[art, virtual worlds]

Winter Lights, an art and photography exhibit, has just opened in the Gallerie Octaviana. The show features work from Mad Swiss Cow, Marcel Moré, Sume, Marjie Kennedy, Pirate Johnny, Smiling da Vinci, and Nancy Waldman on the first floor of the expansive gallery space. Upstairs are two new installations of a Circleworks box and a hued light environment.

The owner and artistic curator of the gallery is Annie Octavia.

What you may now be realizing is that Annie and her gallery are located in the magical space of a virtual world called Second Life. Annie is the online avatar of Beth Felice. I interviewed Beth about Second Life, her gallery, the show, and some of the special kinds of creative works that are all the rage in this Other (S)P(l)ace.

Here’s the interview along with shots and videos from the gallery, the installation.

1. For those people who have never even heard of Second Life… can you give us a brief overview of what it is and how it works?

Second life is an example of a MUVE, multi-user virtual environment, a fancified way of saying 3D web browsing. Does it look like a video game, yes. Is there any “game” objective, not really. Who is there? Currently a vibrant world community of about 7 million, including over 350 colleges and universities, NASA, CDC, libraries, museums, both with counterparts in the physical world and those that exist only in second life (sl).

For a presentation I gave in November at the Federation of State Humanities Councils I created a wiki at http://virtualplace.missourihumanities.org/secondlife. You’ll find a nice assortment of articles, factoids and links there.

2. How long have you been involved in SL? How long have you had the Gallerie Octaviana?

I stumbled into SL Labor day weekend 2006. At that time there were about 400,000 users. There was a release of virtual land (512 square feet is included with each paid account) in December of 06 and I staked a claim then, and built the first gallery.

3. Have you had other exhibits?

Yes, I’ve quite enjoyed bringing flickr friends into SL, and hopefully vice versa.

4. Is exhibiting art in SL a good way to get publicity for one’s work?

I’m not sure if you are talking about a subjective or a metric here. In a way, there is a large community of eyeballs, a very organized art community, and the ability to have things on display 24/7. That being said, the most traffic is generated by real time events, openings, artist discussions, etc. I am most interested in this idea of immersion, of being able to walk the representation of self through the art. I am very interested in this intersection of photorealism and illustrative style, and using some of the fantastical qualities, the “magic” not possible in the physical world.

As an aside, I have read that up to 10% (and many believe this number might be higher) of the Sl community is physically challenged in some way. There are some pretty amazing stories about the communities of stroke survivors, wheelchair bound, autistic, and people living with chronic diseases like cystic fibrosis rejoicing in the ability to be “just another” person…or just another person that can fly.

I’m still stuck on the concept of publicity for one’s work. I’m not sure. I think the most interesting work might be that which combines sound, movement, scripting, graphic, and interpretation. And it might exist specifically in a place like SL. Am not sure that work ports straight across from a gallery wall around the corner, into the virtual gallery.

5. I think it’s fairly easy to conceptualize how you put images onto the “walls” of your gallery, but you also have moving 3-d sculptures. Those are a little tougher for me to imagine creating. Tell us about those.

I made a little video, creating an object, and assigning properties and “textures” (graphics). SL Prim-er for Practically Creative Quarter folks

[readers: be sure to check out this primer on prims.
it’s well done and totally intriguing.
also you’ll see the pcq home page on the gallery wall!]

6. Tell us about your alter ego, Annie Octavia. How is she like you? How is she different? Did you have an idea of who you would be on SL or did it evolve out of the experience of being there?

There seems to be an ongoing discussion between immersionists and augmentationists in virtual worlds. Some people want to explore parts of their personality they might not commit to IRL (in real life) and some people see the avatar as an extension of self, trying to make it as close to reality as possible. I remember one of the first librarian meetings I went to, one fellow had made himself into a two story tall dust ball.

There is actually a good deal of scholarly interest in these topics
virtualworldsconnect.com/
edition.cnn.com/2007/TECH/06/07/virtual_identity
ibiblio.org/nmediac/winter2004/matusitz.html
gwynethllewelyn.net

Annie began as a representation of self. I’m not much of an actor. Recently a great friend started to explore the visual and creative aspects of costume. Remember, as everything in SL is user created, this includes hair, clothes, etc. A current favorite designer mixes traditional Japanese costuming with a distopian future and goth.

7. What else would you like people who haven’t experienced it to know about Second Life?

In a way it is a next iteration of the internet, and reminiscent of how you might describe what one could find “online” in the early ’90s. It is a communication tool, a collaboration application. It takes the more singular activity of person browsing web via computer to a social activity.

8. Anything else you’d like to say that I neglected to ask about?

Winter Lights is up through April. Anyone wanting a little help learning the SL environment, please feel free to email. The next project is a more intensive scripting project, coordinating events of sound and image with avatar movement through space, or interaction with other avatars. I also seem to be composing a lot these days, and that happens in a very NON networked world!

A Visit to Gallerie Octaviana

When Beth asked me to be in her show this time, I decided to go visit Gallerie Octaviana. I had never been on Second Life but had heard about it, so I was curious. It takes a little time—but not money—to get set up there. I would estimate that it took me between one and two hours to begin. This included time to register and decide on the basic parameters of my avatar (my name is *Aplomb Pomilio*—you can freely choose your first name but the last name must be taken from an extensive list). Then I went to the orientation island where I figured out how to navigate, use the map, chat and appearance interfaces and so on.

I then set out in the world to find the gallery. Even though I thought I had the parameters, I was not able to find it on my own. Second Life is big! I landed in some pretty amazing places though. Finally, I had to email Beth and ask her to contact me in SL. She pinpointed her spot and I was able to teleport there.

Walking through the gallery with Annie (dressed fabulously!) as my guide, is like being a character in a video game, I suppose, except better because you know no one’s going to shoot at you! I have to say it’s pretty amazing to see my photos and the PCQ home page up on a gallery wall in this other worldly place. Thanks Beth for a fascinating introduction to Second Life.

Here I am in some person’s clothing shop (sorry I am too disoriented in this foreign land to know where exactly I am):

I’m sorry I didn’t turn around to face the camera. I couldn’t figure out how to make that happen. The bird on my shoulder was given to me when I showed up on orientation island. It’s probably a sign of a real n%b*. Anyway, it was a stay-at-home adventure for sure. Cheers!

*Note from Beth:

The bird on your shoulder is not the sign of the n00b, just a gift from someone, who also was once new. In virtual and real world communities, people care about one another, and this just makes every day a complete wonder.

You can find all of Beth’s projects and websites at bfelice.jaiku.com :: Beth is also a member of our social network: Being Practically Creative Come on over and check it out.

February 08: Some of my thoughts and photos on further exploration of Second Life. And on the pleasures of playing dress-up!

[-crackles!-]

Today is the second full moon of June if you live in the Eastern Hemisphere. For those of us in the Western Hemisphere, it was May 31, 2007. Since I seem to have missed it last month, I’m celebrating it with those of you in the other half of the world. Either way, we both get a full moon [just barely] in June [except Aukland and thereabouts!].

The second full moon in a month is called a Blue Moon.

Blue Moons come around every 2.7 years or 41 times a century.

Even rarer is a year with a double Blue Moon. Those only occur 4.5 times a century or every 19 years or so.

The last Blue Moon was in July 2004.

The next Blue Moon will be December 2009.

Blue Moons have nothing to do with the look of the moon, though on a gorgeous summer night in June we might be excused if we imagined a special hue. Moons do spur people to be creative:

Movies:

Moonstruck
Joe Versus the Volcano
Paper Moon
Apollo 13
Man on the Moon
Walk on the Moon

Songs:

Blue Moon
Moon Over Miami
Moon River
Moondance
Moonlight in Vermont
Dancing in the Moonlight
Moonshadow
By the Light of the Silvery Moon
Moonage Daydream
There’s a Moon in the Sky
Dark Side of the Moon
Bad Side of the Moon
It’s Only a Paper Moon
Harvest Moon
Song about the Moon
Ticket to the Moon
Heading to the Moon

Open your curtains as you sleep tonight and let the light shine down upon you. Maybe you’ll feel more creative because of it!

My Blue Moon photosandwich above was made with the help of hypergenesb who allows his photos to be used under a creative commons license. Thank you! I had a fun time playing with your beautiful photo. On his flickr page, hypergenesb has fully annotated his moon. Click the image to see it and his other photos!

[-fiber art, alterations-]

mormors syskrin grandmothers sewingbox

Originally uploaded by gunnels.

This morning’s inspiration comes from Gunnel Svensson of Sweden. She posted this lovely sampler to the flickr Practically Creative pool. It’s made of things from her grandmother’s sewing box.

What treasures!

What a wonderful idea!

Most of us who love fabrics, also love collecting old bits of lace, crocheted edges, ribbons, thread, buttons. Putting them together into a fabric collage is the perfect way to not only save them but also to display and pay tribute to them as well. As Gunnel shows, we can use buttons and thread and even scissors!

It’s a lovely way to incorporate small stitchery projects that were never completed. Now there’s a tribute to our creative but overly busy ancestral womenfolk—finally *completing* their incomplete projects! I would be delighted to think that my granddaughter would care enough to do that with all my incompletes some day!

Think not only of monograms and lace but also quilt squares and scraps made from those gorgeous old fabrics that cannot be duplicated by modern means. Or how about those handmade items that have long since worn out but that are too precious to be thrown away? I know I have some of those tucked away.

Think of it as Heritage Art whether the bits and pieces are from your relatives or are things that you’ve picked up along the way from antique stores and flea markets. They were done by someone’s ancestors and more than likely by women who had very similar instincts for making something beautiful out of what was at hand.

Thank you, Gunnel for your inspiring art.

Click the image to get a closer look at Gunnel’s work.
Please visit Gunnel’s bog.
Edited to add: I just found on Gunnels blog that her sampler has been made into postcards. How lovely! Check them out here.

[-photography, process-]

red carnation

Originally uploaded by nuanc.

This photo is one I took over two years ago. It came up this morning while I was playing the game Free Association! on flickr. The game involves posting an image in response to the last one posted by someone else. I did a flickr search through my photos for “window” and “silhouette” and this popped up. I hadn’t seen it in a long time and I found that I enjoyed it—really for the first time.

It has unexpected qualities. The distorted shape of the window. The gradation of blue from the top of the window to the whiter light at the bottom. The reflection of green on the window sill and the way the light between the tree branches seems to slide inside into to the corner of the window. The pop of red! And there’s something going on between outside and inside. That’s open to interpretation, of course, but either the flower faces the window as if yearning to be outside or perhaps the bare birch tree is admiring/envious of that splash of living colour. I’m not sure, but there’s certainly a hint of communication between the two.

All of this, of course, was unintended.

I took the photograph with my LOMO LC-A. It’s a refurbished version of a cheap camera made in Russia decades ago and it gives erratic and often impressionistic results—which is why LOMO’s have become popular and lucrative long after the cameras stopped being manufactured.

This photo was of a truly unremarkable scene. My step-son had been visiting and left an empty can of 7-UP on his window sill. Also in his room (this was after he’d gone home) I found a red carnation that he’d picked up in some restaurant we’d been to. Rather than toss both of them immediately into the waste basket, I put the carnation in the 7-UP can and took some LOMO’s.

This morning when I really saw it for the first time, it made me think about the act of creating as one of constantly expecting the unexpected. This image isn’t just about the unpredictability of the LOMO, though that’s a big part of it. It is also about taking the time to photograph an unremarkable scene and to chance shooting a dull, unsuccessful photograph in order to come up with something that has something different to offer. It took combining the colours of what was there: the metallic green 7-UP can and the red carnation against the white and blue background and taking it from a low angle in order to catch the super blue of the highest sky. It took depending on the unpredictability of the little Russian camera.

Each act of creation is an act of faith. We don’t know if it’s going to work out or not. That’s never the point. Doing it is the point. Doing it with an open heart and sense of expectancy that will allow us to recognize—once it’s done—when we have indeed caught the unexpected.

[-photography, digital art-]

Memories of hope

Originally uploaded by Baywhale.

This locally sunny (woke up to snow, but the sky has ‘blued-up’ nicely) Sunday, I’ve chosen a photograph by baywhale.

His abstract images use reflection, transparency, colour, texture, words and numbers to bring us in close to his unique view of an urban world. Fragments of walls, windows, surfaces - rusted, painted, peeling, dirty - are transformed into visually rich, deep and poetic works of art. In addition, he uses titles to expand upon and offer glimpses (though no simple explanations) into his own interpretation of these images.

Here’s a tutorial that baywhale was kind enough to do for The PCQ on the technique he uses to make what he describes as “photosandwiches.”

Thanks, Baywhale!

© 05 - 07 baywhale, all rights reserved

Please visit Baywhale’s flickr stream to see more of his creations.
Of his Adventures in Wonderland set, Bay says,

I see this set as ‘pure’ art, the deep and dark psychology takes place when I take the individual pictures but when I combine them it’s all about pleasure.

Baywhale, a computer operator in London, is also a proponent of the World Community Grid, a painless way to contribute to our world. Information on his World Community Grid group can be found at the flickr group, The Painless Charity of the Amazing Secret Angels- photograhers who flickr

Originally published in the February 2006 on the original Practically Creative blog; edited slightly for re-publication

[-photography, alterations-]

The Patina group on flickr.com is for images of anything that has “a rich, interesting, complex surface sheen due to age and use.” At this writing, 101 photographers have contributed close to 900 photos, gathering, IMHO, one of the most gorgeous collections on flickr. Read the rest of this entry »

[-poetry, art-]

poem by Sherry D. Ramsey
images by Travis Sutton and Flikr

They’ve made me comfortable, or tried

arthritis-pocked bones protest every surface now

muscles fatigued beyond resting

Death beckons a bony invitation–

I decline.

I choose the upload.

A week now, neurojacked into the console

threadlike filaments tracing

the secret convolutions of my brain

compiling the message that is me

Eighty-nine year-old ET

phoning myself home.

Today.

I write this poem because

I have ciphered my life in poetry

the only immortality

to which I dared aspire

So many words, so many years

and now reduced to words–

is it such a poor reduction in the end?

Is this the last poem I will write?

Will my uploaded self

still think in the cadences

of line and stanza

emotion and image?

Or will I compile/compute/calculate/respond

in precisely packeted bits of data;

filtered through thought loop and memory engram code

of this particular elderly female poet

but emerging as something other.

This poem will be

uploaded like all the rest

will I read it later and wonder who I was

to write such a thing?

Who will I be?

Decoded/recoded/encoded/uploaded into my new APC

Ambulatory Personality Console

intuitive interface, self-directed motion

best they can do right now,

but in ten years, they say, we’ll have RPR’s

Robotic Personality Repositories

arms, legs, face

Save a picture

it can even look like me.

The preparations pause

one last chance to reconsider:

death or discontinuity?

My daughter is here

truest poetry I ever wrote

She holds my hand, smiles through tears

Will she recognize me

talk to me still in keyboard stutter

fingers skittering over the keys of my APC

if she finds it too unnerving to speak to a machine

while I blink-flash my responses

upon the screen of my face

answer in synthesized mother tones

Will she still read love in my pixellated, digitized eyes?

I nod.

The neurojack tugs at my scalp.

Somewhere, someone taps a key.

Eighty-nine years of

thought and word and memory and me

stream out of my brain

like atmosphere pushed rudely aside by vacuum

like blood welling up in a vial

I still feel my daughter’s hand…

[Darkness. With a silicon flavor.]

Sensory inputs blink into being

I see the room [too sharp, adjust filter]

And there is my [beautiful] daughter

She hesitates, torn between the husk on the bed

and the ergonomic contours of my new APC

“Mom?” she asks.

“I’m fine.”

[synthesized mother voice operating

within normal parameters]

[soothing]

I offer the pre-programmed equivalent of a smile.

More tears. But I think she understands.

Her mother is still here.

I take stock.

[no pain]

[no fatigue]

No blood, no heart, no hand, no breast, no brain

but still the words, thank God;

I am reduced to words

but the words are enough.

Travis Sutton’s work can be seen at flickr.com/photos/travissutton.

Flikr’s work is here.

See Sherry Ramsey’s other work in The PCQ:

I, Galaxy
Accidents Happen
Seven Creative Ways to Enjoy your Garden

Originally re-published (poem) and published (artwork) by permission of the poet and artists in the January 2006 issue of The Practically Creative Quarterly, theme: alterations

Mind Space

- giving myself permission to work

The space in our minds is often more cluttered than our studio space. Here’s an article that may help unclutter yours.

by Suze Corte

Here’s the way I work.

I’m not saying it’s efficient or even evolved; it’s just what comes naturally. For me there are two kinds of goals: the practical, everyday type and the creative ones. When I set a practical goal like having the house clean by Friday, I go about it directly and stay with it until I finish. True, I may procrastinate until Thursday night but still, I can plan exactly how to go about the task, how much time it will take, and what the final result will look and feel like.

Not so with creative goals.

When I dream up something I want to accomplish creatively, I invariably begin somewhere in the middle and work towards both “ends”the start and the finish. I remember doing this with a newsletter I was asked to create. The content included children’s art and writing, so the style, I felt, needed to be free flowing, surprising, and playful. Since it was a four-page newsletter, I had plenty of space to express myself. I began working on the project by brainstorming. I jotted down ideas for a while, then switched to playing with type styles, and soon found myself sorting through drawings and stories. I hit on an idea to use an appealing child’s drawing of a bee and repeat it, buzzing through the issue to highlight different articles. I tried it, liked it, but decided to set it aside in case I thought of something even better later on!

The process went on in this manner—somewhat like a bee flitting from one flower to another—until the newsletter began to take shape and make sense conceptually and visually. I eventually got around to designing a logo that fit the style, but I found that I needed to lay out a lot of the content before I knew what the “beginning” of the newsletter looked like. The point is, the final result was not something I originally foresaw from top to bottom. I had started with some basic space and size requirements and vague conceptual notions, but no concrete vision of the end product. Quite characteristically, I didn’t head out towards this creative goal on a smooth linear route. To the contrary, I weaved, spun around curves, backed up, switched around, and regained forward movement by fits and spits. Despite the path I took—or maybe because of it—the newsletter turned out to be delightful, inspiring to readers, and visually pleasing. And I felt fulfilled creatively, as if a puzzle had been solved and a mystery revealed. It was great fun!

Sometimes, of course, creative goals are not geared towards this kind of progress to their final destination. For me these are often the ones where I not only begin the journey in the middle of the road, but also complicate my life even further by nebulously approaching as if it were a circle, with no beginning or end, something like a traffic roundabout with options shooting off in many different directions. I don’t do this to confuse or frustrate myself; I find that it just happens as a matter of course with some impending creative quests. These are the projects that tend to get set aside until some future time when other ideas emerge that will send my thinking in a more fruitful direction. And let’s face it, some projects don’t deserve to be finished and are meant to be perpetually stalled.

I often put off creative pursuits by telling myself that I am working on them when really I am just cleaning the work table. I know a lot about procrastination, having developed my skills to master status. Gathering supplies is another nice technique for avoiding actual creative work: you look busy and you are, in fact, dealing with the tools of the trade, and so it is a great trick for pretending to be in the actual process of producing something. However, there are times when even these ruses turn towards the light and become useful. Sometimes while playing like I’m cleaning my studio, a glinting object will catch my eye, and like a magpie, I start to gather goodies and fill my creative mind with interesting bits and pieces, thought and ideas, connections and relationships that work.

In the course of writing this article—which, by the way, was only a vague concept in the narrow recesses of my mind about an hour ago—I have rediscovered a great two-part truth about my way of working towards and reaching creative goals: it doesn’t matter how I get there as long as I get there AND I must give myself permission to honor whatever path I take. There is no one right way to go and there is no reason to feel like there’s suddenly a Wrong Turn sign in my way when I choose to select a meandering path to my creative goal. This has all been very therapeutic for me, and now I will go create something. Or not. Or not now-ish.

My studio table is a mess.

words and images © 2005 - 2007 Suze Corte; all rights reserved

Originally published in the July 2005 issue of The Practically Creative Quarterly; theme: space and spaces

Suze Corte is a writer, artist and pre-school teacher in Houston, Texas. In 2007, she was chosen as be the Houston Area Association of Educator’s of Young Children’s Teacher of the Year and the Texas Association of Educators of Young Children’s Teacher of the Year. Congratulations, Suze! It is a well-deserved recognition.

[-crackles!-]

If you’ve tried everything else…you could just PLAY with your collection:

Read the rest of this entry »

[-digital photography tutorial-]

a photosandwich recipe by Baywhale

To make this image:

I start by opening one image in Photoshop.

I then open a second image:

On the Window menu I select Tile in order to display both images at the same time, then using the move tool (shaped like an arrow) drag one image on top of the other.

On the Window menu select the Layers toolbox. In this toolbox the background layer will be set automatically at an opacity of 100%. Adjust the opacity of the additional layer; the higher the opacity the more it will ’show through’ the background. I would suggest starting with 30% but you need to experiment to get a result you like.

For this example I add one other layer:

There’s no limit to the number of layers you can use so experiment to see what looks good. As you add layers the overall contrast level will fall and the result might look quite dull until you alter the overall contrast in the next stage.

When all layers have been added I Save As a separate image on which I make adjustments to contrast, brightness and so on. I usually don’t close the original image containing the individual layers as I almost always go back to try a different combination for a ‘Saved As’ image.

Photoshop gives many options in how the layers are combined. You can also apply gradients and alter the brightness and contrast of individual layers. But for now most of your experimenting will be in selecting the images to use and playing with the opacity levels.

Have fun!

Bay

All photos: © 2005 - 2007 baywhale all rights reserved

Here’s another article inspired by a baywhale creation: Memories of Hope.
See Baywhale’s “Nettles” in our Gallery.

Please visit Baywhale’s flickr stream to see more of his creations.
Of his Adventures in Wonderland set, Bay says,

I see this set as ‘pure’ art, the deep and dark psychology takes place when I take the individual pictures but when I combine them it’s all about pleasure.

Baywhale, a computer operator in London, is also a proponent of the World Community Grid, a painless way to contribute to our world. Information on his World Community Grid group can be found at the flickr group, The Painless Charity of the Amazing Secret Angels- photograhers who flickr

Originally published in the January 2006 issue of The Practically Creative Quarterly, theme: Alterations

Editors note: You don’t have to have Photoshop to do this technique. Any photo or art software will allow you to layer and manipulate transparencies, brightness and contrast.