Ann Tracy's

2012-01-23T14:48:00.000-08:00

It's called Winter Celebration and based on a photo taken outside my upstairs window before going up to my attic studio. I love the look of snow on tree branches. I'll leave this with you while I jet off to San Francisco for my niece's wedding and short visit with family & friends in Sacramento too.

Gung Hay Fat Choi

Happy Year Of The Dragon

Glistening with Probabilities

2012-01-17T08:02:00.000-08:00

Almost sounds dirty doesn't it? Maybe that's why the phrase came to me a week or so ago and apparently has been in my mind since. Now a bright new year is opening before us and of course I have a few things in mind for this year. I want to submit a piece to a Professional Women Photographers show in New York and go to the reception! I intend to sell more art and find a Maine gallery to rep me. I also intend to do a full staged reading of Orestes 3.0 at the Portland Fringe Fest. I intend to finish the commissioned piece for Aime and Jamie before their new baby is born. I was surprised at how I blocked myself so many times working on that piece. But I showed them four different versions of ways I could head and got some good feedback from them.

Another thing I did at the very beginning of the year was to enter a piece or work in a show at Altered Esthetics in Minneapolis. I thought "Power of Words" would be a great piece for their Belles Lettres exhibition and apparent they thought so too, as it was juried in! They will get the 3rd in a limited edition run of 25. If you'd like your print on either canvas or paper, go to my sales site to get it.

Merry Christmas

2011-12-24T12:07:00.000-08:00

This is a Christmas card I designed this year based on a couple of photos I took in Kennebunkport when I picked up my artwork from the Maine Women in the Arts show. It will go on sale on the Fine Art America site after the first of the year.

As a special treat for friends and family, I'd like to re-post a story written by a Sacramento friend, Donya Wicken....

Santa Borg

I was just about fed up with Christmas shopping, cooking and

decorating and was ready to cancel the whole thing and buy a

one-way ticket to the Bahamas when I heard a tortured wail

from upstairs. I raced up to find middle son Derek

glowering self righteously at littlest son Ryan who promptly

flung himself at me sobbing. I examined him for signs of

damage and at the same time shot Derek “the look”

demanding to know what he had done to provoke this storm of

anguish.

Finally Ryan calmed down enough to tell me himself. “He

said Santa Claus is really Uncle Robert” he choked out

and then collapsed again into helpless sobs.

“Derek, why did you tell him that?” I groaned in my now-look-what-you've-done voice.

“Well, it’s true isn’t it? He’s old enough to know

the truth. Anybody but a dumb little kid could have figured

it out for himself. Uncle Robert always wears such a dorky

fake beard and his ho ho hos are totally lame.”

Ryan wailed louder.

“Well, aren’t you going to tell him the truth?”

demanded Derek.

Before I could answer, a voice behind me spoke. “I’ll

tell him the truth. I’ll tell you both the truth. “ It

was oldest son Roger, sounding strangely like a super hero.

“I know the truth because I am in junior high school,”

he said. “I am old enough to know things that dumb

little kids like you are too young to understand.” He

stared straight at Derek as he spoke and I was secretly

pleased to see Derek cringe.

“All right then,” Derek challenged, “tell us the

truth. “

“Yeah Roger, tell us.” Ryan looked hopefully at Roger.

“All right, you remember that Star Trek movie when the

Borg tried to assimilate Captain Picard?”

“Yeah.”

“Cool.”

“Well which one was the real Borg?”

“Ha, that’s a dumb question,” Derek replied.

“There’s only one Borg. All those Borg people are just

part of the collective.”

”Except Captain Picard,” Ryan interjected. “He

wasn’t a real Borg. But all the others were.”

“That’s right,” said Roger. “And that’s how Santa

Claus is.”

Ryan’s eyes opened wide and he looked like he was going to

start to wail again. “You mean Santa Claus is a Borg?”

“No dummy, “ Derek explained contemptuously. “The

Borg are bad guys. Santa Claus is a good guy. “

“That’s right, Derek, Santa Claus is a good guy. But

he is like the Borg because he is a collective. He is one

mind but he has many bodies all over the world. That’s

how he can go to all those houses in one night. And every

time somebody puts on a Santa Claus uniform he is

assimilated into the collective and becomes a Santa

Claus.”

“Wow.” said Ryan.

“Oh yeah,” Derek argued, “what about when somebody

puts on a Santa suit because he’s a crook and he’s going

to rob somebody’s house?”

“Then it is not a uniform. It’s just a disguise. And

when somebody does that something bad will happen to him

because you can only wear the Santa Uniform to do good deeds

and make people happy.”

“So Derek was wrong.” Ryan announced triumphantly.

“Uncle Robert isn’t Santa Claus.”

“No Ryan. That’s not what I’m saying. Uncle Robert

has been assimilated into the collective. Uncle Robert

really is Santa Claus.”

Ryan gazed at Roger with unabashed adoration. “Wow.”

“Isn’t that right, Derek?” Roger demanded.

“Well, if you tell it like that. Yeah I guess so. Is

that right, Mom?”

“It makes sense to me,” I said. “It makes a lot

more sense than most things this time of year.”

Roger walked downstairs with me. Behind us we heard the

joyful sounds of a war being organized between the Evil Borg

Collective and the Good Santa Collective. “That was

amazing, Roger," I said. "You came up with a story that satisfied both

of your brothers. How did you do it?”

“Don’t you remember, Mom? The principal chose me to

play Santa Claus for the kids at the Head Start Christmas

party. I’ve been assimilated.”

Happy Holidaze

2011-12-15T09:42:00.000-08:00

Saw this in Kennebunkport a few weeks ago when I was there to pick up the work that didn't see at the Maine Women in the Arts show for Prelude to the Season there. But the good news is that I did sell one piece - the digital woodcut Two Gulls.

What with being one of Santa's elves this time of year, I've gotten a bit behind in the blogging. So the next few posts will be catch up ones in which I share the installation photos from the Windows show I was in at the E Street Gallery back in October and the Lumens show (which runs until Dec 27th).

In the meantime, one of my peeps in the Digital Art Guild Yahoo Group - Wayne Cosshall - is now publishing Digital ImageMaker International. You can get a copy via PDF and read a wonderful article about Bonny Lhotka, whose work I have admired for many years.

Shop Local in Southern Maine

2011-11-29T15:50:00.001-08:00

I'll be there show sitting on Friday, Dec 2nd from 1 to 4 pm... hope I see you there!

Gratitude

2011-11-23T12:42:00.001-08:00

I'm very grateful to all the readers of this blog for sticking with me through thick and thin as I continue my journey as an artist who works in different media. I've been all full of visual art matters for some time, so let's swing the set over to the theatre side for just a bit. Enormous thanks to PlayLab at Snow Lion Rep here in Portland for including me in PlayLab and for the reading this past Monday night of Orestes 3.0, directed by Al D’Andrea with the following cast:

ELECTRA: April Singley
ORESTES: Michael Dix Thomas
HELEN: Brittany Cook
MENELAUS: John Kreutzberger
CASSANDRA: Kerry Ann Loomis
WOUNDED MAN (WILLIAM): Thomas Campbell
WOUNDED MAN (JOHN): Simon Skold
NURSE MEG: Brittany Cook
NURSE TISI: Jacquelyn Mansfield
NURSE ALECTO: Amanda Painter

Facing us from right to left: April, Michael, Jacquelyn, Amanda, Brittany & John

Great thanks to all the members of PlayLab who attended and gave me great feedback. I'm really looking forward to finishing this puppy by the end of December and getting a full reading of it later this spring.

Here's wishing each an every one of you a great Thanksgiving and joy and abundance this holiday season.

Gonna Make you a Star

2011-11-15T09:01:00.001-08:00

Scams are all around us on a daily basis, but for the artist it seems they appear in an email at least once a day. Of course we are very vulnerable as we want to think that someone happened to stumble across our art and thinks it's just wonderful. I almost got caught up in that this morning when I read this:

"Dear Ann,

My name is Peter Sullivan and I am a freelance curator working with Abraham Lubelski organizing a March group exhibition in New York. I am inviting you to participate and take advantage of a unique opportunity to not only exhibit but to also get a full years' worth of publicity/exposure on the web and in print. This offer is the best publicity package available anywhere in today's contemporary art world. The fee for this complete one-year publicity package (and New York exhibition) is $1,950. I am particularly excited and interested in your work Motel Variations: Biggest Little City and I believe it would be an important addition to our program. By paying close attention to the intuitive works of each artist, we are hoping to construct an exhibition of works that truly speaks to our viewers and subscribers."

The fee was too steep for me at this point in time and it made me wonder if anyone else had ever gotten such a letter. A little google search turned this up. Thanks so much Helen Ansell for blogging about it and confirming my suspicions.

2011-11-07T09:27:00.000-08:00

I've been in Sacramento for a couple of days now and think I'm finally over the jet lag! The Saturday night closing reception at the E Street Gallery for the Looking In Looking Out show was great. Saw lots of old friends and even took a few photos. If you go HERE, I've posted them on Flickr for those of you who are not on Facebook.

Had a marvelous brunch at the Fox and Goose with my friends Art Luna and Cherie Hacker and dinner last night with Nancy Heard.

Art Luna and Cherie Hacker at the Fox and Goose, Sacramento

Today it's off to Sonoma for lunch with Barbara Medaille. You can see her wonderful landscape paintings here.

2011-10-31T14:17:00.000-07:00

For those of you NOT out in Sacramento, this is the image that's in the big 24 x 24" light box - "Classic Power with Man and Birdcage". I shot a photo of it before I sent it off to Lumens.

2011-10-28T09:20:00.000-07:00

Back in the Saddle

2011-10-26T12:55:00.000-07:00

The strangest thing has happened - my blog just disappeared from cyberspace last week! Now it's back with no explanation or reasons or anything. I wonder if it had anything to do with blogger changing it's look over the past two weeks.

I'm finishing up work on the lightboxes getting ready to ship them to Sacramento, where they will be on display at Lumens Gallery thanks to the good folks at the Center for Contemporary Art Sacramento and the marvelous intern Diana Bowers who will be installing the show.

Also looking forward to getting together with good friends and family, now that my brother and his wife are in town now along with my niece Sara.

One of the light boxes I'll be exhibiting is part of my motel series that I created for the 2009 Greeting from NadaDada Motel show at the Barrick Museum in Las Vegas.

Motel Variations: Biggest Little City

2011-10-17T15:24:00.000-07:00

Here are some of the new images to be exhibited in light boxes at Lumens (21st & K Sts) in midtown Sacramento.

Occupied October

2011-10-08T14:03:00.000-07:00

Classical Power 1

Not that September was not busy, getting work ready for the Windows show at the E Street Gallery in Sacramento. But I knew I had to hustle as I needed to get back to work on the art for the Lumens show in November so I could ship it slow train and have it not cost a fortune. This is one of the big concerns about showing work cross country like this - getting it there. One always hopes that there will be enough sales to more than cover it, but any chance I get to ship long before the due date I will.

The image above is the newest edition to the Power Series based on photos taken here and in a special photo shoot at my friend George Streng's studio in Woodland - Photogenics. What will be interesting about the show at Lumens is that I'll be exhibiting one of the very first pieces I made for the Barrick Museum show in Las Vegas along with new work like the piece above.

As soon as the work gets printed and I can put it into the light boxes, off it goes to Sacramento and on I go to two other projects I have in the hamper, both commissions. In between all this, we have 3 sets of company coming to "peep the leaves". Our friends from PA, Bob and June are here now. I'm glad they're making dinner tonight. A day after they leave, my sister comes to town for 5 days and then we have another day off and then Cherie Hacker, my artist friend arrives for a few days. Then about a week and a half later, I'm off for 8 days in Sacto for the closing of one show and the opening of another!

New Show Opens Oct 6th in Sacramento

2011-09-26T11:53:00.000-07:00

A Little Help from my Friends

2011-09-15T07:12:00.000-07:00

Pluperfect Window - Mass MOCA

We all need that don't we? I certainly do right now as it's been over a week since the last blog post and I'm working my butt off on the photos for the group show I'm doing with Cherie Hacker and Carrie Markel over at the E Street Gallery in Sacramento.

So my fellow member of the Digital Art Guild, Andrew Darlow is helping me out without even knowing about it! Darlow is a wonderful photographer, writer and speaker who is also a nice guy. Although I don't deal with promoting your own artwork here much, I think this article that he wrote has some good tips for folks who do any kind of limited edition runs of their work, digital or otherwise.

Personally I like Fine Art America as a place to sell my prints. If any of my readers out there are using a similar site, let us know what it is and how it's working for you!.

Real Art

2011-09-05T10:02:00.000-07:00

Ever notice how some people are so funny and insecure about change? That thought occurred to me after a conversation with a very nice woman who runs an arts center in mid-coast Maine. There was an event at which artists could show their work and since I haven't been able to do so yet, I thought it was a good opportunity. This woman had seen my work on line and cautioned me not to call my work digital paintings as she would get flack about it from other artists. I told her I would call them digital mixed media since some of them are based on the photos I take. But what of this my friends:

This is a digital painting which I created in both photoshop and in corel paint. Because I like to be a shite-disturber, I gonna bring it to that even and call it a giclee of a digital painting. Then this morning on my daily digital art email, was a link to a story by Joe Nalven that echoes this theme.

Then I ran across this story the other day about selling digital art (and video too I suppose). I've also reached out to the digital art community via the Digital Art Guild to see if there are any members from New England or Maine. I'm thinking of starting a Facebook page for local digital artists out here and perhaps we can do local shows the way the San Diego folks do.

The Empress Has No Clothes

2011-08-24T21:26:00.000-07:00

Since Sunday, I've been on an artist retreat at Belvoir Terrace in Lenox, which is a lovely little town in the Berkshires in the northwestern part of the state. I was invited to participate with theatre women from New York, Massachusetts and Nebraska via my former theatre professor Juanita Rice. This was to be a week to soak up the ambiance of the area, visit museums and historic places and for me, work on some scripts that need a bit of tweaking. The Berkshires have traditionally been a place for the rich from New York and Boston to "summer" and this is evidenced by Belvoir Terrace and the other grand estates in the area.

Theatre professor Judith Hart had been teaching workshops for young girls in junior high and high school. She wanted to share this experience with other theatre friends and was generous enough to invite a newcomer to the group because of our mutual friend Juanita. There was also a chamber music workshop for adults going on at the same time.

I've had the most marvelous time with the seven other women who accepted me into their circle of long standing friendship and I am most grateful for that. They are all funny, smart and talented and I've been enriched by meeting them.

Since the musicians perform for each other in the evenings, Judy wanted us to "give back" to our little community so we presented some short performances featuring women artists of the area such as writers Edith Wharton, Emily Dickinson and actress Fanny Kemble. Although we had to follow a fabulous pianist, the musicians appreciated our little performances.

This evening we went to see Red Hot Patriot, a one-woman show about Texas journalist Molly Ivins, who was all about calling a spade a spade. This was produced by Shakespeare & Co and starred company founder Tina Packard. To say I was excited to see this show was an understatement. I have loved Molly Ivins columns skewering the high and the mighty in politics for many years.

This is why it's so lamentable to put on my theatre critic's hat (I was theatre critic for KGNR and KXPR radio stations in Sacramento in late 80s and early 90s) and give the show a lukewarm review. You don't know me Ms. Packard for I am one of the "little people" and you are the grande dame of Shakespeare and Company. But it's the little people who can speak the truth with impunity, rather like Ivins did.

While Packard has the "look" for Ivins, she tried to do the show in a Texas accent and failed. Large sections of the show became "veddy" British in accent and Shakespearean in tone and inflection. The script didn't give us Ivins' best that is easily available in her columns and books, but seemed to take the best parts of her obit instead. The wall projections could have been used to greater advantage visually to punch both the jokes, the story line and more illustrate the Texas lifestyle that made Ivins what she was as a writer.

But when one is directing a long-time theatre star, what director could say the empress has no clothes?

Mo Better

2011-08-15T07:55:00.000-07:00

I should always give myself a week after making something before posting it here. As you can see, I've added to the Power of Autumnal Equinox and I think it's a stronger piece than before. What do you think?

2011-08-13T11:14:00.000-07:00

This is a new piece of art I created for a mail art show that my friend Jonathan is doing in Cambridge MA.
It's called "Power of the Autumnal Equinox" It's 8" x 8".
Here's the info:
Theme: “CIRCUS” and or “AUTUMNAL EQUINOX”

Size, Technique Free - No Jury, No Returns - Deadline 16 September 2011

Documentation to all

To be exhibited during the

Autumnal Equinox Circus Performance

At the Plough & Stars

Cambridge, MA

Post artwork to:

Christine

c/o

The Plough & Stars

912 Massachusetts Ave.

Cambridge, MA

02139

USA

You really should send some work there...

La Luna

2011-08-11T18:34:00.000-07:00

Ever notice how some days are filled with happy coincidences? Like today as we were driving back from Montreal, I noticed the moon in her glory as she shined down between telephone poles and I thought of the Power of the Moon - yes that will be my next iteration in the Power series.

Then when we got back to the house and I checked email, I found this profoundly beautiful poem sent to me by my friend Barbara Medaille, a superb California landscape artist.

The Moon

The moon can be taken in teaspoons

or as a capsule every two hours.

It is a good hypnotic or narcotic

and relieves, too,

hangovers of those drunk on philosophy.

A piece of the moon tucked in the pocket

is a better good luck charm than a rabbit’s foot;

It works as a love charm,

to get rich without connections

and to ward off doctors.

It can be given as a treat to children

when they can’t sleep.

A few moon drops in the eyes of the elderly

help them die well.

Put a tender new moon leaf

under your pillow

and you will see your heart’s desire.

Always carry a small jar of moon air

for when you are drowning,

And give a key to the moon

to prisoners and the disillusioned,

to those condemned to death

and those condemned to life.

There is no better tonic than the moon

given in precise, controlled doses.

- Jaime Sabines (1926-99)

(Translated by Rebecca Del Rio)

And Away We Go....

2011-08-08T07:36:00.000-07:00

You know you're getting old when you write headlines for your blog and realize that only people your age or older will actually get the reference - this time to that old TV show The Honeymooners starring Jackie Gleason. But I am in fact going away to Montreal for my birthday tomorrow. It will also be a short test run for our new house/pet sitter. We need to dial someone in now before winter hits and we need to go south for a week or so at a time. This way the critters get acclimated to her before we take off for a big trip.

But that doesn't mean I'm not working my butt off (if only that could happen in the real world - sigh). I've been doing some pro bono PR work for a group of young artists with whom I'll be showing later this month. You can read all about it HERE.

And I'm preparing the work for the show that Cherie Hacker and I are doing in October at the E Street Gallery. It's based on the photos of windows we have taken over the years. I shoot windows from the outside looking in and Cherie shoots from the inside looking out. Yes, you can guess as to what the name of the show will be. I'm also working on art for my solo show at Lumen's Store Gallery in November. Thanks again go out to the Center for Contemporary Art in Sacramento who arranged the show for me.

In between all this, I'm re-writing two scripts for a couple of theatrical opportunities. Here's a piece of my show that just arrived back here after being in the solo show at Luna's Cafe.

"Pele's Fire"

Can you guess the medium of this piece?

Strange Dreams Anyone?

2011-07-21T11:50:00.000-07:00

I'm sure that we all have strange dreams that seem like string theory in action with several dimensions operating at once. I was thinking of this when I made this little video based on the stills from Zombie Kickball

Now onto the work that I have already signed up for! Cherie Hacker and I will be having a show of our photographs of windows. For years I have shot windows from the outside looking in and Cherie has shot them from the inside looking out. That show will be in October at the E Street Gallery in Sacramento.

In November, I was invited by the Center for Contemporary Art to show some of my back lit pieces at Lumens on K Street in Sacramento. I'll be showing some new work there and will come out for the artist's reception.

Then my real estate agent, Amie Joseph, asked me to do a commission piece - a post modern landscape with figures in it. She and her husband first lived together in a little house in Falmouth Flats and they even got married there so it has great sentimental value to them. I've already shot many photos from which to work, but I still need some photos of sunset at low tide on the estuary behind their house, which you can see out the glass doors in their living room.

Both Amie and her husband Jaime are excited about this process and so am I - as it's a first for them to commission work and it's the first non-relative piece I'll have worked on like this. They will be moving soon and want to keep this special place with them.

Zombie Redux

2011-07-19T07:15:00.000-07:00

I really didn't like the quality of the MPEG4 file I uploaded this past weekend. I output that ttype of file because it was the format needed to enter a video competition at the Center for Contemporary Art in Sacramento. It is small in size, but not large in quality. So I decided to make a QuickTime copy of the video and post it to Vimeo. Using the "ultra fast" (cough choke) Time Warner cable upload speeds - this effort took 13 hours. But here it is. Think there is a quality difference?

I also upgraded my Time Warner account so hopefully the next video will load faster!

Zombies

2011-07-17T14:58:00.000-07:00

Ever wonder why Zombies are so popular? I often do and when I found out that there was a group of folks who dressed up as Zombies to play kickball once a year here in Portland Maine, I just had to go record it. This little video is part of the shoot, will post the other one later. Would love comments,

Zombie Kickball from Ann Tracy on Vimeo.

Special thanks to all the Zombies who showed up this past June!

Independence

2011-07-10T09:15:00.000-07:00

Gay Marriage supporters at the Round Pond 4th of July Parade

I've been trying to figure out how to form some sort of segue between the 4th of July, (when I went Down East to Round Pond for their wonderfully wacky parade and then onto Christmas Cove for a lovely lunch with JK, the Sista from Savannah plus Amie and Jamie, parade veterans) and the death of American painter Cy Twombly. I think I've found it in the concept of independence, a highly prized quality of New Englanders and the way that Twombly, himself a New Englander, ignored his critics.

The parade in Round Pond is a great example of Yankee DIY spirit and inclusiveness. While there were more homemade floats of the liberal persuasion, there were also some conservative ones as well. Perhaps this willingness to take aim at both sides comes from the concept of the Town Meeting, which still is the way politics operates at the local level here. Everyone gets a chance to speak their piece.

There's a wonderful art blog for the area here called the New England Journal of Aesthetic Research. It's insightful and helps me keep track of what's going on in my reclaimed home turf. In it, Greg Cook has a link to a great, fairly recent interview with Twombly on a show of his in London. In that and other interviews that I've read recently, Twombly just didn't pay any attention to what people said about his work, he worked independently of what others might way.

Maybe because I'm still working on my little 3-minute Zombie movie based on short video footage and photos of the Zombie Kickball game held here in Portland back in June, I went to Twombly's website and started to click quickly on the links to his work. I really think there's a movie there. The way the work is arranged there is a flow that I liked. Go ahead and try it for yourself - here.

I'd love to know what you think about it! Here's one of my favorite paintings of his - I love the energy in it.