Art and Design

Sm{art}: Writing Tips from the Experts

Kelsey Wallace — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 16:37:19 -0500

Recently, The Guardian asked several successful fiction writers to come up with a top ten list of their personal writing dos and don'ts. Since we've all got a secret novelist lurking within us (don't pretend you haven't fantasized about going on a book tour) here are some of the more interesting tips from the likes of Margaret Atwood, Zadie Smith, Jeanette Winterson, and more.

From Margaret Atwood, a bit of writerly romantic advice:

You can never read your own book with the innocent anticipation that comes with that first delicious page of a new book, because you wrote the thing. You've been backstage. You've seen how the rabbits were smuggled into the hat. Therefore ask a reading friend or two to look at it before you give it to anyone in the publishing business. This friend should not be someone with whom you have a romantic relationship, unless you want to break up.

From Zadie Smith, a practical approach:

Don't romanticise your "vocation". You can either write good sentences or you can't. There is no "writer's lifestyle". All that matters is what you leave on the page.

From Joyce Carol Oates, some advice on keeping it in perspective:

Keep in mind Oscar Wilde: "A little sincerity is a dangerous thing, and a great deal of it is absolutely fatal."

From Hilary Mantel, who wants you to keep to yourself:

If you get stuck, get away from your desk. Take a walk, take a bath, go to sleep, make a pie, draw, listen to music, meditate, exercise; whatever you do, don't just stick there scowling at the problem. But don't make telephone calls or go to a party; if you do, other people's words will pour in where your lost words should be. Open a gap for them, create a space. Be patient.

From Jeanette Winterson, a feminist tip:

Take no notice of anyone with a gender agenda. A lot of men still think that women lack imagination of the fiery kind.

I like the piece because not only does it offer some inspiring tips from some excellent writers, but it also demonstrates how those writers themselves have been influenced by their predecessors and by one another. Our creative efforts don't exist in a vacuum, and it's wonderful to see that fact in action.

Which rules from the article did you find the most helpful? Do you have any tips you use when writing or creating art in other media? Share them in the comments section!

Sm{art}: The Visibility Project

Kat Kimberley — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 15:28:51 -0500

What makes “good” Art?

Despite what museums curators, art critics, and other “established” representatives tell you, “good art” usually boils down to a matter of individual taste. Me, I get bored looking at bucolic landscapes paintings. Did I mention those child angels from the Victorian Era really creep me out? Yeah, I know, I’m supposed to enjoy the soft pastels of Monet or the drooping clocks of Dali. But I don’t. Given the choice, I’ll take a screenprint by Favianna Rodriguez over a Warhol or a Jennifer Linton over a Degas.

Most of the art our culture celebrates is the same type of art that makes me yawn. See, I enjoy art that gets my blood racing. For me, good art needs to be both aesthetically appealing and make my brain hurt. Because of my intense predilection for this type of provocative eye candy, I was exceedingly pleased recently to discover the Visibility Project—a female, Asian American, Queer portraiture project by Bay Area Photographer Mia Nakano and Los Angeles collaborator Christine Pan.

At an art gallery called Seed Corn in San Francisco, I stumbled upon their work. The gallery is operated by The Greenlining Institute as part of a broader Community Arts Initiative which “serves as a way to acknowledge the debt that social justice movements owe artists.” Bingo! I rushed inside—this sounded like just my cup of tea!

From across the room, a single photograph caught my eye. As I approached the portrait to look into the eyes of the subject my mind spewed out categories “Woman” “Asian” and “Queer.” But just as soon as I had pegged this person into narrow, culturally defined pigeonholes, I began to be troubled by my reductive thinking. My conscious grew angry at my brain. Why couldn’t my mind view a face without forcing it into a constructed category? Was gender and sexuality somehow being performed in these photos? How could I relate without stereotyping?

Little did I know, the internal moral tug-o-war taking place within my head over these shifting categories was the expressed intention of the artists. The Visibility Project was launched in 2008 by Photographers Mia and Christine as a way to present the strength, emotion, passion, and diversity that exist within the Queer Asian American community. Nakano and Pan began the project by putting out emails to their networks for 12-15 Asian American persons who identified as queer females, whether it be a lesbian, bisexual, mtf, ftm, or genderqueer orientation. The email was simple and said “come as you are.” There was no stylist or make-up artist, or prearranged wardrobe. The response they got was overwhelming and the show quickly expanded to 40+ participants.

Recently, I spoke with Nakano about her interests in photography and the intersections between race, gender, and sexual orientation in her work. She described her inspiration stemming from her travels to Nepal as a photojournalist where she documented Nepali GLBTQI human rights workers of the Blue Diamond Society, the largest queer rights organization in Nepal. “It was phenomenal to engage with queer rights activists who put their lives on the line by being out and being visible.” She continued, “Once, I rode on a bus for an hour with a BDS activist to reach a "possible" lesbian, to let her know that yes, there were other people like her, and a small but dedicated community who would support her. ”

Since retuning to the States and founding the Visibility Project with Christine Pan, the work has rapidly taken on a life of it’s own thanks to generous support from AQWA (Asian and Pacific Islander Queer Women and Transgender Activists) RayKo Photo Center and Astraea. The project has moved beyond photos to include video segments with participants speaking about issues like Proposition eight, gender and sexual identity, as well as the process of coming out in multi-ethnic communities. The portraits have been featured in a handful of galleries throughout California and the project is now expanding to include participants in cities across the country, and will culminate in a book and short documentary film.

If you ask me, these are not only beautiful portraits, but on a deeper level, they help to humanize the diversity and complexity embedded within constructed categories. That’s what I call good art! While the Visibility Project photos may never be canonized, or widely appreciated, they encourage the viewer to not only appreciate fine art, but in doing so, to contemplate identity, culture, ethnicity, representation, and sexual orientation. Now, I admit I’m no expert on fine art but when’s the last time a Monet Lilly pad or a Degas ballerina made you do all that?

If you are excited about the Visibility Project and would like to learn more, or to take part in upcoming photo/video shoots, please contact Mia and Christine here.

Sm{art}: Jeff Sheng's Don't Ask Don't Tell

Kjerstin Johnson — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 18:43:04 -0500

Glynn and Celine, Fort Worth, Texas, 2009

The problematic policy of Don't Ask Don't Tell, implemented in 1993 by President Bill Clinton, has now been beautifully, if not dutifully rendered visible by LA-based photographer Jeff Sheng. That is, visible to the certain point his courageous subjects can be while in uniform.

The Don't Ask Don't Tell project started in 2008 when Sheng began receiving anonymous emails in response to his Fearless project, a series of portrait photographs of high school and collegiate athelete who identified as gay, lesbian, or transgendered and were out to their teammates. Some of these emails were from closeted servicemen or women, and Sheng was inspired to begin documenting them (with their trust and permission) through photography.

Collecting dozens of photographs (more than he expected), Sheng planned to release one large volume of photographs in early 2011, but instead decided to release the project in volumes throughout 2010, partially encouraged by the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network to raise awareness of the issue, given Obama's State-of-the-Union promise to "work with Congress and our military to finally repeal the law that denies gay Americans the right to serve the country they love because of who they are...It’s the right thing to do."

Sheng's photographs appear simple at first glance, but quickly draw you into complexity. Although the subjects' military uniform is in plain site, their identity is concealed, partially for metaphor of Don't Ask Don't Tell, but also for their own safety and anonymity.

Natalie, Corpus Christi, Texas, 2009

Sheng explains his process:

"I have purposely shot each image in a way that obscures to some degree the identity of the individuals, and the final image that is released to the public is first approved by the subject, and is in many ways, their expression of their closet-ness and lack of identity. For each image, I have asked the individual to wear their uniform, while staging the photoshoot in a bedroom or local hotel room where that person is currently serving. I am interest in the intersections between public and private space, and the government's policing of our private spaces - the bedroom being the most representative of this."

Mark, Savannah, Georgia, 2009

Entirely self-funded and self-published, Volume 1 of Don't Ask Don't Tell is available for $30 (with a $5 discount for veterans, students, and low-income folks) here, and check his website for updates on the project. He's also looking for more participants for the upcoming books - find more info here

Smart: Norman Rockwell’s Birthday and the Birth of a Feminist Icon

Shaamini Yogaretnam — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 15:38:56 -0500

February 3rd, 2010 marked the 116th birthday of Norman Rockwell. Google’s clever inclusion of his art among the letters of the search engine’s logo alerted me to the historic date. Oh Google! You went and did it again with your clever intertextuality.

Rockwell rose to artistic fame with his Americana paintings depicting everyday life and its sentiments. On May 29th, 1943 The Saturday Evening Post ran as its cover Rockwell’s painting of “Rosie the Riveter.” Norman Rockwell’s painting was the first widely publicized visual representation of Rosie the Riveter. Rockwell’s Rosie was a commanding figure decked in overalls and a matching work shirt. Sleeves rolled up, Rosie was muscular and ready to work. With an American flag waving as the entire backdrop, Rosie sits on her lunch break balancing her lunch box – her sign of humanity – and her riveting gun – her symbol of power, importance and patriarchically-validated purpose. Rosie was hard at work, her goggles and visor visible, yet pushed up out of her face, as proof. But she is hungry, justifiably so after a job well done; her sandwich is her hard-won right. Our Rosie is a beauty – strong and muscular with painted finger nails, red lipstick, that perfectly tidy mess of red curls and even an angelic halo encircling her head. She is confident as she gazes out into the distance, all the while using as a foot stool a bruised and battered copy of Hitler’s Mein Kampf. Rockwell’s Rosie is undeniably a more potent image than that which has come to culturally represent Rosie the River, J. Howard Miller’s “We Can Do It.”

It is argued by artistic scholars and many a Rockwell historian that Rosie was one of the works that Americans particularly identified with. Rockwell’s nostalgic scenes and neighbourly characters fell short of what a female Riveter, representing the face of wartime womanhood, could do for the nation. A feminist artistic icon, Rosie the Riveter is worth commending for its efforts to publicize and popularize the mass entrance of women in the workplace and necessarily worth highlighting the many biased limitations of the icon. Full disclosure: I have Miller’s “We Can Do It” Rosie tattooed on a substantial portion of my back. Can I still write this confident not to skew my analytical skills? Mmmmyes.

“Rosie the Riveter” as the all-encompassing term for women’s labor force participation during WWII that it has come to signify, was first introduced in 1942 by a song of the same. Written by Redd Evans and John Jacob Loeb, the song was re-recorded by numerous artists and become a sure-fire hit. The song’s Rosie is a martyred assembly line worker, tireless and patriotic as the lyrics suggest: All the day long/ Whether rain or shine/ She’s a part of the assembly line./ She’s making history/Working for victory/Rosie the Riveter.

Although many women took on male dominated trades during WWII, women were expected to return to their reproductive labor positions within the home once men returned from the war. Most women who entered the workplace specifically at wartime opted to do this. Later many women chose to return to their jobs in traditionally gendered work such as clerical or administrative positions – what has since been term pink-collar work.

The fact that the image was based on and closely linked to a real woman, Rose Will Monroe, may have contributed to the icon’s popularity. The numerous service announcements, wartime films and posters she was the star of were used to encourage even the most doubtful of women to go to work for one reason – to support the war effort and their men.

Rosie the Riveter is an imperfect icon. While she (and yes, I know I am personifying an image and therefore imbuing it with all sorts of muddy ethical issues) is undeniably a feminist icon, it is a certain type of feminism that is celebrated while others are marginalized or altogether ignored. Rosie as a white woman stands in for the wartime contributions of other white women. The significant contributions of many others, mainly black women, are not conveyed by the icon. Jobs previously unavailable to black women as a result of their race became acceptable for them when the wartime atmosphere of necessity and urgency took over. No longer considered undesirable by employers, these women played every bit as much a role in the patriotic effort that their white counterparts did. The idea of working was not unheard of before the war. Women have worked and minority status in the form of race, class or sexuality, was usually what informed this behavior regardless of war. While many assume that a sexual division of labor, independent of time and space, is the reason women were primarily relegated to the domestic sphere prior to WWII, they fail to recognize the significance of a cultural division of labor influenced by sex. It was the middle-class white woman who was at home and the middle class white man in the workplace.

Rosie is still largely a propagandistic symbol. Women’s right to widespread opportunity came only at patriarchal capitalism’s allowance and need for this. Women’s labor was exploited for the war effort, with women making a fraction of the wages offered to men doing the same work, and then refused once the war was over.

What else does the Rosie image ignore? A symbol exclusively for American feminism, Rosie ignores the likely double shift wartime woman workers faced. These women were getting it done on the job and at home, or at least trying to, but it is only their paid labor force participation that garners praise. Beyond that, Rosie is a heterosexist image. Used to propel feminine women into traditionally masculine work, the propaganda work of the image is predicated on an obligatory owing relationship to at least one man. We’re doing it all for men so they can get home safely and quickly! Rosie ignores the gender non-normative women who, based on their “deviant” gender performance or sexuality, were denied access to traditionally feminine jobs. These women did the same work as many riveters both before and after the war and their contributions fail to receive any significant status quo attention.

Wrought with many a problem, Rosie is not the ideal of women’s opportunity that she is often made out to be. But herein lies the value of feminist art – facilitation of conversation. What Rosie the Riveter speaks to and what she is (in)capable of conveying are all tied up together in Rockwell’s painting. The image demands, and Rosie sure does get!

Further Reading: Interpretations of a Classic

Sm{art}: Keetra Dean Dixon

Belin Liu — Sun, 24 Jan 2010 20:59:34 -0500

Keetra Dean Dixon's work never fails to put a smile on my face.

In a world that is ripe with cynicism, it's nice to know that designers and artists like Dixon try to break those cynical patterns. The fact that she has become successful in the commercial field because, not in spite, of her personal vision and aesthetic is a testament to her talents; positivity and a view of the world that is unpredictable yet consistent in its uniqueness. Her mission of inspiring wonder and awe in the daily routine is a breath of fresh air.

Wonders Kept: Souvenirs of the Unexpected, Dixon's MFA piece at Cranbrook, is still one of my favorites. Innocuous looking photobooths were placed in random public spaces.

"The booth holds no denotation of it's unique qualities. Users enter the booth, pose for two shots and exit as usual. During the developing process, the photos are "analyzed" and customized with forecasts consisting of patterns, symbols and messages -- the resulting portrait presents an unexpected interference over a traditional photobooth image."

Next to the booth would be a "key" of all the patterns and symbols for participants to decipher from their photos.

//////////////////////////////////////////////////

Dixon's work fuses DIY (her mother was a crafter, father a metalsmith) with formal training of Bauhaus Gestalt theory -- an analytical approach to design with an objective to move towards. Dixon developed many of her core objectives during her masters studies at the Cranbrook Academy of Art, a place reknowned for its open studio and experimental environment. Running the multimedia gamut, her projects range from crafted blood pillows to massive interactive video installations.

Her work has been recognized on several fronts including a place in the permanent design collection at the SFMOMA, the choice for STEP magazine’s Emerging Talent ‘09, and the honorable ranking of ADC Young Gun ‘08. Dixon’s first solo exhibit took place November 2009 in London’s Kessel Kramer Gallery KKOutlet.

//////////////////////////////////////////////////

Cordial Invitations

//////////////////////////////////////////////////

The Great Slumber: Blood Puddle PIllows

//////////////////////////////////////////////////

Little Public Plaques

//////////////////////////////////////////////////

Half Wishing, Half Lying

//////////////////////////////////////////////////

Hall of Fragments (with Rockwell Group)

You should definitely go here to see this installation in action.

//////////////////////////////////////////////////

Comforter

"It's about asking people to embody those unexpected moments and respond in a positive light." ~ KDD

//////////////////////////////////////////////////

Some fun facts about Keetra Dean Dixon (thanks SiouxWIRE):

She prefers the trashier version of a grilled cheese sandwich.

She used to live in an Igloo and fight bears on a daily basis for survival.

Born and raised Alaskan (see above).

Falls on the veggie side of things, but that never squelches her competitive nature.

She'll punch you (HARD) in the face if you say she can't live without electricity for a week.

She feels that cars move too slow and days move too quick.

If she ever went to prison she would design the best tats for people.

Outshoot at the gun range every time so keep her on your side for the zombie invasion.

For more information:

FromKeetra

From K to J - Keetra Dean Dixon and partner JK Keller

Quick interview with Keetra Dean Dixon for ADC Young Guns '08:

Out of the Bin: Asylum-seeking lesbians find expression through art

Kjerstin Johnson — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 17:05:16 -0500

The recent Uganda death penalty bill for homosexuality has raised awareness of the inhumane treatment of LGBT people globally. The repercussions of rape, jail, and murder for expressing your sexuality are horrendous, but they sometimes make it easy to cast a blind eye to the way so-called first-world countries continue to foster homophobia, transphobia, and sexism. Gay women seeking asylum in the UK know all too well that homophobia does not stop at the border.

Through a new art project with Artangel, an organization that sponsors interactive art projects, some of these woman are able to express the dehumanizing and difficult process of gaining asylum, which includes writing twenty pages on your prosection as well as being able to "prove" your new homosexual lifestyle in the West (for more information on seeking asylum, visit the UK Lesbian & Gay Immigration Group). One gay woman who came to Britain from Gambia with her son writes “When you’re in Africa you think that when you come to Europe there are gay rights. But it’s not like that. There are so many issues that I’m dealing with right now which make things even more difficult for me, so I’m in a big battle. And until I win that battle, everything is on hold.” Another woman writes, “Sometimes I wonder how I got into the position of a 'refugee'; being pitied, given handouts, being a second class citizen, labelled and displayed.”

Working with the Israeli interdisciplinary visual artist Oreet Ashery, twelve lesbians seeking asylum in Britain from multiple countries including Barbados, Gambia, and Nigeria engaged in the project Staying: Dream, Bin, Stud and Other Stories Through a series of workshops, the women told their stories through developed alter-ego characters until they completed a manuscript of drawings, discussions, and stories compiled in a bound volume.

Ashery explains the idea behind the workshopping characters as "My aim was to work with each woman and the group as a whole to help each participant to develop a character. The character would enable the participants to tell their stories and experience themselves in a different way. To my mind, working with alter egos and fictional characters is never about pure fiction or about hiding behind a mask; on the contrary, it is a way to push to the foreground an aspect of oneself and to exaggerate it."

The character Dream was developed from her recurring dream about chains and handcuffs:

"Yeah, I had this dream. I was in chains and then my eyes... When you apply for asylum, they take your photo, and everything I saw was [in] this dream...I've never committed a crime, but in the dream I was a prisoner, and I did not understand why. I was taken in handcuffs like a criminal....Where I come from, you have to do something really, really, really big to be handcuffed. And I haven't done anything bad."

A sample dialog between two characters Bin (who as a gay person feels like a piece of trash thrown away) and House (a character made up of rooms that recalls an aspect of her life):

House: How is life treating you living in Brixton, compared with your home country in Africa?
Bin: I am not living yet.
House: What do you mean?
Bin: I am not living yet in Brixton, I am staying in Brixton.
House: What is stopping you from living?
Bin: I have to wait for the Home Office.

The character Bin

The project is scheduled to go live January 20, so Bitch readers in London should check it out. A slideshow of the women can be found on the Artangel site, and more of the artwork will be available online later as well. Five hundred copies of the finalized book will be distributed among various organizations, hopefully raising a more informed perspective on women seeking asylum (Ashery herself admits she was ignorant to how the immigration process worked for gay and lesbian asylum seekers before the project and had gross misperceptions.) “Before the project I couldn’t express myself,” Bin says. “I knew what I wanted to say but I kept quiet about it. But working with the others has taught me to respect myself. Writing has helped me to rediscover myself.”

h/t to @MaameMensima and @CTrouper

ArtAngel: Staying [ArtAngel]
Artangel gives African lesbians a voice in Britain [Times Online]

Sm{art}: Margaret Kilgallen

Belin Liu — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 19:17:30 -0500

At an early age, Margaret Kilgallen was impressed by examples of works by Southwest and Mexican artists. She employed these artists' use of warm colors in her own painting. Her many works in gouache and acrylic on found paper reflect an interest in typographic styles and symbology.

Jobs as a librarian and bookbinder in the early and mid 1990s contributed to her encyclopedic knowledge of signs drawn from American folk tradition, printmaking, and letterpress. Kilgallen's aesthetic and methods were a direct correlation with her love of “things that show the evidence of the human hand.” Painting directly on the wall, Kilgallen created room-size murals that recalled a time when personal craft and handmade signs were the norm.

"Having a background in doing printmaking and letterpress, I think that I became very interested in images that were flat and graphic. And my painting still today is very flat...American craft is like that too -- the painting is very flat. And also the painting that you see on the storefronts, handmade signs, tend to be very flat. That's probably my biggest influence..." ~MK

//////////////////////////////////////////////

Kilgallen was also a graffiti artist under the tag names "Meta" and "Matokie Slaughter." The latter name, a homage to folk musician Matokie Slaughter, was specifically used for freight train graffiti -- a hobo tradition that strongly influenced her work. Kilgallen was an accomplished banjo player and became an avid surfer after moving to California to obtain her MFA at Stanford University.

"If you're doing something in the city, then hopefully you're speaking to somebody who has an open mind who is walking by. And you're also speaking to a community of other people who do similar types of work. I like to think that the outdoor community is broad and able and open for anybody to see." ~MK

Have you walked down the streets of the Mission district in San Francisco and stumbled across this mural?

Or browse various street corners and peered inside shop windows to come across this in downtown SF?

Margaret was a key member of the Mission School art movement. This movement is generally considered to have emerged in the early 1990s around a core group of artists closely aligned with the larger lowbrow art movement. It is considered to be a regional expression of that movement, named after the Mission District in San Francisco. Artists of the Mission School take their inspiration from the urban, bohemian, DIY "street" culture of the district and are strongly influenced by mural and graffiti art, comic and cartoon art, and folk art forms such assign painting and hobo art.

"On any day in the Mission in San Francisco, you can see a hand-painted sign that is kind of funky, and maybe that person, if they had money, would prefer to have had a neon sign. But I don't prefer that. I think it's beautiful, what they did and that they did it themselves. That's what I find beautiful." ~MK

For a more in-depth idea of the Mission District in the early 1990s, please read the article San Francisco's Real Mission by John Krich.

//////////////////////////////////////////////

Strong, independent women walking, surfing, fighting, and biking feature prominently in Margaret's work.

"I believe there need to be women visual in our every day landscape, working hard and doing their own thing, whether you like it or not, whether it's acceptable or not...I especially hope to inspire young women because often I feel like so much emphasis is put on how beautiful you are, and how thin you are, and not a lot of emphasis is put on what you can do and how smart you are. I'd like to change that, change the emphasis of what's important when looking at a woman." ~MK

//////////////////////////////////////////////

Margaret Kilgallen was taken away much too soon, passing away in 2001, at age 33, from complications of breast cancer. She is survived by her daughter Asha, as well as her husband and collaborator Barry McGee.

Her work has been shown at Deitch Projects and the Drawing Room in New York, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts and the Luggage Store in San Francisco, the Forum for Contemporary Art in St. Louis, and the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston. Kilgallen’s work was recently presented at the UCLA/Armand Hammer Museum. In 2002, her work was chosen for the Whitney Biennial, one of the most prestiguous exhibitions of contemporary art by lesser or unknown artists in the world. In 2005, the REDCAT gallery did a survey of her artwork called In the Sweet Bye and Bye.

Her work was also an important part of the 2004–2006 touring exhibit, Beautiful Losers: Contemporary Art and Street Culture. These artists include Barry McGee, Chris Johanson, Josh Lazcano, Alicia McCarthy, Clare Rojas, Thomas Campbell, Dan Flanagan, Symantha Gates, Nell Gould, and filmmaker Bill Daniel.

A documentary about this collective was released in 2008.

If interested, please check out PBS -- Art:21 series. You can stream episodes online. http://www.pbs.org/art21

HIGHLY recommended viewing for any contemporary...well...any art lover, really. They do a wonderful feature on Margaret Kilgallen.

Sm{art}: Ginger Rogers Takahashi

Kjerstin Johnson — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 19:37:27 -0500

Image taken from Takahashi's Myspace page.

I saw Ginger Rogers Takahashi's work in the art auction for the Lesbian Herstory Archive. Although her work spans illustration, multimedia, wall hangings, and music, the themes of sexuality, gender, and community run throughout. (Rabbits also seem to be a motif).

A screenprinted poster from 2004. Image from the New Museum

Whether it's her involvement with the Mobilivre Bookmobile, where a super cute a 1959 Airstream Overlander trailer, interior-redecorated as a mini-zine and book arts store toured the country, or Butch in the Bog, a collaboration with Celeste Dupuy-Spencer, it's clear that aesthetic is as important as community building to her. As she told the New York City News Service, “As an artist, I like to create situations for people to come together and to have an encounter."

One of Takahashi's notable works is an army of lovers cannot fail, where "Powerstich" events are held in homes, galleries, or gardens, and people come together to help stitch a white-on-white quilt while listening to participatory readings on privilege, sex, and gender. Started in 2004, Takahashi breathes new life into the traditional craft and social gathering with its consciousness-raising and untraditional matter. From her artist's statement:

I see the history of family and community quilting as harnessing possibly the foremost political activities: community-building and dialog, creating a sense of belonging for those who participate. The quilting forums are symbolic of the same ideals upheld by my own queer community. While redefining these traditions, an army of lovers cannot fail brings the spirit of this shared experience to an extended community.

Also considering historically outdated modes of production, this quilt has been in progress for over two years, and will require at least one more year to completion. Thankfully, the end product is not the piece, but rather the process—the informal gatherings and invaluable dialog between friends and strangers.

The detail of the quilt is also rather untraditional...

Images from the New Museum's Museum as Hub

She's also a co-founder of the feminist genderqueer art collective LTTR, which "seeks to create and build a context for a culture of critical thinkers whose work not only speaks in dialogue with one another, but consistently challenges its own form by shifting shape and design to best respond to contemporary concerns." They also publish a journal by the same name, and lucky for us, you can check out every issue online.

As a co-worker put it, GRB "rocks my box!" But she gets even cooler: she's released an album with Mirah and part of JD Samson's latest project MEN. Here's the video for their song "Off Our Backs" made by fellow LTTR co-founder K8 Hardy

Check out more of Ginger Brooks Takahashi's work on her own site, her recent work includes "A graphic of the island of lesbos with icons depicting different sites and tourist activities." Yeah!

Sm{art}: Support Lesbian Art and Archives

Kjerstin Johnson — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 18:25:27 -0500

Ka-ching! Aw, did you hear that? It was the last of 80 raffle tickets sold off from the Lesbian Herstory Archives Benefit Art Auction! That means if you didn't pick up your ticket in time, you don't get to take home one of 80 works of art by 80 lesbian artists. The good news is that if you're in New York City this weekend, you can still view the works on display and support the archive at the door. (That way, it's like you won ALL of the art!)

The rest of us can view a few of the works online at Own This City, where I found the above photo, "Battaglia al Castello di Civitella Ranieri" by Patricia Cronin, and mark down a trip to the archives the next time we find ourselves in Park Slope.

The archive began 1974 when a group of women began a vast undertaking of collecting and archiving historical texts and artifacts. Eventually the wall-to-wall collection could not be contained and they were able to purchase a brownstone in 1990. From their website:

The Lesbian Herstory Archives is a magical place—part library, part museum, a community gathering space- and it houses the world’s largest collection of materials by and about lesbians and their communities. The Archives has both print and non-print materials, such as books, unpublished papers, conference proceedings, newsletters, photographs, slides, periodicals, audio-tapes, CDs, DVDS, videos, films, subject and organizational files, reference tools, artwork, calendars, banners, manuscripts, music, clothing, buttons and other materials about lesbians and lesbian lives in the U.S. and in other countries. With minor exceptions, all of the material has been donated to the Archives.

The benefit is Saturday December 19th, Alexander Gray Assiciates 526 West 26 Street, Suite 1019, New York. Doors open at 1pm.

Sm{art}: The People's History series by Just Seeds

Kjerstin Johnson — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 21:12:59 -0500

As the American calendar rolls around to another historically-dubious holiday, it's comforting to know you can celebrate the righteous kind of history year-round with People's History posters from Just Seeds. At four bucks a pop, you can afford to load up on your favorite activists, or give them as presents to remind folks of the heroes that History-with-a-capital-H (not to mention present-day media) tends to conveniently forget. Here are just some of the offerings...

The women-anarchist militias of the Spanish Revolution of 1936 by Cristy Road

Resistance during the 2006 teachers' strike in Oaxaca by Tim Simons and Barucha Calamity Peller

The Korean Peasants League, indigenous farmers who stood up to the WTO by Nicole Schulman

And you can buy the People's History series as postcard packs too! Here's one of Sylvia Ray Rivera, NYC drag queen and activist in the Gay Liberation Front, Black Panthers, and Young Lions, and a Stonewall rioter (art by John Gerken).

Just Seeds is an artist cooperative whose artists are scattered throughout the United States, and have plenty of other cool artwork besides the People's History series! Check out the selection at JustSeeds.org.