A Life That Doesn't Suck, Part One

We had the first meeting of "A Life That Doesn't Suck: Financial Crisis Edition" last night. Andrew Simonet of Headlong Dance Theater is running the workshop, and spoke eloquently about how important it is - crucial, in fact, for both ourselves and our culture - to create a sustainable creative life.

He spoke about initiating a shift from being a career-driven artist to a misson-driven one; about creating a community in which the success of other artists is also a success for you/me; and about the importance of strategic planning, including setting a large, even improbable goal and then making incremental, manageable steps towards that goal.

The second half of the workshop involved us taking little steps towards our own artist statements, working to scuplt a paragraph that speaks in the voice of our work, is an accurate reflection of our values and vision, and is still accessible and interesting to others. We made a list of seven words that describe our work, then a list of fourteen words, then a paragraph. Here's my list of fourteen (I'm dealing with my dance work here, though there's a lot of overlap with my collage work):

whimsy
reciprocity
pattern
juice
hobble
eraser
between
group
gifts
touch
askew
relationships
crystallize
wonky

Doldrums

Holly of decor8 blog recently posted about daily flower arrangements as a way to overcome the end-of-winter blues. I like this idea a lot - I love flowers, especially daffodils and irises - but it's not financially feasible for me right now, given that I'm mostly unemployed.

So here I am, stuck in the creative doldrums, and waiting anxiously for spring. Somehow this unpleasant transitional season makes even more acute the questions I always wrestle with: how do I balance art, time, and money? Why do life concerns of bills and housekeeping always take so much time? How come I can't find a job? (Thanks, economy. Thanks a lot.) How can I learn some sense of discipline inside creativity, so that I'm not always only prey to the whims of my impulses?

I'm really looking forward to a workshop in April called "A Life That Doesn't Suck (Financial Crisis Edition)", run by several professional dancers in Philadelphia as part of the city's annual Dance Theater Camp. While I expect most of the discussion to be immediately relevant to the dance side of my art world, I know the issues we'll be talking about - the value of art, building community, time, money - are relevant across the board.

In the meantime, I think I'll go riffle through my box of paper goodies and send friends some unexpected mail. Hopefully that will briefly lift any sense of blah they might be struggling against, and perhaps help my sense of wellbeing, too.

Mew Gallery Pay the Rent Event

Calling all Philadelphia lovers of the handmade!

Mew Gallery is holding its third annual fundraiser next week in order to help - you got it - pay the store's rent. It's an art auction and raffle with lots of exciting perks, including beer specials, DJs, and dancing. $5 suggested donation at the door.

Tuesday, March 3
6 - 10 pm
South Philly Tap Room
1509 Mifflin Street, Philly

You could walk away with some of my cards! I've made two sets of three cards each, a set called Winterberries and a set called Herbs & Spices.

You could also walk away with jewelry, zines, clothes, photography, ceramics, and much more. Some of the other artists who have donated work: Alina tees & zines, Anna Burke photography, Beck's Buttons jewelry, Boto Designs, Carolyn Giordano, Faceplant Wasted, Flying Fox, Gray Nation, Isaac Bushkin, J.L. Schnabel, Jessica Liddel, Joy Stember, Julia Blaukopf, KnitKnit, Lana Heckendorn, Lauren Lopez, Leslie Albend, Megan Dorien, Mike Geno, Miss Koco, Nicole Rae Styer, Rebelle Couture, Sarah Myers, Shannon McLaughlin, Sideways E, Tiny Airplanes, Tranquility jewelry, Un De Six clothing, WabiSabi, Warren Veith...

Please come and support your local artists and this gallery that brings them all together under one creative roof!

Ta-da!

My cards are now available at Mew Gallery, 906 Christian St, Philadelphia!

Here are a few tasty morsels to whet your appetite. Please go to Mew for the complete meal.

Another heart-slayer of a book

I found this one at the Bryn Mawr Bookstore, a used bookstore in Cambridge, MA where I used to work.

Paintings: Forces of Nature II, 1994-1998
Marlene Tseng Yu
Las Vegas Art Museum (exhibition book)

Marlene's paintings are extraordinary. She works mainly with acrylics, often on a very large scale, and creates works of improbable, strange beauty. They are mysterious blooms of color textured and sculpted to present something cosmic, oceanic, microscopic.... These are grandiose words, I know, but I promise you they're apt. I have never seen paintings so organic and so resonant.

This is her website: www.marlenetsengyu.com. You can see a few examples of her work in photographs there. The book does them better justice. I hope to be able to see some in person one day.

A Note to Philadelphia

Dear Philadelphia,

Mew Gallery in the Italian Market will soon begin carrying my cards! A community oriented, quirky gallery and shop that carries hand- and locally-made items, Mew is on Christian St. just west of 9th St. This is their website.

I will write to you again once my items are on the shelves and waiting for you.

Sincerely,

Hannah

Under the Ice

I’ve been sick, and as is usual for me in that circumstance, I haven’t been feeling inspired. But I made myself sit down to work, and at the end of an afternoon I tried something new: I layered pieces of different off-white papers pressed with leaves, threads, and speckles underneath a large piece of bright white paper laced with white thread. Over the off-white and under the bright, I placed a strip of origami paper laced with large purple flowers.

I like asking my partner, Jordan, to help me name my designs; he has a knack for it. He named this one “Under the Ice”, and it’s perfect! The name inspired me to keep working with the design, tinkering with the two bottom layers to really capture the essence of leaves caught under a film of ice. I’m really pleased with the results. Here are a few cards from the developing series:

Hawk & Whippoorwill

This summer I created 50 limited edition covers for the literary journal Hawk & Whippoorwill. H & W, "poems of man and nature", is a lovely little journal being resurrected by Pen & Anvil Press in Boston. There are still a few copies of my art-cover editions left, only $10 each. See this page for more information:

http://bostonpoetry.com/hw/currentnews.html

Dinner Party Invitations, 2008

Silver Sky Moutains, 2008

Brown and Blue Mountains, 2008

Red Samurai, 2008

Energy Fields Four, July 2008

All rights to all images posted on this blog are held by Bell Buoy Press.

Why I like to play with paper.

I can’t draw. Really, I’m remarkably bad at it. I tried painting in high school, and basically ended up smearing color around in vaguely interesting ways without regard to form or composition - I love color. But painting, without that drawing foundation, didn’t stick. I seem to have found my medium now, though: playing with paper lets me experiment with color, texture, pattern, and space in a way that’s incredibly satisfying and yields strong results.

Despite the swirling world of developing communication technologies, I feel paper in all contexts is inextricably tied to the richness of books, the power of the written word. On a different level, my pleasure in paper has much to do with the aesthetic beauty of a blank page. A piece of paper promises everything – anything – to me in a way that a blank canvas never did. And now that I’ve stopped trying to draw on it, the paper and I have much more interesting conversations.

I make collages, cards, stationery, invitations, coasters, and sometimes books. I also really love turning gift wrapping into an art form. A couple of old examples of my wrapping, from Christmas ’06, are included with this post. I am happy to take commissions for artwork or gift presentation, and to field inquiries of all kinds. Please feel free to contact me via a comment here; Bell Buoy’s email: bellbuoypress@gmail.com; or via my Etsy site: bellbuoypress.etsy.com.

A fair warning: Musings on dance and choreography will creep their way into this blog. Since I am also – and perhaps primarily – a performance artist, thoughts on my artistic process will definitely include input from that genre.