Monday, May 21, 2007

art doin's to the sad back...

last week we got the chance to see miranda july speak at yerba buena center for the arts along with 2 other artists on generosity. it was truly a great, albeit short, chat about generosity in the arts & their perspective on this theme. she relayed a story about a piece she sometimes does. it goes like this: at talks & such, before entering into the room, july will ask for something from your purse or bag that you might be willing to part with - say, some altoids, or a sharpie or something. each person, if willing gives up something. then when seated, she will start an "auction" of sorts and in this rather small setting, bidding begins on these items. strange in and of itself no? to be bidding on someone's sharpie? well, at the end, she collects the money & she asks everyone to close their eyes - and then asks to the audience, with their eyes closed, who among them would this $100 or so, really & truly make a difference to them. could really make an impact in their life -- and whoever raises their hand, she gives it to them...isn't that moving? what an intimate, generous gesture...

on top of hearing her speak, at the end upon leaving, we each received her new book, no one belongs here more than you for FREE! talk about generosity :) she's my art hero for right now.

friday night we went to the MFA show at fort mason for SFAI students. the mister received his masters there so we like to go to the openings & keep up! this was my favorite piece. go check it out if you get the chance.

last, i was supposed to go to the maker faire in san mateo, and i tweaked my back slinging the 50 lb bag of dog food around like it was a baby on my hip or something - thus, all weekend in bed with the heating pad :( boo hoo. but poor dixie loo seriously had no food for like a week. we were feeding her bones with peanut butter & human food snacks because neither of us could make it to the darn pawtrero pet store to pick it up for her. bad owners, such bad owners!

this week entails: calling the passport office because they *still* haven't come - geez louise already. we applied back in february! tying up some loose ends with sprout studio, getting a coupla wholesale orders off & the last of the packages before we scoot out for our divine litte first time trot across europe!! we confirmed our hotel in paris, & the more i read on berlin & budapest, the more i'm thinking we may want to spend a wee bit more time there and less in other places like prague & krakow...we shall see!

more later lovelies! have a great start to your week :)

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

ooh, hotel stella looks great! is that one of the hotels from my lists? i think it might be. :)

jenifer lake said...

could be...i happened to see it in "let's go" first, then in a borrowed rick steve's paris book i saw it again. i think it's kinda divey for a hotel; just as in kinda run down...but we aren't prissy's & when it clocks in at 50 euros a night in the latin quarter, when other hotels run 100-200, we'll take shabby any day. plus, we aren't gonna be hanging in the hotel!

i did do another once through all those great tips you sent us & printed them out :)

Kerstin Svendsen said...

i so wanted to go, but had a project presentation at school. boo. sounds like it was good!