Now Available At The Art Gallery of Nova Scotia Shop, August 30th, 2016

Here are pics of work dropped off at The Art Gallery of Nova Scotia shop in downtown Halifax today.  I'm super excited to have some pieces here again!  These are all from previous firings, though the pics were taken this afternoon at Cable Wharf on the waterfront with Amos Pewter in the background.  

Lidded Vessel: crow with nest of three baby crows

Four larger figurines:

Polar bear, snowy owl, bunny

Puffin

 Smaller figurines:

Buffalo

Turtles

Sled dog

Two crows, which made me think of a Local Xpress article about the soon to be opening if it hasn't yet Two Crows Brewing Company pub downtown which looks super cool.  The articles mentions a "One [Crow] For Sorrow" nursery rhyme I had never heard of before!

 

Rooster

Polar bear and brown bear

Two bunnies 

 

Snake

Barn owl and beaver

Bowls!  All of the pieces in this group are white mid fire stoneware, as with all my functional ware, these bowls are foodsafe.  They are also technically dishwasher safe, although handwashing is recommended.

Large crow bowl

Two rabbit bowls

Snowy owl bowl

Suffolk sheep bowl

I'm still working away on a kiln full of new stoneware sculptures and functional/sculptural pieces, including some new designs, coming along as soon as possible!

This (past nine) week's favourite things! Monday June 27th - Sunday August 28th 2016

1.  Evgenia Makogon's stunning show of oil paintings "My Maritimes" at the Teichert Gallery in downtown Halifax, in the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia (AGNS) building.  The show is up until Wednesday August 31st, though Evgenia's work can be seen at Teichert year round.  Here are a couple of pics.  The first is of the artist with her youngest daughter:

In other news from across the hall, the new Pavia cafe at the AGNS has been open and looking delicious for awhile, and the new gift shop is back in consignment store action.  I'll soon have some work available there once again.

2.  Masterchef.  I've been binge watching seasons of this on youtube while working on stuff so now everything is "stunning" "delicious" and "wow"; Season 6 is my favourite.  Something about the creative energy that goes into cooking lends itself well to have on in the background during art making.  Epic Rap Battles did a funny video on Gordon Ramsay vs Julia Childs though I think he's more chilled out than depicted here.  Tesla vs Edison is still my favourite rap battle though. 

3.  Garlic scape pesto.  This is the first year we've grown garlic, and learned they make these things called scapes that need to be clipped, but can also be eaten and pesto is a delicious use for them.   Ingredients were: garlic scapes, fresh basil, lightly steamed kale, olive oil, salt, pepper, some parmesan, soaked nuts and seeds: walnut, almonds, pumpkin seeds, brazil nuts, sunflower seeds. 

Garlic scapes, pic taken July 22ndish

4.  The hand painted pottery on this page - found it while looking for inspiration to make some functional puffin ware.

5.  The movie "Chef" on Canadian Netflix 

6.  Also from Netflix, Episode 4, "Sugar" from the 4 part BBC documentary series "Addicted to Pleasure" with Brian Cox.  I had no idea how precious sugar was at first, and how wealthy people used to commission fancy, large sugar sculptures for decoration.

7.  This Charles Eisentein talk on Youtube, labelled "The New Mythology" though the title in the video is "The More Beautiful World Our Hearts Know is Possible"

8.   Three Steps for completely eliminating problems from your life.  6 minute youtube video talk by Tony Mase. 

9.  Fifteen furry ferret facts for national ferret day  (article).  A group of ferrets is called a business!  Wow! I had no idea. 

10.  This entire website "Artist Career Training".  which I stumbled across on twitter and is chock full of good stuff, especially all the interviews with artists under the community tab.  The free ebook that comes with subscribing to the mailing list is really good too. 

11.  This post/list by an artist I stumbled across from the above site:  "40 Things I Have Learned in 40 years".  Great art on this site too.

12.  new research topic "the Jezebel spirit" there's lots about this on youtube, much of which is a bit 'out there' but does give an interesting supernatural explanation for narcissism and psychopathy.   Here is one that was relatively balanced, by a Christian minister who also describes the 'Ahab spirit' which manifests in enablers:  "Jezebel/Narcissistic Spirits - What they are and how to deal with them". 

13.  The Inner Integration youtube channel, especially this interview with Dr. George Simon, author of the bestseller In Sheep's Clothing on "understanding and dealing with manipulative people".  This is one of the best, most compassionate talks I've heard on this topic, and may be enjoyable for both scammers and the scammed.  

14.  This "Sidewalk Closed" sign spotted on Dutch Village Road August 22nd near Joseph Howe Drive in front of The Edison, which under construction by WM Fares for RC Jane Properties. It seems be made from blue ink or paint on a pizza box (?).  We've had such a long list of issues with this building since construction started that I'll soon be addressing them in a separate blog post, to vent frustration and also out of solidarity with small businesses impacted by the Nova Centre construction, and those residents around Wellington who protested against those condos who are soon to be impacted as well.  There were some excellent talk radio interviews with business owners impacted by the Nova Centre, someone made the allusion being 'swatted away like a fly' despite having valid concerns.  In our case our favourite analogy is we're tired of being treated like the blue creatures in the movie Avatar.   

Photo credit to the young photographer in the neighbourhood, and kudos to this person's parent for passing it along.




An email to council confirmed that while there are permits for this work this is not appropriate signage.  

We're still waiting to hear back from city staff as to why this wasn't addressed the week prior, as we had called 311 and contacted council when we saw the same or similar sign was being used to close the sidewalk while a crew was hoisting windows and doors up to the top of the building with that blue crane thing in the background.  

Pedestrians could still ignore the sign to pass underneath, and really who would blame them what with expensive jaywalking tickets. 

Also waiting to hear back as to whether the City of Halifax will take any responsibility for expense of dealing with the plague of rats that has been unleashed on the city by all of the recent construction everywhere.  

A by law officer told us that in their opinion all of this displacement is definitely related to the increase in rat numbers, including those currently chawing their way through our property.    

To date it seems to be homeowners' responsibility to barricade their properties against these furred invaders, however we have had no answers whether the city controls all the rats nesting, breeding and feeding on city land (parks, walking trails etc).   According to this CBC article, Halifax doesn't have a pest control program though they are being baited for in certain areas downtown where the rats are freaking out tourists. 

In my opinion this rat situation would be tantamount to a community having some sort of band of resident brazen child predators, and instead of the local government/law enforcement doing anything to remove them, telling all the townspeople they need to lock up their kids and predator proof their homes: eg, "Rats the Size of Cats Driven into Halifax neighbourhood" cbc article Aug 23

 Maybe Halifax could use a business of ferrets!  Or maybe Halifax could look into how other Canadian port cities with construction and warm winters have handled this issue. 

15.  Speaking of Edison, August 12 was World Elephant Day.  Here's a great youtube video called "Elephant Feelings" by John Haskell.   It is about Topsy the elephant that Edison had electrocuted, along with other animals, as part of his 'war of currents' against Nikola Tesla, to debunk Tesla's AC current as being dangerous. 

This animated music video "Topsy's Story "Persist" by All India Radio" is also moving.  
 

 


 

Now Available at Jenny Jib August 13, 2016

Here are pics of 9 new Pulp Creatures dropped off at Jenny Jib in Lunenburg this past Thursday.  

It's been awhile (almost 2 years!) since I've worked in papier mache so these were a lot of fun and fortunately it turned out to be a great day to get some pics at nearby beautiful Hirtle's beach.

First up are the 2 "Sidney the Pittsburgh Penguins" made in honour of Nova Scotia's own Sidney Crosby, the Pittsburgh Peguins captain who is quickly becoming a national treasure.

Here's a great CBC article from last month about the parade for Sidney Crosby and the Stanley Cup in his hometown of Cole Harbour.  This is a really sweet article too about how he surprised a fan in rural Nova Scotia

In one sculpture "Sidney the Pittsburgh Penguin" is holding the Stanley Cup, and in the other I tried to copy the pose of the penguin on the team's jersey.  Big thanks to my super hockey fan husband for the suggestion and input!  These are way more detailed than the hockey raccoons I made in 2014; as an aside one of the players who inspired these raccoons has since switched from the leafs to the penguins.

 A close up.  Turns out Sidney Crosby shoots left and the penguin on the jersey shoots right:

... Then they  went down to the beach to check out the great white shark and show off the Stanley Cup.  (For non-hockey followers, the Pittsburgh Penguins beat the San Jose Sharks for this year's Stanley Cup).

Another shot of that shark, it has a hook built into the top so it can hang as well as sit:

Next up a herring gull with three piping plovers.  Piping plovers nest on beaches and are endangered, check out the Nova Scotia Piping Plover Conservation Program for tips on on how to help these summer visitors thrive.

Next, two crabs.  This wasn't intentional but posting these pics makes me think of play on a well loved Dr Seuss book... "one crab, two crab, red crab, blue crab"

 

 


 A group shot of the crabs and birds:

A photo of everybody:

And final photo before dropping everything off at Jenny Jib, Sidney the Pittsburgh Penguin with the Stanley Cup in front of the Lunenburg Arena. 




Hooray!  These creatures took a lot longer than expected! but I'll be getting back in to the clay soon and working on the next firing!