stickers given to me by Zak. It seemed appropriate to the collage and the state of things last week.
P.S. A thanks again to Lloyd Budd for upgrading WordPress on my site while we hung out at Northern Voice last weekend. We did a trade, and my part was to show him how to use his Rebel XTi. I don’t do this very often and a lot of camera stuff is just second nature now, so it’s always interesting for me to try and explain things like aperture, shutter speed, and ISO. I think it rocked his world just like his upgrade of WordPress rocked mine.
Cameraphone pic taken at the opening.
I’m a little behind on posting about this because the show actually opened two weeks ago, but I have a letter in the Love Letters show at Grace Gallery. I enjoy writing letters and decided I had to do something to submit for the show. My letter is written to Boris, but using more “poetic” language than I would normally write in. I wasn’t sure if it was any good (read: incredibly sappy.) until I went to opening night and read it again. I wrote it by hand in one draft, trying to be as articulate and neat as possible since it was going to be in a show. Boris has only seen this photo of it but I’m pretty sure he had the mushies when he read it.
I hope you can read the words at its current size because I couldn’t quite bring myself to retype them for further sharing. Even though this letter is hanging in a gallery and has been read by many people, it is still a very personal piece of work.
More about the show opening on Scout Magazine.