Mindfulness & Making

The blog has moved

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 16:06:00 +0000

Dear Readers,

I moved my blog to a new address and it is now running on a wordpress engine. You can find it here. http://una-love.com/reneeblog/

Please pardon its appearance while I figure out how to customize.

-Renee

Moving the Blog

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 16:17:00 +0000

Dear Readers,

Due to changes Blogger has made to their blog builder, I will be transferring this blog to a Wordpress engine, but it will remain at this address. I'm not sure how to do this, or what it may do to your rss feed, if you subscribe. So please check back at this location in about a week.

I'm hoping to write more here soon, once I get this transfer sorted out. I may also begin writing for Mindful Metropolis. I'm not sure of the content for that column yet, but I think it will be more like art reviews and studio visits with artists, so I think I will keep my auto-biographical approach here.

Thank you for reading.

Sincerely,
Renee

Neutrality

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 22:28:00 +0000

Happy New Year! Sorry I’ve had such a long hiatus from writing. I would love to blame it on something like the end of the semester, the holidays, vacation, etc., but I don’t really believe it was any of those. I believe my silence is the result of and overwhelming feeling of neutrality I’ve had for a while. Its not quite a depression, but more like a type of boring contentment. I’ve had no inspiration to make work in my studio or apply for shows and its really becoming quite frustrating.

I’ve started some of what I need to do to turn this around.

Get back on track with meditation. I tend to loose my momentum during the holidays and while traveling, something I’m embarrassed to admit, but I am getting back on track with my at home practice, and I am signed up for the next evening class, Contentment in Everyday Life at The Shambhala Center.
Exercise. After our ski vacation I am really inspired to exercise outside nearly everyday even when it is cold, snowy and icy here in Chicago. I’ve been cross-country skiing once and have been urban hiking around town in my new yaktrax.
Reading. I’ve started to dive into my new books starting with “The Critique Handbook, A Sourcebook and Survival Guide” Which will help me lead more rigorous critiques during this next semester.
Going to my studio. This area still needs improvement. I just need to go there, even when there is seemingly nothing to do.
Remain open. It seems like I’ve been short circuiting every idea. “Oh that won’t work.” or “Thats dumb.” Almost all my work is the result of making one thing and discovering something else unexpected. Without the making part, the discover will never come.
Go to see art. This is also on the to-do list. I want to go to some openings and make use of my new Art Institute membership this week.
Be Gentle. I am also reading “Start Where You Are,” and I need to remind myself of Pema’s gentle approach constantly. Beating myself up for perceived failures will not get me anywhere. Lately, even though I’ve been accomplishing things from my to do list, I only feel like I’ve done nothing.
Sketchbook! Work in it. I am planning to cut out everything I found inspiring from last year’s Sculpture Magazines for my sketchbook, and review previous notes and ideas.
Help someone. This is something I’ve been aware of since undergrad. Somehow helping someone else really gets things going. I don’t have any art friends I can help at the moment, but I will be helping my neighbor design some storage solutions for her condo.

Hope your new year is of to a more inspired start.

Seeking Contributions and Contributors

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 21:53:00 +0000

Dear Artists, Artisans, Writers, Craftspeople, Musicians, Designers, Carpenters, and Makers of All Kinds,

Do you use a meditative practice in your life? What is your meditative practice and how does it relate to your making practice? How does your making community relate to your meditative practice? How does your meditative community relate to what you make? How do make time for meditation and making?

I’m looking for contributions and contributors for this blog. Please consider writing about your experience with mindfulness and making. Unfortunately, I cannot offer you fame or fortune for your contribution, but I hope you will help create a community of dialogue here online. If enough people begin to contribute, I am interested in moving this blog to its own domain and collaborating with interested people on developing it.

Please submit your finished and titled essay, a short bio, your website address and/or blog address to me reneeuna at gmail.com.

Thank you!

Art, Teaching and Meditation

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 21:43:00 +0000

I wrote an essay for Chicago Artist’s Resource on the relationship of art, teaching and meditation in my life. You can read it on their site.

Open Crit @ Hyde Park Art Center

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 21:05:00 +0000

Last Thursday I was included in a new program at The Hyde Park Art Center: Open Crit. It was lead by photographer Daywoud Bey and curator Nathan Mason, both were so great. Three other artists were selected to present and the room was full of great people who contributed. I showed Orange Jelly and my ceramic fungi and received great observations and suggestions. The atmosphere was really great, all participants were motivated by being helpful and honest. I would recommend this program for anyone. I will be back as an audience member because I feel like I’m rusty in the art discourse.

Demoted/Downsized

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 16:38:00 +0000

Recently, an employer of mine dramatically reduced my appointments and consequently my pay. This sadden me since I thought of this as may main employment, it not only provided me with the lions share of my income, but it was also a stimulating appointment for me and my students. I felt very invested in the program even though I was only part time. Since this reduction, my responsibilities have been ambiguous and greater then my remaining appointment would indicate. In short I have been demoted/downsized. In this economy many people are doing more work for less money, and are glad to be doing it, but it is frustrating and stings in very real and human ways, and is probably an excellent moment for practice.

Things I am not doing:

Recognizing the impermanence of everything, but namely jobs and associated responsibilities, or even that this demotion could be impermanent.
Recognizing that I have no self, and clinging to any identity (even one associated with employment) will bring suffering.
Recognizing habitual behavior as the creator of cocoons and other restrictive protective devises of the mind.
Answering the question my dad asked himself when he was demoted late in his career.

“If I didn’t have this job, and someone offered me this job, would I take it?”

This question is like a reset button. It is precise. It elegantly releases the past from dictating the future and brings the situation into the present moment. It reminds me that everyday is a new job and every moment is filled with the unexpected.

Hopefully soon, by applying effort, I will be doing the above.

The Path of Labor

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 01:36:00 +0000

From Franconia Iron 2009

This summer I had the great opportunity to participate in Franconia Sculpture Park’s Thirteenth Annual Iron Pour. This took the form of a week long residency living and working at the park with over seventeen other artists making our molds and preparing for the pour.

The process of making cast iron art is extremely labor intensive, and the process of making it out of doors, competing with the weather, and sometimes for working space is even more strenuous. All the steps needed to create the art, from making sand molds, to cracking iron radiators into small pieces and breaking coke into small pieces, to pouring the molten iron itself, is just so HEAVY! I had participated in many pours when I was younger and I remembered what hard work they were. In fact, I lifted weights in preparation for this residency to protect my back from what was coming. After the first two days of working I almost felt as if it was more than I could do. It was so much harder than I remembered. I worked almost from dawn to dusk most days, which was facilitated by sleeping in a tent. Most of my fellow artists kept the same schedule. As more days past, I was still so very tired, but my production did not decrease. I think this was mainly due to working with such friendly and dedicated artists. I fell into the river of momentum, which when it was white water was hard to keep my head above water, but was most often slow and steady. I began to love the intensity of working all day, never having to wonder what to do next because there was too much to do. I found that the intensity of the physical labor kept me in the moment almost the whole time. It was a one pointed labor. Only as I finished my projects did my mind have the space to wander and worry.

From Franconia Iron 2009

The pour was a spectacular culmination to the week. Many artists made very ambitious projects which were almost all successful and wonderful.

From Franconia Iron 2009

My modest project was not as successful as I’d hoped, but I left feeling completely inspired and happy, knowing that I would miss the hard work. After the pour many of the artists disappeared before I could say goodbye to them, and this seemed standard. When I left I was sad to leave, and felt myself foolishly clinging to the experience and happy to be coming home. I hope that I can carry that work ethic and one pointedness into my fractured practices of studio, and teaching.

I dream of a museum without curatorial comments.

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 22:13:00 +0000

This week I made my first trip to The Art Institute’s new Modern Wing with my mom and sisters. We had a lovely time there, and even got to eat in the new restaurant. I was quite pleased to see that the new Modern Wing, featured some much needed contemporary art, like Robert Gober, and Bruce Nauman, but I would have loved to see more (like the whole wing filled with contemporary art). The modern standards looked great as well, although much of the exhibit was the same work which was featured in galleries in the old building.

While wandering the galleries and looking at the work, I found those little curatorial tags to be particularly pesky. Not that they had changed at all: Artist Name, Nationality, Life Dates, Piece Dates, and a paragraph. That paragraph bothered me, like a person who keeps talking while you are trying to concentrate on a task. I found myself “feeling bad” if I didn’t read the paragraph, like I might be missing something, but then found the first two sentences to be so far from the experience of looking that I quit reading.

What would a museum be like without those paragraphs? What would it be like for the art to stand on its own? I dream of an exhibit where each work is free to stand on its own, free from the historical cannon, free from its family of work in another collection, free from the artist’s biography, free to be seen by an audience entrusted to have their own experience.

The Wheel of Technology

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 19:27:00 +0000

My foot is stuck in the samsaric wheel of technology. I’ve been meaning to write this entry for a while on iPod Touch v. Steno Pad, but now I see the wheel is stronger and more inevitable as I find myself needing to buy an Adobe Creative Suite.

iPod Touch v. Steno Pad

For many years I’ve been happily using a steno pad to keep my list of things to do. I even have a steno pad system.

Write everything down one sheet of the pad.
Cross things off as the are completed (very satisfying).
When that sheet becomes too jumbled up with crossed out things, copy the unfinished items onto a new sheet and add additional items
Repeat.

This is a good system, but it has some draw backs namely all the different activities I do in different locations. I need to keep in order what I need to accomplish in my studio, at the studio at Loyola, household things, and then there are the things I want to buy, which happens at stores, like what materials I need to buy for my studio, groceries, gifts, etc. I could easily make a list of my lists. Also the steno pad cannot talk to my online calendar that organizes my social life, my two jobs, and collaborates with my husband’s calendar. My online calendar is wonderful because I can access it at both my jobs, at home, if I’m visiting my parents, anywhere I can get on the internet. I cannot get on the internet at my studio and my steno pad cannot get on the internet anywhere.

My lists and my calendar are very interrelated. I was perfectly happy living in this “quagmire” until I was dazzled by my colleague's iPod Touch. Its does almost everything an iPhone does, but doesn’t have a huge monthly price tag. I can sync it to my online calendar, access it and update it even without wifi. It can keep many beautiful lists all at my finger tips, on which I can actually cross out my accomplished items, just like on paper. Furthermore I can check my email at a cafe, look up google maps, and of course listen to music and podcasts. This is it! This will be the tool that will make my life run so well it will be near perfection. HA!

How many times have I said that? iPod Touch will not solve all my problems, it will create as many new problems as it solves. My steno pad doesn’t need software upgrades and enjoy the slower pace of writing by hand. How mindfully will I use the iPod Touch? But, yet I know, soon I will make the switch. I know it is inevitable, I am just waiting for the next upgraded model to be released.

Meditation Retreat

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 21:29:00 +0000

I recently attended my first ever week long meditation retreat at The Atlanta Shambhala Center. This week long retreat was an Art Weekthun. Weekthun is a week long program based on the traditional Tibetan month long retreat Dathun. The art part of this meditation retreat was not the reason I choose this Weekthun over the others being offered this summer, I choose this one because of scheduling between my husband and I and because we could drive there. However this program was really perfect for me in all my practices, meditation, teaching and making.

The Atlanta Shambhala Center which hosted this Art Weekthun was so much more beautiful, grand, comprehensive and impressive then I could have ever expected. Their center and facilities are so wonderful, they are now being called an Urban Land Center. In about the past seven years they bought wonderful land with two buildings on it, built a large and beautiful new meditation hall, and acquired a guest house. I could not recommend doing a program there enough. I had such a great time, they are so friendly and wonderful it was just great.

The Art Weekthun was an interesting program consisting mostly of sitting meditation, but also interlaced with different art practices meant to be executed as a continuation of meditation practice. This was my first exposure to Dharma Arts. I found the form and the approach to be a great way to remind me of how my own art practice is a type of meditation practice. Getting into the “zone” or “flow” is the basic joy of making. The Dharma Arts we practiced there are like a direct connect to that place.

The Dharma Arts approach, for me, was at first too simple, but as I stayed with it, rather then being a know-it-all in my mind, I realized that within this simple approach was some of what I’ve been missing in my teaching. I needed to see and do very simple exercises to realize how I could connect and engage my students more. This lead to a conversation with Lance Brunner about my interest in mindfulness or contemplative practice in higher education. More on this later....

Equally important was the sitting meditation. I really felt my practice deepen. I really began to see the gears of my mind, and my ego’s agenda. There were wonderful moments of understanding. I can’t wait to do another Weekthun, hopefully soon or maybe a Dathun.

This blog seems so short and inadequate compared to my experience there. I know that it will offer me more to learn as time passes.

art weekthun at atlanta shambhala center 2009

Fungi @ Atlanta Shambhala Center

Mushroom Meditation

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Mon, 11 May 2009 18:35:00 +0000

This past Saturday I participated in my first morel hunt with fellow members of The Illinois Mycological Association in a forested area in the outskirts of Chicago. It was a great mixture of new foragers and seasoned experts. Fungal knowledge was shared freely about how to find morels as well as what other species of fungi were called. We all had a great time which culminated in finding a great number of morels at the end of our expedition.

Looking for morels or any mushroom reminds me of when a moment of insight arises. Like when I have a problem to solve, I research it, activity think about, sleep on it, and then when I’m doing something completely unrelated the solution reveals itself. Similarly when looking for morels, you must be mentally prepared, know what your looking for and where to look, but it is when I was NOT looking for them that I saw them. I would stand still, in the right spot and wait for them to reveal themselves to me.

Finding morels involves pattern recognition within the density of patterned information of the forest.

The first patterns learned are the pattern of Ash bark and what a dead elm looks like and you begin following these patterns through the forest.

Then once you see your first morel, the pattern of the cap is imprinted in your mind, and you look at the ground, hoping this pattern will jump up. The harder you look for the morel pattern on the ground, the less likely you’ll see it. I found that looking casually, like I was waiting for something else would cause them to appear.The rush of the reward of finding one can be blinding or sometimes it can bring clarity to see the neighboring morels. But, either way, eventually my mind had to “reset” to the patterns of the Ash, Elm and Morel, cycling through all three without hanging onto any of them too tightly. My mind also wanted to find other patterns, like, that they grow in the open, but then I’d find one under a bush, or that they grow about four feet from an Ash tree, but then I’d find one nowhere near an Ash tree. Ironically, our biggest find of morels was not distinctly near the two tell-tail trees, but was in an area that was more open.

After three hours of this on Saturday, when I closed my eyes, I could see the patterns, mainly of the Ash bark and the morel cap. I found myself looking at the roadside as we drove away, unable to stop looking for them, even as I was moving too fast and too far away to possibly see them.

Orange Jelly on display • Enjoy your commute!

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Wed, 06 May 2009 18:15:00 +0000

Orange Jelly is on display at Loyola University's Ralph Arnold Fine Arts Annex, 1134 W. Sheridan Rd., Chicago. It can be viewed from the street and in passing cars and is on display until August.

Orange Jelly is a an installation made from orange sweaters which have been transformed into a fungal invasion of the space. It is part of a series of works I've been making which use the form of fungi as a metaphor for liminal states of being. Fungi are liminal in that they commonly grow on dead things spanning the space between life and death and biologically they are more closely related to animals, but most people view them as plants.

I love exhibiting this peice in this gallery space because the space is liminal in that it acts as both a gallery and as public space.

View Ralph Arnold Fine Arts Annex in a larger map

Science, Buddhism and Art

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Sun, 19 Apr 2009 22:27:00 +0000

On April 10, 11, and 12 I took a course at The Shambhala Meditation Center in Chicago titled Consciousness, Compassion, and Transcendence which was taught by Jeremy Hayward. I was inspired by his first talk on Friday night when he talked about the principles that Buddhism and Science have in common, I thought these principles also applied to art. This blog entry is structured based on his talk and his comments on science and Buddhism. I’ve added my thoughts on art to each of his points.

Science, Buddhism and Art are based in questioning. They are based in a longing which is fundamental in humanity. This longing seeks the truth, but these three disciplines look for the truth in different yet complimentary ways. They have the following in common:

Art, Science and Buddhism are:

based on experiment not faith.

In science the hypothesis and experiment are fundamental. In Buddhism the practitioner learns by trying and doing and is not expected to believe anything that he or she cannot experience. In both of these practices dogmatism is out of place, but it is unfortunately often present in science and occasionally Buddhism.

In the case of art, experiment and faith converge. The artist is like a scientist performing experiments without a hypothesis. The studio is like a crazy lab or strange and wonderful manifestation of these experiments. The artist also has faith in his or herself. Her ability to know without knowing, from an intuitive place, which of the experiments are a true expression is essential. Not all experiments should make it out of the studio. Only some of the experiments create their own momentum within the studio and begin to drive the sequential experiments. This making is genuine. This is making without knowing. Once the artist sees what the outcome will be, the rest of the process is labor, just work to complete the piece.

Dogma also has no place in art. The “what is and isn’t art” argument should by now have reached the end of its rope. On the other hand art is not nihilistic. Art is not anything, but anything can become art.

aware of a disharmony between appearance and reality.

Science and Buddhism are both seeking a truth that is obscured by our limited faculties. The scientist is looking for fundamental principles and building blocks of the universe. The meditation practitioner is using meditation to experience without the duality of self and other prevalent in our consciousness.

The artist is also confronted by and confronting this disharmony. It is apparent when a student is learning to draw from observation like in my class at Wright College. The mind obscures what we see with assumptions and language, which is an obstacle to true observation. I see teaching students to draw from observation as a task of unlearning and letting go.

Artists are free to explore and manipulate the disharmony between appearance and reality. Artists include interpretive, emotional, and chaotic elements in their work to express a personal reality often clouded by disharmony. The disharmony between appearance and reality can be used a life long muse for artists inspiring works that are personally expressive and yet collectively appreciated.

recognizing the problem of the observer.

Scientists know that they as the experimenter are effecting the experiment and try to eliminate themselves from the experiment. Buddhists experiment on themselves, and know that the human mind is non-dualistic in nature, but that it expresses itself as dualistic in most situations, which creates an observer experience.

Artists are constantly working with and against the observer. I my own practice I’ve struggled with and have now come to rest in a confident place with the observer. In the past varied contrived observers would manifest in my mind like a multiple personality disorder and judge my work as I created it in my studio. “What would my mom think of this? My grandpa? My old professor? What would my peers say about it in a critique? Will galleries like it? Will someone want to buy this? Why do people buy art?....” I think the voices have both quieted and unified into a steady confidence. This took a while to happen and grad school helped this process. I took risks in grad school and was rewarded by the outcome of each one. I also think my meditation practice has helped. Its not that the observers have gone away, they remain an important team in my making. The more I realize that my art and my making are not about me, the easier it has been to work with the observer. Without the pressure of the self and a mandate of self expression the observer and the observed can merge.

concerned with cause and effect.

Science sees cause and effect as a linear progression because science has a concept of time. Buddhists see cause and effect as a network if interrelationships (karma).

On this topic the young artist unfortunately shares more with the scientist. I remember talking to a freshman at Alfred at the end of his freshman year about his next endeavors. He was very swept up with idea of creating a “body of work,” and was setting about this task as though he was writing a history book. I recommended that he make what he want without regard for a “body of work” and let some art historian or critic figure it out and “make sense of it all.” This approach to making saddens me when the artist is not aware of what he or she is participating in. This linear approach to making is structured not for the artist but for the marketplace and collector. It makes buying this artist’s work seem like they are buying into a greater plan, something that has already happened which mimics the post-mortum sale of an artist’s work. This also helps the galleries sell the work because it mimics selling a brand, not something messy and unpredictable like art. I think this type of making and buying is not genuine and is based on a construct that is not only out dated, but probably was never beneficial to either party. This linear construct of making and selling work implies that the artist is too wild and should be corralled and that collector is unable to buy what he or she likes.

Making should be open. The work of an artist will inevitably create some kind of body of work which will be deeper and more enriched without the addition of a linear construct. During my graduate studies I had to present my work in a one hour slide talk. Preparing for this talk was the first time I ever saw all my work together on a large light box. As I moved the work around I realized I had to begin my talk with work I did during high school because it was still relevant conceptually to the work I was pursuing in grad school, and is even still relevant now. This was a wonderful discovery, not a plan. The work should always be about discovery both for the maker and the viewer.

improving the human condition.

Buddhism is really driven by this. First you start with improving yourself, but your motivation is to get it together so you can help others. Science helps humanity, but only incidentally, its main focus is on phenomena, and if this results in atomic bombs or revolutionary medicine, the motivation was the same.

Talking about art improving the human condition is complex for me. Art as it is now, sequestered to its museums and galleries is hard to see has helping humanity. I say this as a “fine artist” working within the system of galleries and museums. This sequestered world is my world, for better or worse. However, I suggest that art does improve the human condition. The experience of the viewer, unaltered the dogma of history or criticism can be a genuine in the moment experience. Many viewers are separated from this experience because of the museum or gallery experience. They don’t feel they have the authority to view and experience the art on their own terms, but when they can be reunited with their own curiosity the viewing experience can be wonderful.

Creatively Stuck

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 03:02:00 +0000

During and after my latest exhibit I experienced a familiar decline in creative production. It took exhibiting a few times after graduate school to catch on to this now reoccurring trend. Even though I now come to expect a decline in creativity during and after an exhibit, it can still be frustrating. I used this time to reflect on this experience and other times in which I had lost the impulse to make. In my experience, getting stuck can be caused by a variety of reasons, but, I’ve narrowed it down to four major causes that affect me.

Causes of getting stuck:

Too much time: I make more and I am generally more creative when I am very busy. Recently, being hit by two spring breaks (from the two different schools I teach at) has not put a boost into my making but as rather taken a big chunk out of it.

Completing a big project: There’s so much energy going into the project, that once its completed there is a deflated feeling. What will I work on next?

Melancholy: In spite of what my husband may say, it happens to us all. It could be the weather, or too much partying, or a legitimate depression. Sooner or later the blues will get you, and keep you feeling heavy and unmotivated.

Uninspired: Being uninspired is a little like the chicken and the egg. If its not caused by melancholy, it will certainly cause it. Occasionally, I just don’t have any ideas.

I feel that within these obstacles are opportunities. Here are the solutions I try to implement after I have the awareness to realize that my art practice has slowed or stopped. Sometimes it takes a while to even realize that I’ve spent eight hours this week watching The Wire on DVD, not only because its gripping and addictive, but because I might be avoiding an obstacle. So after the light of awareness hits me, I try some of these transformations.

Problem: Too much time

Solutions:

The List:
Make lists. Make long term to do lists, but most importantly, make a list of accomplish-able tasks for the next day. Be sure to vary tasks, from the household, to the studio, to the recreational. Don’t try to punish yourself or make up for lost time by suddenly putting in 10 hours at the studio after a hiatus.

Volunteer:
Volunteer your time so you are more busy. Volunteer with an organization or just help your friend out with moving. Get out there and be helpful. You’ll feel great and productive and you’ll want to get back to work.

Get outside:
Just do something. Go to museums, galleries, socialize anything. Get out of your house. Break your routine.

Take a class/Join a club:
Meet new people, learn new things. Do something that seems totally non-art related.

Problem: Completed a big project

Solutions:

Give yourself a break (if you deserve it):
If you just completed a major show or a major project. Relax. There is generally a feeling of exhaustion from all the work or a post partum like depression. Give yourself some time to transition to the next project.

Catch up on the computer stuff:
Update your email list, and website. Do the clerical stuff you don’t have time for when you’re jammin in your studio.

Network:
Use your show as an opportunity to meet new people.

Look:
Look for new materials and new inspirations for your next projects.

Problem: Melancholy

Solutions:

Do Nothing:
No matter what, it will eventually pass. No really, it will. Sometimes what you resist, persists.

Wallow in it:
Better yet, use it as inspiration. Make drawings or simple notations of how you feel. All of experience is source material for your work, so don’t miss out on this just because it feels crappy.

Exercise:
Put it on your list of things to do and then do it. Elevating your heart rate will elevate your whole being. You don’t have to like it, but you just might after a while.

Read:
Read those books you’ve been meaning to get around to.

Just get to work:
Go to your studio and work, even if you feel crappy.

Problem: Uninspired

Solutions:

Meditation:
Continue your meditation practice, add more time or go on a retreat. Creating space in your mind will allow the next thing to bubble up. The first entry in google when searching “creatively stuck," says “Try Sitting With The Silence.”

Repeat:
Do something repetitive at home or in your studio. Allot a certain amount of time for this repetitive action and do it for the whole time. Repeat as needed.

Be patient:
.....

Finally some closing thoughts on staying creative.

Work without a purpose.
Draw something everyday.
Write by hand everyday.

Fluxliminal Closing Reception-Friday, March 20th, 5:30-7:30PM

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 01:44:00 +0000

Winter is over! Please join us for the closing reception of our show investingating transitional states using photography and sculpture, on the spring equinox, this Friday, March 20th, 5:30-7:30PM at Loyola University's Crown Center Gallery.

fluxliminal

Vesna Jovanovic and Renee Prisble Una present new work
investigating the changing world between states of being.

Feburary 27- March 20, 2009
Closing Reception: March 20, 5:30-7:30

Crown Center Gallery • 1001 West Loyola Avenue • Chicago, IL 60626 • 773-508-7510
Gallery Hours: 10am-7pm M-F, 12-4pm Sat & Sun and by appointment

Work in Progress- Orange Sweater Fungus, Mountain Stickers

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 22:26:00 +0000

I am making some new fungus forms using orange sweaters I buy at thrift stores. The colony is growing day by day. Vesna and I are trying to show together in the gallery space in the Art Annex at Loyola. We will both be showing work dealing with fungi and decay. I will include this piece and the ceramic works. Vesna will show really large photographs from a pinhole camera. We just need to set a date with the department.
These are my plasticine models for the next generation mountain stickers. “Mountain Stickers” will be an affordable installation art product that creates a collaboration between the collector and me, the artist. The work will be small scale, low relief mountain ranges that are easy to arrange and affix to the collector’s wall. The collector will have the option of leaving the material of the molded mountains exposed, or painting over them with their wall color to create a seamless installation. An exhibition label completes the piece and the collaboration.

I hope to have these ready for market and sale in a couple months.

Clocking In

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 22:43:00 +0000

The new year has started off great! I'm not really that into new years resolutions because I think they are too rigid of a concept, but I have made some changes.

Michael and I are meditating together almost everyday, and we have been to the Shambhala Meditation Center two Sundays in a row. Our goal was to meditate every day in January, but we have already fallen short of that, however our goal has created some momentum that has us returning to the cushion.

I have scheduled on my google calendar to be at my studio two hours every weekday this semester. I am off to a good start. My commitment is to be there for two hour even if there is nothing to do. I have been organizing and rearranging things over there and I am really enjoying it. It feels like a new studio. Committing to be there no matter what is already rejuvenating the practice of play that has been absent from my studio for many years.

New Work, Work for Sale, Updates

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Sun, 21 Dec 2008 16:37:00 +0000

Dear Friends and Colleagues,

New Work in Ceramics
I wanted to share some new work I created while teaching a ceramics handbuilding class this past semester at Loyola. The working title for the installation is Beautiful Decay- Fungi. All pieces are glazed stoneware. These are installed in my studio. I now need to find a place exhibit them. They can be installed easily with screws into any wall. They are the beginning of work I'll be exploring, which is purchasable installation art. Since much of my previous work is destroyed as the installation comes down, and can usually only be installed by me, this represents an exciting additional direction for investigation. This new work can be bought and installed by the consumer, transferring some of the art making experience to the consumer.

Beautiful Decay- Fungi looks at the beautiful and transformative quality of death and decay and reminds us of the cycle of destruction and creation.

Work for Sale
After the success of my recent show at minidutch, I was inspired to sell some affordable work through Etsy. Please check out my shop by clicking here. I will be adding more work to it from time to time. Hope you enjoy it.

Logo
Inspired by the sale of several pieces, I developed a logo to stamp my work with. I feel that this logo references a craftsman tradition or the chop signature of a sumi painter. Both really satisfy me. This stamp will accompany new work as a signature.

Instruction
I've just ended the best semester of teaching so far. Through an unexpected circumstance I was able to teach a ceramics Handbuilding class at Loyola in addition to the two sections of Sculpture I teach there, and the one section of Drawing I teach at Wright College. I feel like I've really found the symbiosis of teaching and studio work and I am proud to present some great student work from these classes on my website here.

This winter break promises to be a productive and busy time in my studio and sending out portfolios. I hope you have a Happy Holidays and a Great New Year!

Sincerely,

Renee Prisble Una

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Beautiful Decay

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 23:37:00 +0000

New work created at Loyola from the past semester. All pieces are glazed stoneware. These are installed in my studio. I now need to find a place exhibit them. They can be installed easily with screws into any wall. They are the beginning of work I'll be exploring, which is purchasable installation art. The work can be bought and installed by the consumer, transferring some of the art experience to the consumer.

Beautiful Decay looks at the beautiful and transformative quality of death and decay and reminds us of the cycle of destruction and creation.

Ceramic Fungi Samples

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 23:12:00 +0000

The success of these surfaces has prompted more forms. I had a great weekend in the studio at Loyola.

Leftover Leftovers

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 02:10:00 +0000

These four works are leftover from the Leftover's show. They are great pieces, two latex tubing pieces, and two masking tape paintings. Don't be the last people on the block with out one of my pieces! Contact me for more information!

New Business Card Design

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 23:37:00 +0000

What a long day of computering...My eyes are tired

Materials Exchange, Oct 12 @ mini dutch

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 13:33:00 +0000

In keeping with the spirit of my show at mini dutch, it will close Oct. 12th with a materials exchange. Bring all that crap from the corners of your studio to swap for new crap from someone else's studio. It should be fun! Meet and network with other artists, get rid of old materials, get some new materials.

Take a moment to post what you'll be bring here, if you know.

http://www.minidutchgallery.org/materials-exchange/

Artxposium this weekend!

renee@una-love.com (Renee Prisble Una) — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 04:39:00 +0000

Hey Everybody! Its time for Artxposium, carnival like, festive, art exhibit in West Chicago. Its worth the drive! I am showing the second incarnation of The Prayer Wheel Project. Hope you can make it.

artXposium 2008

On its second edition this year, artXposium is a 3-day multimedia art experience with more than 80 participating artists. Local, national and international talent will come together from September 19th to the 21st to display a variety of art work ranging from traditional painting, sculpture, and photography to interactive, multimedia, and sound installations. This years event also include the inaugural month long international artist-in-residence program featuring Danish artist Gudrun Hasle at the West Chicago City Museum.