17 April 2014

the teeniest, tiniest











you guys. I'm in it. I'm up to my eyeballs in it. am swimming in unwieldy cardboard boxes and unending rolls of bubble wrap. am wading through seven years of the kids' paintings and drawings and school work, seven years gone unchecked. forgotten thrift store finds and unfinished art projects, more broken crayons than I have ever seen in my life, more old bills, more receipts, more paper everything. (side note: I have enough party supply stock to open my own shop). we do not actually leave the city of portland until the middle of june but we have to be out of this house by the end of the month. that's fourteen days. there's so much to do I don't even think there's time for sleep. I  AM  IN  IT.

but the secret to surviving what's often referred to as the third most stressful event of life (preceded only by death and divorce) is this: teeny tiny breaks. the teeniest, the tiniest, the most mundane of pleasures, but in highly concentrated form. last time we moved, I remember taking the time to sort ava's hair accessories by color. in the middle of everything. in the middle of the mountain of boxes and the feverish to-do lists and the small children knocking at the bathroom door, crying for frozen waffles. I remember how cool the bathroom tiles felt beneath me as I sat and sorted, how spectacularly overwhelmed I was by everything but how completely calmed I was to sit there and just sort for ten minutes.

and that's what these photographs are for me. my teeny tiny break. taken with the holga in palm springs back in 2012, finally dropped off and developed two years later. teeny tiny break number one: sitting in the car, thumbing through said freshly developed photographs. teeny tiny break number two: sharing them here. when I look at these, I can practically feel the heat on the back of my neck, smell the air around me, hear the click of that plastic camera. I am transported, just for a second. and really, that's all I need.

11 April 2014

tahoe!

Untitled

oh hey, teaching a few photography workshops at the create/explore/discover art retreat in tahoe this fall! on the roster: instant magic and a class I call five for five. and then: patchwork collages and painting with mati rose, crocheted stones and arm knitting with anneimage transfers and paper flowers with courtney. in tahoe! tahoe! I've never been but the people, they say nice things. I'll tell you, organizer sarah stevenson has outdone herself. I am excited.

meet me in tahoe in october? I'll be there with bells on. well, maybe not bells. I'll most likely be the one with all the polaroid cameras.

(retreat registration officially open! more here)

07 April 2014

as seen by



me, through the eyes (and lens) of my brother. I'm forever thankful for it, don't even really have any words for it except I wish we could have seen into the future when we were kids. wish we could have seen who we are now, what we do, what we make. I wonder what we would have thought of all this. I like to think about things like that.

and then there's this:



I'm amazed by the work my brother makes. I really am. and I'm honored to see little bits and pieces of projects we've worked on together in this reel. I'm excited about the future. friends, if you want to fall down a beautiful, beautiful rabbit hole, head on over here. get lost in nate's work. it's easy to do.

p.s. if that first film has you jonesin for polaroid fun times, stay tuned. instant magic workshops (two!) are happening. announcements= right around the corner.

04 April 2014

c is for color // d is for diptych








pink, yellow, orange, purple, green, red, blue. plus a few happy accidents, a few fortuitous images. mine are on the left, xanthe's are on the right. am missing color//colour right about now but we'll be back this summer. and when I need a boost, I know just where to go.

(more diptychs here and many thanks to my lovely co-collaborator xanthe for putting these fine diptychs together)
(she's the cat's pajamas, she is)