Residencies

Leaving Lisbon - Cerdeira Village Residency Journal 2

The second and final day of my stay in Lisbon, I first went to the Estufa Fria.  It's a beautiful greenhouse complex in the Parque Eduardo VII (which I later found out is filled with prostitutes and drug sellers at night... but it was fine in the daytime!).  Though the entrance fee is normally quite cheap anyway, it was actually free for me - I think every Sunday morning the fee is waived.  As I walked in, I was greeted by a pool filled with fish, waterfowl, and turtles.  Then I walked through the main "cold" greenhouse which contains plants that can thrive in the standard Lisbon climate with just a little additional protection, and the two branching greenhouses ("hot," for plants that want a bit warmer and wetter environment like orchids and bananas, and "sweet," for cacti and succulents).  The plants all looked very happy, and I enjoyed seeing some that I keep as houseplants thriving in more natural yet massive plantings.

I then went to the Chiado district, stopped for a quick snack of bread and cheese at a little pop-up market and bought a few local desserts to try.  As I was walking around the area noticed a tall, decorative elevator with a short line of tourists waiting to get on called the Santa Justa Lift.  I decided to get in line; due to my foot, I couldn't handle the hike to the castle which is the more normal touristic look-out point to the city so this was quite an unexpected find!  The line moved relatively quickly, too, and I soon paid the 5.15 euro fare to get aboard.  Once up, I managed with tacit permission from the guard to sneak into a religious ruin and got chased out shortly thereafter by a different guard but not before taking a look and snapping a couple photos!  Then I soaked in the aerial view of the city.

After that, I took Tram 15 to the Belém district and saw the Mosteiro dos Jeronimos cathedral, which is spectacular.  Then I crossed the street as I saw there was a market; it was the first non-touristic shopping opportunity I saw.  All the normal touristic shops sell the same cheap goods for inflated prices (probably manufactured abroad, ironically); especially after traveling enough in a given region, I've found myself to be really not interested in their wares.  This market, though, was geared toward locals (many of the vendors only spoke Portuguese, which is both inconvenient for me but also a strong sign that they are not in it for the tourism angle).  I still actually only bought a couple things - primarily because my luggage was already completely full and I only plan to make more room while in Madrid through using up a lot of what I brought with me (clay, shampoo, lotion, contact solution, etc).  And most of what was being sold was not luggage friendly - vases and other home decor - or was something that I can also pick up in Madrid (scarves and jewelry).  I did buy a little brass dish that caught my fancy, though, and an eighteenth century azulejo tile.  The market was being held next to the annual Lisbon Thai Festival, which was quite random, so I strolled through that, too - it was quite small.

Then I rode the tram to the Torre de Belém, and took a look at it.  I might've decided to go inside, but by the time I got there it had just closed.  According to TripAdvisor, though, I didn't miss much - the outside is the real draw.

Finally, I had dinner at a place literally next door to my AirBnB as all the walking had done a number on my foot already, sampled a caipirinha, and went to bed.

The next day, I packed up my belongings and took taxi to the train station in order to catch my ride to Coimbra B.   I was going to be picked up there by one of the residency staff and driven the rest of the way into Cerdeira Village.  I apparently left the Coimbra B station on the wrong side, so it took a while for the residency staff member to find me, but he eventually did and off we went, driving past the famous University of Coimbra renowned for its medical training en route.  I had also requested we stop to get groceries, and that made the trip long enough that Nuno, the staffer, wanted to get lunch before groceries in Lousã.  He was so kind about my being vegetarian, and we walked to two different restaurants before he settled on a third and basically ordered off menu directly in the kitchen (he knew the waitstaff) for me and even requested they box up my leftovers, which is not even really a thing in Europe.  We also drove past Lousã's castle and a miracle-granting church-on-a-cliff (though really, in this part of the world, everything is on a mountainside or cliff...).

Then we came to Cerdeira Village, where I will be staying for two weeks on a residency.  From May 22nd through May 31st, I will be a normal resident, but from June 1st through June 4th, I will also participate in the Elementos à Solta (Art Meets Nature) Festival.  I was invited to do this residency as one of two sponsored international artists, meaning that Cerdeira Village is letting us stay and use their facilities for free.

The village is a traditional Schist village, which means the houses are made out of thinly stacked and mortared schist rock.  It is also carved into the mountainside; almost nowhere apart from in rooms is flat, and even in the houses there are flights of stairs and you are constantly called to go up or down inclines or stairs to get anywhere.  It is not an ideal site to have a foot injury (!) but luckily, it is not as bad of an injury as it could have been, and upon arrival it was exactly a week old so it already had some time to heal.  Plus, I'd already gotten some of my wanderlust out while in Lisbon so I planned to use the first few days to crank out some studio time.  I met the other sponsored artist, a Finnish woman named Julia, when she arrived a couple hours after I did, and we soon went to bed.  Free accommodations means we're sharing a room, and the room itself can house six people in three bunk beds; we were each set up on the bottom of two of the bunk beds.  I already hit my head on the bottom of the top bunk above me twice, and it took me about an hour of being super self-conscious about making noise while tossing, turning, sneezing, and whatnot next to a stranger trying to sleep, but with my own earplugs and a warm comforter, I eventually fell asleep.

Hobbled But Here! - Cerdeira Village Residency Journal 1

Amidst all the bustling about I had to do prior to setting off on my summer of back-to-back Iberian Peninsula residencies, I managed to get my left foot slammed in a heavy metal shop door four days before I needed to leave.  I had it X-rayed to make sure I hadn't fractured or broken anything - the results thankfully came back that it was just swollen and bruised - and then tried to ice and rest it as much as was possible during those intervening days.  I flew out on Friday, May 19th from MCI connecting in Philadelphia to then go on to Lisbon.  I had decided when scheduling my flights to spend two days in Lisbon before heading on to Cerdeira Village since it's my first time in Portugal.  

My foot was still not really ready to attempt all the various stressors of airports, so I requested wheelchair assistance in the airports.  Everyone who helped me was very kind, and though at the beginning I felt guilty for requesting it, by the time I saw how many lines I got to bypass, I was grateful; one of the hazards of lines beyond the obvious of having to stand a lot is other people blindly backing luggage/themselves into your feet and I really didn't fancy taking another hit to my wounded foot.  Plus the request came with the ability to request aisle seating on the right (putting my injured left foot into the aisle), which meant I could avoid seatmates from bumping me and stretch it out to rest it in the aisle during non-service periods.

My first flight from MCI to PHL went off without a hitch; the plane was bare bones but functional (no inset TV monitors, sadly, but I don't expect them on domestic flights - they're more of a rare perk).  My second flight from PHL to LIS, as is often the wont at PHL, was delayed by slightly over two hours.  It did mean I was able to eat something at an airport restaurant, though, which was good because though my second flight was international and came with dinner and breakfast, I discovered that American Airlines does somewhat weird vegetarian meals (I signed up for the special meals ahead of time to accommodate my vegetarian diet).  They collapse all the veg*n meals together, which makes sense to maximize utility, but then don't actually make the whole meal vegan - they randomly pick and choose what will be vegan and what will be vegetarian in ways that seem to maximize taste issues.  For dinner, there was vegan pasta in marinara sauce with a not-great fake cheese but an accompanying dinner roll had milk as an ingredient and we were just not given the separate cheese slice that accompanied the dinner rolls for other diners.  There was also a salad and fruit, which I appreciated, but I think everyone got those.  For breakfast, the whole standard meal was vegetarian (blueberry muffin, granola, yogurt, and some form of healthy-ish dessert/granola bar).  The veg*n meal instead came with yogurt (still with milk), a vegan cookie, and a small dish of fruit.  I did appreciate the fruit, but wasn't sure why we didn't also get one of the other options for a similar quantity of food items.

The time really stretched on during the second flight, too, because unlike every other international flight I've taken in recent years, this airplane also had no individual tv monitors in the seat backs.  I was really, really thankful I had decided to buy a Kindle Paperwhite in anticipation of being mostly disconnected while in Cerdeira Village because that was my only entertainment.  To be fair, the plane did have a few overhead monitors scattered through the plane and you could try to watch those, but you obviously had to watch whatever was on (from afar) and had no ability to pause it while service was happening or you went to the restroom.  I just ignored that option and read (or briefly, tried to sleep - it's very hard for me to sleep upright, though, so I think I caught about 15-30 minutes).  My seat was also in the very back (no recline) and directly below the flight attendant's overhead storage, and they kept rummaging through it.

Toward the last few hours of the flight, I also noticed both my feet were swollen to the point that my sandals and my compression wrap on my left foot were really uncomfortable.  I assume it was due to the pressure change, though I have to say I've never noticed this side effect before.  I knew I wasn't really in a position to redo the wrap properly if I took it off, though, and I needed it to walk even a little, so I ignored that problem and just loosened my sandal straps.

When I got off that plane, my left foot was basically numb and I thought that it was really very good that I asked for wheelchair assistance.  It was especially nice because it also let me skip the long customs line for a much shorter staff-and-disabled line, and then the very nice attendant also got my luggage off the baggage claim for me, stuck it on a trolley, hailed a cab, and got it put in the taxi for me as well.  (She asked if someone was picking me up and I answered that I was going to take a taxi; the Lisbon airport is surprisingly central and most people can either walk or take the subway to their destination but my foot was alternately numb and throbbing and my luggage is, even when both my feet work, not a joy to navigate the subway with.)  Even though I knew how close the airport was to my AirBnB, I was still pleasantly surprised that the ride only cost 8.5 euro (I gave the taxi driver a 10 and she helped me get my luggage into the building proper).  

I then rode in the archaic lift (with manual door guards) up to my host's place, and thankfully was immediately let in; though that's how it ideally goes, I had to wait for around 20 minutes to get access to my AirBnB in Paris.  The first things I did were to take off the compression wrap and get the ice pack I put in my suitcase into the freezer.  Then I took a short nap - around an hour and a half.  I rewrapped my foot and went out to see if I could catch Tram 28.

Before my foot incident, I had plans for what I wanted to do during my two days in Lisbon, but due to my foot (and also due to the delayed flight which together with the short nap ate up much of the first day), I decided to significantly curtail my plans.  Luckily one of the tourist attractions is done primarily sitting down: Tram 28.  It's an old-school single car tram that takes passengers through the Alfama district and past a number of famous sights.  Waiting in line for the tram was a little rough (I regretted not tossing my sunscreen into my bookbag even though it was already 4:30pm - the sun was still fierce!) given all the tourists who had the same idea, and I had to wait for a tram with available seating due to my foot, but I eventually got onto an empty tram and snagged a coveted window seat.  While waiting in line, I also briefly befriended a nice Canadian couple who let me in on the best side to sit on and that my attempting to walk much of the Alfama would be a bad idea due to its numerous inclines, declines, and straight up stairs.

The tram ride was nice, though it was also surprisingly fast - we zipped by a lot of places that I would have liked to explore, had I had the time and a better foot.  When we came to the end of the line, since we were kicked off anyway I chose to take a small exploration before returning and also snagged a bite to eat at a vegan-friendly waffle place and literally the only place open that served food at that hour.  I was a little sad that my attempts to order both a savory and a sweet waffle were lost in translation and ended in only the sweet one being delivered; that being said, though I would have preferred the savory one once the sweet had been placed at my table I realized there was no way I would've been able to eat two of them and Europe is not a doggy-bag culture.  So what I ate was a strawberry-greek yogurt-granola topped oat waffle; it was really quite good and very affordable even though it wasn't quite what I had in mind as a meal.

I got back on the return tram, and got off in the Alfama district near the Arc de Triomphe.  I wandered around for honestly probably way too far before deciding I was pretty thoroughly lost, it was 8pm, and my foot had started to complain a while ago and was getting pretty insistent about it - so I just hailed a cab.  That ride ended up being only 5.5 euro (rounded to 6 euro with a tip), and I decided it's affordable enough to rely on taxis if my foot is hurting.

I do have to say I keep spending cash in Lisbon so far; I'm surprised but the taxis, metro, and restaurants so far did not want to accept credit cards.  I brought some cash along, though, so it should be fine.

Back in my AirBnB, I met one of the other people renting a room here - she's a Spanish professor at the University of Lisbon who is almost done with the semester and will then return back to her home near Galicia, Spain, when it's over.  We briefly chatted and then I got ready for bed and turned in around 9:30pm.

I woke up at 12:30am, and try though I might, I could not go back to sleep.  Jet lag is annoying!  After just lying in the dark for 45 minutes, I decided to journal instead.  And now here we are, and here I will leave you to hopefully return to sleep shortly in order to wake rested and at a semi-normal time on Sunday!

My Summer Plans!

I finally know what I'll be doing this summer!  Usually I nail down artist residency plans much earlier in the year, but it's been much more up in the air this time around.  Until now!

I am extremely pleased to announce that I was fortunate enough to be selected for one of the two spots allocated to international artists to attend a fully sponsored two-week-long residency at Cerdeira Village in Portugal in association with the 2017 "Bichos" themed Elementos à Solta (Art Meets Nature) festival.  I will be working in ceramics with 3P QuickCure Clay both in the preceding days and as well as actively at the festival.

I am also very happy to share that I have additionally been chosen to attend a two-month-long residency at Intercambiador ACART in Madrid, Spain.  I previously studied abroad in Madrid in 2007, so it's been a decade since I've last lived there.  It will be nice to return as a more well-traveled and seasoned adult.  I will probably be working with a mix of 2D and 3D aspects.

I will do the two back-to-back, starting with Cerdeira Village and then heading to Intercambiador ACART.  It will be a very busy, very productive summer!

L'Est Eclair Newspaper Article Reviewing My La Maison Verte Exhibition

I'm so pleased - L'Est éclair not only chose The Slightest Disturbance as the illustrating artwork in their article about our upcoming exhibition at the Jardin Botanique de Marnay-sur-Seine, but their journalist who attended the show also highlighted my permanent door installation in her follow-up review of the exhibition!

Exhibition Photos from La Maison Verte Residency at the Jardin Botanique de Marnay-sur-Seine

Here are a few images from the La Mason Verte June 2016 Artists in Residence Exhibition I had in the Jardin Botanique de Marnay-sur-Seine.  My exhibition was entitled Garden Lore.  The door, obviously, is permanently installed, and was about 20 feet away from the display area I used for the rest of my pieces.  Note how the garden staff tidied up the door's surrounding area for the exhibition and added a permanent sign with my details on it!  Two of the photos below (the ones with a bit of an apricot tint) were taken by photographer Abril M. Barruecos.

La Maison Verte Travels Part 6

On Day 24, we went to Paris!  We had wanted to catch the 9:46am train, but when we got to the station it was canceled due to the strikes so we had to wait around for an hour to catch the 10:46am one.  Due to all the transit and weather issues, we all decided to stay overnight - I was coming back the next day, Ariel was staying another, and Melanie for yet another!  We arrived around noon, and the weather was cold with occasional bouts of rain.  Melanie and Ariel had to go to a photo processing shop, so we decided to all meet up for drinks at 5pm.  I wanted to just wander around a section of the city I'd read had interesting concept stores and a vegan burger bar, so I went there.  It was nice to walk around a big city again - it made me nostalgic for when I lived in New York City - but the weather was irregular and the store prices were all very high, and the Airbnb I booked had a check-in at 3pm so I basically poked my head into a few shops, ate a very nice vegan burger and fries, and then tried to figure out where I was staying.  I ended up getting a little lost but eventually found the place which while centrally located was itself on a mildly sketchy side street.  While I waited for the hostess to come let me in, a guy who presumably lived in a complex next to her building yelled at me in French and seemed like he wanted to fight but I just answered that I didn't speak French and ignored him.  He kept yelling and I got the sense it was quite nasty, but since I had no real reaction given that I wasn't actually sure what he was saying, he got bored and wandered off to engage a more responsive audience elsewhere.  My hostess then came down and got me, and once in her apartment it was really airy and nice.  I dropped off some of my stuff (I didn't need to schlep my toothbrush around for the evening) and went off to meet the other artists.  Both their boyfriends happened to be able to be there as well, so it was a nice opportunity to get to know each other better.

The following day I decided to visit the Catacombs.  I had been torn as to whether I wanted to commit to doing so, which meant I didn't buy tickets in advance.  I therefore had to pay my penance, which was waiting in line for 2 hours.  It was very interesting, though, once I got inside and after climbing down 130 stairs, walking the 1.2 miles of mine shaft and ossuary, and then climbing back up 83 stairs, I felt like I got a workout in!  I then had lunch at a nearby restaurant, followed by a street crepe, and then I decided that I wanted to see the Eiffel Tower again so I rode the Metro over to it.  The Eurocup 2016 is going on this month, and there were a ton of British and Polish fans milling about on the way to the tower.  And then I saw - the tower itself had a big inflatable soccer ball hung inside to celebrate as well.  After I walked to and from the tower I rode back to the Airbnb, picked up the rest of my stuff, and then went back to Marnay.

The next two days were entirely devoted to working in the studio.

Day 28 was the Fête de la Musique - an annual event celebrating music.  I worked in the studio in the morning, but in the evening we all went over to the fête.  I made popcorn on the cooktop then added some salt and brought this along with a bottle of wine; the popcorn was a huge hit.  I'd previously tried some other dishes, but I now understood the French way of slowly picking at things over the course of several hours so bringing something that stays tasty and is easily sharable yet also not brought by others is the way to go.  Ariel and her father Adrian played the guitar and sang a couple songs, and Erica sang a solo, a CAMAC artist did a poetry reading in Mandarin which was then laboriously translated into French by way of English, and a local resident named Cecil DJed.  Group songs were also sung by a number of the townspeople, and there was a fair amount of dancing.  A little girl gave me some leaves to put in my hair, which I did, and Patricia was so enamored of how it looked on me that she decided we'd all wear the leaves at our reception a few days later.

The next two days were again completely focused on studio work.

Then it was our exhibition day!  It felt like it came so fast; I had been working on the door this whole time and we finally installed it the morning of the exhibition.  It was nice to have it back in its home again.  I spent the day hurrying up and waiting; getting my pieces ready to go but having to wait for the space they were to be installed in to clean up, for instance.  Everyone (particularly Guillon, Patricia, and Kinga) was really kind in helping me set up.   By 4pm, everything was installed and we all went back to gather the special leaves to put in our hair, clean up, and get dressed.  The exhibition opened at 6pm, and Didiot gave a speech.  It went well, and Mathilde even bought five of my greeting cards to frame and hang in her properties!  I will make a separate post with images from the exhibition.

La Maison Verte - Artwork 7

My seventh piece at La Maison Verte was my intervention in the garden - my conversion of the water-pump door into a piece of artwork.  The door is 41x31x6" and is a mixed media installation including the original door materials, a poplar plank and back braces to replace the rotting base, 3P Quick Cure Clay, acrylics, screws, epoxy, and satin polyurethane.  It's titled Genius loci.  The piece is meant to be permanent, but of course the eye stalks and tentacles of the snail are relatively fragile so they may break if visitors to the garden are not gentle with it; that's in keeping with my overall message about the environment.  Nature provides us with so many rewards but in turn requires some human consideration and restraint.

Below is documentation of the project from start to finish!

And finally, a panoramic view to finish the post off:

Promotional Materials for La Maison Verte Exhibition

My group exhibition in the Jardin Botanique de Marnay-sur-Seine is almost upon us - it will take place in the garden on Friday, June 24th, at 6pm.  Patricia, Mathilde, and Didier have all assisted in putting together these materials advertising and discussing our work.

La Maison Verte Travels Part 5

Day 14 was sunny again!  I took a midday walk around the village to appreciate the weather, and as I was walking by a house, Erica (a transplant-turned-local orginally from Mexico) popped out to tell me about her bikes and how we at La Maison Verte should feel free to use them.  I then decided to pretty much invite myself into her garden to see it as the glimpses from the exterior of it were enticing, and then once in her garden her husband Morgan proffered some wine, and lunch... before I knew it, I'd spent the whole afternoon there, and gotten to sample homemade yogurt and rhubarb crumble (as well as veggies and salad) to boot.  Morgan then told me they were going to go wade around in some flooded road puddles later on and that I should come.  To be honest, it didn't sound that appealing but when in France...  I went.  At first we were supposed to walk but then everyone decided to ride bikes.  I am not great at riding bikes; I have one that I can just about get around on if I'm riding mostly flat streets, but it's a cushy bike that's been measured to my body, and I also haven't ridden on it for a few years now.  The bikes that are here are of random heights, hard seats, narrow wheels, and the terrain is variable.  I was not interested in riding a bike.  I thought I'd just bow out gracefully from the puddle-wading, then, but Morgan decided I would ride sidesaddle on the back of his bike instead.  It was hilariously awkward but moderately functional, so I just went with it.  The flooded road had a series of "puddles" that escalated quickly into pools and then frankly effectively turned into a stream.  We had a good time for a bit, but then the skies opened up and started raining hard.  And lightning followed, which freaked everyone out because we were all in water, surrounded by metal bridges.  So we all raced back.  The rain started to turn into hail, then rain, then hail.  It was a crazy but weirdly enjoyable end to the afternoon.

Day 15 was back to poor weather and I stayed inside working on artwork.

Day 16 Mathilde needed to go to Troyes to pick up some materials for the café she's constructing in the town (which will be the sole shop once it opens next year), so she brought us and Patricia along for the ride.  Troyes has a number of medieval churches, a tool museum that Patricia really likes, and is generally a nice small city.  We went to the biggest church, toured the tool museum, wandered about for a little while, and then all headed back.  I wanted to explore it more so I decided to head back soon.  Then I checked the weather forecast.  The only probably nice day was the following day; all the rest of the days in the extended forecast projected a lot of rain.

So on Day 17, I worked in the morning but went in the afternoon back to Troyes just to wander around for myself.  While at the train station, Mathilde was waiting to pick up some people from the other side of the tracks and we chatted across them talking about my visiting Troyes and my future plans for Paris until my train arrived.  I got on, and saw her through the window signalling NO, GET OFF!  I was so confused; I asked people on the train if this went to Troyes, and they said yes, but Mathilde was doing acrobatics on the other side viewable through the windows so I got back off, ran to the end of the train where there was a gap we could yell across, and she yelled, "That's not the train to Paris!" as the train made a noise that indicated it was about to leave.  I yelled back, "I'm going to Troyes!" and ran back to try to get the last door on the train to open.  I was in luck - I think perhaps the conductor saw the drama happening as I got a door open, stepped in, and the train immediately took off.  Since I'd been so cooped up in Marnay, it was nice to get to explore a new city on my own (and pop into some actual shops!).  Unfortunately, the prices on things here are really high.  I kept seeing things for 30 euros that would probably go for around 5-10 dollars in the US.

Day 18 was rainy again, as predicted.  Nonetheless, a British expat-turned-local named Andy had promised me he'd take me to a gorgeous botanical garden/greenhouse in a park in a town about an hour away called Sens, and we decided to go that afternoon.  Melanie joined us.  When we got to the park, there was about a fifteen minute walk inside to get to the greenhouses, and Andy was worried they'd be shut due to the weather (there was already some flooding in the park) but we figured we'd see when we got there.  Along the way, we got to see some white swans, geese, ducks, and then a black swan.  The black swan was such a character.  He knew he was beautiful, and wanted to be appreciated.  Once he saw us, he swam back and forth on a patch of stream like it was a catwalk, and he'd slow down and pirouette when he came to where we were to turn around.  We enjoyed the show for a while, and then tried to leave, but he moved the show up along with us like he didn't want us to go - but still with the overall affectation that he was deigning to display for us.  It was hilarious.  Melanie and I had to use the toilet, though, so we eventually left him and made our way to the WC.  I believe this was my first squatty potty.  I know I've seen them before, but I think I've never had the courage to use one until now.  They're actually quite easy to use, luckily!  Then we went into the greenhouses which were thankfully open.  They were really, really well put together.  There was an outdoor cactus and succulent section, a semi-tropical outdoor garden, an indoor cactus and succulent section, and a winding indoor tropical section.  I'd be happy to have the whole greenhouse transported to my house.  I knew more about all the plants than Andy and Melanie, so I told them trivia and then spotted some Mimosa pudica.  Neither of them had encountered the plant before (which I thought a little odd of Andy since it's a moderately common European houseplant) so they were thrilled to experience its sensitivity.  On the way back, Andy took a detour and showed us two local dolmens (one up close and the other from afar) dating back to the early Neolithic period.  They're like mini-Stonehenges, and it was really interesting to get to see them.  He also drove us past a menhir, which is a monolith from the same era.  This whole afternoon was a pretty much ideal excursion to my taste, so I was pretty satiated with my somewhat more eventful week and returned to the studio feeling much less cooped up.

Day 19 was entirely a studio day.  I sculpted with QCC on the door, which I'd finished preparing a few days earlier after finally getting Leo to fix the bottom of it, getting Kinga to loan me her scrapers, and after spending a long, hot afternoon myself scraping all the old paint off the door.

Day 20 was also committed to artwork.

Day 21 I mostly worked in my studio, but in the evening we took a quick trip over to the neighboring town of Saron-sur-Aube where we'd be participating in the Art & Jardins 2016 festival exhibition and sale.  We got to see some of the sites some other artists would be exhibiting in, and then got to visit the house we were displaying in so we could discuss who wanted what space and how we planned to exhibit.  I brought quite a large stack of my greeting cards with me since I knew I'd be participating in this, so hopefully they sell well!

Day 22 was another studio day.

Day 23 was primarily another studio day, but at 8pm we all went over to Mathilde's house for apéritifs and entrées (the latter of which, in French, means appetizer and not the main course) with many of the core group of friends (Erica, Guillon, Abril, Leo, Kinga, Patricia) and some new faces as well.  It was a lot of fun, and I learned I like prosecco!

La Maison Verte - Artwork 4

Here's my fourth piece!  It's titled Floating and is 3P Quick Cure Clay and acrylic on a 16x12" birch panel.  The whole thing is super shiny because I used a gloss varnish to seal and protect it, but I managed to get some images that aren't quite so glare-filled.  I also ended up gloss varnishing The Slightest Disturbance as well. 

La Maison Verte - Artwork 3 Progress Pics

I was much better about taking progress photos for this piece!  Here are some images documenting my process on Under the Bonnets.

La Maison Verte Travels Part 4

Day 9 was supposed to be Paris day, but after we woke up early and drove to Provins to catch the train in, it turned out that the train strikes canceled the train and the next one wouldn't be for three hours.  It was also pouring out.  So Paula canceled her doctor's appointments and I took a nap back at the house.  Paula and Adrian later went to pick up their daughter, Ariel, at the airport and said the weather was awful and there was a truck that went off the road into a ditch.  We later heard the Louvre and several other major institutions closed and were moving storage from basements.  So I went back to working in the studio!  I did get to meet Ariel that afternoon, which was lovely, and then even later that evening our final new resident, Melanie, arrived.  She'd gotten stuck in all of the train strike problems.

Day 10 I just kept trucking in the studio.  It was still raining.  I really can't emphasize the rain enough.  Lots and lots of rain.  It has been reported to be the rainiest May in France in a century.

Day 11 was a Saturday, so we went to the market in Nogent, and they were having a rose exhibition in the upstairs part.  It wasn't quite as wet out but it was enough so that it was about half the size of the previous week's market.  When we got back, I walked through the garden again and proposed my permanent intervention/installation idea to Patricia and Didier (the director of the Jardin Botanique).  They had asked me to consider doing one (or several) permanent alterations - either painting the bell-shaped cement pillars in the garden, doing murals on some exposed, irregularly shaped walls, or something else.  I had been mulling it over for a few days as none of their suggested options felt right for my delicate type of artwork.  I kept gravitating toward this small door surrounded by a wall of ivy - it felt intimate and its size and shape are more to my taste - plus it was made of wood so I could use the QCC on it if I wanted.  I explained that I wanted to sculpt/paint something on this door, and they agreed.  I had imagined awkwardly trying to do it onsite whenever the weather permitted, but Guillon, one of the workers at the garden, suggested he just take it off and bring it over.  That actually sounded like a much better idea!  Once he delivered it, he said Didier wanted Leo to fix the bottom of the door (which had rotten away a bit and was not structurally sound anymore) first.  I also needed to scrape off all the old paint as it was flaking away, so I needed to borrow paint scrapers.  I took a walk to CAMAC and had a great discussion with a creative writer and artist from Germany (though originally Taiwanese).  She had some amazing flipbooks she'd made, and had some really interesting insights into her practice.

Day 12 was brocante (flea market/boot sale) day in a semi-nearby town (it was about a 45 minute drive, I think?).  This day was thankfully not raining, so the brocante was actually on!  I did learn that it was not as big as it was supposed to be because some vendors were still concerned it might rain... but it was huge, nonetheless.  I was frankly unprepared for the scale of the thing; it just kept going on and on and on.  For about ten or twelve city blocks, I'd guess?  Most of the stuff on offer was pretty worn and/or not to my taste, but I did find a ridiculously loud, thin coat that I bought for myself and a very stern woman/cork bottle stopper.  In the evening I tried to hunt down Leo to ask him about the door (and the scrapers) but I couldn't find him.  I left a message with his mother that I was looking for him.

Day 13 it was actually sunny!  I walked around again - out to the storks, to recycle glass bottles from the house, through the garden - and just generally appreciated the better weather.

La Maison Verte Travels Part 3

On Day 4, Kinga stopped by with a heat gun that works very well, so I was able to continue to begin a couple pieces of artwork!  I took another walk through the Jardin Botanique and then worked in my studio until evening.  We had been invited to an annual neighborhood event starting at 7:30pm - the fête des voisins, known in the US as a block party.  Neighbors in the vicinity brought potluck dishes and beverages and we all doused ourselves in mosquito repellent and had a convivial gathering until the streetlights went out at 11pm.  I brought broccoli fritters and wine, but people didn't start eating until at least a half an hour after the start so my fritters cooled and weren't so tasty.  Other people made great food, though!  I also got to know a little bit better the villagers, though I am definitely hampered by my lack of French.  I had thought that most French would understand Spanish, as that's been my experience previously, but at least in this region if they know a second language at all it's a little English.  Which is of course welcome, but I am feeling the language barrier strongly compared to my travels in other countries.

Day 5 was market day in Nogent-sur-Seine, the nearby town with the train station and grocery stores.  Paula and Adrian were nice enough to let me tag along (and to wait for me since I was much slower given the newness of everything).  Market day is like a farmer's market plus a pop-up dollar store; I bought a new cardigan which has already proven to be a great purchase given this unseasonably cold and rainy weather, and I also bought some fresh produce and some desserts from the boulangerie (bakery) nearby.  They also drove me to the grocery store to get a few more staples; I then led four store clerks and a helpful English-speaking customer in a quixotic quest to find me popcorn kernels.  Apparently that's a really strange request; they sell buckets of carmel corn in the front of the store, but people don't make their own!  I personally really prefer very lightly flavored popcorn - just a little salt, usually - and everywhere else I've been that's an easy accommodation but apparently not here!  When I got back from shopping I was pretty exhausted.  I may have still had a little jet lag, plus I didn't get enough sleep the previous night.  Either way, I slept for the next few hours and then puttered around in the studio for the rest of the evening.

Day 6, Sunday, is brocante day in France.  Every Sunday during the summer a different town or two holds a brocante (basically a flea market or boot sale).  A large number of the locals go to these regularly; apparently it's the only way to buy dishes/bikes/easels if you're trying to save money.  I was warned that they're not worthwhile if it's raining, but Adrian and Paula wanted to go despite the weather so I tagged along.  It was enjoyable to see one, but the rain did deter most of the vendors from even attending and those that did quickly covered up (or just packed away) their goods right when we arrived as the rain picked up.  So it was mostly a soggy bust.  When we got back, more studio time!  The rain is annoying for excursions, but great for my studio practice...

Day 7 was Monday, a day when pretty much everything including the Jardin Botanique is closed in France.  It was also still raining.  I took a walk around the village despite the rain as I was feeling cooped up.  After visiting the storks and the town center, I inveigled my way into CAMAC, the other artist residency.  I explored the gallery (and saw an interesting sculpture of an elongated soccer ball which I enjoyed) and the studio of one of the artists, and then as I was heading back out that artist, Augustine, actually spotted me and invited me into his room.  He was leaving the next day (he was a May resident), so I was fortunate to get to see and discuss his artwork with him before he left.  While discussing his work, he asked me what I planned to work on and I brought up 3P Quick Cure Clay.  He was really interested, so I invited him back to my studio then and there since he was leaving the next day.  We acquired another interested artist-turned-temporary-CAMAC-cook, Sasha, and set off for my studio.  I showed QCC to them, and they both marveled at it - in fact, Augustine was super excited and interested in it and wanted some for himself.  I told him to give me his contact details and I'd pass along the website where he could buy it.  Augustine was also particularly enthusiastic about the two works-in-progress I had, which was very heartening.  Particularly since these type of heavy relief pieces are somewhat new to me, I'm not 100% certain of what I'm doing so hearing positive feedback was really nice.  They also gave me some constructive criticism, which I later incorporated into the piece and agree that it was helpful.

Day 8, Tuesday, was still very rainy.  I had breakfast and then spent most of the late morning and early afternoon planning what I wanted to do/see in Paris on Thursday, because Paula had to go into Paris that day for a doctor's appointment and so it would be a cheap and guided way to ease into visiting the city to go with her.  It is supposed to rain on Thursday, so though my first desire is to see the Jardin des Plantes and associated zoo, I decided to stick to more indoorsy activities.  I've already made the rounds of the tourist destinations (the Arc de Triomphe, Sacré-Cœur, the Eiffel Tower, Notre-Dame, and so on) so I'd like to get a more local taste.  I'm planning on hitting up some local markets and concept stores, and also hope to acquire more socks.  I only brought five pairs, and given the weather and the fact that Europeans eschew dryers, it's a bit of a problem.  After making all my plans, I realized I'd pushed lunch until very late and was starving.  I popped downstairs to urgently make food... and the gas was finished.  No more cooktop for me.  I walked over to the Jardin to ask if they could kindly switch the gas over, but when they came it turned out the other one was also empty and no one had bothered to refill it.  I was not amused, as I was at this point in full-on hangry mode.  Finally it turned out that the electric plate on the cooktop was still functioning, so I used that and satiated myself.  Then Patricia and I consulted on when I could go to the grocery store tomorrow, but it turned out that tomorrow was inconvenient for her so it would be better to go that evening.  So we went out to get more groceries (and stopped at a local hardware store to get spray varnish for me as well; I can never bring it because it's an aerosol) and while out she invited me over to dinner.  She also invited Andy, a British transplant to Marnay, and we had a very enjoyable evening - to the point where we outlasted the streetlights and Andy had to drive me the few blocks home because without the lights it was pitch black outside!

Upcoming: Residency at La Maison Verte

As you might have noticed in USM's recent press release about my upcoming exhibitions, toward the end of this month I'll begin a five-and-a-half week residency in the Pays'art program at La Maison Verte in Marnay-sur-Seine, France.  I'm very excited, as this residency takes place at the Jardin Botanique de Marnay-sur-Seine; I love working with plants both professionally as well as having a houseplant addiction, so this is a great fit.  La Maison Verte has a "Final Friday" opening each month, and so I will have an exhibition on June 24th.  In addition, they have arranged for the program's artists in residence to participate in Art & Jardins 2016 on June 25th and 26th.

If I have any readers who have experience with the region and can share any travel advice, I'd be grateful to hear it!

University of Saint Mary Press Release on My Early Summer Shows

The University of Saint Mary just published a new press release on my early summer exhibition schedule (though I have another application out, so I may have more to share coming up!).

Art Program Director Honored for Her Masterpieces

(Leavenworth, Kan.)—The University of Saint Mary Art Program Director Shelby Prindaville was recently selected for a solo exhibition in the All Souls Gallery at All Souls Unitarian Universalist Church at 4501 Walnut Street, Kansas City, Mo. The public is invited to an opening reception for the exhibit on Friday, April 22, from 6-7 p.m. Her work can be viewed in the gallery April 14-May 20, Monday through Friday 10 a.m.-4 p.m. and Sunday 9 a.m.-2 p.m.
 
Prindaville was also juried into the 47th Annual Smoky Hills Art Exhibition at Hays Art Center at 112 E. 11th Street, Hays, Kan. The annual exhibition is a statewide fine art competition open to any artist currently living in Kansas. Juror Mark Hartman selected Prindaville’s “Perspective” to be included in the show. The public is invited to view the piece, along with the other selections, from April 29-June 8. An opening reception and awards ceremony is scheduled for Friday, April 29, from 6:30-9:30 p.m.
 
“I am very pleased that my work is being recognized by each of these organizations,” said Prindaville. “I hope my art inspires viewers to reflect and deepen their connections with the natural world through my pieces' thematic exploration of environmental conservation and sustainability.”
 
In addition to both of these achievements, Prindaville was accepted to a summer artist residency program at Pays'art in La Maison Verte (The Green House) at the Botanical Garden of Marnay-sur-Seine in France. The residency will culminate in her onsite "Garden Lore" exhibition opening June 24.

To see her work, visit shelbyprindaville.com.

Tribeza Magazine's Article on Madroño Ranch's Artist Residency

"Ranch Refuge" is an older article, but for some reason I couldn't find a link to it online until recently (maybe Tribeza Magazine only publishes its archives online?) so I'm sharing it now.  This piece is about the Madroño Ranch artist residency - I attended it twice and my series of bison paintings stems from those residencies.  Here's my spotlight within the essay:

Many visitors find the bison inspiring. Artist Shelby Prindaville says, “The Madroño Ranch residency provided a wonderful opportunity for me to begin a body of work focused on bison, one of the quintessential American icons.” 

Madroño Ranch isn't currently open to new residents anymore so I feel doubly lucky I learned about and was accepted into the residency when I did.