artist presentation

My Upcoming Northwest Iowa Group Sierra Club Presentation!

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The Northwest Iowa Group Sierra Club invited me to give an artist lecture about my ecologically-focused studio practice at their upcoming Tuesday, March 28th meeting!

My presentation will be from 6-7pm with a Q&A and reception afterwards, as a small selection of my paintings and 100% wild, site-specific ceramics will be on display and I will offer prints, greeting cards, and magnets for sale. My friend and colleague Terri McGaffin will be giving my introduction and helped organize this event along with Jeanne Bockholt. I’m excited to share and discuss my work with this environmental conservation organization!

This event will be held at the First Unitarian Church located at 2508 Jackson St in Sioux City, IA. This programming is free and the public is encouraged to attend. 

(If you’re available earlier, they’ll be hosting a potluck from 5-6pm as well in the basement - I’ll be there too!)

La Pedrada de Noemi Residency Journal 6

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Sorry for the break in updates - I ended up being in several places without internet as I'll be discussing!  Anyway, back to the journal...

It turned out Sunday ended up not being so good for Sella either, and I had gotten wrapped up in a painting, so I had another studio day.  Then Monday was spent getting ready for the solo exhibition Noemi had arranged for me in La Casa Museo Orlando Hernandez (The Orlando Hernandez House Museum); we got the keys to the place from the local government and scoped it out, prepared the exhibition room, and got double-sided mounting tape to help secure my pieces to the walls.  Tuesday evening was my opening, but that morning Noemi had arranged for me to visit the northern part of the island's recycling center for a tour as a part of a group (she had originally planned to come as well, but ended up needing to sit for state exams that day).  I was a little skeptical of how interesting it would be and also had yet to install the artwork or shop for the reception refreshments, but Noemi said she thought it would take around an hour and really wanted me to go.  So I went!  It actually took three and a half hours, and only about half an hour of it was interesting (touring the actual facilities).  The other three hours involved watching videos and protracted lectures and Q&As about the importance and minutiae of recycling - in my case, at least, preaching to the bored choir.  But I got back with - just! - enough time to eat lunch, install my artwork, and run to SPAR to buy some refreshments.  The reception went well, and then the rest of the week I babysat the exhibition (with no internet) and started some new pieces from within the exhibition itself - a sort of performance art in its own way!  On Friday I did an artist lecture and a demo of QuickCure Clay, and then later on another exhibition opened up in an adjoining space, and their reception also flooded over into mine and I had a hopping second reception-of-sorts as well.

Over the weekend Noemi took me to the north to see the towns of Arucas and Gáldar, and we visited the Painted Cave museum, where we got a chance to glimpse aboriginal cave paintings from a carefully monitored chamber so as to attempt to preserve what's left of the paintings after severe degradation from tourists during the late 70's and 80's.  Noemi also thought I should try paragliding, so she arranged for a friend to take me up in a tandem parachute!  I'm up for new things, so I did it, and I'm glad I had the experience - but I didn't enjoy it very much.  I get pretty motion sick, and the turning and swooping set it off quite strongly.  I also got bored with it after the first few minutes - we just sort of looped back and forth over the same bit of land, and once I'd taken it in... the views were extremely similar to what you'd see out of an airplane, so it felt more normal than I would've thought.  I love scuba diving, though, and I know that is not everyone's bag, so I'm still pleased I gave paragliding a go.  On Sunday we visited the Maspalomas area so that I could see the sand dunes, which were beautiful, and I got a taste of the Maspalomas beach as well which is a tourist hotspot (it turns into Playa del Ingles, which is the most well known) and was absolutely crammed with people.  I prefer the beach at Las Canteras in Las Palmas or in Arinaga, honestly.  Then we went up to see Sella, finally, and her place was great!  She runs a retreat center called EcoTara where groups with instructors book in to run yoga and other health and lifestyle retreats.  We spent a lazy afternoon there, and the drives along the way both coming and going were spectacular as well.

Then we took my show down (the other exhibition in the adjoining space kindly babysat mine as well over the weekend), and I went down to Arinaga to rejoin Silviu, who had been busy scoping out opportunities for me to have a second exhibition down there, because he's just that lovely of a person.  We spent the next day figuring out where I'd have the second show, and La Canela y Hierbabuena said they'd love to have me.

Intercambiador ACART Residency Journal 2

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On Sundays in Spain, many shops are closed.  There is, however, a giant market that is held every Sunday called the Rastro.  It spans many city blocks, with tents selling various types of clothing, books, movies, magazines, antiques, jewelry, and more.  Various bars and bakeries in the Rastro stay open as well to cater to the crowd.  I told Fari we had to go there my first Sunday (which was my seventh day in Madrid), since she hadn't even heard of it.  We went to the La Latina metro stop on Line 5 of the metro, and entered the Rastro.  Fari thought she would want to shop for different things than I did, so we set up a time to meet back at the metro stop and then parted ways.  Since I knew I would come back perhaps every Sunday or at least several more, I mostly just browsed and took stock of what was offered in multiple places and what was more unique.  By the time we met back up, I'd only purchased a small antique Spanish tile - I spent six euro on it.  Fari had purchased a few things, though, including a decorative Indian sheet, a pair of pants, and a loose housedress.  I had gotten to our meeting place slightly before her and had time to check my phone for any vegetarian-friendly places nearby, so for lunch we went to a small place called Pura Vida.  I really liked it - they give you a free tapas plate of vegetarian paella with a drink order and we also split a trio of salads with bread.  

The following day was when Intercambiador ACART held our artist presentations, wherein interested members of the public can come listen to us talk about our artistic practices.  Fari and I were joined by a South American artist named Tamara who has a studio space in the newly opened studio we visited a few days previously.

After another day in the studio (I'd spent a fair amount of time there already in the previous days), Fari and I took a day trip to Toledo.  I've been there before back in 2007, but it was great to see it again.  We spent most of the time there taking in the huge cathedral (with artwork by a number of great artists including El Greco), eating lunch, and just wandering and shopping around the streets between the cathedral and the downtown square.  Fari and I ate and shopped independently, mostly because she was starving and left the cathedral earlier than I wanted to so she could get food.  I ate at a vegetarian restaurant called Madre Tierra which I had googled, and had a very experimental salad with a frozen goat cheese that basically tasted like normal ice cream.  It was interesting and I am glad for the experience but I wouldn't reorder it!  We did manage to quickly poke around the monastery right toward the end, though, and there was some sort of honoring of recent doctoral candidates happening which was quite neat.  Neither Fari nor I are great with directions, though, and we also had to locate and catch a bus back to the train station, so we headed back.  In the end, we didn't get lost and we caught our bus right away, so we got to the train station way too early - a little less than two hours early!  But our feet were sore, most of the tourist attractions and even some of the shops start to close around when we left anyway, and it's better to be early than miss your train!

Cerdeira Village Residency Journal 6

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Starting on Wednesday through Friday, artists piled into the shared house Julia and I were staying in so that they could set up for the festival (which officially began on Thursday but really truly started on Friday).  In the end, I think we housed more than 16 people in the house, and 7 in our room!  It was really packed and we had to take shifts in the kitchen.  The festival, called Elementos à Solta (Art Meets Nature), took place throughout the village from Thursday through Sunday and involved ceramics as well as fiber arts, wooden pieces, motion-sensing installations, and more.  There were additionally workshops for art novices in the mornings and scheduled theatre and music performances in the evening.  I really enjoyed a stage performance by eight ceramic artists; it was the first theatre piece I've seen that was really nevertheless as much a studio art performance piece.

Many of the displaying artists come to the festival every year (and this was the festival's twelfth year) so they all knew each other very well, but they were also extremely welcoming to Julia and me.  I found a mix of Spanish and English tends to be decently understood by most Portuguese speakers, which was helpful.  We were provided meals during the festival (usually on the residencies I attend you make your own food) and the cooks very kindly made vegetarian fare available each time, which I found very thoughtful.

The festival wound down on Sunday, and Julia left early that afternoon (her installation will remain up until nature has its way with it - perhaps through the winter!) after we finished our scheduled artist presentation.  I grew very close to Julia during our time there, and it was very sad to have her leave.  It also meant my own time to leave was drawing near; I had decided to take a bus from Coimbra to Madrid the following morning.  I had planned to try to use a sort-of legitimized hitchhiking (car-sharing) service, but no one was making the trip the day I needed to go.  I then considered flying, but within-Europe flights don't provide any free checked or carry-on luggage beyond a small bag, and I have two big suitcases with me so it would have been too costly.  The bus was only a few hours longer and was significantly cheaper.

Packing my sculptures took about two hours; I actually packed them about three times trying to get the packing materials to support and protect the pieces.  I have no idea if the sculptures' fragile branches will be in fragments by the time they reach the US; I tried my best, though!  I needed to mail them from Portugal because since I had two suitcases and a backpack already, I didn't have the hands to also carry a large box along.  On Monday morning, Nuno and I went to the post office and mailed my box out (fingers crossed!) before he dropped me off at the bus station.  The trip from Coimbra to Madrid was thankfully uneventful, and the bus driver of the second bus (we had to change buses very early into the trip to connect with the Spanish line) stopped several times such that we could avoid using the bus toilet - I was very appreciative of that!  We did stop at the Spanish border and police came aboard and checked passports; I was a little surprised about this because one of my international students said the borders are not really controlled for ground traffic between EU countries.

Newspaper Articles in Catalan about Bòlit Artist Presentation

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Somewhat belatedly, I thought I'd share two newspaper articles published in the Diari de Girona in Catalan about the artist presentation I took part in at the Bòlit Centre d'Art Contemporani in Girona, Spain.  

Els quatre artistes becats pel Bòlit amb residència presenten els projectes

Un becat pel Bòlit «reviurà» cinc edificis desapareguts de Girona