the beijing posts – part 2 – “it’s real pretty, but what does it say?”

The Beijing series
Sometimes it was confusing, sometimes it was revolting, but always interesting.

Part 2 – use of text

Given the work I’m doing in the studio these days, I’ve become sensitive to seeing both uses of text and repair sights.  I’ll  deal with images of repairs I found tomorrow.

when text is exoticisized, unrecognizable as information, it becomes pure line and design language.  What I see looking at written Chinese is different than how someone who speaks mandarin views it.

But there’s also the element of the use of calligraphy as an art form that was different.  In it’s graphic dimensions, calligraphy was definitely used differently and in unusual places.

The best example is the practice of calligraphy by older beijingers in the temple of heaven park.

It was easy to see the extension of writing skills into calligraphic line with this particular writer.  For all the writers, the posture was the same:  bent over, left arm behind the back, right arm perpendicular to the ground.  She was particularly fluid in her lettering and her movements were like ballet.

Using brushes made of plastic tubing with tips of shaped foam

The ephemeral quality of the writing itself made it particularly beautiful to me.

Painted with water, on a hot day the writing would simply evaporate in front of us.

Another odd and beautiful place that I found text was on these carved wooden figures at the panjouling market.  They were about 2 feet high and covered head to toe with text.

A very happy couple.

The figures were not local, presumably coming from northern china, possibly Tibet.  The writing may represent essentially medical illustrations for acupuncture.  That’s only a guess.  What I do know is how much I wish I wasn’t afraid to buy big, huge, ridiculous things for fear of how to carry them.

Another place that I saw text that I enjoyed were in the imperial treasury in the Forbidden City.  There were lots of things worth noting in this collection and I’ll highlight my favorites later.  But these are two pieces that caused me to pause.

Book in gold gift from Tibet. Prayers written in Tibetan and mandarin.

Coral “bonsai” sculpture with prayer hanging from tree.

The summer Palace is quite outside the city situated on a number of man-made lakes.  The huge sight is now a park dotted with small pagodas and more intimate spaces.  Some of these intimate spaces become hang-outs for kids who mark up the walls with the ancient art of grafitti.

In none of these cases did it bother me that I didn’t know what was being said.  It didn’t occur to me until it was too late that I might have been curious about the context of these writings.

But I have to say in many cases, I’m not sure that translations would have helped.

The beijing posts

Sometimes it was confusing, sometimes it was revolting, but always interesting.

Part 1 –Architecture and Human space
(the first of a series about a few of the things that were particularly compelling to me.)

For a good overview, have a look at this group of articles from last year on beijing’s recent architectural leaps of faith.
•    The architecture was overwhelming and the division of human space is, at turns, alarming and comforting.  The amount of contemporary, grand scale architecture is unlike anything since turn-of-the-century New York.  High rise apartment and office buildings stretch for miles in every direction.  Imagine the sprawl of los angeles but the majority of buildings are 15-20 stories tall.

•    Last year’s olympics had a huge impact on the face of Beijing.  And according to all I’ve read, “face” is everything for the Chinese.  How things look to outsiders is incredibly important. So on the surface at least, it has been critical for Beijing to appear the most innovative, the most progressive in it’s architecture.
The bicycles that used to take up so much space on beijing’s streets are far less than they used to be, although they are still in use for everything.

The heavy traffic congestion is now mostly taken up by all new cars so one is left with the sense that everything in Beijing is either less than 10 years old or more than a thousand years old with little that is notable in between.

Temple of Heaven with the National Performing Arts Center in the background

At the street level, however, things appeared quite differently. Interior space is at a premium in a city where the population has exploded.  In one tourist/night life area we passed by a men’s dormitory.  The space was approximately 14’x16’ and was packed with about 10 bunks beds stacked 4 beds high.  Most of the men who lived there were sitting outside watching the tourists go by and catching a breeze from the lake that was next to their living quarters. Inside, if you didn’t have air-conditioning (few older houses do), you were doomed to a very sweaty night.
Older neighborhoods also seem to have no indoor plumbing and people rely heavily on public bathrooms for both laundry and personal hygiene. In the neighborhood where we stayed, these public bathrooms were set along a green-space route that separated the noisy main street from the hutong (essentially, mandarin for barrio or neighborhood).  In the evenings, people would meet in this narrow, long green space, take their passagiata, do their bathroom duties, play music and dance, play checkers and let their little ones pee in the grass.

Old woman dancing with fan and scarf surrounded by musicians in hutong.

•    I have to say, in terms of architectural achievement, the Great Wall is, in fact, quite great.  We hiked 10 kilometers of the wall, which at some points had an 85% grade, more like climbing a crumbling ladder.  (i didn’t lose consciousness once) But the views of the wall conjoined to the landscape were really spectacular.

Sprawling more than 4000 miles built stone by stone in the middle nowhere.

Most interesting was how the wall faithfully follows the form of the landscape.  The Chinese point out the way the wall looks like the spine of a dragon as it moves over the hills.

In sections, workers in coolie hats were laboring (slowly in the heat) to restore portions of the wall as they have done for more than a thousand years.  Some 2 million Chinese are estimated to have died during the course of building the wall.  Watching old men hovering over the edge of the wall at a 15 ft. drop, it’s easy to see how.

It is the most dynamic piece of architecture I’ve ever seen.

July flew by without posts so catching up. Workroom in conversano.

First arriving in italy for ten days allowed us some time to get our living situation sorted out here in the south.
In our apartment I have one room which is partially dedicated to studio.

This has seriously enhanced the quality of life in italy for me.

You see, Italians are masters of what they call ‘la bella fare niente’ meaning ‘the beauty of nothing to do’.  They are extremely good at doing nothing and have many state holidays which celebrate doing nothing.  Unfortunately, I suffer with nothing to do.
Now that I have a little studio space, I can continue with some of the work I started in the spring. I brought a lot of tools with me this time knowing I would have a space to set up shop. I purchased a german version of a flexshaft which helps with many small chores.

Francesco’s dad is a blacksmith so there’s an anvil, a bench shear and some other gizmos if I need them. Two doors down is eugenio, a violin maker from rome, who is helping me make a specialized bench pin since I didn’t bring one.  I’ll be talking soon the local orofo (goldsmith) about how one purchases a torch in italy.  My understanding is that the government heavily regulates who can buy tools and metal.

There are many small impediments.  Plugs that mysteriously don’t fit with old wiring systems.  An ancient wobbly work table constantly in danger of collapse.
But it’s sweet and it’s mine and I can feel like I’m making some progress.

fly pearls

fly pearls

i am so pleased about how these came out i can hardly stand it.
as far as i can tell this is the first time that anyone has ever tried engraving a pearl. these pearls were fairly expensive tahitians and laser girl and i practiced about 40 times before we decided it was time to commit. it was all about marksmanship.

updated itinerary for the fall

so here’s where things stand as of today for our fall plans:

june 29th – leave for italy

july 10 – depart italy for beijing

• beijing pearl market
• forbidden city
• great wall
• arts district
• crazy food

i tried to find a pearl farm to visit but it’s a solid investment of time and money to do so.  nothing was conveniently located to our path and our timing is too tight to bear inconveniences.

this is what i wanted to see:  nucleating the pearls and then harvesting them.

but these guys at GIA and Pearl Paradise did a pretty good job of documenting the process.

i’ll have to hope for another opportunity in the future.

july 19 - depart for hong kong

• visiting with old friends
• tai chi in kowloon park
• 10,000 degrees fahrenheit
• great food
• tailor made cheongsam
• maybe more pearl buying

july 27 - return to italy

august - slow down a bit in italy

• set up apartment and work space
• swim in the sea
• visit to cortona with mary pearse?
• work on design programs
• work on grants/curriculum
• eat

september – rome

• september 5 – wedding in ancona  (not us)
• side trip to paper museum in fabriano

• september 7-12 – venice biennale

october

england  – one week or so

• birmingham ‘taking time: craft and the Slow Movement’ curated by helen carnac
• bristol school of art – university of west england – visit with elizabeth turrell and the center for fine print research.
• visit to bath for old friends

november and december

• maybe i’ll actually sit still for awhile and just enjoy rome
• check back for updates

january

• back in california looking for a place to live and starting classes
  

tributaries

way behind on posts.

may was busy and, therefore, blogless.  so there’s much catching up to do.

first it’s time to give props to my wing man Micheal Bernard.

hoist

Michael is my sabbatical replacement while i’m away and he’s doing an amazing job.  as well as keeping my studio under control, he recently had a one person show at the National Ornamental Metal Museum in their tributaries series.

and now he’s a feautured artist on crafthaus.

you can read more about his work here.

i feel very lucky that i was able to score michael for my replacement.

thanks sir!

next it’s time to give a little room to Rachel Shimpock.

toast bracelets

Rachel’s post-baccaulaueate work at Long Beach City College has won her a coveted SNAG Educational Endowment Scholarship.  these awards are usually fought over by university students and has never been won by a community college student before.  we’re super proud of rachel.  and the prize money is well-timed as rachel starts her move to san diego to begin graduate school at san diego state university.

congratulations rachel.

new thinks in the think tank

here’s some stuff i’ve been looking at.  i’ve made several of these collages and am trying to figure out what to do with them.  some pieces of them are hopefully going to make into mother of pearl.

some pieces that i’m working on i want to be like ikebana for the body.  ikebana is amazing stuff.  if i could do that, i’d be on the right track.

i’ve also been collecting some wonderful old rusty things.  this is a beautiful nail from mike @ velvet  da vinci.  spring here in ohio reveals tons of rusty old bits in parking lots.  it’s like an easter egg hunt finding them.

and then there’s the latest spoons i’ve been looking at.  this one i found in a new orleans antique shop.  apparently for dispensing medicine, particularly to children.

i’m close to finishing several spoons yet completion seems so far away and covered with snow sometimes.

swaps and collaborations

i’ve fallen in recently to working with other artists on some small projects.

emily watson somehow finds the energy to run artist exchanges and has put together a massive international swap.  the premise is to take something that has been laying about the studio being unproductive and send it on to another artist who takes that object, makes something useful and  sends it back.

i received a nice little package from erica millner @ mio studio in lancaster, pa.  it includes some aluminum, ebony, cocobolo and redheart woods.  i know nothing about wood.

i see spoons in there somewhere, somehow.

i sent a package to tosca teran at nanopod studio in toronto with these tidbits: one thai kyat note, a mother of pearl handle, a sterling cone, 2 borosilicate vials and two blue glass cabachons.  good luck tosca.

on a different track:

then there’s the piece that chris hentz finished milling out for me from one of those first digital files.

i want to take that file and apply it to james thurman’s mokume kane.  he sent me a 5×8 block of laminated black and white paper to experiment with.

using this file should make the most of all the layers in the block.  results soon, i hope.

you can see james’ very funny and informative video of how he makes and uses this process here.

finally, i committed to giving away 5 pieces to 5 facebook friends including penny watson-crum (a former student and amazing musician in california), sabrina hazelwood (childhood friend in bath, england), erika uzmann (CIA student), terry knapp frick (college buddy, virginia) and joan dulla (jewelry artist, arizona).  in exchange, i get  one piece from annissa cordova in new york and all of my recipients have to commit to sending 5 pieces to 5 of their facebook friends who will do the same.

i went a little bit over on my 5 commitments so i will be doing exchanges with colleen terry (CIA student) and rachel shimpock (former student).

i have all year, i can make them anything i want and hopefully it will be fun for everybody.  thanks to annissa for passing that forward.

i’ll post what develops.

art of opening announcement

JUNE 09 UPDATE: i was very pleased that usula newman, curator of jewelry at the Museum of Art and Design in NY purchased my decanter/wine stopper for her own collection.

that was very exciting.

i was tickled to see that the announcement for the art of opening used my image for the decanter for omar khayyam.

see post.

cool.

rhino retreat results

i want to express my gratitude to chris hentz for his dogged determination that i learn something over the course of 5 days in louisiana.  and to barbara minor for her constant care and feeding while i slogged through my baby steps of learning rhino (3D modeling software).

even though there were a few times i didn’t think i could absorb any more information, chris patiently guided me through, helping me with my ideas and stressing the importance of technical exercise.  hmm sounds vaguely familiar.

my tangible results

i started with this:

this is a cartesian form known as Pearls of Sluze which has the specific mathematical expression of yn = k(a-x)p xm.  i’ve had this shape in my notebook for about ten years and have envisioned it as a darkly textured ball that is light in the hand. the fact that the form can be described exactly in a numeric language is very compelling to me.  there are several dozens of forms like this each with their own particular mathematical characteristics and shape distinctions.

ideally, i have wanted to see this one in iron, like a rusty finial on an old fence.  but casting it in iron would make it too heavy.  but, i’m one step closer to getting what i want.

chris helped me take that shape and rotate it on it’s axis to create this in rhino:

this is the rhino rendering which allows the form to be three-dimensionally printed.  in this case using a zcorp printer which prints plaster and a catalyst to harden it.  i have more pictures of this process here.  we printed eleven, to have plenty to experiment with. they are hollow with 2mm walls and look like small eggs or mexican wedding cookies. i called them bonbons.

each of these eleven bonbons will have a different fate as i experiment with what the materials can and can’t do.

the next thing i wanted to do was based on this sketch from my notebook:

that became combined in my head with the live oak leaves that littered the streets around chris and barbara’s neighborhood:

the leaves swirl following water patterns when it rains.

i’m still in the process of making a successful combination of those things.  so far it looks like this:

there are many versions of this square but chris milled out this one:

now all i need are the many years of diligent practice to make somethign really useful.