Sketches of People on Bart

Installing at the Oakland Airport

I have just finished a fun week of installing at the Oakland Airport a group of works done by folks at Creative Visions. I have learned so much in just four days. There are so many tricks to hanging art, and treating the pieces with utmost care. Especially at the airport where we must hang everything so that it is earthquake safe, and also so that the public viewers cannot grab the art off the wall and run. I learned about using cleats, 409 to rub off marks on the wall, seflon and copper crimps to secure art, steel pins to hold down pieces, I even used some tools that I have never seen before. This is just the beginning. It is only part time work which is great, because I can get into Third Street Studio and work on my art, yet it makes it difficult to pay rent, bills, and the endless loans looming overhead. I feel determined, and confident that somehow it will all work out. Yes!

Oakland Museum

I am now an official tech. At the Oakland Museum, working for Professional Services, helping install shows and taking them down. I have always been interested in this work. I now realize I really love this kind of work, and I feel so lucky that I have landed here. Thanks to Barabara Holmes and Dina Rubiolo!!!

Performance #1

I am working with these two objects.

Trains at the Third Street Studio

Slowly settling into the studio. I love the trains. This one was a particularly colorful one.
It is great to be home.

DMV in Oakland

Hi,
so, while at the dmv and in a car line to get vehicle verification, a car crashes into my side door. The passenger door does not open now. An older gentleman who was in the driver seat of the Pontiac gets out, he feels awful, speaks no english and waits for his wife to approach me as she comes out of the DMV office. We work the system, her insurance only covers her butt if she is hit by someone, so I trust her,we exchange numbers and names and she says she will pay for the damage. On to the landfill to throw sticks for Lucha into the beautiful bay. Lucha does not like things in the sky. There were two kite surfers in the water. The bright yellow and black kites freaked Lucha, and so the walk was brisk and paranoid. The landfill is still there though and that is special, to have open wild land next to the bay, with trails through brush to be explored, and wild licorice.

Master of Fine Arts Graduate Looking For Work

The Search begins, and so does my career as a professional artist. Ideally I would like to work in the studio 20 hours a week, and work the other 20 hours teaching art. I am searching. First to the DMV to register my super pick up truck back as a California resident, good bye Massachusetts. Here comes a train, an amtrak, they like to blow their horns.

Home

I am back to the Third Street Studio. Yes, it's amazing that it is still here. My blog will now take a turn. It will be used as the third street studio blog, keeping you up to date on my work, performances, shows, and thoughts. Stay tuned.

San Clemente, California

I arrived to San Clemente to see Margarite a good ol wonderful pal of mine. She replaced me in Peace Corps and lived in the same village I lived in for two years in Honduras. She has been living in San Clemente now for a number of years and lives in the cutest house with her husband Mark and two great roommates. As soon as I arrived, it felt like vacation mode. Margarite and I went right away to the beach and jumped in naked with our dogs. Margarite is pregnant and it was beautiful to see her round belly, just a few more months, yipeee. The next day we went back to the beach and spent the whole day with a long board, umbrellas, sandwiches, chips, a cooler with cold beer, yes!. I surfed and caught lots of waves. The fun just kept on going. Margaret called some friends and we rented a 30ft sailboat and 8 of us went sailing the next day. That was a lot of fun too, but I don’t think I really like sailing on huge boats that much. I wasn’t sea sick, but I felt like I could be, and I wanted to do more than to stand around on the boat. I like the smaller action pact sail boats.
I didn't take any pictures for some reason. You will just have to imagin warm ocean waves, sand, surfboards, bellys, sailboats, naps, sandwiches, seagulls, and Sushi.

Colorado River

Hot hours later, appears, the Colorado River, huge, wide and wet. An RV campsite sign sticks out like a soar thumb and I pull off the highway, find a campsite, and in minutes Lucha and I are swimming in the clear green and refreshing water cooling off on the California side…looking over to the hotgasass of Arizona.

115 Degrees

115 degrees in Phoenix, Arizona I drove through the miserable heat, I wanted to get to the biggest water source, which I believed would be the Colorado River right on the border of Arizona and California. At first I thought, I might go and camp above Fort Apache near a dam, but it was a bit out of the way, and their was a huge fire on the side of the road with all the smoke blowing in that direction. I felt the urge to pass the fire away from the direction the smoke was blowing. The smoke was a super thick grey and coming from some industrial factory like structure. My fear was that it somehow was carrying chemicals and I should get as far away as possible from it. So I did, the highway felt like a river anyway, full of cars, and no way to get out of it except to move forward. It was hot, Lucha was doing exceptionally well, somehow finding a way to sleep deeply rather than be bothered with panting. From time to time I had to make sure she was actually alive and breathing.

Shash's house and my tent

Shash has lived here for five years. It is such a magical place, the wind, the silence, the red in the earth, the sounds at night, the owl, the coyotes, and the stars, soooo many stars. I had the best time sitting with Shash outside, laughing and farting, sharing stories, and experiences while we stared up at the stars trying to identify the UFO's apart from the airplanes.

Snowflake, Arizona

I left Albuquerque in the morning after sending off packages of Chilies to some friends and family. I was on my way to Snowflake, Arizona to meet Shash. I had a lot to think about on my drive. I was filled with new friend stories and fun experiences from my stay in Santa Fe. I met such wonderful people, socialized a lot, danced at pride festival, hiked in the mountains with Lucha and saw a beautiful woman circus performance. The road has such wonderful ways of allowing one to meditate and reflect, while beautiful distinct landscapes fly by. I did not even have music on. I just listened to the warm wind pour into the windows carrying the smell of desert sages. I was absorbed in my thoughts and the scenery passing by. I felt such peace, I love driving.
I met Shash at the library in Snowflake. She wisked me away to visit Barbara Kerr's land, who was instrumental in the invention of the solar oven and all the various ways of cooking using solar power. Her and Jim, run a sustainable educational non-profit home in Taylor, Arizona. I got to meet them both and was given a super quick tour of their home. Next we were off to yoga, the teacher and three of us stretched and breathed through the yoga postures and ended with a meditation. Next, out to Shash’s land, 40 minutes out on dirt roads. Wow, we arrived, and her living room is comfy cushion chairs outside underneath the stars. Oh, what a life, she lives in a mud hut, there is a well for water, solar panels for electricity, and lots of wind, stars, birds, peacefulness, so much peace…which is Shash’s mantra and her signiture in her art to always include the word or symbol of Peace. She works primarily with glass, slumping it and melting it together, by a unique kiln process.
While there she showed me a few projects to work on while she would be away in town. After she left, I took off my shirt, it was hot, the wind blowing, and I began taking down plastic from a wire structure. I grabbed the film camera and made a short film focusing on the marble ties she uses to tie things down, I hope to show a glimpse of this on my blog when I figure out how to upload moving images. The picture is of Shash near her home.