Far Below, post reception

The show which I have referred to often, in hopes that someone will praise me for the massive amount of work it required, as the show which was produced in one month. Thus far, no one has been terribly impressed, which leads me to believe that I over-estimate my own endeavours. Anyhow, the show looked lovely, a fact which was largely ignored by most of the gallery attendees.

You see, Pravus Gallery is divided into three spaces, and my show "Far Below" occupied the middle of the three spaces. The first space had a group show of custom vinyl toys (Moodys, actually), and was a great testament to horror vacui*, all tiny details and bright colors. The third space is occupied by Synthetic Compound, a vinyl toy shop and a similar description as above can be accurately applied to it. And there was my show inbetween, with big pools of space between the pieces and bereft of any colors besides the black and white of monochromatic relief printing.

Perhaps if my work cannot visually compete, then I should re-think my approach to art. I should do this, but I'm not going to. Instead, I'm going to assign the smaller crowd that my show attracted as the inevitable sifting that intellectually superior art must do. See what I did there? I took a situation which illustrated my artistic shortcomings and made it into the opposite. Because I'm deluded like that.

Because of the short notice of this show, I was unable to do much in the way of publicity for it. But my friend at the local weekly wrote a short piece on it, mostly about how I was shortly to leave Phoenix. And now everyone asks when we're going to move, and we respond with the reply, disappointingly lacking in urgency, that we leave in a month and a half. It's like putting on the turn signal blocks in advance of the actual turn.


That's me with the backpack. I have to wear gloves nearly all of the time for reasons that I won't go into. Suffice it to say, they are not fashion inspired reasons. So I'm up against the inability to dress reasonably well with gloves and not looking very gothy, or not looking like a pretensious nance, wearing gloves in a Phoenix summer. Do you have any glove wearing recommendations? They must be full gloves, no thug-ish looking fingerless nonsense.




The Fish. I'm most proud of the fish. It's the first piece I've made that skipped the intermediary step of making a blank of the pattern to test it, and then to draw the image on. For the fish, I drew the original pattern and the drawing directly onto the material before cutting, and didn't know if the whole thing would work until after printing it and sewing it together.



By the by, we're now accepting submissions for Super Fun Activity Challenge 2, Activity Quest.

Far Below

Ah, I've never worked so hard for so little before. Come and be disappointed in me! I'll be the mousey looking character trying to blend into the wall

Super Fun!

Last night was amazing! Not only was Super Fun Activity Challenge a great and wonderful success, but I then went home exhausted and had a sci-fi dream about terraforming Mars and inadvertently becoming immortal.



I had two entries in the book, and this is the finished product of one of them, "Make a Homeowners' Association":


My now super famous and successful friend Trent Call. Trent just had a two page feature in Juxtapoz, with full color and adoring interview. I was so jealous that it took me two whole days to congratulate him after seeing it. But, ever the opportunist, I invited Trent to come to APE and table with us in November, riding the wake of his success to sell comics and toys.



Do you want a Super Fun Activity Challenge? They are exceedingly easy to procure! All one need do is send me $5 for the book and $2 for the shipping, and I will send you a lovely copy, guaranteed to be chock-a-block with super fun. Message me for my paypal address. If you're in Phoenix, you can bypass the $2 shipping and stop by the Trunk Space, at 1506 NW Grand, and pick one up there for $5.

I've got another show opening on May 2nd at Pravus Gallery in Phoenix. It will be called either "The Ocean" or "The Deep." I haven't decided which, but I'd better decide soon as I'm making the cards tomorrow. All of the work for this show I'm making in the month prior to the opening. I've never done something so last minute before, so I'm both eager and terrified to see how I make out.

Long Beach

Ahh, Long Beach. The word "seduction" was mentioned more than once by the faculty and current grad students I spoke with while I was there, and I must admit that it was not inappropriate. The presses. Oh! The presses they had there sent me into such flurries of anticipation. What large and unweildy useless things I could make with access to those presses.

The Los Angeles area is so green. It's positively vulgar the amount of herbivorous procreation that goes on there on an daily basis. Having grown up largely in the desert, I can identify most of the native and nonnative plants that grow here, but there, I'd no idea what most everything was. It sort of all blurred together into a giant green mass, smelling strongly of unidentified lilies. My decision on school is still officially unmade, though I'm still terrified of the winter at the other option. Like most major decisions, this one is being made by a spreadsheet.

Asphalt and Air did an email interview with me, and reading through it I sadly realize what poor editing skills I have. But I take solace knowing that I'm a visual arts major, and being able to spell with any degree of literacy is an achievement.

Emily B, a wonderful fiber artist, featured some of my work on her blog.

And Found Object did a little feature, too.

All of this blog-related exposure convinced some poor sap to buy this fellow, of which I, of course, could only take only take the worst of photos before mailing her off:


Figure modeling, that old standby of wellpaying and extraordinarily dull work that I find myself regularly swearing off of and then returning to whenever I'm at all hard up had produced these two paintings, or, more accuratley put, David Alvarado and James Buck produced these two paintings marginally related to me holding still for too long.

Tentacle

Yesterday was Pi Day, and I'm certain you're already familiar with it. It's the sort of made up holiday that I find not nearly as insufferable as the others. On Pi Day, what does one do? Calculate the diameter of various circles, and see how far you can name off its various digits? Far less irritating than saying "Arrr" after every phrase. My friend Kevin's birthday was also yesterday, and never before had he realized that his birthday coincided with a made-up holiday. He's the one who bought he monkey, so I went to his party, even though I usually find most of his friends about as sufferable as Talk Like a Pirate day. We visited the monkey, hung from the porch rafters and bestrewn with ropes of LEDs. I'll admit, that despite my better self, I was worried about what would happen to this, my largest of all creations, once it was in Kevin's possession, and I was pleased with what he was doing with it. I cannot ask for anything better than being well lit and with no severe damaging.

All schools have written back, and I've not been rejected to a one. The letters of acceptance are hung like trophies from the print drying rack. From a school in the great Frozen North, a letter came describing the various grants and scholarships of merit that they had awarded me, the total of which was somewhat more than I had made last year. The amount stared up from the paper at me, beseechingly. A great wadge of institutionalized money, just waiting for a kind hearted person like myself to spend it. But I must remain strong! I steal myself against the sad saucer eyes of the Minneapolisian money, and decide to see if the school in Long Beach might see their way to giving me some sor of similar amount. Truth be told, I'm terrified of living somewhere as cold as Minneapolis. My personal insulation isn't much, and I don't know well I'd function at those temperatures. Next weekend the boy and I will travel to the coast to wheedle and coax, and perhaps there will then be an additional chunk of institutionalized money whose feelings I must consider.



A few Phoenicians, some Chicagoans, a distant Argentinian, a couple of Los Angelinos, an affianced San Franciscan, a homesick New Yorker, and a great variety of Saltines have or shortly will recieve a single disembodied tentacle. For the sake of my wallet, I restricted the list to only those whose company I have physically been in the presence of. I envision a small town's worth of people, having consternation clearly read on their faces as they empty package's contents to find that single tentacle. Because, my darlings, I love you, but in a way that is best expressed through the language of perverse fetishism.



If you were an attendee at my last solo show, ages in the distant past of last year's Autumn, you may have remembered these blank fawns that I made. They sold out within the first 45 minutes of the show, mostly because they were evidently the least disturbing and lowest priced of my extensive scion. But now, they can be had at the Frosty Darling Boutique in Salt Lake City, and The TrunkSpace in Phoenix. But if you aren't in either city and still want one, you can get it from my website just as soon as I find my way to updating the damn thing. And if you aren't one of the lucky few to be counted as among my most best beloved, then you can pretend you are by buying a tentacle from Synthetic Compound.



Phoenix is host to particularly fine weather right now. I don't have any delusions about how long it will last, but I'm rather pleased that I get to see the city with a smattering of green over the dust and brown. It still isn't half as pretty as most places I've lived, but it's tolerable for now, and I'll be leaving in the next couple of months while it's still pretending that it's a habitable place.

A great pallet of Lorica arrived last month, and orders that had backed up for weeks and months were suddenly addressed. I've beening doing nothing but make belts for what seems like ages now. And now I'm nearly done, and I don't care with what you keep your pants aloft, so long as I've nothing to do with it.

Wasps

Reduction style relief print, on a tetrahedron kite, edition of 20. Made for the Kite show at Trunkspace, and the kite part is made out of old chopsticks.

Super Fun Activity Challenge

Deadline extended by two weeks!

Also, I heard back from the first school, and I was accepted to CSULB. Two more to go before I make a decision, but pretty awesome nonetheless!

Sometimes, as I fall asleep I compose elegant sentences descirbing what I've done that day and what I will do the next. I use words like "rubicund," to make simple bruises or poor complexions seem more exceptional and wonderful than they are. Only rarely do I ever commit those lambent words to a physical form, and then I realize just what I hideous pedantic egoist I am.

Before hanging the Kite show a few days ago, Caleb and I had to take down the monkey from where he was hung from the ceiling of the Trunk Space, looming. I tied his arms to his spine, and tied his legs and tail together, so that what was intended to be carried aloft by seven people, could be transported by just the two of us. Someone finally bought the great puppet recently, for a rather paltry sum, that I find kingly knowing that I was shortly to cut the monkey down and throw him away, having run out of patience for finding storage spaces large enough to accomodate him around the house.



The Kite show was only marginally successful. When it rains in Phoenix, as it did last night during the opening reception, Phoenicians panic and approach the weather as though it were an transitive beast, uncertain where it may strike next. Their prior experience with light drizzles ending in only creating more muddy clay around the city they adamantly ignore, and stay locked up inside residences waiting for when the rain turns to something more insideous. Phoenicians have read far too much Hemingway. Nonetheless, nearly all of the artists did come, and the sprinkling of artists' girlfriends and boyfriends made it seem like a far more successful turnout than it actually was.

I made tetrahedron kites with reduction style woodcut wasps on them, and I steeled myself against an evening of listening to people comment on the "bees."



The next reception for the Kite show is on First Friday, March 7th. My next solo is at Deus Ex Machine in Phoenix, opening May 2nd.

Ants

Ants.

Stoic

Last weekend, I modeled for Dr. Sketchy's. It was unbelievably cold, and in most of the pictures I have a sort of pained and stoic expression on my face. Most of the people drawing didn't take off their coats, and a couple wore gloves.

The panties and hosiery were made by Lipstich Cyanide.

Applications for grad school were sent to Austin, and Chicago. I'm working on the other three, and nearly done. Not much else to report at this time.

In suits

New poster art. I think I'm going to try to sell the original on gigposters.com or something. The last one I gave away, and the one before that was just a photoshop composite of painting with text overlaid, but this one I've actually still got and I need some W.A.M. soon to deflect all the costs of making slides, and getting transcripts, and paying fees, and overnighting packages.



My first show for 2008. I was much more excited when I was initially invited to be in this show than I am about it now. Most of the artists aren't printmakers, but I guess that just means I get to show everyone else up with my sweet actual printmaker action.


I'll be modeling for Dr. Sketchy's tomorrow (Sunday, December 30th) at Trunkspace in Phoenix, 1506 NW Grand from 7 to 10 pm. I need to dig up something remotely burlesque-y to wear.

Old rejected set. Say stuff about it, if you're so inclined.

2 to 3 years

One day, I want to meet Cory McAbee, so that my mouth may fill with cumbersome rocks, impossible to talk around.

For the past few years, each time I curate a show, I always invite him to participate. He's yet to accept, but always responds with witty demuring emails.

Suicidegirls recently rejected this action:

In this series of photos, I illustrate the American style pronunciation of Roethke. Very informative. Click on the picture if you're the sort interested in that manner of thing.


I'm knee deep in graduate school application nonsense. I've narrowed my list down to 5 schools, and am laboring away at the essays, attempting wit and brevity and brilliance in short 120 eighty character lines. The great morass of slides was reduced to a coherent and Spartan 20 (15 for Austin), but I'm afraid that I can't find any of my old ethings to include. Hopefully, that one oversite won't cost me. The hope is that Long Beach, Austin, Chicago, Providence, or Minneapolis will be my residence of 2 to 3 years at least.

Any of you Phoenicians reading this should consider attending the last Phoenix Dr. Sketchy's of 2007 at Trunk Space, Dec. 30th. I shall be there, this time for reals.

Salt Lake, Again

At my friend Xkot's salon, Elegba has a spot in the corner, next to the door (where Elegba should be) and I imagine, that given Xkot's reputation for being so adept at cutting children's hair, Elegba must lose quite a few of his lollipops. Xkot gives people a slightly different version of themselves, the well coiffed and groomed version, so it seems fitting that Elegba is there to be ingratiated to at this occasion, this switching over. I went to a printmaker's lecture once where the artist showed us slides, and before she turned the lights back on to resume the lecture, she gave a small offering to Elegba, because she didn't know what would be there when the lights went back on. That's how I first met Eshu, first heard of what he was responsible for.

Above Elegba, my dinosaur and nervous hospital pony stand next to Xkot's heart. Xkot gave me a hair cut, and it took him not quite all of five minutes. Xkot has my two favorite dolls from this series, or at least he has them in his salon until I take them back or someone buys them. I keep meaning to take those two, the nervous pony, and the bighanded cautius little man, but always decide that whoever buys art from a salon with Elegba in the corner in Utah of all places, must be a good sort and a deserving home.



My sister's children adore me. I find it's easy to maintain such adoration when you see someone rarely and always bring gifts when you do visit. And well worth the getting of presents to hear the crimson haired hellions yell a garbled version of your name shrilly when you arrive.






My favorite gallery was sold. After January, Kayo Gallery will be in the hands of a some strange woman, who may not be so lax about display methods as Kenny was. I tensely await the outcome.

Sketchy

This is, I think, my third time modeling for Dr. Sketchy's Phoenix.

I'm bringing the monkey.

Some Souls

The Monkey! All paper mache, excepting the spine which is filled with metal pipe, and insulation foam. That's me with the fake mustache.



After many trials and tribulations, not least of which was the spine suddenly snapping, the (squirrel) monkey is finished. David B. and I endured much wheatpaste dried on our arms, and sunscreen was used liberally. David V. swept in at the last minute and gently persuaded us to believe in the merits of structural integrity. We were dapper in our bowties and tophats, but as soon as the hats came off, we just looked like nothing more than a gang of disgruntled wait staff.

Now I need to think up excuses to bring him out again.


These photos are by Kevin Patterson.

All Souls Procession Website

skills extend to

My skateboarding skills extend to moving in a fairly straight line, avoiding inclines, and doing that little jump to get over cracks.

Acrylic on wooden deck, shirt.




The pink one in the middle:


Show info here.
Closing reception on November 2nd.

I highly recommend you buy one of my decks, because I really don't want to have them after the show comes down. How do you even store that thing? It's shaped all wonky.

Paper mache in process, results forthcoming:

Bizarre sunburn

Super Fun Activity Challenge!

That, the above, is the never show I'm putting together. "Predilection" is at an end, all that's left is to get checks cut and mail portfolios to the out of state artists.

The Super Fun Activity Challenge is open to everyone, but there's limited space so not all entries will be used. So make yours amazing.


I push sunscreen on people like it's an addictive substance that I've a large stake in, and use it myself with such devotion, it's a wonder I've not been whited out entirely. Sadly, all of that discipline was for naught, and I got a bizarre shaped sunburn while working on what will become a giant monkey skeleton. Now it's all itchy and painful and weird looking, like a half assed attempt at those insipid wing tattoos.



The monkey skeleton is that of a squirrel monkey. Squirrel monkeys have the greatest brain to body ratio of all simians (1/17, whereas we humans are at 1/35) and the females of the species number among the exclusive membership of those possessing pseudo peni. My squirrel monkey is made out of paper mache, and is intended for the Day of the Dead Parade coming up soon in Tucson. As work as progressed on the monkey, I've become less generous with its company. Initially, we were going to let anyone who wanted to help carry it around, but now we're only letting people who've actually worked on it (with one exception) tote it around on dowels. That unsatiated itch on my back might have something to do with it, and the tiny piles of wheatpaste, dried on my skin and then picked off, throughout the house might have something to do with my miserliness as well.



Two other artists and I went on a four day long roadtrip to Salt Lake City (two days driving, two days in SLC). One had never been to SLC before, and the other hadn't lived there in years and only had family in the city. I was careful about which of my friends we hung out with, choosing the most gregarious, clever, and friendly (a journalist, a musician, and a painter) of the bunch so that the out of towners wouldn't feel alienated and weird. By the end of the trip, Steph and David had this utopic vision of SLC (it is pretty cool), that all the artists in the city had great stories to tell, had sudden parties filled with adorable cyclists, and accepted strangers with open arms. I nearly drank the draught too, and was filled with nostalgia for my hometown. But I'll return a champion and victor or nothing at all, and elusive victory is not yet mine.

It snowed the second day we were in town. I was not dressed for the weather.



Phoenicians, you all should come out for my second Swap-o-rama-rama this Sunday, the 14th. The last one got a "Best of" award from Phoenix New Times (though the yellow journalists of the rag failed to cite my name, and only included the names of the venue owners). I even screenprinted posters. How's that for DIY ethic?