in addition... (found fish ball)

So, this was the nearly forgotten masterpiece that wouldn't upload at first.  I think my favorite part is the reflection of the carnie who is trying to persuade the kids to use the fishing pole (if you listen to the audio) instead of using their hands. Of course, the accidental resemblance to actual fish schooling or bait balls is unintentional by the carnie, but super-awesome none the less.



(I hope there isn't an add for google or calvin klein bras or something before that upload.  The things I don't know how to control...)

I watch underwater nature programming to comfort myself in times of strife, especially Mr. David Attenborough's Life Series (more about this soon).   I also recently got to enjoy watching the Vaux Swifts converge on the chimney at Chapman School in Portland, Oregon (though I did not shoot this video).



These swirling masses of the same sized objects remind me of how my brain often feels, and that reminder is remarkably comforting.  I think it should be alarming, but instead I'm grateful to see, physically embodied, the electricity in my brain. Notice how there are almost always a group of swifts, or sharks, that are segwaying off to the side?  But they are still moving with purpose.  That is also a very accurate visual metaphor...

Benton Franklin County Fair

So, about 10 days ago I worked the Benton Franklin County Fair beer garden as a volunteer.  We broke records of $5 pours of local wines and Coors products (booo... but at least I got to collect bottle caps...) in our tight red, rhinestone bedazzled shirts and fancy break-up boots (the two ladies I worked with were in their 70's and super impressed that I could use a winekey).

I couldn't remember the last time I had been to the fair, and there will be a whole blog on the fancy 4H rabbits and birds and the little girls asleep with their cows, but this first blog should be about how the fair relates to my work.

When I imagine a home for my work it's in a scenario like the county fair.  Where there are booths for information on everything from post-partum awareness to rural electric emergency preparedness, and strange collections of creatures and multi-cultural fried foods.  There should be lots of games with no particular rules but most of which utilize things like balloons or empty bottles or wind-up fish for which you win things like squid hats.  And rickety rides with hand-painted backdrops.  There should be scrip for beer.  There should be all sorts of strange flying light up insect replicas.  The belly dancing demonstrations could be right next to the get out the vote campaign.



This will be an interesting contrast to Platform Art Fair in L.A. at the end of this month, which I somehow think will not include me seeing how many elephant ears I can eat in an evening (3, so many different textures from the different booths- everything from crunchy like cracker to molten like sunken soufle to just the way it should be- stretchy, starchy, dough like fried pizza covered in partially hydrogenated liquid magic and covered in cinnamon that did not come from a fancy spice store.).

I walked around the fair after the beer tent closed, and because I was filming I felt like I was in this silent, still bubble surrounded by marvelous, vibrant, fast moving people.  I really need to get a comfortable tripod, or use the gopro in such situations, because I'm often standing on my tip-toes, which makes me have to rock around to get these shots.  Would it be less noticeable if I had a helmet camera mount on?



I'm not sure if I'm making art when I make little videos like this.  I'm certainly not in control to the extent that I would like to be to know for sure that it was "art."  I have so much to learn about how to make a good video.  Instead they are more like moving stills I would have stuck into a "sketch" book in college in 1999.



I went out for a beer with a technical engineer friend last night, and he caught the last little bit of the last upload. He said something like "I see the video, but I don't know what it means."  Which cracked me up- why does it need to mean anything?  Or do anything?  It's just a thing- a preserved idea. Oh, so much to think about how to premise.  It's meaning is the magic...

Arlo Guthrie, a Conceptual Artist.

So, this is the only video I could find with the audio I wanted.  And it is a strange, strange montage, which I am happy to tell you I did not spend 6 minutes watching.

"I told just about everything there was to tell about it- how come, why, what for, but you know what I always used to neglect to explain was the significance of the pickle."  And, though the pickle features in the rest of the song, it's not exactly what is "significant."  The pickle remains a red herring. That seems like the just about the perfect way to write about art- all the details, but revealing none of the mystery.

Also, if this isn't discursive, I don't know what is.

long, amazing vid

Oh, I want to give talks like this.

reading about fluxus...

...and these songs keep getting stuck in my head.  Oh Yoko!



If you wait until the last 2 minutes of the 2nd video there's a classic joke re-enacted by John and Yoko, one I remember doing with friends all the way through sophomore year of college, and never knowing it was a John+Yoko reference (I mean, sheesh, how many folks had seen this video before YouTube?).

There are awful comments about Yoko with both these videos.  And, I have to admit, she's hard for me to watch.  But she must have a great sense of humor.  John certainly did.  I wish people hadn't felt the need to take the Beatles so seriously, because they had such a capacity for joviality- to me the most important of qualities.  Help! and Hard Days Night are both great comic films.

I also have always looked forward to encountering Fluxus re-collections. So many of their jokes seem to slip in under the radar.  When I visited the MOMA in Januray there was a whole, lovely, empty wing of Fluxus related detritus. I giggled myself silly reading such bizarre and nihilist poppycock behind the very expensive glass protecting it.  The nicest thing, though, was the lack of people. This photo recreation with the cardboard cutout was by far the best part.  Looking back on it now, maybe this is the way I should do my work.  Do an installation, photograph it, painstakingly document what was in the photograph, and then box it all up and preserve it for history, complete with cardboard cutout.  Hmmm...

oh yo o o ko... oh yo o o ko... my love... will...turn...you...ah-on...

Iphone videos by Rory Sparks

vids taken by Rory after I had left Portland today, and Em Space yesterday.  Super Duper.  The first one is so beautifully jaggedy, and the last one is just so funny.  It will never cease to amaze me how other people's documentation of my work shows me so much more about it than my own.  Here's to excellent friends,

A day off from reading...mostly...

My mentor from First Semester, Miss Rory Sparks, runs a print shop in Portland's industrial area, (http://www.em-space.org/), and today, my last full day in Portland for awhile, I decided to play with balloons.  I sat outside Em Space in the hot Oregon sun in half of a bikini, with a hot pink helium tank and a big smile, and greeted folks as they entered an exited the springwater corridor, a popular bike route.  Guys from the Ross Island Gravel company came out to chat, and generally it was a nice way to spend a brilliantly bright August afternoon. I shot video as well, possibly to sprinkle throughout a new website project.

One of my new assignments is to come up with two paragraphs to describe my process. Part of it will have to be about shopping, which I find hilarious.  But often I find that a big part of what I do has to do with availability of inspiring materials.  That probably makes me shallow. Nonetheless, it's true.

As I was leaving, the owner of the fixed gear bicycle featured in the last photo came out to unlock his bike. I watched from inside my truck, surreptitious.  He looked, walked around the post, and then got out his iphone and shot pictures of the small sculpture. Made me feel extremely happy.  And motivated to go read more about conceptual art.