The Hunger Curios

As a child I loved the Mother West Wind Stories by Thornton Burgess.  At the time I was not aware of the social commentary going on in the tales of these animals.  As an adult I found many references to topics like hunger.  I made this artist-book based on four of those references.

You can click on each picture to see an enlargement.

The Hunger Curios, view 1

The book is meant to be experienced (like a cabinet of curios) as well as read.

Incorporated in The Hunger Curios are four smaller books of collages with quotations from Burgess’ work.

Getting into the book

It is important to me that my book not be an illustration of Burgess’ work.  It is more a visual rumination based on some of Burgess’ thoughts.

As a digital artist, I find that I do not want to abandon the old ways.  Curious fact:

• digit |ˈdijit|
  noun
  1 any of the numerals from 0 to 9, esp. when forming part of a number.
  2 a finger (including the thumb) or toe.
  • Zoology an equivalent structure at the end of the limbs of many higher vertebrates.
  ORIGIN late Middle English: from Latin digitus ‘finger, toe’; sense 1 arose from the practice of counting on the fingers.

So while digital refers to counting on the fingers and toes, it can also mean something that you make with your fingers (and – presumably – your toes).  I feel at home in either world.

The experience of making the collages was liberating.  I had a bunch of old prints which I tore up and put back together heedless of the thought process.  Fast and dirty.  But since the old prints were printed on heavy watercolor paper, the ink cracked and seams broke open when I tried to make the accordion folds.  So I then scanned the collages and printed them on long-fiber Japanese paper, and lo….they were manageable.

Just as in childhood, I had to put the books away when Mother called.  So here is The Hunger Curios back in its cabinet.

If you wish to read through the small books, go to www.jandove.com/index.php/artist-made-books/the-hunger-curios

Oola and I will be taking off in Mom’s Memorial Prius to attend a wedding in Texas.  I am planning on sending you a drawing or photograph a day.

Another Trip to Blue

Oola in her prom dress

Once again Oola dons her celebratory prom dress.  We have been awarded an artist residency at Blue Mountain Center in upstate New York this summer.  Oola is practicing her imaginary canoe to get in shape.  This time we won’t forget the swim suits!

I am planning to do something of an artist book/installation in the woods.  Without Oola…..just me and the bears…..

We’ll keep you in the loop.  Does an artist make books in the woods?!

Fourth Street Studios

Within the memory of living artists there  exists the dregs of an attitude toward photography that said, photography is not Art.  It is merely a technical production of an image.  Painting is “Art”.  This attitude has fortunately waned.

And I remember an art professor who insisted that etching was art, but silkscreen was not, because the ink in silkscreen sat on the surface of the paper while etching ink sank so luxuriously into the paper.

Nowadays there is a prejudice that sees only the “traditional” printmaking techniques as valid High Art, while art that is produced on the computer is supposedly not Art.  Ghosts of “giclee”, fugitive color issues, and the use of digital printing to simply reproduce images made in “traditional” media still dog the artist who creates images by digital means.

Well, Oola and I are here to tell you that “Art” is not about what materials or equipment are used.  Art is not even about the product.  Art is about the process of bringing an idea, or a nagging question, or a screech from the amygdala to life.  Or maybe it is just about the need to metaphorically scratch an itch.

We went to see three artists in the Fourth Street Studios in Berkeley who make art-prints by means of the computer.

You can click on any image below to see an enlargement that reveals more detail.

Kristin Doner

Kristin Doner makes her digital images by copying her finger prints on the scanner as the light moves under the glass.  She riffs on these fragments digitally, making abstract images of both delicacy and strength, and as the name “Wabi-Sabi” implies, elegant impermanence.  To see and read Kristin’s explanation of her process, see her blog http://kdstour.wordpress.com

Kristin Doner, from the Wabi-Sabi Ikebana series

From a distance Matthew Silverberg’s HUUUUUGE prints look like glowing light, enough light that they are their own contexts.

Matthew Silverberg

Then, when you get close to them you see myriads of stringed textures, like the “skeins” of thread or yarn implied in their titles.  If you know something about Photoshop you will recognize the work of combining many, many layers and modes.

You can see more of Matthew’s “Skein” series at www.matthewsilverberg.com/pages/wop_skein.html.

On the more photographic side of digital expression, Joanna Ruckman has created a marvelous series from her inheritance of her grandmother’s aprons.  The tales hidden in these digital composites are fascinating and moving.  Just bring your own experience and your imagination to her work.

Joanne Ruckman

I love this image for its reduction to absolute essentials: light and a breeze animating an apron, breathing memories to life. In Joanna’s words  “…memories are woven in to familial artifacts while exploring cultural boundaries and American tradition.”

Joanna Ruckman  – from the “Apron” series.

See more of this remarkable series at http://www.joannaruckman.com

So, like the Mysterious One says, “It ain’t the instrument, it’s the music you make with the instrument.”  Oola says that a teacher once told her not to say “ain’t”.  So Oola says to tell you this:  “Ain’t, Ain’t, Ain’t.”

Oola’s Reception

Oola had a celebratory evening.  Jerry Adams Gallery, Berkeley City College, 3/13/13.

Oola and Friends

Oola, unPhotoshopped

Oola and Friends

Hot dog hors d’oeuvres with yellow mustard for Oola’s friends.

Lee laughing

The Wild Card makes music.

Oola, the Prez, and the Chairman

Tao

A quiet moment

Students studenting

Sabrina

Oola surprises Lee

Oola can dance.

Lilia

Photos by Minoosh Zomorodinia

A grand time was had by all. The hot dogs were yummie too.

You can see enlargements and/or a slide show by clicking on any image.

Trip to Lafayette and Mighty Fine Guitars

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The smell of French Polish lingers in the studio, and The WildCard has finished a second Octave mandolin.  This is the sister of Octave Mando 1 which currently can be seen at Thin Man Strings, in Alameda, CA.

Octave Mando front

Octave Mando, back

Octave Mando tail piece

Octave mando side

A click on any picture will lead to an enlarged version.  Right click on the slide show images above for enlargements.

Today we travel out to Lafayette to Mighty Fine Guitars to try to find a home for this dark beauty.

This time the three of us will travel by BART.  It’s a smooth, comfy ride out of the big city into suburbs tucked into the rolling green hills.  It will get hotter’n Hades this summer, but today is a beautiful California spring day.

A short walk from the Lafayette BART station is  a place for some of the finest handcrafted guitars you will ever experience.

It was a short walk but Oola needs a rest.

None of the testosterone induced, amplifier busting Wha-Wha of other guitar stores I have had the misfortune to enter.  Everything here is centered on the beautiful woods and sounds of individually hand built acoustic guitars.  The store is a treat to the eye, and the guitars are works of art.

Stevie Coyle is a musician, teacher, and the owner of this wonderful little store.  Here he is, listening to the tones of  Mr. WildCard’s octave mando.

Stevie Coyle, trying out WildCard’s Octave Mando

I love the look musicians get when they are checking out a sound.  It is like the look my students used to get when they learned to remove all impediments to actually Seeing the object they were drawing – all the protective veils pulled away – it was like they allowed their eyes to become vulnerable.  In the musician I can see the direct connection they have to the sound of the instrument they are fondling.  And it is a beautiful thing.

The treat in the guitar store is to (first ask permission) take a guitar off the wall and admire in from every angle, then play it.  Here is Oola with an eye-popper named “Cubist” from Michael Dunn, of Canada.  Notice how the sound hole is in two parts.  And – I loved this – there is a long skinny sound “hole” on the back which is made from overlapping layers of wood.

Oola admires Michael Dunn’s “Cubist” guitar

In this store it is not surprising to have some of the greats among the instrument makers show up.  On this particular day Butch Boswell came into town from San Luis Obispo.

Butch Boswell and WildCard’s Octave Mando

Here you see that look again.  Butch plays the mando beautifully, and this instrument jumped to life in his hands. Below Butch listens to an exquisite little parlor guitar made of maple by John How from Cool, CA.

Butch Boswell with a guitar by John How

It is hard to leave the sights and sounds of a great guitar shop, but we had to head home.  If you wish to see and/or try out Mr. WildCard’s octave mando, or the other fine instruments, visit Mighty Fine Guitars, Wed-Sun 11 am – 7 pm,

85 Lafayette Cir
Lafayette, CA 94549

(925) 268-8226.

To see the workshop where Mr. WildCard makes his instruments go to http://jandove.wordpress.com/2011/06/13/trip-to-berkeley-wildcard-guitars/

To visit the WildCard Guitars website: http://www.wildcardguitars.net

On the way back we stopped at the Crosses of Lafayette protest site. In 2006, as we were discovering how many American men and women were dying in Iraq, Jeffrey Heaton and volunteers  began hammering memorial crosses into this hillside owned by Louise Clark.  Islamic Crescents and Stars of David joined the crosses.  This war protest suffered vandalism in the horrible days when to question the whole debacle was to be “disloyal”, but the protesters restored it.  Now, as Americans are being moved away from that particular mode of violence named the Iraq War, the project remains to remind travelers on BART and on Hwy 24 of the 6,702 who died.

The Lafayette crosses from BART

The Lafayette Crosses, and Crescents, and Stars of David

In the McArthur BART station, the flower vendor reminds me that there is still hope for us humans.

Oola vs the Forces of Evil and Dismay

Click on the card to see a larger version.

Following on the chicken/egg question – and along the lines of  “Does language express our concepts, or does language create our concepts” – in this body of art and tomfoolery Jan asks “Are images the result of our perceptions, hopes, and fears, or do images create and perpetuate our cultural/social experience.”  How important is “High Art” and what is it doing to us?  Oola takes on all questions in her own inimitable style.

Oola rides again.  And there will be hotdogs with yellow mustard at her reception!  All welcome!

http://www.jandove.com/index.php/oola

To San Francisco and the Balclutha

Today we’re all taking a break and a trip on a San Francisco Bay Ferry to the San Francisco Maritime National Historic Park where we will visit the Balclutha.  Oola is awake annoyingly early, and eager to go.  The One who would be Mysterious is always up early.  Her royal highness the cat never deigns to be annoyed, but she would never get on a ship.  So that just leaves me to be annoyed.

But the day is beautiful, not even really cold.  So we all head over to Jack London Square to catch the ferry.  This is a very busy harbor, and we watch the modern loading of container cargo on a huge cargo ship.

Loading Cargo, a truckload at a time.

It leads one  to think about the basic shape of a ship and give thanks that the whole thing does not usually tip over and sink.

The ferry boat ride is a smoothey. The Mysterious One likes the boat’s indoor accommodations while Oola and I want to ride outside.

Oola waves to Bird Man

Oola and the SF skyline

She jumps up on a bench to get a good look at the SF skyline (behind you, Oola).

After disembarking there is a short walk to the Maritime Park along what used to be a rough part of town called the Barbary Coast where able young men used to get – among other things – Shanghaied.

Of course we have to stop in the Musée Mecanique. The mysterious one thinks this stop alone is worth the price of the trip.  It certainly feels a lot cleaner than it did the last time I was here.  And some of the more sinister aspects of the collection seem to be gone.  Oola likes the fortune tellers.  She thinks she will apply for the job.

Musee Mechanique, fortune teller

But I prefer Laughing Sal – something so perverse about her.  In 2003 so much was I fascinated by her that she became the center of one of my  short After Effects projects — back when I was studying such things.

Laughing Lady  This link will take you to the animation.

But it is early.  Not many visitors yet,  and the quarters are not exactly flowing into the machines.  It is still and quiet.

Another attraction on the way is the pier with the WWII liberty ship, the Jeremiah O’Brien, and submarine, the USS Pampanito.  Again, too many choices, but Oola wants to be part of the scene.

Oola as Rosie the Riveter

Now this is the Fisherman’s Wharf, so there is lots of classy stuff for sale:

Tourist trinkets

But, really! This store must be doing well, it is in such an elite part of town.  Did the owner THINK about the message (Hook, knife, gun, canons)?;  Who wrote the Business plan for this one?

Bay Company

Finally, we walk into the morning sunlight of the Hyde Street Pier, and we are greeted by the sight of Dolphin Club swimmers in the 50° SF Bay water, getting ready for the Polar Bear Swim. Get thee hence, you all-too-vivid imagination.  I am cold just remembering it.  These guys are SERIOUS.

Ahead of us is

the Balclutha.

The Balclutha when she was called the Star of Alaska, sailing the salmon route between SF and Alaska.

She is a three-masted, steel-hulled, square-rigged ship built to carry a variety of cargo all over the world. Launched in 1886 near Glasgow, Scotland, the ship carried goods around Cape Horn 17 times. It took a crew of about 26 men to handle the ship at sea with her complex rigging and 25 sails.  Click here for an entertaining account of life aboard the Sailing Ship.

Figure Head

Center Mast

sail stitching

rope

rigging

more rigging

Click on thumbnails to see larger versions.

Galley

Cramped, dark and dangerous.  How would you like to cook in here?  It still smells of ‘ duff like lead, beans like bullets, tea and coffee bewitched, beef kids containing green lumps of salt junk swimming in an evil smelling mass of slush.’  Norman Pearce

Ship’s carpenter’s bench

The mysterious one told us about this work bench.  The ship’s carpenter could repair anything from the big mast to the book matched paneling in the Captain’s quarters.

Captain’s Sitting Room

The skylight was covered by this beautiful structure:

skylight over captain’s quarters

There was also a children’s room, a zinc lined bathtub, a toilet, a master bedroom.

For everybody else — not so much.

Mid Shipmen’s quarters

Not as luxurious as the captain’s space, but with windows, skylight, cubbies, and clean. Six men and everything they own in this tiny space!

But this was a hundred times better than the Chinese worker’s quarters — cramped, damp, no natural light, far back in the cargo hold — and they had to do their own cooking.  Their situation was close to desperate. Resentful crewmen would register their frustration by sending bed bugs down the vents to the Captain’s quarters.

cargo

As in the Port of Oakland picture at the beginning of this post, it is Important that the cargo doesn’t shift, especially in heavy seas.

NOT like the Port of Oakland:

Much Oofing to load this ship with cargo

We want to stay but hunger makes the decision.  On the way to find food, a National Park employee with a big chunk of cake on a paper plate tells us there was a big Christmas party on the Eureka, an historic steam-powered Ferry across the pier from the Balclutha and fascinating in its own right.  There might still be a little food left, he says.

Now neither the mysterious one nor I are much enthusiastic about company Christmas parties.  But like Oola, we are hungry and not looking forward to battling the crowds in Fisherman’s wharf.  So we quickly work our way back out on the pier and find:

Eureka, a banquet

Turkey, ham, and all the trimmings, in copious quantities. Plus a table full of pies, cakes, whipped cream, tea and coffee.  I feel like we are crashing the party (and we are), but the man in the red shirt and white hat with the white beard welcomes us and demands we eat up.

He says his wife, Susan, makes all this, and that she does it every year, and that we had to take a left-over pie home with us.  Not a piece of pie, a whole delicious pumpkin pie.

The only disturbing elements are the guns and tasers on the Park Rangers’ belts.

So we sit on the old wooden benches and eat and eat until it is time to catch the ferry home.

But on the way to the Bay Ferry two memorable things happen.

First, Oola finds a Starling in winter plumage, and converses with him in his own language.  “Three words,” he says.  “Give me three words and I will make a poem for you”.

click on image to see the startling plumage on this starling

The second event unrolls at Pier 42.  The mysterious one is out on the plaza listening to an extraordinary blues player.  Oola and I warm a bench in the sun while waiting for our ferry home.  A tall black man, with an enormous, toothless smile arrives, spots the pie and starts a conversation.  “You got apple pie there?  Apple Pie is my favorite.”  “Pumkin Pie” I say.  “OOOOH, Pumpkin Pie is my best favorite!” says he with his booming voice and a face that is laughter incarnate.  Then he commences to regale me with little known winter facts about the waterfront.  When the mysterious one returns, we give pie to the entrepreneur in our midst.  With an upturned face and two famished bites, he promptly devours it while thanking us loudly through his big toothless grin.

Back in the harbor between Alameda and Oakland we must wait for an enormous cargo ship to be pushed into place by  tiny tug boats.  It is amazing to watch the maneuvering.  It has been a beautiful day.  I do not want it to end.  I am not annoyed.

Infinity Detail

Here is a book that has been fermenting for a while. I’ve been tearing up old prints and making new ones from the pieces.  And I was curious about light coming through the paper. This version has been produced digitally.

Infinity Detail

As the book emerged I saw that it wanted to take on some aspect of the infinity symbol.  So then – of course – there crept in that old nagging Catholic question, “What exactly is ‘Infinity’?”  “What exactly is ‘the moment’?”.  “What is ‘now’?- as soon as you are aware of now, it is ‘then’.  I hear that other animals don’t ask these questions.  Is that true?  What is “Truth”? Do other animals have “Truth”?………..

Infinity Detail, selected page

Infinity Detail, selected page

Infinity Detail, construction

You can see more (and larger) details at www.jandove.com/index.php/artist-made-books/infinity-detail

I had planned to post my reflections on a recent trip to see the Balclutha in SF. But after the event yesterday in Connecticut my mother/teacher heart was elsewhere.  It goes out to the families in that unspeakable tragedy, and to every parent who is holding children closer today.  May the healing begin soon for all.

Homeless Furniture in West Oakland

You’ve seen them, the derelict couches on the side of the road. We get plenty of them here in West Oakland.  One of the options when circumstances keep you from getting “on the road” is to see Home as a visitor might.  So Oola and I have been wandering around taking pictures of the abandoned furniture waiting to be picked up by the City.  After a while, the couches seemed to have their own personalities;  they become members of the homeless community of an area.

I wanted to make a book of the homeless furniture, a book that would express those personalities, but it wasn’t working.  Until one day I combined some of my figure drawings in a (nearly) life-size scale with the photographs, and something clicked “ON”.  The “ghosts” in the furniture jumped to life — on the page as well as in my head.  Since the images are about 80″ tall I thought they are too big for a traditional bound book — until I thought about books very ancient and almost as old as the midden.  I thought of scrolls on aged and yellowed paper.

These pages are digitally printed on asuka, a natural warm white Japanese paper that I got from Hiromi Paper on a road trip many months ago.

Here are a couple of the images from my newest artist book called Homeless Furniture.

eARTh

and

Exempt

In Exempt is was happily surprised to discover references to cave painting and drawing, probably because I have been fascinated by a wonderful interactive website site about the Lascaux caves recently.

If you want to see more images (and larger) of my newest, click onto http://www.jandove.com/index.php/artist-made-books/homeless-furniture.

Wimmen’s Comix

Oola at the Wimmen’s Comix Opening

Once again Oola dons her special reception gown.  We are going to San Francisco on BART to the opening reception for the 40th Anniversary of  Wimmen’s Comix show in the San Francisco Library.  The Library is easy to find, just at the top of the Civic Center Bart station stairs.

There was a mix up in reception times, but we wandered around the displays on the 4th floor and had some good,  healthifying chortles and guffaws.

Wimmen’s Comix, # 17 Caryn Leschen  Oola remembers a cousin who looked something like this.  Big family.

Back in the day, underground comic books seemed pretty much a guy thing to me.  Though I did learn something about a job well done from Mr. Natural; and Fat Freddy’s Cat had shortcuts with which I could identify when confronted with life’s persistent problems.

Lee Marrs and Sharon Rudahl, two of the “founding Mommies” of Wimmen’s Comix

But there was a group of uppity women cartoonists in San Francisco who thought their work should be seen too; and maybe they should make some $$$ for their work; and they did something about it.  From 1972 to 1992 they published Wimmen’s Comix and put the woman’s voice into the public eyeball.  They were telling funny stories about stuff I was interested in.  Imagine that!

Art should speak for itself.  Taking decent picts of the work (art) was a problem, what with the glass and all.  But here are some fragments of the pages that made me lol.  The first is a one page story of the first pair of glasses which become big as umbrellas.

Lee Binswanger, The Glasses from Hell

Ah, yes.  The adventures in the Gynocologist’s office….

Nancy Husari, Gyno Cops

And like Lee says, “Four pages in glorious black and white”.  Stories of real life.

Lee Marrs

On this post there is no way to do visual justice to the work.  Get yourself over to the SF Main Library, Fourth Floor. You won’t be sorry.

100 Larkin St.
San Francisco, 94102
(415) 557-4400

The show will be up until February 7, 2013.