Bird Lamp

My last summer project, made possibly by my cousin's craft night. :)



Should I find myself with some free time this semester ( ha. ha.) I intend to make a few more.

Three months later, it's summer!

So, I've been back in the states for a whole month now, and I'm only just now getting around to posting again.
Figured I should post the finished masks; the second one didn't have time for a paint job, but that's all alright. I like the wood look anyway.


I've been back a school, taking summer classes, in case any y'all are interested. Just finishing up Jr. Illustration 1 , which should transfer over to concepts 2 credit. A Jr. Illustration core credit I couldn't get while abroad.
The first assignment for the class was to create a desk calendar. Out of the given non-profits, I chose to do The Nature Conservancy, and focused on their Sonoran Desert Project.



However, if I had had the time to come up with enough ideas, I probably would have done The Hunger Project. Both of these are worth a look at.


The second project was to make a post card. After trying and trying and failing to make a decent image for the ice hotel in Jukkasjarvi, Sweden, I ended up just doing one of the other choices: Harajuku Japan. My favorite part of this assignment, (both in making, and the result) was the stamp, which is shown next to the postcard back. Though, it was actually stamp size when I printed it.


And I just started life drawing this week. (I'm so glad this week is over, it was three double studio days in a row. NEVER AGAIN!) I'll be sure to get some of those assignments up soon as I've actually completed them.

Masks and Drawing

I'm almost finished with my mask! Just have to finish painting, but you'll have to sit with me as I started another one. This one has more personality though, and is an actual character in the Topeng dance, which I still have yet to see, he comes out at the very end, steals children and gives them money.

Also, I met up with my Advisor for my ISP project at a Life Drawing class, it was kind of weird being in Indonesia surrounded by old white people drawing a nude.....

I feel so out of practice!

Mask Making, Day 2,3, 4

Just posting progress shots!

Moved form the Axe to hammer and chisel and finally to the knife on day four. I really hope to finish it this week, but we'll see how far I get.

Topeng adventures Day one

So, since this is primarily an art blog, I figured I should post some art or something, but I don't have a scanner or access to photoshop this semester so you'll just have to deal with pictures of the Topeng mask making process.

Monday morning we didn't have class till 1:00 pm (but lunch was provided at noon) so I made my merry way over to the village-town of Mas, home to the one and only Ida Bagus Anon,Topeng mask maker extraordinaire. (No really, according to his claims, he is half the reason tourists buy Topeng masks at all) I was given a chunk of wood, an axe, and some dimensions and set out to make a mask of my very own.

After two hours of hacking away it looked a bit like this.

Then onto step two...cutting the corners off.

I didn't end up getting to far on that part though what with it being quarter past eleven and me needing to leave at 11:45. So at the end of Day One my mask stood at this point.

My right arm is so sore!

In other news, the sister of my fmaily's son's wife came to visit Monday evening and brought her family. And if that's not confusing enough, her husband is from Croatia, they met in India, and now they live just outside of London. They share English as a second language but haven't yet been able to learn each other's native tongue, and their two year old son's travel records would put an enthusiast to shame. I can only hope their hour long motor bike ride back to Denpasar went well despite the thunderstorm.

Check in

So I apologies for the lack of posts. I will put the blame partly on not having a steady time or place for Internet, and partially on my own inability to write things down every day. So rather than submit to you another freakishly long post describing in detail my experiences in Java and the past week and a half in Bali I figured I'd just say I'm alive, and living with a wonderful family in Bedulu Bail. We have a regular class schedule now, which is actually very helpful, and we're not busing around every moment. We had our first free weekend last week, and then another this week, and we've been here a month. Should give you an idea of how our schedule's been.

I will say that in Java we were able to visit the two great temples known as Brambadour and Prambanon. And had a short week long home stay with a Muslim family in a village outside the city of Yogyakarta. And that I lost any pictures I had of them when I went and lost my camera. I did manage to replace that though, so there will be plenty more pictures from this trip.

TaiPei

If there's one thing all airports share in common, it's the waiting, and the planes, but those are all branded differently and not everyone sells the same brand but the waiting is universal. This airport, however, also has free WiFi. So I figured I should get the whole travel part of this blog happening.

Which means I now get to share the woes of my journey. Or something :)

I did get off to a bit bumpy start, quite literally; helicopter noise and all followed by the tire blowout on the way to the airport. Lucky, it wasn't to far from home and the lovely ladies from the Stanley clan were able to rescue me off the side of the freeway and get me to good ol' SFO with plenty of time to spare. Thanks again guys!

The plane ride here wasn't to shabby, small amount of turbulence and a child crying here and there, but over all not to bad. They played the Owl Movie of Pretty, but I woke up part way through it, and the image quality wasn't that great, so I opted to try sleeping again. It worked as well as sleeping on a plane ever does.

The meals served aboard the plane weren't anything special, or especially nasty, but I do wish I had stayed away from the potato salad at dinner. The breakfast fruit was surprisingly good however, so that made up for it.

So know I'm sitting in a HUGE gate waiting for my flight to Denpasar, Indonesia, biding my time and looking at the rain. Don't know when I'll get to check in next, but hope all is well till then!