Buried Treasure 2011

Buried Treasure - A Call for Collaborative Participants!

So many blogs...so little time. With so many wonderful art blogs to follow, it is difficult to always find the time to keep up with every new post -- let alone have the time to visit the posts that were put up before you discovered each blog.

So...two years ago I started an annual treasure hunt. Buried Treasure is about digging deep to uncover some hidden gems. The premise is simple. On Thursday, July 28th all participating bloggers will re-post one (or more) of their favorite posts that ever appeared on their blog. As you might already know, I don't like too many rules when it comes to art. So anything goes.

Please leave a comment on this post if you would like to participate. On Thursday, July 28th, I will post a list of all participating artists on my blog so that you can be sure to find all the Buried Treasure. Feel free to let your own readers know about this project by spotlighting it on a post on or prior to reveal day. Please (and this is important) email me with a link when your post goes up so I know to add you to the posted list on my blog.

And if you cannot wait until next week, you can click here and here to be taken to the links from over 140 favorite posts from 2009, and here for the posts from 2010. These are also always available on my sidebar.

Happy hunting!

Exquisite

Welcome to the Exquisite Corpse

The Exquisite Corpse Festival officially kicks off with an opening night party on Saturday, July 9th at 7:30 at Space on White in NYC. The collaborative visual creations of over 30 artists, from print to sculpture to fashion design, will be on display. The exquisite corpse is not the work of art itself, but a game played by three artists, who may or may not know each other or even see each other. Each artist secretly creates a piece of the same whole. One takes the head, another the torso, and a third the legs. They collaborate not through negotiation but through trust. Originally executed via a drawing folded in thirds, Exquisite Corpse Festival expands this idea to a vast aray of artistic mediums- from music, to plays to taxidermy.  My partners in exquisite crime were John Borrero and Stephanie Rubiano. Together we created a mixed media sculpture, although we worked on our assigned parts separately. John made the base and legs, Stephanie made the torso and wings, and I made the head.

Without further ado, I introduce you to our very own exquisite corpse...

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She is approximately 2 feet tall. Her head is made from heavy gage wire and vintage book pages with greek text from 1820. Her torso and wings are made from soldered wire, gampi paper, and encaustic medium (beeswax and damar resin). Her base is made from a wooden found object and her skirt was created from several different vintage silks.

The Exquisite Corpse Festival will run from July 9th to August 2nd. Space on White is located on 81 White Street (off Broadway) in Tribeca. The gallery is open 7 days a week from 10:30am to 10:00pm.

An Even Dozen

Issue number 12 of PASTICCIO QUARTZ has arrived. Sarah Fishburn and Angela Cartwright are the writers, artists, and masterminds behind this QUality ART Zine. I have always said that this publication is more than a zine and the current issue is no exception. Between the covers you will find 60-pages packed with artistic inspiration.

This issue features an interview with artist Amanda Marie Ploegsma, an article featuring ceramic artist Laurie Beth Zuckerman, and a workshop project by Suzi Blu. There are book recommendations and reviews, website recommendations, apps for artists, quotes, wordplay, recipes, and of course the Palais d'Art section which highlights the original artwork of more than 15 artists. And there seems to be endless tidbits of cool information sprinkled throughout, including info about eco-friendly products, chalkboard paint, Japanese cloth wrapping, and so much more.

And a big thank you is due to Sarah and Angela for also including a feature about Winds of Change, a collaborative project and self-published book that I completed with Roxanne Evans Stout from River Garden Studio.

You can purchase all 12 issues of Pasticcio here.

Let it Shine

Earlier this month I posted an update regarding my collaboration with Bridgette Guerzon Mills and Jen Wordon. Our project began in early 2009 and is in the process of winding down. We each created a book structure that we would all work in, with the main idea of the collaboration being to challenge ourselves creatively. 

My recent post showed the pages I made for Book of Trees, Bridgette's book of plaster pages. I continue to work on the last sets of pages in Contexture, my own book of paper pages, and I will highlight these on my blog in the near future. Today's post is all about Shine, Jen's metal pages. The three pages, back and front, that I contributed to her project follow...

All three projects from the collaboration will be exhibited at the end of July as part of the Milwaukee Avenue Arts Festival in Chicago. Specific details about the exhibition will be posted soon.