unbelievable (= more)

saturday was so smooth, so good, so special, tried to temper my expectations for sunday a little bit.

but sunday delivered too!

i changed the projection incorporating some of what we did saturday into it, here's a still frame from what was projected:

































linda and philippa were both there again, also sarah brought asher. for the end of the "painted garden" piece, we painted everything brown as we collapsed it all back into the wall (away from the camera = back down to the soil) = garden wilting.









































then we shot some other videos, sarah instigated it, here's a still frame:







































it's friday night, this weekend can't possibly compare to last weekend. but i'm so happy to be editing this footage now. i was there.

painted garden

an email i sent:

"

3 march 2009

subject: saturday and/or sunday morning?

i thought we could get together for a couple of hours and mess around with paint / video / collage / talking about spring planting / growth? we could do it at my studio [or maybe griggs' studio (lindalinda, if you have time / keenness)] -

could be really fun. short time, energy burst, we make something together?

"

another one:

"

6 march 2009

subject: saturday & or sunday morning details

linda & i will be ready to go at 9am both days

hope you can join us

bring anything you want to use to make something

we'll have some paint, collage stuff, video projectors, cameras...

improvisational, figuring-it-out and just doing, instinctual artmaking, this will not just be a seed we will make something grow, more-or-less instantly

if you want to bring someone along, please feel free to bring someone along. but a collaboration between linda/susan/erik or linda/sarah/erik or linda/athena/jeff/erik or linda/philippa/erik or any other combination sounds really fun and exciting to me.

linda, see you tomorrow! susan, sarah, philippa, jeff, athena, isaiah = hope to see you tomorrow and/or sunday!

- erik

"

collaboration can go really smoothly or it can go absolutely nowhere. maybe nobody shows up. maybe somebody is thinking x and somebody else is thinking y and they both get frustrated. but saturday was magic. i can't think of how i'd rather spend lifetime.

linda was already there when i arrived - on a saturday morning - i was late - maybe 9:15am. we set up two computers, two projectors, and a video camera facing a wall. susan showed up with oil crayons - one of the amazing things about the day was how everybody kept showing up with different materials. everyone came with an idea which made the piece grow.

anyway we hung up a brown piece of paper on the wall (soil). we projected jeff's growing roots animation and my plant animation onto that, one in each projector. i got out some paint. we started drawing and painting.








































linda had the idea of not just collaging, but folding out leaves so that they hung out into space. she provided green paper. susan had brought newspaper and cardboard with her. we used all three.






































































































the other linda showed up, bearing tulips and plant cuttings. in they went. we were all painting, drawing, collaging. at this point there was enough vegetation that the soil was mostly obscured, so i put my dynamic plants-growing animation piece into the other projector as well.

susan was bothered by the projection moving but the painting / drawing / collage remaining static. we put the fan on the piece, everything was moving.














































































































all of this was a performance for the video camera. the final piece will be a linear video of what we made - essentially an animation. (i think.)









































at some point susan left, linda left, philippa arrived; she brought seed catalogs with lots of pictures fo plants and flowers, and fabric. she also wanted things moving towards the camera. we strung thread through the studio and began to collage out into space.























































































this is how we ended the day saturday, maybe 3pmish (before heading to singing with linda, then volta solo and finally brooklyn for dinner with ruthie & ellen).




































i've been wanting to collaborate with jeff, linda, linda, philippa, and susan for a long time. i wish we could do more. (i mean i hope we can do more.)

if i do nothing else this year, 2009 will have been a good year.

crit

a week ago sunday, showed the first version of spring planting. feedback was super-helpful.

pre-spring planting

seeds planted in my studio some weeks ago have started sprouting











































a time-lapse camera is recording the growth every thirty seconds















































































i love knowing that if i'm asleep or eating or in the shower or even working on my art, these plants and these machines are also contributing towards spring planting growing.

here today

james and i (james actually) titled our piece and ?completed it. here's an image from the colab show which finished a couple of weeks ago. that question mark is in there because for me this piece has become an exploration of the impossibility of sustained stasis, a simple illustration of the evanescence of everything.

dustbin of history?

not if i can do anything about it!

summer shade

spring planting is involving a lot of nurturing (for me, collaborators, and the viewer/participant), like a garden would. summer is all about relaxing, lying in a hammock... the process and the final piece should both provide that feeling.

colab

these pics feel so old! i guess it was about nine days ago we installed the show at the chashama chelsea space. i'll be gallery-sitting this saturday, february 21st, from 3pm to 6pm if you want to check out the show. 266 w 37th street, between 7th & 8th avenues.

it's a group show. colab meets once a month, we help each other with our writing, and founder/leader sarah schmerler helps us with our writing. writing about our art.

for this show, we worked together in pairs, writing about each others' art. the writing is displayed alongside the work. there's a lot to see and experience, hope you enjoy it.

pictures from installation day 8th february 2009:

sarah thinks:

































the mid-installation shopping trip:



































view from the sidewalk as we put it together:





































sarah helps annette and joanne with their writing, cynthia writes on the wall beneath hanna's painting, hanna writes on the wall beneath cynthia's piece:




































cynthia and joanne show where cynthia's thread will go:




































james and i observe chris and shannon writing about each others' art:



































sarah writes on the mirror:




































annette writes on the wall beneath an earlier incarnation of joanne's piece:



































group decision-making:



























view of james'-and-my piece in an earlier incarnation:




























something sarah wrote about james'-and-my piece "here today":




































looking in from the outside:


































same scene, different view:




























has been very gratifying to be a part of this process. other things going on, more images to come soon.

this show keeps changing, hope you can make it saturday.

making spring planting

yesterday i got frustrated with how slow photoshop was behaving (the machine i was on, the resolution i was on). started taking pictures of the monitor instead, to crop and enlarge, using the macro feature on the camera. became like stop-motion animation. almost too smooth, thought it might look choppier. going to play more with that technique, really enjoyed it.

traffic cone appreciation

saturday was a lot of fun. just a few people joined for stages (only john and i completed the full walk) for the traffic cone observation and photography tour. haven't had time to add the new images into the piece yet, but if you come to the closing party this friday evening (which i just found out about a couple of hours ago at kendrick's crit), you'll see a changed piece (incorporating new photos, color photos, other people's photos).






































here are the notes from my gallery talk:



"

rarely serve any discernable function

like paintings, primary function is to be looked at

like abstract art, they may be impenetrable. they may not be compelling to everyone.

color jumps out at you, demanding your attention

modern phenomenon

always changing

location in the world and eye-grabbing nature combine to form an extremely low-effort aesthetic experience (vs. going to a concert, for example)

things to look for:

- manufactured characteristics (what kind of cone is it?)

- wear and tear (what has happened to it?)

- location (where is it?)

- relationship to other cones (is it part of a community?)

together the aspects/attributes of traffic cones create visual poetry

for free

for everyone

public art which didn’t exist a hundred years ago

which is changing all the time

which may disappear

which can be documented

and appreciated almost effortlessly

"


also held up a piece of paper to show the difference between orange-projected-onto-orange and orange-projected-onto-white:





























good news for further exploration and awareness-raising of traffic cone aesthetics. got letter a few days ago: "on behalf of the lower manhattan cultural council and new york city department of cultural affairs, it is our pleasure to notify you that your project, how to enjoy traffic cones, has been awarded a 2009 manhattan community arts fund grant. congratulations!"

which means that there will be warm-weather traffic cone viewing tours, among other things. and i really want to involve people in the project. excited.