a digest of updates from a busy artist

artist Nadia Utto and i at the ArtFind kick off party

ArtFind is right around the corner.

ArtFind is an art show coordinated by Soul Arts Society.
Soul Arts Society is a loosely affiliated band of artists who put on shows for their mutual benefit. we, the artists, all live on the Treasure Coast of Florida. ArtFind is our second group show. facebook: @soulartssociety

event posters

my contributions for ArtFind 2018: logo and other graphic elements for web and print, web and social media marketing, coordinating between artists and host businesses. it’s kept me busy.

i will be showing my art at Gray Gardens Design & Salvage. (instagram.com/graygardensdesign)
it’s a great place. i ignored a twinge of guilt and called dibs.
here’s a link for the locals: facebook.com/events/212185782947696/
seriously, if you’re local, please come and support local art and local business.

among other works, i will display my new creation: a fascination lamp.
materials:

  • an old stump (Gray Gardens gave it to me in the spirit of collaboration, and told me i could do whatever i wanted.)
  • a ton of epoxy resin – colored with mica powder and alcohol inks
  • cement and cement mastic for the base
  • random pieces of metal, stone, and the like
  • the vertebrae of some ocean creature (my friend Dominic gave them to me)
  • some hollow glass orbs
  • re-purposed parts from two other lamps
  • and two hundred feet of LED lights.

it’s fascinating. (at least to me.)

challenges: the only real challenge was chiseling out the inside of the stump. you’d think the thing was partly petrified. i chiseled for days. i felt like i was paying some kind of karmic debt. i’m pretty sure the stump is from an Australian Pine, what elsewhere is called she-oak, and is not really a conifer at all. this suspicion is reinforced by another colloquial name for the same tree: ironwood. not funny.
i had a little trouble leveling the base, resulting in some unexpected cement grinding. but now it sits level as a calm sea.

here’s a timeline of progress pics. i’ll share a photo of it finished after the show.


the fifth book in the False Key anthology is OUT and available on the interweb.

the best way to get a hold of a copy is Poetic Justice Books and Art (https://www.poeticjusticebooks.com/). not a local? Kris will ship anywhere.

since we signed every book in the house when Poetic Justice Books & Arts hosted our book launch party, ordering from him is a good way to get your hands on a copy signed by all the authors and the artist responsible for our great cover art.
i mean: fuck amazon! you can support an Actual Independent Book Store!

here’s a photo of us crazy book people. i’m wearing a mask that i made for the occasion.

this is a good place for me to segue from the new book to my future intentions for my space on Patreon.

i will continue to share my creative forays and miscellaneous writing, but i have been floundering for a project that could serve as a main course. and now i think i know what that project is.

i have four not-so-short short stories that are begging to be transformed into a series of illustrated novellas. they are the stories published in the last four False Key anthologies.
they need a little polishing, maybe some adapting. before i wrote PO Box 319 in Somewhere South of Sane, i hadn’t really written anything since college. (excepting drunken ramblings, maybe a poem here and there.) so, in four years of four stories and a few dozen poems, my writing has evolved noticeably.
Conspicuously.
authors, feel me on this. i read that first story and i cringe. i sat down with it and re-worked almost every sentence.

the first five pages, divided into two short chapters, are edited almost to my satisfaction and are ready for illustration. i can’t wait! i am going to be so so extra in filling these books with as many images as there are paragraphs!
is that too much? i don’t know. we’ll just have to work it out as we go.

i’ll restructure my subscription tiers to accommodate these new plans. i still want to offer gifts and correspondence, but the False Key project (title?) will be a main thread and premium content.

first, i have to get through next weekend’s show. after which i will require a day of napping with books.

other news:

  • i helped to hang the first exhibit of the season at the local UU church. i’m a member of that congregation, and a member of the art committee. the next show is mine: i will be on exhibit throughout December. photos coming soon. facebook presence still under development: facebook.com/ArtInTheNarthex
  • i’ve really neglected my etsy shop lately. all of a sudden, i made a few sales, which reminded me of how much i like selling handmade things through a website to people in far away places. moral sufficiently boosted, i hope to post some new products (attractive resin trinkets) within the next week. (etsy.com/shop/BlueLeafShop)

that’s it, a fairly full digest of my artventuring. thanks for riding along.

Sept misc updates

soooo….
i have not posted for a While. i will obviously need to utilize this platform with greater frequency and consistency. here’s to a renewed effort on that front!
and here are some of the things with which i have been busy, busy enough that this facet of expression has been ruthlessly back-burner-ed despite my best intentions.

Florida State Beekeepers Association Annual Conference

i’m painting a bee box to be auctioned! the money will go to honey bee research.
my box has crystals painted on it in a semi-realistic fashion.
this is a study i did as preparation for the task. will post final photos soon!


ArtFind 2018 – Soul Arts Society

i am very busy helping to plan and coordinate this event. i am also doing the graphic elements for promotion and sign-age. and the marketing.

find us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/soulartssociety/

i look forward to participating in this event as an artist as well. on Nov 10th 5-9pm


False Key Anthology

hard to believe it – we are on book 5! the group is also planning to change distribution methods and re-fine some of our earlier editions.
look at the beautiful cover my wonderful boyfriend made!

Howl at the Moon Writers Jam

our long-time running original content open mic has a new home starting in Oct. Howl at the Moon is joining forces with Drop the MIC Night at Ground Floor Farm. Drop the MIC is a weekly open mic, and every third Weds each month will be a Howl at the Moon Writers Jam.


Art in Narthex at the Treasure Coast Unitarian Universalist Congregation

our opening show is in Nov. a member of the congregation will show her fine antique collection of handmade quilts. the RE committee will display textile art by the youngest members of the congregation as a complement to the quilts.
our young members dove right into the project. each received a small picture frame to use as a ‘loom’ for a variety of string, ribbon, strips of material. some of us created very ordered woven pieces, and others experimented with more abstract methods. one more session, and i think we will have some completed pieces for the show.
in Dec, i will show my own art in the Narthex Gallery. this will be my first single-artist show.

ciao for now!
_C

An orgone condenser by any other name…

Karl Hans Welz, Austrian scientist and inventor, owns the trademarks for: orgone and orgone generator and has owned it for at least a decade, but he didn’t enforce it until a few years ago. orgonomers(?) and orgonite artists claim the term has become generic through common usage. find a petition challenging this trademark on Change.org.

Welz looking grumpy

(yes, i signed it. mostly due to my first impression of Welz, who likes to shut down peoples’ websites for selling ‘orgonite’.)
a few observations about Welz: he does not look like a person one would like to join for lunch, he talks like a robot, and builds some of the most hideous websites you’ll ever see. his orgone generator devices are not at all the odd but aesthetic configurations popularized by Don and Carol Croft. surf his wave on the web for 10 minutes, and your bions will be screaming for some metal filings and a hunk of quartz suspended in some type of resin.

organite by Carol Croft (crystalinsights.net)

that is, orgonite.

drop that term into the google machine to find much more than the hideous, primary-hued sites of Welz.
First, wade through the products, because people love to make this stuff and he can’t shut them down fast enough.
Follow some links that reference the Croft couple and their work as Etheric Warriors.
then, follow a link to the biography of Wilhelm Reich, the scientist that became, in essence, the good doctor of the free-love movement.
experience the rabbit hole of endearingly weird psuedo-science, conspiracy theory, glowing anectodal accounts, and pop culture references.
maybe, discover this song from the 70s. bonus: check that off the list.

Welz did in fact coin the term organite and is responsible for organite as we know it today: metal filings suspended in resin. the Crofts improved on the design by adding a crystal for the piezoelectric punch, and because crystals make everything better.

the original term orgone belongs to Reich. his orgone chambers were enclosures the size of phone booths with walls made from layers of steel wool alternating with sheep wool or plastic fibers or some other type of organic material. a person seeking the therapeutic benefits would sit on a chair in the enclosure until feeling slightly nauseous – the sign that they were charged to the max with potent orgone energy.

Reich claimed his orgone accumulators could cure cancer. William S. Burroughs, who used the method as a cure for ‘junk-sickness’, had an orgone generator inside an orgone generator. he also claimed it got him off, yes, sexually.

for your friend.

in case you know someone with a problem that might be solved thus, here is a pdf with instructions. you know, for your friend. The Orgone Accumulator Handbook

Reich, a contemporary of Freud, nurtured a fierce conviction that most of what troubled humankind could be solved by a good orgasm. he portmanteau-ed ‘orgone’ from ‘orgasm’ and ‘ozone’ and defined it as a universal life-force vital energy and an organizing principle running counter to entropy.

out of fairness to Welz, Reich was not a universally loved and respected figure either. his contemporaries scoffed at his research, his books were burned, the FDA banned his treatments, and he was eventually thrown in jail. in short, he was a perfect fit for the Beat Generation and a natural segue into the Free Love movement of the 60s.

that was the mid 20th century. a little more digging will reveal deeper roots.
Oscar Korschelt, German chemist and inventor, build the Solar Ether Radiation Apparatus in 1890 possibly on the same principles.
Franz Anton Mesmer, who pioneered the system of therapuetics known as mesmerism, may have build the first device to accumulate ‘animal magnetism’ in the middle of the 18th century.
i also stumbled on a few mentions of Czech occultist Franz Bardon. Ostensibly, Bardon wangled some ideas that eventually resulted in the concept of orgone and then orgonite, like wee idea-generating bions.

now i want to make things.

i am a beginner at working in  this medium. i will share discoveries and woes transparently.

materials:
clearcast 7050 – this is the only resin i have ever used. it is a 1:2 part epoxy resin. i researched a lot, and then i bought this. i have no basis for comparison.
containers and stirrers – disposable things to mix the resin
lots of little silicon molds – find an endless variety of these online.
bits of metal and gem stone crystals and whatever random beads and things one has laying around
butane torch – priceless for removing bubbles and inexpensive at home depot
some attractive material – and maybe a bead, sanded flat on one side with a Dremel – and some glue like E6000


the resin: Clearcast 7050 epoxy resin for making jewelry

silicone molds of any kind can work. butane torch = game changer.

dust is the enemy,  so use a box. Dremel photobomb.

putting little random things in art is the bestest

no issues with curing using small batches. measure very carefully.

smells like starburst if you’re me ( but do not eat it)


observations on material and process:
this resin doesn’t mix quite as thin as one convincing youtube lady claimed. a watery resin is a plus because it allows bubbles to escape.
these youtube crafters hold up sample chunks of resin that seem to glow with an ethereal flawlessness. but despite stirring very carefully, i am getting micro-bubbles in my pieces. not the end of the world for these are busier pieces, but i want to have more control. i am concerned it might have something to do how i time multiple pours on a single piece or my timing in using the torch to draw existing bubbles to the surface. i’ll learn more as i go. the reader is encouraged to comment.
this ClearCast 7050 is really crystal clear and cures rock hard. and it actually smells kind of… good. citrus-y. but i also find E6000 glue smells like fake watermelon flavor, so it could just be me.

using Novus 1, 2 & 3 with a microfiber cloth. got bored, used dremel

had to polish because i got excited and poked it before it was cured.

my intention is not to find the very best materials or totally refine the process or teach other people. my goal is to make something that i can confidently sell. i rely on the information i dredge from forums and product reviews before deciding what to buy or try. i expect a learning curve, but experiment as efficiently and optimistically as possible until i reach the goal of a sufficiently refined finished product.
i might come back and affiliate link this post. if i do, i will note it. i will never blow any smoke about how wonderful this or that linked product might be, just describe my experience.


look: a micro-organite.
that’s my fun-at-nomenclature stab at a TM-free name for this guy. this is a prototype for a pocket-sized ‘orgone collecting’ charm.

for the fabric, i used a piece of ribbon. first i glued it to the bottom, then cut around it leaving a couple millimeters to fold and glue to the sides. i cut the seam off the ribbon and glued that around the circumference to give it a finished look. this ribbon has wire in it, so i threaded the bead on that. it worked well. i taped off the resin and sprayed the fabric with a gloss enamel to prevent stray threads.


i looked up orgonite on a lark and found a lot of talented artists making resin sculptures full of color and personality. i believe good art is energizing. that’s not the same as mainlining animal magnetism, but it’s ample reason to create or enjoy the craft.
is there more to it? what is the efficacy of these hippie EMF dissruptors?  what do i think? i think i don’t know enough, and i would hate for my arbitrary opinion to sway another away from conducting ones own research.
may the artventure continue!

next micro-organite project in its mold. metal filings.

resin pendants using pendant trays and printed artwork

experiment: teeny micro-organite pendants.

easy on the monkey

things people say sometimes about mediation that prevent them from really doing it:

  • i don’t/can’t meditate because i can’t stop myself from thinking.
  •  i meditate by doing things i like. when something causes me contentment, i am meditating.
  • in the dictionary, meditate is defined as: to think carefully or deeply about something.

meditation changes lives. a regular, formal practice alters the brain in objectively (scientifically) observable ways. the inner experience of these changes and those less observable are profoundly freeing and uplifting. the benefits are too great to wave aside arbitrarily for a lack of information or understanding. let’s dispel some common misconceptions.

stopping the mind from thinking through use of volition is virtually impossible

a common misconception: meditation is about quieting the mind, therefore we must use our will power to squelch and strangle every poor little thought… if this were the case, no one would ever meditate. there’s no way such self-abuse could ever lead anyone to an inner state of peace.

the thinking mind has long been compared to a monkey. the monkey chatters. the monkey swings from branch to branch. it’s attention span leaves much to be desired. the monkey is not tame and obeys it’s own nature.
don’t strangle your monkey. first of all, he’s only doing what he does because it is his nature. secondly, monkeys freak when you try to strangle them. don’t be a jerk to your monkey.

so, decoding the above: it is the nature of the mind to think. why expect otherwise? the important realization, the absolutely critical realization, is that you are not your thoughts, you are not your mind. ask: who is it that is watching the monkey…?

and where does this leave us? in a position to stop chasing the poor little simian all over the place. chill and monkey-watch. human awareness is powerful. giving chase to thoughts imbues them with energy and gives rise to potentially endless narratives. observing rather than engaging thoughts will calm and quiet the monkey-mind. this takes practice, but practice is synonymous with success. every time i remember to disengage from the stream of thoughts and become the witness once more, i have succeeded.

liking what your are doing at the moment is not the same as meditating.

as an artist, i’m no stranger to the meditative mood. accessing creativity is like a switching back and forth between rational thinking states and deeper no-thought states that yield inspiration. those no-thought states might be same as or similar to a meditative state. but without the intention of meditating, of encouraging that inner space one moment at a time, it isn’t meditating.

i experience random sensations of deep interconnection with all of creation. it’s a good time that might relate directly to my own spiritual foundation, but it does not offer the same benefits as actually meditating. meditation might foster in one a deep sense of affinity, contentment, and joy, but the reverse is not valid logic.

the dictionary definition implying intentional thought is clearly not the subject at hand

i’m not saying that the definition in Websters is invalid. lots of words have multiple meanings or mean different things in different contexts. but clearly we are talking about the not-thinking kind here.

in closing:

give it a shot because there are no substitutions for becoming the master of your own mind. how powerful are your thoughts? do they serve you well? do they sweep you up in a storm? leave you with clenched fists over a scenario merely imagined? how much energy could be refocused to better use with an improvement in your thought-life?

i recommend this book:
“Joy of Living” by Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche
for its great basic meditation techniques. his approach is lighthearted and accessible. this book is very secular and mentions more science than faith. i’m big on faith, don’t get me wrong – my own faith is deepened by the benefits of meditation. but sometimes you just need to retrain your brain. its non-religiousness renders it suitable for all audiences.

Phillip K Dick’s DIVINE INVASION broke my teen shackles of angst & despair

i was born the same year my favorite science fiction author died. i don’t really think that means anything. other than that i could be a reincarnation of Phillip K Dick. no, i don’t really believe that.
but i do Love him. i came to discover that i probably love his books because a lot of my interests, ideas and views echo his.

i find this most compelling about his novels:
as the science fiction gets wild enough to dash any sense of “this could actually happen at anytime” the characters become more and more real, lovable and complex.
the stories demand something deeply personal from the main players and therefore the reader, nothing so simple or symbolic as the mere slaying of a dragon.
the sense of participating in the human experience is only accentuated by the unlikelihood of the grosser narrative aspects.

Phillip Kindred Dick suffered from mental illness and hallucinations, experimented with drugs, and was married something like 7 times. in almost all the photographs of him that i’ve seen his eyes reflect a certain angst or thirst. he had transcendental experiences, and described himself as a cosmic pantheist (yes!) and fictionalizing philosopher rather than a novelist. he was born prematurely alongside a twin sister who died several weeks later. his own death resulted from a stroke at the age of 53 in 1982.

themes/tropes explored in his work naturally reflect his life and preoccupations: a phantom twin, hallucinations, mental illness, the subconscious, the moral obligations of mankind, theology and metaphysics.
couple those elements with scifi dystopia… yeah: what could be better?

back to a more personal narrative: i’m using my favorite books as a autobiographical tool. one reason i’m doing this is that i’m squeamish over anything autobiographical (including job applications which i plan to avoid here on out). the other reason is that i read this really stupid article (i refuse to link to it.) that can be summed up briefly by my following paraphrase:

“you’re all dumb pop-culture automatons, just like me. consequently i can assume that you all lied when the personal book-list fad rolled through your facebook timeline. Your favorite books are actually Harry Potter, 50 Shades of Grey, and [insert NY Best Seller bullshit here] because you’re not capable of being shaped by important works of the written word and only read for mind-numbing enjoyment.”

yes, i take issue with this. how could this person possibly know that Carlos Casteneda changed my life by altering the way i look at road-killed animals? what? it has to do with a crow. i’ll explain that later.

Back to Dick. (lol)
most New England kids are exposed to Dick’s work in middle school: Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep which gave rise to the movie Blade Runner in the same year of his death/my birth. somehow i missed that book during my childhood. i was a senior in high school when i read Divine Invasion. i felt like i was In that book. the story swept over me in waves. now, i wax autobiographical:

a young kid, i was close enough to norm to escape serious remedial attention. i was a quiet kid, at times very withdrawn. i liked solitude every bit as much as company. i spent as much time as i could alone in nature.

but by the end of high school, i was just borderline freak-out weirdo. i could still be fairly quiet about it, though it showed. i felt really different from everyone except from a handful of friends. and i was; this isn’t a lack of humility or terminal uniqueness. i was asking questions about the nature of reality, theological and metaphysical questions. i was searching deeply for a cohesive sense of meaning. i was doing these things consciously and i knew only a few other kids who would play.

also, my search for meaning did not mix well with adolescent hormonal flux. i found myself having regular nightmares and experiencing frequent acute states (i didn’t know to call them that then). my senses would ignite like a fireworks display. that wasn’t always unpleasant, but could be overwhelming and disorienting. (i think acute states are natural during adolescence, and that they mix strangely with whatever the kid is experiencing during that time. i am describing an experience that is personal and universal.)

i have a natural tendency to escapism and therefore had already become a master at suspension of disbelief. Divine Invasion was one of those books that i willed to life. while i was reading it and the months following, it became my personal Torah – which in fact the book mentions and to which it ascribes a beautiful life and energy.

i had been failing at putting the pieces together. a lot of this was a mix of chance and teenage disillusion. i found my own interpersonal experience mostly isolating. the world seemed fractured, fragmented and i felt that way myself. i encountered Gnosticism and the online parody religion called Discordianism at around the same time. Hand in hand, they validated my fear that reality was chaotic and flawed. i hopped on that train with a ‘hail Eris’, decided that confusion must be the natural state of man and that my only hope was to embrace and enjoy it. not a good place. yes, there were drugs.

Dick’s self-described cosmic pantheism couched in the familiar salve of science fiction offered me an alternative mythos. and it was prettier and much more human(e). i had found a new train. i was off the hook of resigning myself to a world ruled by Loki, Eris, the Demiurge… it sounds so cheesy now, but my fantastical 17 year old mind was just thrashing with this stuff. really, it was self-abuse.
thank you, Divine Universe. you don’t have to invade, just knock at the door anytime you like.

    WordPress › Error

    There has been a critical error on your website.

    Learn more about debugging in WordPress.