If you're local, go check out the Lawrence Art Guild's Holiday Fair tomorrow. Along with tons of other artists, Sweet Husband and our good friend Calley will have a booth with lots of pretty jewelry for you and yours!
Please head over and check out my friend Calley's new website Calley Mae. She makes gorgeous haircombs and wooden jewelry out of some really unique types of wood. (Which made taking pictures of it all super fun for me!) Although there isn't a whole lot for sale yet in her shop, I 'spect there will be more soon. Really, go see.
We spent the afternoon at the "Bodies Revealed" exhibit that's currently at Union Station in Kansas City. In case you haven't read about it before, the exhibit shows the insides of actual bodies that have been preserved by, essentially, removing all the water and replacing it with a plastic.
My favorite "aha!" moment was when I saw a healthy brain, next to one that had Alzheimer's. The Alzheimer's brain was significantly shrunken--about a third of the size of the healthy one--I just hadn't ever thought about it that way.
In general, it was surprising to me, but seeing the bodies actually made me a little queasy. It's weird to think of yourself that way--bones, tissue, nerves. As the subtitle of the exhibit suggests, it is fascinating, but at the same time it was also a little gross. I guess I didn't realize just how real it would be. Before seeing the exhibit, I could have imagined donating my body for a project like that. After seeing it, I can categorically say I would not donate my body for such a display. It's hard to explain logically, but it almost felt like a violation--like we were seeing parts that ought to remain private?
Overall, I'm glad we went to see it. But it certainly made me think more than I thought it would.
The other day these wonderful adult merit badges (made by designer Lee Meszaros) popped up on my Google reader. The three pictured are for "Being a Straight Shooter", "Going Out On a Limb", and "Rolling With the Punches", but there are others for things like "Having Meat On You Bones", "Taking the Cake", and "Cutting It Close".
The badges got me thinking about how we regularly give children awards and certificates for learning new skills, but--once you get that last diploma--recognition for the lessons we acquire as adults is much more rare.
So, for this week's poll:
How do you think it would change your interactions with people if we were all required to wear merit badges showing the adult life lessons we've learned? What are three merit badges you've already earned? One you still need to earn? One you'd give to someone else?
Comment and discuss.
It could be my rabid crafty kick. It could be that it's nasty outside. It could be that it's been a slow week.
Whatever the cause, I have spent the past 48 hours freaking obsessed with etsy.
For the uninitiated, etsy is a website where people can buy and sell handmade items. Everything must largely be the work of the person selling it, and no mass produced items are allowed. The result is a very artsy, fun, and neat little marketplace.
My very favorite local artist, Rachael Sudlow, has a little shop. I'm getting some great ideas for felted bead necklaces here and here. This little heart would be the most perfect thing ever for Valentine's Day. And I just bought the pendant pictured above from Littleput Books. (Her little recycled scrabble tiles are so pretty, it took me almost an hour to pick the one I wanted.)
I'm usually so against promoting the accumulation of stuff--'cause don't we all have enough?--but today I'm making an exception. For this week's poll:
Do a search on etsy--you can search by category, location, or even color, but personally I'm a big fan of the "pounce" feature. Leave a link below to one thing you absolutely love and tell why.
Comment and discuss.
Today's Christmas fun was the 13th Annual Gingerbread Festival and Auction. It works pretty much the same way the Festival of Trees did--people give a small donation to get in to see the houses, then eventually the houses are auctioned off with proceeds going to Big Brothers/Big Sisters.
There were graham cracker houses made by little kids, log cabins made of pretzels, some very pretty sugar stained glass, and even a few Lawrence landmarks. It totally inspired me to make a gingerbread house this year. More pictures (including a few of Sweet Husband's booth at the Holiday Art Fair) are here.
If you're local be sure and stop by Sweet Husband's "Oread Designs" booth at the Lawrence Art Guild Holiday Art Fair.
The Fair runs from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. tommorrow at the Lawrence Arts Center which is at 940 New Hampshire Street.
Sweet Husband and I took a country drive to Pendleton's Market today to see the newest bit of work by crop artist, Stan Herd.
This particular piece is a gigantic version of one of the new stamps issued by the U.S. Postal Service celebrating pollinating insects. It features a Southern Dogface butterfly.
I wish we could have made it out to see it last weekend when they were doing the first "unveiling" because they had a 40 foot lift, and I think we would have been able to see it better from higher up. Even from the little side tower that was there it was still pretty cool though.
Here's a news article with a better picture and more info.
This evening Sweet Husband and I went to the opening of Stephen Johnson's "Abstract Alphabet" exhibit at the Spencer Museum on KU campus. As I may or may not have said before, my general criteria for good art is stuff that makes me smile. And in that regard the alphabet was definitely a success.
As we walked up to the museum, there were adults and kids making brownie sundaes (with sprinkles!) in tents on the front lawn, and brightly colored hula hoops were scattered about. The first piece inside the door was a set of painted, curvy spoons (for the letter "S") set vertically on square and round blocks. But further in was my favorite--"Meditation on the Memory of a Princess"--a gigantic, pink, 8 layer, air mattress tribute to both "the princess and the pea" and the letter "M". Very fun!
The exhibit runs through August 5, so if you're local go check it out.
I was running errands on my lunch hour the other day, when I saw a man on a corner selling flowers from a cart. I stopped and picked out some beautiful variegated daisies.
Later on, finding myself a little bored, I started picking the petals off of one and realized they'd make a great subject for s'more "scanographs". There are a few more of the daisy here, as well as a few of the little "Iron Cross" begonia that also lives in my office.
Over my lunch break today, I ventured out into the rain to see an exhibit called "The Last Supper: Final meal Requests of U.S. Death Row Inmates”. Julie Green, the artist, began the project in 1999 after being disturbed that the last meal requests of death row inmates were published in the newspaper. According to what appears to be her website, to date 234 plates are complete, and every death penalty state is included. Her site also says:
"Because of the content, The Last Supper is challenging to produce and may be challenging to view. While painting, I think about the death penalty, the victims, the heinous crimes committed, the individuals executed, the large number of minorities on death row, and the margin for error in judicial process. I think about food, choice, and whether inmates are able to eat the food they order. Specific food requests, often regional specialties, sometimes tell where the individual lived and may provide clues on the one’s race and economic level. Inmates in some states are limited to food available in the prison kitchen. There is a great deal of red meat but few lobsters, and no sushi or Godiva chocolates."
I absolutely love the concept of this exhibit. Whatever your opinion is about the death penalty, I think we do ourselves a disservice by de-humanizing criminals in general and death row inmates in particular. It's easy to say that X-convict did such and such and is therefore a monster and not fit to live; it's much harder, but much more honest, to realize that he or she is a person--a person who has done horrible things, no doubt--but a person all the same. And I think it's easier for the rest of us to identify with someone who likes Coke or (as on one of the plates I saw today) pickles.
As much as I liked the idea however, I didn't care for the way it was carried out. The monochromatic paint (Sweet Husband said it's called "China Paint") made it difficult to make out exactly what some of the requested food was, and the whole thing had a kind of junior-high art student feel to it. I did like the way the plates were displayed though--as I stepped back to look at them all as a whole it really struck me that each one represented a person.
Regular readers will by now be thinking, "OK, OK, art-shmart--is there a Wednesday poll question coming soon?" Ah, but there is--have you guessed it already? For this week's poll:
If you knew you were going to die at midnight tonight, what would your "last supper" be?
Comment and discuss.
Sometime this summer, I was at the frame shop waiting my turn when I noticed that the lady* in front of me had a very interesting little print. When I asked, she said it was a photo she had taken herself. Turns out she was a local artist whose latest project was taking pictures of cows in such a way that they looked like landscapes. Being a big fan of art that makes people smile, I thought her "cowscape" was charming.
So, when I was surfing through the paper this morning and saw that even more of her cows were going to be part of tonight's downtown gallery walk (article here), I decided I needed to go see some moo...er, um, more.
The slide show doesn't really do the cows justice. Up close (and 5 times the size of course) you can really suspend reality and see the cow as a prairie landscape. The hairy texture looks like exotic grass with a wide blue sky background. They were gorgeous, I only wish she would do more.
(*My mysterious bovine-loving, frame-shop lady's name is Rachael Sudlow. In addition to her cow pictures, she also sells jewelry.)
Sweet Husband, Nice Redhead Friend, and I braved the ice and snow today, to go to one of the neatest art exhibits I've been to in quite awhile. The artist's name is Bill Bowerman, and he uses found objects and various lighting techniques to make beautiful "scanographs" (Check out just a few of the things that were in the exhibit here, and an online chat with Bowerman here).
Of course, when I got home I just had to try it for myself--mine aren't nearly as cool as "the Scan Man's", but I really had fun trying. This paperwhite blossom is one of the things I made, and here are a few more. I think the biggest challenge was keeping the scanner bed clean--that and finding things that scanned well (for example, some loose tea that I tried just ended up looking blah). But overall, I was pretty pleased with some of my results, and I can't wait for gardening season--this is definitely going to put a new angle on things!
This ring (made by Sweet Husband) was one of 70 pieces out of about 300 chosen for a student show at the Birger Sandzen Memorial Gallery in Lindsborg, Kansas.
We drove to Lindsborg this past weekend for the show closing--more pictures are here. I have to confess, I was a little disappointed in Lindsborg itself. Everyone kept saying it was such a cool little town, but I didn't think it was much different from any other.
This weekend was Sweet Husband's Senior Show--here are the pictures. And he made the paper even.
If you're around Lawrence this weekend, you should come to Sweet Husband's show. I have some pictures of his work posted here, and here are the details for the show....
These are two of Sweet Husband's projects. One is a picture of a real object, the other is a computer rendering--the object itself doesn't exist. Can you tell which is which? Leave your guess in a comment if you'd like, and I'll post the answer in a few days.
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