condensed week in review

Last Sunday after we took down the show, Sarah, John, and I went to the Half King for drinks and ended up hanging out for a few hours.  It was a lot of fun - I'm not going to elaborate because I'm tired and lazy right now but case in point this is for them:

John Salvest + Shwarma

Sarah Hardesty + Calamari

Oh, Sarah would be so proud of me because today I went to the restaurant Red Bamboo which is a vegan and vegetarian restaurant.  The dessert was good.

So anyway, Emma got here on Friday and today was spent seeing a lot of stuff in the city: Canal Street; we walked across the Brooklyn Bridge; SoHo; Union Square.  Tomorrow we're thinking of going to the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens for the cherry blossom festival, Central Park, and a few museums.

OH! I just got some really great news: I made my first sale on Etsy to the Monroe County Heritage Museum in Alabama!

my article @ albion.edu/news

So I wrote this article for my school and even though the woman that put it online changed a few crucial sentences to make a few things incorrect, overall this is the correct piece and I corrected all that I could for this post.

It is Sunday night again and I am sitting front row at the comedy club down the street from the building where I live. Horatio Sanz is literally lying at my feet acting out a scene with his fellow cast members. This has become my weekly routine: seeing a free improv comedy show whose members include Amy Poehler and Bobby Moynihan. The next night at a stand-up comedy show I am sitting at the feet of Zach Galifianakis, Kristen Schaal, Eugene Mirman, Andrea Rosen, and Charles Star. But I do much more than see famous comedians for free every week. 

I have three internships during the week: two with artists—Emilie Clark and Mickalene Thomas—and one with the Morgan Lehman Gallery. One day I might be on the phone with Condé Nast chair S.I. Newhouse and the next I will be gluing hundreds of shimmering rhinestones onto elaborate paintings that explore cultural and personal conceptions of female identity. I have had dinner with up-and-coming artists at an art collector’s restaurant; been to cocktail parties where art collectors, artists, and gallery owners mingle; and worked at a contemporary art fair whose participants were galleries from all over the world.

It has been a little over two months since I arrived in New York City and so far I have been to lectures by famous artists, book readings, gallery openings, museums, Broadway shows, and endless tourist attractions. New York City is not like any other city I have been to; everything here is fast paced—it is the city that never sleeps. I feel as though every day here is really three days crammed into one; I would not have it any other way.

Right now I am working on my own art pieces that will be in a gallery show organized by the students in my program at our residence, which happens to be in Chelsea—the heart of the art world. This opportunity is especially exciting because our sponsors will be invited to this show and anyone in New York City can attend. Not only do I get to collaborate with my peers, but I will also be expressing the influence my sponsors and New York have had on me as an artist and person. 


Being off-campus has definitely given me a fresh perspective, one that I would not have if I had stayed on campus. I have been keeping a blog of my adventures, please feel free to visit: www.owleyedesigns.blogspot.com

washington, dc

Friday afternoon I left on a bus for Washington, D.C.  Lesson learned, you get what you pay for.  I only paid $2.50 for a roundtrip bus ticket.  There was never so much chaos involved in my travels before.  The whole way there, I wasn't sure if I was on my way to D.C. or another of the destinations that are offered by the bus company.  Luckily I did make it to D.C. safely.  That first night Stephanie, Kelly, and I went out to an incredibly late dinner at Bus Boys & Poets.  We were trying to go to a poetry slam, but it was unfortunately all sold out.  On Saturday we went to a lot of monuments and the national archives.  We also got to see fireworks for the Cherry Blossom Festival.  For dinner we went to a very delicious mexican restaurant, but were too tired to go out after that and we just stayed in to watch Practical Magic.  On Sunday we woke up a little early to take a paddle boat ride in front of the Jefferson monument.  It was a little chilly but fun.  We spent most of the day at the Natural History Museum and we saw the Imax movie Deep Sea 3D - it was so cool!  

Last night I stayed up entirely too late working on paintings, but I didn't even realize what time it was.  

day off

Today I have the day off so of course I'm going to spend it productively by making art.  I finished one new journal for my Etsy - don't forget that I'm having a showcase on Friday!  So I'm going to finish three more today.  I also will be finishing my mini-series of paintings that are going into our gallery show here at the building where I live.  We just ordered the postcards yesterday.  The show opens April 27th from 7:00-9:00 PM.  I also will be starting and finishing a more conceptual piece involving Craigslist's Missed Connections section and Metro cards.  (Pictures to follow in some near future entry.)

I didn't do much on Thursday and Friday of last week, just painting the mini-series (this is the piece that was inspired partially by Emily Burbank's book Woman as Decoration, which I mentioned in my last entry).  On Saturday Stephanie and I left in the wee hours of the morning (7 AM to be exact) to get on the Long Island Rail Road for Southampton.  We got there around 10 AM and were picked up by Stephanie's great grandma's husband's brother's daughter (I think I got that right) or as we call her, Francis.  Francis drove us around, showed us the beach! briefly and then we went to "town" and had lunch.  Basically Long Island is all country side and sometimes big houses, a lot of times not.  It reminded me of going up north in Michigan except with a more New England flavor, but a lot of times I would have thought I had never left Michigan which was sort of depressing.  We had a very good lunch and afterwards Francis drove us to Sag Harbor which is the town mentioned a lot in Moby Dick.  We were dragging a little due to our early morning so we went back to the house to take a nap.  I finished reading Girl with a Pearl Earring.  We had a delicious homemade meal and then watched Revolutionary Road and went to bed.  

On Sunday Stephanie and I basically spent our whole day at the beach.  We started in town (which looks like the Village in Grosse Pointe except with better parking, no "hoodlum" children and more high end shopping).  We walked all the way to the beach from there which wasn't too far but it wasn't very close either.  There were so many sea horses when we got to the beach!  I picked up about 10 and they are now in the process of being preserved for some future art piece.  We threw about three sea horses back into the ocean because they were still somewhat alive.  Afterwards we went back to Francis' house and had a late lunch and then lounged around until our bus left at 6:30.  We got back to the city around 8:00 and I felt like we were home.  

Yesterday I worked more on Emilie's website and it's looking really great.  I also sewed the two "leg" sculptures around the pvc piping we got.  Next week I'll be working on the "fur tent."  I'll take pictures and then you'll understand what I'm talking about.

Woman as Decoration

Sunday was the first Sunday that I missed ASSSSCAT since I've been here ... but I was babysitting so it was all for a good cause.  Monday night Stephanie and I went to see Whiplash - we haven't been in quite a while - and it turned out to be a roast of Pete Holmes.  So we only stayed for 45 minutes.  Last night I finished reading Woman as Decoration by Emily Burbank (1917).  I was trying to resolve how to make a series of four small paintings more conceptual instead of just pretty and static.  I found Emily's book online and now have a fabulous idea (hopefully).  I'm just waiting for my supplies from Dick Blick to arrive and of course, my paints from home.  Tonight I have to take my macbook into the Apple store because there's something wrong with the battery.  And then I'm going to a bar for a birthday party - 99 cent pints!  Whoo.

Now I'm off to work in Brooklyn.