Lucas County Art Festival - Bottitudes and Fahrenheit 1220

Had some great conversations at the Lucas County Arts Council Arts Festival this past Saturday. The Death of Books shared booth space with Susan Lee's Bottitudes. Both sides of the booth had people giggling and chuckling, so it was a good day.

I had a fine collection of wire baskets from an old swimming pool locker that I used to stage the robot sculptures. They seemed to work fairly well - at least I was able to raise them off the table and isolate each one individually.

The Bots are made of raku fired clay and then embellished with a variety of metal hardware, jewelry pieces, watch parts, springs, and screws. They are then mounted on pedestals and coated with some really cool, iridescent layers of paint.

Susan Lee's Madonna of Too Much Information was featured front and center - she garnered a lot of attention.

 

I also displayed Fahrenheit 1220 - an aluminum and copper wire book I made to honor the passing of Ray Bradbury in 2012. I have displayed it in other venues, but it didn't seem to get as much traffic and attention as it did on Saturday. It was shown at this festival next to a hard-back copy of Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451.
Once people realized that 1220 is the melting point of aluminum, they seemed to "get it".

 

What I learned in displaying this historically pivotal novel, however, is that people still think the book is about censorship and book burning. While books do get burned (in the print and the film version), Bradbury himself is on record more than once telling us that it is a story about the digital pablum that television spews at the viewers and about how our brains are turning into mush because of it.

I am beginning to think that conceptual art is not a good direction for me. Quite frankly I am not sure I enjoy explaining my artistic premise over and over and over again. Should I be satisfied with a body of work if I am the only one who feels that it is expressing what I want the viewer to see? Or what I want them to think? If the visual art I create requires me to print a full page of typed information to explain the concept, 

the history of the creation, and the end result, have I succeeded at all? 

Did Bradbury's book fail because the message he wanted to convey was missed by most of the readers?

The Death of Books at the Des Moines Public Library

A few pieces from this series were seen on display during January and February at the main location for the Des Moines Public Library. The director, Greg Heid, saw them when they were on display at the Des Moines Arts Festival and asked me to be in touch with him. Even though it took me many months to get in touch with him again (I was busy trying to graduate with five majors and then we had the move to Chariton), he was still interested in having them on display.

If you are a regular visitor at the Central Branch of the Des Moines Public Library, you would have seen these both in some glass cases (as shown) and also pulled out and put on feature pillars for two receptions held at the library. 

Director Gregory Heid had this to say: "We received some great comments from the display. They did elicit some good discussions on the future of books. About the only negative comment that we received was someone who said that it was not their, 'cup of tea', but she could understand the artistic and social commentary of the works." If all I ever accomplish with this body of work is to make some people smile, make some people think, and make some people mad - I will consider it a wildly successful artistic journey. 

That Place on Grand, Chariton, Iowa

The Death of Books is now featured at That Place on Grand in Chariton, Iowa, located at 118 North Grand. This is an eclectic store that offers antiques, consignment items, new products, and gently used articles.

I am happy to be able to display this body of conceptual art in part of the store's main display windows - giant glass panes at street level of this old brick building built in 1894 for the Knights of Pythias Lodge. It's a great location on the east side of the square at the foot of the Lucas County courthouse. 

These are the very last pieces of the conceptual book art that was originally displayed at the Des Moines Arts Festival in 2012, and again at Greater Des Moines Exhibited at the Polk County Heritage Gallery in 2013, where I received a Special Mention. If you have seen this work before and passed up the opportunity to purchase one for your own library, don't miss your chance now to own a truly one-of-a-kind piece of art.

I love books. I love to read them. I love to hold them.   
I confess … I am a book sniffer.

This body of work represents my sadness for

the fact that we don’t open dictionaries anymore. Spell check has made the entire next generation practically incapable of spelling. Word programs on our computers not only flag a word for being spelled incorrectly, it will correct it for us. Our smart phones automatically anticipate the word we might be starting to type, and then will finish spelling it for us.

Dictionaries once held a position of power and authority in the library. Usually the largest book in the building, it was sometimes grandly displayed on an oak podium. I wanted to create artwork that would illustrate the fact that we never open these great old books anymore. These were once our doorways to knowledge – we opened a book to find answers. Not just dictionaries, but encyclopedias and many other reference books.

Now, with e-readers, even printed fiction books are in danger. It was just in 2011 that Amazon.com announced that they sell more e-books than they do paper books. 2010 was the last year that Encyclopedia Brittanica printed their beautifully bound sets for your library shelves. We just no longer open paper books as much as we once did – for pleasure or for research. 

I have collected many antique dictionaries over the years, and I actually use them. I like to see how the definition of a word has changed over one hundred years. I knew I had a duplicate of a 1949 Webster’s, so The Death of Books began with one of those copies. I attached antique doorknobs to the book in a way so that they no longer turned, to show that we don’t open these old books anymore. After I did that, I decided that it simply wasn’t tragic enough – it wasn’t traumatic enough to express how strongly I felt. So I decided the noble thing to do was to put this book out of its misery. I didn’t want this antique dictionary to die a death of neglect on the shelf, or worse yet, in a box somewhere getting dusty. I wanted to elevate it to the height of conceptual art in the hopes that someone else would put it out on their desk or their coffee table and have this discussion with someone else. So I shot it. I euthanized my antique dictionary to give it an honorable death.

This body of work includes many reference books, as well as several groupings of fiction. Each piece is completely one-of-a-kind. All of them have doorknobs that seal their fate. All of them have their own toe-tag hanging from a knob that details their name (book title), DOB (date of birth), DOD (date of death), Place of Death, and Cause of Death (homicide). Every piece is unique and includes an evidence bag that contains the round that went through that book, along with the brass casing found at the scene. Some of the books have the bullet in situ, or in position, trapped inside the book.

There are other issues at play in this conceptual art.

The Death of Books touches on the topic of the desensitization of violence in our culture, particularly of our children. It also skims the surface of the sociology and psychology of the community and how our families are affected by it. It reaches into our pasts, and makes us question our futures.

See The Death of Books at That Place on Grand, 118 N. Grand, Chariton, IA.

Aftermath - The DSM Arts Festival

Here are a few photos from the Des Moines Arts Festival. I had so much fun ... and so many questions to answer about this body of work.

Most people were really attracted to the bright colors and unusual arrangement. I was really lucky to be in an end spot, which allowed me a little bit of bonus space outside my 10'x10' allotment, but more importantly, it put me in a premium spot as the first booth on the right as patrons walked through a main entry to the festival streets.

I had some brown craft bags printed with the name of this project (you can see one in this picture), and I was happy to sell a few bags as people entered just as impulse items. Probably the cheapest thing to buy at the festival!

It was clear that many people just enjoyed seeing books - most of them old books, a few of them new books. It was a stretch for some people to accept and appreciate books as part of a body of conceptual art. Some were just simply horrified that I had violated perfectly good books with bullet holes.

In addition to books that have been shot, I also included a few Golden Books that are caught in old, rusty hunting traps - you can see Chicken Little in the foreground with the bright yellow cover. That book was actually a 1930s copy that was already falling apart, so I didn't feel too bad about letting it get caught in the jaws of a rusty trap, but still, it was really just as difficult to execute those pieces as the ones that I shot - pun fully intended.

A big conversation starter was another piece in the foreground - do you see the one with the black gas pipe drilled through a pile of askew books? That is my Book Club. Intended for home security - use it for self defense. I carried it around like a bat on my shoulder, but it is very heavy (about 15 pounds), so even though I play softball, I didn't swing it very often. Besides, there were too many people around to do that without causing fright. It worked just as well as a walking stick, and I encouraged people to hold it and think about the metaphor. Lots of laughs and interaction with that one. I would love to make a custom cabinet for it - like the wooden cabinets that used to be used for a fireman's axe. Now, we usually see a fire extinguisher in a metal box with a glass front. That display would be another homage to Ray Bradbury.

This piece is titled "Rorschach Test", and features two dictionary 
pages from the first section of a 1959 Webster's in the area that has the "new" words in it. Rorscach Test was one of the new words,along with others like "schizophrenia", "seabees", and an  entire collection of other post WWII era military terms.

I have used a bird's skull in the center as well as beaver jawbones in the four corners. The lead buttons are those that used to be used to match house window sashes with screens and storms - in the day when they were framed with wood. In the fall you removed the wood framed screens from your windows and replaced them with wood framed storm glass to keep the winter chill outside.

The antique glasses are yellow to match the yellow in the beaver teeth. I thought of using rose-colored glasses for the metaphor, but then it would not match the teeth, and I really wanted to keep the sepia-tone palette going throughout the whole piece. Non-glare plexiglas is used to complete the look of an archeological museum display in a cabinet, with the entire blue-framed piece appearing to float between the layers.

I was not able to get a really good shot of the actual shelving unit inside the booth - it was always surrounded with people in a very small space. However, I did take the above photo in our back yard that really highlights my husband's talents. We had several lengthy discussions about possible displays, and if time were no factor, we would have created an entire tree with books growing out of the branches.

What we made allowed us to include the use of doors as shelves, which helped tie together the whole analogy of "books as doorways" with the doorknobs on the books themselves. It was tricky for him to cut the individual logs so that the doors would sit relatively level on them, but he is a skilled perfectionist. I was fortunate to have the Queen Anne's Lace in bloom - I love this picture of the trees in the meadow.

Even the knob used to hold a bag was an antique cabinet knob.

It seemed throughout the festival that people who talked to me were genuinely interested in hearing about the idea behind The Death of Books. Most of these people were baby boomers, like myself. Lots of teachers - lots of librarians - lots of students.

One of my favorite parts of the booth was the yellow papered wall in the back with the giant red letters that spelled out "READ". I actually bought these letters from the North Side Library when they remodeled and upgraded their signage. It was my intent to have a house big enough to have a large library so I could install the LIBRARY letters on my wall. Didn't happen. I mean, it hasn't happened ... yet! I have downsized my thinking a little bit and now plan on using the word READ instead. Still don't have the house that it will fit, but I do have the letters.

So I covered the back wall with yellow paper and hung Sharpies from string in various spots with the hope that people would write their own comments. I wrote something on the paper as starter, but it took no time at all for the idea to bloom. I am going to just share some of those photos and let you enjoy them...

 

 

I have no idea what the foreign language comments are, but I choose to believe that they are positive notes from a fellow book lover. I originally just had paper installed above the silver bar (see photo below), but it was filling up fast and few could reach the area above the red letters, so on the second day I added more strips of yellow paper below the silver bar. After the shelves were taken apart and removed from the booth, I snapped this shot of my ten foot wide back wall. Now, I am thinking when I have a big enough house to have a large library, I will install these red letters on my wall, but I think I will include the yellow paper behind them. The messages are so personal and so profound, they give me a lump in my throat when I read them.

The Death of Books at the Des Moines Arts Festival

I am thrilled and humbled to be honored as one of the Emerging Iowa Artists selected for the 2012 show which opens in just a few days on June 22nd. This three day show consistently is voted into the top ten art festivals in the nation and sees about 250,000 people throughout the weekend. My booth is called The Death of Books, and for those of you have followed this blog, you saw the very first pieces posted in my blog from November of 2011. Most people just kind of look at me and nod politely when I try to describe this body of work. Most people also do not recognize immediately that those holes are bullet holes, but you can see the question in their eyes and the wrinkle in their forehead and you can almost hear the thought, "Is that what I think it is? I have never seen a bullet hole up close and personal, but what else could it be? Why is there bullet holes in the book? I get the doorknob idea - they no longer open, no one opens books for information anymore. Why bullet holes?"

I continue to explore the tragic fall of "real books". I am still saddened by the fact that some children are growing up and have no idea how to look up the spelling of a word in a paper dictionary. I am annoyed on a daily basis as I see fellow college students that not only can't spell, they don't even know how to use spell-check correctly. It is astonishing to me to see a word used incorrectly in a power point presentation. You know what I mean - someone didn't know how to spell a word, and as they typed it in, Word automatically suggests several words close to what it thinks they are trying to spell. The problem is, when the student doesn't recognize the correct word in the list (because they don't know how to spell it), I imagine they just pick the word at the top of the blue list. They have no idea if they are right or wrong, but they know they have selected something that Word suggested so they know it is spelled right. Unbelievable.

I love dictionaries. I love words. I always have and always will.

I have found some extraordinary books that I have used in the latest body of work being revealed this weekend. I have found some extraordinary doorknobs to pair with them.

Most of the books are dictionaries and other reference books. No one uses these anymore. With the ease and availability of the internet, people just point and click online - for everything.

When was the last time you opened a book that was more than one hundred years old? Have you ever done that? If you haven't, can you even imagine what that is like? A book of that age probably passed through five generations. A century. One hundred years.

My son found a small pocket-sized book in the basement of our house awhile ago. It was printed in 1856. That makes it older than the American Civil War (1861–1865). It was written to be used for flower and plant identification. I am sure it was the type of book a proper lady used. Small enough to be kept in a tiny handbag or tucked away on a bookshelf in the parlor. Apparently at some point, it was lost or forgotten. Dropped behind the piano. Stuck behind the back of the mantel. It is in pristine condition. We don't have it on a high shelf to be admired, although we are very careful with it. We use it. We read it. My eleven-year-old son has taken it outside into our 1.57 acre backyard and used this tiny little gem of a book to identify plants and flowers growing in a natural setting (which means we don't mow). It is an extraordinary book and we are honored to be the caretakers.

In preparing for the festival this weekend I have been amassing an arsenal of books and doorknobs. As the assembling process started, I found that I had a significant stumbling block. I came across a few books that I could not bring myself to either shoot or drill for doorknobs. I couldn't do it. I have decided that for the time being that they have won a "stay of execution". I am going to display some of these books at the art festival with lengths of gold cord wrapped around them - kind of like the pictures you see of Houdini before he submerges himself in that claustrophobic tank of water. I want people to appreciate the fact that for the time being, they have been saved. They are still being held captive, however, and I may decide to shoot them someday, but not today and definitely not tomorrow.

The last couple of years as a full time student with five majors has really been a challenge. I owe a big thank you to Kelly Friesleben, my academic advisor, who has never failed to encourage me in my somewhat radical approach to higher education. I keep telling every one who asks that these five majors are all related and they will work together for a greater good that has yet to be revealed to me. I feel peace on this path so I will stay the course. There are times that it has felt like being in a luge competition, and not only in your night class Dr. Kathy Petersen! Thank you for your mighty passion for psychology and thank you for your relentless pushing in the classroom. I am sure that sometimes it feels like shoving boulders uphill on a muddy slope, but I want you to know that your efforts have made a difference in my life, and they have influenced my art. Thank you Professor Guy Cunningham for incorporating your unique view of the world in your classroom, but more importantly, for challenging me to create my own. Your wit and intelligence has always been stimulating and sardonic - in a good way! Thank you Dr. Sheryl Leytham for your soft heart and your sharp brain. Both have helped me to have a little more empathy and a little more hope for the human race. The opportunity to re-examine recent art history was never made more exciting than it was in Rachel Schwaller's class - thank you for stirring up my disgust for Jeff Koons and my admiration for Andy Warhol! Your enthusiasm is contagious! Mary Jones, I did not think it was possible for me to love books any more - until I took your bookbinding class and fell in love all over again.  While it definitely made the pursuit of this body of work more painful and more difficult for me, it also made it much more meaningful. I hope that message comes through in this conceptual art. Thank you also, Mary, for taking the photographs I needed to meet the requirements of the application for the Des Moines Arts Festival - they were beautiful and professional and I am sure they were a big reason the jury accepted my work for the Emerging Iowa Artists category.

Last but not least, thank you Michael Lane! You were the first person after my husband to see the first dictionary with the first doorknobs and the first bullet hole. Your reaction was priceless and was the tipping point in my decision to go down this path. Not only did you tell me that I "absolutely needed to take" the bookbinding class, but you encouraged me by letting me know that this concept was really, really relevant. With you by my side I filled out the Iowa Arts Council mini-grant application (which I won!) asking for help with a custom display for this body of work as well as marketing pieces to be printed for the festival. I am just as excited about the custom display as I am about the books - it is the perfect metaphor to complement the books. I will take pictures at the festival and share them at a later date.

If you are in central Iowa and can join us at the Des Moines Arts Festival this weekend, please do. I am in booth #EIA12 in the southeast corner of the festival grounds.

TV Trays and Thrift Store Frames

What is the state of Contemporary Art?

Since we have talked all semester about the impact and influence the internet has had on art today, I simply googled that phrase. The third hit that comes up is a link to a Washington Post review by WP critic Blake Gopnik. He is decidedly unhappy with what he saw in three massive European shows.

The first pieces I will talk about are quite different, McCracken on the right and Davila on the left. Gopnik has this to say: Noting the juxtaposition betweem McCracken's work and Davila's, Post critic Blake Gopnik writes, Documenta "curators are equally committed, apparently, to a bevy of extra-sloppy, ugly-is-beautiful, sex-themed allegories."

I think this is a good start in showing where contemporary is today, and what critics are saying about it. Essentially, they are as lost as the up-and-coming artists are. I still stand by my opinion that when it comes to Post Modernism, anything goes. I don't think an artists has any limits - subject matter, material, installation, performance, electronic media - it is ALL SYSTEMS GO!!! If there are any artists today who feel constricted, then they are simply confused by their alternatives. It is because they have no boundaries that they are lost. They are still thinking like college students. They need an assignment with parameters. They are coming out of college and are just standing there with the deer-in-the-headlights look in their eyes going, "Okay, now what do I do?"

I was very happy with the class that I am writing this blog for - the teacher was particularly enthusiastic about Art History from 1960, and also clearly loved to instigate conflict. Her favorite comment: "Fascinating!" I am old enough that I still think of Spock when I hear that word used singularly, but she is far younger than me, so I am pretty sure she does not have the same connection to that word as I do. (A plastic Spock, just for you Rachel!)

Aside from that, we were always encourage to spew about our likes and dislikes - every time we came to class. It was the mediocre work that was the worst - she needed to show us stuff that either elicited an "I love it!" or an "I hate it!" Anything in the middle was boring. If it did not bring out strong emotions from us, she didn't spend any time on it. She went out of her way to find artists and works that were strong emotionally. Isn't that what art is all about - stirring you to emotions? Don't you always remember all of the really awesome art you have seen? But don't you also always remember the really awful stuff? I think they both are burned equally into my brain cells.

The Davila piece shown above reminds of our assignment of appropriated art. One of our class members bought a framed piece of (expletive) from a thrift store, and painted some additional things on top of it. Perfect for the assignment. I have done this exact things in the past with my young boys - bought framed pieces at the thrift store, primed them over, and given them their own "masterpiece" substrates to work on. I have also taken the same approach a few times in art therapy projects.This was a little intimidating at first for my boys, but the senior citizens who worked on this for art therapy loved it. They all had an inner DaVinci going on and were thrilled that it was already framed and ready to go.

I think my boys were more interested in painting out some TV trays and covering them with their new designs. They knew they were going to be a surface to eat on, and we finished them with several coats of clear polycrylic to help protect them. They also use them for play - marbles work great because there is a lip on the edge to keep things from rolling off, army guys work great - small enough to make a whole battlefield, and just writing and drawing. They are so proud of these, and I love the fact that we made art they could use and appreciate every day. The framed paintings we appropriated from the thrift store? Those never got hung. They were never that excited about the finished product. Were they intimidated by the thought that a framed piece of art was not within their abilities? Maybe. They mostly just weren't sure what to paint. The TV trays? No hesitation. They both jumped right in. The only difference I can clearly see is the big frame - it must have been a little too much for them.

The Davila piece looks like an appropriated framed piece. Maybe it was another of the artist's pieces that did not sell, so he added a bunch to it. Maybe it was his practice palette - I've seen some really beautiful palettes that end up being hung for art. Accidental art. That is contemporary.

Then you look at McCracken's minimalist piece from the late 80's and say, "Yeah, that is still relevant today. That is still contemporary art". To me, it clearly took more time and effort than Davila's, but that is not singularly what makes it contemporary art.

After trying so hard this entire semester to define art, to declare if art is alive or dead, to identify art when I see it, and finally to ask what the state of contemporary art is today - I am still not sure I have any definitive answers. I am not sure anyone in our class does, including the intelligent, knowledgeable, and passionate instructor (you can call me a suck-up, but those adjectives are sincere).

What I have learned is this: I am sincere and passionate about the art I create. I am filled with emotion that I am trying to express when I work on the pieces I work on. It is important to me to instill a reaction in the people that view my art. Last of all, I deeply hope that I am creating a memorable image for people to carry for the rest of their lives. I want them to remember my work in ten or twenty or fifty years and say, "Yeah, I remember that. It was kind of cool and it made me think."

The Plight of the Mega-Artist

Oh please. I can't believe that we spent an entire class period on this "plight". Wah wah wah, cry me a river. What? You, as a Super Star, have too much money? Too much fame? Too much recognition? Well if it's enough, then stop doing what you are doing. Go away. Go into hiding. Surely you have enough money that you can afford to be anonymous - if you really want to, that is.

The thing is, I don't think you want the anonymity. I don't think that you really want to go away. I think you are addicted to your fame, deserved or not, and now you truly cannot get enough of it. You are so persecuted. You are so pursued. The press won't leave you alone. Why don't you try this: Try farting every time you are interviewed - tv, radio, internet, or old fashioned newspaper and magazine interviews, just try farting. It would be best to do the SBD's - silent but deadly. My ex-husband was a pro at those. I am sure you can put together just the right combination of food and drink to time the release of your natural gases with an interviewer asking, "So what is next for you, SuperStar? What can you possibly tackle next that will turn to gold?"

I just have to say this to you, SuperStar: lead, follow, or get out of the way. Don't stand at the front of the line and complain, you big, whiny baby. In Wanda's infinite wisdom, "Shut Up and Like It or Get Out" Cafe.