Archives for category: workshop
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »

Reality check

May 24, 2015 //
4

push push and little ele

The recipes are all done. The Artist’s Survival cookbook is at the layout stage. Hang on, a dear Dede-follower might think, wasn’t the book at the layout stage a month ago? How can it take so long? Yeah, well, I’ve got my tax bill! It is not much, but it depends on the reference point. If you have nothing, not much is too much. Pretty sure plenty of readers can empathise with me here :) It is the equivalent to going to jail in Monopoly: don’t pass GO on your way. Well, not quite. Looking back on last year I have moved substantially, but I am not where I want to be. I moved a little sideways. I have a part-time teaching job that takes up more time than it is supposed to. I am teaching young creatives, and I thoroughly enjoy the contact with the students and their development. Sadly, a clash in teaching philosophies with a colleague results in a lot of friction and ultimately the job takes up more head space than it should. The Dedes suffer.

The tax bill made me do a reality check! No more fluffing around. I have to finish the book and get it out. It will happen, but to speed up the process I will I need a little cash. This will go towards roping in some professionals that can do jobs I can’t do. I would also like to have a small print run of hard cover books.

Therefore I have finally decided to go ahead with a crowd funding campaign. This is not much more than pre-selling the books and it gives me an indication whether people are prepared to buy it. Of course, like any artist I have my doubts at times. And of course I know some of you really enjoy the puppets and the idea. A particularly big THANK YOU goes to Tony and Jürgen for their invaluable support throughout the entire process.

Yesterday I started to make a new flash drama film to support the upcoming campaign. As part of the campaign I will also offer four real Dedes as an incentive for a donation. As you may know, the Dedes are usually not for sale. Sometimes the lil’ Dedes are available. The real Dedes are bigger (between 12 and 15cm) and have a label on their neck to identify them as Dedes. They are the ones that go on exhibitions and star in stop motion films. The lil’Dedes are just puppets that try to be Dedes. They are smaller. You can see the difference in the photo. And while they are still handcrafted I don’t record where they go. The little elephant will go on sale at the Art in Action event at the Michael Park School (Steiner School) in Auckland on the 13 June, where I hold a puppet making and film making workshop.

So far I have sold four of the Dedes (my heart ached each time). I really don’t want to let them go. Two of the buyers allowed their puppets to stay with me. Push Push the elephant is one of them, Harvey the rabbit is the other. Ultimately the puppets become more valuable the more often they show up in films.  One, Lap Dog has gone to a collector I don’t know personally and Punch too aka Han de Vere has gone to a person I didn’t know, but know now. (Message for Han, Top Dog is still waiting to join you! He is still muzzled, sitting in the corner.)

Still, the campaign might not work, as I am not very well connected. I work with puppets and reflect, I am not out there selling myself.  Another (not uncommon) trait a lot of people can empathise with :). However, the book will go ahead, one way or another. It is just a question of how and when. I have finally set a deadline. I will have it done and dusted in July! (this year).  And as I always say to my students. A deadline is a deadline, no expemptions!

Tags , , , ,
Categories Art, Book Launch, Books, Comedy, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Self-publishing, workshop

Pizza

January 13, 2015 //
0

L'artiste pizza2

While they all loved L’Artiste’s pizza bread, it is not the same as a pizza. They begged him to come back the next day and run a pizza making workshop.

The first thing they learned is that people have different preferences when it comes to their pizza base. There is no right or wrong, just different likes. L’Artiste favours a thin and crunchy crust, as do most of the Dedes. If you like it more spongy, simply allow the dough to rise longer between kneading.

It takes L’Artiste exactly one hour from entering the kitchen to having the pizza on the table. So it’s not really a quick dinner, but time flies as the process is broken up into different tasks. He also considers pizza making a social event and loves having other people help chop up toppings while they chat away.

The dough is exactly the same as for the pizza bread yesterday, but because it is covered with juicy sauce and toppings it will need 20 minutes to bake. Once the pizza is in the oven there is plenty of time to clean the kitchen, throw together a nice side salad or simply have a glass of wine in anticipation. And when the kitchen is nice and tidy, the evening can begin!

Ingredients for one tray of pizza (two large or 4 small slices)

2 cups of flour, a scant teaspoon of dry yeast, 3/4 cup of warm water. Various toppings and grated cheese.

Method

Put the flour in the bowl and add half of the water and the yeast. Now you can do other chores for 15 minutes while the yeast becomes active. When the yeast is foamy, mix it with the flour, add the rest of the water and knead to an elastic dough. Let it rest to rise.

Switch the oven on to 2000C and attend to the sauce that goes on top of the base. L’Artiste usually fries some diced onions in olive oil and adds a can of diced tomatoes (yes, a can! He read somewhere that canned tomatoes have more lycopene than fresh tomatoes, but watch out for the salt content of the canned ones!). Then he adds the mediterranean selection of herbs… rosmary, sage, oregano, thyme..

While the sauce reduces, he chops the toppings everyone wants, or else whatever he can find in the fridge (at least a red pepper, onions and garlic). If he has helpers he just supervises this task and someone has to grate the cheese. He prefers a combination of edam cheese and goat cheese. But either or will do, though the correct cheese topping for a pizza is mozzarella. Fresh mozzarella is hard to come by where the Dedes live. The wonderful thing about pizza is that anything goes. If you like it, put it on!

After the chopping and grating is done, knead the dough again, roll it out to its final size and place it on the baking tray dusted with flour. Pour the sauce on, spreading it around. Then distribute the various toppings. Lastly, put the cheese on top. If the pizza is shared, and it mostly is, L’Artiste adds what everyone wants to different sections (There is always someone who doesn’t like olives, while the next one doesn’t like salami). He then cuts the pizza before it goes in the oven, which makes it easier to divide up once it is baked.

Bake for 20 minutes at 2000C.

Tags , , , , ,
Categories Absurd, Art, Comedy, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, recipes, Social Network, workshop

Studio One workshop

October 12, 2014 //
4

little skeleton

Last week I had this great workshop at Studio One in Auckland. It was supposed to be a holiday programme for kids from 10 to 14. Truth was the youngest was just 8 and I was a bit worried, that the age difference would be too noticeable. Surprisingly it wasn’t at all. They all played wonderfully together and came up with this lovely story not to judge a book by its cover. I am always amazed about their creativity. Isn’t this skeleton just gorgeous? It is made out of two shuttlecocks and pipe cleaner by thirteen-year-old David. We had so many characters in the end we could easily have made a few films…. But what I really like is that they come up with one story as a group and work on it together.

For me personally it was a wonderful break from the drudgery of school and it became very clear to me that I have to get back into the swing with my puppets. I have three projects on the boil and have to make up my mind which one I am starting first. Life is definitely too short…

And here is the film we’ve created.

Tags , , , , ,
Categories Absurd, Art, film, Fun, Life, Stop Motion, workshop

A bit of magic

September 7, 2014 //
2

Life is a bit of a chaos at the moment and when this happens the blog has to take a back seat. There is one more film from last week to put up, which is really an easy task and only takes a minute. But I got side tracked again, as I took in a homeless person this week and preferred to have good conversations around the dinnertable rather than popping down to the computer to work on my blog. Yes, a real conversation beats sitting in front of the computer anytime. So, here slightly delayed the last film we made at the Festival. This one is an impromptu impromptu. Impromptu for me, as I wasn’t prepared for the participants and impromptu for them as they weren’t expecting it at all. It was a a group of 8 to 10 year-olds. I had accidentially set up the stage in the wrong room. Luckily three out of the four people that had enrolled in the worksho pthat day were sick. We just got into the swing with the last remaining person when a group of kids showed up for their weekly art class. There was a bit of a discussion who’s room it was. It turned out that the volunteer at the reception had forgotten to tell me I should set-up somewhere else, so I offered my participant to come to the next workshop at my studio when the group will be bigger. She was very happy with this solution. So my assistant and I started packing up when the art teacher suggested we should run the workshop with the kids as we were here anyway. Working with kids is so different from working with grown-ups. Workshops with kids are full on, as they all want to talk at once and you have to channel their engery.No way I could run a workshop without an assistant. But it is great fun, I thoroughly enjoy seeing them getting right into it.

Tags , , ,
Categories Absurd, Art, Comedy, film, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Stop Motion, workshop

Alien Encounter

September 1, 2014 //
0

The results of last week’s workshops could not have been more different. On the first day we had only a small group. Half the people who had booked  into the workshop were taken ill as a nasty cough doing the rounds in Auckland. We still had great fun and in my opinion it shows in the little film.

Tags , , , ,
Categories Absurd, Art, Comedy, film, Fun, Stop Motion, workshop

Good riddance

August 31, 2014 //
0

Last week I did three workshops as part of the Festival of Performing Objects. In those  workshops the participants used my Dede puppets to come up with an impromptu play and then acted the story out. During the process props have to be created on the fly. The story might end up totally different than originally anticipated. The film I put up today, was the one we did last. The group did not know each other, which of course adds another dimension to the workshop. So it took a while until they came up with a subject they all could relate to. Of all three workshop this one was certainly the most structured story and thought through from from beginning to end.

Normally I would take around 200 pictures during a workshop. In this one I got barely 90, so it is a bit of a stretch. But i think the result isn’t too bad.

Tags , , , , , , ,
Categories Art, Comedy, Exhibition, film, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Stop Motion, workshop

Red carpet event

August 28, 2014 //
4

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

This week is probably the busiest week I will have all year. It started off on Monday with finishing one puppet workshop. I had done a six week course at Toi Ora, an art trust that works in the mental health sector. This is definitely the area I want to move into. Unfortunately the course didn’t quite work as I envisaged it. I liked the students and the settings, but there were also areas that weren’t sitting right, though I think my blog isn’t the forum to divulge what didn’t work. In the course the participants made their own characters and came up with the story and we celebrated the uplaod of our little film with a red carpet event. It’s a very short film, so we only had a very little red carpet.

And here  is the film

Tags , , , , , ,
Categories Absurd, Art, Comedy, film, Fun, Life, Stop Motion, workshop

How to become an artist?

August 25, 2014 //
2

chech witch

The picture today shows a hand-crafted czech witch, which is on display at the Festival. I have my eyes on her as I see myself in her, but I can’t afford the little cutey. Pity.

This week I will give two talks. One at the gallery about “puppets in today’s world” and the other at school about my artwork. I prepared both talks on Saturday, writing down minutely what I want to say. though I know very well its impossible for me to stick to a script.  As usual I will digress on the day. On the slightest cue from the audience I am off in a tangent. Though I find writing down speeches a brilliant exercise to focus on what I am doing and condense my thoughts into easy to digest sentences. The talk I will deliver to the students will be mainly inspirational and only in the end I will touch on my own pathway. The key message is that in my opinion there are two approaches to be recognised as artist: Either by your work or by your personality. Ultimately you want to be heard in the world of chatter. If you are aiming to be recognised by your work you need to find your style: your voice. If you want to be recognised for who you are you basically have to make noise, be outrageous in one way or another. Of course nothing is as clear-cut… but there is a chance for the quieter ones amongst us.

 

Tags , , , ,
Categories Absurd, Art, craft, Exhibition, Fun, Life, workshop

Meet the Spoon Family

August 3, 2014 //
0

wooden spoons

At the Festival of Performing Objects we are going to have a Kid’s zone in the Gallery and we hope that the little visitors will take to an impromptu play. I bought a packet of googly eyes for $2 at the Salvation Army Shop, and the wooden spoons in the Everything-is-50%- off-sale at the 2-Dollar-Shop. My ethical conscience is cringing at the price, but as I am living on flour and water at the moment, I told it to shut up! For my workshops I usually make a trip to the North Shore Resource Centre to get material. This is a really good volunteer organisation that my friend Cath put me on to. They collect leftovers, recycled or surplus material and you can get a big bag of all sorts of goodies to create puppets (or other artworks) for a dirt cheap price.  The most expensive part of these characters are the squishy noses made from disposable ear plugs. Unfortunately, they only had orange ones in the hardware store.

Anyway, I got carried away embellishing them. The idea was that the wooden spoons should be really simple so that they are easy to clean. Ah well, the handles are still easy to wipe down and that is where you hold them.

 

Tags , , , , ,
Categories Art, Comedy, craft, Exhibition, Fun, Hand Puppets, Promotion, workshop

Packing up

July 31, 2014 //
5

suitcase

Oh dear, this year seems to be the year of best intentions. I am so sorry for having neglected my blog for some time. Though it doesn’t mean the Dedes have been neglected.

You might know I have lost a few of my major sources of income at the end of last year and I have been working hard to secure new income streams. Now six month later everything came to fruition at once and this just means I am rushed off my feet to fulfill all my promises. My book of “101 recipes with flour and water” is still not finished, however, I am using it a lot, but I am stuck on 51 recipes.  My backyard chooks deliver an invaluable addition to my diet too.

Recently I have taken on a part-time teaching job. My first salaried job in 20 odd years. Even though I have been teaching for a long time, it was always on a contract basis. It seems with a salary inevitably come the politics… Something I want to steer clear off as much as possible. Navigating the foul ground takes a lot of energy. Believe me, I feel some good puppet stories coming on….

The Festival of Performing Objects is about to start. This weekend I have to deliver the Dedes I want to show in the exhibition. Every Dede is keen to pack up and go. Some of them will just sit in the Gallery for the month, while others will get action in the stop-motion workshops of the last week. I have to make a decision who is going to do what. I did a lot of work in the early days of the organisation unfortunately with all the changes to my working life poor Kim (the manager of the arts centre) had to bear the brunt of the recent weeks. She did an amazing work luring puppeteers out of the underwood. I am very confident it will be a fantastic exhibition.

It looks like we are getting quite a bit of attention. The first article about the event was published this week.

HM puppets 28_7_14

Tags , , , ,
Categories Art, craft, Exhibition, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Promotion, Stop Motion, workshop
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »