Northern Spark — Twin Cities Nuit Blanche

Northern Spark Installation by Roman Verostko, Three-Story Drawing Machine, Minneapolis College of Art & Design, Minneapolis, Minnesota, April 2011, photo © Creative Commons by Northern Spark. Some rights reserved.

I walk in the tradition of the Night Owl, and revel in the sleepless rituals of nuit blanche. Tonight from 9pm to 6am, Liz and I will be traversing the Mississippi River (from Minneapolis to St. Paul and back!) to visit the art installations of Northern Spark. Various corners of the Twins Cities will be lit up from dusk until dawn with venues that include: the Mill City Silos, Minnesota Center for Book Arts, poetry at All My Relations Arts, the GLOW-a-BOUT at Loring Park near the Walker Art Center (open all night and featuring the Lullaby Experiment by Marcus Young, creator of Everyday Poems For City Sidewalk), and four site specific installations (see Three-Story Drawing Machine by Roman Verostko above) at my alma mater, the Minneapolis College of Art & Design.

The information below is from the Northern Spark Media Kit. The Northern Spark website includes a complete list of events that you can add to your own interactive map that charts your night’s events. You can also download and print this PDF of the Northern Spark Guide listing the details of each installation across the Twin Cities. Hope to see you at this community event for the Arts, public art at its best!

The Nuit Blanche Movement

The idea of a nuit blanche (translated as “white night” or “sleepless night”) is an art event/tradition first seen in St. Petersburg, Russia and Berlin, Germany in the mid 1990s and first named “nuit blanche” in Paris in 2002. Since that time, the idea of the nuit blanche has expanded dramatically becoming a popular art event in cities throughout the world.

Today, a Nuit Blanche event consists of art installations and events in public spaces and museums, art galleries, and other cultural institutions opening their doors free of charge to the public from dusk till dawn. In effect, the host city itself is turned into a de facto art gallery, providing space for art installations, performances (music, film, dance, performance art), social gatherings, and other activities.

Besides St. Petersburg, Berlin, and Paris, nuit blanche events have taken place in Toronto, New York City, Tel Aviv, Santa Monica, and Montreal.

Northern Spark 2011

Spearheaded by Northern Lights.mn, Northern Spark is the first ever nuit blanche event in the Midwest. Northern Lights.mn is a roving, collaborative, interactive media-oriented, arts agency from the Twin Cities but for the world. It presents innovative art in the public sphere, both physical and virtual, focusing on artists creatively using technology, both old and new, to engender new relations between audiences and artwork and more broadly between people and their built environments.

Northern Spark will take place from June 4 (sundown ~8:55 p.m.) to June 5, 2011 (sunrise ~5:28 a.m.) at various locations along the Mississippi River and surrounding areas in Minneapolis and St. Paul. More than 60 artists from Minnesota, the surrounding area, and select locations across the country will be represented at the event.

Northern Spark Installation by Deborah Miller, Mill City Silos, Minneapolis, Minnesota, April 2011, photo © Creative Commons by Northern Spark. Some rights reserved.

Northern Spark:

First All Night Take Over Of The Twin Cities

MINNEAPOLIS, May 3, 2011 – It’s no secret Minneapolis St Paul is one of the leading centers of art in the United States. But on June 4 this year, the Twin Cities will join for the first time, the worldwide Nuit Blanche arts movement by hosting “Northern Spark,” the area’s first ever, all-night long arts festival.

For one night only, more than 60 regional and national artists together with the Twin Cities’ arts community will display new art installations at public places and unexpected locations throughout the city. Directed and produced by Northern Lights.mn and funded by the MN State Arts Board, Northern Spark takes place this summer from sunset on June 4 (8:55 p.m.) until the morning of June 5, 2011 (sunrise 5:28 a.m.).

“The Twin Cities has an amazing art culture and reputation,” says Northern Lights director, Steve Dietz. “Our aim is to really showcase that artistic excellence in a way never quite seen before by transforming the cities’ urban landscapes into a Twin Cites-wide art gallery for one special night.” The Northern Spark event will include a wide diversity of art forms and projects including multi-story projections, audio environments with vistas, installations traveling down the Mississippi on barges, houseboats and paddleboats, headphone concerts, and the use of everything from bioluminescent algae and sewer pipes for organs to more traditional media such as banjos and puppets.

One of the most highly anticipated installations is Jim Campbell’s “Scattered Light” from New York’s Madison Square Park, in which LED light bulbs suspended in a cube-shape on high tensile wire blink on and off to recreate the forms of pedestrians’ movements in three dimensions. Other artists involved in the nuit blanche include Christopher Baker, Phillip Blackburn, Body Cartography, Bart Buch, Barbara Claussen, Wing Young Huie, Debora Miller, Minneapolis Art on Wheels, Ali Momeni, Janaki Ranpura, Red76, Rigo 23, Jenny Schmid, Andréa Stanislav, Piotr Szyhalski, Diane Willow, Roman Verostko, Liu Xuguang, Marcus Young, and others.

The event is a collaboration — rarely seen on this kind of scale — of more than 40 partners each of which will sponsor one or more projects for the duration of the night. The goal is to showcase the urban splendor of the Twin Cities in a unique way, introducing a broad and diverse audience to innovative local and national talent in an inspiring journey through the night.

Northern Spark Installations: Wing Young Huie (TOP) by Nomad World Pub, St. Paul, Minnesota, Deborah Miller (BOTTOM) at Mill City Silos, Minneapolis, Minnesota, April 2011, © Creative Commons by Northern Spark. Some rights reserved.

-posted on red Ravine, Saturday, June 4th, 2011

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Spirits In The Bosque – Patrick Dougherty Leaves His Mark On Albuquerque

Here’s Looking at You, Patrick Dougherty installation at Bosque School,
Albuquerque, October 2009, photo © 2009 by ybonesy. All rights reserved.

 
 
 
 
One evening last week I went to see North Carolina artist Patrick Dougherty give a talk to an audience of parents, students, faculty and staff of Bosque School, plus a few members of the broader Albuquerque community. The turnout was solid. All seats were filled, yet I couldn’t help but lament how tucked away this globally recognized, soft-spoken artist was—how very hidden his presence in our city was to the public at large. And just how much they were missing by not being here.
 
Dougherty was guest artist at the independent Bosque School (grades 6-12) from October 5-23. According to the multi-arts organization collaborative LAND/ART, which sponsored the sculptor, Dougherty was here to create “a site-specific work on the grounds of the school adjoining the Rio Grande Valley State Park, using willow saplings harvested from the site and involving the students and teachers in the process.” (Bosque School is known for the way it incorporates study of the adjacent cottonwood forest—also known as “the bosque“—and river into its Science curriculum.)
 
This was Dougherty’s first time working with students this age. He’s done installations at museums, university and college campuses, and on sites of all types, from Ireland to France, Connecticut to California—over 200 works in the US, Asia, and Europe over the past two-plus decades.

He wasn’t in New Mexico to create art in a highly visible public space. His primary job was to work with students and teachers. The installation was open to the public most days and weekends during his stay, and many people took advantage of visiting hours. But still, hearing him speak on a late afternoon in October was like stumbling upon the city’s best kept art secret.
 
 
 
 
 

       

Patrick Dougherty poses for a shot after his talk (left), building the installation
required scaffolding (right), which visitors were sometimes allowed to climb,
October 2009, photos © 2009 by ybonesy. All rights reserved.

 
 
 
 
Drawing with sticks
 
Dougherty began his talk by walking the audience through a slideshow, starting with images of the log cabin home he built by hand, then moving to samples of his installations. He was funny and charming and deep in an unassuming way. He told us that he thinks about sticks as drawing material. “Consider the stick as a line,” he suggested, talking to us as if we were fellow artists.

His favorite piece, which he said he liked precisely because of its good lines, was “Tension Zones,” installed in Sheboygan, Wisconsin in 1995 at the John Michael Kohler Arts Center. (Unfortunately, the only image I found was in a hard-to-read archived article from the Milwaukee Sentinel.)
 
He went on to talk about his work in three ways, showing examples of each:

1. Architecture: Many of his installations have an interplay with buildings. Stick sculptures climb walls, cap towers, or lean into buildings.
2. Trees: Dougherty often uses trees as “a matrix.” He might make use of the limbs, trunks, or the canopy of the tree, building his installation in relation to one or all of those parts. He showed us pieces that seemed to sprout leaves in spring and shed them in winter.
3. No thing: Many of his installations, he said, were built in “just space,” indoors or outdoors. 
    

After the talk, members of the audience had many questions. “How did the students catch on?” someone asked. “Great,” Dougherty said, “we know all about sticks; it’s the Hunter-Gatherer in our blood.” He reminded us that the stick is a universal play thing for all children. They use sticks to draw in the dirt, as instruments, building material, weapons, and utensils.
 
 
 
 
 

   

Drawing-with-sticks details from the Bosque School installation,
October 2009, photos © 2009 by ybonesy. All rights reserved.

 
 
 
 
Two Years and Three Weeks
 
Dougherty’s pieces generally have the same lifespan as that of a stick, which is about two years. After two years, most installations come down.

In an interview (date unknown) on Don’t Panic Online, Dougherty talked about the temporary nature of his work:
 
 

I think that part of my work’s allure is its impermanence, the life cycle that is built into the growth and decay of saplings. My focus has always been the process of building a work and allowing those who pass to enjoy the daily changes or drama of building a sculpture as well as the final product. However, the line between trash and treasure is thin, and the sculptures, like the sticks they are made from, begin to fade after two years.  Often the public imagines that a work of art should be made to last, but I believe that a sculpture, like a good flower bed, has its season.

 
Other highlights from Dougherty’s talk include (italics direct quotes; the rest paraphrased):
 

• On Art and Being an Artist: The art world is not a wall; it’s a loose-knit group of people. Artists are just normal people who are looking for their place in the world.

 

• On finding that Place in the world: Hysteria rides on the shoulder of every creative person.

 

• On building his own house, a log cabin: He wanted to build a house that was functional, with no maintenance once it was done. That way he could live and work there when the money wasn’t rolling in.

 

• On living in North Carolina: Lots of maples in North Carolina, and the stones there have color. Some places have a lot of stones, but they’re not different colors like they are in North Carolina.

 

• On using willows to build art: Every time you cut the base of the willow, you get twice as many sticks that grow back. (Which was good to hear, given that my daughter was worried that nature was being sacrified for art. It wasn’t.)

 

• On how long it takes: Dougherty stays for about three weeks in each locale, which, he joked, is about the maximum amount of time before his hosts get sick of him.

 

• On climbing the pieces: Please don’t. Even though the structures are solid due to the layers and layers of sticks, as well as the stick foundations that gird them, climbing tends to destroy the surface over time. However, people (drunk adults, especially!) love to climb the sculptures.
• On whether the students liked it: They loved it, although they felt at times constrained by doing things the way Dougherty wanted. In order to give the kids some freedom, there were three experimental installations where the students could do whatever they wanted.

 
 
 
 

  

Long view of the installation (left), and looking out from inside an experimental
sculpture, October 2009, photos © 2009 by ybonesy. All rights reserved.

Brown meets Green

After the talk we were invited to go outside to see the installation and walk around and inside of it. The piece is made up of three two-sided heads, like masks with eyes and noses, which, according to Dougherty, are a combination kachina and Green Man, who often can be seen adorning ancient cathedrals.

The masks were much larger than I had expected. I’d seen them just a few days before during an admissions open house at the school, but my viewing was brief plus I was distracted by the other goings-on. In my mind’s eye, the sculptures were about twice as large as a person. Wrong! They are many times taller than the average person, as you can see by the photo below, which shows someone standing in the doorway/mouth of one of the masks.

The best part of the event was watching people of all ages marvel at the creations. Inside, outside, peeking around corners. A father dressed in a suit and tie (he must have come straight from work) played a sort of hide-and-seek tag with his two daughters, running in and out of each structure. I walked slowly into the giant heads, looking at elegant lines of the willows and taking in the most wondrous fragrance of sage and willow. One woman turned to me and exclaimed, “If only we could bottle that smell!”

The sun was sinking as the visitors scattered. I went over to the experimental installations. The sticks were not nearly as tightly layered as in the giant masks, but they had shape and structure. What an opportunity to learn with a master. Art in the Schools like it’s never been done before.

More information on Patrick Dougherty

• Patrick Dougherty’s Incredible Nest Houses, on Environmental Graffiti
• Patrick Dougherty: Artist in Residence, University of Kansas Spencer Museum of Art
• Stickwork: Interview with Patrick Dougherty, Don’t Panic online magazine
• Yardworking: An Interview with Patrick Dougherty, ArtFocus Online

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Out With The Old, In With The Old (Recycled Fashion Goes To Washington, DC)

Santa Fe designer Nancy Judd and her recycled “trashion” (trash fashion) are headed to Washington, DC, to Saturday’s Green Inaugural Ball honoring President-elect Barack Obama. Judd, a former Recycling Coordinator at the City Different’s Solid Waste Department and current owner of Recycle Runway, has expanded her gorgeous line of “Dumpster coutre” to include pieces inspired by Obama campaign throwaways.

The Wall Street Journal featured Judd on the front page of its January 13th issue, for having caught the eye of organizers of the $500-a-ticket all-organic pre-Inaugural celebration, which is expected to draw 1,000 environmentalists. Models will display Judd’s garments on platforms in the main lobby area.

Showing her stuff in the nation’s capital is a big step for a woman who used to put on a furry blue costume and sweat her way through parades as Carlos Coyote, Santa Fe’s recycling mascot.”

Using campaign paraphernalia she rescued from a dumpster outside an Obama campaign office, Judd has developed an elegant line of Obama-wear, so far consisting of these three pieces (photos were provided by Judd and are used with her permission):







Obamanos Coat

This man’s coat is made from Obama campaign paper door hangers that have been lacquered and stitched together. (Look closely and you can see lots of little smiling Obamas and Bidens.) It took Judd 200 hours to cut, paste, and sew the coat.

Judd tailored the coat to Obama’s measurements, which she found online. She is hoping he will stop by the event and try on the coat. She even managed to hinge the sleeves to give him a measure of mobility: “He can’t wave, but he can shake a hand.”

Maybe the mental image of that dress made from glass might make people think twice before they throw out a bottle next time.

~Jenna Mack, co-producer of the Green Inaugural Ball (from WSJ)

Obama Cocktail Dress

Judd is shown here modeling an old-new take on the ubiquitious “little black dress,” this one made from plastic yard signs. She has no training in fashion, nor does she know how to sketch. She gets ideas from old paper dolls.

Her pieces are conceived as wearable sculpture and she doesn’t sell any of them. They are educational tools to help illustrate the problems facing our environment and to raise awareness.

You can’t be didactic or shaming or all gloom-and-doom…so you sneak in the back door.

~Judd, on how to talk to others about sustainability (from WSJ)

Voter Swing Coat

This stylish suit is woven from strips of voter-registration posters.

For Judd, making dazzling garments to hit home a serious message about the earth is a labor of love. For the past two years, she has been living off of savings and a small business loan. She won’t be making money from the Green Inaugural Ball, either, although she is selling tote bags made from recycled campaign posters to cover trip expenses.

The children were amazed to see that something so beautiful could be created out of something we would normally throw away.

~Pat Bluett, assistant director of a Boys & Girls Club (from WSJ)

I’m relieved to know that some of the printed materials—door hangers and brochures that so many volunteers handed out during the campaign—have been “re-purposed” into such gorgeous pieces. (How she managed to cut the plastic yards signs, I can’t figure out. Those things are indestructuable—don’t ask me how I know.)

More than that, I am proud of this talented New Mexico designer for making it to Washington, DC and to an audience of prominent and influential environmental leaders. She’s created a unique and fabulous way to get across a vital message to people young and old—and people in power ought to see her work.

Speaking of people in power, would you say hello to Obama for me, Nancy? Just give him a big hug on my behalf as you’re helping him try on the Obamanos Coat. Thanks.

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Trash In Fashion

I love the Albuquerque International Sunport. I love that it’s small and easy to navigate. I love the ageless art deco wood-and-leather chairs, comfy to sit in while waiting to board a flight. Mostly I love what the airport folks dream up to entertain weary travelers passing in and out of the airport’s doors.

Case in point — Recycle Runway: The Airport Project.

Recycle Runway is an exhibit of elegant dresses, coats, shoes, hats, and other accessories — all made of trash. Pages from magazines folded into intricate, colorful fans and sewn onto a flamenco dress. An entire cowgirl getup, complete with cowgirl hat, made from the woven sheets of phone books. The most colorful outfit is a dress covered in plastic “buttons” cut out of laundry detergent bottles.

This exhibit is delightful. More than that, it is hopeful.

There is something moving about seeing the beauty that can come from empty aluminum cans, reams of computer paper, ubiquitous plastic bags, crushed glass, even rusty nails. No woman is ever going to wear crushed glass all over herself (Help! Your hug just shredded my stomach!), yet these articles of clothing bring home the message that we MUST recycle if we are to save our planet. That recycling is more than a duty. Recycling is beauty.

Nancy Judd started Recycle Runway seven years ago, after working as the Recycling Coordinator for the City of Santa Fe and then as Executive Director of the New Mexico Recycling Coalition. The exhibit has already been featured in several airports this past fall. It’s unclear where it will go next, but one thing is for sure. It adds to a growing movement of artists taking on environmental issues.

My favorite pieces are a Carmen Miranda-style headdress, blouse, and skirt made of plastic Target bags, and a coat made of cassette innards.

Recycle Runway will be in the Albuquerque International Sunport through January 16, 2008. If you miss it, you can write to an address on the website to ask whether it will be showing up at an airport in your part of the country. And if you’re really excited by this kind of art, mark your calendars for the tenth annual Recycle Santa Fe Festival in November 2008.

Good job, little airport of mine! So what that you’re not truly international? You give free internet access, and more important, ya got culture!

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