today in the studio
January 19, 2012
Progress on the bird drawing:
Start of a new drawing:
The second drawing is inspired in part by this one, from Aldrovandi; I was originally going to put a headdress on the deer (I was thinking of an octopus for a headdress, actually), but once the antler was in there it felt like too much. Somebody in one of these drawings is definitely going to be wearing an octopus on their head, though.
Posted by jodi on January 19, 2012 at 6.21pm
new drawing in progress
January 14, 2012
For an upcoming (date TBA) solo show of tattoo flash drawings at rEvolution gallery & studio in Kingsville.
For inspiration I am looking at: early printed books about animals and mythological creatures, in particular my old favourites, Edward Topsell*’s The Historie of The Foure-Footed Beastes (1607) and The Historie of Serpents (1608), and Ulisse Aldrovandi**’s Monstrorum historia cum Paralipomenis historiae omnium animalium (1642); old botanical engravings of weeds and mushrooms; various danse macabres of different eras; renaissance manuscript illuminations of fantastic animals, demons, hellmouths and the like; early 20th century ex libris plates***; old lace pattern books; typeface catalogues; old engravings of insects and cephalopods and who knows what else.
*I’ve been scanning images from facsimile editions of the Topsell, but you can find images of the plates at this link.
**Aldrovandi’s History of Monsters can be seen in full at this link (a warning: while this book is full of strange and funny imaginary creatures it also presents a variety of birth defects and disabilities as equally “monstrous”, so, that’s disturbing).
***Pratt Libraries has a wonderful collection of over a thousand ex libris plates in this flickr set.
Posted by jodi on January 14, 2012 at 8.24am
some things i’m working on
January 11, 2012
Carving a new woodblock so that I can print some stripes on fabric.
And doing some production sewing for an upcoming installation by Broken City Lab.
Posted by jodi on January 11, 2012 at 6.13pm
future heirloom
November 16, 2011
This ugly old wedding dress is the raw material for a new project prototype: creating new and useful items out of what would otherwise sit folded in tissue forever, slowly fading, creases setting in permanently. You spent thousands on this dress, and possibly even dreamed of wearing it your whole entire life. Don’t store it under the bed where it’ll get knocked around every time you sweep the floor. Don’t store it in the basement where it’ll get ruined the first time you have a sewage flood! Instead carry the memory of your special day with you always, in the form of such practical items as: grocery totes. Placemats. A laptop case. Diaper soakers! (because after marriage comes the baby carriage, amirite?).
Any suggestions for practical and irreverent items (that people ACTUALLY USE) to add to the list will be welcomed and considered. I am especially excited about the grocery totes, but there must be something that can be done with all that lace. Kitchen curtains? Car rags? Ooh, car seat covers. Do people still use those?
Posted by jodi on November 16, 2011 at 1.56pm
studio warming party at the house
October 18, 2011
Sunday, October 23, 4pm to 8pm
The House, 131 Elliott Street West, Windsor Ontario
There will be live music (TBD), Rino’s bar will be open for your beverage needs, and there will be plenty of art on display. I’ll also be debuting my new line of woodblock printed skirts, never before seen! Come say hello, check out what I’ve been up to, enjoy drinks on the patio one last time before winter (weather permitting), and help me christen my brand new studio.
Posted by jodi on October 18, 2011 at 8.42am
october 5 drawing
October 6, 2011
Here’s the drawing I created during my two hours as a guest on the local CBC radio programme The Bridge. The printing underneath, at least four layers of woodblock in varying shades of green and blue, was already on the page before starting, and a layer of acrylic gesso was rubbed onto the entire page earlier in the day to push those colours into the background a bit before laying down a line drawing on top. The drawing started with a tiny square in the centre and spiraled out to cover most of the page. I really had to scramble to finish this in the two hours.
At the end of the programme the drawing was given away to a listener. Thank you so much to everyone who emailed for a chance to win the piece. I didn’t get to see all of your emails but the host and producer did show me a few of them in which people said some very kind and flattering things about me. So that was lovely! Also good for the ego was the fact that there were a lot more emails from people hoping to win my drawing than there were from people hoping to win tickets to see Crystal Gayle at the casino tonight. I’m thinking about making that my byline for a while: MORE POPULAR THAN CRYSTAL GAYLE. Maybe tomorrow I’ll show you a picture of me from when I used to have waist length hair, if I can find one.
Posted by jodi on October 6, 2011 at 9.42am
library drawing
October 4, 2011
It seemed best to keep it simple and work with as few rules as possible with this drawing, as I had no idea what I was in for being a “book” in the Human Library (Windsor Public Library, October first 2011), and how much time there would actually be for drawing. I started in the middle with a tiny square and worked outward in a net pattern, counting each closed section completed. Each time the drawing was interrupted in order to chat with a library visitor, the last section drawn was filled in to mark the drawing’s pauses, and the number was stamped in the upper right corner. Upon resuming drawing, counting started again at zero. The result is a measure of blocks of time between conversations and periods of work interrupted. You can see that it got busy there for a while and then wound down towards the end. The number at the bottom is the total number of sections in the drawing.
In general, the people attending the event were fairly engaged; always wary of talking more than a stranger wants to hear and dreading the appearance of that glazed expression, I very briefly described only the rules under which I was working to each person who approached me, and let them draw the conversation out from there. This worked pretty well, and most people stuck around to talk for a little while. One woman took one look at what I was doing and immediately brought up sari production, which was fascinating (of course I love saris, and wear them on occasion at Pennsic).
I wanted to paste a Date Due slip onto myself for stamping, in keeping with the signing-out-books format of Human Libraries, but apparently they don’t use those nice yellow ones that only get pasted across the top anymore? If slips and stamps are used at all, it’s a sticker and it doesn’t say “Date Due”. Bah. Even with a librarian for a spouse I somehow managed to miss my window of opportunity to pilfer fun library supplies. So I stamped the back of my hand every time a visitor left (“returned”, I suppose) me: Oct 01 2011, Oct 01 2011, Oct 01 2011.
Posted by jodi on October 4, 2011 at 10.47am
new from old
August 12, 2011
If you know me at all then you’ll know just how wacky this is right here: I went to Pennsic for fifteen days and did not bring along any knitting or sewing projects. I KNOW! Okay, that little orange sock with the two broken bamboo needles was in my satchel, but that was for in the car only (okay, also for waiting in line at Herald’s Point that one time and also for during a class Peter and I attended on making mustards, because those times are Idle Hands Times which are in no way the same as Projects Times, right?). Also I did not bring anything to read other than the WFTDA rule book (ugh. . . does there really need to be an entire section on Blocking With The Head detailing all the ways in which it is not okay to block with the head at all, when it could just say “Blocking With The Head: DON’T”?).
So, what did I bring to occupy my time, most of which is spent in camp since I’m too lazy to go anywhere and do anything at Pennsic? Drawings. Lots and lots of drawings, of which I worked on a good few, one in particular which may finally be about to turn the corner from AWFUL to FINISHED. I’m not going to show you those yet, because they’re still awful. But here’s the other thing I worked on: two of the drawings were stapled onto plywood boards so that they can be worked with multiple layers of wet drawing materials and still remain flat. One of those boards was the back side of a block from that ill-fated larger-than-life self portrait I started way back in my first semester of graduate school. Because drawing is a solitary activity for me and one cannot spend one’s entire vacation sitting inside the tent drawing while one’s friends are outside having social times, I also brought along a set of knives so that I could flip the drawing over and cut on the block while chilling around the camp dining room with my House Redhair homies.
This 24 x 36″ block has been cut into and printed quite a few times, and at the moment consists of a section of a figure completely covered with thin chatter lines, with rougher chatter marks in the background. I’m cutting away all but a grid of 1″ circles, so that what little will remain of the existing image can be printed as polka-dots on fabric.
The wood is the cheapest, most difficult to cut plywood you can get, either pine or fir, because that’s all I could afford in my first year of grad school. Now I dream of Shina and buy birch, which is still hard to cut but not nearly as split-tastic as the pine. But because I can’t waste old work, I’m dulling my blades on this old block one last time, taking the wood right down to the middle layer so it’ll print nice and clean (hah! like I ever print anything cleanly).
These are going to be some janky-assed polka dots.
Posted by jodi on August 12, 2011 at 7.26am
one more fountain video
July 17, 2011
This one is even grosser. By which I mean more awesome.
Posted by jodi on July 17, 2011 at 2.33pm
the purelegance hand-sanitizing fountain
July 17, 2011
A collaborative installation with Peter Zimmerman.
Here are a few short videos we shot while installing the fountain:
The Purelegance Hand-Sanitizing Fountain will be on view at 406 Pelissier Street, Windsor, Ontario as part of Artcite’s Visual Fringe exhibition, July 15 to 30 2011. Viewers are encouraged to partake in the total cleansing experience of the hand-sanitizing fountain. Visiting hours for the exhibition space are:
Sunday, July 17 1-6pm
Thursday July 21 3-7pm
Friday July 22 3-7pm
Saturday July 23 1-5pm
Walking tours of this and other downtown Visual Fringe exhibition venues will take place on Saturday July 23 at 1:30pm and again at 4pm, with some of the participating artists in attendance. To take the Visual Fringe tour, please meet at Artcite, 109 University Avenue, at one of the above times.
Posted by jodi on July 17, 2011 at 9.49am
