Birmingham

Through my art I’ve been exploring this question of what it means to be human in a global age. The DNA of Blue project that's evolving should  function on several platforms - from live participation to photography to internet connectivity.  

The project should travel broadly to invite participation from many points of view. The question is what attracts all humans with intense immediate interest, regardless of culture, age, education or sex? What makes us all human?

 

Color was my own personal answer. I fall into color, it evokes an intense dreamlike state in which I forget everything around me. As a child, I wanted to eat color. Paint was the most immediate way to handle, manipulate, and build with color so I’ve painted for 30 years. 

Now I’m looking beyond the painting’s flat surface for new connections. I want to get beyond the cultural constraints built into the act of painting, the viewer’s perception of painting, the meaning assigned to painting, which are all tied into the marketing of painting.

That's how I brought DNA of Blue to the Birmingham Bloomfield Art Center for a group show, "Water Works", put together with my digital art group, art alchemists. This group of photographers, print makers, scientists and late comers to art had a grip on the computer, printer and internet questions that would have taken me a million years to figure out on my own. We produced two group projects, a portfolio of prints, "Point of Departure", which instigated my Temple series, and for this show we included a group portfolio in book form, H20. It was orchestrated by one of our members, a master of handmade books, Barbara Brown.

     



The clear plexiglas cover is etched with the title, "H20", and each page is an a print by one of the group relating to  the theme of water. Here is my contribution.

Under Water,2006, digital print, edition of 20.

DNA of Blue fit with the water theme by the very nature of the ongoing collection of designs. There is now a flow of work collected from various sites. At the opening of the show,  participants were invited to add to the flow and their activity was videoed. Strands of designs collected at specific sites and printed in long groups as well as single designs were shown on the walls along with photos of past participation.

 

This participant also sold me an origami box he'd made out of a dollar bill. For $5. We agreed on the how the nature of art and money is funny but not necessarily equivalent.

At the end of the opening, one fellow wanted to stay and talk about art, drink a little more wine and set to work.

He built with one hand, keeping his drinking hand steady.

No matter how many times it collapse, he went back to start again.

Finally he went at it with both hands.

An odyssey completed.

Sync

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Sync 07, the annual digital and multimedia show sponsored by the University of Michigan School of Art and Design draws cutting edge art from around the country. I took DNA of Blue to the show and made camcordings of participants as they put together their arrangements. I wanted to move the project into the platform of internet connectivity. 

Large mounted photographs of single pieces and strands, long strings of photos mounted together, were shown at the same time. 

Further plans include making a version that can be done on the web, saved and sent in to be added to the collection.

During the opening, people were invited to participate by making their own arrangements.

Many participants were not art students but engineers and scientists. They liked to use the pieces to build in three dimensions.

The year before, at Sync 06, I'd shown my digital print series, Temple, a portfolio of 16 prints that meditated on the search for spiritual transformation. Recent travels to China and India had introduced me to Buddhist, Confucian, Taoist, Jain and Hindu temples, whose confined and intensified spaces seemed to echo in the new interior space of the computer. What could be made with mouse and screen that speaks to our most inarticulate needs? Using the layering abilities of Photoshop and some scanned brushstrokes, I repeated and transposed images from composition to composition. It felt like I was scratching the first art into the walls of the computer cave. 

Winter Gates, 2004, image 12" x 12", edition of 20

First Ring, 2004, image 12" x 12", edition of 20

Transmigration, 2004, image 12" x 12", edition of 20

Break of Day, 2004, image 12" x 12", edition of 20

The DNA of Blue project took the moving and transposing of pieces to the radical step of inviting the public to make the transformations themselves. This time I used the computer and internet to reach a wide new audience. The first youtube project I tried was of people from the Sync 07 event adding their designs to the ongoing DNA of Blue project.

Kids love to get into the act. Few art shows engage kids in the art making process.

Two visitors from China got busy and made an arrangement.  With very limited English, they made me understand that it spelled "China." This got me thinking more about how cross-cultural presentation of this project could discover new uses for the shapes and colors.

The people at Sync produced a stream of designs which made an elegant strand.

They also enjoyed throwing together designs in a scattered and seemingly haphazard way.

MCACA conference

The first public event where I brought the DNA of Blue was the 2006 Michigan Council for Arts and Cultural Affairs conference, the annual event that draws together people from all over the state who are involved in the arts and culture. I thought it would be a natural place to test the project. I didn't get permission, I just came as a conference attendee. So I was a bit nervous.

I spread a black cloth on the carpet and put out 12 shapes painted in different shades of blue. Photos of other arrangements were laid beside it. I started by fooling around, made an arrangement, then invited other people to participate.

Old friends got right to work. Janet made 3 designs.

Mike, from Monroe, said he was making music.

Some really spread out.

A woman from the Chelsea Center of the Arts left her booth and built a blue castle.

Director of the Department 
of History, Arts and Libraries participates.

Other work I was doing at the time explored cutting up and reconstructing cotton T-shirts. Some were blue, too.

E Pluribus Unum, 2005; 1 cotton T-shirt, felt backing, 6’ht x 6’-8”w