today we're working with 3 classes of middle school kids, supporting them in preparing their project presentation dress rehearsal in 2 weeks, and their final presentations the 3rd week in may. the idea is for their project presentations to be fun, interactive, informative, and NOT involve the deadly tri-folds. once again, we're seeing that middle school kids, once freed from the constraints of one-size fits-all education, quickly find their natural enthusiasm for learning.
12:30 PM: we're on luch break, and i'm thinking about my gallery talk in a few days at space gallery in denver. it will be an interesting experience to meet the other artists i'm showing with in the reMARKable show, only one of whom i know and am friends with on facebook. my plan is to talk mostly about my love for process, and how that looks in the creation of the works i'm exhibiting. it will be too bright to use the projector successfully, so i've brought some props with me, for example: illustrations of "unfinished" 19th c. plein air paintings, where the unfinished bits are an integral part of the painting, somehow making it ok for me to treat every phase of a new painting as the final phase; a few sheets of old oil palettes iuse for my collages; some of my warm-up exercises, which are studies of an 11th c. chinese calligrapher's work, some of which are later incorporated into collages, etc. my message being that the process is the product, and that knowing that makes the creation of art a far more inclusive and satisfying event.
