MMMM Film preview….

Mater Matrix Mother and Medium from Ian Lucero on Vimeo.

“Still Water” opens at Dalton Gallery, Oct. 8th, 2009

I have just finished installing the crocheted river of “Mater Matrix Mother and Medium” on the campus of Agnes Scott College in Decatur/Atlanta, as part of a show about artists considering the whole gambit of water issues, entitled “Still Water” at the Dalton Gallery.  It opens tomorrow, Oct. 8th , from 5-8, with a walk-through presentation of all the artworks by the senior art students from 5-5:45.

Here’s what curator Lisa Alembik has to say

“Still Water” explores the complexities between humans and water in the environment, from the breakdown of systems that we think we control to the creation of community by the commonality of water memories and culture. Agnes Scott is a geographically significant location for such a topic as the college rests on the Eastern Continental Divide, situated so that rain falling on the north side of campus runs to the Gulf of Mexico, while that which falls the south side eventually drains to the Atlantic Ocean. Artworks, located in the gallery and on campus grounds, include a range of media: from couches in the student center lounge that discreetly store water, signaling the “Potential Inevitability” that individuals will soon need to amass private water supplies (Steve Jarvis, GA), to exquisite quilts introducing topographic views of sensitive environmental sites on which we humans have encroached (Linda Gass, CA), to three-dimensional maps of the Chattahoochee watershed made of delicately cut-paper (Lauren Rosenthal, PA).

Water brings nourishment and takes it away. It dries up to disappear; it saturates and overflows the banks. It may arrive from afar, traveling hundreds of miles to reach us in the form of a plastic water bottle, or it may arrive from a river only a few miles away in the guise of the tap water we get from our faucets. Its potential is constant, yet it changes dramatically with circumstance. The artists in “Still Water”, whether purposefully or not, promote working towards solutions for a realistic future vision of sustainable growth. With the swiftly spinning planet becoming smaller every day in the face of our increasingly globalized consumer culture, the importance of opening clear routes of communication to translate the overlapping languages of water is critical to our time. Our survival depends upon the health of this essential compound. In the exhibit various circumstances are explored as these artists dredge up answers from silent waters.

If you do happen to be in the Atlanta area, my installation is located near the corner of College and McDonough Streets, as well as another segment in stunning giant magnolia tree deeper in the campus in front of Campbell Hall.  I fell in love with the tree, and just had to work in it, even though it was far from where I needed to install the span of the piece.

Pictures all coming soon!  It has been raining a bunch, preventing me from bringing my camera out there.

Clip from Mater Matrix Mother and Medium Short Film on Flickr….

A film still from the short film that Ian Lucero is working on based on the MMMM performance.  I have seen about 3 minutes of a promo, and am so thrilled, and so truly truly grateful to have had the chance to work with such incredible artists, Ian, Morgan and Zoe (and Juniper Shuey and Paul Margolis).  All so generous and humble and so full of vision….

The film will premier at Ohge Ltd. Gallery in Seattle in January 2010….stay tuned….

The 3 minute promo will be showing at Dalton Gallery at Agnes Scott College….I am here in Atlanta installing the river as part of “Still Water”….

Clip from Mater Matrix Mother and Medium Short Film on Flickr – Photo Sharing!.

Time to crochet again at Olympic Sculpture Park for “The Salmon Return”, 9/19/09, noon-3pm

come crochet at the Olympic Sculpture Park!!

After the whirlwind of crocheting this spring and summer, I can hardly believe my eyes that it is time again to work on “Mater Matrix Mother and Medium”, and invite you to join me, tomorrow from noon – 3pm!  I’ll be making yards and yards of the big crocheted ropes that I need to reinstall the Fiber River on the campus of Agnes Scott College in Atlanta , hosted by the Dalton Gallery, beginning on Oct. 1st, 2009.  So, if you never got to crochet with me or are dying for more, please join me tomorrow at SAM’s Olympic Sculpture Park for their family programs event “The Salmon Return”.  They have once again invited me to come join them with a whole host of other programs for kids and adults such as….

Special performance: Roger Fernandes tells stories about salmon at 1 pm.

Visit activity stations by:

• City of Seattle’s Restore Our Waters and Seattle Public Utilities
• Colorific Kids face painting
• Friends of the Issaquah Salmon Hatchery
• Mandy Greer—Mater Matrix Mother and Medium
• The Nature Consortium
• People for Puget Sound
• Salmon-Safe and the Network for Business Innovation and Sustainability (NBIS)
• TASTE Café

University of Washington’s Wetland Ecosystem Team

Agnes Scott College (kinda looks like UW, right?)

First day of taking the river down

with my friend Inna…

She took the scissors to the first tie, cut it open and a spider the size of a silver dollar crawled out!  When I flicked it onto the ground, it sounded like a marble.  No other creature encounters…but, my how much faster it is to take down them put up.  We carefully rolled it into long cigars and began packing them into bike boxes (so I can take them on the air plane to Atlanta…..the river is heading to Agnes Scott College on Sept. 30th, 2009 through November!)

The River stays up until Aug. 23rd for the Arts-in-Nature Festival!!

The Nature Consortium … teaching environmental lessons through the creative arts and hands-on conservation projects – naturec.org.

Trying to tie up some loose end in the private life…I have neglected wrapping up on the blog about the performance , the response to the performance, and what will happen in the future with MMMM.  First, it’s run has been extended!  If you have been to Camp Long since July 31st, you will see that it is still up!  I check on it often and make little repairs, and still continue to speak with people about it while I am there.  And tell everyone that it will stay up for the incredible Arts-in-Nature Festival on Aug. 22 – 23rd, 11-9 and 11-6.  I will be doing some sort of crocheting workshop on those days, but don’t have the details yet…I adore Camp Long, every inch of it, and am so excited to see the place transformed into one big art party!  Every cabin filled with sound installations and tons of other stuff!!  Come say farewell to the river!

I’ve got some deadlines over the weekend , and then will get back to my loose ends with this blog…getting pictures up of the performance!

MMMM Performance gets a mention on “Pacific Standard” blog

A great mention on Pacific Standard

Pacific Standard: Rivers Arms.

Revisiting influences…

 

Clootie well

 I’m listening to “Pagan Poetry” as I work, and it brought my mind back to one of the early influences on this project….cloth tied in the woods, healing, rotting, pilgrimage…

The Clootie Well is a rather weird remnant of an ancient tradition once commonly found in Scotland and Ireland, of holy wells to which pilgrims would come and make offerings, usually in the hope of having an illness cured. The tradition dates far back into pre-Christian times, to the practice of leaving votive offerings to the local spirits or gods in wells and springs…..

Pilgrims would come, perform a ceremony that involved circling the well sunwise three times before splashing some of its water on the ground and making a prayer. They would then tie a piece of cloth or “cloot” that had been in contact with the ill person to a nearby tree.

As the cloot rotted away, the illness would depart the sick person. An alternative tradition suggests that sick children would be left here overnight to be healed. Presumably any with the strength or spirit to survive what would have been an exceedingly creepy ordeal were pretty likely to recover anyway.

From Undiscovered Scotland   (land of my People)

 

The Performance is upon us! 7/16/09 at 6:30 pm

rehearsing

Thursday July 16th, 2009 at 6:30 pm  Mater Matrix Mother and Medium will reach its performative culmination with a site-specific performance by Seattle-based and internationally-recognized choreographer/dancer Zoe Scofield, with music for clarinet and megaphone created and performed by musician/composer Morgan Henderson .

 

Come join in this one-time experience at the Pond at Camp Long in West Seattle, 5200 35th Ave. SW.  

 

The Performance, created by collaboration between myself, Zoe Scofield and Morgan Henderson is a hushed reflection on the subtle dynamics of the Forest embedded in the urban environment, at once organic as it is artificial.  All three artists, in our own way, having responded to the quirky overgrown tranquility of Camp Long’s little pond, invite you to sit for a short time in quiet observation of the rhythms of this unusual site, heightening your focus through sound, movement, breath and site-responsive installation.

 

Mater Matrix Mother and Medium began with the creation of a 200 ft.- long fiber river, created in part through a series of over 30 community events all over Seattle, where I taught anyone willing to learn, how to crochet.  I then took the fiber “pools” into the forest of Camp Long and spent nearly six weeks on a ladder crocheting the river into the trees, flowing from 25 feet up in the tree canopy to nearly touching the forest floor.

 

The River, made up of thousands upon thousands of tiny moments and movements of individual citizens, integrated, linked together and interwoven into the natural environment, will itself embed Zoe Scofield in an exploration of how we ourselves are both literal and metaphoric manifestations of the living essence of water.  Our experience of water is both one of ultimate intimacy and also of civic structure.  This artwork, a unique blend of community engagement and personal inquiry, site-embedded installation and performance, embodies the ancient human practice of acknowledging our own physicality rooted in the cycles of water and how this forms the very foundation of human community.  Water, both mundane and miraculous, mirrors the everyday meeting of strangers and the tiny moments that begin to bond us together.

 

Please consider bringing a blanket to sit on during the performance but lawn chairs will obstruct others’ view.  Come enjoy some tranquility! 

 

This project is part of three temporary public art projects in the Water Calling series, and are commissioned by the Seattle Office of Arts & Cultural Affairs with Seattle Public Utilities (SPU) 1% for Art funds. The projects reflect SPU’s management of the complete cycle of hydrology for Seattle’s water resources from drinking water through drainage, and Restore Our Waters, the city’s initiative to protect and restore Seattle’s urban waterways.

 

MMMM now has a flickr group so YOU can post pictures!

Just an idea I’m going to try.  So many people have been visiting the park and taking loads of pictures of the installation in progress, I thought it might be interesting to figure out a way for people to share them.  I am taking a lot of pictures, but people are taking weird angles, me on the ladder, friends in front of the river, kids heads poking through the holes…

Let’s share…if you belong to flickr, join the Group http://www.flickr.com/groups/matermatrixmothermedium and you can post your pictures for me and others to enjoy.  MMMM also has it’s own flickr stream where I do my best to post all of my images through out the project..

Go see “Waterlines” !! (Stranger review)

Go see Stokley Towles’ piece “Waterlines”, one of the other “Water Calling” projects.  Great Stranger review!

It’s the Water – Theater – The Stranger, Seattle’s Only Newspaper.

 

 

“Water Calling” Public Art – Temporary Projects

Ack!!! Just realized I did not have a direct link to “Water Calling” information on this blog, the series of temporary public art projects that MMMM is a part of.  I have been truly swamped this past month.  But literally two more days of install…

“Water Calling ”   Public Art – Temporary Projects.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Crocheting on a ladder…

I haven’t really been able to keep up with the blog while installing the river in the park, but have lots and lots of pictures…

A little film from the “Knitting and Networking” event at the AFTA conference on June 19th

 

YouTube – hooked in seattle 7 1 09.

A perfect example of the flow of conversation  when people have something to do with their hands.  (but it looks like I’m talking about washing dishes….)

High Point Library redux, West Seattle

These young ladies were one of the highlights of making this project!  I’ve just been thinking about them and hoping they can make it to the park to see the installation/performance.  

 

The Arts | Art and conversation flow from hands and heart of artist Mandy Greer | Seattle Times News

 

A great article in the Seattle Times!  Thank you to all the people who are coming to visit the park because of it!

 

 

The Arts | Art and conversation flow from hands and heart of artist Mandy Greer | Seattle Times News.

We all make art

I found this environmental fiber/community fiber-based art practice by Iranian artist Atefeh Khas on another friend’s website (another amazing environmental/fiber/community-based writer artist, Abigail Doan).  I came across these images just as I was beginning to work my river into the trees, and just as all the storm of the Iranian election was beginning.  I, of course, feel a great deal of kinship to the work I am seeing on Atefeh’s website, and am reminded of the freedoms I have to do and share what I love.  I am also reminded by her work of how patterns, materials, impulses and desires for beauty, kinship and meaning span all cultures, and art can shorten the distances between us.   

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

THIS is really the last one, really! SAM FAMILY DAY

I thought last Friday at the AFTA convention was the last crochet event for MMMM, but I was wrong.  One last time!  This time at the Seattle Art Museum Family Day.  SAM Family Programs have been a huge supporter of my project from hosting me at their Teen Art Attack evening to twice hosting me at family programs out at the Olympic Sculpture Park.  I am so glad to go to this final event with them.  The two programs out at the Sculpture Park were particularly wonderful, as I got to work, share my project, as well as spend time with my own child who often gets the shaft when I get so busy on large projects.

buzzz

  If you have kids or know someone that does, bring them to SAM, the line-up looks to be really fun.  Temporary Tatoos  with Gretchen Bennett!!  My son also attends the Circus School that will be performing and they pretty much always rock!

 

SAM Family Programs: Don’t Miss the Summer Fun!
FAMILY DAY: BUST A MOVE 
Presented by TARGET
Saturday, June 27, 10 am–3 pm
SAM Downtown

Make your move through outrageous obstacle courses designed for making art in new ways, like the artists in
Target Practice: Painting Under Attack 1949–78. Create collages, recycled art, stencils and see-through paintings. Design temporary tattoos with Joshua Lindenmayer and Gretchen Bennett. Crochet with Mandy Greer. See live painting demos with ArtWorks and Pratt Fine Arts Center.

LIVE PERFORMANCES
* Madcap toymaker Rick Hartman
* Hilarious Zambini Bros. puppet show
* Electrifying tapdancing by Northwest Tap Connection
* Feats by the School of Acrobatics and New Circus Arts
* Plus facepainting, storytelling and more!

Community Partnerships: Visit the Barnes & Noble Pacific Place store June 26–28 and a portion of your purchases will benefit SAM.

This is it. The last crocheting event….

 

Kathleen has crocheted with me three times...

I am pretty sure this is it.  Your last chance to come crochet with me and others, in support of Mater Matrix Mother and Medium.  If you haven’t noticed AFTA is coming to town, and I have been invited to take part in a session called…

 

Knitting & Networking, Craft & Conversation scheduled for Friday, June 19, 7:00 p.m.–9:00 p.m.
Renaissance Hotel, Visions Room

Description: Crafting circles can be a powerful medium for community dialogue and building social capital. Bring your knitting, crochet, or other needlecraft and join other knitters and crocheters from the field for conversation and networking. Local artist Mandy Greer, a fabric sculptor and costumer, will join us to talk about a new project that connects crochet and dialogue to water quality. All are welcome!

 Originally this event was for convention goers only, but I have been informed that I can invite all who are interested in joining in with the crocheting for MMMM!  So, please come hang with me and art people from all over this land, down at the Renaissance Hotel , 515 Madison Street, Seattle, WA 98104.  Last chance..going, going…go to Camp Long.

By the way, reading myself described as a “costumer” makes me think of this killer costume I made for me kid…

Crocheting into the Woods!

I have been chomping at the bit to begin the process of installing this giant river form into the woods at Camp Long, so am excited to say I have started.  It’s a slow laborious process, like putting together a giant puzzle….but it’s really fun!

  And going to take me the full month with my hands full time in the woods.  I have so much I wish I could post on this blog, but it will actually have to wait until I get the majority of the river into the trees.  Like, I saw a giant owl the other day in Camp Long.  A Giant, chilling, mythology-making creature staring at me with dark black eyes like she could eat me if she felt like it…..it was amazing!

Staring at trees and chalk on the sidewalk: the last events! …. for now…

 

buzzzzz, getting polinated

I am a busy busy  bee trying to finish up the wearable element for Zoe to rehearse with, as well as the planning for moving myself into the landscape of Camp Long , but there are a few remaining crochet events, beginning tomorrow.  I will be crocheting the afternoon away under the trees near my site, further getting to know the shapes and spaces.  I always forget this important part of my process…it feels like wasting time, but I’ve come to realize sitting and staring at my work, in-process, is very valuable.

working out of the studio.....ahhhhh

 Usually in the studio, I have armatures in-process that I STARE at forever while I sew or crochet, etc.  With the armature here a living environment, as much as I wish this were possible, I haven’t been able to sit for hours under these trees that I will soon get to know very well.  Perhaps this can happen for the next outdoor works….

grass and silk

 

earlier in the spring at Discovery Park

Then later Thursday evening, I’ll be coming home to my beloved neighborhood Columbia City, with the generosity of the Columbia City Gallery hosting me from 6-8. I know there are many art events thursday night, but if you are in the neighborhood, please swing by, even just for a bit. (and whoa!  check out the jurors of their latest call for art!!, Jeffry Mitchell, Suzanne Beal, and Lisa Harris)

Columbia City Gallery

 

 

Then, this weekend I’ll be at the Morgan Junction Festival in West Seattle for a bit, with Camp Long.  It will be my first chance to visit the new interactive public art piece by SuttonBeresCuller at Morgan Junction Park…

Salon, a series of museum-style frames stamped in the sidewalk that borders the neighborhood park. Artist trio SuttonBeresCuller etched and color tinted the “picture frames” that invite the public to create their own works of art. Make a masterpiece and meet the artists! 

The guys will be there at the new park, for it’s dedication from 10am – 11am.  These guys are doing all sorts of thrilling community-based art right now, I’m inspired!

My schedule w/links!

• 11th of June, Thurs, noon – 4 pm, Camp Long, 5200 35th Ave. SW at Dawson   
• 11th of June, Thurs, 6 pm – 8 pm, Columbia City Gallery,  
4864 Rainier Ave S.     

• 13th of June, Sat, 11 am – 2:30 pm, Morgan Junction Community Festival with Camp Long, 6401 California Ave. S.W.

best of: Water!

best of: Water!.

Joey Veltkamp writes about all the watery SPU temporary public art projects happening this summer!

 

 

 

 

This weekend…SCULPTURE PARK!

 

celebrate those flowers

Back into the sun I go! Hopefully this slight cooling will hold tomorrow as I head to the Olympic Sculpture Park to participate in Seattle Art Museum’s family programs “Celebrate Wildflowers” event. Back in April I took part in “Climate Day for Kids”, had a blast, and I’m sure this event will be just as fun.  Here’s a quick look at all the activity stations for tomorrow:  
Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture, King County Noxious Weed Board, Seattle Art Museum, Skokomish Tribe, TASTE Café, University of Washington Botanic Gardens Education, Washington Native Plant Society, Washington Rare Plant Care and Conservation.

 

Please come join me!  And also, a huge thank you to writer/artist/curator Sharon Arnold for her continued enthusiasm for MMMM (and help crocheting AND yarn donations AND cheering me on in this last leg of this art marathon!)  

Thanks Sharon!

She has been posting about the project, including tomorrow, at her blog “Dimensions are Variable”.  Check it out and her posts about art – writing, making, viewing and loving.

 

 

 

SUNDAY!  I’ll be back at the Sculpture Park on my own, inviting you to join me in a little handwork, amazing views and hopefully cool and sunny weather.  I’ll be in the Cafe if another windstorm blows through.  10 am – 2pm.

MONDAY!!  You can catch up with me on Monday, of all days!  During lunch 11 am – 2 pm, I’ll be back under Leo Berk’s conference room cloud in the 4Culture conference room.  All my blue looked so good under his blue, and I forgot my camera last time, so Tina Hoggatt made it happen for me again!  If you work downtown, hope you can stop by, bring your lunch!

Leo Berk, "Low Ceiling"

New events scheduled!! (some of the last…so come join in!)

I’m not quite willing to say these are the last events I’ll be scheduling … it’s all gone by so fast!  And I have at least 60 more feet to make!  But, these are some of the last events, so if you are curious to experience what this is all about, get out your calendar and see what works!

• 7th of June , Sun,  10 am – 2 pm,  SAM Olympic Sculpture Park, outside PACCAR Pavillion (inside if rain), 2901 Western Avenue

• 8th of June, Mon, 11 am – 2 pm, 4Culture Conference Room, 101 Prefontaine Place S. 

• 11th of June, Thurs, noon – 4 pm, Camp Long, 5200 35th Ave. SW at Dawson   
• 11th of June, Thurs, 6 pm – 8 pm, Columbia City Gallery,  
4864 Rainier Ave S.     

See all the events here.

 

130 feet, approx.

Inspiration for MMMM at Columbia City Gallery: Another performer collaboration and another crochet event

This Saturday May 30th from 5-8pm at the Columbia City Gallery , I have work in a group show called “5280; Ten Artists Living Within a Mile of the Gallery”.  I’ll be showing a little bit of inspiration for MMMM – another product of a collaboration with an incredible performer. Last summer and fall, I collaborated with the luminous performance artist, Haruko Nishimura.

the Slug Princess

 

dusk at Smoke Farm

 Together we created a hybridized mythological creature, the Slug Princess — an arion slug goddess —  with my work as the lumbering undulating skin and Haruko’s work with Butoh as the mercurial spirit of this creature of appetite.  We then worked with filmmaker Ian Lucero to create a short film called “The Silvering Path”, shot at Smoke Farm in Arlington Washington.

 

filming

 

 It was an intensely inspiring experience for me, watching my work, shredded fibers and yarns crocheted and beaded, pulsing and lumbering through tall grasses, twisting around rocks, picking up dirt, moisture and life.  

 

little creature on my creature

I believe the three of us together created something really beautiful and unsettling, and I wanted more.  More collaboration, and more of seeing fiber breath to life, not just because it was wrapped around a body, but because it rubbed and caressed the natural environment.  I knew I wanted to do work that didn’t just use the natural environment as a site for action, but would become entwined, enmeshed with all the processes, however minute, of the environment.  I wanted to push my work with a performer further away from “costume” & literally interweave the body into the landscape using stones, trees and flowing water interacting with changing fabric. I wanted to explore using the environment as material not simply backdrop, to create an installation that is in & changed by the elements.  

an early sketch

Then this SPU project came up, and of course those desires and ideas from the Silvering Path directly inspired what I am trying to accomplish now with MMMM and the interaction with the landscape at Camp Long.  So, at the Columbia City Gallery I’ll be showing the slug wearable element as well as these giant magic crocheted cabbages from the film.  It’s a group show celebrating 10 years of the Gallery, as well as celebrating this little hub of artists down here in the south end.  More about “The Silvering Path”…

And the Gallery has also generously offered to host a crochet event on Thursday June 11 from 6-8 pm, so you can come crochet,see the show,  catch dinner at Tutta Bella and head to a movie at Columbia Cinema.  Columbia City has it all!!  The Columbia City Gallery is at 4864 Rainier Ave S | Seattle WA 98118 | 206.760.9843

“5,280″ runs from May 27 – July 5th, 2009