Mt. Cook, NZ time-lapse

One final time-lapse from Mt. Cook, New Zealand. All of these NZ videos were created when I was at the New Pacific Studio residency...

Kiwi [night vision]

I realized I promised I would post video of some of the kiwi I saw, but never did. I caught one calling out (very cool) and one actually touching me (accidentally). These little buggers are absolutely fascinating to me.

Mt. Cook, NZ sunset time-lapse

Castlepoint, NZ tilt-shift

Mt. Cook, New Zealand

A time-lapse I shot when I was down in New Zealand. Never got around to editing or posting any of the time-lapses until now.

Lake Tahoe

We haven't had any clouds in a week. Nice to finally see some clouds up at Lake Tahoe...

Mike Dibb

When I was at the Blue Mountain Center, I met Mike Dibb, a documentary filmmaker from the UK. Mike learned of an inmate named Donny Johnson at the Pelican State Prison. He was introduced to him by a friend of his, Steve Kurtz, and he has been corresponding with him for some time. Donny has been in solitary confinement for 20 years. In order to try and stay sane, Donny began to create tiny paintings. Since he isn't allowed paint or brushes, he has had to improvise and has made brushes from his own hair, and paints by extracting ink from pens and by dissolving the coatings on M&Ms and Skittles candies for color. He started mailing them to Mike after they started corresponding.

Here is another detail:





And this is the back of the card he painted it on.

Beth Thielen and BerkShares

This is Beth Thielen (left) with one of her projects. Beth is another artist and activist I met at the Blue Mountain Center. She told us about an experiment in the Berkshire region of Massachusetts where they are printing their own currency which they call BerkShares. Exchanging $100 gets you $105 BerkShare dollars.



Beth sent me an email this morning (with the image above) and the message, "What better way to participate in an experiment for an alternative economic future than to buy my morning coffee with BerkShares!"

I took a snapshot of some of the currency. The top two are the fronts of bills and the remainder are the backs:



From their website, this is an explanation of BerkShares:

"BerkShares are a local currency for the Berkshire region. Dubbed a "great economic experiment" by the New York Times, BerkShares are a tool for community empowerment, enabling merchants and consumers to plant the seeds for an alternative economic future for their communities. Launched in the fall of 2006, BerkShares had a robust initiation, with over one million BerkShares having been circulated in the first nine months and over two million to date. Currently, more than three hundred and sixty businesses have signed up to accept the currency. Five different banks have partnered with BerkShares, with a total of thirteen branch offices now serving as exchange stations. For BerkShares, this is only the beginning. Future plans could involve BerkShare checking accounts, electronic transfer of funds, ATM machines, and even a loan program to facilitate the creation of new, local businesses manufacturing more of the goods that are used locally."

Fire

I miss hanging around the campfires at the Blue Mountain Center.

Susan Rosenberg

Susan kicked everyone's ass in ping pong. Everyone's.

Blue Mountain Center

I have been so caught up with other things (Apple training and traveling) that I haven't updated in a long while. About a month ago I was at the Blue Mountain Center. These are just a handful of images from BMC.



Eddie Martinez



Paul Rucker

Burned

On rare occasions, I get asked what happened to my old web site. "Why are the links broken?" "Why is it on fire?"

There is no deep explanation. You can visit timguthrie.com and see the burning remains for yourself, but it might be worth repeating the reasoning behind disabling my old site and why I even have a blog in the first place.

So...

You can visit this link to read a full explanation, but this was never meant for anyone beyond friends and family. It doesn't cover anything even slightly important. This spot isn't special, but friends asked me to keep a blog and I complied.

"But why is the other site on fire?"

Since this blog became my temporary new site and because I hated my old web site, I decided to disable it. Then, I set the site on fire (virtually speaking). No good reason. Just thought it was mildly humorous.

Sure, it's nice when I get a random email asking to reactivate my old website so someone can show another friend my (old) art, and I admit I will eventually reactivate the site.

And, no, this isn't very professional of me. Maybe I will get a new site up before the summer ends (doubtful before the year ends, to be honest). At that time, I will likely stop updating this blog (at least on a regular basis).

Of course, when this blog stops being used, someone is bound to ask why. But since this blog never existed for any lofty reason and it won't be missed by more than probably a half dozen people (and not really even by any of them), I don't foresee any protests.

But there you have it. That is why my website has been on fire for over a year, now.

Burn, baby, burn.

Blue Mountain Center

This is also a scheduled post. I should be at the Blue Mountain Center by now, participating in a special "Prison Sessions" artist residency. I am not sure how much internet access I will have, but hopefully I can post images of new drawings I will be working on while at BMC.

This residency relates to the extraordinary renditions project I have mentioned earlier on this blog and will consist of pieces that will be exhibited in Reno (July) and Kansas City (November).

New Pacific Studio, pt 3

I can't believe my time at NPS has gone by so quickly. When I was in Denmark, I essentially worked on things that I could have done anywhere and afterwards thought, "Why didn't I actually immerse myself in Denmark?" I mean, Ørslev Kloster was a GREAT residency run by this very cool guy, Garry, but still ... I didn't take advantage of the country other than to cycle around.

While at the residency in Ireland, I definitely did more things that were specific to the project and I actually took time to see and use parts of Ireland and Annaghmakerrig. That was a smart move, of course.

So, I decided at the last minute before the New Zealand residency to handle it very differently. The proposal was sent well over a year ago when I was still toying with nuclear testing research (which reminds me, Kay found some great articles in the local paper - I will have to write about that later). Now I am focused on very different projects, mostly relating to the environment. So, I decided I better actually see and experience New Zealand and the environment rather than just sit in front of a computer for several weeks.

So, I traveled. Fun, but more importantly, I spent a lot of time just thinking while driving. This might come across as self-indulgent or extravagant, but it may ultimately have turned out to be a good move. I resolved parts of the animation, designed new pieces, and resolved part of the upcoming Fontenelle exhibit all by just getting away from everyone and everything and just thinking... It was like going on the longest, coolest walk ever.

I am not sure what to share here until I commit some of the things to paper or digital file.

I can share this, however: I brought a part of Fontenelle Forest with me to NPS. I wove the branches into the bark of a tree at NPS so they were roughly pointing toward Fontenelle.

Angel ... audio

Just a quick comment. Again, Mark Roper wrote Angel and is the poet I worked with at the Tyrone Guthrie Center at Annaghmakerrig. I told him that I would not post the audio file of the narration. I don't want to give everything away, especially since I am already spoiling so much by updating you with images. I was thinking of making an animatic, but decided against posting something like that, as well.

However, I really wish you could hear the audio that is nearly complete (but I can't bring myself to post). The poem is so good. Mark's narration sounds perfect (Thanks in large part to Sandy's excellent equipment). And, when I was in Paris, I worked with Maureen Evans-Hansen and Patrick Michaud on music. Maureen essentially did the music (Patrick was mainly the technician. And then there was me towering over her shoulder constantly making comments ... poor, patient Maureen).

Well, I hadn't listened to the sound file since August when I was last experimenting with timing/pauses, extra sound effects, etc. Of course, I have read the poem or heard the narration so many times. I know it forwards and backwards. I know what the voice of Angel sounds like (I have come to know him as just Angel rather than "the angel")

Yet, when I played it a few days ago, I got goosebumps when Angel sings

---

and a side note, I also still think Sandy's narration for the fetus story is funny. I don't know if I will ever pursue that piece, though ... sadly, I think it has been abandoned

More random stuff

I was with Nick White shooting video of the Te Apiti wind farm today. I won't post any videos here (not even sure how I will use them just yet). Instead, here are a few random images from our excursion:



This is just a fraction of the windmills set up on the wind farm (Nick doesn't like the phrase wind farm). These are the earlier models, probably set up during the 90's.



One of the many newer and larger wind turbines.



So many sheep here. They were all around the bases of the wind turbines.



We also hiked around some rainforest areas near the Manawatu Gorge. No, not where they filmed Lord of the Rings (why do people keep asking me this?) but similar stuff.

NZ Shaman quote

This is Nick White, an artist here in New Zealand. He and I will explore the Manawatu Gorge today. The other day, he relayed a quote to me that a shaman (his word, but he might have also used Kahuna) here in New Zealand told him:

"What we do to the Earth, we do to ourselves."

Miniature experiment

Not much to see here. It is only a few seconds long and very little happens in this video. It is just a quick experiment miniaturizing with tilt-shift photography. I might have to play a bit more to achieve what I want.



I know it is hard to see in a tiny video, so here is a still you can click on for a larger detail view. It might give you a better idea of where I am going.

New Pacific Studio, pt 2

Some of these images have larger detail images linked to them. Click if you see the little hand.

That's Kay Flavell, the Director of the New Pacific Studios. She took me up on a long hike on her neighbor's 350+ acre farmland so we could see NPS from above.



This is about a third of the way into our walk.



If you click to view the detail and look really hard (centered vertically and about a third in from the right) you can see the NPS from where we were standing.



This is a telephoto shot of that area where you can see the back of the NPS.

New Zealand from space

That's right. From space.



I can't quite make out the studios from this angle.