dayton is not in ohio

Here are a few images from Anna’s little exhibition at the Art Institute. Karen and I planned a little opening for her, and while none of her little friends were able to come, we had a nice time as a family. All of these painting were done on paper scavenged from a Felix Gonzalez Torres stacked paper work, and most were created using Crayola washable paints. On Mondays, when Anna is with me at the studio, I hang her a sheet of paper. She tells me which colors to dish out onto her plywood pallete and what brush she wants. I encourage her to experiment… some are done with her fingers and hands, and she’s done a couple with plastic bag covered feet and shoes. She often asks for music. Sometimes she is very active and aggressive, sometimes more methodical and cerebral. I just enjoy watching her go. Bottom line is Anna really enjoys painting and this has been a fun project to work on as father and daughter.

Hey, don’t miss the post below if you’re interested in new art, but I had to post on this… Led Zeppelin’s first live performance in a century and a half… I do hope that they do a full blown tour, that they come to Chicago, and that I win the lottery tomorrow so I can buy tickets… I missed the Page-Plant tour in Memphis because I was stupid… so this is probably my last chance…

Steel, motor, springs, baseball bat, bearings, switches, wiring, power supply, hardware (48 x 48 x 72 inches, variable)

Here are a couple of images of a sculpture that I made this semester. Didn’t make much to write home about, but this one ended up looking kind of cool. I will post some video of it as soon as I shoot some.

The class that I TA for is currently doing a mapping project. They are supposed to come up with some kind of autobiographical map. There are several shows in Chicago dealing with the same idea such as William Pope L. at the Art Institute and Mapping the Body at the MCA, as well as one on maps in general at the Field Museum. They all correspond to the Festival of Maps taking place this winter in Chicago.

As is often the case when I TA, I came up with my own, (not autobiographical) idea. I may develop it into something more, but for the time being I decided to see what would happen if I began plugging the Illinois Lottery Mega Millions Jackpot numbers (six numbers between one and fifty-six) into Google Earth, as GPS coordinates. I chose the north and western hemispheres since this is where the lottery takes place. After discovering that most of them were located in the middle of the Atlantic ocean, I decided to plot the boundary of all possible lottery combinations. To find the four corners I plugged in the following lottery coordinates: (1 2 3 N 4 5 6 W) (1 2 3 N 56 55 54 W) (56 55 54 N 53 52 51 W) (53 52 51 N 1 2 3 W). I then plotted a path connecting these locations and creating a boundary. I ended up with a trapezoid that covers approximately 12 million square miles. The lower boundary sits right on the equator, and the Mid Atlantic Ridge runs right down the middle.

Each unique combination of numbers represents about 1000 square feet. But there is some empty space in there because numbers can’t be repeated, meaning, finally, that within this 12 million square mile area there are 176 million evenly-spaced 1000 sq/ft parcels of land (or mostly ocean, in this case) that you can stake your claim to for one U.S. Dollar. Being a visual/spacial person this gives me a much better idea of how ridiculous the odds are for winning the lottery. It’s like guessing exactly where our current apartment is located if given an area about the size of, oh… Asia.

Next I plan on plugging in all of the winning combinations for 2007 and seeing where that takes me… I’m also gonna buy a few tickets.