February 4th, 2011
 
I woke up early and went off to set.  It was a crazy day because we are coming to the end of shooting on The Muppets and I still had quite a few interviews to gather.
 
I wrapped my crew around 8pm and was home by 9.  While on set, I got a request from the producer of the movie to film a little thing with Kermit and his son on Saturday.  I figured I would be working on the promo reel anyways so what the hey, I could come by.
 
As Murphy’s law would have it, I was driving home and I got a call from my co-worker Nathan.  He said, “I finished the promo reel, man!  You don’t have to come in on Saturday!”  I told him a defeated, “No.  Unfortunately, I still do.”
 
 
Now for some exciting news that I’ve been holding onto for a while to share…
 
As I’ve been doing this creative thing-a-day blog I have been pondering all the while of how I’m going to end the year.  I had toyed with an idea for my final day of filling up a room with everything I’ve done over the year and calling it “364 Days, 1 Room”.  Well, a while ago I sent the idea to my friend Jesse LaTour who co-owns an art gallery in Fullerton called The Hibbleton.  Unfortunately, He already had an artist scheduled for that time but he loved the idea.  He sent out my email to everyone he thought might find it interesting and my friends Mike and Candace emailed me back.
 
Mike and Candace own the studio space directly next door to The Hibbleton, it’s called The Violethour.  Mike and Candace are extremely creative people.  They are regulars at Burning Man and Mike has been a member of the Black Rock Rangers, a team of moderators who deal with problems that arise at Burning Man, for many years.  They’re space is super cool and as it turns out this March they are going to have me as they’re featured artist!
 
This is going to be an amazing and surreal event in my life.  I don’t consider myself an artist of the caliber of those that might adorn the walls of a bona-fide art gallery, let alone have the complete space but that is exactly what is happening.  I have had plenty of bad days or simply desperate reaches but the show will be more about looking at the whole rather than just the pieces.
 
I envision the show to be more like a hands-on exploritorium rather than a regular art show.  I will have the harmonograph table for people to get they’re own drawings.  I’ll have free sheet music strips and a couple of music boxes for people to compose they’re own songs with.  I’ll have an animation stand with a dry-erase board so people can feel free to add a few frames to the collaborative animation that hopefully will get created over the course of the show.  I’ll have instruments that people can play with, contact mics hanging from the walls and amplifying objects in the room, the modular and hopefully a few monome artists who might be willing to do a live performance.
 
I hope that people who walk through the show that wouldn’t normally consider themselves artists leave inspired by the concept that perhaps they actually are.  I remember the feeling I got the first time one of my posts made it to another blog and they referred to me as an artist.  I was like, Artist?  Uh, Ok.  I’m an artist.
 
It is going to be an epic thing to prepare for and who knows how it will turn out, but I can think of no better way to celebrate the end of this whole experience.
 
 
So anyways, to my creative thing of the day.  Tonight, after leaving set I went by The Violethour to meet with Mike and Candace.  I came to look at the space and imagine how I might use it for my show.  Even though it was quite late I felt pretty inspired at the end of the night.
 
I didn’t get home until almost 1 am but I went directly to my watercolors.  I figured I’d do something similar to what I did on Day 311 where I start with a flat wash of color and finish it with black ink and the dip-pen.
 
Once the wash was done I could see the haze of what might be a landscape in front of me.  I liked the way it looked so I decided to keep the dip-pen to a minimum.  I drew in a couple of lines to suggest the ridges of a hillside and then I added some birds in the upper corner.
 
I practiced drawing the objects in my sketchbook before drawing it on my final piece so that I wouldn’t leave any ugly mistakes in it.
 
In the end, I really like the minimal quality of the final piece.