Jumping the Gun on Artwalk Culver City
I am happy to see that the City of Culver City will be presenting the fourth annual Artwalk Culver City on Saturday, May 30th. I hope this event continues on into perpetuity. If you have never done it, I recommend participating... at least once. However, I won't be going on the walk.
Last Saturday, May 16, I joined some other members of the Culver City Art Group to jump the gun and do our own version of the walk... sans all the crowds and inherent noise.
We visited about a dozen galleries on La Cienega and Washington Blvds. (For map of the galleries, click here.) There were four of us, which was the perfect number to move relatively quickly but also enjoy a smattering of differing opinions.
As always with art, some of it did not appeal to me at all (this is art?), some crept up on me after looking at it for a while, some I fell in love with immediately, some I felt the need to figure out or investigate, some I was disgusted with, some was sweet and whimsical... so many diverse emotions and reactions.
After approximately three hours of looking, feeling, and walking, I think we were all drained both psychically and physically. Over the week since, I have been hit by images and sensations relating to the artwork at odd times. Some pieces I would like to inspect again, some I wonder why those particular pieces bother me so much. It would be interesting, as an exercise, to retrace my footsteps and discover whether or not I have the same feelings the second time. But the galleries have moved on with new exhibits and I wouldn't make the time anyway.
Viewing art is always so much more pleasant when there are few other people around. Although I like to support friends and be up on what is new, I am beginning to dislike artist receptions and gallery openings. In fact, I don't enjoy anything anymore where there are crowds of people.
For example, viewing the Pompeii exhibit at LACMA on a members' only day saw an acceptable number of people in attendance. I wonder what it will be like the next time I go. I remember having to push and shove my way through the Tut exhibit several years ago. I was able to see it three times, and each time it was worse. Once there was even a screaming baby following us from room to room!
So, while I hope the Artwalk Culver City will be as well-attended as ever, that Culver City will make lots of money from it, and that thousands of people will enjoy it, I'm glad I won't have to be there jostling for position in front of a painting for a few seconds before somebody's elbow intrudes on my view. Or, probably, I am missing the point, and actually viewing the art isn't the purpose at all!

A Craving for Fish Tacos

To help celebrate its tenth anniversary, I visited the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach on Tuesday. Yes, it has taken me that long. While I have visited the Monterey Aquarium twice, I never got around to visiting the one in my own back yard. And that was only because KL mentioned she was going and I decided to tag along.

If you have never been, all I can say is "GO!" I have painted quite a few fish/ocean/undersea ceramic tiles, most of which were sea creatures from my imagination. But who needs imagination when you are faced with the real thing? The fish are beautiful and unbelievable beyond any attempt to paint something fanciful.

Taking photos was not easy: through glass, underwater, changing light, and those sea creatures will not sit still for a portrait—not even the sea anemones. But halfway though our day my memory card filled up as I realized I had taken 200 photos! Yes, I could have zapped some previous images but my practice is to fill up a one gig card, dump the whole thing on to a CD and start over. Maybe it was just as well, as sometimes the camera can get in the way of the immediate experience when you are seeing everything through the camera lens and not your own eyeballs. None of the photos I took are spectacular, but they are an impression of a moment.

Although all the different kinds of fish were enjoyable, I loved the coral reefs and ocean plants just as much. The myriad shapes, colors and forms were amazing. I felt as though I was in a moving art gallery. Why do we mere mortals attempt to create art when Alice, Goddess of Nature, will always win the prizes?

I was impressed with the aquarium overall—a good mix of inside and outside exhibits. I enjoyed discovering diverse regions of the oceans such as Southern California and Baja, the North Pacific, and the coral reefs of the Pacific. Outside it was fun to see the seals at mealtime and to touch the silky, velvet stingrays as they swam past.

Almost immediately I developed a craving for a fish sandwich! At lunchtime we walked over to restaurant row where I devoured two wonderful fish tacos at Islands. As we walked back to the aquarium we decided on an impulse to take the 45-minute harbor cruise. Out on the water with salt spray and wind in my face all my cares and worries drifted away.

We finished up the afternoon back at the aquarium. It was much quieter as the bus loads of school kids had left. Of course, I am glad that young students are able to visit a facility that teaches about the importance of the oceans. Hopefully there are some budding marine biologists among them.

On the way out we revisited the Lorikeet Forest. Over 100 of these noisy but vividly-colored birds live there. One of them took a fancy to my straw sun visor and when I attempted to put him back on his branch he became very upset and took a good bite out of two of my fingers!

As we drove home on the freeway I felt as if I had taken a vacation to another country. I have images of the beautiful sea creatures swimming around in my head and some ideas for more tiles.

Now I feel like having a tuna sandwich for lunch...

(photos copyright roslyn m wilkins)

Mobile Art, BabyCountry Squire station wagon, my favorite of the show.

You want mobile art, baby? Alexander Calder can't hold a spark plug to the Sixth Annual Cruisin' Back to Culver City Car Show held on May 9th, 2009. This show is located just two blocks from my house but until last year I always had plans out of town on that day. Last year I had just enough time to run through like a whirlwind. So this year I planned ahead. As it was my birthday (okay, you missed it again but I don't hold grudges—for more than a few years) I decided to go, on my own, if necessary. But KJ to the rescue!

It was a typical balmy Culver City day, the same kind of day, I'm sure when Harry Culver met up with Thomas Ince filming his western on the shores of Ballona Creek and thereby started the whole film industry in Culver City—but I digress.

1932 Roadster, pure vintage

We walked up to the car show about eleven. By then there was no parking on my street and hordes of people were walking from every direction. Now, I am NOT a car person by any definition of that word. To me a car is merely transportation (with the exception of my beloved Subaru who I think of as more of a chariot than an automobile) but there is something about the love people have for their vintage vehicles that I can appreciate.

Elvira was supposed to be the Mistress of Ceremonies but by the time we left in the afternoon she still had not shown her face—well, daylight is tough on vampires so I can't be too hard on her.

The show consisted of over 400 cars. It was fun to see the old Keystone-cops style Culver City police car and the new SUV I assume the CCPD had painted on non-city time (or as KJ noted, that's where my tax dollars are going!).

This was the first time I had been inside the Culver City Fire Station—and if you've heard rumours about the CCFD they are all true—the hunkiest crew anywhere! KJ wanted to know if they had a calendar for sale—now there's a way to make up the $6 million city deficit pretty darn fast...

Rear end of the Watidiz, wildest of the show.

My favorite car of the show was the red Country Squire station wagon at the top of the blog. It looks a lot like my Outback and I could see myself driving around town in that car. The wildest car hands down, inside and out, was the Watidiz.

But if I was a vintage purist I suppose I would have to pick the 1932 Roadster as best of show. Well, not really. I loved them all, for a non-car person, that is.

So now I've really "done" the Culver City Car Show and next year I don't have to feel so guilty about having other plans. But I may just find myself sauntering up there anyway...

And another kind of art—food presentation—was to be found at Akasha where AB took me for my birthday dinner that evening. Although the food tasted divine (we ate tapas style) we decided the artful presentation was part of the pleasure of eating there. Ya know, art is everywhere if you only stay on the alert for it—which I definitely enjoy doing.

(photos are copyright roslyn m wilkins)

The Last Days of Pompeii

A friend who could not take the time off work gave me her member tickets to see Pompeii and the Roman Villa: Art and Culture around the Bay of Naples at LACMA (Los Angeles County Art Museum). I invited TL to go with me on April 30.
When I visited Italy in 2005 (was it really that long ago?) one of the reasons I picked that particular Globus tour was because I wanted to see Pompeii. Our tour guide turned out to be mediocre on his good days and one of the many disappointments was that several people on the tour asked to get to Sorrento earlier than scheduled (to which he acquiesced). This meant a hurried trip to Pompeii.
(However, I do want to say that despite our guide, I had a great time visiting Italy and would take that same tour again in a second.)
Even worse was that the local guide spent 45 minutes of our time standing in one spot giving us a history of Pompeii when we could have been walking around seeing the place for ourselves. I wandered off, missing most of the information. So one day before leaving the planet for good, I have to go back on my own.
But happily, the exhibit at LACMA gave me the opportunity to make up for what I missed on that tour—and much more.
On my last day in Rome by myself, and after my travel companion left, I was able to visit the National Museum. Among other magnificent treasures, I saw room after room of frescoes rescued from Roman villas. And many magnificent floor mosaics laid out as they were meant to be seen, horizontally. I'll never forget that experience.
The LACMA exhibit is eclectic in its selection of art objects from sculptures to frescoes. Approximately one hundred and twenty items make up the exhibit, giving an impressive example of the art enjoyed by the wealthy Romans of that era. As far as archaeology goes, the Roman Empire happens to be my favorite period. If we have multiple lives, I must have lived in that time as I always feel so much at home when surrounded by the art and artifacts of that era.
After returning from my trip to Greece, I took a class in the UCLA Archaeology Program in 2008 entitled Art at the Getty Villa, one of the most enjoyable classes in the program. It was taught by Kenneth Lapatin, Associate Curator of Antiquities at The J. Paul Getty Museum, who happens to be the guest curator for this exhibit at LACMA. I had the opportunity in that class to talk about one of the mosaics at the Getty Villa as well as researching the production of ancient glass.
I was a little disappointed that only one mosaic was represented at the LACMA exhibit, as that art form was such an important part of Roman life (but at least it was displayed horizontally!). However, there was a nice representation of glassware from the Getty collection.
As a LACMA member myself I am fortunate that I will have a second opportunity to view the Pompeii exhibit again before it closes. In the meantime I am reading the catalog that I just had to buy. By the time I return in August I hope I will have been able to read it from cover to cover—I am well on my way.
If you have any interest in the Roman Empire at all (and I find it hard to believe that would eliminate anybody!) you must make the effort to see the Pompeii exhibit.
After seeing the exhibit I rented the 1935 movie The Last Days of Pompeii. It was pretty hokey by today's standards but it offered some groundbreaking special effects and gave some insight into how tough life was for the average citizen during that time. And who knew Preston Foster was such a hunk? {:>)
Out of their ashes we have learned so much...
(Photo copyright roslyn m wilkins)

Kaypro, oh dearest Kaypro

I missed my Kaypro for twenty five years.

Laid off from my corporate job as construction manager when the independent oil industry went belly up, I spent one glorious summer in 1985 as a housewife growing, bottling, freezing, and cooking my own vegetables for an unappreciative husband (no matter how accomplished I became it was NOT his mommy's cooking)—and writing short stories. On my Kaypro. Mostly science fiction. That was my escape from the life in which I found myself trapped.

Back in those days I had no sense of self-worth or self-esteem so every rejection slip became the death knell for that particular story. Quite a few piled up. So, of course, I gave up. What was I supposed to do? I retreated to corporate life, my CPM Kaypro became an IBM AT and a Microsystems XT and a 286 and a 386 and so on... My divorce was finalized and life drudged on.

But that Kaypro will always be a part of me. It lives under my desk as a foot rest. I have all the original manuals and floppy disks. I've tried to get rid of it but it won't go away. And most of you (with the exception of one person, I know) are going "What the H is a Kaypro?"

Kaypro was one of the very first personal computers. It ran on an operating system called CPM. It very nearly became the OS you would be using today, except somebody else had more tenacity than the guy who owned that system, and while he became dust because he didn't show up for a meeting, the guy with a whole lot more hutzpah, Bill Gates, made it into the winning circle. Sometimes life is determined by tiny decisions.

Anyway, my Kaypro had a 5-inch screen and a keyboard that clipped to the front of the computer so I could carry it around like a suitcase. There was no hard drive but two slots for floppy disks. One drove the program, the other was the working disk.

So I spent that summer writing my short stories and poems in my room (we had a three-bedroom house so we could each have our own office) or in the kitchen or outside on the deck. Despite other problems, it was probably the best summer of my life. I was out of corporate life and being my own creative self. I guess in some way, I have been trying to get back there ever since.

So, warp speed, Scotty, to 2009 (yes, I AM going to see the new Star Trek movie this week) and here I am, sitting out on my deck on a May evening surrounded by my geraniums, writing this post on the re-incarnation of my Kaypro: my HP laptop. I bought it last year because my ancient desktop computer is showing its age and I could not afford to be computer-less. But it has now become such an important part of my life I couldn't imagine living without it.

(The neighborhood flock of parrots just flew squawking overhead—I would have missed that if I was writing this indoors!)

So, what does this have to do with art, exactly? Well, I was going to write about the Pompeii exhibit I saw recently at LACMA but I got slightly side-tracked, didn't I? Please stay tuned for that report!

Hand-Painted Ceramic Tiles 101

Several people have asked me for a tutorial on painting tiles to install in their bathrooms or kitchens or to make trivets to give as gifts. So here goes with Installment One.

To start, a little background: I first began painting tiles when a potter friend (okay, a boyfriend) had some nice, shiny tiles lying around, some old glaze and one huge kiln (and several smaller ones) in his garage. It seemed like a fun thing to do, so why not?

I think I was hooked from the first brush stroke on that tile. His tiles were already glazed (like the ones you buy at Home Depot) so I didn't need any clear glaze to create a hard coating.

Doing it this way the colors are not at their brightest, but that was okay with me. So after we broke up, not knowing any better, I continued to paint on previously glazed tiles.

Other interests came and went in my life and it was several years later that I decided to get back into painting tiles again as I found I missed that kind of art. I took a couple of classes at Culver City Adult School, and with my (now) friend Lori Escalera with the Parks and Recreation Department, as I didn't have my own kiln at the time. By then I was painting on bisque (once fired) tiles, not twice-fired, glazed tiles.

One thing I learned from Lori was to make a sample palette. So that is where we will start in Installment Two, and I'll share the rest of my tile-painting adventures with you then.

I usually work on 6-inch square bisque tiles. I buy all my tiles and supplies from Aftosa but there are local suppliers who I am told are cheaper—you'll have to check this out for yourself—and certainly a ton of stores on the internet.

I use only Mayco Stroke & Coat Wonderglaze because that's what I'm used to, and I know what to expect from that brand. There are many other brands to choose from; again, that's up to you to check out. Some fun, trippy glazes for weird and wondrous results are Mayco Chunkies, Elements and Crystalites, but that's a whole other story that maybe I'll tell after the tutorials (gives you something to look forward to, eh?).

As for brushes, my favorites are found at Aftosa, Red Pointer Brushes. Again, you can probably find these locally at an art supply store. For more detailed work I use whatever watercolor or acrylic brushes I find necessary. I'll talk about some of those later on.

After all the decorative painting is done, I use two coats of a Duncan clear glaze. But we'll get into that later. I'll post a complete list of supplies somewhere along the line so you will be all set to get started on your own project.

In the meantime, you may want to think about what your subject will be (this is, hands down, the hardest part!). My favorites are cats, my travels, wetlands (birds, trees and plants) and the ocean (as in fish).

See you next time!

(photo and design copyright roslyn m wilkins)

Castle Howard Visited

Brideshead Revisited (made in 1981) is one of those made-for-British-TV masterpieces that will never be equaled, in my opinion. While I enjoyed the 2008 movie version, I was not as captivated emotionally by the characters as I was in the TV version. Having never read the book, I have no idea which version was truer to the author's intention, but I know what I like!

However, the one "character" that still stood up over the span of 27 years was the building that "played" Brideshead in both versions—Castle Howard. Castle Howard is located a few miles north of the city of York (where my Dad was born) in Northern England. It is not a castle in the strict sense of the word—it is not a fortress and there are no turrets to shoot bows and arrows. Built for the 3rd Earl of Carlisle around the turn of the 18th Century, it is one of England's famous stately homes.

On April 25th I attended the lecture at the Getty Villa, Bringing It All Back Home: Grand Tour Collections at Castle Howard in the 18th Century, with the curator of the art collections, Christopher Ridgway.

I was all set for a rather boring, informational lecture, but as I had previously seen the three Roman portrait busts on display at the Villa (which I wrote about previously), I was interested to learn about the rest of the collection.

When the lecture ended more than an hour later I was disappointed—I wanted it to continue for another hour. I was delighted, captivated and intrigued! As well as discussing the fine art collection and the travels of the Howard family (and Rover, the dog) we were treated to an exploration of other facets of maintaining a stately home such as remodeling the toilets and managing the beef herd (and managing those unruly herds of tourists, too!).

As I was leaving the Getty I was ready to drive straight to the airport and hop on a plane to Yorkshire. Castle Howard is now definitely on my short list of places to see in the near future.

In the days subsequent to the lecture I have planned the trip in my head. I am going to stay in that small hotel near Paddington Station (where KJ and I spent a couple of nights on our way to Greece two years ago) and "do" as many museums and galleries in London as I can manage in a week: The V&A, British Museum, National Gallery, the Tates. Then I will travel to Sussex to visit Fishbourne Palace where some wonderful Roman mosaics have been uncovered. Then travel north (all this by train, of course) to visit Castle Howard.

When I still had my corporate job I was planning on Egypt as my next overseas stop, but now I have developed this need to be in England. So Egypt may have to wait, especially as I have no idea how I will raise the funds for any kind of travel at this point. But I know if I focus on this it WILL happen!