I heard someone say this as I wandered through the mall on a saturday… or maybe it was a friday… forget it. The point is that I heard these words spoken, wiht sincerity, as I wandered through the mall on an otherwise unperturbed day. To anyone reading this who is currently wondering why this bothers me, stop reading now and go somewhere else. Or read on if you’d like to understand …. Moving on.

Art. is. not. always. Pretty.

Art is a great many things. It is visceral. It is primal. It is frightening. It is pushing the envelpoe, regardless of direction. Art is chaos swallowing order and finding order in itself. Art is the evolution of our first real methods of communication. Before they had words, people “spoke” through grunts and miming. I picture it something like a very enthusiastic game of charades after a few drinks. Our first “writing” was pictures of hunters and bison, I think.These methods of communication eventually became what we now think of as “Art”.

Has art ever stopped being about communication?
No.
I don’t think there is any art that isn’t an elaborite form of communication. I don’t think it’s possible. Everything we “Do” is a method of communication… hold on….

Sorry about that. I wanted a cigarrette.

So, right… Art and what it is, in my apropriately “humble” opinion.

Art says something. I tells us things that words alone cannot always express, except for written works. They tell us, in words, things that words alone cannot always express, Which doesn’t really seem possible, but there it is.
Art makes us look into places we otherwise ignore. Sometimes places that we fear. Sometimes things that confuse us. Sometimes it takes us to fun places. Sometimes not. But the art we like is the art that “speaks” to us. That is it’s purpose. To take us places that we need to go, and tells us things we need to understand.

Art can be pretty. Art can also be ugly, vulgar, disturbing and lewd.
At this point in our sociological evolution, art is.

That’s all. Have fun.

JK

Essentially, we are given four feet of wall each and get to create an evolving piece of art, installation, works, progression, whatever.  The only stipulation was that our work needs to raise money for the scholarships.

Now, each of us is an Artist.  That is why we started and support and work and run and recruit for our collective: so that we could have other Artists around to help us, to support us, inspire us, challenge us.  But for all that, we are still each individual artists making our place and mark on the world and trying to make rent in the process.  Therefore, as a Collective, we have decided to each do our own piece in the show for personal exposure and personal creative control.  Spilled inc, however, will be credited and conversed about….we are the Collective and remain the Collective, but we are Artists first.

Our entries, works, progressions, and rants will continue to be posted here for those who can’t make it to the CSMA site (on State off Aurora where all the construction is), for those who live in other states, and for those who have a debilitating fear of the outside world.

subMISSIONs: PROject PROposal

“String or Nothing”

I am proposing a series of 13 original works based on what I have in my pockets (which on any given day can be quite a collection).  My explorations will include different media from ink to watercolor, acrylic to sculpture and will explore different styles through those media including impressionist, cubist, and graphic.

The initial installation and first work will be posted during the first day and the original works will be posted every other day for the 26 day marathon.

The installation will begin with numbered pockets on the wall: some unattached, some in-situ (as it were), all of different types and varieties.  Also on the wall will be raffle tickets and a stapler.  Attendees may enter to win any of the studies by stapling their donation (minimum $1) to their raffle ticket and putting it in the appropriately numbered pocket. “Winners” will be chosen at the final reception.

- Bobbie Kolpakas

“We have some cool stuff going on and we need artists,” they said.

"Artists we have," we replied, "how can we help you?"

“We need artists for our Arts for All Marathon.  It raises money for scholarships so anyone can get the training they want and be an Artist.”

"Money for Artists to learn to be Artists!" We exclaimed, "We're in. What are you doing?"

CSMA replied by sending us to their website and the information below.  Artists, all, this is a great way to get exposure, to meet like-minded people, and to be Artists in Ithaca.   Make a post-it, sign up on their website with a project (Collect Members Projects will be posted and pictures will follow), be an Artist.

*************

Post-It Note Art Show

CSMA invites all of Ithaca and Tompkins County to be artists and art collectors for our Post-It Note Art Show as part of CSMA’s Arts for All Marathon.

Take a Post-It or sticky note, make art on it, and bring it or mail it to CSMA from now until October 20th. Then join us on October 23rd for the Opening/Purchasing Night of the CSMA Post-It Note Art Show where all submitted work will be on view and sale for $5 each to benefit CSMA’s scholarship fund.

By Oct. 20th, bring or mail your post-it note art to:
CSMA
330 E. Martin Luther King Jr./State Street
Ithaca, NY 14850
Attn: Post-It Art Show

On the back of your post-it note art, in pencil, please include:

• * your name
• * phone number
• * e-mail address, and
• * web site

Be awed and inspired by viewing submitted Post-It art at CSMA starting September 28th, then join us on Friday, October 23, 2009 to view and purchase the art of hundreds of your relatives, friends, and neighbors. For inspiration, check out the link at youtube.com/watch?v=G4pnoO3W_gM

Four Running Feet Redux

opening: Fri Oct 2, 5–8 pm
runs Oct 2–24

Community School of Music and Arts

Legacy Foundation Gallery (1st Floor)

4 feet of space per artist, evolving throughout the month, curated by Ed Marion.

(note: ideas should be EVOLVING art pieces that are connected to a way to raise funds for the scholarship like raffling the pieces or piece at the end)

ARTIST SIGN UP AT:

2009 Arts for All Marathon

Meanwhile, there are many part-time artists and talented and inspired students in our area with paintings that sit in closets and boxes and wooden chests because the artist is finished with that work and has no place to hang it and hasn’t been able to sell it or find it a home.

Have Art, Give Art; Need Art, Take Art is an event designed to fill that gap in communication and blank apartment walls in and around the City of Ithaca.  HAGA NATA (Have Art Give Art Need Art Take Art is an unwieldy name for everyday use) is a one-day Event (August 29, to be precise) hosted by spilled, Inc to take place on the Commons (amphitheatre).

Any and all artists are welcome to bring art at any time from 10am to 4pm to the center pavilion and Give Art.  Art will be displayed until someone would like to Take Art.  No applications or reviews or sending samples, no hanging dates or red dots or pick up after the show is dismantled.  Just bring Art, see Art, want Art, take Art, enjoy Art.

All donations will fund the spilled Inc Fall Event: a premiere production of Cupcakes for Jean Paul Sartre a play by local writer Carolyn Holmes.

Event Title: HAGA NATA (Have Art, Give Art; Need Art, Take Art)

Event Date: August 29, 2009; 10am – 4pm

Event Location: Amphitheatre, Ithaca Commons

What if in the 1940′s someone had invented an operation or a treatment to make black people look white?   It would have been heralded as genius, it would have been touted on billboards and government funded and used to make black people ashamed of still being black.  And it wouldn’t have been right.

It seems a bit ironic to me that jim crow has finally imported to the North in the form of smoker discrimination.

Below is a letter I sent to the Mayor of Ithaca and every member of the City Council as well as both of our top newspapers.   Smokers should not be ashamed if they smoke by choice.  We should not be harrassed and discriminated against by the government.

DEAR MAYOR AND COUNCIL MEMBERS:

I am a smoker.

I am not ashamed of this or anxious to quit.  I have stopped in the past – with nicotine gum and lozenges I found the process about as hard as quitting biting my nails, that is to say as hard as it is to do away with any habit.

I choose, consciously, to smoke.  I choose when I smoke. I choose where I smoke.

I enjoy stepping outside, taking a break from work and enjoying a quiet cigarette as I watch the cars and people go by.  I enjoy sitting near the waterfall and smoking while I contemplate the water wearing down the shale over thousands of years.  I enjoy the social atmosphere of smoking: going outside with a group and sharing a habit and a good conversation.

Obviously, cigarettes aren’t brilliant for my health, but I smoke in moderation and my health is very good.   I am a consenting adult who chooses, with full consideration of future consequences, to smoke.  You may think that my decision is ludicrous, but the United States of America was not founded on individual opinions of other individuals, or even government opinion of individuals, but on each individual choosing his or her path and lifestyle.

Unless it restricts another individual’s path or lifestyle, which brings us to the question at hand: banning smoking in Ithaca parks and Ithaca Commons.

I consider myself a polite smoker.  I don’t smoke inside my home because I like the taste and the choice of smoking, not the lingering smell.  For the same reason, I don’t smoke in doorways and don’t smoke “upwind” of non-smokers right next to me.  I don’t smoke directly near small children, although I don’t hide that I smoke from children either.    But we are not discussing smoking indoors or in doorways; we are discussing smoking in the outdoors.

As an individual, I would feel my rights severely limited if this ban is passed.  Part of enjoying the outdoors and social gatherings is, to me, having a cigarette.  Unlike in an enclosed space, the actual danger of second hand smoke to others is minimal at best.  If the ban is being considered because some people don’t like the smell, perhaps you should consider making daily showers required by government mandate as well.  Or banning Brut (I hate the smell of that stuff!).

While I don’t agree that banning smoking in any outdoor public place is a correct path for the City of Ithaca to take, I think that there are steps that could be taken to reduce the “problem” of smoking in a way that strengthens the community rather then dividing it.  People, smokers and non, generally want to be good neighbors.  Awareness of child-frequented areas like playground with signs would reduce the problem and encourage the tolerant and friendly community atmosphere that makes Ithaca such a wonderful place to live.  Commissioning artists to design and create functional and artistic “butt stops” for the Commons would provide function, form, and the art that the Commons is know for while supporting area artists.

I urge you, as we struggle as a community to overcome during this difficult economic time, not to mold Ithaca as a place of limits and regulations.  Rather, let’s outline the specific problem and find creative and effective ways to solve it that encourage neighborliness and tolerance.

Thank you for your deep consideration of this matter,

Roberta Kolpakas

Thoughts to Accompany Changing the Course of the Cascadilla Photographs

I recall going to a nature preserve as a young child.  I am quite sure it was some sort of school field trip and I want to name the place Nature Hollow.  I have vague recollections of stuffed creatures behind glass in their “visitor’s center” and a clear recollection of being admonished by our “nature guide” not to take anything or touch anything off the trail.

“We are preserving the natural landscape,” said the young woman (I realize that now, though at the time she was simply a GROWN-UP) in a khaki outfit with too many pockets and a name badge, “from human contact and interference to study it.”

In Ithaca, we are surrounded by state parks and waterfalls with maintained trails and paths to an extent I have never lived with before.

No wading.

No swimming.

Signs for lawyers, because no one pays any attention.  Any warm day you can see dozens of people with rolled up pant legs or with shoes and socks in hand or in bathing suits walking up or down the falls.  We are not tourists, with a tourist’s camera and a touris’ts baggage and a tourist’s mindset.  We exist in this area as a part of this area just as the landscape is a part of this area.  Perhaps Ithaca attracts people like us because of the landscape….but that is another thought.

Going to the gorges is an almost transcendent experience.  It impresses on my mind the vastness of TIME.  Feeling the rocks underneath your feet warn smooth my the ever running water, the sections where the water once ran – perhaps last week, perhaps a hundred years before I was born – to feel with my own hands the smooth lip beneath the water falling where I think it should be a sharp and broken edge.   The water rushes or meanders each minute washing away miniscule bit by miniscule bit of the solid bedrock that makes the bed of the gorge.

Being in the water, standing on the rock, touching it, communing with it: it is an awareness of a span of time not generally conceived of in our human minds. It makes me wish I had paid better attention in my 9^th grade Earth Science class, a lifetime ago.  There is so much about this place that is in understood to some greater or lesser extent that is not understood by me.  There is so much knowledge out there that is floating waiting to be plucked and built upon.

I, personally, understand only a simple and basic summary of chaos theory, for instance. I know the axiom: a butterfly flaps its wings in Beijing and New York gets sun instead of rain.  Standing in the torrential section of Cascadilla Falls, I see the water flow around my legs, push against my legs, and follow a new course because of my legs for as long as I stand there. I am a part of the rock beneath my feet, a part of the water fighting around by ankles, a part of the wind that whips the spray from higher falls on my face and the sun that beats down tanning me since my sunscreen long ago became part of the water and ceased to be part of me.

I am part of it now – right this second as I sit here in my apartment typing on my computer – and I will be part of it for the rest of its history.  Perhaps standing for ten minutes as I did will have little overall effect on the course of that stream, perhaps it has changed the whole course of the falls.  I am not enough a student of Chaos to know.

As I stood there in the falls, these reflections washing over me as though coming from the water into my consciousness, the rock sculptures pop into my head.

I certainly hold no claim for originating the idea.  My fiancée – who lived in Ithaca for a good chunk of the 1990’s and is a student of whatever his surroundings are – said that there have always been rock sculptures.  I can easily imaging a Iroquois teenager hundreds of years ago making them.  People just do them.  Amusing, I thought.  Inventive and creative a personal art form.

Standing there in that moment I realized what creating one of those sculptures would mean to me.  (I don’t and wouldn’t presume to speak for any other artists who create such things: rather I would invite them to write their own explanation or statement.  We would be happy to post them.)  To me, taking rocks from one place on the falls and relocating them into the strangely balanced formation is a way of changing the falls.  Perhaps my being there changed them, perhaps standing for 10 minutes changed them….but moving the rocks and reforming them into this sculpture did change them.  I am part of the course of the falls.  Next week when I return it may be gone, overpowered by the water, toppled by lack of pressure, but the rocks will scatter to where they might not have otherwise gone.

Do not touch.

Do not wade.

Do not swim.

Do not leave the trail.

You are a contaminant.

I say: I am a part of it.  I change this place not out of malice but out of empathy.  To move a rock, inch by inch all by yourself over years must be a tedious business.  I helped the stream as I would a fellow artist.  I helped the Universe as I would a fellow artist.

Perhaps it is a result of my childhood pilgrimages, as though the modern Pilgrim’s Progress in a secular American way, but fireworks always seemed to me a very meditative thing. I am sure that Li Tian, the man credited with the creation of fireworks 1,000 years ago would be pleased with that comment, as he was a Buddhist monk. Fireworks served as a creative force in Chinese culture, used at weddings and deaths, used at births and New Year celebrations for their beauty and for their noise to ward off evil spirits, until the Crusades took the technology back to the West. By 1560, fireworks had been applied to weapons technology.

Ithaca, NY – with the strange mix of art and business that exists here – had a similarly strange balance in its firework show: luring you into a lulling state with rhythmically timed blasts, then jolting you into new thoughts with a barrage or a BOOM! At the very end, seemingly in celebration of the Buddhist roots of this art form and the area that allows us to flourish and be, was a cluster of silver cascades suspended with a chorus of static. A fiery representation of the falls and gorges that create our unique geography in a way that would have made Gandalf proud to be an Ithacan.

That serene image seemed into direct contrast to the banging, blasting, booming barrage that preceded it. Lights like a moving strobe and torrents of shots engulfing our senses for so long one wanted to scream in the face of it. Wondering if any vets are among the tailgating crowd in the parking lot next door or the cars streaming past. I have never been to war, and I was having flashbacks. Considering the sad abundance in our country of former soldiers suffering from what I still like to call Shell Shock – the (comparably) modern, American meaning of fireworks came into my head with a vengeance.

Fireworks were, at its inception, a sign of victory. A sign of battle waged – through peaceful means when possible and violent means when necessary – and battles won. The people who settled this country did not have an easy life. Necessity drove them from the comfort provided in England: grocers and butchers and dressmakers and pubs. It drove them to embark with little backing from companies looking to export and import to a virtual wilderness where many of the natives were hostile, due to the behavior of earlier colonists, where the winters killed and starvation was not uncommon. As they carved out a life for themselves, created comforts that they had once struggled to buy, grew food that they had once purchased from another man they realized, individually and collectively, that they did not need a government (then the monarchical government of England) to collect taxes to take care of them. They were self-sufficient. They were independent. The Declaration of Independence did not create America’s independence: it told the world what the founding fathers already knew to be true.

As the lights of the fireworks illuminate me, I realize that we are not far from a Revolutionary War battlefield. I remember driving by it time and again between Elmira and Corning, where the speed limit is a snails 55 rather than the standard Route 17 sixty five miles per hour. I have never stopped, but know it is there. It seems so commonplace, a concept we have always known – from elementary school on up: America fought England to be independent and won. But in that day and time, England was the world’s superpower and we were just a bunch of idealists and farmers and kids with hunting guns and no boots. We financially broke and rich in belief, which is the only way to win such a war. A few dozen miles away, men and boys huddled and feared for their lives and continued on and returned fire in the face of cannons and gunshots echoing in these fireworks 235 years later to be able to live in a land where they could do as they pleased without fear of reprisal, without interference, without unnecessary taxes and unwanted restrictions. To celebrate their victory, they used their gunpowder to shoot off fireworks.

We are celebrating our Independence Day and should be reflecting on what we have become. Have we sustained a state where we can live, individually, as we choose without fear of reprisal? Can we exist peacefully without government interference in our daily lives? Nothing can stay the same, nothing ever has. Evolution is as Darwinian with governments as it is with organisms, so we must, as part of our Independence Day, consider what we are and what we want to be as the United States of America. Most importantly we must consider, as a people, what we are willing to endure and what work we are willing to do to make the United States of America a land of freedom and of liberty and of independence. And if you choose to celebrate this Fourth of July with fireworks, make sure you have the proper government certifications and permits.

The boy with golden wings sat cross-legged on the flat of a cliff. Behind him the cliff stretched as far as the eye could see, and before him lay a great precipice. The boy stared for long moments into the vast blue expanse beyond the edge of the cliff, and then looked into his lap. Cradled in his lap was a small sack containing a variety of objects. He grabbed one and held it up, gazing at it forlornly. It was a silver heart on a chain. It had been gifted to him by his father.

His father had been one of the most glorious people in the whole universe. His eyes were as blue, and as deep as the ocean, his hair raven black, and great feathered wings sprang from his back that were as dark as his hair. The boy still remembered the warmth of those wings when his father embraced him, and his smell, like iron and sandalwood, a smell only his father had had.

One day, at the twilight before night, the boy and his family had gathered at the edge of the precipice. His father had walked up to him with the silver heart, holding it out to the boy. He placed it in the boys hand and said, ” Today I must leave you, and your mother, and sisters. But I will give you this heart to remember me by. It is made of silver, the purest of metals, just like the purity of your own heart. When darkness haunts you, look on this gift, and I will be there.” And with that his father turned, and walked of the edge of the precipice, taking flight, and heading east towards the enroaching darkness. To brave adventures, and battles forever. At least, so were the boys thoughts.

The boy hung the heart around his neck, to let the world see the the measure of him. He picked out another object. He brought it to his nose, inhaling deeply. It was a scarf, colored as bright as the sun. It had been gifted to him by his mother.

His mother had had wings of differant sort. They had been more alike to the wings of the faerie, and looked like liquid fire. Her eyes were the gold of dawn, and her hair had been as red as blood, longer than she was even tall. She had smelled like the breeze off of spring meadows.The scarf had always adorned her like a crown.

The very dawn after his father had left, the boys mother walked up to him, removing the scarf. She placed it into his hands and said, ” I too must leave you, and your sisters, my son. But you will have this scarf to remember me by. Wear it with pride. For though you are different, it should not mark you as less. Just as the sun is the most different in the heavens, it shines the brightest, and gives life to us all. When you feel alone in the world, breathe deep of this scarf, and I will be there.” And with that the boys mother had walked off the edge of the precipice, flying west into the fleeing darkness. To give life and love to a new family. At least, so were the boys thoughts.

The boy took the scarf and tied it into his mass of long brown locks. He too could be crowned with the sun. Let the world see the light of his difference. He picked up another object from the sack, his heart filled with sorrow at its sight. It was an iron dagger.
The dagger had been gifted to him by his younger sister. She had had the wings of thier father, but her eyes had been a deep purple, and her hair lavender. She had smelled like the night after rain, and had been almost always silent.

The night after thier mother had left, the boys younger sister had walked up to him and given him the dagger. She had said no words. She walked off the edge of the precipice and did not fly. She fell straight down into the unfathomable depths. She didn’t even scream. She just must not have cared. At least, so were the boys thoughts.

The boy stared down at the dagger in his hands and did not know what to do with it. He laid it on the cliff next to him, and drew out the last object in his sack. It was a hand mirror, bound in plain wood with a matching handle. It had been gifted to him by his elder sister.
His elder sister had had wings like thier mother, except hers were the green of an emerald. Her eyes were the black of deep caverns, and her hair was the same bark-brown as his. She had smelled like the wild of the forest. She had been his closest friend. Perhaps, because of the hair, it was because they were more alike than thier other sister. Or perhaps, it was just because they both liked the woods.

On the zenith of the day after thier sister had died. She had walked up to him, placed the mirror into his hands, and said, ” I must also leave, Dreamdancer”, for that is what she called him, ” but I give you this mirror to remember me by. You must always remember to believe in yourself to find the paths you must tread. Whether they be the shadowed trails of the forest, or the sun-brightened aerials of the boundless sky. If you are lost, gaze into this mirror, and I will be there.” And with that she walked of the precipice, and flew into the arms of a gypsy woman, and they just faded away. Gypsy magik, who can ken it? At least, those were the boys thoughts.

The boy stood up then, grabbing the dagger from the ground next to him, and walked to the edge of the precipice. He gazed into the mirror, admiring the deep blue of his eyes, like his fathers. He touched his hair, a reminder of his older sister always, and met the knots of the scarf, the bright love of his mother was with him there too. He put the mirror back into his sack, and tied it to the cord around his waist. He looked down at the dagger in his hand, and then out over the precipice.

Where would he fly to, if he could? Should he fly into the coming darkness, or should he chase after its tail? If he flew at midday, would it be into the arms of a gypsy, and their strange and wondrous magik? Would leaving at night mean that he would meet the same unknowable end as his younger sister?

The boy with golden wings just didn’t know.

When am asked what religion I am, I answer:

I am an Artist.

To be an Artist is to be one with the world instead of an observer.  It is to experience and record through music, through painting, through writing.   It is to exist in this moment, to meditate and understand what led to this moment, and let this moment pass when it is done.   Every person has their experience with the world, and it has prepared them to record it in some way.

Understand, I am not suggesting the formation of the New Artists Church, repent all and be saved.  In fact, such a thing would be anathema of all that Artists represent.   Rather, I am suggesting that artists embrace their calling and accept their place.

The struggle between the material and the ethereal is a constant problem for us.  It always has been.  But to be an artist is to accept that your lifestyle will be different – finely crafted pieces are made by our own hands, not bought.  Our homes represent our selves and ourselves are often extreme.  Our humor is evidenced in our clothing and our eclecticism.

We do not work from nine to five, Monday through Friday.  In one sense we work always, in another, never.  We experience the world, we experience life, we experience that which has been created and we, in turn, create.  We do what we can that will both use our talent and feed our artistry while making us the money we need to survive.

I mix this in with religion and spirituality because to create is to be transcendent.  Whatever spiritual ideal that an Artist personally holds – agnostic or even atheistic –  anyone can believe that to bring forth something which highlights, or is inspired by, the universe is to enhance the universe.  It is to continue the cycle of beauty and understanding – even if the inspiration is something ugly.  Even if the work is something hideous.  If it is inspired, it is beautiful beyond aestheticism.
I am an Artist.

My work is mine.  I share it because I must.  My path is laid, I walk only walk it.  My art lights my way.

I am an Artist.