Shop Now for Gurnenthar's Ascendance

"Dildo Mountain" has gone to its final dumpster, and several other works from my 2015 Artomatic have inexplicably been exchanged for actual money. Thank you, kind supporters!

If anyone else has small bills they wish to declutter, here are a few of the unclaimed assemblages that survived deinstallation.

"That Was Before"

A fellow Artomatician discovered that this piece looks INDESCRIBABLY GREAT with the use of a specific kind of prismatic "3D" glasses, which we will therefore include at no extra charge.

(OK, not indescribably -- they make the deep murky blues retreat into apparent fathomless distance while the gold and glass details leap forward, "3D-ifying" the canvas to an unusual extent. It is, we must concede, groovy.)

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"Klingle Gulch"

Torn from the pages of the novel (still seeking representation), this assemblage is redolant of bad witchcraft, urban obsessions and suspicious feralities. Literarily, not literally redolant. Actual artwork is odorless.

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"Like a drone about to take flight..."

We were less than certain that this assemblage would survive the bubblewrap, but it has done so. Nevertheless, postal delivery is to be considered moderately risky. Pickup preferred.

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{Prints of Oracule A &/or B can also be obtained, and I am getting into the flow with the Art Cards -- $8 for one, $13 for two.)

Final evenings of Artomatic 2015

Last four days/eves: Dec. 9th through 12th. Artomatic is open Wed.-Thu. 5 to 10 p.m. and Fri.-Sat. 11 a.m. to midnight.

I will be there Wed. and Sat. evenings. Still much unbought art! Plus installation elements with varying degrees of ephemerality. It all goes away (or to new homes) next week.

See previous post (below) to order art cards. Thank you, early supporters! Coming soon, limited fridge magnets. All different, hand-collaged, logo-free, inedible. Inquire within.

ORDER NOW FOR KRAMPUSNACHT

Artful Prosecards

Contribute to my incipient-novelist fund and receive a unique art/photo card with a brief handwritten novel excerpt inside. (You choose: juicy, spooky, funny, or evocative.)

PayPal $8 to trepan8 at yahoo dot com -- Include prose flavor preference and addressee's mailing address. (Also specify if you want to receive card[s] with the inside right panel blank, to add your own message.)

Two for $13: choose a second recipient (card will be totally different) or receive a second unique card at the same address, months from now when you've forgotten all about it.

Ten for $60 (all rather different) -- Support the arts and send unique Holiday/End-of-Year greetings!

Deluxe, Limited Edition -- $12 apiece buys you the Extra Postage Required version. These collage-assemblages may include tiny bones, rusted metal, fabric, or other found-object elements. Sent in padded envelope.

It is fun to get mail. < citation needed >

www.dorothyhickson.com

Dodo's First Art Sale [etc.] - Artomatic update

More than one piece in the current Artomatic show, "My Novel Is Seeking Representation," has now been sold! Come out to New Carrollton/Hyattsville by December 12th to see "Sampling" and "Rust Is Heavy" before they go to their new homes.

Artomatic.org

Plus, there is a little interview with me here: www.artomatic.org/artist-interview-dorothy-hickson

Artomatic 2015: My Novel Is Seeking Representation

The "Artist Statement" is true: I have a novel in search of an agent. It spans the genres of fantasy and literary fiction to explore the realms of magic and skepticism, sex and other intoxicants, ancient powers and corporate propaganda. (My fangirl crushes include Ursula LeGuin, Tim Powers, Margaret Atwood, and David Foster Wallace.) A tiny sliver of the story may be found here: dorothyhickson.com. Agents, publishers, and rich patrons of the arts are invited to email me at trepan8 @ yahoo.com for a synopsis, sample chapters, SASE, and/or the whole manuscript.

You can also follow me on Twitter and Instagram @dorothyjhickson (note the middle initial J).

My space at Artomatic is 6-016, in a tiny corner room on the fourth floor -- right behind Eye of Ra's nude photos.

Opening, meeting, closing (Chance of snacking)

Artomatic opens this Friday (10/30) in New Carrollton, Maryland. "Meet the Artists" night is Saturday, Nov. 14th and the closing night party is December 12th. The building is closed Mondays and Tuesdays, as is only proper.

BxiieVision at SculptureFest

This weekend's guest art handlers also brought news from the North:

Another dead insect

At the Artomatic installation space, the insects appear to have been subsisting on a diet of International Klein Blue.

Rust Is Heavy

Heading out the door...

Artomatic in Maryland: Oct. 30 - Dec. 12, 2015

Trigger Warning: Large insect with far too many legs

If you go to the Maryland end of the Orange Line (New Carrollton), slither between the parking garages, cross the street and walk up the hill past a sort of marshy little wild tangle, then the 2015 Artomatic building will be on your left. It is on Corporate Drive, boy is it ever, so corporate it looks!

It also has a parking lot. It does not, as far as I know, have giant centipedes.

(I was actually trying to rescue this poor mangled metaphor but ended up killing it. It may already have been injured by the time I saw it -- in my sink as I was washing dishes -- but its condition declined precipitously once it met me.)

My art space is 6-016, in a little corner room on the top floor. Opening night is October 30th (more photos here at some point!)

Collectivism is a Tease [Revised post!]

Apparently an Artomatic occurs this autumn after all...

Will EFAC exhibit, in all our glorious collectivity?

It is not yet known. But we are having ideas.

IT IS KNOWN. As it turns out, Artomatic is pretty staunchly anti- that idea. It is all about the individual (unless, I guess, you're a glass school). OK then! I still signed up. There will be new stuff, and it MAY* contain hidden nods to the work of my collectivity-buddies. Come see it! Wilds of Maryland, Oct. 30 - Dec. 12.

--- djh

*spoiler: WILL

Chainlink Cube Under Way

The ECO-Visions show is coming up next weekend.  I'm supposed to install my piece this Sunday.

I'm not as far along as I would like...  I wish I had another week, but I don't.  Anyway, I started the actual assembly last night.  The poles that comprise the cube edges and vertices have been assembled and are now quite sturdy.  Today I will start to hang the chainlink that forms the faces.

As usual when I do a project in a new medium, I create lots of spin-off art and ideas for future use.  Here are a few pictures showing things I've been doing with chainlink.

The Hyping of the Dodo

If All Be True

A novel of magic, mischief,
sex and other intoxicants,
old friends, ancient conspiracies,
& the Philly Folkfest.

Read a free excerpt online: dorothyhickson.com

Currently seeking agent/publisher

The above text appears on little cards I am making in preparation for the aforementioned fest, which starts this Thursday. Hand them out? Leave little stacks near the information booth? Tape them up in the portapotties? Maybe I will make them into a hula skirt and do the dance of a thousand papercuts.

Self-promotion feels unnatural to me (perhaps I should say blatant self-promotion, as there are those who categorize all art and adornment as "showing off") -- but really, what's wrong with showing off, when there's something to show? I have spent a lot of time and energy on this novel. Never enough, and far too much of the energy went into avoidance rather than work, but there has also been work.

The book is in final "Gamma Draft" tweak-level revision and will go out to one more trusted (and patient) reader at the end of this month. September will be the time of querying agents, researching publishers, and refining my (shudder) promotional materials.

Someday, we hope, the book tour.

Things in the Works

Artomatic may be doing an event this October -- in the wilds of Maryland. Should this take place, I hope to turn up with a small installation and/or to read something from my novel, the Gamma Draft of which is currently tormenting me full-time.

You can help (with the installation, not the novel) by donating old scissors or shears of any kind, hardshell suitcases, a little red wagon and/or a dissecting table (table or wagon could be returned intact at the end).

Meanwhile and unrelatedly, here is a beautiful project Bxiie has in the works: Build Sculpture for ECO-Visions. To help Bxiie out, see details at the link.

More on these and other adventures as they develop.

Paper Pirates

I've been out of touch but with good reason.  I'm really busy building several outdoor somethings for Sculpturefest, a show in Woodstock, Vermont, that starts the weekend after next.  I also have some 3D work going on, a new PVC piece in progress, and am working on the concept for another outdoor piece for Ecovisions, another outdoor show in Woodstock starting in September.  

On Saturday, June 13, Rabid and I attended the Paper Pirates event in Brooklyn.  

The premise is fun; interested people send up to four photos then go to the party.  At the party, everyone looks at the pictures.  When the signal is given, everyone grabs a photo or photos that they like to take home.

Two weeks ago, I sent Paper Pirates four pictures; three of sculptural stuff and one of my friend, Scott Slagle, DJing.

The party was in an event space.  It was kind of busy.  The below picture is not mine; it is by Paper Pirates and from their Facebook page here.

There were a lot of pictures; maybe two hundred. 

The first cool thing that happened was right as we entered.  The event was sponsored by 'Stolen Rum' and the various social media ads had stated that rum would be on offer.  Well, the bar only had beer.  That was fine, really, though I had been building an interest in having a sniff of rum.  So I ordered a beer for Rabid and one for myself (not too expensive; $4 each) and asked about the rum.  The bartender said that they were only serving beer.  I told the bartender that we had come down from Vermont expressly for the rum.  He looked as though he was at a loss for a moment and then gave me both beers and wouldn't accept any cash.  Thank you!

Rabid and I wandered around and looked at pictures.  

Along the way, we found three of my pictures; one in the above shot and two in the below.

We realized that the Slagle DJ picture was not on one of the walls.  I got this weird sinking feeling.  Why would they put up my other three pictures but not that one?

We took another walk around the room and both saw the Slagle picture at the same time...  It was by itself on the front of the DJ booth!

Wow!  I felt honored to have my picture set off all by itself.

After a bit, Rabid and I tracked down Tim, one of the Paper Pirates guys, and I thanked him for the placement.  He remembered that my picture had come with three sculpture shots and we momentarily discussed the broad scope of what I do.  He had to move along but he warned us that the picture stealing would occur in the next fifteen minutes or so.  We went and staked out images that we liked.

After a bit, the DJ announced that the pictures could be removed.  I took the understated WTC image shown above (I am remiss by not knowing the name of the photographer yet but I will update this post as soon as I figure it out).

The DJ took the Slagle shot.

One of my images was abandoned.  It was sort of a default picture and I agree that I could have selected a better one.  After the comped beer and the Slagle placement, I was perfectly fine with my lonely lame picture being left on the wall.

#Latergram

Reminder: While we are not always in the throes of blogging, often we are Instagramming...

dorothyjhickson (djh / flightless, that's me)

bxiie (bxiie)

filthyrusty (filth)

First May Friday

Sorry for the late notice but White River Junction, Vermont, is the host of a First Friday arts event this evening.  I have two pieces in the Upper Valley Zen Center benefit show.

More details here;

https://www.facebook.com/events/526397790831831/

'White River Junction...  It's not so bad!'  Awesome.

New code for the old book

Today I walked to the park by way of two Little Free Libraries, sharing Filth's surplus copies of The Yiddish Policemen's Union and Geek Love, which latter volume has acquired new coding on the back...

Then I headed down to Klingle Gulch...

Back in the Studio

 Yesterday was a lovely day in southern Vermont.  I spent some time cleaning up after the winter and then got down to serious work; airing out the studio and getting ready for art production season.  Really, it's two seasons; one from now until the mosquitos become thick enough to preclude working and then the second from when I get desperate enough to wear DEET in the studio until the weather gets cold enough that paint doesn't dry properly.

I set up the furnace.  I added some reflectors to direct the heat up and away from the ground and cinderblocks.  This turns out to make a huge difference; instead of taking fifteen or twenty minutes for 1/4" PVC to get warm enough to work with, it takes less than five.  It's actually too efficient and I'm not totally sure if I will keep using the reflectors.

I made an armature.  This is PVC tubes, chicken wire, and popsicle sticks.  

I taped up some PVC.

I cut some PVC.  The '31' refers to the number of cuts to be made.

 I also fiddled with some twigs and devices from last year.  I like how this came out.

Where We Are Broken

Dental cast, tulle, feathers, cut-up photograph (DJH by Scott Church), molded acrylic, notebook panel, sigil, doily, lace, dye, paint, water-damaged bathroom sign, found rusty hook.

A New Show, A New Project

Happy spring!

I have a piece in a show at the Artistree Gallery in Pomfret, Vermont, starting Friday and running through May 2.  If you happen to be around, go see it.  The image links to the Artistree web site.

Also, I'm working on a project and you can help.

I  have a slew of these QR code stickers that point to my website. If you promise to stick one of these someplace public and arguably subversive, take a picture of it, and send me a copy of the image, I'll happily mail you two of these awesome 3" x 3" stickers plus a really cool 6" x 6" sticker (below). If you'd like to participate, please send me your mailing address via private message on the BxiieVision Facebook page (http://bxiie.com/fb).  Blah, blah, I reserve the right to limit the number of stickers I send out so please message me early.

The best sticker placement (as judged by me) will win a special prize; a one-of-a-kind sculptural 'device' made from a credit-card-sized piece of PVC. If you're planning a visit to North Korea in the next few weeks, let me know and I'll include an extra sticker.

Thank you!

Remember, for a joke to be practical, the jokee should get something out of it that they can use.

What's Been Going On With Me (djh)

Hey, so it turns out that revision is the extra-hard part of writing a novel! This is the stage I had avoided for LITERALLY* DECADES. (Even in college I never revised; I just rewrote. I threw on another coat of first-draft.)

Once, never having had a Pilates class, I tried out a Pilates machine that isolates the abs. It turned out that I basically HAD no abs. I've always relied on other muscle groups (most catastrophically my neck). Take away those options and I could not budge that machine.

To revise, I need to find a mental space between my day-job mode (proofreader/copy-editor) and my creative-writer mode -- or some way to switch back and forth without losing either energy. I need to reexamine my own work without my inner critic dismissing the whole drafty project as garbage and sunk costs.

You know how one can usually read one's own handwriting, even if no-one else can? That's the other reason it's so hard to edit oneself: because I KNEW WHAT I MEANT. A few simple words may flood my brain with imagery, but no-one else is necessarily going there with me. "That day in the rain" has everything inside it for me and nothing for you -- or it might trigger a completely different flood of associations, to which I have no access unless you write your own story. (Which you should totally do! I recommend keeping it very short, and making a thorough outline.)

I keep groping blurrily for the imagery that will transfer across the barrier, yet will not be a cliche.

"even if I could put down accurately the thing that I saw and enjoyed, it would not give the observer the kind of feeling it gave me. I had to create an equivalent for what I felt about what I was looking at -- not copy it." ---Georgia O'Keeffe

It is brutally hard work and most of it is invisible. I don't look any different when I am tweezing the slivers of glass out of my own flayed-open heart than I did when I was just goofing off. My loved ones do not get what is taking so long.

This week I finished a second draft. It is shorter and possibly tighter than the first draft. It might be missing whatever the good parts were, whatever elusive magic kept me striving. I have no idea. I can't look at it right now (only partly because my Beta Reader took her copy home and I am out of paper). I will probably go for a lot of walks. I do not know what is next.

*NON-FIGURATIVELY

Human intervention.

Human intervention. by filth (Click for full-sized image.)

The Need for Proper Refrigeration

So, I think I got this bad chicken steak last Friday.  I'm working the day shift, you know, one twelve hour shift starting at oh-six-hundred and things are great; no calls all morning.  I order a chicken cheese steak early; I call over there at eleven and they say the grill's already on and it's no problem so I grab a radio and walk across the street and pick up my steak.  I'm hungry; the thing smells like sex on a bun.  Walking back to the house the tones drop for some chest pain thing over on Westmont.  I sprint back and jump onto my special white bus with the flashy red lights and the woo-woo noises.  I throw the brown paper bag into the map console and we go screaming out of there over to Westmont for the chest pain thing which turns out to be a fucking cardiac arrest, CPR in progress.  We do the whole thing, whatever.  After that it's back-to-back calls for the next eight hours, going on two hours after I'm supposed to be off shift.  Finally we get back to the barn so I can clock out.  I grab my bedraggled steak from the ambo...  The bag looks fine.  That steak tastes fine.  I'm so hungry I eat it right there in the goddamned dayroom before going home.  I eat the hell out of that steak and then I drive home.  I start feeling queasy before I even get to a hundred and thirty second street.  I gotta pull over and vomit, right there on Franklin, in the park and ride.  Awesome, I get home, she's annoyed not just because I got held over and we missed out on some important plans she thought we had but also because I vomit on the carpet right when I get to the living room.  Smooth move, I know.  So I drag my ass to bed.  Right away I start getting these crazy hot flashes and weird pains in my thighs, abdomen, right shoulder and neck, and head.  I'm sweating like a dog, totally drenching the sheets.  She bails for the sofa, understandably.  I'm a sweaty, achy mess.  I toss and turn.  Finally, I drop into some sort of broken, crazy sleep. While I'm sleeping, I have these weird dreams regarding the neighbors.  I know it's the neighbors in my dream because they always wear those stupid goat and marmot outfits.  Anyway, I dream that I'm woke up by a knocking at the door and when I get it, it's the neighbors and they come in and ply me with alcohol and various illicit substances and concepts.  The next thing I know, there's some big fire out in the yard and goat and marmot are dancing around it chanting something about healthcare plans and gerrymandering and I'm like, this is boring so I'm out of here.  Anyway, after that weird dream I wake up on the sofa.  Somehow she's in bed, no longer the sofa, that's the best thing, really.  But I don't remember the exchange.  And somehow I've bumped my head and seem to be bleeding ever so slightly.  Anyway, I don't work Saturdays so I sleep in until there is no more sleeping.  Making coffee, I look at my phone and find a new photograph.

Ready, Set...

"Just a Box of Art"

I've been taking a bit of a break during the cold weather although I've been giving a lot of thought to upcoming projects.

- I have a few bundles of willow and birch sticks that I have ideas for.

- I'm musing about labyrinths and have a few potential ideas.

- I've been playing with 3D modeling.

- I've been messing around with QR codes (again).

- I'm researching how to sculpt with foam and fiberglass so I'll be ready to work in those mediums when the weather gets warm.

- I'm gearing up for a KickStarter campaign to scale Anniversary to 4' x 8'.

Anniversary 2014

Art 2015 is like a box I'm almost ready to open.