Clogged Currents Dance at Sub Zero Festival

Last Friday was the Sub Zero Festival in San Jose. I created three large banners that were displayed outside the San Jose Museum of Quilts and Textiles. Visitors added elements to the banners throughout the evening and at 9:00pm and 10:00pm dancer Christina Braun danced to music created by composer Scott Perry. This is the second time that we three have worked together and Christina has named our collaboration efforts "Nectar".

The Sub Zero event was a lot of fun and later I was told that over 1,200 visitors entered the Quilt Museum. We were stationed outside so even more passed by. Below are images at the beginning of the evening. The event ran from 6 to midnight.














































Here are some images of the set up and the visitors beginning to come and participate in the visitor activity which was creating diatoms from recycled plastics and attaching them to the water banners. Rob Bell of Zomadic made these beautiful stands. For the craft activity I had the help of Susan Suriyapa, a grad student at San Jose State. She was really fantastic and full of energy(back to camera in black).























Below:Visitor elements beginning to be added.























I am glad that I got a chance early on to see what else was at the festival. I love this car. I had actually seen it in the Mission District of San Francisco a few weeks prior on Portrero and 26th.


















The ball below was one of two spinning around flashing lights and emitting music. I loved the way it looked with the scattered Jacaranda flowers that happened to have fallen from the trees lining the street. It looked like purple confetti and at first I thought the flowers were intended elements of the display.


















Below: Christina Braun before getting dressed for the performance. She was wonderful helping getting the lights and booth set up and she even made a diatom. I loved how relaxed and happy she was. I would have been totally stressed if I was about to perform!























Below: Scott Perry getting the music set up for the dance performance. He brought all his own equipment and the necessary black tape to hold the cables down. He, too, was super adaptable. He came expecting the performance to be inside (I had mentioned it might be inside if it rained), but was ready to set up outside and I am sure had to lug his equipment from a few blocks away at least as the streets were blocked off in the area of the festival.























I love this jellyfish like creation by a visitor. This is right before the first dance performance started at 9:00 pm. There was a large crowd around for both performances.























Christina showing Anna (Scott's girlfriend) how to use her camera before the performance.























Here is a description of the performance Clogged Currents:
Enveloped in plastic grocery bags and an illuminated diatom hat, San Francisco butoh artist Christina Braun will dance two performances centering on the water themed tapestries of Corinne Okada Takara. Her eerie and playful movements will reflect upon plastic bags clogging waterways and algae blooms flourishing in the stagnation. Contemporary music representing sludge, filth, and pollution in nature created by composer Scott Perry. Costuming will be elements which remove from Takara’s large water tapestries in front of The San Jose Museum of Quilts and Textiles.
The performance begins!














































Below: A short video snippet of early portion of dance performance.

































































A video snippet of a later portion of the performance:

Visitor Participatory Diatom Project

Here is my step-by-step board for the woven diatom visitor project at the San Jose Museum of Quilts and Textiles for the Sub Zero Festival tomorrow. There will be a second activity which is creating diatoms from plastic bottle bottoms. All materials were collected from creek clean ups and schools.













Today I will be prepping the plastic bags into strips for the weaving. I will also have print out images of diatoms for inspiration.

Refining the Visitor Activity of The Quilt Museum's Sub Zero Project

I have spent a few hours refining what will be the visitor component of the San Jose Museum of Quilt and Textile project for the Sub Zero Festival on June 5th.
The visitors will have a choice of creating diatoms from plastic bottle bottoms or weaving a diatom from plastic bag yarn.

I have chosen the imagery of diatoms because these bloom in our creeks when they are clogged with plastic bags, bottles and all the other garbage that have led our Guadalupe River and Coyote Creek to be declared "Impaired".

I have already prepped all the plastic bottles collected from the Rotary Club clean up at Guadalupe river and collected from a Walk-a-Thon from Stevens Creek Elementary. All that remains is to hole punch these so that they can be tied down to the banners after the visitor has decorated them.

The plastic bags are being collected at Lynnbrook High School in Cupertino and at Horace Cureton in Alum Rock.

Below: Plastic bottle diatom samples.These are created by cutting off the bottoms of plastic bottles and then decorating them with permanent magic markers.








































Below: Diatoms woven samples. Made from pipe cleaners, floral wire and plastic bag yarn and produce netting.

Plastic Bag Collection for Sub Zero Festival Project

I have begun collecting plastic bags and bottles from schools and a creek clean up. Above are some of the bags. I will cut these and link them into strips to create "yarn" for visitors to weave into diatom shapes.
This poster below went out the sculpture art classes at Lynnbrook High School in Cupertino. I will be visiting James Lick in East San Jose as well. I have been collecting from Stevens Creek Elementary and will also solicit from Horace Cureton in Alum Rock.























I know no one at James Lick, but will be contacting their art department to at least talk with them. I am curious to know more about their art program. It is such a busy time for schools right now. They are wrapping things up, there are tons of events going on and I expect I will be lucky to get a handful of bags from each school. Happily I just got a bunch of produce netting in the mail from The Wing Luke Museum. I also get a lot of this netting from mom friends and teachers at my son's school, Stevens Creek Elementary. I will be using this plastic in the banners, too.

Below: some of the plastic used on the base banner tapestries. Not a great shot and I have two here stacked as I need my building board for the third banner.
























I have been researching semi permanent installations and light festivals. I found this. I think the beauty of the installation is partly in the lovely old buildings:
http://www.valgusfestival.ee/eng/hansaflux.html

















I also found this and was pretty excited.
http://www.valgusfestival.ee/eng/virmalised.html









































The San Jose Museum of Quilts and Textile activity for the Sub Zero Festival will also use plastic bottles. The visitor will be using only the bottoms of the plastic bottles, decorate them with colored permanent markers and attach them to the banners. Some of these plastic "diatoms" will light up with led lights I got at IKEA. I had hoped to purchase the solar powered led lights but they are completely sold out everywhere. I was surprised but I guess I shouldn't have been. They were well designed, simple and elegant. Below are the small battery powered led lights I purchased instead. I will just have to switch these on during the festival. I had really wanted solar powered led lights and will keep exploring that for future illuminated outdoor projects. This initial disappointment in not being able to get these led me to research light festivals and how others incorporte light into their semi permanent art.

Second Water Tapestry for San Jose Quilt Museum

Above: wire work and painter's tape making where mesh will go.

I have completed the rough background for the second water themed banners. This one uses blue mesh donated from Walker Bags of San Francisco and some recycled blue plastic bags. These four large tapestries will be part of a visitor participatory project and semi permanent installation for the San Jose Museum of Quilts and Textiles. The visitor component will happen during the Sub Zero Festival in Downtown San Jose on June 5th (6pm to midnight).

Below: Tape marking off areas to add mesh to. Illustrator file print out of design.
























Below: I have begun hand sewing the mesh on with fishing line. I am not using thread as it would rot and be more fragile for this exterior banner project. I keep making the mistake of putting the needle and fishing thread in my mouth as I normally do in hand stitching...mistake. The fishing line is treated with something that irritates my mouth (a numbing agent for fish?..I have no idea). Anyway, that combined with my now pretty blistered hands from intensive wire work make me think, wow, this is what we mean suffering for our art!























The blue plastic trash bags are stitched on from the back.

Water Tapestry Banners

I have begun the first of the water tapestry banners for the San Jose Museum of Quilts and Textiles.
Below: wire frame built upon a black foam core support.























The pattern is modified off of a Japanese kimono print and it reminded me of water undulating.
Each banner will be around 7ft x 3ft x 5" deep. Here is the first one started. I hope I don't run out of wire. This stuff is expensive now and I double it up by twisting it with a drill. I will be covering some areas with colored mesh donated by Walker Bag of San Francisco. Most of the detail elements of the diatoms will be created and added by visitors to the Sub Zero Festival. I will be creating some larger elements that light up and one will remove as a hat for the butoh dancer.

Mesh in process of being added. Note the blue painter's tape outline I am using. The tape enables me to transfer the design to the grid on the foam core for each particular banner. I then take the tape off and reapply the tape to create the next banner's mesh pattern. This way I can use the same foam core for all banners.























Below: Banner removed from black foam core and temporarily attached to T stand. The color is not as vibrant off of the foam core, but I am hoping when it is suspended in front of the tinted windows of the museum the mesh will appear as vibrant as it did on the foam core. I am hoping we can hang them a few inches away from the glass to highlight the airy nature of the grid. I also hope people don't mess with it! This is the first time I have created exterior public art and I just hope no one is tempted to test how flexible the wire is. I kind of wish these could hang above arm reach and then I wouldn't worry.























I am approaching this as both a design challenge (keep the and labor and material costs down as much as possible) and as a learning ground on how to outreach for a public art project in a very short period of time. I have started contacting four schools soliciting donations of colored grocery bags and I will provided them with info regarding the water exhibit at the museum, the Sub Zero Festival and the "impaired" status of our Coyote Creek and Guadalupe River. The cost of this project is really is in the labor of the banners and the materials prep. I am doing this project really for the experience of an outdoor public art display. I have only created interior public art before and this will be a good test for me.

Detail of prelim sketch on black foam core:























Below: Mesh donated by Walker Bag of San Francisco. I have been fortunate enough to have benefited from the generosity of several businesses in the past and have stored up on some pretty special materials that I have be able to use for public art.




















Some of this mesh was used at De Anza College for the construction fence around the site of the new Visual and Performing Arts Center.
http://www.deanza.edu/euphrat/collaborations.html


























Above: Diatom test for visitor participatory component of banners. Visitors will decorate these cut off bottoms of plastic bottles with permanent markers. They will decorate them to look like diatoms. I have a large collection of these plastic bottles collected from a Guadalupe River clean up last weekend and from a Walk-a-Thon from Stevens Creek Elementary School in Cupertino. I have contacted a high school in Cupertino through its art department and they have agreed to collect plastic bags. I have also contacted an elementary school in Alum Rock and will be soon contacting a high school in Alum Rock regarding this project.

Butoh Water Dance Concept

I was asked by a San Jose museum to brainstorm on ideas for a public participatory activity that tied into Bay Area water issues and textiles for the SUBZERO Festival in June.

I have been thinking of a project that would incorporate small amounts of local water into a very large dramatic outdoor hanging “tapestry”. The tapestry would be composed of hundreds of recycled snack sized clear ziplock bags folded and partially filled with water. Each bag would suspend from an earring hook that is pre-attached to a large metal grid. At night this hanging “tapestry” could be lit up really fantastically. The project would work like this:

1. Visitor receives a zip lock bag.

2. Visitor cuts out a water related shape (ie: fish) from recycled scraps of fabric. Maybe writes something about water conservation?

3. This small shape is placed into the bag.

4. Visitor partially fills bag from water provided (buckets will be there labeled with what the source was)

5. Bag is folded in half and hung from an earring hook on large outdoor vertical grid.

I thought it would be also interesting to create a dramatic garment composed of local water filled baggies (recycled baggies) that a butoh dancer wears and breaks as she moves to music concrete made up of sounds from water sources in the Bay Area. Maybe part of the garment would be plastic bags reclaimed from creek and Bay water clean ups.

Butoh dancer I am thinking of is Christina Braun. She is a choreographer/producer of SF Butoh LAB and Co-producer of BUTOH SanFrancisco's "80/08" Butoh Dance :
http://www.flickr.com/photos/goodlux/246283848/in/set-72157594472240023/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/goodlux/173103389/in/set-72157594472240023/

I envision the tapestry illuminated at night, but not at a high cost so I have been thinking of solar options. The dance performance I would like to be in the evening as well or at least at dusk.

Possible solar lighting options:
Solar Glowing Globes by Frontgate: $49.99 each (shifts through different colors)


















I really enjoy these round floating lights as they remind me of the old Japanese glass fishing floats so prized in Hawaii when my dad was growing up. After big storms these glass floats would sometimes wash ashore unbroken. I remember at my grandma's house on Maui there were a few of these precious finds nested away in the garage.

Solig Solar lights from IKEA $7.99 each. Man, good price!














I need to see how luminous these are at night and I need to find out if they are study enough to be among foot traffic during the festival days.

It would be great to have a combination of each type of light...