dayton is not in ohio

My recent trip to New York kicked off on Wednesday after a “Chicago Red-Eye” flight by doing a slide lecture about my work at the New York Center for Art and Media Studies (NYCAMS). I was invited by my friend James Romaine who teaches art history at NYCAMS and I then stuck around with my friend and NY-based artist Albert Pedulla for a lecture by critic Merrily Kerr regarding the College Art Association (CAA) BFA exhibition currently installed at NYCAMS.

Thursday, I was off to PS1 where I enjoyed the Not For Sale exhibition and then particularly the photographs of ViK Muniz. I’ve admired Muniz’ photographs in reproductions, but his large scale works are simply mindblowing in person. I highly recommend that you visit the site and peruse if you don’t know his work.

Thursday night kicked of the International Arts Movement conference, which was good to be at. I was part of a grad student panel of Friday, and then most of the days were filled with catching up and chatting with artist friends and going to the plenary sessions. The plenary highlights were an interview with Daniel Libeskind, the lead architect of the controversial Freedom Tower at the World Trade Center site, Jeremy Begbie, and a music set by New York based, Mississippi native Kelly McRae. Overall, the conference was encouraging, like most of these types of conferences; Nothing earthshaking, but a great chance for vigorous conversation and networking. The whole trip also provided a nice opportunity to get away from Chicago and my studio and do some good thinking about the direction of my work. These days were also highlighted by some awesome late-night convesations over good scotch with Albert, who graciously put me up at his home in New Jersey.

On Sunday morning, three friends from Philly, Rob Matthews, Scott Laumann and Rubens Ghenov drove up and we went to the Armory show. This is where I took all my pictures… Some highlights included: 1. an abundance of monkeys and simian-like creatures, 2. my first-ever official paparazzo shot after Rob spotted Glenn Close , and 3. just the spectacle of miles and miles of the art market laid out like a cattle show. I think someone in our entourage described it as something like a flea market for really rich people.

The crew, with me reflected in the side of this mirror plated garbage truck.

Glenn

Simian

Monkey

There was lots of good art, lots of interesting art, and lots of bad and boring art. Overall, it was fun, especially to hang out with friends from Philly!

My saga home began at 3:30 when I was dropped off at the subway for my train and bus ride to Laguardia. Laguardia is a nasty airport, but I’d rather be in Laguardia for three hours than crammed in the window seat of the last row of a stuffy plane on the tarmac. My seat didn’t recline, but the seat of the lady in front of me did. Oh, did it recline! Aren’t those things supposed to be up while we’re on the ground!? If I was from New York I would have told her as much, but being the southerner that I am, I suffered in long-legged silence.

Finally in the air, but no more comfortable, I decided to kill time by doing something creative on my computer. I looked like a praying mantis at the keyboard with the funny way I had to cock my arms to touch the mouse pad and keyboard. I’m a little nervous flying, especially with turbulence, so I ended up making a video dealing with the subject using the iSight camera built into my monitor. Actually, in the end, I could only do this because I was sitting on the last row. Anywhere else and I may have been arrested and institutionalized when I got off the flight… I guess this is my first short film.

Here’s a link to an unfinished short film by my friend Mark Dixon. It’s fimed entirely in and around the Church Studios, and much of it takes place in my former studio. About the short, Mark mentions: “Still working on it (the ending I don’t like)…” There is no music yet (at least not that accentuates the visuals) and this may have something to do with why Mark doesn’t like the ending. It’s intended to be a suspense/horror film, and it ends up being, well, neither very horrifying or overly suspenseful, but keep in mind that this is a work in progress. The highlight of the film is its most subtle moment, but no spoilers here. I know it will be fun to watch for anyone who knows the Church Studios or the Church Studio crowd. Rubens Ghenov takes a major role in the film. I was also excited to see that I designed and constructed some important set components, although I’m disappointed that I did not receive a credit. I can’t wait to see the finished product!

…wear one of these T-shirts.

This has been a wild year… and now I can drink my coffee out of a mug that finds my windmills in the company of Rembrandt, and Ed Knippers.

To back up a bit, the book It Was Good: Making Art to the Glory of God (link to the first edition) has recently (I don’t even have a copy yet) been released in an expanded second edition. My windmills are included in the final chapter and my red pipes are also in there somewhere. I knew about this, but I didn’t know that I’d be able to find my art on the spine in such good company. The three images are the editor’s suggestion of the Trinity. Father (Rembrandt), Son (Knippers) and Holy Spirit (Castleman). I have to say that I’m flattered by this disproportionate juxtaposition, and I’m grateful that, in order that I not get a big head about it, this triune image has also found its way onto a completely commercialized product line. This bib, for example:

I’ll probably get one for Anna, but I will be very firm that she is not, under any circumstance, to drool or vomit on Rembrandt. Go ahead and have at the rest of us — and I know Ed would agree.

On a similarly wild note, the new member directory of Christians in the Visual Arts has just come out, with said windmills on the cover. Again, however, I have a hard time being reconciled with the obvious injustice that my work is on the cover, and Tim Hawkinson’s work, is on the inside. Wha…!

I have a sinking feeling that I am the unwitting subject of some Greek tragicomedy, and next week the windmills are going to fall on someone’s head, I’ll be sued and forced to quit school, my family will turn their backs on me, and I’ll live out my lonely days doing pastel portraits in post-Katrina Jackson Square for $8.00 a pop.

Here are several images of my new piece as installed in the sculpture “Base Space” gallery. Al of them were taken with my new camera, a Nikon D-200 digital SLR. The first image looks grainy and much warmer because I was experimenting with shooting at 1600 ISO. I got many more fantastic shots and a lot of video, so stay tuned for that. You have to see this thing in action to really appreciate it.

Here are a few images of the newer version of the shredder.

Completed sculpture including the motion detector

From below with acoustic tiles and recessed light

The only reason that I have this streak is because, a) collecting and keeping reams and reams of rejection letters over the years actually succeeded in compelling the art world to have pity on me, b) I only apply to things that seem to fit my strengths — I don’t bet on the 40/1 horse, and c) apparently my writing is stronger than my drawing.

Regardless, I’m excited to have the chance to make my putt-putt hole! REALLY excited! No awkward, stressful, wine and cheese opening for this one… It’s a freaking golf tournament, baby! There really is no better blend for me than golf and art and athletic competition. The irony is that one of the prominent art webcasts in Chicago is called Bad at Sports. Not the Church Studios crew! We have a gym, sucka!

So anyway, since the streak is alive I thought I’d reminisce about the proposal streak…

1. Eastern State Penitentiary, 2005 — Every self-respecting sculptor in Philadelphia is required by secret civic art-law to submit a proposal to Eastern State’s installation program, so that’s why I did. The only reason I got an idea for this is because the Church Studios were next door and I had a free artist’s pass. I simply spent so much time inside the prison, that eventually the only thing I could think about was trying to escape my self-imposed incarceration, and The End of the Tunnel was born. I owe everybody at the studios a lot for the success of this one (especially Keith Crowley and Ben Volta) because of the feedback to simplify my original, more complex ideas.

2. Chambers-Wylie/Broad Street Ministry, 2006 — This one just made sense to apply to. I’m an artist and a Presbyterian preacher’s kid. This was a call for proposals for an installation in a Presbyterian church building. Duh! However I really struggled with articulating my idea for this installation, and considered not applying even after I had labored over a complex drawing, because I couldn’t do the vision in my head justice with the written proposal. I woke up the morning the proposals were due with the idea for a narrative, rather than a description in the abstract, and wrote it quickly with the deadline just a few hours away. I liked the idea for Tilting at Giants a lot, and was almost sad that I liked it so much, because you just can’t get your hopes up with this kind of thing…

3. Experimental Putt-Putt @ Material Exchange — This was a no brainer to apply for. It was a mini golf hole. How could I not give this one a shot? I wrote in my proposal that one reason I felt qualified to do a golf hole is because I’ve actually listened to golf on the radio. It’s true. I listened to the final round of the 2005 Masters. Tiger won. It was awesome. This actually had a lot to do with coming up with the idea for Tin Cup: A braille mini-golf hole for the sight impaired.

A couple of weeks ago we were having chicken salad and I asked Anna if she wanted to know how chicken salad is made. So I cut the shape of a chicken out of paper, grabbed our paper shredder and let Anna put the chicken in the paper shredder. Voila! Chicken salad, basically.

This gave me the idea to create a paper shredding artwork. This piece here is three shredders that simultaneously shred three 8″ x 150′ rolls of paper. It makes 1/4″ strips so when you do the math: 3(150 x 32)=14,400… that’s 14,400 linear feet of paper. In other words, three rather small 8″ x 5″ x 5″ rolls make a mountain of shredded paper. The rolls take about 5 minutes to shred and it’s quite a loud process.

After a good critique, I’m working on a newer version that uses four shredders mounted above and shredding through slots in a standard 2′ x 2′ acoustic ceiling tile like the kind used in a standard dropped ceiling. The critique was an encouragement to push the possibilities of the actual shredding mechanism beyond just the crude, very plain wooden frame. The new piece also includes a recessed ceiling light situated between the four shredders. Images and some video of this new piece are forthcoming, but here are some more images of the prototype.

Florida State’s Al Thornton looks away from Duke coach Mike Kryzewski, right, when they met after the Seminoles defeated the Blue Devils 68-67 for the first time at Cameron Indoor Stadium in Durham, N.C., Sunday, Feb. 4, 2007.

I thought I’d just compare our weather to some other balmy spots in the world. Some nasty Chicagoans have said that this is pretty normal… Thanks to the weather man, however, we know that this is colder than it has been in over a decade.

Iceland? Come on…

I want you to pay close attention to the sunrise and sunset times on this one. I’ve never heard of it but I think it may be located in Valhalla…

This is a U.S. Research center — I know, I know… it’s the southern hemisphere, making it summer right now. I don’t care, it’s ANTARCTICA. And just so you don’t think that all of Antarctica is a sunny paradise in the summer: