"living is a form of not being sure,
not knowing what next or how.
the moment you know how, you begin to die a little.
the artist never entirely knows.
we guess.
we may be wrong,
but we take leap after leap in the dark."
- agnes de mille

... there's gonna be a mixed media class at the echo centre in port alberni this saturday... it'll be fun... you should come (unless you're signed up for ken's workshop at the old schoolhouse)

come and build...

A work of art is abundant, spills out, gets drunk,
sits up with you all night and forgets to close the curtains,
offers you a disguise a difference, a pose. Cut and cut it
through and there is still a diamond at the core. Skin the
the top and it is rich.

jeanette winterson



...what you doing this summer, got some free time, extra dollar,
come on then, come and build something - here in Wells, BC
or if you want to be close to the badlands -here in Red Deer, ab

rags and rust...

you can name your poison
go on ahead and make some noise
I ain't sentimental
this ain't a purchase it's a rental

tomwaits



...do you want to make dolls, Please look here...

the spirit and the self...

Art is not documentary. It may incidentally serve that
function in its own way but its true effort is to open to
us dimensions of the spirit and of the self that normally
lie smothered under the weight of living.
-jeanette winterson

teaching a trade...

you're innocent when you dream
Running through the graveyard
we laughed my friends and I
we swore we'd be together
until the day we died
-tw



...lots of workshops lately, gave my first art-doll in victoria a couple of months ago...
this snap below - erika, gilly, and Dale

...thank you erika, gillian and dale.


...and thanks to Vanier high school teacher Heather...
amy and l got to work with a dozen students on a wonderful art project,
which you can see in Vancouver at ArtStarts


...amy and l gave a mixed media workshop to students from the En'owkin Centre in Penticton last month.
What a wonderful pleasure it was to work with these students.
...and a wonderful pleasure to work with amy.

...the mind is restless, turbulent, strong and unyielding...
as difficult to subdue as the wind.
-bhagavad-gita


...last weekend we gave a bricolage workshop in Courtenay
the snap above was a rusty piece done by colleen.
oh and hey look who showed up in Courtenay...




Makes it kind of special down in the core
And you're dreamin' of them Saturdays that came before
It's found you stumblin'
Stumblin' onto the heart of Saturday night
And you're stumblin'
Stumblin onto the heart of Saturday night
-tw

farming a boat...

There's a bird in the chimmney
And a stone in my bed
When the road's washed out
They pass the bottle around
-tomwaits



Rolla, BC.



...Karl, Emily, and Dean.
They live on a cattle farm in Rolla, they are all good artists,
they are all wonderful warm and generous people.
Emily made this boat out of sticks and
cow placenta she collects during the winter births.
I spent a couple of months one winter up there...
l will never forget the richness and warmth they shared with me.



"The reality of art is the reality of the imagination."-j.winterson

Rags and Rust...

It's a place i've found
There's a world going on
Underground
They're alive, they're awake
While the rest of the world is asleep
Below the mine shaft roads
It will all unfold
-tomwaits



Dolls have been with humankind since prehistoric times giving us mystery, magic, play and power.
This doll making workshop will play with contemporary artdolls, paper dolls, teddy bears, poppets, fabric, wood, beeswax, plaster.
Through personal narrative you will explore your own story creating dolls infused with energy and relation to self.



...yes if your in victoria Dec.10th l will be giving a artdoll workshop. Come by and stick some needles in your thumb.

fran's new work...

...go see fran's work at the new west gallery in Sydney, BC.

empty blank spaces...

"Each truly subjective photograph describes the self of the photographer.
Each symbol, throught the process of transference or projection,
becomes totemic of the photographer's unconscious drives and archetypes.
Each photographer deals with issues, emotions and taboos particular to his
psychological identity. Often what does not appear in the empty blank spaces
- is more important than what is included."
-arthur goldsmith

knots, ropes, and slings...

"Well I got here at eight and I'll be here till two
I'll try my best to entertain you
and
Please don't mind me if I get a bit crude
I'm your late night evening prostitute"
-t.w.

art shows in grand forks

should you be happening by...

This is a recent piece I did. It was actually a wedding card for a friend.

Be well...

Sherie

How many wear a smile upon their face

Although their hearts may hold an empty place?

Then there were twelve...

I lit a wooden match; I let it all burn down
I've broken every rule; I've wrecked it all down
-tw

One was filled with pain and sorrow so beautiful it made us all cry, one a head of red like a beacon for us all
one darkly dancing to banff, one who did not do pretty art,
one who taught us rusty vinegar, one who started with a glue gun but buried it in the dirt,
one who burst into the class at the last minute with nothing but gave lots,
one, a raging granny who was anything but raging, one who ignored instructions but it didn't matter,
one who made us laugh and made our art smell like instant coffee,
one who could've been high maintenance but ended up simply charming.

...and then there were twelve,
twelve wonderful students who came out to the metchosin summer school of the arts and created beautiful things for a week.
All of you, thank you.

  


  
  

love and rust...

my show opens soon...

"Ultimately, photography is subversive not when it frightens, repels, or even stignatizes but when it is pensive, when it thinks."
-roland barthes


LOVER OF FLESH
frantisek drtikol
Frantisek Drtikol was born in 1883 in Pribram, Czechoslovakia. He apprenticed at a portrait studio before attending in 1901 the Munich Lehr-Und Versuchsanstalt fur Photographie, a teaching and research institute.
Frantisek returned to Prague where he opened his own portrait studio, photographing artists and writers, and becoming very well known for it.
...a painter, Frantisek Drtikol contiuned to paint, making backdrops for his photographs. He was influenced by art Nouveau and in turn he was a influentual figure in the Bauhaus movement.



...experimental, expressive, Frantisek started to embrace the ideals of the art deco movement, began using cutouts and softness of lighting, dream like compositions. He was finding a new language. Taking this even further, in 1930 Frantisek stopped using models altogether amd began creating cutout figures that he inserted into his compositions.


"The eye is a great, beautiful chapter. And one that you never finish reading. I find that its range of expression keeps expanding, depending on how the sharpness of my own eye improves and how my empathy for other people deepens. The glint of an eye... A model once came to me: a gaunt, plain face, a thin body, but uncommonly pretty eyes - large and sad. I would have liked to place those eyes somewhere in a void, so they could live a completely separate life, so they could live through their sad beauty." - Frantisek Drtikol





I find Frantisek's photography heavy with sadness, l find beauty and thickness there but so alone.








In 1935 Frantisek gave up photography completely, returning to painting and philosophy. Drifting into obscurity he died lonely and forgotten in 1961.