Old image, new life...

Last week, with the help of two good friends, I was able to finally do a screenprint run of an image I made as a two-part stencil years ago. The old prints were part of Josh MacPhee's traveling "Stencil Pirates" exhibit, which happened maybe a year or so before the book was published. The stencil has seen a lot of paint since then, and it's on it's last legs. This summer I sprayed large transparencies directly from the stencil so I would always have something to burn screens from. The screened version still looks a lot like a stencil with it's inconsistent lines and overspray. The original idea came when my stolen bike was returned to me after I put posters all over my Nashville neighborhood asking for it back - the stencil said "search..." at the top left, but that part didn't make it on to this print. These should post to the Justseeds store in a couple weeks.

"Signs of Me" pilot project underway

Last night I helped six kids between the ages of 6 and 8 realize "street signs" that they dreamed up. I'd never helped kids that young, it was quite a trip! Part of a project by Pittsburgh artist Carley Parrish, "Signs of Me" is a Sprout funded "Spark" initiative where kids get to design signs that they'd like to see around the city about their favorite things (swimming, skateboarding, the night sky, etc). They rendered their ideas in Illustrator last week, and then I cut them out of vinyl using my plotting equipment. I brought everything in in stacks of stickers and we set to work assembling the signs - next week Carley installs them around the Polish Hill neighborhood in Pittsburgh, more pics when they get up! Pictured are Gaia, Jasmine, and Genley.

Book Draft Finished!

If all is going as planned, then as you are reading this I am en route to visit some old friends in North Carolina and then to hit the beaches of the Outer Banks for some straight up vacation time after finally turning in the first draft of the book I am writing/editing for Justseeds. This book saw me researching and writing for the better half of the summer, with little time for other projects (hence a lack in posts), and it's a real relief to get a workable draft to Microcosm and walk out the door to a whole lot of doing nothing in particular for a country minute. Looks like the book will be titled "Firebrands: Portraits from the Americas" - it is essentially an illustrated primer of radicals from the Americas for a "young adult" audience. Comes out some time next year, but at the moment I couldn't tell you exactly when (in time for Christmas 2010, I hope...) My accomplice in the book is fellow Justseeder Bec Young, recently transplanted to Pittsburgh by way of Detroit. The pic above is my work station at home - this is what my world has looked like for the last three months or so, and the garden has suffered some as a result. It's been an adventure, if you're into that sort of thing (I am). My head is filled with so many stories...

One addition I did manage to make to the blog is a nifty little badge on the right hand side from our friends at ilovemountains.org: you can enter in your zip code and see just how connected you are to mountaintop removal coal mining, in case you were somehow feeling comfortable about where you probably get your electricity. Give it a shot, visit their website, and spread the word. We just might stop the bastards yet.

Little Rock coyote track...

Bill Daniel just sent me over this photo from our tour this past June. As I was installing coyote tracks in the roads of some of the towns we visited, Bill took some photo documentation. Most of it is on B&W film which I haven't seen yet, but he did send this great digital shot (which I must have taken on his camera) of him driving the van over a freshly installed track a couple of times for good measure. This shot was in Little Rock, Arkansas - I've been laying low on installing more tracks in Pittsburgh while they repave some streets...

Justseeds Retreat 2009 in Braddock

This past weekend, the Pittsburgh contingent of Justseeds (Mary "Mack" Tremonte, Bec Young, and myself) hosted Justseeds' 2009 planning retreat at the convent in Braddock, PA with the generous help of the folks at Transformazium and Mayor John Fetterman. Much was accomplished, including the above obligatory silly group portrait - this one in front of the Edgar Thomson Steel Works, which roared without pause across the street from where we met, ate, and slept. It was an invigorating experience, despite the mental toll of three days of meetings!

Pictured are (top R to L): Kevin Caplicki, Nicolas Lampert, Colin Matthes, Pete Yahnke, Bec Young, Roger Peet, Kristine Virsis, Alec "Icky" Dunn.
(middle L to R): Melanie Cervantes, Favianna Rodriguez, Erik Ruin, Molly Fair, Jesse Purcell.
(kneeling in front R to L): Hippopatumus Lampert, Josh MacPhee, Dara Greenwald, Mary Tremonte, Meredith Stern, and myself.
Not pictured were Chris Stain, Swoon, Jesus Barraza, and Fernando Marti.

"Crushed Totally" video party backdrop

Although this video will probably never make it into my general portfolio (and now that I think of it will probably never even be seen publicly again!) I thought I ought to at least post it here. In June, I agreed to edit together this video for a one-time viewing at the "My So-Called Bike" fundraiser party that some close friends were organizing. The party was held at Pittsburgh's Free Ride Recycled Bike Cooperative, which I worked with for several years, on Saturday, June 20, 2009. Profits from the party went to the new Free Ride summer programs and to the Book 'Em! Books to Prisoners program. The party was themed after the short-lived teen television drama "My So-Called Life" (1994-95), and participants accordingly dressed more or less like they did in high school (not a far stretch for many).

The video, entitled "Crushed Totally: World Happiness Dance Total Bust Infinity Loop Or Like Whatever", consists entirely of re-edited and slowed down clips from original MSCL episodes, with attention paid to non-dialog scenes with excruciating teen drama, longing gazes, locker leans, and any scene I could find involving a bicycle. Meant to be a tongue-in-cheek backdrop for an already ridiculously themed party, "Crushed Totally" was projected large on a cinderblock wall behind the beer table and adjacent to the raging dance floor (the video has no sound). The party was a success, money was raised, and a whole lot of people stood and watched this absurd video while they waited in line for alcohol, or maybe hung out casually waiting to be dragged into the giant Trapper Keeper for a bit of "Seven Minutes in Trapper Keeper Heaven" (I'm not making that part up). Creation of this video resulted in a moderate emotional crisis in which the editor began to feel as though the original television show bore a terrifying resemblance to his actual life, somehow...

Stamp by bUZ bLURR

While on tour with Bill Daniel earlier this month, I had the pleasure of spending a couple of (hot and humid) days in Little Rock, Arkansas at the Arkansas Community Arts Center (ACAC). Bill did a two-night show with bUZ bLURR (aka Colossus of Roads) - the walls at the ACAC were filled with Bill's Texas punk photos and bUZ's stencil portraits (see below). I had a chance to chat with bUZ a bit on the second day about why he started doing mail art, when he got involved in the railroad, and how he turned Tav Falco on to Jack Kerouac books in high school growing up in Gurdy, AR. bUZ takes close-up flash photos of people and turns them into intricate papercuts, and many of these eventually become postage stamps. Today I was excited to get a stamp in the mail from bUZ taken from a photo he took of me in Little Rock!