New Mixed Media Pieces for "Home Art Explosion!" Art Show

I was recently in another art show of the Bagavagabonds. Their theme for this "Art Explosion" was HOME. This was an interesting theme for me because we just recently purchased our first home.

I decided to take some abstract photos of items around my own new home but magnified and at interesting angles so that most are indiscernible except to me - a curtain's pattern, a small portion of a chandelier, blinds, part of a lamp base, and part of a door handle made interesting subjects. I printed my photos on transparent acetate.

I wanted to juxtapose two different types of "home" in each of my pieces. Besides the physical dwelling, I also wanted to suggest our body as the most important home - the one we will never move away from as long as we are on this earth. I found a vintage book on immunology with drawings and photographs of lysosomes, cytoplasms, blood vessels and cells. I then combined my photos with these pages in interesting ways and framed them. I love utilizing vintage books in my photography work because I feel that photography in the present day has become so duplicable. I like to create work that is one-of-a-kind so that it inherently maintains its' integrity and specialness.

I then took some vintage keys I have collected over the years and dipped them into matte black paint. When dry, I dangled them with invisible thread in the front of each piece to convey the idea that we all have the power to unlock ourselves if we just realize that the key to understanding ourselves is within reach.

To see photos from the art opening, check out this page of my website.

Sketchbook Project Comes to Los Angeles

 The traveling art exhibit "The Sketchbook Project" that I was a part of finally made it's stop in Los Angeles the weekend of August 2-4 at Iam8Bit Gallery. It was really cool to see my book again after it has been traveling for 8 months. They even give you a library card and you can check out the sketchbooks. Such a cool exhibit. It will live on permanently in Brooklyn, NY so if you are ever out there, you can check out my book by name! Here are a couple of shots from when I went....

Sketchbook Project - Behind the Scenes

At the end of 2012, I decided to participate in "The Sketchbook Project".  It is a a collection of artists' sketchbooks from around the world that makes up a traveling art exhibit. It will then permanently live at the Brooklyn Art Library at the end of the tour. Come check it out if you are in any of the neighborhoods where it will be traveling to. Otherwise there is a link at the bottom of this post where you can see a digital version of the entire book.

When they sent me my blank sketchbook, it sat on my desk, not started, for months. I wasn't inspired with the right "idea". I was, however, obsessed with my usual ruminating about life and death and the nuances it shadows onto my life. I finally decided to put my obsession, though starkly personal and dark, into play and use the material for my book. I incorporated buddhist funeral papers I found in Chinatown, orange ribbon, black netting (to symbolize black 1940s hats that may be worn to church funerals), my original photos cut into squares to symbolize the perfect cut-out of existence that is never the reality, my pencil and ink drawings, and my original prose printed on acetate. I actually rebinded the booklet to incorporate the acetate between the pages. Here are some images of my process:

You can see a digital version of the entire book here.

Migration Mixed Media Art Pieces for Bagavagabonds Art Show

The theme of the Bagavagabonds show this time was MIGRATION. I decided to juxtapose two different styles of migration for my series of 6 mixed media pieces. I took photos that I took from a couple cities (San Francisco, Los Angeles, Boston, and Brussels) showing different forms of transportation - elevators, airports, a bike rack, a subway. a ferris wheel, and a freeway - and printed them in grayscale on acetate paper. I positioned these with original pages from a vintage book on evolution I found at my favorite bookstore (my blog on this bookstore here). I wanted to show the immediate literal migration of people versus longterm migration of the theory of evolution. Here some photos of my process and the final product (All my pieces sold out for a great cause!) You can see photos of the art show reception here.

 

The Last Bookstore - In Downtown Los Angeles - A place of inspiration

For my last art show, I got stuck. I started several different pieces and wasn't happy with how any of them evolved. So late one night I went a few blocks to my favorite bookstore "The Last Bookstore". It is on 453 S. Spring Street. (More info here: http://www.yelp.com/biz/the-last-bookstore-los-angeles) . I try to also always pop in when I take my power walks around my neighborhood. The bottom floor has an extensive collection of interesting new books. Upstairs all the books are only $1. There are also cool art pieces all around the store, many installations made with books or pages of books flying or the tunnel or books or rainbow of colored spines. This also used to be a bank I think so the vault upstairs is now turned into their sic-fi section, appropriately dark, gloomy with a narrator's voice reading a book and a cool art installation. Here are some photos I have taken here:

MOCA Sunday Studio, December 2, 2012

In December, I went to another Sunday Studio entitled, "Pushing the Boundaries of Painting" Mixed Media on Canvas by MOCA's creative Sunday Studio community. We started by focusing on sculpture pieces by Lee Bontecou. 

Then we had access to lots of sculpture materials - burlap, wire, netting, needle and thread, string, glue, cotton, fabric. I started filling the wire netting with cotton and then used a needle with string to envelop it into a flower. David made a cloud out of burlap, staples, string and cotton. We were then encouraged to leave our pieces there as part of a larger collaborative installation sculpture wall.