My Art filled weekend- waht I did Superbowl weekend

Their are times in my life that life is really good and times that I find my life very frustrating. I found myself last weekend to be very inspired on Sunday when I drove home from The Hearts and Crafts show at Java's on Gibbs Street. I had just meet some very inspiring artists making awesome creations. I meet three girls taking photos who asked me to jump in and have one taken. The photos were inspired by the paper mustaches on sticks that artists from littlegreenbird were handing out for free. They were really fun and people were all walking around with them. The more people walked around with them the more other people wanted to know from where they were coming.  It was a great idea.

I spoke with several artist at that event. I meet the owners and creators of Evenandoddcreative. They make cuff bracelets and messenger style bags from old sheets of sign vinyl and  bike inner tubes. I talked with them for awhile about the unique materials they use and the complications of those materials...like trying to sew though bike inner tubes and sign vinyl.

I spoke with Lauren Premo who makes enchanting hand thrown mugs and beaded jewelry. She told me a little bit about the resist method she uses when glazing her pieces.She also told about the joy of her new married life.Congrats! Lauren!

I also spoke with fellow RNEST artists" Fawn Brokaw of FawnRayDesigns (wonderful mixed media using natural objects), Kira Sinclair the maker of "Nubbins", and other textile creations and BuenHelena who makes art and finds inspiration in vintage items.

Spoke with many many other talented artists and could not possibly list them all in detail within the limited window of time I have to dedicate to this blog entry. Besides, I am going through my weekend backwards here and this is only Sunday afternoon but a shout out goes to Robert Frank, Alexander BOG, Amy Rau, and Sarah Ortiz.

On Saturday night I performed in a Hafla (belly dance party) put on by the student performance troupe "Rashas Rhinestones" along with other dance sisters at Goddess Hour.



This is me as part of the newly named "Tribal Goddess Collective." We  performed to the song "Minnie the Moocher"

All the performers did a great job!
Just before the meeting literally just before (I had to go in costume). I went to the second meeting for the Warehouse co-op, which is a group of artists trying to create a  artist collective space.

Before that I raced home form work walked my dog, scarfed down some food, and got all gussied up for the performance.

Before that I was working my usual Saturday shift at the art gallery and had a real blast with the kids that day. They had me laughing as we all drew, toured the gallery and told each other stories...We were creating drawings of art galleries and I decided to make your drawing a gallery on art all dedicated to mustaches.

On Friday I came home from  after school care work heated up that frozen food I made the week before in my Crockpot ate that up then Ed and  I went to Anderson Alley art studios near Village Gate. We talked with many talented artists there too. The "Thaw" Rochester theme was in effect. The artist there had created ice sculptures ice art outside their studios in the hallway space the most impressive ice sculpture I saw was outside of Nosferatu art studio.It was large blocks of ice with objects inside them with lighting and their was dry ice underneath to create fog.

 
I  talked with, old friend,  glass and ceramic artist Nancy Valle about her process and how her jewelry items are like "mini sculpture" to her.  I picked out an item from her dollar bin to make a necklace. I also talke to many other artists and found them all talented and intriguing.

The last First Friday- May 7th

It has taken me a long time to write about this. Fourteen days to be exact. A friend of mine and I went over to the Village Gate. There was a special event going on we wanted to check out. Plus the Anderson Alley artist studios building right next door, was having an open house.We wanted to make it to Four Walls Gallery but ran out of time.

At Village Gate ArtPeace, a local non profit,was putting on an event. Shakedown, the exhibit of local works by teenagers from 34 local high Schools. Many of the works were vibrant and bold. Some had images of despair. I was pleasantly surprised with the variety of media including paintings in oil, watercolor, mixed media collage.Their were also some sculptural and ceramics work on display. The entire upstairs space of the Village Gate was full of works on display. I had been a substitute teacher for many of the teachers who had work on display. To find out more about ArtPeace or Shakedown go to http://artpeace.org/about.html.

Next door at the Anderson Alley Spring Fling there were several local musicians in each floor of the old warehouse space performing. There were several artists participating in the open house event with their studio's open for people to come see the work. I spent some time talking to a friend and colleague Nancy Valle, in her new studio space and her studio mate Pat Triviono.

Nancy is a experienced artist and arts educator having several years experience teaching locally through RCSD and School of the Arts as well as Genesee Community Charter school at RMSC.
Her current work is mostly ceramics and glass. She specializes in large outdoor ceramics for garden and outdoor ornamental. The work is bold, colorful and has textures you just want to touch. If you would like to see more of her work go to http://www.nancyvalle.com/NancyValle.com/Ceramic_Portfolio/Pages/sculpture.html
Nancy is also a talented glass artist and sells her work at several locations locally including. More Fire Glass and The Memorial Art Gallery's gift shop.

Pat is a talented oil painter work with figurative works. I have talked Advanced painting classes with her at the Creative workshop though instructor Fred Lipp. Her collection of work continues to grow. She uses bold imagery that borders between realistic and surreal.

It was a good night seeing many other artists, art teachers, art enthusiasts and colleagues that I had not seen in a long time.

Currents

So I recently attended the first Friday art gallery events and went to three galleries. I attended the ROCO 6x6 preview party. The Four walls gallery and More Fire Garden show.

I had submitted a piece to the 6x6 show so I got to play the guess which one is mine game with them. I pointed out the wall which had mine told them it used watercolor and then pointed out that mine had some materials that others one their did not have. They guessed it. "Yours is probably mixed media." "Yours has crayon".

I was really impressed by the number of pieces variety of media creative ways people had solved the6x6 problem. Some had done 3d works using 6x6x6 for their dimensions. There were also several works by local school children. Several art teachers I had talked to had their students submit work for the show. I think it is a great thing that so many people participated.
I wondered about several of the abstract paintings. As a group they were powerful. If you purchased just one though it seemed like it would get lost.

My friend worked with a guy that had artwork in the "Get A Grip" show at Four Walls Gallery on Elton street so we went over and checked it out. I really liked the gallery shape. The atmospere was comfortable. It took us a while to find but we went through the side entrance orginally.
I saw the show cards and was pleasently surprised. My old college professor Kathy Farrell was having an art show there too.http://www.monroecc.edu/wusers/kfarrell/. She had a show of assemblage boxes most of which used balls. She also had a game to play where you had to match the boxes to the famous couple associated with each box. We tried it, a few I got and felt comfortable about others I had no idea who the couples were so I had to guess. There was also a green stepstool on the ground which I assumed was for you to step on. I step up and say to my friends "It's a stepstool right? I should be sble to step on it." There comes Kathy out of the crowd ."Yeah you can step on it. Look inside the boxes lift the lids." These two boxes with glasses and noses and fake mustaches. You lift the lids and look inside to see they are jammed packed full of balls.

There are certain things that I have always appreciated about her work. One part has always been that some part of it incorpates the viewer to interact withy the art in a way different then just looking.The work is like her, very whimsical. She uses lots of discarded toys and bright colors. The pencils she posted for the game were of course brightly colored and sparkly.... I told my friends "These boxes,picture entire bookshelves and a small room full of stuff like this and that's what her office looks like."

I wondered if she started making the boxes first and then came up with the theme or if had the theme of couples first and then made the boxes?

I really appreciated the Get A Grip show too. It used Skateboard grip tape as the source for images. The proceeeds from work sold in the show will go into creating a skatebaord park from local a abandoned area under a bridge. That really seems like a great idea to me.

The cool thing was two days later I am at one of the schools I sub at and this kid has brought in his skateboard to paint. I tell him about the show and he said he had already seen it.

I am not sure how many of the artwork could actually be applied to a board. I really enjoyed the variety of materials used such as pastels(those really worked great ion that surface), airbrush, collage, mixed media drawing, paints etc.
For more info on skate parks and related issues go to http://www.rochestercitynewspaper.com/news/articles/2007/10/RECREATION-No-place-to-go/print/
or krudco.com