Art to Acting

Doing a double again after getting back from a wonderful week on the west coast - niece's wedding and visit to family and friends in Sacramento.  Before I left, I auditioned for a few minor roles for Bluebird, a movie written and directed by Lance Edmands (originally from Kennebunk) which was being filmed north of Bangor, Maine.  I got a callback and read for them and then it was time to get on that jet plane.  While I was in San Francisco with my dear friend Kate Maney, I got a call that they really wanted me for a featured extra part. 

I've been doing films off and on since 1996 and I swore that I would never be an extra (or "the meat" as one director called us) again.  But I had to reconsider this time.  Edmands is an up and coming writer/director (Sundance award winner) and I was told they "really" wanted me and would be able to reimburse me for mileage (shoot site was 3.5 hours north of Portland). 

This is his first feature film and he's written a drama that deals with the relationships of people to the landscape and set it in his home state.  How could I not help a young artist realize one of his dreams.  As artists (no matter what genre we work in) I feel we have an obligation to help each other as much as we can.  I certainly did with giving young actors and directors opportunities when I was running my theatre company in Sacramento (Beyond the Proscenium Productions). 

Although the call time was like working in radio news again, I'm glad I did it.  This cast and crew had it going on.  No silly-shallying as I've experienced in other films, but a tight, professionally run ship captained by a young man I think is going to make quite a name for himself and for Maine as a movie-making destination..  

Now, back to visual art.  I'm finishing up a commission piece for Amie and Jamie and I still need to wire a digital collage on canvas for the Belles Lettres exhibit at Altered Esthetics in Minneapolis and get it to Fed Ex by week's end.  I'm so grateful that I can move from genre to genre and work with wonderful people!

It's called Winter Celebration and based on a photo taken outside my upstairs window before going up to my attic studio.  I love the look of snow on tree branches.  I'll leave this with you while I jet off to San Francisco for my niece's wedding and short visit with family & friends in Sacramento too.

Gung Hay Fat Choi

Happy Year Of The Dragon

Glistening with Probabilities

Almost sounds dirty doesn't it?  Maybe that's why the phrase came to me a week or so ago and apparently has been in my mind since.  Now a bright new year is opening before us and of course I have a few things in mind for this year.  I want to submit a piece to a Professional Women Photographers show in New York and go to the reception!  I intend to sell more art and find a Maine gallery to rep me.   I also intend to do a full staged reading of Orestes 3.0 at the Portland Fringe Fest.  I intend to finish the commissioned piece for Aime and Jamie before their new baby is born.  I  was surprised at how I blocked myself so many times working on that piece.  But I showed them four different versions of ways I could head and got some good feedback from them.

Another thing I did at the very beginning of the year was to enter a piece or work in a show at Altered Esthetics in Minneapolis.  I thought "Power of Words" would be a great piece for their Belles Lettres exhibition and apparent they thought so too, as it was juried in!  They will get the 3rd in a limited edition run of 25.  If you'd like your print on either canvas or paper, go to my sales site to get it.

Merry Christmas

This is a Christmas card I designed this year based on a couple of photos I took in Kennebunkport when I picked up my artwork from the Maine Women in the Arts show.  It will go on sale on the Fine Art America site after the first of the year. 

As a special treat for friends and family, I'd like to re-post a story written by a Sacramento friend, Donya Wicken....

Santa Borg

(c) by Donya Wicken

I was just about fed up with Christmas shopping, cooking and

decorating and was ready to cancel the whole thing and buy a

one-way ticket to the Bahamas when I heard a tortured wail

from upstairs.  I raced up to find  middle son Derek

glowering self righteously at littlest son Ryan who promptly

flung himself at me sobbing.  I examined him for signs of

damage and at the same time shot Derek  “the look”

demanding to know what he had done to provoke this storm of

anguish.

Finally Ryan calmed down enough to tell me himself.   “He

said Santa Claus is really Uncle Robert”  he choked out

and then collapsed again into helpless sobs.

“Derek,  why did you tell him that?”  I groaned in my now-look-what-you've-done voice.

“Well, it’s true isn’t it?  He’s old enough to know

the truth.  Anybody but a dumb little kid could have figured

it out for himself.  Uncle Robert  always wears such a dorky

fake beard and his ho ho hos are totally lame.”

Ryan wailed louder.

“Well, aren’t you going to tell him the truth?”

demanded Derek.

Before I could answer, a voice behind me spoke.  “I’ll

tell him the truth.  I’ll tell you both the truth. “  It

was oldest son Roger, sounding strangely like a super hero.

“I know the truth because I am in junior high school,”

he said.   “I am old enough to know things that dumb

little kids like you are too young to understand.”  He

stared straight at Derek as he spoke and I was secretly

pleased to see Derek cringe.

“All right then,” Derek challenged, “tell us the

truth. “

“Yeah Roger, tell us.”  Ryan looked hopefully at Roger.

“All right, you remember that Star Trek movie when the

Borg tried to assimilate Captain Picard?”

“Yeah.”

“Cool.”

“Well which one was the real Borg?”

“Ha, that’s a dumb question,” Derek replied.

“There’s only one Borg.  All those Borg people are just

part of the collective.”

”Except Captain Picard,” Ryan interjected.  “He

wasn’t a real Borg.  But all the others were.”

“That’s right,” said Roger.  “And that’s how Santa

Claus is.”

Ryan’s eyes opened wide and he looked like he was going to

start to wail again.  “You mean Santa Claus is a Borg?”

“No dummy, “ Derek explained contemptuously.  “The

Borg are bad guys.  Santa Claus is a good guy. “

“That’s right, Derek, Santa Claus is a good guy.   But

he is like the Borg because he is a collective.  He is one

mind but he has many bodies all over the world.  That’s

how he can go to all those houses in one night.  And every

time somebody puts on a Santa Claus uniform he is

assimilated into the collective and becomes a Santa

Claus.”

“Wow.”  said Ryan.

“Oh yeah,”   Derek argued,  “what about when somebody

puts on a Santa suit because he’s a crook and he’s going

to rob somebody’s house?”

“Then it is not a uniform.  It’s just a disguise.  And

when somebody does that something bad will happen to him

because you can only wear the Santa Uniform to do good deeds

and make people happy.”

“So Derek was wrong.”  Ryan announced triumphantly.

“Uncle Robert isn’t Santa Claus.”

“No Ryan.  That’s not what I’m saying.  Uncle Robert

has been assimilated into the collective.   Uncle Robert

really is Santa Claus.”

Ryan gazed at Roger with unabashed adoration.  “Wow.”

“Isn’t that right, Derek?”  Roger demanded.

“Well,  if you tell it like that.  Yeah I guess so.  Is

that right, Mom?”

“It makes sense to me,”  I said.  “It makes a lot

more sense than most things this time of year.”

Roger walked downstairs with me.  Behind us we heard the

joyful sounds of a war being organized between the Evil Borg

Collective and the Good Santa Collective.  “That was

amazing, Roger," I said.  "You came up with a story that satisfied both

of your brothers.  How did you do it?”

“Don’t you remember, Mom?   The principal chose me to

play Santa Claus for the kids at the Head Start Christmas

party.  I’ve been assimilated.”

Happy Holidaze

Saw this in Kennebunkport a few weeks ago when I was there to pick up the work that didn't see at the Maine Women in the Arts show for Prelude to the Season there.  But the good news is that I did sell one piece - the digital woodcut Two Gulls.

 What with being  one of Santa's elves this time of year, I've gotten a bit behind in the blogging.  So the next few posts will be catch up ones in which I share the installation photos from the Windows show I was in at the E Street Gallery back in October and the Lumens show (which runs until Dec 27th).

In the meantime, one of my peeps in the Digital Art Guild Yahoo Group - Wayne Cosshall - is now publishing Digital ImageMaker International.  You can get a copy via PDF and read a wonderful article about Bonny Lhotka, whose work I have admired for many years.

Shop Local in Southern Maine

I'll be there show sitting on Friday, Dec 2nd from 1 to 4 pm... hope I see you there!

Gratitude

I'm very grateful to all the readers of this blog for sticking with me through thick and thin as I continue my journey as an artist who works in different media.  I've been all full of visual art matters for some time, so let's swing the set over to the theatre side for just a bit.  Enormous thanks to PlayLab at Snow Lion Rep here in Portland for including me in PlayLab and for the reading this past Monday night of Orestes 3.0, directed by Al D’Andrea with the following cast:

ELECTRA: April Singley
ORESTES: Michael Dix Thomas
HELEN: Brittany Cook
MENELAUS: John Kreutzberger
CASSANDRA: Kerry Ann Loomis
WOUNDED MAN (WILLIAM): Thomas Campbell
WOUNDED MAN (JOHN): Simon Skold
NURSE MEG: Brittany Cook
NURSE TISI: Jacquelyn Mansfield
NURSE ALECTO: Amanda Painter

Facing us from right to left:  April, Michael, Jacquelyn, Amanda, Brittany & John

 

 

Great thanks to all the members of PlayLab who attended and gave me great feedback.  I'm really looking forward to finishing this puppy by the end of December and getting a full reading of it later this spring. 

Here's wishing each an every one of you a great Thanksgiving and joy and abundance this holiday season.

Gonna Make you a Star

Scams are all around us on a daily basis, but for the artist it seems they appear in an email at least once a day.  Of course we are very vulnerable as we want to think that someone happened to stumble across our art and thinks it's just wonderful.  I almost got caught up in that this morning when I read this:

"Dear Ann,

My name is Peter Sullivan and I am a freelance curator working with Abraham Lubelski organizing a March group exhibition in New York. I am inviting you to participate and take advantage of a unique opportunity to not only exhibit but to also get a full years' worth of publicity/exposure on the web and in print. This offer is the best publicity package available anywhere in today's contemporary art world. The fee for this complete one-year publicity package (and New York exhibition) is $1,950. I am particularly excited and interested in your work Motel Variations: Biggest Little City  and I believe it would be an important addition to our program. By paying close attention to the intuitive works of each artist, we are hoping to construct an exhibition of works that truly speaks to our viewers and subscribers."

The fee was too steep for me at this point in time and it made me wonder if anyone else had ever gotten such a letter.  A little google search turned this up.  Thanks so much Helen Ansell for blogging about it and confirming my suspicions. 

I've been in Sacramento for a couple of days now and think I'm finally over the jet lag!  The Saturday night closing reception at the E Street Gallery for the Looking In Looking Out show was great.  Saw lots of old friends and even took a few photos.  If you go HERE, I've posted them on Flickr for those of you who are not on Facebook.

Had a marvelous brunch at the Fox and Goose with my friends Art Luna and Cherie Hacker and dinner last night with Nancy Heard.

Art Luna and Cherie Hacker at the Fox and Goose, Sacramento

Today it's off to Sonoma for lunch with Barbara Medaille.  You can see her wonderful landscape paintings here.

For those of you NOT out in Sacramento, this is the image that's in the big 24 x 24" light box - "Classic Power with Man and Birdcage".   I shot a photo of it before I sent it off to Lumens.

Back in the Saddle

The strangest thing has happened - my blog just disappeared from cyberspace last week!  Now it's back with no explanation or reasons or anything.  I wonder if it had anything to do with blogger changing it's look over the past two weeks. 

I'm finishing up work on the lightboxes getting ready to ship them to Sacramento, where they will be on display at Lumens Gallery thanks to the good folks at the Center for Contemporary Art Sacramento and the marvelous intern Diana Bowers who will be installing the show.

Also looking forward to getting together with good friends and family, now that my brother and his wife are in town now along with my niece Sara. 

One of the light boxes I'll be exhibiting is part of my motel series that I created for the 2009 Greeting from NadaDada Motel show at the Barrick Museum in Las Vegas.

Motel Variations: Biggest Little City