Top Reasons why I have been absent from blogging lately

The following (art related) events transpired since August 8th:

Cause and Effect: a show by Lori LaBissonaire.
The Alley Jam:  a benefit for the Cancer Society and Division Street Skate Park
Co-creating two more large canvas's for Humpday Hash at the new Century Center
First Annual Artists on A Boat wonder cruise (aka the only time I got up to one of the lakes this summer)
Rise Up's Art for India painting Party
Showing my work at Tart for the Under the Cover's Tom Petty Project
PoetHouse Patron Dinner
Planning a large mural for the stage at the Bend Roots Festival

AND coming up:

Saturday:  Jo Lundberg's show titled Four Letter Words (which is gonna be fabulous)
Friday and Sunday- two important yoga events- Bikram Yoga Bend's Summers End Party and Yogis Unite- the biggest outdoor yoga event in Bend History

AND
Tonight I will be prowling, or more like scampering the catwalk at Rise Up's Annual Fashion Show sporting this wonderful creation by the wonderful Miss Sarah Mikolowsky.  Let's just cross our fingers that my walking skills are right on.

making a cappuccino at Lone Pine

The Weight of the World.

The world is light and it fits on my shoulder.   Well, this one does anyway.  Today, the girls (Cyr and Jo) went thrifting in order to gather art supplies.  We hit the jackpot.  I found Four globes for the beginning of an installation(it's Earth Day, twas meant to be).  I am going to be painting new maps on the globes, creating new worlds.   Reworking, retelling, creating new constellations.

I also found a super cool hat, and a lovely new umbrella which will be in our bag of tricks for next week's soon-to-be-named Spring Art Adventure, a four day trek into the Steens Mountains.  Similar to last summer's  "Paint the Hills and Call Them Ours," which resulted in much art and merrymaking.

Not much to speak of. But some to show.

"go and find the people that you know (nothing happens here that doesn't happen there)" 

March got away from me.  It feels like every time I went to update this little bloggity-blog something else pulled me away. Still- I have a bit to show for it (though the viewfinder in my camera is now a lovely abstract bit of cracked lcd screen).    

         

From the top: a bit of Cara Thayer and Louie Van Patten's amazing collaborative work that hung at Lone Pine during the month of March.  The progression of a collaborative painting I did with Mr. Tom Monson, which is now in the hallway of TBD Loft.   Detail of one of Jo Lundberg's  pieces from her solo show(Something to Sleep On).  Detail of "if I'm lost it's only for a little while" by Tom Monson, from his solo show(fake it 'til ya feeeeel it)  currently up at the PoetHouse. 

B Positiv

Jo Lundberg's original oil on canvas was the B Positv signature piece this year.

For the sixth year in a row, McMenamin's Old St. Frances School hosted the B Positiv Art Auction on Saturday night.   B Positiv is a foundation that was created in support of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Foundation in honor and memory of Hannah Pite- daughter of Poet House Friend Danny Pite, whose blood type changed from A to B positive after treatment for a rare form of cancer.  This year, Jo designed the poster piece for the event.  I contributed a piece for the second year in a row.  I'm not sure if results are in for the amount raised (upward of 8000 total I believe), but I was honored that my friend and Yoga instructor Molly bid on and won my piece.

Lori, Adina and Jo

person, tree, house- now owned by ms. molly clark.

we drive east to find art

Jo, Cyr and I went on another art drive today, first stopping by a pedestrian tunnel near Pilot Butte, then heading east on Highway 20.  Jo and Cyr had gathered a gold star-shaped mylar balloon to use as a prop, as well as an old lamp and a vintage suitcase.  I captured quite a few photos that I am going to use as references for collages, the mood both whimsical and lonesome.

I don't know what it is about these drives, we find the oddest things.  Driving through the badlands we came upon a huge pile of cinder that ODOT must use to salt the roads.  The ruddy color against the stormy sky was beautiful, scrambling to the top of the pile was rewarding.   Along the same stretch of BLM land we found an abandoned tiny play house, still filled with toys.   A gift left by superstitious ranchers to some feral child who was being raised by wolves, I imagine.

Art for India

joe kimmel

part of my contribution

lori l.

The annual Rise Up Art for India Painting Party was the happening place to be last Sunday. Rise Up gathered local (and formally local) artists to spend the afternoon at the warehouse filling two huge canvases with designs. This is my second year of participating in this fun event, and while I didn't get to spend quite as much time as I would have liked on the canvas, it was good to catch up with Portland artist and friend Joe Kimmel, as well as Lori, Jo, and a few other art friends.

The canvases will be on display downtown for this Art Hop- and then will be auctioned at the end of the month...

And Then...

The end of summer approaches rapidly, and life has been one big blur.
A good blur.



Here is a list of what's happening.

• Day 22 of a bikram yoga challenge. I am planning on every day until:
• Army Owl arrives in Central Oregon on the 28th of September.
• Going to see Band of Horses tomorrow in Eugene with PoHo friends.
• Sending my Apple to the Doctor. Obviously the axiom doesn't apply here.
• Finishing art for Person, Tree, House- First Friday's theme, and then-
• Moving art from the hospital on Thursday to have a solo show hosted by Lone Pine Coffee Roasters, which will be hopping as well on First Friday.
• Floating Bonnie Rait and Taj Mahal this weekend.
• Training beginning for the Seattle Half Marathon in November.
• Photo shoots with Miss Cyr and Jo before Cyr's show September 18th (gonna be stinking amazing).
• Art for India Rise Up painting party comes around again on the 26th.

More of an Art Skip

Miss Cyr and I drove up to Portland yesterday through a record high heat wave.  We met up with Miss Jo, who had been traveling around Oregon and at last alighted at her parents house. The afternoon was free for checking out art galleries before the girls dropped me off at the airport for my red eye to Minneapolis.  (I'm still awake and at the airport, delirium has arrived.)

We unfortunately only made it to a couple galleries before they closed- Compound, the Goldsmith Blocks, and the New Space for Photography (Cyr was making connections, and scoping out the dark room).  Not quite an Art Hop, but that typically happens on first Thursdays or last Fridays anyhow.  

My favorite piece had to be an installation by sculptor Kevin Christman.   Bone white figures floated elegantly, each one tucked with peaceful expressions into a fetal position.    I don't recall how many there were,  but each one was different and there was a ballet-esque quality that contrasted with the stillness of them hanging over metallic sorta pillers/stakes .    

The evening continued with Old Friend Terah Beth- one half of the band Hey Lover, joining the girls and me for drinks at a hip little southeast bar called Night Light.  Despite the 101 degrees (I could have done bikram yoga outside!) Portland is a very welcoming town...

Paint the Hills

I am windswept and sun bleached.  

Eastern oregon is an amazing, inspiring place.  Which is the main reason for the adventure of the last three days.  Cyr, Jo, Kelty and I left on sunday morning to drive to the Painted Hills, part of the John Day Fossil Refuge about two and a half hours east of Bend.  Our friends Lori and Shane joined us for the first leg.  We had no destination besides the hills, with  Cyr's camera in tow, as well as costumes and a vintage black film sign with moveable letters.  

Cyr took 345 photos.  

Much of the trip was pulling over at old farmhouses, or walking up the fossil bed self guided path so Jo could play her violin in front of green clay cliffs.  We found an orchard, the John Day River, a baby bird in an old pioneer cemetery, several old bridges, a shoe tree, a coyote dead on a fence,  a rickety foot bridge with cowboys driving trucks through the river nearby, two perfectly suited camp sites, a hundred year old country store, a chocolate blackberry milkshake,  and most of all- silliness, laughter, and poetry.

I'll show photos eventually.

An Aside (July Fourth)

The one break from long hours at the studio this past week came in the form of the fourth of July.  It was a day for spending outside with the PoetHouse Girls.  Lori, her pup Kita, Kelty and I participated in the Pet Parade (we walked alongside a very adventurous Chihuahua, whose owner must have loved the movie Up).  Then we met up with Jo and Cyr on Bikes to participate in the annual Freedom Ride, where thousands of Bend-ers gathered at Pioneer and Columbia parks to take Downtown by storm, clogging the streets in a rowdy pack.  After a dip in the Deschutes, we rode around town soaking in sunshine.   Cyr, Jo, and I ending the holiday watching Fireworks from Overturf Butte and a burrito from Taco Salsa with our fellow PoetHouse Honorary Girl, Jason.

Cross Continental Collaboration and Life's a bench.

before

My weekend project consisted of transforming this tired old garden bench into a funky addition to my little back patio. Yes, I should have been packing for my trip, or working on the commission that I mentioned in the last post, but the eighty degree sunshiny day demanded an outside project. Here is the outcome. When I return from my cross country trip (with the highlight for sure to be the six hours I get to see the Soul-jer, shhhh it's a surprise) I plan on watching the sunset from my little patio with my feet on the railing and a frosty glass of something refreshing. The pattern on the bench matches the cushion on my only arm chair. I figure that way, this bench will be an indoor/outdoor multi-purpose piece.

Life is a Bench

My poethouse artist friend, Miss Jo Lundberg, has been in South America since April, hanging out with Peruvians and brushing up on her already fluent Spanish. She sent me a project a few weeks ago, a page from her sketchbook that she wanted me to print, draw upon, and rescan. When I send it back to her, she will work on it some more, then send it back to me. Technology makes this collaboration that much speedier... The drawing she sent me is lovely, she captured something beautiful in the expressions of the locals. I have started to embellish it, and will scan it before I leave early Tuesday morning.



And now it is time to pull out the gear and get packing...

Dreams of The Flying Pigs

Kera putting the street sign out

Friday night saw the opening of Corrupt Wood(s), a show of new work by my fellow resident artist Jo Lundberg.  It was also a joint birthday shindig for Jo and Cyr, as well as a going away/congrats for getting into grad school party. Jo's latest work consisted of found plywood boards altered with easter egg color landscapes that were informed by the wood grain of the plywood.  Among the landscapes, she added Animal Farm type imagery- one panels hosted a feeding frenzy of birds pecking away at a Bird Seed Liberty Bell.  Another multiple panel piece showed a pine tree dropping bananas and apples cut from monopoly money into a wastebasket.  Jo's work is witty and biting, but also beautifully rendered with detail and care.  The most whimsical piece, was the installation seen above, which consisted of flying piggy banks moving from gilded frames into a three-dimensional plane, only to have one broken on the floor, with chocolate money scattered around for the audience to enjoy. Overall theshow was incredibly cohesive, well thought, and well executed.  Plus, I enjoyed being there for the whole process, as well as helping Jo hang the little piggies from the ceiling.  There is a bittersweetness, of course, as Jo will be leaving for Peru the first week in April, and staying abroad for four months.  I'm hoping the planets will allign and I will be able to go visit her in June, but that's another flying pig at this point...

Below are some of my favorites from the show, enjoy... or Check this to see more... and this.

Lara (my longtime bend buddy and fellow artist)  and me enjoying the show

Things that are inspiring me at the moment.

I am still working on getting through this artistic block I have going on, it has eased a bit- I have made progress on the birdhouse, as well as a couple new collages. In order to really get through said block, I am begining to look at it as well-witching time. (and here comes another idea RIGHT now! Hello, IDEA, how are you?)

Needless to say, I am searching for the waters, but also gathering things that I love and am inspired by along the way. Here's a short list.

• Middle Cyclone, by the Lovely and Talented Miss Neko Case. This album just came out last week and I am extremely in love with it. It's an album of love songs and the personification of weather systems. If you don't know Neko, she has this timeless voice that sounds like long stretches of windswept roads. Considered alt-country, she has a slight twang paired with haunting storytelling, quite quirky. Whenever I finally reschedule the art show, I will have this album be the soundtrack.
  
• I went to the movies (thanks to a voucher from the owner of the dogs I walk) last Saturday by myself and saw Coraline in threeD. I am a pretty big fan of Neil Gaiman (the author) as well as the artistry of stop animation. It was such a pretty, witty film (not a kid's movie though!) and the first five minutes showed the Heroine well-witching in Ashland, Oregon, a town slightly south of Bend (three or so hours) where I have spent a little time with good friends that own Bohemia Gallery. I spent the whole movie grinning behind my threeD glasses, when I wasn't reaching out to touch the hummingbirds or scooting down in my seat to avoid the grasp of the villian. If you go see this, be sure to hang around for the credits- they are almost as good as the closing credits for Liminy Snicket- which I thought were highlight of that film.
  
• My PoetHouse community is completely encouraging. I am constantly amazed at the extreme talents that surround me. This past First Friday- the PoHo hosted the latest collaborative show by Joe Kimmel and Company. It was entitled Crystal Dragons, and is thirty-two vibrant paintings, a space man adventure narrative, and a rock show- basically performance art. After the showing, the residents and a friends danced the night away to nineties hip-hop. At the end of this month, Jo Lundberg will be showing her recent work, a series of wittily rendered satirical landscapes that critic these "tough economic times." Jo will be leaving for a four month trip to Peru the first week in April, so the show, along with a karaoke night afterward, will be her going away hurrah.
  
• Central Oregon has been blasted by gale-ish winds the last few days. Yesterday, I had to lean into it as I was walking to the grocery, and it almost blew my scarf away. The beautiful thing about this wind is it is pulling dead leaves and pine needles off of the trees, making way for the buds and new leaves that will shortly be arriving. It's a good metaphor. (goes along with Middle Cyclone quite nicely, convenient.)
  
• Hold on to your hats, mom and dad. Sit down before you read this part. As a ceremonial type of strength gathering, next week when Owl enters basic training, I am getting the tattoo that I have been planning for several years. It is based on the abstract compass shape that is always popping up in my art work. It is a reminder to me that I do always know where I am, and while the direction of my life may be confusing, it is comforting to know that I am where I need to be.