Dancing with Auditions

Auditions for "Dancing with Desire: a Poetic Fandango with the Erotic and the Bawdy", a compilation of erotic poetry from Sanskrit to modern Latina writers, are at the Hutchins School, 24 Mosher St, South Portland (ME) Monday, May 21st from 7 to 8 pm.  Callbacks will be Wed, May 23^rd at a different location. 

 The performance is Thursday, June 28^th at 5 pm at Lucid Stage as a part of PortFringe 2012.  Former founder and artistic director of Sacramento’s Beyond the Proscenium Productions – Ann Tracy -  will be directing. 

Come prepared to have fun with cold reads! The proposed rehearsal schedule will be available so actors can list conflicts.  Three actors are needed:  Young Woman (20-30), Older Woman (35+) and Man (30+).  This will be a reader's theatre piece as there will be only one performance. Please email me your headshot and resume -  anntracy51@gmail.com

In the Stars

Specifically, at Constellation Gallery doing my gallery sitting shift as a new member of the Maine Artists Collective!  I'm very happy to have this great spot on Congress Street in Portland's Art District as my new visual art home.  Right now, the current exhibit is from the graduates of the art program at Southern Maine Community College.  I took some installation shots today:

 

The artists' reception for the show is tonight and First Friday.   Tonight is also my reception of the digital woodcuts that I have over in the group show at Couleur Collection, 240 US Rte 1, Falmouth ME.  If  you're in the area, would love to see you from 5 to 7 pm!

Busy as a Bee in Springtime

So sorry gentle readers that life got so busy I didn't have time to post!  Well it seemed that way at the time.  But now the art is all up in Falmouth at the Couleur Collection, a lovely boutique that also doubles as a gallery space because owner Marcie Feller is also an artist herself!  They are showing my (mostly) floral digital woodcuts.  I had a meeting with Marcie at the store this morning to discuss the artists' reception, I'm sharing the wall space with several other artists. 

As I was driving back, I had to stop at the UPS store in Falmouth to drop off a package of something that needed to be returned.  As I pulled into the parking lot this was what I was greeted with

This sweet dog was in the store next door and was just having a look see out the window.  By the time I got my camera phone out of my purse and got out of the car, he was gone.  But I could see him inside, so I called him over so I could take his photo. 

Another thing that has been taking up some time is my volunteer work as a PR consultant to the Portland Performing Arts Festival.  It's been a great opportunity to meet some new people who are also interested in the arts.  I'm most excited about seeing Allison Chase's new dance-theatre company perform.  It will be the first time her new group performs in public since her nasty break-up with Pilobolus, where she was once the founding artistic director. 

As soon as we have the artists' reception May 3rd, I will post the photos of the art on the walls.  But I'd really like you Maine folks to come out to the reception which will be between 5 and 7 pm.

Winter's Last Gasp

was heard here in Portland Maine sometime during the night or early morning.  We got about an inch and it was melted by noon.  I took this photo with the phone and then manipulated it in photoshop to get some Easter candy color into it.  What amazes me still about the snow days here is how bright they are.  The photo was almost like a black and white and it took some time with both the curves filter as well as copying the image and using different blending modes in the layers to get these delicate hues.

In other art news, I got a call from a darling little clothing store where I have shopped up in Falmouth.  They not only carry one of my favorite designers (Eileen Fisher) but they also have art shows.  Last time I was in there I must have mentioned that I thought my floral digital woodcuts would look good in there to the woman who handles the art shows.  Got an email from her last week asking me to show exactly that!  I was so jazzed that I also ended up taking a shot from last summer of these great pink lillies and giving them the digital woodcut treatment.  I really like the result.

Back to the Boards?

Well, not me personally, but after last night's meeting about the first annual Portland Fringe Festival with members of the Portland Theatre Collaborative, I'm just about to direct an old Beyond the Proscenium Productions chestnut - Dancing with Desire: A Poetic Fandango with the Erotic and the Bawdy.  This compilation of erotic poetry, punctuated with sassy, dirty limericks, last played the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 1996.  In that production, I played the Older Woman and received the only fan letters I've ever had in my performing career.  The other characters were the Younger Woman and the Man, played by Samatha Ostermiller and Tim Dougherty.  Here's a photo of us at Luna's Cafe where we performed it as a fundraiser for the trip to the Fringe.

Yes, this was way back before I let my hair go prematurely salt and pepper.  It will be 20 years this July.  Time sure passes quickly when you're having fun!

Altered Flares

Power of Words © 2007

The title of today's blog comes from two things that are on my mind right now.  The huge solar flare that could cause problems with the electric grid system, never mind our individual electronic devices which I admit are very near and dear to my heart and the fact that I just got photos of the show that the above piece was juried into at Altered Esthetics in Minneapolis. 

Here's a link to the solar flare story which could be problematical but I haven't noticed anything untoward this morning with my experiences with electronic media.  Here's another link to the Belle Lettres show at AE.

MoPho Forever

The hubby and doggie and I are off on a little trip to the south to visit my Sista in Savannah.  On the way down, we're driving, we crossed this huge bridge and tunnel that crosses the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay.  We had driven from southern New Jersey down the Delaware shore just to see this part of the country.  The following is a photo taken with my android cell phone using an app called PaperCam.

While I wouldn't put  this in a show, I do think it goes a step beyond your typical travel photo.  In such the same way that photography is considered a fine art, cell phone photography is as well.

Joe Nalven, one of the moderators for the DigitalFineArts Guild & Yahoo group,  wrote a blog for the San Diego paper about aesthetics and cell phone photography which you can find here

Another luminary in the Digital Art World, Harald Johnson, came up with a great new term for this style of art.... and I thought I'd  share his response from the Digital Fine Art Yahoo group:

"Good blog, Joe, and good conversation-starter here. And I agree with your
changing the branded term "iPhoneography," but I think "cellphoneography" misses
the mark as well. I take pictures with my iPodtouch and my iPad, all using the
same/similar apps, and neither of which is a cellphone. But they are all mobile
devices. Hence, the better term (IMHO): "mobileography". Or: "MoPho" for short.
And Mobileography just rolls off the tongue better, don't you think? And MoPho has all kinds of racy, off-color connotations that make it especially attractive to artists, buyers, and the press. Think Marketing! (!)"

I like the way you think Harald.... it's MoPho for me!

Knowing Your Rights

I've been meaning to post something in the past six months about the rights photographers have to take pictures of anything on public property.  This great photo blog I follow (A Photo Editor) has been running interesting articles over the past few months about that very subject.  I've kept saving those emails for reference and realize that if I don't post something about it now, I never will.  So click HERE for a silly video but good information from the ACLU.

Art to Acting

Doing a double again after getting back from a wonderful week on the west coast - niece's wedding and visit to family and friends in Sacramento.  Before I left, I auditioned for a few minor roles for Bluebird, a movie written and directed by Lance Edmands (originally from Kennebunk) which was being filmed north of Bangor, Maine.  I got a callback and read for them and then it was time to get on that jet plane.  While I was in San Francisco with my dear friend Kate Maney, I got a call that they really wanted me for a featured extra part. 

I've been doing films off and on since 1996 and I swore that I would never be an extra (or "the meat" as one director called us) again.  But I had to reconsider this time.  Edmands is an up and coming writer/director (Sundance award winner) and I was told they "really" wanted me and would be able to reimburse me for mileage (shoot site was 3.5 hours north of Portland). 

This is his first feature film and he's written a drama that deals with the relationships of people to the landscape and set it in his home state.  How could I not help a young artist realize one of his dreams.  As artists (no matter what genre we work in) I feel we have an obligation to help each other as much as we can.  I certainly did with giving young actors and directors opportunities when I was running my theatre company in Sacramento (Beyond the Proscenium Productions). 

Although the call time was like working in radio news again, I'm glad I did it.  This cast and crew had it going on.  No silly-shallying as I've experienced in other films, but a tight, professionally run ship captained by a young man I think is going to make quite a name for himself and for Maine as a movie-making destination..  

Now, back to visual art.  I'm finishing up a commission piece for Amie and Jamie and I still need to wire a digital collage on canvas for the Belles Lettres exhibit at Altered Esthetics in Minneapolis and get it to Fed Ex by week's end.  I'm so grateful that I can move from genre to genre and work with wonderful people!

It's called Winter Celebration and based on a photo taken outside my upstairs window before going up to my attic studio.  I love the look of snow on tree branches.  I'll leave this with you while I jet off to San Francisco for my niece's wedding and short visit with family & friends in Sacramento too.

Gung Hay Fat Choi

Happy Year Of The Dragon

Glistening with Probabilities

Almost sounds dirty doesn't it?  Maybe that's why the phrase came to me a week or so ago and apparently has been in my mind since.  Now a bright new year is opening before us and of course I have a few things in mind for this year.  I want to submit a piece to a Professional Women Photographers show in New York and go to the reception!  I intend to sell more art and find a Maine gallery to rep me.   I also intend to do a full staged reading of Orestes 3.0 at the Portland Fringe Fest.  I intend to finish the commissioned piece for Aime and Jamie before their new baby is born.  I  was surprised at how I blocked myself so many times working on that piece.  But I showed them four different versions of ways I could head and got some good feedback from them.

Another thing I did at the very beginning of the year was to enter a piece or work in a show at Altered Esthetics in Minneapolis.  I thought "Power of Words" would be a great piece for their Belles Lettres exhibition and apparent they thought so too, as it was juried in!  They will get the 3rd in a limited edition run of 25.  If you'd like your print on either canvas or paper, go to my sales site to get it.

Merry Christmas

This is a Christmas card I designed this year based on a couple of photos I took in Kennebunkport when I picked up my artwork from the Maine Women in the Arts show.  It will go on sale on the Fine Art America site after the first of the year. 

As a special treat for friends and family, I'd like to re-post a story written by a Sacramento friend, Donya Wicken....

Santa Borg

(c) by Donya Wicken

I was just about fed up with Christmas shopping, cooking and

decorating and was ready to cancel the whole thing and buy a

one-way ticket to the Bahamas when I heard a tortured wail

from upstairs.  I raced up to find  middle son Derek

glowering self righteously at littlest son Ryan who promptly

flung himself at me sobbing.  I examined him for signs of

damage and at the same time shot Derek  “the look”

demanding to know what he had done to provoke this storm of

anguish.

Finally Ryan calmed down enough to tell me himself.   “He

said Santa Claus is really Uncle Robert”  he choked out

and then collapsed again into helpless sobs.

“Derek,  why did you tell him that?”  I groaned in my now-look-what-you've-done voice.

“Well, it’s true isn’t it?  He’s old enough to know

the truth.  Anybody but a dumb little kid could have figured

it out for himself.  Uncle Robert  always wears such a dorky

fake beard and his ho ho hos are totally lame.”

Ryan wailed louder.

“Well, aren’t you going to tell him the truth?”

demanded Derek.

Before I could answer, a voice behind me spoke.  “I’ll

tell him the truth.  I’ll tell you both the truth. “  It

was oldest son Roger, sounding strangely like a super hero.

“I know the truth because I am in junior high school,”

he said.   “I am old enough to know things that dumb

little kids like you are too young to understand.”  He

stared straight at Derek as he spoke and I was secretly

pleased to see Derek cringe.

“All right then,” Derek challenged, “tell us the

truth. “

“Yeah Roger, tell us.”  Ryan looked hopefully at Roger.

“All right, you remember that Star Trek movie when the

Borg tried to assimilate Captain Picard?”

“Yeah.”

“Cool.”

“Well which one was the real Borg?”

“Ha, that’s a dumb question,” Derek replied.

“There’s only one Borg.  All those Borg people are just

part of the collective.”

”Except Captain Picard,” Ryan interjected.  “He

wasn’t a real Borg.  But all the others were.”

“That’s right,” said Roger.  “And that’s how Santa

Claus is.”

Ryan’s eyes opened wide and he looked like he was going to

start to wail again.  “You mean Santa Claus is a Borg?”

“No dummy, “ Derek explained contemptuously.  “The

Borg are bad guys.  Santa Claus is a good guy. “

“That’s right, Derek, Santa Claus is a good guy.   But

he is like the Borg because he is a collective.  He is one

mind but he has many bodies all over the world.  That’s

how he can go to all those houses in one night.  And every

time somebody puts on a Santa Claus uniform he is

assimilated into the collective and becomes a Santa

Claus.”

“Wow.”  said Ryan.

“Oh yeah,”   Derek argued,  “what about when somebody

puts on a Santa suit because he’s a crook and he’s going

to rob somebody’s house?”

“Then it is not a uniform.  It’s just a disguise.  And

when somebody does that something bad will happen to him

because you can only wear the Santa Uniform to do good deeds

and make people happy.”

“So Derek was wrong.”  Ryan announced triumphantly.

“Uncle Robert isn’t Santa Claus.”

“No Ryan.  That’s not what I’m saying.  Uncle Robert

has been assimilated into the collective.   Uncle Robert

really is Santa Claus.”

Ryan gazed at Roger with unabashed adoration.  “Wow.”

“Isn’t that right, Derek?”  Roger demanded.

“Well,  if you tell it like that.  Yeah I guess so.  Is

that right, Mom?”

“It makes sense to me,”  I said.  “It makes a lot

more sense than most things this time of year.”

Roger walked downstairs with me.  Behind us we heard the

joyful sounds of a war being organized between the Evil Borg

Collective and the Good Santa Collective.  “That was

amazing, Roger," I said.  "You came up with a story that satisfied both

of your brothers.  How did you do it?”

“Don’t you remember, Mom?   The principal chose me to

play Santa Claus for the kids at the Head Start Christmas

party.  I’ve been assimilated.”