Current Events

New things are happening.

• Jennifer and I are now co-vice presidents of Box 13.
• I'm going to have two pieces in a self portrait show at Lawndale during Fotofest.
• My How I Will Die series will also be up during Fotofest at Gallery 1724. The opening will be March 31.
• I'm working a new project with a collaborator. Images and details coming soon.

The real reason I love 4x5

Today I discovered a subconscious reason why I think 4x5 film is the best. I'm working on a new series that I'm shooting on medium format. It was so frustrating at the end of the shoot to not be able to process it right away because the roll wasn't done yet. I love instant gratification. With 4x5, you could shoot just one frame and still get it processed right away.

Plus, I love wearing my dark cloth as a cape. :)

Art Crawl

Art Crawl is this Saturday. I'll be at Box 13 all day. Come see my studio!

http://www.artcrawlhouston.com/

Texas Contemporary Art Fair

This weekend I went to the second art fair in less than a month in Houston. I actually liked this one a lot better. It was a little smaller so it was less overwhelming and I though the work was overall better.

My first favorite artist was a photographer named Carol Selter. Her bird images are amazing.

My other favorite Lauren DiCioccio. She used string and objects. This book was awesome and she also had slides where the image was embroidered. Very cool work!

Bug Night

My office-mate put on a bug night at school tonight. I wasn't sure what to expect but it turned out to be really fun. I got some pictures that I like which is weird because I usually don't do a very good job unless I'm setting something up.

The processor has arrived!

It's in....and it's taking up a ton of space!

New Work

art filled weekend

This weekend I finally started using the studio to make stuff rather than just setting it up. It's so nice being able to spread out. The first shot I did is something I definitely would not have been able to do at home. I'm processing the film tomorrow so images will come soon.

I also went to Houston's first Fine Art Fair. It was really interesting to wander around and see a ton of contemporary art in one place. My favorite thing that I saw was work by a Mexican artist named Hugo Lugo (www.hugolugo.com). I hadn't seen any of his work before, but it is amazing. He used watercolor and string to make his pieces.

Right now I'm in the studio waiting for the black paint on my foot to dry....

The darkroom is dark!

This weekend, Jenni and I and our awesome helpers worked on making the darkroom actually dark. We got almost the whole room painted and we raised the walls all the way up to the ceiling. Woo!

This weekend was also my last HCP event as Staff. As excited as I am about the new job, I am definitely going to miss it there.

New Beginnings

This week I moved into a studio and into a new job/office. It's been a big week since I've never had a studio or an office.

On Saturday, Jennifer McNichols and I moved into Box 13. We are planning on building a color darkroom, but out first task was to clean up the space. It was kind of a wreck when we got there.

This is going to be the light area. We are planning on a few tables, shelves and 5500K light sources. We'll also hang some of our work.

Just to the left of where the above picture ends, there is a door that leads into this room. This is will the darkroom part. I love the amber bottles on the window sill. :)

I also started at College of the Mainland as an Assistant Professor. Yesterday I poked around the darkroom. The school has a 4x5 camera and a bunch of TRLs. Yay! There is also the Epson scanner and printer that we have at HCP which is awesome. The darkroom is nice, but needs more enlargers. That might be my first goal.

This is the classroom area. There is also a mini darkroom off of this room that only has 2 enlargers in it.

I also spent a lot of time yesterday organizing my office. I'm super excited about the office since I've never had one before. I share the space with Mark Greenwalt who teaches painting and drawing. I look forward to covering my walls with art-y stuff. (If you want to donate to this cause, that would be awesome.)

More to come...

Current events

Two exciting things are happening in the next few weeks. First, Jennifer McNichols (http://newworldalmanac.net/_jlfm_all/) and I are getting a studio space at Box 13. We are planning on setting up a color darkroom and using the space to shoot and print. It'll be really nice to not have my entire living room consumed by strobes and softboxes.

Also, I've finally landed a full time gig. Starting in two weeks, I will be a tenure track faculty member at College of the Mainland. Very excited! This semester I'll be teaching two Photo 1 classes and one Photo 2 class, assuming that they fill up.

More to come on each of these adventures...

#15

We'll be 15th in the parade.

Art car or Why I Was Sweating my Ass Off on Sunday

The art car is finally starting to look like something. Yay!

Also, we might have a sociopath on our team...

Art Car Progress

Yesterday, Rachel, David, Sasha and I worked on the art car. Things are going much better. Rachel's dad looked at the car and figured out how to make it reverse. Yay! It also seems like we have figured out how to all work together, which is nice. :) And, most importantly, we put something on the car!

Rachel and I are working on paper macheing the front of the car for the map and David and Sasha are working on the brick wall.

Polaroid

I really miss polaroid. I was looking at some old images today and it made me nostalgic. I love what the Impossible Project is trying to do, but its just not the same.

ID Preview Night

Last night a group of collectors came by to preview the exhibition. Four pieces have already sold!

Come to the opening reception tomorrow from 6-9 at Darke Gallery!

Art Car: Day 1

Yesterday, David, Rachel, Sasha and I started working on our art car. Our first task was to get it into our workspace. We did this with no problem, but in doing so, we found out that the car doesn't reverse. Awesome.

We made a work bulletin board with a calendar and sketches. Please don't steal our amazing ideas. :)

We set up our tarp and started taping off where things will go on the car.

The last thing we did (and the thing I was most excited about) was testing different glues.

It did not go well.

ID

I am very excited to be curating the University of Houston photo/digital media senior show this year. The show is called ID and features 14 artists working with the theme of identity. It will run Apr 8- May 6 at Darke Gallery (320B Detering, Houston, 77007). The opening reception is Friday, Apr 8 from 6-9pm. Here's a sneak peek!

An Nguyen, still from A Butterfly Wade, Single-channel Video, 2010

Lillie Monstrum, Invention No. 19, Archival Inkjet Print, 10” x 15”, 2011

Max G. Trautner, Choice of Salad, Archival Inkjet Print, 15" x 19", 2010

They also got a billboard to advertise their show. It was written up on The Great God Pan is Dead.

http://thegreatgodpanisdead.blogspot.com/2011/02/i-was-driving-to-work-last-wednesday.html

Art Car

This year, Houston's art car parade will change weekends to correspond to the opening of the AAM conference that will take place in Houston. Thousands of curators and museum people will converge on Houston for the week. Because of this the AAM host committee has commissioned an art car to celebrate the diversity of Houston museums and my group got chosen. So, Sasha Dela, Rachel Hewlett, David McClain and I will be building a fabulous art car. Save the date for May 22 to see our creation.

Mission wrap-up

Two weekends ago I went down to Mission, TX for the Citrus Fiesta Parade to help David with his float. Here is our amazing finished product.

There were three floats that entered out category: Valley Products. The rules were basically that we had to cover out whole float with produce from the valley, especially citrus products. Here is the winner. It's the Catholic church...in Mission, TX. Shocking.

It was still super fun though. :)