upside down and in blue

Once upon a time I frequently posted to this blog. It was an outlet for writing about difficulties and successes in the studio. I used it for exhibition news and for progress updates on the slow goings on of the anthotypes.

It's been a long time since I posted to this site. I have been working on several projects, sending out teaching packets hoping for a sign of interest from academia, applying for a residency (long term project coming due very soon), and of course teaching. I would like to write more about teaching but there are fundamental issues I need to wrestle with including professionalism and articulating those things that make me want to teach. Everyone knows its hard and time consuming but rewarding in unlikely ways.

I'll slowly work a discourse on my teaching in future posts. For now I need to get the blog ball rolling. Why not start with a cyanotype.

In the in vivo exhibition, I showed four of the fungi. There were others that I was working on but for many reasons, mostly placement or shape, I elected to work with the four that I did. There was one that almost made the cut. It was an early one but it was a horizontal and it would stick out in a grid of four. The prints I did make of it happened to be made on a paper that wasn't working well or perhaps I was getting lazy with exposure ( I seldom use step wedges although I should). Regardless, they lacked clean  highlights and seemed much flatter than the other four.

There was a little window of impracticality last Saturday. It was the last day to drop off work for the annual Dayton Visual Arts Center auction. I had an OK print of the cyanotype that didn't make the cut but the only frame I had that could accomodate it would be a natural wood finish. OK with a blue print but I am committed to showing the cyanotype floated in white finished wood frames. I had two downstairs I had bought off a student but they were narrower than what I typically used for the 18" x 23" prints I had been making.

So I reprinted it Saturday morning. It was sunny. It was due by 5 pm. It was not a wise decision.

There is a stack of paper I have been sitting on, waiting to try it out with cyanotype and vandyke brown. It was on sale. It was pH neutral. It was crying out for a test run.

I tore it down to 16" x 23", made a good print on the first try. A terrible print on the second. A really, really good print on the third try once it dried down.  I managed to get it framed, wired and down to DVAC before they closed at 5. Somehow I even squeezed in a short artwork documentation session so I could have an image of it.

But being rushed, I made one mistake amongst lots of little ones which I had no time to undo. I wired the frame upside down.

I think I can live with it this way.

Physical Trace

The yellow lab coat came down last Saturday but the results were disappointing. Very little fading occurred which made me re-evaluate the act of sewing in the gallery space I had envisioned.

The coat only got about 40 minutes of late afternoon light on a good sunny day and I doubt there have Ben even ten of those during the run of in vivo. Not the best way to create a physical trace of the exhibition.

It is still disassembled and my inclination is to give the pieces more exposure in the backyard.

the (pink) lab coat is the experiment

The other component of In Vivo which was documented last Thursday, Pink Pokeberry Lab Coat. The pattern was created from a scan of a couple of pokeweed leaves.

The coat has several panels made from various dilutions of pokeberry juice. The left rear has completely faded because of the 1:2 dilution used but retains brown images where pink used to be. The right rear has faded the least and, in fact, achieved the least record of an image from exposure to sun. The right rear and right front pocket both got full strength pokeberry juice. The front panels were made using a 1:1 dilution of pokeberry juice.

The hanger is made from a fallen sycamore branch recovered in South Park (Dayton).

Thank you Charmaine Renee for your excellant sewing skills and problem solving abilities. Charmaine and I will be at DVAC tomorrow at 4 pm to sew together he saffron coat which has been at the front of the gallery receiving a bit of sunlight everyday since the exhibition opened.

waiting with map pins

One month, maybe longer, I return to the blog.

Sorry.

Someday soon excuses will surface but for now I will get right down to business. In Vivo, the three person show at DVAC, has two days remaining. Today, I returned to the gallery to document two of the pieces and now I am regretting not photographing the rest of the installation.

Above is an image of Forty-six, photographed at a raking angle so that you, the viewer, may see how each 12" x 9" piece is anchored to the wall. Just two map pins at the top, which leaves the bottom flapping in the circulating air.