Chemin d'Art 7/7/10

Worked more today. finished a majority of the main element of the installation. worked from 9am till 10:45pm. My two assistants worked very hard today. It was in the mid 90's and we had to work in the sun all day long. I've never worked this hard on a sculpture. I am pretty worn out. 

My friend Anne has been trying to teach me French on our lunch breaks. I'm very slowly slowly learning.

Attached are some working pictures and some pics of my piece and my chapel at night. I have a light that I incorporated into my piece.

Chemin d'Art Residency - Saint-Flour, France

Well I made it to France. It took me 48 hours and ton of waiting and traveling, but I made it to the residency. It's great here. We are staying in an old dormitory for the priests and nuns of the Catholic church of the city. It looks out on the valley of that surrounds the town. Saint-Flour is situated on a bluff made of Basalt. It's quite the quintessential medival town (equipped with its own McDonalds in the more modern part of the city). I have been here a week so I will try and catch everyone up. 

I arrived, as I stated earlier, after 48 hours of travel (I arrived at midnight here). The Following day I got sick halfway through the day with a fever, coughing, sinus stuff, headache, chest stuff and muscle aches. I am still getting over it 5 days later.

It was oppressively hot during the first 3 days of work in which I had a fever. It was around 95 degrees. 

I took saturday easy and just finished up the basic framework of the structure that will support the branches.

On Sunday I took the day off and went hiking with one of my new friends. It was quite nice. I was glad to get into the mountains away from the heat. I got to eat blueberries in the mountains. 

Today is now monday and I have begun to apply the branches to the structure. All seems to be going well. 

I have an assistant named "Emanuel" who is very  helpful. He is a college student helping out for the event. He has been de-leafing branches for the last 3 days, 8 hours a day in the direct sun. Poor dude. He is a world of help. My friend Anne has also been a world of help as I speak no French. She helps me translate as well as helps me run errands  and introduces me around the town. She works for the residency. I don't know what I would do without her.

The Other artists are all very cool people. I enjoy talking to them. Communication is my favorite part because I don't have the skills to communicate with most of them but listening and watching them interact has given me the ability to understand what everyone is saying....or at least the gist of it. 

I think that's all for now. I will post more details about each new day now that I am caught up.

New work at SOMArts for the month of May

So I'll be participating in an exhibition titled "(Re)-Claim with 5 other artists at SOMArts in San Francisco. The opening is May 6, 2010 from 5-8pm. I'll be showing my three newest works that I have just recently created. They are titled: "Relic", "Hybrid Interactions", and "A Form Derived from a Constructed Landscape". Click on the links to view the works on my website. I am very excited by the show and am very pleased with the works I am showing.

Coming up at the end of June I will be leaving to go to Saint-Flour, France for 2 weeks to create a site-specific installation in the town. I will be updating daily with progress pics as well as travel stuff.

That's all for now. Check out the new work.

Kent Lake. A potential photo location for my solo show.

So I was exploring around the San Francisco Bay Area for a location to shoot a photo series for my solo show that I am having in September. I found this reservoir that supplies Marin County with water. It is a very strange and beautiful place. The reservoir is a very dead place and desolate location that is surrounded by lush trees and forest. Giant limbless trees jut out from the surface of the water like black cathedral spires. The edges of the lake are lined with dead branches and burned out carcasses of trees. The water is below the its normal water line leaving a border surrounding the lake were no trees grow, leaving only grass. As the water level rises quickly during these winter months, the water envelops the grass growing on the shore. You can see them below the surface of the water caught in some sort of ghostly stasis. All in all a very strange place. I've posted a few photos of the area to give you an idea of what is looks like.

New York and Islip Art Museum

Well I installed my piece at the Islip Art Museum. I showed up expecting to work all night and all day until Sunday but I managed to finish in 3 days. I spent 57 hours on it total. It was quite an interesting experience working in complete solitude. I did get to think a lot about my work which was fun, but i think what is very important to my work is its social aspects as well as its intellectual ones. I always enjoy working around other artists on a group goal (show). Unfortunately I only met some of the other artists involved on the last day and really only got to talk to them for a half hour. Too bad. Oh well. This piece is entitled "Expansion". It is a kind of organism or growth that slowly expands and adapts to its environment. It is an evolved object born from the relationship that we have with the natural landscape. It is about 9ft. x 9ft. x 9ft. I'm sorry to all the people i missed in NYC. I only had a couple of hours.

Going to New York to install a sculpture at the Islip Art Museum in Long Island

I was invited to participate in an exhibition at the Islip Art Museum. I am flying out tomorrow to New York City. The museum does not have a lot of tools so I have to bring mine. Everything it is packed into one of my suit cases that I will check. I would love to see if they let me carry on my portable circular saw, drill, wood chisels, screw drivers, and hand saw. Lots of fun. I feel like I just condensed my entire studio into one bag. We'll see how it goes. Check back for more updates as I work. Hopefully I will have internet and will be able to post at the museum.

Exhibition at the Islip Art Museum in Long Island, NY

I finished up my residency at the end of September. The completed sculpture looks amazing. I'm very excited. When I returned to New York for a couple of days I was in contact with a gallery and they put me in contact with the Islip Museum of Art. They were looking for artists a show in December. They liked my work and invited me to participate in the show. I'll be building an installation at the museum. I'll be there from November 30 through December 6. Day to day updates will increase as the installation begins.