I wanted to write a long-ish post (with photos) about all of the fun I’m having during my week-long stay in Budapest, but the wireless network in my and Nannette’s “office” (i.e. a large, decadent cafe) won’t deign to allow the uploading of a bunch of images. So for now, I will just be posting one image per visit to the office.  A longer post will have to wait until I’m back in the States.  Some highlights so far include lots of artmaking, insomniac house chickens, a completely affectionate little cat named Mitsy, plenty of good food, and BIG BIG plans.  More to come!

It’s been a busy couple of art months recently.  The latest is an installation called Ghost Town for the Annual Art Faculty Exhibition in the University Gallery at EMU.  What you don’t see is one of the best aspects of the piece: there’s a song.  Mark wrote the most amazing song recently that I dubbed Ghost Town and I knew it had to be part of this piece.  He rigged speakers in the rafters above the installation that plays the song subtly, so that you only really hear it when enveloped in the gold cut paper.

[audio:http://blog.amysacksteder.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/GhostTown.mp3|titles=GhostTown]

To get an interwebby version of the effect, listen to the mp3 while scrolling through the images.

I made the components of this piece at different times.  The gold paper cut-outs and small oil painted panels were all made for my solo exhibition Still at Paint Creek Center for the Arts in April 2009.  The skull pieces (gouache and gold leaf) were made in Budapest this last summer.  They are essentially portraits of the skulls in the artist/stylist/designers’ homes featured on The Selby.  I plan to make more of these and am excited to see where I can go with this piece in the future.

The opening is Tuesday night February 2 from 4 – 7 p.m. in the University Gallery in the Student Center at EMU.    There’s a lot of great work by all of my colleagues.  Come see the show!

One show just came down at the Gallery Project in Ann Arbor and one show just went up at Paint Creek Center for the Arts in Rochester (MI).  I am honored to have been/be a part of both of them.  Here are some photos of my work from Presence/Absence at PCCA (including some new work hot off the drawing table):

Presence/Absence runs from January 15-February 20 with an opening reception at Paint Creek on Friday the 22nd from 7-9.  I am accompanied in the show by four amazing artists: Faina Lerman, Luzhen Qiu, Alison Wong, and Sun You. Here is a sweet blurb about the show in Real Detroit Weekly. Hope you can make it out to the opening!

Come on out to the opening on Friday if you can!  It should be a lot of fun!  Email or message me if you want a shirt to wear to the exhibition.  The info below is from Gallery Project’s website. Visit the site for hours and directions.  Hope to see you there!

Spring 2010 Collection

December 9 to January 11

Opening Reception: Friday, December 11, from 6-9pm.

Gallery Project presents the Spring 2010 Collection, a fashion exhibit showcasing artists as designers and social commentators. The annual fundraising exhibit opens at noon on Wednesday, December 9 and runs to 4pm on Sunday, January 11.  The reception is on Friday, December 11, from 6-9pm.

The 27 local, regional and national artists have created their own collection line or individual pieces specifically for the exhibition, and have made work that will be modeled on the catwalk show during the opening reception.  Artists explore the myriad influences and contexts of fashion, investigating issues such as identity and values, innovation and retrogression, trends and fads, materialism and consumption, high and low fashion, globalism and regionalism, thrift, reusing, recycling and reclaiming.

Artists and art collectives include basement6 (Jon Humphrey and Robin Coe), Jillian Brown, Betsy Brunner, Dorota Coy, Steve Coy, Bianca DePietro, Melissa Dettloff, Reed Esslinger, Jennifer Locke, Lana McKinnon, Modati (Bilal Ghalib, Sarms Jabra, Alexander Lee), Ryan Molloy, Barbara Neri, Amy Sacksteder, Gary Setzer, Bethany Shorb, Alexander Sobolev, Brooks Harris Stevens, Jim Stevens, Britten Stringwell, Jenn Stucker, Talking Squid (Taryn Boyd), Scott Tallenger and Andrew Thompson.

The exhibit is designed as a fun, interactive event.  Visitors are encouraged to come out in their finery to join the debutants, fashionistas, and designers.  A Catwalk Show starting at 7pm will highlight the opening reception.  Paparazzi will be flashing their cameras, with images available for purchase.  Visitors will be able to purchase Photo Passes so that they can photograph themselves, as they model garments and participate in interactive work.  Gallery goers are also invited to make DIY projects throughout the exhibition.

This exhibition is curated by artists Jennifer Locke, assistant professor of art at Eastern Michigan University, Steve Coy, art lecturer at The University of Michigan School of Art and Design, and Alexander Lee, a founding member of Modati, a local silk screening company.

Gallery Project is a fine art collaborative.  Its mission is to provide a venue for contemporary art that is culturally aware, individualistic, courageous, and thought provoking.  Gallery Project is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.  It is located at 215 South Fourth Avenue in Ann Arbor, Michigan.  Fall/Winter gallery hours: Tuesday through Thursday, noon-6; Friday and Saturday, noon-9; and Sunday, noon-4. The gallery is closed on Mondays.  For more information, please call 734-997-7012 or contact us through our website: www.thegalleryproject.com

It’s a busy, busy week of show preparation in the ol’ studio.  The work for the next Gallery Project exhibition is due Sunday.  Yikes!  Details coming soon to their website.

Also, if you happen to find yourself in the Philly area, you can attend the reception for the 2010 Calendar: MUSEUMS, Krista Peel’s latest venture that features a piece from yours truly.  The calendar would make a great Christmas gift.  Check it out.

My calendar page.  Looks like I’m back to Ms. January!  I can’t believe I have been in these awesome calendars of KP’s since 2004!  What an honor!

I have a show coming up at Gallery Project in Ann Arbor curated by three other artists, one of whom is my good friend and colleague at EMU, Jennifer Locke.  The show is called The Spring 2010 Collection (aka Fashion Show), and thus all of the work is about issues surrounding fashion, from a more cynical look at consumer culture, to a positive look at DIY and preloved movements.  The work in my series The Beautiful Ones, falls somewhere in between these two areas.  In 2007, I made a painting that had t-shirts that people could purchase and wear–something affordable to take away from the gallery-going experience–which was akin to being able to purchase band merch at a rock show.  In short, my painting could have groupies.  The goal was to allow people to be in a sort of performative dialog with the work.  The painting is “about” this sort of indie hipster culture, and also propagates it as well.  So, I had originally conceived of making two paintings and up until recently, just had the one.  This show was the perfect opportunity to realize the other.  They are both based on small drawings I did in France in 2007.  Below are some images of the piece in progress.  Progress continues.

Here are two images of the t-shirt designs (printed by VGKids), one or both of which will be sewn into the surface of the painting.  They are printed on American Apparel Classic Girl and Standard American styles in the color natural and made from organic cotton.  I have sizes ranging from small to XL in both unisex and women’s shirts.  If you’re interested in a shirt, just email me with your size, style, and design preference.  They cost $15, but there’s a free shirt for anyone who is willing to come to the opening sporting the shirt and who stays for at least a half hour.  Let me know (by commenting on this post) if you want to participate, so that I can get you a shirt before the show.  I have already hired a bunch of my students, so it should be a lot of fun!

Here’s the info for the show.

What: The 2010 Collection (Fashion Show)

Where:  Gallery Project, 215 South Fourth Avenue, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48104

When: Opening Friday December 11, 2009, 6-9 p.m. Show runs from Dec 9 – Jan 11.

Gallery hours are:

Fall/Winter hours:

Tue -Thu, noon-6

Fri -Saturday, noon-9

Sun, noon to 4

I have been particularly struck by the work of two artists of late.  Mark Dion and Mike McFalls.

Last night I had the pleasure of attending a lecture by artist Mark Dion at Cranbrook.  First of all, his talk was riveting.  He speaks in such a narrative, engaging manner, that when he was finished, I just wanted him to keep talking.  Luckily he answered some questions at the end of the lecture.

This piece showcases objects excavated during his project the Tate Thames Dig.  It is a double-sided cabinet that houses the objects such as wine bottle necks, toys, and cell phones in a particular manner according to color, type, and other commonalities.

He spoke about a lot of ideas that have been bouncing around in my head lately.  Among which are curiosity cabinets, alchemy, the surrealists and their influences, and fictionalized truths.  All of this wraps into my AE work and the way that I eventually want to present it.

My brother came across the work of Mike McFalls at the art gallery in the new art complex at Interlochen Center for the Arts in northern Michigan, where I used to teach.  When I recently asked people for suggestions of artists using model train sets in their work, for a post, Joe suggested Mike’s work.  Coincidentally, two of my colleagues at EMU recently curated some of his work into the Contemporary Sculpture exhibition at EMU’s University Gallery.  I especially loved the work when I saw it in person, so much so, that we bought a piece, and I’m trading him a drawing for another one.  Here are some images of his work.

This piece is similar to the one we’re taking home.  I love finding artists who’s work resonates with my current investigations and passions.  I am itching to get back to island paintings, but for now, I am working on a piece from the Beautiful Ones series for an exhibition at the Gallery Project in December that is similar to this one in approach:

If I’ve been remiss in blogging, it’s only because I’ve been blogging.  I’ve been helping Mark with Irreverent Vegan a lot lately.  There’s so much food-related stuff to do this time of year, what with putting the gardens to bed, buying up boatloads of tomatoes at the farmer’s market for canning, making pesto from end-of-season basil, etc.  Mark made swoon-worthy pesto and tomato pasta and baked green tomatoes last night.  Check out our action on that blog and let us know what you think.

So, some stuff has been happening on the art front as well.  Mark and I stretched this monster last week:

Though sadly it was a rainy day when we stretched it and the humidity affected it.  It was tight as a drum when I left the studio last Thursday.  When I returned to the studio, it was as wrinkly and saggy as all get-out.  Great sadness ensued.  For me.  Then after about ten minutes of moping, (and since I have a painting due for a show in December) I got my stuff together and started painting on a different canvas.  I altered my Photoshop mock-up to be suited for a vertical rather than a horizontal format and shazam! I’m back in business.  This painting involves big circles, for which I fashioned a very high-tech compass out of a brooch, some string and a sponge brush.  Macgyver,  eat your heart out.

I also co-curated an exhibition at EMU called Contemporary Painting, which I’m really happy with.  More on that later.

And, because our cats have been so dang photogenic lately, a bunch of cat photos.  Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

So, after a long wait, with much suspense, I present to you the islands.  They are supposed to be mini art museums, thus the walkways and little doors.  My friend and fellow artist Krista Peel has challenged me and a two handfuls of other artists to come up with mini art museums for her latest calendar project.  She will harness her mad skills to photograph these little buildings with railroad people milling about them and assign them to a particular month in a glossy, glorious calendar.  My particular take on the challenge was obviously influenced by my recent work drawing and painting the islands. 

So though I always have fun making work for KP’s calendar projects (wow!  since 2004 now), they always reaffirm for me how much I love painting and drawing as opposed to working with 3D-oriented media, as in this case with pink insulation foam and plaster.  I had much more fun painting the surface of the islands than I did doing all of that sanding.  Still, it’s nice to be able to expand into whatever realm is presented and I am pretty happy with the final result which isn’t too far off than what I has envisioned in my drawing.  Plus, as I mentioned before, this was my first foray into model railroad land.  It’s quite a place!

There are a lot of artists out there doing this model railroad thing, and other work with miniatures.  I must say, in the following cases (and with Krista Peel’s work, which is, of course, a given), I am quite taken with it:

Thomas Doyle makes strange little events happen in snow globes.

Though these following images by Walter Martin and Paloma Muñoz are c-prints, they are clearly taken using diorama-like sets.  Is it any coincidence that the title of this series is “Islands”?

Thanks to my friend Abigail for alerting me to these artists in her blog.  Let me know if you come across others…

I haven’t been able to write in awhile because of all of the end-of-summer activity going on right now.  I wanted to post about my weekend trip to Quincy, Illinois.  Why yes, that is the famous site of the Lincoln/Douglas Debate.  Glad you mentioned it.  I went because I wanted to see two dear friends from grad school who are seldom in the same place when I have time to travel to them. This time the stars aligned to make it so, such that Thursday I found myself aboard my first ever U.S. passenger train headed toward Quincy via Chicago.  It was a wonderful weekend of art, friends, good food, catching up, and a  lot of laughter.  I stayed at the impeccable 1914 bungalow of friends Jen and Todd and got to hang out with their kiddos Trevor and Joel.

Of course I was inspired by the people I was with, but since I am always mesmerized by other peoples’ spaces (thus my infatuation with sites like The Selby, Apartment Therapy and magazines like Dwell), I thought I would post about it.  Jen and Todd (and even her parents) worked hard to make their basement into a space where Jen would want to have a studio and where the boys can play year-round.  They sealed the walls, cleaned up a lot and spray painted the heck out of the ceiling.  The result is a clean, crisp space with painted walls, floors, beams and trim that coordinates with the rest of the house.

To see more images of her work, visit her website.

The occasion for my visit was our friend Kelly‘s exhibition at the college where Jen teaches and runs the gallery.  I got there too late to attend the opening, but did get there in time to: attend (even help out with)  Kelly’s mural painting workshop, go to the farmer’s market, do some thrifting ($25 pair of Lane end tables- score!), enjoy several delicious meals, play soccer with a pair of squirts, partake in raspberry AND lemon sorbet at a sci-fi/horror themed ice cream parlor (Eye-Scream anyone?).

Saturday night we were awestruck by a breathtaking sunset.

Here’s my attempt at one of the photos that inspires Jen’s paintings:

Even with 18 hours on a train, it was a very complete and restoring weekend.