Button Button Whose Got the Button

The sculpture is up & running! Yay! A little course in QLab (a software used for...I don't really know what? Creative work flow management? Producing multimedia installations and theater productions through one workspace/start button? Eh...I'll get back to you when I understand more....), a primer in tripleheads (uh...a box that takes in multiple inputs and feeds them into one source in order to get information and multiple monitors synced- think daytraders and  gaming/military set ups, which, according to the internet, both regularly use and which also adds another layer to the densely political content that will be displayed on these multiple monitors), and some understanding of computer networking/ISP linking led me to really help out on the reconstruction of this piece! It also led me to realize that we must mark EVERY SINGLE wire before taking it apart again! Now, we await the arrival of more polarized film, animate like crazy woods-dwelling recluses, try to streamline the wire-y tangle hidden behind the sculpture (abstract pic of piece seen here) and then premier it to the public in early 2012 (it is still a secret on where...! Soon I can shout it from the rooftops--soon!).

I've also been learning a ton about animation cels...two things I have learned already: hairs stuck on glass can be very, very distracting when shooting the frame and, when painting a cel, it is good to go heavy on the paint right up to the line of the image (especially with Brent's jagged little sharpie marks flying on the edges of all things!). So much work to do still but, I know, it will be worth it! Now...what is all of this about snow? It looks too much like Fall for this to be happening...or maybe just my laundry looks like Fall?

At Home With the Sculpture

We brought home the sculpture from EMPAC and are trying to get it in working order! Thanks to my crash course in computer networking (thanks Peter & Dave!) I was able to access the tower that holds all the secrets, I mean animation clips, which is just a small part of the reconstructive battle! We also had to get a piece of it re-welded (no, it wasn't because I am a welding novice, it was because Ryan had to grind it down to fit in the car!) which meant a trip to a local fabrication factory where an old friend of Brent's (who just started making these awesome lights!) helped put the metal back together! 

Now it is a matter of finessing wires and then, soon, it will be alive in the house! Much like the tiny mouse I keep seeing running under the sculpture! O yes, winter friends! Here is a pic titled "At Home With The Sculpture." Notice the home to art ratio?! It's getting hard to tell the difference, hmmm...

The Band

We are in animating mode over here- sorry for the lack of posts...! Cutting cels, drawing, shooting- it really puts your head in a weird spot making it hard to remember what talking to people is like and making chilly Autumn walks a blessing from the exacto-knife and sharpie kingdom you are the ruler of! So, since my brain is stuck, I thought I would take this time to talk about what our fellow bandmates have been up to lately! They are the ones who are lucky enough to see those finished frames flash by during our live shows but not have to paint the cels themselves leaving their Fall season packed with excitement...!

We've played Gravity with a lot of people over these past few years so here are just a few updates of what some of our fellow musicians are up to...let's see: Drew Henkels (theramin player extraordinnaire!) has been touring around with his band, Drew & The Medicinal Pen! He is also working on his new album, has made a video compilation of his music video work and is developing a new idea for a live performance art installation piece that seems pretty exciting! Go Drew! Go! Our sometimes cellist John Swartz has reformatted his beautiful photography website, where you can see some of his images from our touring...very weird seeing another eye capture these experiences! Look out for cameos of me & our other fellow travelers! Upright bassist Todd Chandler recently was awarded a grant from Rooftop Films for his newest short film about the Norwegian seed bank, an episode in his series of fictional truths that creatively explore natural topics through an artistic lens of film and art.  Todd was also involved in the Occupy Wall Street Suits for Wall Street event that outfitted protesters in professional attire so they will be taken seriously by the media and not pigeonholed as un-showered hippies meaninglessly banging drums!

Speaking of which...in drummer news: Brendan Canty has a new band! They are called Deathfix! And they recently played at a HS football field in the D.C. area! Can't wait to hear them! Last Friday Jim White played a live soundtrack to Eve Sussman's newest, poetic, lush film piece White on White. On November 10th our most recent drummer, David Freeman, will be performing some live music as part of the exhibit Jews on Vinyl, a gallery/museum show of record covers telling the visual story of popular music and Jewish heritage. And Mike McGinley (sometimes drummer, sometimes horn player, always hilarious!) still hasn't made an internet outlet for his amazing paintings and drawings...come on Mike! I will set up a tumblr for you, just send me some photos!

And Brent & I? Still on the animation front! Hurrah! Here are a few stormy Fall pics I've managed to take in between frames! O, and I have an old Fall pic up on this site too! Seasonal fun for all! Stay tuned!

Plastic in the Afterlife

Ever since I learned of 3D printing technology I have been in disbelief. And now that I have spent some time with an adorable little 3D printer in action I not only believe, I am a full on convert! So the way it works is you create a coded file of the object you want, feed it into the little printer, the printer melts and shoots a spool of material (colored plastic! which, after my inquiry, we all discovered does in fact come in glow in the dark!!!!!) onto a platform given your specifications and there is your little three dimensional entity! Immediately upon seeing it Brent sprang into action insisting that glasses should be made for his piece (which needs to be viewed through a polarized lens in order to see the images on the screens, piece in progress pictured at left! photo by Brent Green)...I really want to make a polarized monocle I can wear around my neck so I will be able to see the animation on the ghostly LCD screens at any moment... or a monocle on a ring...or just plain rings...or shower curtain rings, or a ring to hold my kitchen measuring cups together or a replacement handle for that broken knife in the kitchen or a replacement part for just about anything for that matter....absolutely addictive!

 So...we learned this week that one should never own a Makerbot! You never knew you needed lots of little things made out of plastic until the possibility of immediate object creation presented itself!

The Clock? Good. Donuts By A Lake? Better.

Despite insane thunderstorms and other odd occurances the band arrived safely at The Museum of Fine Arts Boston on Friday! Yay! Mike (whose plane was delayed due to weather!), Todd (who, while visiting family pre-show, got a scalding soup burn all over his hand!), David (our drummer for this show! whose water logged car stopped working once he reached the museum!) and  Drew, Brent & I (who made it in record time thanks to Brent's terrifying speed brought on by fear of being late due to weather! even with a stop off at Lakeside Diner in CT, pictured, whose homemade donuts I literally had a dream about last night, we made it with time to spare!) piled onto the theater stage in the MFA and performed to a room of those brave enough to fight the torrential downpours! When approaching the museum I was overwhelmed by the enormity of the space itself, of the towering columns and vast entrance system but it wasn't until I began setting up my foley gear in front of a huge, looming Frank Stella piece did I start to really see the scope of what was inside this space!

 Luckily enough we were able return to the museum the next morning to pick up our remaining gear and shuffle around the collection, a collection that is just as vast and impressive as the physical space itself! I mean seriously. Picassos, Van Goghs, Monets, Degas, Gauguins- it was like a whose who of the best of painting & sculpture with the additional landmarks of other, less recognizable but equally as compelling artists (like Max Beckmann!! Karel Appel!!)  and a brand new contemporary wing with some of my old favorites (Matthew Day Jackson, Kate Gilmore, Warhol) and new favorites (Sigalet Landau!). There is even some ancient art scattered around in separate galleries in the form of mummies and Greek vases and a current textile exhibit dedicated to the cloth of Britain during WWII (the propaganda scarves are amazing!). We even got to see the The Clock. (loquacious discussion about this piece after the jump!)

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Feature Film and The T

Yesterday we embarked on the first line tests for Brent's newest feature film! YES! Walking around the neighborhood I followed behind lugging a tripod and some gear as we set out to see what some things looked like through a camera in anticipation of the next in the series of projects. I don't know too much for right now other than that I see Brent scribbling in a new notebook and retreating to the piano in the barn every so often to record...but I do know that I am excited! Here are some photos I took of our (first of many) film shoot/strolls!

And by the way: if you are in the Boston area tomorrow (Friday October 14th) come out to the Museum of Fine Arts for our live Gravity Was Everywhere Back Then show! We even have (another) new addition to our band in the form of a different drummer! Can't wait to see good old Beantown, which I haven't been to since I was a kid! Hope I don't die in a molasses flood (which really happened and which my Massachusetts bred Mom TERRIFIED me with as a child as she read me a children's book all about the deadly sticky situtation, complete with light hearted, cutesy illustrations! This explains so much!?)! Anyway...come to the show!

S.S. Shelley

While moseying around New York at the end of our Gravity tour last week I headed over to MoMA to see if I could get a peek at the new Willem de Kooning retrospective. I don't know much about him other than he was part of the New York group of painters usually lumped in with Pollock, loosely called "abstract expressionists." I've also heard rumors that this particular show is valued at $4billion (!) and I will admit, as someone who has recently learned a thing or two in museum show budgeting/insurance, I was a little intrigued by what a show worth $4billion would look like....

The answer is: AMAZING! One of the things I've learned as a part of the Nervousfilms crew is that all of the artists I come across never want things to be easy. They want things to be difficult, to be pushing the boundaries of their capabilities and to constantly be propelling forward in craft and form. I don't think I have ever seen an exhibit (except maybe the Miro one in London) that you could so visibily see the strange growth and pushing into the future that, in my opinion, is the mark of true artistic genius. With style, color, shape and layering (and the eventual pulling back of these things) you can trace the ways in which the artist was searching for a new way of expression proving that de Kooning really took painting into a whole new realm.

This is the first major retrospective of this incredible painter which I kind of can not believe?! Even his biography (coming to America from Rotterdam as a vagrant stowaway, starting his New York creative career as a sign painter & window dresser, sharing a studio with Arshile Gorky, working for the Federal Art Project, becoming a recognized member of art history) is so bouyant, an example of a creative American dream, that makes me wonder why this kind of museum validation has taken so long? Either way it is finally here in the form of a breathtaking exhibit by a real master- go see it! These poorly scanned postcards are not right to have put up here! Bah!

Experimental Prototype Performing Arts Center

The other day I realized that EMPAC (Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center) is a kind of embodiment of what Walt Disney envisioned for his beloved EPCOT (Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow). Disney saw it as a utopic city that could use advanced technology to create a better society and EMPAC is pretty much doing that, elevating man through the arts and sciences, pushing the boundaries of our cultural capabilities, expanding the scope of the visual and the scientific. Since we've been working here on Brent's project we have seen so many performances, pieces of art, lectures and some things that can't even be defined each one consistently moving forward in terms of art history and ingenuity. Watching Brent collaborate with brilliant engineers is an incredible feeling- troubleshooting from two entirely separate fields whose gap keeps closing further with accessibility.

During our most recent stay at EMPAC the director of the space came to offer his curatorial expertise on how people will break the sculpture (a terrifying experience for all)! He reasoned that there is an accesibilty, a familiarity with media arts that make people more comfortable and more likely to break them! It never occurred to me that multi-media is a medium that permeates all of our existences and that EMPAC is trying to push open your home tv to make way for more useful creativity, as seen in the beautiful messages of Brent's new piece which is, in fact, exploded LCD monitors! Here is yet another in progress pic of Brent's piece along with a picture of the futuristic walls (and spheres!) of EMPAC, a place that enables creative ideas to come to life...now I do sound like a Disney ad! But, come on guys, look at this place! It truly is a haven for all kinds of minds! Our last leg of residency is coming up and I am so sad to leave this completely inspiring place...stay tuned for where & when the premier of Too Many Men Strange Fates Are Given, the result of our EMPAC stay, will take place! (It is an exciting secret! Yay!)

Internet Film Readings

After beginning the morning with cutting animation cels for the newest in Brent Green adventures I have taken to the internet to peruse the world of film! I think the mindless measuring and cutting and counting and measuring, cutting and counting made me need to put the film world into a little bit of perspective...to remind myself of the movie magic at the end of the painstaking production!

First off...what the heck is this? Apparently a lady saw a film and she thought the trailer was misleading and she thought some of the characters/themes were racist and she was expecting a film with more explosions or something so she is now suing the film distribution company?! This is terrifying. Seriously terrifying. Dear movie gods, please throw this case in the trash! I cannot imagine a world where going to the movies results in a courtroom battle from an unhappy audience...why not just throw popcorn at the screen to express dissatisfaction like in the good old days?

Speaking of popcorn...this article in Cabinet Magazine was a pretty interesting read! The author discusses the sensory experience of seeing films in foreign countries with different snacks, realizing that the cinematic experience is one of habit, expectation and sensory overload, filling in the senses of taste and smell with food! As someone who has watched movies in theaters all over the place I do have to say that the familiar smell of popcorn, the lights dimming, the chair slowly lowering as I angle up to the screen, the memories of soda sticky floors and tearing red seat cushions with chalky exposed foam are all overwhelming feelings that lull me into the complete dream world that movie going should be! No matter where in the world I see a movie there is a meditative familiarity that will always make me feel at home in a movie theater audience!

Lastly in film internet readings: an interview with Ruggero Deodato over at Electric Sheep Magazine! I have squirmed at Deodato's film Cannibal Holocaust before on the blog but, after reading this interview, I think my squirming has turned to (a squirming) admiration! Concerned that his film of fiction caused more outrage than actual political atrocities, that media is a sensational farce and that the anger over his portrayal of animal killings is hypocritical given that every meat-y meal comes from the same action leads me to think that Deodato was actually politically motivated in his grotesque, awful, horror film! Even if I don't think his messages were portrayed in the best way...I am actually a little comforted to hear his defense/reasoning! Schlock horror with a message! I had no idea!

Ok internet film world...I must leave you now! To go back to the realities of filmmaking! Measure, cut, count, measure, cut, count....o! And by the way: our IFC Center live show has been postponed to further in the Fall so there is still a chance to see Gravity after our upcoming Friday show in Boston! I don't know if there will be popcorn at this live performance since it is at a museum but I do know that we'll try to make it an awesome show- and not just to avoid lawsuits! Hope to see you there!

A Muncie Girl!

When I first got to Muncie Indiana, napping on my hotel room bed, I could hear a real live marching band rehearsing in the distance which immediately brought to mind filmic images of Tim Robbins in his gangle-y glory singing about fighting eagles and cawing like a simpleton in the Coen Brothers film The Hudsucker Proxy as he sang "Fight on dear old Muncie" and flapped about the room like a maniacal bird! I guess that is a bad first impression. As is the abundance of fried food (who invented the "grilled cheese" made of mozzarella sticks anyway?). But, after wandering around Ball State University for a day, I have a few great things to add to my understanding of Muncie.

First off, Ball State is named after the brothers who invented the classic glass Ball jar! What?! Awesome! Jars! Love those jars! And the history of pickling that they conjure up images of! Second, the art museum on campus (The David Owsley Museum of Art) was surprisingly great! Despite it's tiny size the space held everything from a small ethnographic room of artifacts from all over the globe, a Renaissance painting room, a beautiful array of modern & contemporary art (including a piece by one of my favorite artists Mel Bochner! and a stunning piece by Lee Krasner!) and a thorough collection of just about every era & type of cultural expression (medieval icons, Asian scrolls, modern furniture design, Greek coins etc.) tastefully curated to maximize the space. Thirdly, the campus art making facilities are also beyond your average art school fare with giant ceramics studios, metal working shops, wood shops and more all housed inside a huge arts complex- even with a food court (though I don't know how much I suggest eating there, see above note about fried foods...)! The artist/professor that brought us out, Maura Jasper is the final reason why Ball State rocks. You might recognize her work from Dinosaur Jr. album covers or maybe her Punk Rock Aerobics project that took moving to music to a new level of bad ass expression in the face of evil fitness culture! She is an inspiration and I am so glad she's making her home out on the plains be as cool as it can be!

The show was pretty good, taking place in an old recital hall with wooden beams and lecturing projection system in the geology wing of the school out behind the art museum (where glass cases loaded with geodes and dinosaur casts reside!)...the audience seemed a bit stunned, not knowing what they were in for and being politely (extremely!) silent during the films duration, but, being that no one walked out, I guess it went over ok?! Fight on dear old Muncie and thanks for the tree picked pears & unexpected overabundance of art! Hope you have a reaction to our film since we left, did you? Please? Muncie audience comments welcome!

Bloomington, A Place for Cinema!

After our live show in Bloomington Indiana we were loading the truck up and were obstructed by a woman wheeling a huge harp on a hand truck into the back of her own vehicle at the very same loading dock we were piling our ample drum set & guitars into: the symphony orchestra at Indiana State University was in the midst of a show at the time of our own musical performance, right next door! Not only did I not know that Bloomington is home to an enormous music conservatory but I also did not know that they are starting to become more and more recognized for their cinema as well!

The IU Cinema, which we performed Gravity in a few nights ago, not only looked incredible (with WPA-type murals curtained as the lights dimmed [side note: why don't we have a Federal Art Project equivalent right about now?] and heavy deep purple-y red velvet drapes drawn back just before the screening) the programming and programmers are incredible as well, even their calendar is expertly conceived, glossy and intriguing as it displays the season of everything from classics like Hitchcock, to (one of my faves!) King Vidor's Stella Dallas to a TON of new indie & foreign films I've never even heard of that all look equally compelling! The show was pretty well attended and Peter, who runs the amazing local film screening collective called The Ryder that takes place in venues throughout Bloomington and who was instrumental in having us in town after seeing us perform over at (the best docu-fiction film festival in the world) True/False gave us such a heart warming, thoughtful intro that stunned us right before taking the stage (and even made me tear up a little!), an intro that definitely got us ready to put on a good show!

Without Brendan for this leg of the tour Mike (and even Brent!) took over drums and I added a melodic, driving glockenspiel to the mix making the show another new musical foray for our crew! The crowd seemed to like it too with plenty of film lovers staying to talk after the performance (including a few students who learned that Brent doesn't like talking about frame rates the hard way!). When thinking of great film one doesn't immediately make the jump to Bloomington Indiana but after our live performance there my mind will probably link the two from now on! I'd also like to thank whoever invented the Chaicoff-sky drink (half chai latte! half coffee! all pun!) over at Soma for making me highly caffeinated prior to the show and to Secrectly Canadian studios for occupying Brent & the band after the show while some of Mike & Todd's friends were recording there, giving this here blogger some quiet post-show downtime! I hope we can go back to this bustling cinematic, musical college town sometime again, an environment that made Gravity feel right at home! Bloomington! Who knew?!

Hoosiers?

Have we ever done a show in Indiana before? I don't think so? Hm. Well, then I guess it makes sense we are embarking on three shows in Indiana! The first took place at the Indianapolis Museum of Art (co-sponsored by the progressive community non-profit Big Car and by IndyMOCA) and I think the band hit a stride with this show that added a little bit of experimentation to our steady lurching rock phase that we seem to be in on this tour! Since setting up the show at the IMA people who have been there kept telling us of how wondrous the museum is but I guess I had to see it with my own eyes to really understand!

The building is a sleek modern beauty and the grounds include acres of ponds, parks and public art (including an amphitheater that we were supposed to play in but ended up having to move indoors thanks to the quickly approaching Fall chill!). Given the nature of touring I, once again, didn't see a ton of the art on display but I did read a lot about what goes on in the space: a classic Old Masters exhibit, an entire project dedicated to exploring the local river ecosystem and the balance of our modern existence within nature, a sweet local pop artist's meditation on the nature of the childlike joy of space travel! Even the loading dock (pictured at top) was the semi-permanent home to a prime Robert Indiana piece while it undergoes a little maintenance! On top of all of this the huge theater we played in, The Toby, had the best sound I think we've ever had and such a great, super clean video projection, not bad for a space that only recently reopened after years of disuse! Who knew that Indianapolis had this little gem out here! Go to Indianapolis for the art! And stay for the sugary sweet bed & breakfasts (Mike pictured behind said b&b's baby grand!)

Ohio-o-o-o!

Brent & I had been through Columbus Ohio before with Gravity in a last minute decision on our way down to install the set in Arizona way back when! This time, with band in tow, we performed the live version in the very same film theater in the depths of the Wexner Center for the Arts! The Wexner is an amazing contemporary art museum who I wish I had a chance to spend more time with! Their film programming is perfection, the art they have on view is superbly curated and very much on the forefront of what people are doing artistically and every single person who works there is undoubtedly the nicest! Their current show of the apocalyptic bio murals of Alexis Rockman looks insane and the delicate little worlds of terrariums by Paula Hayes beamed out as hopeful little messages into the museum lobby. Maybe one day we can come through town with time to spare and I can really take in the wonders of the Wexner!

As for the Gravity show...another strange, new musical territory that we haven't really delved into before! It never ceases to amaze me the range of music we've produced for this film, so much so that there is some talk of releasing a recording of a live Gravity soundtrack so others can share in understanding the diversity of musical changes! Before we move onto the next city though a special thank you to Dave from the Wexner for being a lovely host/film scholar, North Market for having way too many options of the best of all that is culinary and to the musician behind Time and Temperature who I wasn't able to shower with musical praise due to just plain exhaustion! Your voice is so pretty Val! So, so pretty!  Overall Columbus has taught me that I need to spend more time with it so I can appropriately thank it for all of it's hidden splendor!

Carnegie, Heinz, Warhol

Pittsburgh is one of those places that seems surreal...tough steel bridges, an insane amount of art, serious (serious) football culture, boarded up architectural wonders, a funicular rising up the side of a mountain- the whole place just seems like some weird dream and each time I go there I feel transported into a strange Pennsylvania microcosm so unlike our own!

Pittsburgh Filmmakers and the Three Rivers Film Festival brought about the PA premier of Gravity Was Everywhere Back Then, live show and all! The Regent Square Movie Theater is a great old movie house, complete with patented sticky floor (which I have nostalgia for from the red concrete gooey-ness of my childhood theater!), on the outskirts of Pittsburgh proper where a large crowd watched as we performed one of the last few Gravity live shows. Our band for this show was Brendan (on drums), Mike McGinley (as Mike McGinley, not Leonard, on an array of things ranging from trombone to violin), Drew Henkels (on various trash picked items! and a theramin! and harmonium! and a guitar!), me (foley lady) & Brent (narrator, band leader, guitar) and, our newest addition to the line-up, Todd Chandler (on upright bass) and we made an all new, improvised soundtrack settle just below the film in a way that I think really picked up on the strange-ghostly town! This show really sounded different than any of the other ones we've played...I don't know what it is but a really gruff rock noise percussive jazz or something permeated the soundtrack and it felt like a whole new life was in the film!

After the show we ambled around ending up over at Kelly's Bar, a seeming P-burgh legend, where I learned of the local org LUPEC: Ladies United for the Preservation of Endangered Cocktails! There mission of a general good time and a mild feminist social archive is exactly how I live my life as a lady- strong, warming and shared with good friends! (Clinks glass to the ladies of Pittsburgh!) The next morning we foraged for delicious food (Quiet Storm pictured below!) in a deserted stretch of the city before heading on to our next destination...it is so unsettling to be in an old industrial boomtown with tons of shells of houses and the remnants of eras past, it really makes you wonder how we keep repeating this cycle of industrialization! Here's to hoping recent efforts can bring about real change! (Clinks protest cow bell to those occupying Wall Street!)

"better protection of theatres for the benefit of the nation"

Just found out that Gravity is screening at Cube Cinema in the city of Bristol, U.K. tomorrow! Fittingly enough one of the (amazingly great) sound engineers at our live show tonight (which took place in a renovated theater that had been shut down for years and only recently resurrected as a beautiful sonic wonder complete with 35mm film projection and gorgeously sharp digital projection!) was telling me of an organization based out of London called The Theatres Trust. Apparently following a government Act from 1976 the organization came into being to support the art of the movie theater. Through consultation, planning and just plain magic this group of preservationists can do everything from objecting to theater demolition on the basis of cultural importance in the name of history to giving advice on sustainable eco-theaters in the name of the future! So so great! Also, after some research, it turns out that the Cube Cinema has an amazing social conscious as well, pioneering a children's mobile cinema traveling around earthquake torn Haiti in addition to a ton of other socially progressive & interesting projects that make me so glad to have our film be a part of this awesome, inspiring place!