How-To
Slideshow/Discussion this Wednesday @ AS220 in Providence
Posted February 6, 2010 by shaun in People's History!
If you're in Providence, Rhode Island this week, please come by AS220 on Wednesday the 10th and participate in the discussion and slideshow I'm putting on! It's free to the public and starts at 6pm at the AS220 performance space on Empire Street:
"I Brake For Historical Markers"
6-8:30pm, Wednesday, February 10
Pittsburgh-based artist Shaun Slifer will present a slideshow and discussion of problematic and progressive historical monuments and plaques with an eye towards remembering the often-buried stories of struggles for social justice. Slifer will discuss the Howling Mob Society's 2007 guerilla historical marker series commemorating the Great Railroad Strike of 1877.
End of the Year Printing/Studio Visit
Posted December 31, 2009 by pete in Art & Politics
I finally finished up a large print this week, and thought I would share some pictures of the process and the printing of the piece. I also took the opportunity to print a large piece I finished a few months back and never got around to printing. Along with these pictures you will get a little tour of my basement studio, which seems to be getting more and more cramped every time I turn around, and shares a wall with the Justseeds world wide shipping headquarters!
Extinct Animal Masks!
Posted October 27, 2009 by bec_young in How-To
If you don't have a Halloween costume yet, maybe you should make a mask of an extinct or endangered animal and spread awareness while you party! We had a little mask-making workshop at our house recently using cardboard and paper maché. I made a crescent nailtail wallaby, an animal the size of a rabbit which was last seen Central Australia in the mid-1950's. Mary Tremonte made a passenger pigeon, that infamous bird whose flocks used to cover North American skies before hunters took them out in the late 1800's. A saber-tooth tiger, polar bear, a lizard called a Kawekaweau, and a cute short-tailed bat were also part of the mix. If you want to make a mask, first you'll need a image and some information about the animal you want to make. I found a book called A Gap in Nature: Exploring the World's Extinct Animals which has amazing illustrations by Peter Schouten. We drew the shapes of ears, beaks, and faces on cardboard and cut them out, and then attached them together with staple pliers and duct tape. Then we added a layer of paper maché paper over that. If you want your mask to be extra strong, add another layer of paper maché once the first one is dry, but this time use muslin cut into strips. Once that's dry, then you are ready to paint, and add feathers, fur, and details. Here's some shots of the costumes in process!
The People Suck
Posted September 9, 2009 by roger_peet in Inspiration
The world is over.
A goat with its throat slashed may buck against its bonds, but the blood will drain out and it will die. A gentle hand might give it a pill to ease the suffering. Like the goat, we've swallowed the pill, and so it comes to this. Buy an efficient lightbulb. Drive a "hybrid" car. We have eaten the host that was laid on our tongue, the host embossed "HOPE". We've supped from the poisoned chalice to wash it down.
Our sad flapping jaws will keep on hurking out positive affirmations like trained seals clapping for the ringmaster. Our prating of determination and principled struggle and positivity of all sorts sounds now as do the grunts of a dental patient turned loose to the street with a toothless gape and gums full of anaesthetic. For it's Hope that has killed us these many long years, and it will continue to kill us, though it will seem like famine, and it will seem like war. It's hope that strangles the life of the earth, hope that fills the land and water with poison, the hope that something might be better for our children, and the hope that our pestilential children might somehow impossibly behave other than humans have ever done. Hope places around our necks the thin, piano-wire garrotte of sustainability, and chuckles in syncopation with our breathless gasps. Hope throttles us with our efforts to bring "justice" and "peace", to fight "oppression", for we stand in the shadow of one hundred thousand years of world-rending growth and ecological annihilation and proclaim that without darkness, we would never have been able to understand the properties of light.
Silkscreen How-To
Posted August 10, 2009 by jmacphee in How-To
I just stumbled upon this great, easy to follow silkscreening how-to on the No Media Kings site. It's written by artist Shannon Gerard and is a simple, straight-forward introduction to screenprinting, images and all. Check it out HERE.
Print Secrets Revealed!
Posted July 15, 2009 by meredith_stern in How-To
Here is a photo of my most recent linoleum block that reveals my latest secret to more colors on one print. Pictured here is me inking 5 colors on one block. The print will be cut apart and collaged later.
We are fucked.
Posted January 14, 2009 by roger_peet
Ladies and Gentlemen, the jury has returned from their deliberations and they have delivered the following verdict: we are fucked. Yes, fucked. The Earth is strapped down to a filthy bed in a back alley of some benighted slum and is having the guts ripped out of it by the forsaken human race. Let's examine a brief digest of current news that illustrates this problem, namely the problem of OUR BEING FUCKED. 
It was recently the 20th anniversary of the death of Chico Mendes, the Brazilian rubbertapper who was murdered by a cattle rancher and his son for the crime of opposing rainforest clearance in Brazil's Acre region. Mendes' legacy is a network of what are known as "extractive reserves", where people can make a living from the rainforest without chopping it down. That living takes the form of tapping trees for rubber, collecting medicinal plants, and the like. Unfortunately, since the world rubber price has crashed, the tenants of the extractive reserves are now chopping down the forest to grow corn and soybeans and FUCKING SUGARCANE FOR YOUR GODDAMN BIOFUEL CARS. Economics trumps principles, as per usual. Of course it does. If you've got starving children to feed and there's a pristine rainforest right outside your backdoor, guess who loses?
Evo Morales, much vaunted defender of indigenous rights and Bolivian energy independence, opponent of neoliberal development schemes and water privatization, has agreed to permit oil exploration in 400,000 hectares of pristine rainforest in Bolivia's northeast. That oil is going to be used to earn hard currency to raise the standard of living for the vast number of impoverished Bolivians, the majority of whom are indigenous. If you've got starving citizens and a pristine rainforest in your northeast, guess who loses?
Anarchy Snowflake!
Posted December 8, 2008 by bec_young in How-To
I'm excited that it's that time of year again. I don't mean the time of year for cheesy songs that play over and over in public places, or the time of year for rampant socially-sanctioned consumerism. No, I mean the time of year for cutting paper snowflakes! I thought I'd make a pattern and share it with you. Now, get out your scissors!
I recommend you use paper that's relatively thin, otherwise it will be hard to fold and cut. There are different ways to fold your paper in order to get the hexagonal snowflake shape. I used the method on this homeschooling website, but don't be fooled- paper snowflakes are not just for kids! After folding your paper you should have a kite shape. Fold that in half for a scalene triangle. Cut out the pattern as shown above left, starting with the half-heart shape, and then cut everything around it. Above right shows you how it should look once it's unfolded partially, back to the kite shape. On your second flake, just free form it!
Alternatives to Spray Paint: Try Mud Stencils!
Posted December 29, 2007 by nicolas_lampert in Street Art & Graffiti
Milwaukee-based artist Jesse Graves created a number of mud stencils that he recently put up on sidewalks and the sides of buildings. Below is his “how-to-guide” and a link to his website with more images.
To avoid using toxic spray paint, I found a way to make mud stencils. Here is how you do it.
Materials: Mylar, X-Acto knife, tape, mud, sponge.
1. Design your stencil. Draw your stencil the size you want it, or design it on a computer and print it. Make sure you do not have islands (parts of an image that will fall out if you cut around them, like the middle of an O.) If you are using text, use a stencil font. If are using a computer print your design the size you want the stencil to be. If it is larger then 8X10 cut it apart in photo shop and print it in pieces, or enlarge it at a local copy store.
2. Cut it. Tape your design behind or in front of the transparent Mylar. Mylar is the same stuff used as transparencies for projectors, you can find a roll of it at art stores. Use the X-Acto knife to cut your deign out of the Mylar.
3. Get Mud. Find or make some mud. I mixed soil and water then beat it with a whisk. Make sure your mud is not watery. It should be about the same consistency as peanut butter.
4. Post it. Tape the stencil to whatever you want it on, it works on sidewalks or walls. If parts of the Mylar roll up put some tape under it. Then use the sponge to dab the mud on your stencil. Do not press too hard because if you squeeze muddy water out of the sponge it may sneak under the stencil.
5. Enjoy. Remove the tape on the outside of the stencil. Carefully remove the Mylar, and enjoy you non-toxic mud stencil.
This is still an experimental process. Post your comments, ideas, and pictures at http://mudstencils.wordpress.com/
