Art and practice.

Speaking of books, another book I have been reading is Buddha mind in contemporary Art, a collection of essays and interviews regarding the relationship of Buddhism to art making and artworks.  There are so many valuable and inspiring commentaries by artists, critics, curators, and just art "people "in this book that it is difficult to choose one idea to share here.  I picked up the book because of a curator I liked - a few of his writings I'd read just rang true to me.  I've  always been interested in Buddhism, so this book has proven inspiring to me as it addresses, from various points of view, the  remarkable similarity between mindfulness practice and art making.

When I was in college, I studied printmaking and fiber arts as I was magnetically pulled toward those  repetitive disciplines.   Much like my love for running as exercise, hiking, and other sustained, contemplative activities, I was unaware of how my art-making resembled mindfulness practice and pointed to my essential desire to create space in my own mind and cultivate the mental state of flow.

 Upon introduction to meditation technique, I realized my art making was so similar. I also realized my art making could provide context and  inspiration for mindfulness as the end result is a product that continues to exist beyond my own contemplative practice. So I started to make  art, however sophomorically, that pointed toward these ideas I was learning in a novice Buddhist study.  I still love many of those well intentioned works.

In my recent years of having stepped away from the art community, I find (through reading, art making and learning new art 'languages' such as piano and Spanish),  that my mindfulness practice is stronger and more important to me than ever.  As a student, I was not fully aware of the potential for mindfulness practice in my art making, but over time I see there is always an unfolding realization of this essential aspect of my work.   Perhaps the only purpose of art making for me is to cultivate and present the possibility for mindful living.

Current progress in my time of slow contemplation of my marriage, the "spending time" that is "us" and that unequivocally builds my awareness for our growth (with all it's rises and pitfalls) as partners.

Tinnient Campana... public.

Completed throughout last summer, installed in 2 exhibitions last Fall and installed early January 2013 in Russel Christopher Hair Salon - Tinnient Campana. 

click on images to view larger

This sculptural installation of 99 bells engages the viewer's own sensory knowledge and curiosity.  To engage a bell is intuitive despite the Bell's ongoing antiquity and gradual obsoletion. 

The spatial relationship one has when near a bell is often magnetic as we are drawn to hear its tone and resonance.  Each bell is completely unique and offers the classically peaceful experience of hearing sound and feeling subtle vibration.

So thankful to Russ and Shannon to have this lovely black wall to install these bells.
Visit the salon to see the installation at 3221 E. Colfax Ave. Denver, CO 80206.
Tinnient Campana is available for purchase; if interested, please inquire.

October and November

I got busy.
busier than normal and then I had to decompress after all the business.

Most of October I did one of 3 things: Worked at Pablo's coffee where I always work on the weekends, worked weekdays at the Museum of Contemporary Art Denver where I do install on contract a few times a year, and worked on a large cross-stitch.  I also spent a few days with my amazing, artful friends, Nina and Craig who visited from Wisconsin and I also did the work of GroundSwell Gallery because we had another opening (as we do every month).  Here are a few notable pictures from that time:

MCA's Postcript show up through Feb. 3, I helped hang the many grid layouts

Lindsay St. Antoine opened at GroundSwell Gallery Nov. 10,  I bought this painting.

field trip to Clyfford Still Museum with Christian, Nina and Craig.

Pablo's Coffee...  mmm, latte.  I can sling a lot of lattes in 5 - 7 hours

This is the project that it's been all about for the last 8 months.  Showing one more week at Redline Gallery for the Art by Craft exhibit. (click image to see full size)

The month of October was especially important for completing this cross stitch project.  Spending Time, a double portrait of my husband and myself created from a photograph that I took and then pixilated.  Each stitch recreates the image pixel by pixel.  Formally, this work nods to early American needlework and the tedious work of commemorating family through stitches.  Conceptually, the sustained work of cross stitching over 8 months, spending time with the image of us together, builds to a meditative practice.  I felt the work became compulsive as the deadline for the Art by Craft exhibition neared, though I doubt it would have been so, had there not been a deadline.  This piece is immediately very personal to me.  Maybe that's obvious, but unlike other artwork that I have made, I feel more protective and private about this.  I want it to be as simple as it is and as monumental as it is without elaboration.

Also installed at this exhibition, the Tinnient Campana installation (previously installed at Forest Room 5 in September). 

Tinnient Campana also on view at Redine through Nov. 29 (click image for full size)

This artwork refers to the proliferation of ring tones without bells in modern culture.  The bell itself (like latin and other obsolete forms of communication have done) is gradually becoming a lesser known object or tool for communication.  Lovely in tactile forms and unique resonances, I wanted to make the bells for this installation out of adoration for the antiquated object and recognition for its outmoded-ness highlighted by our dear cell phones.  Tinnient Campana literally means, ring the bell, and our unknowing of that meaning may leave us hesitantly reaching for the bell as though to ring it, unsure of our intuition.

This installation is difficult to photograph because it is about 25 ft. long in total.  Eventually, my website will be updated to include best images.

Last note:  Because I needed to get back to it, a thank you to Mark Bystrom for noting that my blog has been ignored since early September.