A Trip to Maine

My daughter has been visiting a lot of colleges lately. This past weekend I had a chance to tag along. We visited Colby College in Waterville, Maine. It turns out that  Colby College has the biggest Art Museum in the state. I also heard that it is the biggest college art museum in the country, even though I haven't been able to confirm that yet. 
   The museum has an impressive collection of art. There is a mobile by Alexander Calder.

I forgot to find out the name of this piece.

There was also this wall sculpture by Louise Nevelson. 

I know what you are thinking: "Those shades look cool, but crack a smile dude!" I didn't get this title either. It is a big one. I tried to make a big wall sculpture for my last year's show but I ran into problems with gravity. Louise's piece is standing on the ground so she didn't have to deal with the same problems.

While walking around in the museum I discovered another piece by Louise Nevelson. I had forgotten that she had made pieces that were not wall sculptures. This piece is called

"Standing Figure (Proud Oriental Figure)". Louise made it around 1947 and it is made of painted terracotta.

STUFF

I have not been creating new wall sculptures lately. I have five pieces in my studio in different stages of completion. I don't know whether this cold weather has put me into hibernation mode or if I am just too busy with my teaching job. 
   Today, however, I got nine of my wall sculptures into a new gallery in Turners Falls, Massachusetts. The gallery is called "STUFF". It is actually more than a gallery - there is also antiques and...stuff.  STUFF is located diagonally across the street from the Shea Theater. I have to update this post later so I can add the address and other information. My pieces should be on the walls sometime next week.

added February 20th:

Yesterday I went back to STUFF. My wall sculptures were hanging on the wall. If you are collecting classic Telechron clocks STUFF has 12 cases of them, some of which can be seen near my wall sculptures.

Deb at the store told me that many of the female customers were interested in my piece

called "46 Shades of Gray" (bottom left in this picture). I believe this is because a movie with a similar sounding name just opened last weekend. In the movie the number of shades is different and also the spelling of the word "Grey" is different. 

STUFF is located at 102 Avenue A in Turners Falls.  The locals would say it is at the corner of 3rd and Av A.
You can reach them by calling (413) 863-2300.
Right now there is a small sign in the window, but a bigger sign is coming in the spring.

Looking forward to spring.

Huddled Masses #2 and Jury of my Peers

Why are you putting up all these old photos???  Because I can. Or maybe I should say "Because I finally can." As I have stated before I have had extremely bad luck with digital cameras. All my digital cameras have been:
1. Dropped and broken by my family members.
2. Lost by my family members.
3. Have stopped working at a critical moment.
4. Never worked when I took it out of the package.
5. Memory cards have been defective.
6. ... and so on.

Recently a lot of old pictures have been surfacing from a variety of sources. Here is another old one. This is called " Huddled Masses #2 ".

The picture is from my show at the Nash Gallery in August of 2012.
The one below is from the same show. (Photos by Marlies Stoddard) It is called "Jury of my Peers".  My style has clearly changed in the past two years. I have moved away from representational work towards non-representational work. Neo-Cubist style is taking shape.

Forbes Library in Northampton

Forbes Library in Northampton has become one of my main hangouts. When Pleasant Street Video went out of business a couple of years ago, Forbes Library got most of their DVD collection. This collection wasn't just like any other video store collection. Pleasant Street Video specialized in classics, strange art movies and other hard to find titles. I of course realize that you can get all this on line or on digital cable and so on. However it is not the same for old geezers like me. I want real DVDs.
    While I was in Finland some bozo poured some lighter fluid on the rug in the library stairwell and tried to burn the whole place down. We know from history that people who burn books don't usually fare well in the long run. But if someone tries to burn a whole library it should be seen as a crime against humanity. If you have to burn something, burn something else! Let the library be. I need my DVDs.

The upstairs has been closed for a couple of weeks, while the stairwell is being repaired. Looks like it could have been much worse. They caught the guy who did this. I have no sympathy for library burners. Throw the book at him!

Trip to Finland

In July I made a quick three week trip to Finland. It had been a while. I flew KLM this time. Of course these days most airlines are partnering with other airlines, so even though I had booked a KLM flight I was actually inside Delta, KLM, Finnair and Air France airplanes.

I was originally supposed to fly with my daughter, who was going to town of Hamina ( in southeastern Finland ) for ten days. She was going to take an "Intensive Finnish for Teenagers" class. However, I had to change my ticket and fly a week earlier due to some family reasons.

Eating tasty airline food (above) is always a life altering experience. There is some evidence suggesting that this piece of culinary excellence is actually chicken.

The trip was a lot of fun. I got to hang out with family and old friends. Visiting Finland is always an inspiring experience. I mean it inspires me to make Art. You see things that look different, you speak a different language, you walk around in a jetlag induced haze.... I also discovered that there is a lot of old gray wood available, if I ever have a chance to make some neo-cubist wall sculptures in Finland.

When my daughter wasn't studying finnish we had a chance to see some sights. She was taking pictures of the Helsinki Cathedral and some architectural details in the buildings in downtown Helsinki.

Of course I had to eat some pulla while I was there. Pulla is what we eat with coffee. My wife  calls it "sweet bread", which might be an accurate description, but it won't cover the whole spectrum of a pulla eating experience. Those little white dots are sugar, even though they look like salt. These pullas are distant relatives of cinnamon rolls, but much better.

Naturally eating all this pulla and finnish chocolate is not good for my waistline. 

Now I have to eat nothing but Alfalfa-sprouts for the rest of the summer.

Ray Mason

Here is another old photo. Last year ( I believe it was June) bunch of my wall sculptures got into Mill 180 Gallery. Kim Carlino and her crew hung the pieces up in an interesting formation. The opening was a blast - some caterer provided sumptious banquet of food, some specialty coffee shop provided fancy coffee and a local micro brewery provided craft beer.
   I was thrilled when it turned out that Ray Mason - a local rock legend - was playing a solo gig in front of my art. I think it is safe to call that a multi-media experience.

You should note Ray's rare Silvertone guitar. I have known Ray for twenty years and I have never seen him with another guitar. 

A tiny turtle

July 1st. I was driving home from Northampton and I saw another turtle. This one  was trying to cross the road, and with all the traffic on route 10 I knew it wasn't gonna make it. 
I did what any nature lover would do: I stopped my car, put the flashers on and rushed to help that turtle in distress. Not all the motorists were that happy about my action. This turtle  was much smaller than the last turtle I wrote about, so carrying it across the road wasn't difficult.

Clearly this was not a Snapping Turtle because it could retract completely in its shell. 

I carried it across the road and placed it down on the breakdown lane. After a couple of minutes it still hadn't moved so I eventually placed it in the underbrush on the side of the road.

I took these pictures with my aging cellphone. In the bright sunshine I couldn't see the screen on my phone. Not really great pictures, but at least I got something.