All About Artmaking: From Student to Professor, From Film to Digital

 The hardest part of artmaking is living your life in such a way that your work gets done, over and over - and that means, among other things, finding a host of practices that are just plain useful.  

A piece of art is the surface expression of a life lived within productive patterns.  Over time, the life of a productive artist becomes filled with useful conventions and practical methods, so that a string of finished pieces continues to appear at the surface.

From Art & Fear: Observations on the Perils (and Rewards) of Artmaking

by David Bayles and Ted Orland

Some three decades ago book co-author Ted Orland and I crossed paths in the film darkroom at Stanford University; he a professor, me a student.  Today, I am a professor, guiding students in the digital darkrooms at several Massachusetts colleges.

I recently finished reading Art & Fear.  Bayles and Orland contend that for artists who teach full time, finding the opportunity to create art can be challenging.  Right now, in between semesters, I realized that I myself have been too busy teaching and grading to shoot pictures.  So I carved out a morning to stroll with my camera through Greenfield, Mass.

Possibility

The backlit shapes of this trash barrel beckoned.

Abstract Universals

I got close to the container and set my lens intentionally and specifically out of focus to highlight visual rhythm.

Springtime Miracles

One of the gifts of teaching is that now while I shoot, my feedback to students swirls in my brain.  Using the rule of thirds?  Making precise depth of field choices?  Creating meaning beyond the obvious?  Here, the green leaves swayed in the breeze faster than the flowers, so I held my camera steady and slowed the shutter speed to catch some background blur.

> the = of the Parts

Wilson's Department Store lives on as a store of yore.  For this in-camera multiple exposure, I shot three individual letters of the store's sign and the camera layered them into one image.

Reflecting on Change

With this double exposure, I photographed a bricks and mortar building and then held my camera upside down to photograph a newer stucco structure across the street.  When this image formulated before my eyes on the back of my camera, my artistic excitement took verbal form: "Yeah, baby!"

Back in the Stanford film darkroom, we worked on perfecting a craft that had been around for decades.  Tonight, preparing to teach a new class on Digital Storytelling, I took a brand new iPad out of its box and within less than the minutes needed to make a paper print with chemicals, I was connected to my wireless network, capturing stills and shooting video.

In the end, it's not the technology that matters.  Concurring with Orland and Bayles, I believe that artmaking (a verb!) is in the doing, of maintaining the discipline to create and follow "productive patterns".

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Learning by Drawing: Portraying Reality with Abstract Paintings and Black and White Photographs

I am a huge fan of using sketchbooks to learn about art.

Figure 1 - Before

I sent some postcards of one of my Reality-Based Abstractions.  The Cubist painters inspired these in-camera multiple exposures.  I stuck one of the postcards in my sketchbook. 

Figure 2 - After

Inspired by woven mats I saw in the Oceanic collection at the Peabody Museum at Harvard, I cut another postcard into strips and interlaced them.

Guidelines

About a month later, I absorbed the Picasso Black and White exhibition at the Guggenheim.  Using pen and pencil to draw this painting allowed me to really look and linger.  I noticed the artist's initial drawn outlines that delineated the areas that he later filled in with tones.

Form

Using just pencil to create planes and values, I labored to recreate "Figure".  Notes jotted in my sketchbook:  "Ironic, that at points, I felt I was not recreating a Picasso perfectly.  A Picasso!  An abstraction!  Of all things."

Balance

After relaxing by leaning into and laughing at my fears, I drew this imagined ball rolling on a tightrope. 

Fruits of Labor

At the end of the afternoon, nearly dizzy from art overload, I drew this profile.  Looking closely at the Picassos taught me to look closely at reality.

Classwork

I relayed some of these observations a few weeks later as I taught a Zentangle^® drawing class.  In most cases, with Zentangle, we draw with black pens on white paper, adding shading with regular pencils.  In this class, we reversed the formula.

The discussion of black and white led one student to recall the futility of looking at art history books during the era when such books were printed solely in black and white.  Another described how they felt that black and white photographs portrayed the reality of a situation better than color photographs.

Time Marches On

Interesting, this idea that black and white photographs are more true to reality than color ones.   I believe that portraying a single subject from multiple perspectives simultaneously (like the Cubist painters) can depict reality more clearly than a "normal" painting.  What do you think?

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"Best Faculty In-Service Day Ever" - Teaching a Zentangle Workshop

“Will there be any competition?” the Director of Athletics asked me just before I began teaching a Zentangle^® workshop at Stoneleigh-Burnham School, a college preparatory boarding and day school for girls, grades 7-12, located in Greenfield, MA.

“No,” I replied, “this about the whole group coming together.”

“Two teams?” he asked hopefully.

“Sorry.”

My workshop was the afternoon session of a professional development day held just before classes resumed at the school after winter break.

Zentangle is a relaxing and easy to learn method of creating beautiful images from structured patterns. Students draw on 3.5 inch squares of fine art paper referred to as “tiles”. The term “tile” stems from the unifying ritual of combining artworks completed in class to form a mosaic.



                  “The best meeting ever - no one talked,” quipped the Director of Instrumental Music, as the participants assembled the first mosaic and closely examined each other’s art.

An English teacher exclaimed, “We should do a whole school Zentangle.”

"We should exhibit these," an Administrator chimed in.

A Spanish teacher noted how quiet the room was while the faculty and staff members worked on their creations. “We had been talking about the need for “quiet” in the lives of our girls. So this really set a great tone.”

“Did you find any competition?” I asked the Director of Athletics at the end of the workshop.

“Only what prices these different pieces might sell for,” he replied, gesturing towards the mosaic of freshly drawn Zentangle artworks.


I later heard via email from the school’s Director of Communications. “I just wanted to write to thank you for leading us in Zentangle yesterday. I think everyone was really excited by it - I saw two Facebook posts by faculty members showing off their work. The title of one Facebook album was "Best Faculty In-Service Day Ever."

I just thought you should know that you've engaged the SBS faculty with a creative process and inspired us to look to the world for pattern and rhythm.

Personally...I was able to melt into the ink for a few hours and escape the deadlines and tough work schedule that I have on tap for the next 10 weeks."

Mosaic #1:

The "tiles" above are the first Zentangle artworks ever drawn by the workshop participants.

Since I taught a set of structured patterns, unity exists between the creations.  However, since each person approached the patterns with their own style, each artwork is also unique.

Click for more information on Zentangle.

Thank you for your interest -
      - John Nordell, M.Ed. & Certified Zentangle Teacher^tm 

P.S. Big thanks to Hank Mixsell at Stoneleigh-Burnham for taking these photographs!

Mosaic #2:

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[ ] Windows on the Artistic Process [ ] and Election Day [ ]

A week and a half before Election Day, I swung by a lunchtime gallery talk given by Ellen Alvord at the Mount Holyoke College Museum of Art:  African American Artists and the Experimental Printmaking Institute:  The Janet Hickey Tague '66 Collection.  Alvord's talk effectively mixed technical details along with the aesthetic approach each artist brought brought to printmaking, whether David C. Driskell carving and printing the top of a stool or Faith Ringgold alluding to her story quilts by printing marks that evoke actual thread stitches.

Melvin Edwards, Untitled, 2005
 "The material is the metaphor for what you want to create."

Sculptor Melvin Edwards used a laser to cut a 1/4 inch thick aluminum plate to print this striking image.  From the notes jotted in my sketchbook:  Slave blacksmiths created chains at night to make extra money to buy their freedom. 

After the talk I discussed with Alvord teaching the creative problem solving process and she generously printed out for me the article Let's Get Serious About Cultivating Creativity by Steven J. Tepper and George D. Kuh. (Download the PDF.)  Inspired and energized, I drove home along the Connecticut River corridor, pondering cutting and then printing aluminum.

Plate and Stencil

The day before the Obama-Romney showdown, I started cutting some aluminum flashing bought at Home Depot.  Laboring to cut the material a matte knife, I flip flopped between yearning for the precision and power of Melvin Edward's laser and enjoying experimenting with refining methods to cut the shapes I desired with the tools I possessed. 

Nature's Adhesive

Knowing of Faith Ringgold's powerful symbolic use of the American flag in her work, and with the election nigh, I combined the two ideas.  Aiming for art rather than craft,  I eschewed glue and attached the punched aluminum stars with sap from a pine tree.

Process and Product

Watch the whole process unfold:

Both Sides Now

On my way in to vote, I worked with the light penetrating a Scott Brown for Senate sign.

Process

Posing for a picture, I made my marks with care and precision, imagining I was teaching my Zentangle drawing students.

Compass Points - Walking to the Polls

Leaving the polls, I delved into making multiple exposures.

Thank you - Melvin Edwards - for the inspiration.

I outline the artistic process as follows in the syllabus for my digital photography students at American International College:

Prepares - Contemplates: plans, sketches, thinks, writes, looks at art and works on basics.

Practices - Creates: tests techniques, experiments, has fun, produces art.

Makes Mistakes - Redoes: takes risks, seeks peer and instructor support, tries again and learns from failure.

Presents - Appraises: Online exhibits, reflective journaling and critique.

Create Art.  Look at Art.  Enjoy your Life.  © 2012 John Nordell

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Reverse Evolution - A Return to Drawing with Berries and Feathers

Several years ago, my monkey alter ego Chuck Darwin produced a prize winning video that explained the technical nuances of digital color management:  The Theory of the Evolution of Color Management.  The primate scoffed at primitive humans that once used berries for ink.

Free Ink - Berries by the Roadside

Well, in this video, I risk Chuck's censure by mashing and using Pokeweed berries to make ink for drawing with a feather. 



I loved the imprecision of using the feather.  Occasionally, a chunk of mashed berry would become lodged inside my quill, leading to thick, explosive lines. 

Tactile

Nothing like homespun art supplies.  I have stockpiled pine tree sap to use in lieu of glue for an upcoming printmaking project.  Stay tuned! 

P.S. If you find yourself inspired to mash and draw, please keep in mind that the Pokeweed berries are toxic. 

© John Nordell

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Metaphorical Mental Ladders

I can clearly remember the clang of a riot cop's baton striking the aluminum ladder carried by fellow photojournalist Rick Friedman as years ago we covered neo-Nazis exercising their right to free speech in Boston.  I also remember the same cop taking aim and hitting the bone at the joint of my right knee.  I guess Rick and I needed such encouragement to move back from the action.

Acknowledging Honks

Why was Rick carrying a ladder?  Anything to get a different angle on things.  I thought of Rick as I brought my ladder to get a fresh viewpoint on the picket line of union nurses staging an one day strike in early October protesting an impasse in contract talks with Baystate Franklin Medical Center in Greenfield, MA.

Quite a thing for nurses to go on strike.  The nurses told me that the offered contract will adversely affect patient care given the terms related to overtime pay and sick time guidelines.

Dog's Eye View

I have no idea what the contract issues really are, nor what a just resolution would be.  However, it is clear that both sides have very different points of view.  With this shot, I crouched down for a low angle of registered nurse Karen Boyden leading chants.

Viewpoints.  Points of view.  Angles.  Stances.  Sides.  Perhaps we all need to carry metaphorical mental ladders to aid understanding those who think differently from the way we do. 

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From Ink and Paper, to Thread and Cloth, to Light and Pixels

      I met Susan Garfield-Wright
when I taught a Zentangle^® class at the Cancer Connection in Northampton, Mass.  I taught the class while researching the correlation between participating in a Zentangle class and well-being.

     Zentangle describes an easy to learn and relaxing method of creating beautiful images from structured patterns.

     It was Garfield-Wright's first Zentangle class.  At right, is the artwork she created.

 
     Self-described as an art quilter, Garfield-Wright realized during the class that "these designs are meant to be quilted on things.”
  


     So she headed over to A Notion to Quilt in Shelburne, MA and used the longarm quilting machine to experiment with "drawing" Zentangle patterns with thread.

     I enjoyed discussing with Garfield-Wright her explorations with the mixing of mediums, as well as the ways she plans to incorporate Zentangle concepts into future quilting projects.

     When creating as a photographer, I often shoot multiple exposures, that is, taking several pictures in succession of the same subject and then programming my camera to layer the variations into a single image.

     My goal with this process of abstracting reality is to portray the inner essence of a subject by presenting multiple views simultaneously.

    From ink and paper, to thread and cloth, to light and pixels.

    Note:  This fall I will be teaching the Zentangle drawing method at A Notion to Quilt.  The classes will progress from learning Zentangle fundamentals to applying these creative concepts to the world of quilting.  © John Nordell

    

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