Foreign Exchange video

I have a series of drawings I did a few years back that I've been waiting to do something with, they felt very static on the pieces of vellum I drew them on. I was lucky enough to have Bill from Radical Cartography do some individual scans of the drawings and so I've finally decided to make them into a short video. Here is the background on the project:

This video was created from a series of drawings inspired by a teacher's edition atlas from the mid-1990's. Each country in the atlas had a graphic with it’s shape superimposed to scale on an outline of the US. I recreated the entire series from A-Z using ink on vellum. I was intrigued by the slow, methodical process of precisely drawing each shape of every country and redrawing the outline of the US over and over and over. I created visual conversations based on line, shape and scale that depoliticized these shapes. Because the source I was using was at least 15 years old,  some of the countries do not even exist today or their borders have changed. I like to think that maps are similar to photographs in that they represent something at a given moment that will inevitably change or become out of date.

Link to the video on vimeo.

New art/ 20x200

I've been meaning to buy something from 20x200 for years and the time has finally come! If you haven't seen this website, I strongly encourage you to check it out. It's a really great way to buy art but at a much more affordable price than a gallery. Here are two pieces I just bought:

Yes, it's another map. But this was too cool to pass up. It's by Aaron Stroup Cope from a series called prettymaps which is also an awesome website (more on that in a separate post). In case you can't tell, it's Chicago:)

This is the other piece, alleverythingthatisyou sno8_231 by Mike + Doug Starn. This was super exciting because I've liked their work since I was in high school. Their older work had a very 90's feel (lots of layers, wax, varnish, photos presented in a grid, black + white, etc.) but this series is newer and more minimal. The coolest part? The brothers created a camera that could capture individual snowflakes in the moments between a solid and liquid state.

Photobooth slideshow

It's taken me awhile but I've finally done something with the 550+ photos we had from the "photobooth" at our wedding!
Check it out here:
http://vimeo.com/33408403

Longman & Eagle Inn

For our first anniversary we wanted to do something special but didn't really want to travel far since we've been away a lot this year. So we decided to book a room at the Longman & Eagle Inn and have dinner there. It felt a little weird going "on vacation" someplace so close but it was fantastic! We really felt like we were getting away and coming home the next day took 10 minutes which was awesome. Here are some photos and details from our time there, I highly recommend it!!

Here's our room, they have 6 different rooms ranging in price from $75-$200 so we chose one right in the middle. I loved the design of everything, it was very modern and comfortable and well thought out.

This was our free gift in our room!

And they had an awesome tape deck with pre-made mixtapes for us to listen to! Our favorite was "Raps":)

Our room's wallpaper were prints by super talented duo, Sonnenzimmer

A pretty terrarium

On our way to dinner

I should also mention they give you two free drink tokens in your room, an awesome mini-bar/fridge and will hold a table for you in the restaurant if you tell them when you check in that you want to eat there which means we had no wait on a Saturday night!And this goes without saying but our meal that night was off the charts.

The next morning we walked over to Lula for brunch which was also amazing. All in all a fantastic way to celebrate our first year of marriage!

Big Kids Magazine

“He uses his words to protect himself from the falling icebergs”. Luca, age 8.

BIG Kids Magazine is a contemporary arts publication for children. Driven by discovery, experimentation and response, we invite children to participate in topical conversations about art and the world. With a senior editor who is eight years old, BIG challenges hierarchies of who is listening and who is speaking to amplify small voices in BIG ways.

Amazing!
more info here

via fine little day

Brian Dettmer

I just saw that Brian Dettmer is showing some new works at Packer Schopf Gallery. Being into books, words, maps, etc., I've been a fan of most of his work that I've seen. But after awhile, it can start to look similar. I was excited to see the new series he's done with paperbacks and text. Here are some photos from the show, including some pieces that are more reminiscent of his older works. These are pretty small but the images on the gallery website are larger.

Image transfer workshop- Spudnik Press

Last week I took a one-night workshop at Spudnik Press that focused on image transfers. I've used various image transfer methods in the past in my own work and in courses that I've taught but I felt like I needed a refresher. Two of my colleagues from Marwen were also taking the workshop and it was so fun! I learned a couple of new techniques that I'm excited to play around with some more- like using wintergreen oil, an icy/hot stick and a blender pen to transfer laserjet images. We also talked about acrylic/gel medium transfers which I've done before. It was so nice to work in a creative space with other people! I'm so used to working alone in my studio, I want to push myself more to take courses/workshops more.

Art Fair/New Work

It's that time of year again, Marwen's annual Art Fair is on November 11th. This year I am submitting three photos including these two that I took this summer in the Badlands. They are a bit of a departure for me but there was something I found really interesting about watching people be tourists. More to come!

Student Artwork

The top photo is from a course at Marwen called Guerilla Art and this weekend students wrote messages all around the Marwen building. This was the first one that I saw on my way into the building. Not a bad way to start a Monday!
The next photo (excuse the bad quality, gallery lighting is tough to photograph on a phone), is from my course I taught this Summer called Mixed Media Mapping. I love how different each of the pieces looks, I really wanted each student to find their own style.

Never my love

Was just reminded this weekend at our friends' wedding what a great song this is!

Suppose Design

I absolutely love this place and those whimsical windows!
Suppose Design based in Japan, via Anthology Magazine

2011 European Adventure- Amsterdam recap

After our time in Köln, we took a train to Amsterdam. It was so fun to see the countryside and notice the differences between Germany and the Netherlands. And it only took 2 hours! I'm so jealous of how close cities are to each other in Europe. So many of our friends told us how awesome Amsterdam was but I wasn't sure what to expect. I've spent more time in Portugal/Spain and the U.K. so northern Europe was totally new for me...and I loved it. We walked from the train station to our hotel and the city was so bustling, young, international and yes, there were tons of bikes everywhere! It was such an easy city to walk around and the canals were so pretty. I can definitely see us going back for another trip. Here are some photos: