catch up

its been a while and as we are getting ready to head to Seattle for christmas we thought we would do a quick visual recap of some highlights of the past month- as seen on Facebook, we prepared a casual version of a traditional thanksgiving dinner this year making turkey burgers, sweet potato fries and some green beans with goat cheese, joe started a new job in November as a design consultant for a custom closet company (new work shoes pictured), Tina gave her first art lecture at Biola University followed by studio visits with graduating seniors earlier in December, finals are finally over for the Fall 2012 semester and here is an image to remember the semester by, a quick snapshot of a color theory presentation on the color pink

joshua tree anniversary weekend

we knew we would be too busy on our actually anniversary day (November 8th = 4 years of marriage) to do anything special so we decided to go camping at Joshua Tree the weekend before to celebrate: driving through Joshua Tree National Park, looking out from the campsite, shadows and landscape, a portrait of the desert sun as seen blazing past tina's neck, joe the explorer, timer pictures on rocks

fish pumpkin

a 2012 joe + tina halloween- inspiration images for our pumpkin, an action shot of Joe getting into it with the wood carving tools, pumpkin seeds, meet fish pumpkin

next year: shark pumpkin.

orange county fair

some friends introduced us to the orange county fair last weekend: the crowds and the ferris wheel, joe's fried frog legs which tasted like a mixture between chicken and fish, a food booth color scheme and matching garbage can, and finally, pig races (photo lifted from the internet).

building a couch

Tina and I decided to build our own couch. I drew some sketches and was inspired by the simple construction and design of mid century plywood furniture and the unfinished/exposed look of Restoration Hardware's Deconstructed Furniture Line. These qualities seemed simple enough to replicate because  the way real furniture is built and upholstered seemed like a lot of work and skill. I used salvaged plywood leftover from some sculptures I made. I ended up with a sort of plywood bench/love seat. Tina chose raw silk as the upholstery and she mixed several samples of dye, we decided on a bright warm blue.

flags and art

a view from our 4th of July spent with friends, BBQ, & some outdoor music, an installation of Tina's on view all week at as part of a fiber exhibition showcasing student and faculty work from cal state long beach fiber art department (find the exhibition details on Facebook here or on tina's blog here)

oh nancy collaboration show opens tonite 6-9pm

my fourth collaborative effort with painter Annelie McKenzie opens tonight from 6-9 pm at the Torrance Art Museum (3320 Civic Center Drive). The show is also open on Tuesday July 5th from 11-5. 

Learn more about the Oh Nancy collaboration concept here, the venue here, and my collaboration partner here. 

The show was mentioned on Argot & Ochre. Read the full blog post here.

Hope you can see the show!!

a food post

it had to happen sooner or later, another food post: homemade tortillas!!!, baked tomatoes, squash and potatoes, turkey sandwiches and an eggplant salad with chickpeas and feta, when the grapes were all gone, shrimp and roasted brussel sprouts (our favorite roasted veggie)

Fiber field trip: overview post

the csulb fiber department (plus some adopted fiber students from sculpture and metals) went on a road trip to start the summer, doing some serious exploring in the american southwest. Our small rental car was packed with 4 girls, 10 pairs of shoes, a crockpot, rice cooker and three large brim hats, among other necessities. We drove an average of 6+ hours a day, exploring the hopi and navajo lands of new mexico, textiles wherever we could find them, and sleeping 4 to a room to keep our costs as cheap as possible. This overview post highlights a few themes that emerged over the trip looking over the resulting photos: the car landscape photo (since we did more driving than stopping), the timer group shot, if possible, including the camera strap (this particular example from gas station restroom stop just outside of Hopi land in New Mexico), the landscape (here a view of the Petrified Forest of Arizona), the charm of the american southwest (here the skull chairs at ghost ranch where Georgia O'Keefe was known to have painted and owned a home), road trip music, sculpture grad student Dawn took a lot of photos so i have a nice collection of her as photographer.

MR MFA

a walk around the traffic circle

As part of a project this semester at CSULB, we are doing a 7 part interview with a fellow student and my interviewee is Lance Morris, an MFA student in the Printmaking program. For our final interview, we went on a walk around the Long Beach Traffic Circle, something Lance does regularly to generate imagery for his artwork. We started by exploring the area, without any real rules, taking pictures and recording our conversations along the way: an image of the traffic circle signage which is different for each entrance, the angles specific to the angles of the streets depending on the direction you are going, an unusually quiet moment of watching the traffic circle from a small patch of grass under the shade of some trees, walking up from the roundabout we found a small neighborhood alley that seemed explore worthy in-between a few houses and an oil driller, an alternate view of the traffic circle, the route we took ended up being more than 3 miles and looking something like this, some treasures I found on along the way...

easter

joe, easter style, in his vintage button down shirt, navy cardigan and a minty tie; our first time making deviled eggs; using easter as an excuse to make something new we tried a recipe from one of my favorite food blogs eat this poem (a poem and a recipe each post!) this one inspired by poet Elizabeth Bishop..a tasty crab mac & cheese, some cupcakes with almonds and pastel m&m's (which i will be bringing to csulb tomorrow to share with my studio mates so we don't eat them all by ourselves)