Can’t express how excited I was to recently discover Studio Muti via the Twitter feed of Kenyan digital artist @Jepchumba and the African Digital Art Journal. This bangin’ duo from Cape Town (disappointed its not somewhere else, but its just a matter of time!) has a scifi pop-surrealism post disco groove that I really like. [...]
Gotye’s got some of the most inventive music videos out there. I found this one, for “Thanks for your time,” particularly swell! (Here’s how it is introduced: “Lucy Dyson’s http://www.myspace.com/lucyportal penchant for cutting up old magazines, children’s books and photos of innumerable telephones led to this marvellous animated clip for Thanks For Your Time. ” [...]
There is a delightful story in this week’s New Yorker about the Dutch artist Theo Jansen, who has been developing large scale “beach creatures” that autonomously trek along Holland’s sandy shores. Ostensibly envisioned with an ecological purpose (to retain beach), for some reason the pure lines and spindly white constructions (lots of PVC) evoke recollections [...]
A friend and fellow arts educator/booster recently put me in touch with long-time Vermont artist Timothy Fisher. The paint on his website was peeling and needed a little touch up. This was a great way to encounter another stunning Vermont folk artist. I don’t know alot about Timothy yet, but the few bits I’ve gleaned [...]
For a while I’ve been working to “blow up” my collages – break out of the small-scale mold that has been impressed on me by the Peace Tiles work. Recently, the folks at the Green Mountain Film Festival created an opportunity to go large – with the necessary level of risk involved to really push [...]
About a year ago a friend I’d met at Goucher College during a Peace Tiles workshop I’d run provided me with an opportunity to push forward an idea I’d had for a while: reproduce children’s artwork produced in a Peace Tiles workshop in a way that would be appropriate to a lively public environment and [...]
Around the holidays last year I’d made a promise to knock out a washboard table with a collage top for a family member. I’d gotten the basic idea from the remarkable Victoria Romanoff in Ithaca, New York at a meet up we’d had years ago.This go around, I’d found a couple of pricier washboards with glass rubbing plates. Cleaning [...]
The German artist Martin Kippenberger who died in 1997 has a large installation of his work that sprawls among the white galleries of the Museum of Modern Art in New York. I’m not terribly familiar with this artist, but impressed that he’d turn a Gerhard Richter painting into a table – he’s as playful and anti-establishment as [...]
Andres Myers is a mixed media artist who’s work stands out from the usual. Its almost otherworldly. Familiar too. Layers of color like lacquer, applied carefully and used sculpturally – paper, cloth, plaster, tape, paint, wire – you name it, its there. Its also deliciously abstract – a lollipop that fell onto a sprinkles-covered ice [...]
Scrappy notes from a break-neck talk.Dealing with some concepts, linear time of Carnot (1846) forward – which intersects with music, eg harmonics and the end of time. Movement toward entropy. Question emerged, is it possible to move beyond the ruin of it all? NO! Let’s destroy it. So, with art and history, source of these [...]
Last week’s New Yorker cover struck me with some mixed emotions. Great to see it take the format of Time, Life and other “people” oriented news magazines by featuring the portrait of a person of prominence (yeah, whatever). Actually, a very important figure, our new President, Barack Obama.But a couple of things seemed amiss. First, [...]
Two founder-centered arts organizations, which each address the impact of violence on youth in different ways, are profiled in this month’s issue of ODE Magazine. One, founded in Los Angeles on principles of forgiveness and victim reconciliation, works with youth already deeply involved in the cycle of gang violence. The other, founded and operating in [...]
I’m settling into my new role here at MIT as the IDEAS Competition coordinator. Its a great place to be – the Media Lab, Arts department, Architecture and Urban Studies – all contained within this vast engine of applied research. My role here is to support student interest in applying their ingenuity to community development [...]
In memoriam Perhaps more later…
While I was in Ithaca last week, I had the pleasure of meeting Victoria Romanoff, restorationist and artist. One of the pieces of ‘functional salvage art’ she introduced me to was her “washboard table.” The idea is elegantly simple: for an open-faced (front and back) table, join two antique washboards together with a top surface [...]
While in New York recently for a “Greening the Arts” symposium [see below], I had the very good fortune to meet an artist, preservationist, and self-described “recycling fanatic” Victoria Romanoff. Touring her converted firestation – which serves as her home, studio, and office – I was struck by how full and well-lived her life is, [...]
My buddy Ward Joyce, by day a gifted architect, is working on something with his jewelry-making pal that I never thought would work: bicycle sculpture. In their inimitable way though they’ve brought a great conceptual edge to an otherwise whimsical public art project. Here’s an excerpt from coverage in our local paper: MONTPELIER – Moving [...]
Working between my daughter and an art project for the the Green Mountain Film Festival I caught this lovely shot of sunlight on chalk – with plaster of paris all over my hands.
One of the fun pieces of work for the last couple of years is participating in the Green Mountain Film Festival – as an Operations Committee Member, a film viewer and as a participating artist. This year, working with two friends/colleagues who are both gifted – one is a clothing maker/costume designer and the other [...]
Mine is the bottom right. The “cloud” text says, Children of the earth moulders of clay, movers of rock. In making the tile, I was struck by how well the lighting worked between the girl and the cloudy background I’d painted. That was a pleasing result. The concept continues my interest in the representation of [...]
Crossing the border from Richford, Vermont into Sutton, Canada is always a delight. Not only is Richford this post-industrial gem of a Vermont town just waiting for a revival, Sutton is this understated gourmet haven (yes, it even boasts a cheese shop, chocolate museum and creperie among other delights) with a vibrant arts community. Sutton [...]
Today marks the final day of my work with Twinfield students. All in all it was a lovely experience. The students were so welcoming, and most eager to experiment and “play,” which is a big part of what its all about. I think its fair to say that they are really excited to see what [...]
[From the Times Argus ] High school students, parents and teachers worked side by side in Twinfield’s cafeteria Tuesday, absorbed in combining paints, bits of paper, lettering and treasures they had brought from home to create tiles that express their sense of place. In another part of the building, the elementary students were creating their [...]
Begins tomorrow morning. I’ve worked hard to develop a set of materials that I hope can effectively guide classrooms into thinking about the topic, “What is my place,” while not taxing teachers. Tomorrow morning I spend the day making 45-min presentations to all of the grades. Its a bit like a charrette. In K-4 we [...]
At the end of “The Prophet,” in the company of the seeress Almitra, Almustafa bids farewell to the people of Orphalese, speaking of the misty nature of wanderer. But also about comings again, and truth and the fulfillment of love. “It is life in quest of life in bodies that fear the grave,” he says [...]
A recent re-reading of Khalil Gibran’s “The Prophet” got me thinking about journey’s recently, beginnings and endings. I’ve been in the studio a bit lately as well, going through some old family photographs, letters… bits and pieces of lives strewn across the globe with these vignettes of universality. A journey is an unwritten story… and [...]
A recent post to an art educators list I subscribe to got me thinking about art and action, and when the risks artists take cease to be acceptable modes of expression. The case in question is a Toronto film and video student who carried out the following action: A 24-year-old student, Thorarinn Ingi Jonsson, at [...]
Sony has been tearing up the adspace for high definition televisions with its line of colorful ads for its Bravia line of screens (ie Balls, Fireworks). The latest contribution to the oeuvre was realized by director Frank Budgeon (Gorgeous Enterprises), who used an insane amount of colorful plasticine (its like play-doh but not) to create [...]
Hey everybody! I’m at Gatwick, headed to Dublin and got to thinking its a good time to share some highlights from Dennis’ trip here in the U.S. – a wonderful experience for the two of us that many of you helped to create. Between October 20 and 28 we visited four community-based NGOs, four international [...]
I’m writing from the road in DC, so I’m going to be lame and just post this press release my guru-friend Richard Dana passed along while we gnoshed on pomme fritz at the Bistro du Coin in Washington, DC last night. Short is, he’s got a piece in a group show called “Presence” at (get [...]
A few months ago there was a show at our local coffee joint, Capitol Grounds. There were some large collages that I remember impressed me at the time for their overall composition, though I felt the technique was less resolved than perhaps my eye enjoys. But But they still made a big impression on me: [...]
Writing artist statements and coming up with clever titles for works is probably the least pleasant aspect of promoting one’s work and sense of purpose as an artist. You gotta be somebody; the works need context. Well, I tend to like to create an “atmosphere” with a body of work – something palpable, a space [...]
In getting ready for a small show I am putting up locally, I’ve been obsessing over the archetypes of journeys – and how any “journey” has a beginning, middle, and an end. Rather Oedipal: four legs, two legs, three legs… Anyway, its all a big swill right now though some gems are beginning to emerge. [...]
Summary: I am raising travel funds for Kenyan community-based arts and theater educator Dennis Kimambo to join me in Vermont, USA during October. This Fall Peace Tiles founder Lars Hasselblad Torres and Kenyan educator Dennis Kimambo are planning a get-together in Cabot, Vermont. The purpose of this meeting is to share how each of us [...]
Continuing my experiments with what i am calling the Madou technique, composed this image using sand, string, Ugandan bark cloth, printed cloth, paper, wood and acrylic paint. I wasn’t working with any idea more direct than the sense I got from Madou’s work of things tied together, like the mask used by the disfigured character [...]
July has gotten me back in the studio after a June’s worth of cleaning. This month also finds me working to develop some study aids – exercises in color, simplicity, texture. Small constructions on wood panel that reflect some principle of good design and technique. One of the people who is presently inspiring me in [...]
Had a really fun time working with high school students in the art program at Cabot School in Vermont. Two classes, about 1.5hrs each – had to whip through my introduction on collage so they could get the work. The first group was a sophomores with whom I’d already worked. Their task today was to [...]
Via the OntheCommons.org blog and their guest blogger Don Russell of Provisions Library in Washington, DC I encountered Swoon, a 30-something New York Street artist who mixes up graffiti and decollage. The New York Times has a wonderful audio slideshow of her work that can be found in alleyways and intimate side-streets across the city. [...]
My dear friend-colleague-artist co-conspirator Darlene Charneco was telling me about some opportunities for collaboration that are opening up this summer, and pointed me to the website of the Moroccan artist Salima Raoui. In the “Paintings” section of her website Salima has the following quote from the surrealist poet Paul Eluard (French): It is the warm [...]
An old friend from my days at the Corcoran School of Art, New York City based collage artist Glenn Fischer, has finally gotten around to freshening the paint on his website, so I thought I’d point it out. Spartan but effective, glennfischer.com presents his latest work – very ovally – as well as an archive [...]
Just back from a wonderful two nights in Montréal where the wash of history, art, and commerce never ceases to reinvigorate my satisfaction with Canada. Of course, coming from a Vermonter, that might not sound so special: what expectations of culture can one hold for the least significant state in the Union? Quips aside, Montréal [...]
3 exhibitions: Ingenious3. Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal. Feb10 – Apr22.07. Jean-Pierre Gauthier | Jérôme Fortin | Guy Ben-Ner I always like to go to the musée d’art contemporain here in Montreal, on Wednesday evenings. Not only because it’s free after 6pm, but because the atmosphere is electric. The place is crowded, mostly with young [...]
I was trying to think up a way to bring some excitement and “buzz” to this year’s 5th of May activities that we’ll have at our home this year. I got to thinking about creating personalized invitations that still have a standard look and feel and don’t tax too much in their production demand. Then [...]
I’m looking forward to visiting Montreal this weekend with my family. In particular, looking forward to a visit to the Musée d’Art Contemporain de Montréal where three quirky exhibitions are on view. One of them is a showing of recent large-scale works by the Canadian assemblage artist Jérôme Fortin, who has been on a swift [...]
Thanks so much, Lars, for that beautiful welcome, I really appreciate it. I’m thrilled to be joining this quickly growing, enthusiastic group of mixed media art aficionados. I wanted to write a bit about my process in creating the 13 pieces, called “Madonna & Child OR Re-parenting My Inner Child”, series #3, which were meant [...]
In 1996, my good friend Richard Dana – who I have to confess gave me some great breaks and tolerated my early experiments with good humor! – had an early exhibition of works at the University of Maryland. The exhibition was catalogued in the first volume of the short-lived journal “Encontro,” an electronic publication of [...]
Nick Bantock, the celebrated illustrator, writer and yes collage artist bares some of his trade secrets in this lush volume from Chronicle Books. Nick writes it best: Imagine a young woman sitting in the accounts payable department of an Italian trading office in 1910. The afternoon is dragging interminably. She drifts into a reverie and [...]
So I was pedaling around the internet early this morning, and I arrived at the online doorstep of the Long Island artist Kasha. This great big blue knocker was hanging in the middle of this ancient wood-slab door with wrought-iron hinges. A crow was off in the distance, noisily grinding his beak away against the [...]
These days it seems that way to me: I keep finding the coolest people doing great work north of the 45th parallel. My most recent encounter is Gerard Dubois, a French illustrator with a light, classical touch, who lives with his family in Montréal, Canada. He seems to get around quite a bit, selling corporate [...]
I want to make a quick footnote here to welcome the artist Mary Bogdan to mixedmedia. Mary has generously agreed to join me and – hopefully! – a growing number of international mixed media artists to catalogue the contemporary field of mixed media arts as well as describe, from time to time, some of our [...]
Among my fondest memories from my time running the Center for Collaborative Art and Visual Education in Washington, DC are my encounters with founding Washington Color School artist Sam Gilliam. During the time I knew him, living as my wife and I were at the time, out of a studio apartment in his studio building [...]
My friend Darlene Charneco, who has been a constant source of inspiration, recently introduced me to the work of her father, the painter Nestor Charneco. I can’t wait to see these lush, saturated works in person some day. The convergence of utopian visions, cultural heritage, and flesh as subject result in some very beguiling works [...]
There’s a sweet show up at Capitol Grounds in Montpelier, our local coffee joint. The show features 12 framed works by watercolor artists Linda Maney. Her work doesn’t stop with watercolor: these abstract compositions make use of bright color on paper that has bee torn, recomposed, and then complimented with kraypon strokes and acrylic. A [...]
Footnote: Today’s “Gallery” section of the Times-Argus covers a new show of mixed media works by Vermont artist Jane Horner. Here’s the blurb from the Green Mountain College website (I haven’t been able to make it over the mountains yet!): Green Mountain College invites the public to an opening reception for an exhibit by Vermont [...]
I really enjoyed a recent visit to the member-owned Arts Sutton gallery in Sutton, Quebec where I encountered Mary Bogdan’s “Reparenting my inner child” series. While I was much less captivated in what I saw of collage on the walls than the stirring images of Mary’s constructions that I encountered in her book, “Mary Bogdan” [...]
During a family outing to the lovely town of Sutton in southern Quebec, we happened into the Galerie Farfelu de Sutton. The four of us – Cathleen, Isabel, Wyva and I – trooped into the compact space and browsed around. In a small nook behind the cashier I discovered a “shrine” to the artists Brigite [...]
There’s a wonderful little online exhibition of works by the mixed media artist Darlene Charneco over on Flickr. The ravishing pix are from her recent show in Chelsea’s Morgan Lehman Gallery, NYC. Here’s a snip from Darlene’s Flickrspace: Through the images in Gameland, Darlene Charneco continues to explore the meeting points of real life and [...]
Dan Eldon was a young photojournalist for Reuters covering the civil war in Somalia in 1992 when he was caught in a crossfire and killed. The legacy of this vibrant young man lives on in the journals he left behind. Excerpts from these journals have been beautifully reproduced along with a biography exploring Dan’s life [...]
Janet Van Fleet, an extraordinary multidiscipliary “tactile” artist who lives in Cabot, Vermont will have a solo show at the Lazy Pear Gallery on Main Street, Montpelier. The show will open March 15 and run through May 14. Included in the exhibition “Curious Life Forms” are Janet’s new wire frame figures that recall some of [...]
I am really thrilled to open this blogspace with the news that a local (Cabot, Vermont) artist who has been working for half a century from her home here, South of the Northeast Kingdom, has finally got her work online. The artist is Wilma Lovely, a beautiful human being who has more salt in her [...]