Barbara Smith

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This sounds weird to say, but this piece is actually my first real live enameling piece. Don’t get me wrong…I’ve done lots of test tiles and playing around, but I’ve never made anything significant that involved enamel. (which is funny, since I’m teaching enameling this semester…)

This piece has an interplay between phallic and feminine forms throughout—-side to side and front to back. The larger copper forms were conceived through sketching from images of cell division (I’ve been particularly interested in diagrams of cell division lately). I’m the blue form (phallic) and my brother is the green form (breasts). The overall shape of the butterfly is a symbol of both femininity and homosexuality.

Hi Michelle

I’m back from a great trip to NY…

I’m working with these forms…

Today, I’ve been working on how I’m going to pack this piece for shipment. I’ve got it all packed away, so now I need to type up some instructions (so I can resubmit my form to SCAD…whoops) and do some appropriately placed labeling on my boxes. The way I thought I was going to pack it and display it completely changed, so I’m still working right up to the last second.

I had Meyer Plastics make a clear plexi insert for the collar for display. I picked it up yesterday and I’m not sure it is going to work the way I thought it might. I’m actually not sure that I need it…the collar has some iron-on interfacing inside which adds some stiffness. It pretty much stands on its own. The only problem is that because of the way I did the pin stem on the cameo, it tips forward slightly. If the person installing my piece is careful, they can nudge it in the right direction and get it to stand up perfectly…so, we’ll see. On the next piece I make, I’m definitely doing a different pin stem!

I’m planning a short (hopefully) photo shoot for this coming Sunday where I will shoot this piece on a model. This is my first time doing something like this with my metals work…I’m excited about how it will look on her, but also really freaked out every time I say the word “model”.

Oh, and my package from Australia arrived yesterday…gold plated acupuncture needles! I’m a bit worried about the label on the box though…

I would also like to point out the state of our bathroom right now….

This weekend, with much help from my mother, I finished putting together my long awaited collar! My sewing machine, which is great, doesn’t really deal with the velvet well….nor does it really do buttonholes in any sort of consistent manner. My mom’s sewing machine on the other hand…it does it all.

I’m happy with the way it turned out though. Fits like a glove and looks great on (no pictures of that yet).

Now, I just have a few more things to do before I ship it off to Savannah for the show. First of all, I have to find a model, preferably one with a long neck, to shoot my piece on. And of course, this means I’ll have to find my way into the photo lab and happen upon some equipment…all by this weekend. Then I have to figure out how to pack this thing to it makes it to GA in one piece!

Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like I’ll be going to the SNAG conference, so Savannah will have to wait until another time. I’m bummed that I won’t get to attend the Lineage and Legacy show, but maybe I can visit GA some other time.

On the grad school front, this past Friday I mailed my LAST 2 applications (to Kent State and SUNY-New Paltz). I think the whole process was starting to get to me, but I’m happy to be done compiling my packets. I still need to make visits to the aforementioned schools though…Bill and I will be venturing out to New Paltz, New York at the end of the month so I can meet with Myra and Jamie. We are going to make a weekend out of it…and are staying at an honest to god b-n-b. I promise to take pictures

Did you purchase a diamond between between January 1, 1994 and March 31, 2006? I would really hope you didn’t, but, if you did then say hello to Mr. class action lawsuit against DeBeers for price fixing!

WOOOHOOO!!!

Info here.

And for a little fun, a straight-to-the-point list of why you should never buy or accept diamonds from anyone, EVER. You can find that list here.

If that image isn’t enough to convince you, check out this photo essay: A Trail of Diamonds: Photographs by Kadir van Lohuizen in Foreign Policy Magazine

I realize this is from Fox News…but, it is a good read. Awhile back I had heard about the hair mats used for cleaning up oil spills, but it seems there are quite a few uses for this product.

As I read it, I can’t help but wonder a bit about the origins of the hair and the circumstances surrounding this exchange. It makes me want to see the other side of all of this.

Working at an engineering college and living in a blue collar town, I constantly feel that I have to justify my choice of career. I perceive that people look down on me from time to time, because working in the art field isn’t a “real” job or isn’t as meaningful as an engineer or an IT person. Lately, I have been grappling with this feeling almost every day…and this was especially true over the holidays for whatever reason. As if it isn’t hard enough to do what I do without feeling marginalized on top of it all. At first, I really didn’t give all this a second thought, but something changes when the people closest to you start to play along….

At any rate, I was reading a few interesting tidbits online last night and came across the website for United States Artists. They have a little factoid page that really put some numbers to what has been bothering me over the past few weeks:

A country that loves art, not artists
In a recent survey of attitudes toward artists in the US a vast majority of Americans, 96%, said they were greatly inspired by various kinds of art and highly value art in their lives and communities. But the data suggests astrange paradox.
While Americans value art, the end product, they do not value what artists do, the act of creation. Only 27% of respondents believe that artists contribute “a lot” to the good of society.
Further interview data from the study reflects a strong sentiment in the cultural community that society does not value art-making as legitimate work worthy of compensation. Many perceive the making of art as a frivolous or recreational pursuit.