Learn about art, meditation, crystals, decor, life hacks, and spiritual practices! Join me as I give you regular updates on my sacred art and tips for how to live a holistic and fulfilled spiritual life.
"the fun begins. the adventures continues. we all have more influence in making our world a better place than we think
I think there is beauty in so many seemingly ordinary corners of the world.
I believe strongly in packing light yet am prone to accumulating books of poetry and maps.
I think thinking before you speak is good and listening before you speak is better.
I believe in taking risks and getting lost. I believe we need to find ourselves--reinvent ourselves-- over and over to become more whole.
I think we are all stronger than we think we are.
I'd rather read a book than watch TV. I'd rather read someone's blog than read the news. I'd rather get lost sometimes than always know the way. I'd rather live abroad. I'd rather save my money for traveling than for new clothes. I don't understand designer brands. I'd rather bike than drive. I'd rather have a sense of humor than take things seriously. I'd rather take pictures of people than of famous places.
I love dancing, music, singing. I love people watching, talking to strangers, and blowing bubbles in the park. I like walking from place to place when I have time.
I love hearing people's stories. Can you tell me yours?"
“Just remember that anytime you have a negative emotion, you are, in that moment not letting it in. You are not in the receiving mode. And do you know, your not being in the receiving mode is the only thing that ever keeps you from anything you desire?
‘Wow!’ Annette exclaimed, ‘that’s big!’
“Yes it is, Annette. It can be of value to pay attention to those wonderful signals that negative emotion offers.
“In other words, when you feel negative emotion, just stop and slowly say to yourself, ‘I’m doing it now. Right now, I’m doing that thing that I sometimes do that keeps me from receiving the things I desire.’
“Then laugh, and reach for thoughts that put you more in the receiving mode.”
-Esther and Jerry Hicks
(Sara, Book 3: A Talking Owl Is Worth a Thousand Words!
Hay House, 2008)
“I see that this plan, this purpose of mine,
Is going to take some time.
And part of the process,
Is a need to discuss it,
So boundaries are clearly defined.”
“Your enthusiasm, idealism and creativity could be strong. You may be bursting with new ideas and sudden insights. You can move from breakdown to breakthrough. You are experiencing an expansion in consciousness.
Brilliant Breakthroughs may require that you raise your standards and upgrade your relationships. It is time to speak your truth. Choose what is right for you. Be empowered…
Full Moons can conclude situations. You may find yourself at the end of a relationship or a job. Some of you may feel as though you are operating in crisis mode. Circumstances for those around you may be challenged.
In truth, you are in graduation mode. These events are not always graceful. So please go easy on you. You may feel less than a Self-master. You may feel more like a lost soul. Take comfort, for you are not alone. Many people are experiencing life-changing events.
Sometimes your growth can feel weird or strange. At other times, change can be exhausting. You are no longer connecting to your past. You have yet to discover your new place or new tribe. Truly, the old way of living no longer works for you. You are in transition.
You are experiencing new aspects of yourself. You are giving birth to the new you. Giving birth is painful. This is real work. This is real growth. The more you love and value yourself. The more you have to give to other people…
A helpful way to navigate through life is to use balance in your choices. Instead of asking, ‘Is this a good or bad idea?’ Ask, ‘What supports my balance?’ Balance is essential to being present, powerful and effective. Relax and flow with your changes.”
I bet there are forests who miss me, who wish I was a squirrel in their trees or a supposedly mythical mermaid in their ponds. I bet there are kisses who wish I were in them too, because they like my technique.
I bet there are sun rays looking for me even now, not yet knowing I've gone indoors. There may also be songs wishing I'd turn them on, and others who wish I was already dancing to them.
I wonder if there are dresses that wish I was wearing them, instead of someone else, or left hanging on the hanger. I bet there are houses that wish I were living in them, maybe houses that I'll one day dance through, but not yet, I haven't even visited their towns, and the houses shift and groan their tree trunks and wonder, why do I have to wait?
Cuz they want me see, cuz it'll be that good.
And so I ask my future and all my possibilities and all my impossible perfect fantastical dreams to call for me LOUD, light road flares, use spot lights, catch me with a stage hook and reel me in, bring me close.
Because if I want you, and you want me, I tell my future, what are we waiting for?
It's only ellipsis dividing us.
Let us blow them away like breadcrumbs...
I love to long for my future and I love when my future longs for me. It feels as good as dancing to the most kickass song, when my body predicts beats and breaks and rhythm changes, when it's all tight and suave, like all I've been waiting for is right here, and I'm drinking it down easy.
And really, when life's like that, when I'm drunk on dreams and slippery with time, nothing can hold me back, not rules or logic, and beauty breaks all boundaries.
I burst through the seams, racing my bike down the street, free in the world:
been building over the last couple years. It is a geodesic dome that uses a method of pentagrams and hexagrams as its structure instead of the typical triangle structure that is normally used. The whole dome is held together with a system of harnesses, instead of through bolting together the struts that make it up.
It takes no tools to build. It is made out of forty inch steel poles, welded steel hubs and rope harnesses, which all fit together to form the dome. It can get set up by one or two people in less than an hour.
The key to this dome system is the hub that links the whole thing together and forms the shape. This past year we have been experimenting with how to build different types of hubs to see which will work the best. Firefly was a prototype test for new welded hub that we've just started making.
The dome was covered in the fabric artwork that has been made for this project, titled The Orison Dome, and a tent was hung on the inside to protect from the elements. The inside was decorated and the prayer flag project hung inside, making a small sacred space for people to come hang out and participate in the project.
The Prayer Flag Project project is a community participation project that I have brought to several festivals this year. It was housed inside the dome.
The Prayer Flag Project is a moving installation that is travelling over the course of this year. It is been set up at festivals, in homes, parks and public gatherings. So far it has shown at
The purpose of this project is to inspire people to actively participate in creating their own spiritual space and to promote community wellness.
Based on the idea of Tibetan prayer flags, the I have made empty flags and set up a station where people can design and set up their own. People write their own prayers, wishes, intentions or images on the empty flags. The flags then get hung at the end of the prayer chain. Over the course of the year the chain will grow longer and longer, and the prayers will travel across communities everywhere.
Thanks to all who participated in this project, and see you at another festival soon!
Once again, interesting and lovely art put up in the forest. I'm always impressed by how much peopl are willing to haul in.
Beautiful handmade bug lanterns that light up at night and are picked up and recharged every day.
Dryer camp. For all of those times it rains like crazy and you just want a piece of clothing that's dry and warm.
I wish I could've taken a picture of this installation, but couldn't because of the rules. But it was a bunch of names written on plexiglas connected by string. It was so pretty.
A miniature art museum.
99 bottles of beer on the wall. And yes they sang and passed them around.
UBS messengers, delivering messages from your higher self.
This spun in concentric circles. It was stunning.
The installation made for the temple burn.
One of the rules of this festival is that you have to send in an artifact with your registration form. It's then shown in a little gallery at the festival.
These paper flowers were burned one by one at the end of the festival.
Midnight Poutine's huge poutine for the camp on the last day.
Temple burn.
And this caterpillar was so beautiful. I thought it would make a good art car.
, the giant van with all my stuff got stuck immediately upon entry, and we had to spend a couple hours digging it out, with a bunch of guys from the DPW, which resulted in one broken truck axel, and the eventual extraction of the van. Welcome back to Firefly...
After that, we hauled in my installation to the site. (It's such a hardcore site to haul in) And then I proceeded to very slowly set up my
"I tell you the past is a bucket of ashes, so live not in your yesterdays, no just for tomorrow, but in the here and now. Keep moving and forget the post mortems; and remember, no one can get the jump on the future."
-Carl Sandburg
I look at you and see all the ways a soul can bruise, and I wish I could sink my hands into your flesh and light lanterns along your spine so you know there's nothing but light when I see you. ― Shinji Moon
There is a shipwreck between your ribs and it took eighteen years for me to understand how to understand your kind of drowning. There are people who cannot be held quietly. There are screams that are never externalized. If I looked at the photo albums of your past twenty years, all I would find are decibel meter graphs of phone calls and the intensity of your silence as you sat smoking cigarettes in the garage.
There is a shipwreck between your ribs. You are a box with fragile written on it, and so many people have not handled you with care.
And for the first time, I understand that I will never know how to apologize for being one of them. ― Shinji Moon
Finally on my way to yes I bump into all the places where I said no to my life all the untended wounds the red and purple scars those hieroglyphs of pain carved into my skin, my bones, those coded messages that send me down the wrong street again and again where I find them the old wounds the old misdirections and I lift them one by one close to my heart and I say holy holy.
I have arrived back, tired and happy from Om Reunion Project. I feel a little older, a little more grounded, coming from a place where all of the extreme things I was struggling with during this last year could be brought up, anchored and released in order to move on.
This festival, out of all of the hundreds I've attended in my life, is still the one that I connect with the most. And I do not say that lightly. The people who come to this festival are some of the most attentive and present humans I have ever had the pleasure to come in contact with.
People who know what it means to let go and celebrate as an expedient to spiritual practice. People who do not pass you on the path without looking you in the eye and connecting. People, who in the midst of a party, will take the time to stand with you calmly when you need a hug, someone to hear you, or share a good cry. This festival is authentic, it is present, it stands proudly in the middle of being a crazy party that almost everyone there still refers to as "church".
I feel so grounded in this festival, that for me it is the start of my new year. Happening on the summer solstice, it is a place that I can look back over the past, and look forward and decide how I want my future to be. There is not a better place I can think of to do that, then in a place that I find the best and most ideal aspects of humanity. The connection, environmental focus, community participation, spiritual practice and tribal celebration all embody what I want the world to become.
It is the type of festival where year after year I see people being touched and changed for the better. Indeed, some of us there this year felt it so necessary to anchor in our experiences from that space, that we went through the ritualistic practice of tattooing each other to symbolize some of the things we had learned and wanted to carry forward. And just because life can never be too serious, we happened to be sitting in a giant cheese sculpture in the middle of a field. :)
Bringing the Prayer Flag Project into a space like this seems like one of the most natural things in the world. Unlike other spaces and festivals, were it is sometimes rare for people to have participatory art and sacred spaces, it in no way is foreign to people like this.
The gratefulness expressed for the space, the genuineness of the flags, and the connection of the people who entered was such a gift. This is one festival where what I receive in return for the creation of a space like this, is so nourishing in return, that it doesn't even remotely feel like work.
To each and every human who made this celebration possible through their work, their effort, their dance, their costumes, their food, their presence. Thank you. From the bottom of my heart. For all of you who have added to this project, the sincerity of your energy and love will surely be felt by others across this continent. I feel so blessed.
"[There is] The omnipresence of power: not because it has the privilege of consolidating everything under its invincible unity, but because it is produced from one moment to the next, at every point, or rather in every relation from one point to another. Power is everywhere; not because it embraces everything, but because it comes from everywhere."
-Foucault, The History of Sexuality
As an artist, I spend each and every day pursuing my passion with the belief that with my efforts I can make the world a slightly better place. It is hard to follow your dreams and beliefs, often thankless and exhausting. But I feel so strongly that I have the power to change the world that I have no trouble committing each and every day. If, like Foucault says, power can be produced from one moment to the next with the help of every individual, then we must also believe that every individual has the capacity to change the overarching structure of the system.
So when I find others in the world who are also willing to put everything on the line and pursue their ideals and beliefs of making the world a better place, I want to do everything I can to support them.
One of those people is a friend of mine, Markus Pukonen, who is just starting off on an incredible new journey of circumnavigating the entire globe without using a single motorized vehicle, only propelling himself forward with human power.
Markus has done some super incredible things with his life. He was recently named one of Canada’s Top Modern Day Explorers by Canadian Geographic. He has biked 2500km of the Pacific coast and was the first person to Standup Paddleboard across the Georgia Strait, 55km from Vancouver to Nanaimo. With OAR Northwest he spent 73 days at sea rowing across the Atlantic Ocean from Africa, where they capsized just before they reached North America. Another 3 months was spent rowing down the Mississippi River, and another 20-days circumnavigating Vancouver Island, all with the intention of raising environmental awareness.
"6 years ago I got a call from my dad, he told me that he was diagnosed with Leukemia. If he didn’t have chemotherapy right away he had about 2 weeks to live. At the time I was fighting forest fires and living a good life traveling to sunny and warm locales in the off season, but something didn’t feel right.
I was feeling like I wasn’t living up to my potential as a human and felt the need to be more active in the environmental and social justice movements. I felt the need to be more creative, more active, and to give more of my energy to the world. My sister was pregnant at the time and this made me think even more about my responsibility to use my privileged Canadian position to create a healthier world for my niece.
On my flight home to be with my Dad I came up with the Routes of Change project. Routes of Change is the perfect projection of all of my passions on the planet. It is my answer to the question, “what do you want to be doing when you are told you are going to die?” You are going to die. Find out what you love and work towards doing more of it. Routes of Change is what I want to be doing and how I want to be living when death presents itself.
I want to help create a healthy future for our generations to come and this is the best way I know how, by using my talents and passions to raise support for organizations that are working hard to create a better earth."
-Markus
For the Routes of Change Project, Markus will travel in one consecutive journey around the world by as many motor less means as possible, including rowing, swimming, kayaking, standup paddleboarding, sailing, running, biking, skiing, skateboarding, velomobiling, walking backwards, and pogosticking. Friends and fellow adventurers will join for support throughout the journey and help to create change through communication, education, and entertainment. Each leg of the route will be in partnership with a local social or environmental organization in order to share the movement towards a wiser earth.
The journey is expected to take about five years with weather and political situations largely influencing the route and timing. Markus is not planning on breaking any records, but he will likely create new ones. We are committed to building Routes of Change into a powerful force of change to create a better future for generations to come.
So I've been selected for an exhibition of book art that opens next week.
"Creating book art is one of artist's aesthetic expressions that can be challenging but still stays in a humble way. Selected Book artists created their collective memories and constructed a sculptural art form by filtering it through their personal lens.
We would like to invite viewers to the place where we could share the archive of our feelings, emotions and mingled perception of the process of absorbing the surroundings."
-Memory Bank Website
The piece that I will be showing is Endorphins and Oxytocin, and older work that consists of a weaving and publication I made in 2012.
Endorphins and Oxytocin is a publication and performance project by artist Jodi Sharp. In this project she questions what love is, how we are capable of it, and what role our historical relationships play. It consists of two parts, a book of poetry and writings, and an 18 foot weaving.
In the publication the artist has gone back over old writings, pulling out the redundancies in things that were written from one relationship to the next, questioning how it is possible to feel the same thing so sincerely for multiple people.
The weaving is a catalogue that represents the artist's entire romantic history. Each color represents a different person, and each foot equals a year. In 2013, the artist wore this weaving every day for 3 months, as a way of physically dealing with the history of her relationships, in order to try to understand the concept of love.
For select writings from the book, go here.
For the process of the weaving, go here.
The vernissage will be held on Thursday June 18 from 6-7:30 at 1400 Maisonneuve Boul. W.
Including the artists:
Arman Ainkhürn / Elliot Rajnovic / Gary Cherkas
Hearyung Kim / Jenny Lin / Jodi Sharp / Jon Park
Liz Xu / Lise Tardif / Myriam Bourgeois / Natalie Draz
Sarah Robinson / Shelly Low / Susan Rochester
Soraya Etemad / Tess Gobeil
Also including the Ayatana Residency Mini-Library Artists:
Helga Jakobsen / Susan Rochester / Natalie Draz / Sophie Lindsey / Laura Grossett / Sarah Fagan / Cara Cole / Rahni Allan / Elena Thomas / Alexis Williams
So this week I started printing my digital images for the Orison Dome.
My plan has been to have all of the hexagons on the dome done with screen print, and all the pentagons done with digital dye sublimation. I finished the screen prints in May, and they turned out great. To see those, go here. Now it's time to work on the pentagons.
Digital fabric printing is this amazing process where a large scale printing machine prints actual dye onto the fabric surface. The images turn out just like photographs, but are immersed right into the thread of the fabric.
I've been working with hieroglyphs and sacred geometry images for the base of the prints. The geometry is cut out of photographs taken at two different arts festivals I attended in 2013, Harvest and Firefly. The surrounding pattern is a digital pattern I made from photographs of exploding super novas.
I really wanted to create calm images that felt universal but also in line with my own spiritual path, and reference some of the landscapes and places of my own personal experience. Going from a sense of place, to the vastness of the cosmos, to patterns believed to make up the elements of life.
Once the prints are done, they get rolled up into paper and put into a very hot steamer for a few hours to set the dye.
Then they get unrolled to revealed the final product!
Even though the prints are really large, they're still not quite big enough to fill the whole pentagon shape, so they needed to be edged.
I decided to dye some fabric to complement the other green shade stars, and also so that the fabric would have a little bit of texture to give the edging a forest-y feeling to mimic the prints.
So much more work to do, but they're starting to come along nicely!
. The purpose of this project is to inspire people to actively participate in creating their own spiritual space and to promote community wellness. It will consist of a movable tent and strings of prayer flags that will be set up at festivals and in parks during the year.
In this project, people to write their own prayers for peace and happiness on blank prayer flags that the artist has created. A station is set up in a tent that explains what the flags mean, with supplies available for people to make their own. The prayer flags are then hung on the strings attached to the tent. Over the course of the summer the number of flags will grow and the prayers will travel all over parts of Canada and the US.
This project will began January 1 of this year, and so far has shown at-
This project will continue to travel until January 1 of 2016.
On traditional prayer flags, the ancient Buddhist prayers, mantras and powerful symbols displayed on them produce a spiritual vibration that is activated and carried by the wind across the countryside. All beings that are touched by the wind are uplifted and a little happier. The silent prayers are blessings spoken on the breath of nature. Just as a drop of water can permeate the ocean, prayers dissolved in the wind extend to fill all of space.
The Buddhist prayer flag tradition has a long continuous history dating back to ancient Tibet, China, Persia and India. The Tibetan word for prayer flag is Dar Cho. “Dar” means to increase life, fortune, health and wealth. “Cho” means all sentient beings. Prayer flags are simple devices that, coupled with the natural energy of the wind, quietly harmonize the environment, impartially increasing happiness and good fortune among all living beings.
Placing prayer flags in and around one’s home or business imparts a feeling of harmony, increases the spiritual atmosphere and brings to mind the teachings of enlightenment. By placing prayer flags outdoors their sacred mantras are imprinted on the wind, generating peace and good wishes.
When making your own, in raising the prayer flags proper motivation is important. If they are put up with the attitude “I will benefit from doing this” – that is an ego-centered motivation and the benefits will be small and narrow. If the attitude is “May all beings everywhere receive benefit and find happiness,” the virtue generated by such motivation greatly increases the power of the prayers.
In this project the participants choose the color that they feel best represents their prayer. Then, they write their own prayer on the flag. The flag is then taken and hung up, letting the wind spread good wishes and extend to fill all space!
If you would like to participate in this project, but will not be in a city where it is showing this summer, please feel free to send one to me by mail, and it will get added for you! For more details email me at jodithesharp@gmail.com.
It was so wonderful to see all of the beautiful additions from Figment festival!
This one almost made me cry. I had left a couple business cards out one morning, and when I came back, someone had taken one of my cards and had made a little cradle for it and hung it on the line. Thanks for the good wishes, whoever you are. <3
Even as I was taking them down on the last day, just an hour before the event closed, people were still coming by and asking if they could still make one. The enthusiasm and participation at this event was amazing.
Each and every one is just so beautiful.
Thank you to all who participated in this amazing event! Next stop with this project,
The dome setup with Archimedes went great. We set up four domes, two which had art installations in them, one which was a hangout chill space, and another which was turned into a giant soccer ball, a dream of Toby's for a long time.
It worked out so well, the kids where even playing soccer right through it!
The domes, as per usual, were super functional as useful spaces. It's always amazing to me how just popping up a simple shade structure can create an instant community. The domes were used for theatre, improv, art, workshops, performances, picnics, and just plain 'ol hangouts. There actually wasn't a moment all weekend where I saw them empty.
And such a beautiful view of the Manhattan skyline behind them...
The Chromodome worked out awesome too. It was an installation that Michael thought up, where we erected just the bare frame of our smallest dome, and then people were invited to cover the whole thing with scraps of fabric that came from the dome shade star production. I couldn't believe how much fabric got on that dome in just two days!
As for the rest of the art, it was definitely a burner-eque event, with tons of fun, playful and interactive things all around the beautiful island.
All in all, definitely a magical event, and worth the trip from Montreal for. Especially with how well people responded to my own project, which I will post about tomorrow!
"FIGMENT is an explosion of creative energy. It's a free, annual celebration of participatory art and culture where everything is possible. For one weekend each summer, it transforms Governors Island into a large-scale collaborative artwork - and then it's gone." -
is an oasis on the sun-drenched lawn of Governor’s Island. Four domes ranging in size and color provide shade and shelter for scheduled events, impromptu gatherings, and moments of well-earned rest. We will be partnering with other FIGMENT contributors who value these modest enclosures as a way of focusing attention inward. One of the domes will be dedicated to an interactive art piece called
Chromodome
, that will gradually fill the interior with scrap fabric from production of
The Shade Archipelago
and related projects. Another dome will house
The Prayer Flag Project
, an interactive community piece that will promote engagement.
Today was setup day, a grey and mildly rainy one, with only a few other people on the island. Most of those there where setting up their own installations for the thousands of visitors who will come out to the island over the weekend.
Compared to other's installations that took all day, our setup was pretty easy. It's amazing that these domes pack down into just a few boxes and bundles, and that they go up in almost no time at all.
And it's pretty great that just three of us can build something so big, without using a single tool.
The first themed dome is a soccer ball. Placed a between two goal posts and in front of the Manhattan skyline, it looks pretty amazing. It's not fully completed yet in this picture, but you get the idea.
The second dome is a small green dome with a tent inside where the prayer flags will go.
And the smallest dome will be the Chromodome, which we have put up as a bare frame, and will get covered in fabric by the pubic as the weekend goes on.
The
Prayer Flag Project
went up under the tent, and again it looks so pretty under the hazy light inside the dome.
Photo by Toby Vann
And already today I had my first participant of the weekend, getting ready for the thousands to come!
So we head back to Brooklyn to finish up our last minute tasks, preparing to come back early tomorrow to set up the fourth dome and enjoy some awesome participatory art. If you're in our area, please do come and be a part of this amazing event!
As someone who is not only an installation sculpter, but who also does home renos and interior design as a large part of my income, the making of spaces intrigues and fascinates me. I love how the feeling of a space can change, just by adding color, light, or a new piece of art or furniture.
For me, the two biggest things that I love to add into, and see, in spaces, are natural light and texture. There's something just so magical about beautiful weathered wood, or a highly patterned moulding, roughed up carpets, shelves of books, or unpolished stone. I have hundreds and hundreds of reference images I keep in folders to be inspired by, but I figured I'd post a just few for you.
Although I don't normally label where I get my inspiration images, the majority of them come off of a lot of home design blogs that I follow. I was reading one of my favourite ones this evening, called A Fanciful Twist, a blog I've been reading for at least five years, which in turn inspired me to post some of my own favourite images here.
And on a very related note, a good friend of mine and amazing furniture designer Patrick Dussault launched his new website today. He makes stunning furniture out of repurposed wood and metal. Incredible pieces if you're into furniture that "gives new life to something that has been around for so long," as he aptly states.
This weekend was one crazy epic weekend of 5 events from Wednesday to Sunday, all put on by different subsets of people from Brûleurs de Montréal. Needless to say, there was a lot of crossover between the organizers and volunteers of these events, and I think everyone's pretty tired by now. I was involved in two events this weekend, and that was definitely pushing it for me!
On Saturday we had Block Party, a fundraiser for the epic art project Fire Tetris, the artistic brain child of Jody McIntyre, a local in our community.
This project is unbelievably cool, an over 20 foot metal sculpture of a game board that lets participants play Tetris, with all of the pieces made of fire. The sculpture is made of of dozens of welded metal boxes, each one connected to it's own propane pipe, and is controlled in the same way that pixels on a computer screen are. When the participant presses a specific button, it lights up the fire pixel to create the effect of the classic video game of Tetris.
Needless to say, a project of this magnitude requires an awful lot of money to produce. Although Jody received a grant from Burning Man this year, his team still needs to raise about $10,000 to complete this project. So, they threw an epic fundraiser to try and raise some of what they need.
One of our community members Derek Jones decided that he liked the dome that Archimedes displayed at taBURNak so much, that he wanted to purchase it and keep it in our region. So, this beautiful multi-pink dome will be seen at Burner events all around the city from now on!
A beautiful addition to a wicked setup by the Fire Tetris crew!
Photo by Nicolas Laudo
The Fire Tetris kickstarter will be launching soon, so keep your eye on firetetris.com for awesome ways that you can contribute to this epic project to help these guys get it to Burning Man this year!
The second event I helped host this weekend was Music @ The Gazebo by Bruleurs De Montreal on Sunday afternoon. It ended up being a gloriously sunny day, almost balancing out how tired we all were from the night before.
Dome setup went great, with lots of help from awesome people.
Such a stunning view and such a gorgeous day to set up these lovely structures.
Seven good friends Dj'ed all afternoon. I love all their music, and can't think of a better way to spend a Sunday afternoon then to hang out in the sun and listen to them!
Wabi-sabi (侘寂) represents a comprehensive Japanese world view or aesthetic centered on the acceptance of transience and imperfection. The aesthetic is sometimes described as one of beauty that is "imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete". It is a concept derived from the Buddhist teaching of thethree marks of existence (三法印 sanbōin), specifically impermanence (無常), the other two beingsuffering (苦 ku) and emptiness or absence of self-nature (空).
Characteristics of the wabi-sabi aesthetic include asymmetry, asperity (roughness or irregularity), simplicity, economy, austerity, modesty, intimacy, and appreciation of the ingenuous integrity of natural objects and processes.
So this weekend was the annual Alexandria Blossom Festival, a tiny little festival in Ontario. It was also the very first round of setting up the Dome, working out some bugs, and installing the Prayer Flag Project in it for the first time.
A few things needed to be done to the dome like fixing the tent and rustproofing the hubs and such.
The largest thing I wanted to get done was designing and building a tarp system to weather proof the dome. Something that was functional and also didn't ruin the aestheticism of the dome. On top of everything else I just didn't have time to finish it, so it'll have to wait until next time. Although I did come up with some excellent ideas and solutions for it through some conversations with some of the builders that were there.
I was quite happy with how the new screen prints looked though, once the dome was all put together.
The Prayer Flag Project turned out too. The hanging flags suit the soft sacred atmosphere and muted light of the dome.
It ended up being extremely functional as a place for people to come in and congregate, hang out, chat, nap, and add on to the prayer flag chain on the inside of the dome.
Beautiful altar setup- one of my prints is on the front and the rest is created by my wonderful sometimes collaborator Robyn Crouch.
The flag chain just keeps growing and growing!
All in all, I'd say it was a good first test festival to figure out a better system of making and installing for the rest of the summer. Next up, I'll be setting up next Sunday for Burners at the Gazebo!
So the season has begun, and that means making art for this years festival circuit!
The two projects that were a focus of these last few weeks was getting the Dome and the Prayer Flag Project ready for their first summer festival at the Alexandria Blossom Fest.
While an Archimedes Design Dome is a beautiful thing in of itself, I, being the artist that I am, could not rest with just single color flags for the exterior. I wanted the dome to be covered in imagery. So I decided that I would do screen prints on the hexagon green flags that I had, and that I'd make dye sublimation photographic prints for the flags in the pentagons.
The green flags are actually quite large. So I drew up a big image, and shot it onto the biggest screen I could get my hands on.
It was a pretty huge effort to pull, but they ended up turning out great!
As well I decided to print out a few other things I have been doodling lately, to make them into wearables, or just have those images on fabric.
(you can't really see in this picture, but I am wearing one that I dyed and make into a shirt)
I also tried printing for the first time onto leather, which turned out amazing and I cannot WAIT to make into something!
As well to prep for the Alexandria Festival, I needed to untangle the mess that the prayer flags were in after their installation at taBURNak!
And what better place to hang out and do that but with friends in the sun while everyone else makes art and gardens in Burner Alley in Montreal.
I can feel the tingles as the summer festival season starts to creep up!
The spring grass is just starting to poke through, and you know what that means- time to start prepping for festival season and domes, domes, domes!
Toby Vann from Archimedes Design was in town today so he could deliver a dome to a client, and so we could do some prep work and set up the new prototype hub.
The new prototype hub is the initial attempt at a welded model.
The very first hub was made of hand pressed pipe, and we had some problems with the weak spot inverting when there was too much pressure on it. The second model was a cast steel hub, which is still available, works great and is beautiful, but is really heavy. About 2 pounds a hub. You can see all about those hubs here and here.
So, the boys next step was to work with a new welded hub. Not quite as pretty, but weighs only ounces and will cost far less to produce. I'll be taking the first prototype dome with this hub around with me on the festival circuit this summer, to see how it holds up and to help problem solve some of the stuff that may come up.
But first, we had to put the dome together and make sure it even worked.
Just like old times. I'm not quite nostalgic about last summer yet, but almost. :) If you'd like to see that journey, you can go here.
The hubs ended up fitting together just fine, without changing the shape of the dome at all. They don't feel quite as hardcore solid as the cast hubs, but definitely way more stable than the first pressed version, and they definitely seem like they'll do the trick!
We also gave a very short run through workshop to a client who came to pick up his dome.
Unfortunately we didn't have time to help him build his dome as we'd intended, as it was starting to rain and the park regie had already asked us to take down our initial structure because we didn't have a permit. *groan*
All in all though, a successful day, with almost no hiccups. The hubs ended up working great! Next stop with this dome- Blossom Festival in Alexandria in May. As well, Toby and Michael will be showing more domes at the Maker Faire in San Mateo, California in May.
