hilary pfeifer

Pouffe

2017-06-04T10:11:00.001-07:00

I've been carving another large outdoor piece lately--this one will be part of the Lake Oswego Arts Council's Gallery Without Walls temporary public art exhibition. My piece will be installed on the first of August, but here's some of the process shots of the creation of my sculpture titled Pouffe:

Drilling the pieces was an all-day process and I couldn't have done it without my dear dad. The logs were still holding a lot of moisture so drilling our pilot holes created a cool steam vacuum!

Part of the 8 hour day was spent problem-solving the best way to drill, plus three trips to the NE Portland Tool Library!

Roughing out the logs with a little help from the first tool I made as a student at Oregon College of Art and Craft and a chisel handed down to me from my grandfather.

I had to remove about 2-3 inches of rotten wood from the outside of the logs, but was left with a good 12" diameter piece to carve my patterns.

My stack before carving commenced--some of the taller ones were cut in half to make the stack more interesting and include more patterns.

My piece is titled Pouffe, which is an homage to making your own furniture camping--the stacked elements have shapes reminiscent of the Moroccan pouf forms, and some of them have decorative patterns carved into them.

This is one of the four forms that have a nature-inspired pattern.

Some of my carving tools and a strong cup of coffee helped me in the two weeks I spent carving the patterns into the forms.

Some of the patterns were made with my dremel tool, including this one that involved thousands of lines burned in a featherlike pattern.

Each form took about a day to carve and as I finished each one, I'd stack them to see how they looked together.

I had frequent visits from a new hummingbird, so I named him Leroy after one of my art heroes and master woodcarver Leroy Setziol. Ever time he came for a drink from the feeder, I imagined he was checking in on my progress.

Here's the completed eight pieces post-carving! I will let them dry out for 4-6 weeks before giving them a subtle stain and sealant to accentuate the different stacked elements and preserve them for their two years outdoors. The opening ceremony is Sunday, August 13th from 11am to 3pm.

Nine Reasons Why You Should Come to My Open Studio This Weekend!

2016-10-14T08:41:00.003-07:00

1. You like seeing artists' workspaces because it gives you ideas about your own space.

I have spent the past fourteen years slowly converting a two car garage into a great workspace without breaking the bank. My last addition was to decorate the facade with offcuts from last year's project for Beech Street Apartments.

2. You like cats. Or words. Or words about cats.

This is your last chance to see all the original figures from my new book Catabet! (I'll have books for sale too as well as other little critters!)

3. You like dogs. Weegee would love to tell you how annoying it is that I wrote a book about cats this year.

4. You want to do the Portland Open Studios tour and grab one of my last three free directories! (If you miss out, you can easily get one for $15 at New Seasons Market, or mobile apps at the Portland Open Studios Website for $5!)

5. You want another chance to see a little bit of my Glean residency work from last summer! Maybe I'll even give you a MAKE ART NOT GARBAGE pencil made with recycled newspaper!

6. You want to grab one of the last ten of my Fleur sculptures -- available for an awesome $225 each!

7. You want to hear about my other big summer project, designing two ornamental screens, three freestanding sculptures and painted utility boxes for nearby Peloton Apartments. I'll have my design schematics and a few photos up to show you what I've done.

8. You want to learn more about my cousin Tripper's Kickstarter campaign for his first book The Real Story of Ruth the Tooth!

9. Me. You want to meet me. You want to see me. You haven't seen me in way too long and here I am waiting for you! My address is 4634 NE 19th Ave. (between Prescott and Alberta Streets) in Portland. Open studio hours for this weekend October 15 and 16, 2016 are 10am to 5pm.

What I grafted

2016-08-11T08:12:00.003-07:00

Hey Beautiful People!

I'm back for a quick update on my pieces for the Graft series, part of the PDX-CSA that's connected to Portland Open Studios, in which I'm also participating!

As you will recall, my series is a made up from several different woods, all scrap from other larger projects. Here's a little insight into the woods that will be in these sculptures:

Starting at the top and base, we have some black walnut. This beautiful wood is the bane of a gardener's existence if they're trying to grow vegetables nearby. The tree makes the soil around it quite acidic, and people like me sad. I actually have a large English Walnut in my backyard, with which I have a love/hate relationship. On a hot summer's day, it knocks at least ten degrees off of my studio. It's beautiful to look at. It's a lot of cleanup. But I still love it.

The second wood down is a hard maple that was part of a cutting board.

The third down from the top is Peltogyne, more commonly known as purpleheart. It's a common exotic wood found in Central and South America. Below that is Zebrawood, found in the same part of the world. I love being able to buy these two woods in small scrap and using them minimally in projects like these.

The light colored wood at the bottom is a birch--a very common and easy to work with wood. I like how the bright tan stands out and highlights the little round balls that I randomly embedded in the surface.

On the wall behind this sculpture is one of my favorite things in the studio--a poster called the "Periodic Table of Wood" that has a guide to over 100 woods from around the world. For someone like me who is frequently handed a bucket with all sorts of wood scrap, this poster has come in handy more than once.

Eight reasons you should be at the GLEAN opening tonight!

2016-08-11T07:49:00.001-07:00

1. You know and/or have been following the work of the five artists this year and want to see the show!

2. You have been to the Metro Transfer Station and have gleaning envy.

3. You are incredulous that beauty can come from anything found at “the dump.”

4. You are an artist who’s interested in applying for next year’s GLEAN residency and want to be part of the “in crowd”

5. You are hungry/thirsty and like looking at stuff while you eat and drink.

6. You saw this still from my favorite movie The Gleaners and I and are confused about what this is. (It’s a potato. Not gonna be in the show. Sorry. But read my recent blog post if you want to know more about this amazing movie!)

7. You saw Wasteland and want to relive that movie locally.

8. You want to get one of my recycled newspaper pencil souvenirs I had custom printed for the opening! Free to anyone who comes to the opening and makes a comment about my work that doesn’t involve a Tinkertoys reference! (Not that I disagree–I just hear it a lot and hoping to get some more original feedback.) Make Art Not Garbage!

Glean Opening reception – Thursday, August 11 from 6-9PM
The Bison Building 421 NE 10th Ave. Portland

Gallery hours: Friday, Saturday and Sundays 12-5pm through August 27.

The Gleaners and I

2016-08-04T09:59:00.002-07:00

Now that I'm "done" with the work for the Glean residency, (pending installation,) I finally had some time to watch one of my favorite films of all time: Agnes Varda's "The Gleaners and I." It's pretty much the only movie that I own, and it's great to revisit it every so often. This film is a beautiful portrait of the practice of gleaning through the eyes of an aging woman. I won't spoil the movie for you by showing some of my favorite moments--it's truly a treat to hear Varda narrate the film and see the world through her eyes.

According to Varda, women are the original gleaners. She opens the film with this painting done in 1867 by Millet, titled "The Gleaners."

In France, gleaning is not just a common practice, it's actually written into the law that for all commercial crops, there is a post-harvest period of time after November 1st when the public can enter the land and forage for what's left. We also learn that people from all economic classes take advantage of this law--some are even chefs who are eager to gather up perfectly ripe and free fruits and vegetables to serve their customers. The film shows many examples of urban gleaning as well--including an artist who finds their materials in the streets. This screen shot points out that stooping is a common denominator amongst all gleaners.

One of the sweet moments in the film is when Varda and her film crew stumble upon a reproduction of the famous Millet painting in a thrift store.

And next to the painting was a wheat chaff, so she posed for a self portrait.

Varda is brilliant where she brings her own story into this documentary. I think it's one big reason why I return to this film so often. Summer always reminds me of my first art residency a decade ago at the Center for Art in Wood. Now I'll also always think of Les glaneurs et la glaneuse. It's been a really great past five months being able to glean at the Metro Waste Facility and then working hard to put this show together. I can't wait to see it installed next week.

Opening reception - Thursday, August 11 from 6-9PM
The Bison Building 421 NE 10th Ave. Portland

Gallery hours: Friday, Saturday and Sundays 12-5pm through August 27.

Sketching a Sculpture

2016-08-01T08:24:00.001-07:00

It wasn't until I went back to art school in 1995 that I truly fell in love with the pencil. Previously, I had spent my days finding the perfect pen to express my moods and create the most permanent of doodles. But something changed when I learned to design furniture, and for several years I would never be found without one tucked behind my ear. Now that I have my own studio, my special pencils are strategically placed on every work surface, bearing their printed reminders of places I've visited all around the world.

It was one of my first visits to the Metro Transfer Station when I was handed a small chest of drawers by one of the workers there. Each drawer was filled with basic office supplies: X-acto tools, felt-tipped pens, highlighters, note pads, adhesives, and a ton of pencils. Within the next month, I had my second major pencil encounter--someone had dumped a stamp and coin collection, along with other materials from someone's office space. I came back with dozens of perfectly sharpened pencils that never got to scribe the words intended by their diligent sharpener.

I've seen many artists use pencils in their work, but my favorite by far was Gord Peteran's series of drawings titled "Five Sounds." He did this series during his 2002 residency at the Center for Art in Wood, and they are now part of their permanent collection. Peteran's series takes you through his varied approaches to draw a circle with pencil, paper, a lathe, and his body. The above drawing is the second in his series, when he mounted the paper onto a piece of plywood and held the pencil in his hand. I love this journal of the relationship between human and machine.

It was nice to be, again, reminded of Peteran's series while I did the rough shaping of my forms with the pencils already embedded. Depending on the spacing of the pencils, it would create a circular "drawing" on my sanding disc. The graphite produced more minimalist drawings.

And you can even see a ghost of the sanding process on the face of each piece. I like it because it is a subtle reminder of the spontaneous drawing exercises I employed while in the design stages of this installation. Similarly, I use the disc sander with a high grit paper so I can quickly make shapes. This detail shot reveals the nuances in pencil wood grain you can sometimes spot in even this pea-sized cross-section. I also like how the yellow paint that once dominated the pencil's appearance is subtly evident around the edges.

Fortuitously for this project, one of my fellow Gleaners left me a pack of colored pencils one day.

It's been fun to let people discover this found object that's in each of the 50 pieces I made for this installation. The entire form is seen first, an then there's often an expression of surprise when they recognize this everyday object that has now become a design element.

I feel a little sad cutting apart the batch of pencils that were so carefully sharpened, but hope that somewhere out there in the universe, their previous owner knows that they didn't end up in the landfill. Or perhaps they'll start again with tips from pencil sharpening expert David Rees:

HOW TO SHARPEN PENCILS from Pricefilms on Vimeo.

We install our show in one week! I can't wait to show you this body of work I've spent an intense two months pulling together. The opening is Thursday, August 11th at the Bison Building in Portland (421 NE 10th Ave.) from 6-9 PM. After that, the show will be open Friday-Sunday from noon - 5pm until August 27.

work in progress

2016-06-30T18:26:00.001-07:00

As you may have guessed, it's all systems go here while I bring this body of work together for the Glean residency. Here's a few studio shots I took in the past month.

I was lacking an available surface for drawing a full-scale model, so I used my studio doorway.

These tiny "spoons" were clipped from a piano found at the Metro Transfer Station and will become decorative elements in some of my pieces.

I was so busy this month, I would sometimes squeeze an hour in here or there just making shapes so that I could assemble sculptures later.

trying to make the tail ends of some very old clothespins work into a piece. So far, I've only been satisfied with the nobby ends.

note nobby ends in the piece below!

One benefit of having a good day in the studio is when I spend the following night dreaming about design ideas. This is one such instance, where I woke up with a vision of a solid piece with shapes removed, rather than the additive building of shapes that I typically do. I want to keep pursuing this idea!

Today was the monthly Glean studio review so I decided to bring the 25 pieces I've designed (but not stained or glued together) outside and hang them in my covered work area to get a better sense of how they will look en masse. The final show will be multi-tiered with more breathing room, but it was great to see them in a new setting.

Lures from Hilary Pfeifer on Vimeo.

sketching

2016-06-16T17:31:00.000-07:00

sketching my lures from Hilary Pfeifer on Vimeo.

divine

2016-05-30T14:05:00.002-07:00

I am happy to be part of this year's 5th Annual Recycled Rain Project show as an alumna. You will recall my Save Our Souls installation of rain sticks from last year--this year I searched for another object related with water to inspire a piece, and settled on the divining rod.

The most common tool used for divining (or dowsing) that comes to mind for me is a hazel y-shaped stick, as seen above in this photo of one of the most famous people who claim to be able to use it to find underground water, George Casely.

Otto Edler von Graeve was another famed dowser--note his looped tool. I read a little about the history of these two men, as well as this interesting recounting of the various tests to prove or disprove whether dowsing really works.

My personal feelings about dowsing lie more on the side of skepticism, but for this piece, I thought it was a more interesting conversation to think about the importance of rainwater as an option when underground resources become more scare as our growing population's water demands simultaneously increase. Playing on the term "divine," I made the rod from found turned wood bits to give it a ceremonial feel, and gilded the surface with rainwater and gold leaf.

At the tip is a small raindrop painted with a map of the earth. The Recycled Rain Project show opens Saturday, June 4 at the Ford Gallery on SE 11th and Division Come see the new featured artists, as well as over 25 more, all of whom have used rainwater as a component in their fresh new works. Opening is 6-10pm. 20% of sales go to Solve!

many mobiles

2016-05-29T09:47:00.000-07:00

I've been pushing in the studio for the past few weeks, trying to "sketch out" as many of my lure mobiles as I could before our mid-residency review last Friday. I worked out a lot of them through drawing, and some others have been designed instinctively. So far I have thirteen that are at least started--here's a video of what it feels like to be in my studio right now:
Lures in Progress from Hilary Pfeifer on Vimeo.

It feels so good to be on a roll with this project, so I'm trying to go with it as much as I can right now, since I need to devote July to wrapping up another big project. Only two of these are stained and glued, as photos were needed for the card, but I am already wanting to take one of them apart to revisit the colors. I plan to keep designing and assembling my lures for the next month, so I can glue and stain them in July. If all goes well, I'll have two dozen by showtime.

Again, I can't be more pleased with the Bison Building as our venue. My spot will allow people to stand beneath them, walk up the staircase next to them, and look down on them from the balcony above.

Here's the one I'm completely satisfied with, made with discarded furniture and pencils:

A detail shows the subtle detail of the embedded pencils:

Graft

2016-05-16T12:52:00.000-07:00

My grandfather, John Nelson Dungan, was a great man. He grew up on a citrus ranch in central California, came up to study economics at the University of Oregon, fought in the Navy during World War Two, and returned to the San Joaquin valley to run the family ranch for the rest of his life. In the late 1960's, he worked with Cesar Chavez on behalf of the United Farmworkers' rights, and later testified in front of Robert Kennedy and the Senate Commission as the voice of the Tulare County Farmers Association. I was only able to spend a decade with him before he passed away, but I still have memories of walking together in the neatly tended orange groves, in a time when you could still clearly see the Sierras in the background not just on a good day, but every day.

Grafting young stock onto old hardy roots is part of the early propagation of the oranges, lemons, and tangerines grown on the farm, but my grandfather also grafted as a hobby. Behind their house was a small, private collection of trees he'd "created." Every day we would pick and then drink up that wonderful juice from the tangerine+grapefruit tree.

I took inspiration from my grandfater for a small series of sculptures in his honor that I'm creating this spring for the PDX-CSA. Much like how a farm CSA supports a farmer with funds up-front, this art CSA gives us artists the funds up-front so we can create a special collection at a great price. You get to be involved from the conceptual level, watch the process of creation, and then you get to keep the final product! You can purchase one of my Graft sculptures for only $150 until June 15, or until they sell out. Pair it with a mixed media collage by my CSA-mate Therese Murdza and get 10% off the total cost! There are eight other artists selected for this year's PDX-CSA -- click here to see all of them. Oh , and if you're feeling left out because you don't live in PDX....anyone in any part of the world can participate in this-- PDX-CSA will ship your pieces!

My sculpture series is titled "Graft" because it incorporates five different wood varieties into one tree-like form. Like all of my other sculptural work, these compositions are made almost entirely from wood that’s had a previous intent (scraps from other artisans) or lived a previous utilitarian life as a dwelling, a piece of furniture, a toy or utensil, etc. It’s a reminder that as we expand as a culture, it is important to use our natural resources wisely. Even the tiniest bit of wood is important and has a story to tell. This piece is 11" high and about 3 inches in diameter.

If you're in the Portland area, we're having a launch party tomorrow night with all ten artists present to show you the pieces they've designed for the project! The event will be on the second floor of the Ford Building (2505 SE 11th Ave., Suite 272) on Tuesday, May 17th from 6-8pm. Light snacks and refreshments and lovely art awaits you!

I will fear no evil

2016-05-14T10:15:00.001-07:00

Had a fun day at the Metro Transfer Station yesterday with fellow artist-in-residence Dan Pillers. Here he is with a discarded desk drawer, which soon became our motto of the day.

I didn't come out with a ton of materials yesterday but did glean some items peripherally related to the making of art, including a big collection of metal files of all shapes and sizes, a handtruck, this deluxe boot remover (thanks to Dan for knowing what it was!)

I also found four beautiful large stainless steel welded mesh panels that will be perfect for hanging my lure mobiles. Speaking of which, we got to see the new exhibition space at the Bison Building the other day and I am so happy the show found a home more suitable for my work! Here's a shot I took of the space I'll be filling with mobiles in just three months! the vicinity of those big girders is a 300 square foot zone with 12' of height to play with.

It's so inspiring to finally know where my work will be shown and I can't wait to get into the studio today. I have been sketching like a madwoman and so far have four of my lures in their preliminary stages of construction. I will push to get 12-20 designed before the middle of June so I can spend the final six weeks of the residency doing the tedious but important work getting the color and joinery just right. Mark your calendars!

direction

2016-05-06T09:35:00.000-07:00

I've (finally) settled on my project for the GLEAN residency-- the "lure" idea I was toying with earlier will become an installation of suspended wood sculptures. It took a while to get to the exact vocabulary for these, but after a lot of sketching, I'm really excited about this new body of work that's both a continuation of my past "Weather Patterns" designs, and new territory. I've been waiting for years to do some mobiles......apparently now is the time.

The main materials gleaned from the Metro Transfer Station that I'll be using for these pieces are hardwoods from discarded furniture that will ultimately be colored with stains I've claimed from the hazardous waste section. If I come across some interesting materials along the way, I'll incorporate those too--here's the first piece when I was still laying it out. It has some embedded pencils and some tiny metal parts from a piano to add subtle design elements.

I need these pieces to work in the round, so once I built this initial part and could hang it, I added some lateral spines.

Here's a few more pieces in the works.

found some bling for my safety vest!!

2016-04-20T11:46:00.002-07:00

over the river and through the industrial zone....a gleaning we will go.....

2016-04-19T19:29:00.000-07:00

We're just about a third of the way into the GLEAN residency, and I've been regularly stopping in at Metro couple of times a week to see what materials might be of interest for my project. It's a sweet journey that has developed some routines that I love.

I live in Northeast Portland, so it's usually about a 15 minute drive door to door. I listen to whatever's on our local jazz station KMHD on both drives which gets me in the mood. This is a trick I sometimes use in the studio when I need to force myself into a place where I work more quickly and intuitively. Portland is so lucky to have an amazing jazz station.

I always bring along my sweet companion Weegee, who's always up for errands. He's also come to know that there's treats in the mix for him at the booth you must pass when you enter and exit the Transfer Station. In fact, as soon as we pull up, he's in my lap leaning out the window. Here's Candy giving him his entry handful.

In other news, I built a shed so I could store all of the materials I've been gleaning this year. It's made almost entirely from stuff I grabbed out of the dump, including some wheels I removed from a discarded stage, a well-built palette for the floor, ripple roofing, and the walls were made from these two discarded sets from the locally-shot TV show Grimm.

At first I thought it would be funny to have the police lineup on the outside, but then I realized that they were made using temporary decals and the plywood was indoor grade, so I just used to to do the initial framing because it was easier for me to build and lift the structure by myself. I ended up buying three sheets of exterior plywood to further clad the structure, decorated the sides a little with some cutouts leftover from a public art project last year that are also on the facade of my adjacent studio, and used some leftover house paint to finish it up. I still want to trim it and find some interesting panel to add in the space above the door.

here's the front view with some of my current large-item stash neatly stored inside

a metal shelf with gleaned plastic storage bins holds smaller materials I've gleaned. You can also see the flowers and birds on that outer wall.

Here's a better shot of the wall.....

some of the simple design elements from the inner studio side

This is the back side that's pushed up against my fence--I added a little art for the neighbors so they didn't have to just look at a gray wall.

Excited to be able to spend the rest of the month actually playing in the studio! I had a great visit last week from last year's Gleaner and friend Brenda Mallory, who gave me some great feedback on the few pieces I've made already. Even though I watched her go through it last year, it was really helpful to have a critique at this juncture.

word of the day

2016-04-04T19:11:00.000-07:00

de-piller-ate

/dəˈpilər'āt/

verb

1.
to remove upholstery tacks from a previously discarded item.

"She expertly depillerated the chair she found in the Metro Transfer Station."

Origin

early 21st century: from middle French or Medieval Latin and North/Northeast Portlandian; de-, depil- meaning to remove (upholstery tacks nee hair) + North/Northeast Portlandian; -piller, referring to GLEAN resident Dan Pillers, known for his inspiring removal of upholstery tacks from objects found at the Metro Waste Facility, and who happens to also have a name related to hair.*

First Known Use: 2016 by fellow Glean artist Hilary Pfeifer, after removing approximately 38 upholstery tacks in the same fashion. She stopped, laughed, took a photo, shared it on Instagram and Facebook, and then continued to depillerate the two chairs she found that day.

*it will be noted that no errant hair was detected in the depillerating of this chair.

lure

2016-03-20T14:02:00.001-07:00

I haven't had as much time lately to go gleaning for my metro residency lately, but have started playing around with some of the things I've already picked up.

Here's a sample of the things that have caught my eye: old rulers and yardsticks, axe and hammer handles, turned legs, pencils, picture frames and some giant olive-shaped wood floats.

Another great find was a spool of rubber cord, which I tried burning to see if it produced an effect I liked.

I cut one of the wood floats in half lengthwise and just started playing--seeing if I could come up with a pattern or surface that looks interesting.

I haven't worked this way with materials in a long time, so it's felt really inspiring to be given the opportunity to explore and play.

I think I have a direction for my project as well--one of the things I've learned in my reading about falconry is the use of a "lure" to train or exercise.

It's a small object that can be made in various shapes and materials, most often to resemble a bird or small prey. The falconer spins the lure around on a cord and the falcon swoops down to grab it.

I love watching the relationship between the bird and human here--it reminds me a lot of taking my dog to the park with the chuck-it and ball. I also love the word "lure," as it can have so many meanings.

observe, collect and research

2016-03-10T07:53:00.005-08:00

One of the questions I was asked when I was interviewed for this residency was what I planned on making during the six month period. My response was that I felt that having a period of time to observe that facility, collect materials, and research ideas as they emerge seemed like the best way to create a body of work that is both in keeping with the themes I already explore, and talk in a meaningful way about my residency. Here's my journey so far:

I've been to the Metro Transfer Station three times now. One of the requirements of the residency is that we check in at Recology and get a manifest or bill of lading to help Metro keep its records accurate about what this program is reclaiming from the waste system. Our vehicles are weighed when we enter and exit, just as any car, but they are interested in the pounds of material we are taking out. My first "glean" removed 20 pounds, my second was 40 pounds, and yesterday logged at 100 pounds of materials removed. I have been adding notes about what I take each time on my receipts when I get home, just because it's another interesting way of keeping a journal or record of the time.

I have also spent some time talking to the folks who run the falcons on the property, which has subsequently spawned an obsession with this variety of raptors. I've always been a songbird gal myself, but am really taken with the idea that one bird is used to control another bird to make human life better. I was told that there's less hunting happening now that the seagulls and pigeons have been trained to know that the falcons may be watching them. I've been loving the brand new book Peregrine Spring by Nancy Cowan, where she recounts her journey into the world of raptors. I also spent some time learning more about our local peregrine population on the Portland Audubon website. Apparently 6% of the state's nesting sites are located within the Portland metro area, and you can see lots of gorgeous photos of them on our bridges on the Audubon website. I have been particularly fascinated with this one, which shows a baby peregrine imprinting on a puppet of an adult--part of the fascinating recovery of the species that was once endangered due to DDT exposure.

I have two bodies of work in mind at this point, and my plan is to keep gleaning on a regular basis, and to start making some exploratory work with my ideas to see what has legs. I am excited to start using my hands and intuition at this stage of the GLEAN journey.

Glean Residency begins!

2016-03-01T20:02:00.000-08:00

I'm excited to say that I have recently begun my first artist's residency in eight years--I'm one of five Portland artists chosen to participate in the GLEAN program through the Portland Metro Transfer Station (aka the "Dump",) Recology, and Cracked Pots. Here we all are, suited up in our official red vests and hard hats on orientation day. This residency allows us a six month "golden ticket" to pick through the first level of waste before it goes through intensive sorting process to pull out anything recyclable so that as little as possible ends up in a landfill. Portland's residency is modeled after the highly competitive San Francisco version and I'm psyched to have gotten into this one while it's still relatively unknown here. Click here to learn more about the local program and the other four artists I'll be gleaning with. The six month residency culminates with a show in early September at the Mark Wooley Gallery.

I'm especially curious (and a little frightened) to see what wood treasures I'll find. As you probably already know if you're reading this on my blog, I have been primarily using found wood in my artwork for the past 17 years. I used the word frightened mostly because I need to figure out where I might put the things I bring home.....my studio feels at capacity already! I have a feeling there's an outdoor storage shed in my near future. Maybe I'll get lucky and someone will be tossing one out!

But back to the wood situation. Late last year, a big change occurred in the area when a Newburg papermill closed that was burning 350 tons of wood waste PER DAY. Now this wood is being sent to a landfill. I know I won't be able to make a huge dent in this situation, but one of my intentions for the body of work I'll create over the next six months is to address this issue. There's a lot more interesting information about this situation, including the fact that the mill was so old that it was exempt from burning treated or painted wood, which might be better in another front. You can read more about it by clicking here.

One of the first things to catch my eye when I was interviewing for the residency was the outdoor area with four birds perched inside. I learned that these raptors are used to keep the garbage-eating birds from becoming a huge problem in the building where the trash is stored. I'm hoping to get to learn more about the birds and meet the handlers because there's already a potential bird-themed project brewing in my head. That said, tomorrow will be my first official day of gleaning, and I want to arrive with a fresh mind and let the experience dictate what I create between now and September.

A final note: I spent the day listening to all four of Grayson Perry's Reith Lectures, and especially loved thinking about this quote in relation to the GLEAN Residency:

“If you want to test a work of art.......throw it onto a rubbish dump. And if people walking by notice that it’s there and say “Oh what’s that artwork doing on that rubbish dump”, it’s passed.

Fleur - an edition of 30 sculptures

2015-10-23T11:38:00.001-07:00

I've been working with wood for the past two decades, creating both abstract and figurative sculptures. I use over 90 percent found wood--cutoffs and random shapes I have gleaned from multiple sources. Until three years ago, all of my sculptures were painted, so it didn't really matter what was underneath. That changed when I was asked to create an installation for Oregon State University that reprised my Cumulate installation from a decade earlier. This installation consisted of hundreds of unique abstract forms, which I later organized into groups of 12-25 sculptures which were painted in similar colors and arranged high on the walls to simulate cloud forms. You can see the final installation on my website by clicking here.

Before I painted the sculptures, I arranged them on the floor of my studio and snapped this shot, which made me appreciate how nice the unpainted wood looked. I had a little stash of various hardwoods that I'd amassed over the years, and so I started shaping them and playing around with various arrangements until I had my first series of natural wood sculptures.

I decided to call them Weather Patterns, continuing a broad theme I've been working with for years that talks about the relationship between humans and nature. I think of the bases of these pieces as a building, and the upper forms as an abstraction of weather. Being in tall buildings in Chicago and noticing how the weather can be different on the ground versus being on the upper levels led me to this title. Ever since making these first three pieces, I have continued to make about a dozen one of a kind sculptures annually. Most of them are on my website, which you can see by clicking here.

This year, Artful Home asked me to create a design for their 30th anniversary celebration, so I decided to do my first-ever edition of one of these natural wood sculptures. I decided to adapt a previous design from last year that reminded me of flowers. I'm already familiar with working in production for the animal or the picketing Santas and Rabbis I sell through Artful Home, but I had never done it with this abstract work before.

I needed to make sure I used woods that I either had or could buy in quantities large enough to create each element 30 times.

Even though I repeated the same design for my edition of 30, there are variations in wood grain that make each piece unique. The above image shows how the wenge can vary in grain.

The zebrawood offers another variety of grain options.

The black walnut base can also vary from carmel color to deep brown. Grain is also a variable factor.

On a few pieces, I thought that the evidence of the exterior of the original log was interesting, so the base is not a perfect rectangular cube.
I have posted all thirty pieces made for Artful Home on my Flickr page . (You can scroll through them here on the blog by clicking on the image below.)

Each piece is signed, dated, and shows which number it is in the edition.

I also created fifteen one-of-a-kind sculptures for Artful Home, some of which are pictured below:

To see the entire collection available online, click here!

Where to find me these days......

2015-06-06T07:15:00.000-07:00

Hey Beautiful People!

At the risk of my blog just becoming a mirror of my website, I will mention that I seem to be more actively posting on Facebook these days, so feel free to follow me there. I also keep my website updated with upcoming shows and images of new projects.

I expect to continue to blog here from time to time when I have a project that suits keeping this kind of narrative diary. (Like a residency, new installation, etc.) I have an email list that I only use a few times a year, but let you know if there's something worth writing about.

In the meantime, here's a few shots of my studio -- I'm covering areas with the negative cutouts from my most recent public installation for the Beech Street Apartments. Enjoy!

Recycled Rain Project

2015-05-06T07:32:00.000-07:00

I just completed my first installation in years--a bit smaller scale, but I'm really pleased with the results. It's for a local annual show called the Recycled Rain Project that opens this Saturday. Each artist in this invitational show is asked to create a piece using rainwater to help create awareness about water issues. I decided to make a series of rainsticks featuring birds from the Pacific flyway that are on the Audubon Society's at-risk list. You can read more about it on my website by clicking here. Here's a few teaser shots:

This installation will be shown in its entirety for one night only in Portland, but will have a monthlong run at Velvet da Vinci Gallery this October.

New work for Sitka and OCAC

2014-10-02T06:44:00.000-07:00

A few of these pieces will be in this year's Sitka Invitational

Inspired by the Stephens Creek screens, I added a bird silhouette into this one for next spring's auction at Oregon College of Art and Craft. I hope to do more like this in the near future!

Stephens Creek Crossing

2014-08-06T06:40:00.000-07:00

for more images, click here.

Here we go.....

2014-05-26T08:17:00.001-07:00

My screens for Stephens Creek Crossing are finally being made this week! Here's a shot of the laser cutter in action that will be used for my project.