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May 19, 2006
artist's way open studio review (may)
by gl. at 5:32 pm
it was hot last night but not as hot as it had been the day before, so i am grateful. it was plenty hot enough in the studio, though, which prompted me to break out the fan and make lavendar lemonade. i gotta figure out how to get people moving during the events; most people don't get up to drink, snack, or play with other materials. forgot to put out the tea bags & the "please come in" sign. doh!
we tried another guided intent: "identity," and i managed the format a little better this time. and though i had a hard time personally with the writing this time (i just couldn't get my brain to shut up and focus), i got a good title from it:
["i choose the moon": click the image for the other collages]
this is a neat piece because it's so monochromatic: the only color comes from the reddish stars. of course this piece has a lot of shiny detail: the moon is a swirl from one of those silver paint pens, the stars are a unique faceted print, and the round thing on her heart is a small nut with a little moving gear attached to it -- i love its dimensionality and its interactive quality as the gear spins. (sven found that for me one day on the springwater corridor trail.)
in addition to the collages, sven & jen (a salem participant we met at last month's event) created a collaborative collage animation in under 20 minutes! (from conception to copying the file to celeste to be uploaded):
amazing!
i'm finding it more difficult to finish a collage during a facilitated event. very little of my piece was glued down before i had to talk about it. that actually worked out okay: the little gear nut was a piece i added afterwards instead of a larger rusty metal bracket-thing i had been planning to use.
so the big news is that i'm breaking collage night into two events: the guided intent event i've tried for the last couple of months will move to the first wednesday of the month. this event will have the potential for various mediums & a facilitation fee. but i'll keep the free collage night on the third thursday of the month and it will return to its casual roots. a little something for everyone! plus, our waitlists have been getting longer and so i'd like to give people some more options.
posted by gl. | May 19, 2006 5:32 PM | comments (5) | categories: artist's way
Comments
How the little animated collage came about:
At the end of the evening, Jen was hanging out and she showed me this medical diagram of an eye that she'd found. She'd cut out the eye portion, and was trying out different bits that could go behind the opening. I commented that a lot of things could go there... And that it might actually make an interesting animation.
So I say: "Do you have 15 minutes to spare?"
...I ran to the other side of the house to grab my laptop, a camera, and the tripod. Just so there'd be a parameter, I told Jen we'd only take 20 shots.
She put the images in front of the camera; I snapped the shutter. I uploaded the shots to the computer, and then used QuickTime Pro's "open image sequence" command to instantly turn them into a movie. We decided that 2 frames per second was about right. Still in Quicktime, I compressed using Sorenson3 and then sent the file via the wireless network over to Gretchin's computer.
It wound up taking more than 15 minutes; I had a billion applications open when I went to grab the computer, so it was running slow as molasses. Phooey -- it really could have been done in 15 minutes!
Btw, Jen's title for her first animation: "The More We Look."
Posted by: sven at May 19, 2006 10:38 PM
doh! i can't believe i forgot to mention the title of the animation! i fixed that in the entry. thanks, sven (and jen)!
Posted by: gl. at May 19, 2006 10:51 PM
Wonderful art, both of you!
Posted by: shelley Noble at May 19, 2006 11:41 PM
Yep, beautiful as usual...gl I love 'i choose the moon', one of your best if I do say so myself...Ive always liked kinetic sculpture and interactive artwork...saw an exhibit by one of my professors that was wonderful, basically had an easel set up, and a box in front of it with about 25 small paintings (12"square) inside, the idea was to line up three paintings on the easel to tell a story, usually non-sensical in a logical way but it was interesting to see how the feeling of an image changed based on what images were displayed around it...
Posted by: ubatuber at May 20, 2006 11:46 AM
thanks, uba! yes, i LOVE art like that! we just saw a show at the albert art hop today that had a couple of amazing pieces we'll probably write about later, but they were both whimsical & interactive. including viewer participation & storytelling is even better. :)
Posted by: gl. at May 20, 2006 5:24 PM