tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-71933493786171251082024-03-05T10:12:58.590-08:00Book Arts Jet SetMary Tasillohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02910441089776640717noreply@blogger.comBlogger16125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7193349378617125108.post-50023370349669092952011-10-13T08:01:00.000-07:002011-10-13T08:01:39.511-07:00Occupy Links, plus Zines & EducationThe People's Plaza (previously or otherwise known as Dilworth Plaza, outside City Hall) is peppered with handmade signs and chalk writing. I've heard a lot of discussion in the past week of Occupy Philly about how to clarify our message, and the protest signs reflect this sense. I disagree. I think the first thing we need to do is share our stories. Empathy is how those not moved to spend their time at City Hall will begin to understand what people are doing down there, and there is no way to spark that empathy unless we start communicating who we are as individuals and why we are moved to protest.<br />
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To this end, I'd like to share a couple of projects:<br />
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<ul><li>Today I will be facilitating a zine making workshop at the Education tent, which is at the southern end of the People's Plaza. Printer friends Leah & Alex will be making screens based on participant zines, & bringing them back to the plaza Sunday afternoon for on-site printing of distributable copies.</li>
<li><a href="http://occupyphillyvoices.wordpress.com/">Occupy Philly Voices</a> is a blog started by Julia to record, visually, textually, and audibly, the stories of those involved in the occupation. More content should be coming in the following days, including some photos I've contributed. But there is some good stuff from the first couple of days to get you started.</li>
</ul><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUFmuvsEAb1OZch2zUaNhONt4Sm3EH6LM3ZtDdgPKGL6qyIvAEWMlLv-Xp4MrAdxWR-LaZb9t0o4MHSiLIwPnicBRbVDXYfYogWuZd8ULC6izAr8YNczqzZlifpG7zNwXrrkOGxbznUhg/s1600/IMG_2085.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUFmuvsEAb1OZch2zUaNhONt4Sm3EH6LM3ZtDdgPKGL6qyIvAEWMlLv-Xp4MrAdxWR-LaZb9t0o4MHSiLIwPnicBRbVDXYfYogWuZd8ULC6izAr8YNczqzZlifpG7zNwXrrkOGxbznUhg/s320/IMG_2085.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>The Education tent</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i><br />
</i></div><div style="text-align: left;">Please consider sharing your own story when making signs. Keep an eye on the <a href="http://www.facebook.com/OccupyPhiladelphia">Occupy Philly Facebook page</a> to keep up on the daily events, marches, and other direct action. More good links coming soon!</div>Mary Tasillohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02910441089776640717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7193349378617125108.post-38155906173009083822011-10-10T10:20:00.000-07:002011-10-13T08:09:40.265-07:00Do Art Workers Have Time to Blog?Book Arts Jet Set is getting a revival here as I experience <a href="http://occupyphilly.org/">Occupy Philly</a>, the City of Brotherly Love counterpart to Occupy Wall Street. I haven't blogged on arts, politics, and the economy since leaving a desk job for a juggling act of teaching, editing, and other independent contracting. I refer you to this post's title: do art workers have time to blog?<br />
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Right now I struggle to find a balance of time and attention to put to the activity going on at the west side of City Hall and to put towards my own livelihood. What is going on at City Hall anyway? A fluctuating community of several hundred individuals are: (1) speaking out against economic inequality, (2) working to educate themselves through discussion, reading, and expression so that they might better understand what has happened to our economy and what alternatives might be possible, and (3) practicing community based on respect, care-taking, and alternative economies.<br />
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I want to participate. I also find my email full of queries that need tending to, apropos prior commitments and future work. I work to define myself.<br />
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><i>I work hard.</i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><i>I make less than the median income.</i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><i>I paid $2400 more in federal taxes than:</i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><i>GE</i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><i>Prudential</i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><i>Bank of America</i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><i>Citigroup</i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><i><br />
</i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">Look for images and commentary in the coming days.</div>Mary Tasillohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02910441089776640717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7193349378617125108.post-1898945349968401702010-05-28T12:17:00.000-07:002010-05-28T12:46:15.443-07:00Print, the Media, and EquilibriumRoberta Smith says of MoMA PS1's <span style="font-style: italic;">Greater New York</span>: "It pays lip service to all of the touchstones of the moment: collective art making, the ephemeral, audience participation, political subject matter, art as life, art as documentary, art as social interaction" (<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/28/arts/design/28greater.html?8dpc">NYTimes, May 27</a>). I find myself wondering if lip service is key here; rarely do I see art in such sanctioned spaces that is a real social and political response to the contemporary American landscape. I have been joking about my Five-Year Art Crisis as I re-assess my art practice, the momentum of academic systems that have rewarded me in certain regards (though I remain in the fiscally untenable position of practicing as an independent scholar as well as artist) and the contexts within I would ideally work. And I find that the politics I hold dear thrive best in less sanctioned spaces.<br /><br />Still I turn the idea of <span style="font-style: italic;">equilibrium</span> around in my mind, as the theme of next year's Southern Graphics Council conference. Like so many things in my life, running the art conference circuit doesn't make sense. I pay out of my own pocket to go, and it's not clear what kind of professional rewards I reap. But what continues to compel me is the notion of bridging this gap between the Print Community (I use caps facetiously; how do we determine which communities of people creating prints receive this title?) and the activist print community. And <span style="font-style: italic;">equilibrium</span> seems the perfect umbrella under which to consider how artists approach a world that seems increasingly out of balance.<br /><br />Being an activist is to take an approach of hope and optimism, however dark the world appears. Creating activist art is an act of faith in the power of imagery to sustain social movements. Rebecca Solnit refers to the narrative we tell as activists, reminding us that our arguments and efforts to spread information are aided by telling the story in as many and as compelling ways as possible. To be an activist is to take the position that we the people have control over the spread of information, that we can change public discourse. This is why narrative and graphics become crucial to any campaign. We can no longer trust the media to tell our stories for us. We cannot show up to protest and expect the media to meet us there. We have to change the information landscape, reshape it, redraw the maps we use to guide our lives. This is where the multiple comes into play. This is why I believe in it with ardent fervor. How else do you battle corporate media than by making your image countless times in an attempt to counter-balance their narrative?<br /><br />So with that in mind, I invite any references to print artists addressing these concerns--that of the media, and of trying to restore balance in the narrative of our society.Mary Tasillohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02910441089776640717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7193349378617125108.post-91521587549814428092010-05-21T12:34:00.000-07:002010-05-21T12:44:58.611-07:00Art, Business, and the Revolution<span style="font-style: italic;">Admission #1: </span>When I propose a presentation, I have no idea what my conclusion will be. <br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Admission #2: </span>When I put together a panel discussion, I have a point in mind that I secretly want my panelists to make. Often the panelists have their own ideas--which is fantastic. I’m not attached to how we reach an outcome, as long as that outcome rocks. I wouldn’t trade in the discussion that happened at the Southern Graphics Council Conference panel I moderated, <span style="font-style: italic;">Resisting the Remarque</span>, for anything. But I admit that I secretly wanted to talk more explicitly about art <span style="font-style: italic;">economies</span> that are resisting capitalism than about the social content and context of the artwork at hand.<br /><br />The party line seems to be that most artists are terrible at marketing their work—except when they’re not, in which case we deride them for clearly being more interested in marketing than in art—and then, that we need to overcome our sense that it is somehow wrong to, or that we are undeserving of, making money from our work.<br /><br />Case in point: Manya Scheps’s May 18 article on the Philadelphia Weekly Arts and Culture site, “<a href="http://www.philadelphiaweekly.com/arts-and-culture/art/Good-or-Bad-Picasso-Painting-Sells-for-106M.html">Good or Bad? Picasso Painting Sells for $106M</a>.” Scheps’s take is that instead of deriding the sale as a waste of money, artists should take heart that people are still buying art, and should become participants in the market, stating that: “while small-market artists can’t eliminate the disparity between ultra-rich collectors and themselves, they can steer it in a way that is mutually beneficial.” Frankly, I’m unsure how precisely Scheps thinks one can ever view disparity as mutually beneficial. But more to the point, I’m tired of the idea that artists must embrace the market and let go of their idealism and/or market phobias, as if a resistance to the market could never be a decided form of resistance to the capitalist economy that would appear to rule all decision-making within American society, both socially and politically. Recently selected Republican nominee for Senate for Kentucky, the Tea Party affiliated Rand Paul, stated on primary night, “capitalism is freedom, it means the freedom to voluntarily exchange goods, and retain the fruits of your labor” (as quoted by Kate Zernike in the <a href="http://http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/20/us/politics/20teaparty.html?scp=4&sq=rand+paul&st=nyt">May 19 NYTimes</a>), seeming to conflate our economic system with our system of government. Admittedly this is an understandable mistake, according to the way things play out, but not one you want your government officials to be stating outright. The other problems with this statement I won’t bother to break down here.<br /><br />Chief Cultural Officer of the City of Philadelphia Gary Steuer <a href="http://artscultureandcreativeeconomy.blogspot.com/2010/05/what-poetry-brings-to-business.html">blogged yesterday</a> about the book <span style="font-style: italic;">What Poetry Brings to Business</span>. Again, I tire of these efforts to bring together the worlds of art and business. One would think that in the wake of the recent economic meltdown and the ongoing uncovering of the absolute venality of those running our financial system, it would be okay to be a bit suspicious of our economic system—not just of “the big banks” but of the structure of capitalism itself, and the social mores we’ve brought up alongside it.<br /><br />I don’t object to artists selling their work, particularly as, no matter what our ideals, we find ourselves here trying to survive within a capitalist system. However, I would encourage us, artists and non-artists alike, to think about making a <span style="font-style: italic;">livelihood</span> from our work, rather than about making money from our work. This gives us space to carve out alternative values in thinking about the quality of our lives, to explore economies such as gifting and bartering, and to see our position as artists-outside-the-blockbuster-echelon as a potential site of power and reclamation to redefine the ways we create a livelihood through our work practice.Mary Tasillohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02910441089776640717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7193349378617125108.post-1610751923754582962009-12-31T11:26:00.000-08:002009-12-31T11:42:27.064-08:00On nostalgia, the new year, and zine technologiesAs we come to the end of another year and round out a decade, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/31/opinion/31gilbert.html?th&emc=th">Daniel Gilbert writes of nostalgia</a> in the New York Times, playing right into everything I find depressing about both ushering in a New Year and the General Direction of Things. He states: “But maybe we’ve reached nostalgia’s end. ‘Nostalgia’ — made up of the Greek roots for ‘suffering’ and ‘return’ — is literally a longing for the places of one’s past. And lately, it has become harder and harder to find things to miss about America’s places.” Gilbert then goes on to discuss the chain culture of America and blurring of the lines that distinguish one place from the next.<p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I went to the movies on Christmas Day. Being subjected to 45 minutes of commercials and previews, including a cinematic advertisement for the National Guard, makes me want to drop out of society.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I always prided myself on embracing change. As a teenager in the nineties I decried listening to one’s parents’ music, which many of my peers did, instead embracing the new, grunge/alt/indie/triphiphop. I delved into the cyberpunk culture of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mondo_2000">Mondo2000</a> and fantasized about hacking despite my lack of programming-level computing skills.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">As an adult at the turn of 2010, I have embraced social media and taken my calendar and my music digital. Then again, I find myself attached to older technologies as a printmaker, letterpress printer, and maker of artist books, paper, and zines. Someone remarked to me the other day: “I thought ‘zines were over.” Now certainly media focus on, well, media, concentrates on computer and networking technologies, but this does not <i style="">necessarily</i> mean the death of other older technologies. Try telling the dozens who tabled the <a href="http://www.phillyzinefest.com/">Philadelphia Zine Fest</a> with me this fall that zines are dead. Zines – their creators and audience – can fill <st1:place>West Philadelphia</st1:place>’s Rotunda, as well as other zine and small press events around the country. It hardly looks like a cemetery. Indeed one might surmise that the direction technology has taken has helped rather than hindered zine culture.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">As virtual aspects to our lives have increased, a simultaneous interest in the handmade has arisen. Witness the uptick in knitting, the resurgence of letterpress printing, the success of the handcraft website Etsy, the interest in homebrewing beer. While the photocopier itself may be a speedy technology, these are still self-published and self-bound items. Meanwhile, the flourishing of blogs and social media sites has acclimatized a large population to creating content, which was once upon a time the gaping empty hole of the web. Imagine. Additionally, the internet has aided the distribution of zines and supports the networking of zine makers. Witness the ability to track down zine distros online, the weblinking amongst metazine publications such as <a href="http://www.brokenpencil.com/">Broken Pencil</a> and <a href="http://www.undergroundpress.org/">Zine World</a>. The social networking site Ning has a <a href="http://wemakezines.ning.com/">Zinemakers community</a>, and email groups also support connections amongst zinesters. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">One benchmark of the health of the zine community might be the size and might of the Zine Yearbook over the past 13 years. I quote from <a href="http://zinewiki.com/Zine_Yearbook">Zine Wiki</a> on the 2008 <i style="">Zine Yearbook #9</i>: “at 240 pages #9 is the largest Yearbook yet and proof that zines are not dead." </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Is nostalgia tied exclusively to place, or is it applied to the tangible? Can we be nostalgic for the handheld? If so, maybe there is hope yet for nostalgia and a world that remembers its past, documented in the pages of something that can be picked up, held in the hand, and passed around.<o:p></o:p></p>Mary Tasillohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02910441089776640717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7193349378617125108.post-24034337361182167002009-11-10T13:34:00.000-08:002009-11-10T13:39:13.589-08:00War MemorialToday marks the anniversary of the Vietnam War Memorial’s completion – the memorial that was so controversial for its stark remembrance of the fallen. I have been struggling over past weeks to articulate what it is that has made vets issues one high on my list of concerns – as evidenced by links posted to Facebook and top organizations I donate to. By even raising the question, I reveal myself to be non-military. Still, the more I think about it, I wonder how I could be preoccupied with anything else. How could I not be preoccupied with the too-often overlooked human evidence of two unending wars gone awry? A history of focus on the homeless is tied so clearly to Veterans affairs as we bring home more troops without providing for them. Bush is out of office, and yet we still, as a nation, have our head stuck firmly in the sand.<br /><br />I come home at night to messages about family drama. My sister tries to make a family with an Iraq War vet, now home two years. I come home the next night to the news that Army psychiatrist Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan opened fire at the Fort Hood Soldier Readiness Processing Center, killing 13 and wounding 30. We ask: is it a terrorist attack, this killing spree by a man of Muslim beliefs? We ask: is this the state to which military service is bringing our soldiers? Do we ask how these questions are linked, whether they are two edges of the exact same sword? The Vets must try to help themselves; there are not psychiatrists, healthcare, or sensitive diagnoses to go around. Do they suffer for serving our country? Why did we send them over there? Are the rest of us going to suffer for it? We are all culpable.<br /><br />This post is not a guilt trip. This is about the interconnectedness of all things. Lucy Lippard states that if the artist would rather spend his/her time at parties and bars, that is their choice, but given the fate of artists in totalitarian societies, one might think they would spend some of their time elsewhere. Does this mean each artist must soak their art in political content? No, but it means that artists, as all other citizens, better start seeing themselves as actors/enactors/and/enablers when it comes to their participation in day to day life, the global society, the body politic. Each creation of art is a political act. Art, like life, is about attention – increasingly hard to come by in an ADD culture. This is our future. There are no casualties. We coexist with the dead as with the living. I refuse to believe that violence is necessary, or even inevitable, and I will resist it in every way that I can, in acts both large and small.Mary Tasillohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02910441089776640717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7193349378617125108.post-89586526476459125702009-11-02T06:53:00.000-08:002009-11-02T06:59:07.525-08:00Arts Funding IncreasesAt last there is a small bit of good news at a time when non-profits are making cuts across the board -- to programming, staffing, open hours, etc. The House and Senate have just passed increases of $12.5 million each to the NEA and NEH, raising their budgets to the highest levels in 16 years.<br /><br />April 12-13, 2010 will be Arts Advocacy days in Washington, DC. Visit <a href="http://www.ArtsActionFund.org">Arts Action Fund</a> for more information, and add it to your calendar.Mary Tasillohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02910441089776640717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7193349378617125108.post-19847895326581684072009-10-21T08:43:00.000-07:002009-10-21T10:58:04.423-07:00Paper Nerds and the FutureI've just returned from the Friends of Dard Hunter Annual Meeting in Atlanta, Georgia feeling enthusiastic about the future of hand papermaking and its potential impact on the art world. Let me take a moment to clarify what I mean by art world in this context. I'm not thinking about the world of commercial galleries and museums, which have a questionable future and a questionable impact in my book. I'm thinking about how creativity functions in the social sphere.<br /><br />On the themes of art, sustainability, and social change:<br /><br /><ul><li><a href="http://www.combatpaper.org/">Combat Paper Project</a> shared updates on their recent tours, as well as holding a demonstration featuring a bicycle-powered portable beater built by <a href="http://www.toolsforpaper.com/">Lee Scott McDonald</a>.</li><li>I presented the <a href="http://bookbombing.blogspot.com/">Book Bombs</a> public paper and print project by Michelle Wilson and myself, within the context of other projects engaging multiple approaches to sustainability.</li><li>Also on my panel, <a href="http://www.alienweeds.com/">Patterson Clark</a> discussed his full-cycle approach to sustainable practices of making paper, prints, and inks from invasive plants.</li><li>Students from University of Alabama, alongside ring-leader Steve Miller, lead conference participants in making banana fiber paper, educating about methods for making paper from these cultivated plants, skills that are necessary if we are to transition into utilizing local plant fibers.<br /></li></ul>Most encouraging was the enthusiasm with which the sustainability question was embraced. Amy Richards, a papermaker who works for the <a href="http://plants.ifas.ufl.edu/">Center for Aquatic and Invasive Plants</a> in Florida was on hand to offer the resources of her Center.<br /><br />While many of us traveled from afar to be at this meeting, my hope is that by sharing this energy, our information, and the generous community that papermakers foster, the future impact on how we all exist and create in the world will be worth the environmental impact of our travel, of the book arts jet set mentality. I made a call for Slow Papermaking, and I stand by it, but slowing down and making change takes time. There may be some lofty idealism here in this hope...but why not?Mary Tasillohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02910441089776640717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7193349378617125108.post-37697564367536762772009-04-09T17:36:00.000-07:002009-04-09T17:36:00.670-07:00What is democracy?Last week I was at the opening for a fab book show, <a href="http://www.cfeva.org">Reading in Installments: Book Art Meets Installation</a>, curated by Elysa Voshell and on display here in Philly through April 20 at the Center for Emerging Visual Artists. (Check it out!) Someone mentioned the uncanny knack that some book artists who have been long devoted to the democratic multiple have developed for strictly defining what does and does not count as book art. That is, those who have championed publishing books cheaply and distributing them widely, ostensibly as a democratizing practice, seem strangely resistant to embracing a plurality of practices within the book arts field.<br /><br />The Book Arts List administered by Peter Verheyen through the <a href="http://www.philobiblon.com">Philobiblon</a> website periodically displays a similar intolerance (through no fault of Peter's, I might add). A thread of the past few days demonstrates perfectly the behavior that causes me to unsubscribe from the list in disgust approxmately once a year. Someone submitted an inquiry to the list seeking resources connecting queer theory and the artist book. There were some thoughtful and supportive responses, but unfortunately these were counterbalanced by a cavalcade of those ready to set this individual straight, as it were.<br /><br />Many lambasted the researcher for making assumptions about the marginalization of artist books, as well as about their connections to queer theory. However, these individuals made a swath of assumptions about the person posting the question -- first, that as a student this was an inexperienced researcher and scholar, and second, that there was something offensive about this conclusion or connection. As it turns out, the individual is a writer with multiple Master's degrees. And as John Cutrone succinctly put it in a post to the list, it seems quite clear that both artist books and the LGBT community are marginalized and are linked, at the very least, in this. See eco-feminism and social justice for more on the idea that all oppressions are connected. (Not that I'm claiming the word "oppression" for application to artist books, as many are able to practice in such a field precisely because they inhabit a position of privilege.)<br /><br />I know that the Book Arts List is comprised of many different people, vocal and not, and I feel a strong sense of community with some of these people. But I find myself hard pressed at present to feel that this List as a whole is a community, or at least one I would be other-than-embarrassed to be a part of. There are few individuals out there writing about the artist book. I would think the book arts community would want to support such writing, even if it focuses on a part of the field to which they do not feel connected. I can only think that there is a deep sense of homophobia at play here, even if expressed in the guise of promoting proper scholarly methods. Otherwise, why not let the research process take care of itself. If there's not information to support the idea, there won't be a paper to be written. I suspect that there's a good deal to investigate here - hence the backlash on the list.<br /><br />And all this within a week of the legalization of same-sex marriage in two states. Change comes, but it doesn't come easily. This week I am proud to be a former Vermonter, at least.Mary Tasillohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02910441089776640717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7193349378617125108.post-64758022292481516822009-02-16T08:37:00.004-08:002009-02-16T08:56:02.570-08:00Art is Not WorkWell, there's good news and there's bad news for arts funding as it relates to the freshly passed economic stimulus bill.<br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Good news:</span> The bill passed with $50 million in additional funding for the National Endowment for the Arts.<br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Bad news:</span> That amount was almost axed from the bill.<br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Good news:</span> Arts workers and organizations mobilized to speak up for themselves and contact their representatives to preserve this funding.<br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Bad news:</span> Many of our elected representatives, as well as our citizens, fail to recognize work in the arts as, well, work. The Senate wanted to rule out using stimulus money for museums, arts centers and theaters. Is it not self-evident that these institutions, besides supporting artists, provide actual concrete jobs to artists and non-artists alike? Might I also point out that, as these jobs provide relatively low wages, dedicating $1 million to museum jobs would likely employ more individuals than if we send that $1 million to even shovel-ready infrastructure projects? I'm not suggesting axing infrastructure investment; goodness knows we're grossly overdue for some. Neither am I suggesting that anything is right with poorly paying workers in the arts and culture. But I am wondering where people think arts and culture spending is so frivolously going if not towards creating and supporting jobs. P.S. Art is work, too!<br /><br />For a little more on your legislators and this funding issue: <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/16/arts/16mone.html">www.nytimes.com/2009/02/16/arts/16mone.html.</a>Mary Tasillohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02910441089776640717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7193349378617125108.post-64358254197714001022009-01-23T08:04:00.000-08:002009-01-23T08:08:21.279-08:00The New EconomyI'd like to clip a comment from Paul Krugman, in the Op-Ed section of the NYTimes yesterday, that characterizes a moment in Obama's Inaugural Address that had me scratching my head as well:<br /><br />"Thus, in his speech Mr. Obama attributed the economic crisis in part to 'our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age' — but I have no idea what he meant. This is, first and foremost, a crisis brought on by a runaway financial industry. And if we failed to rein in that industry, it wasn’t because Americans “collectively” refused to make hard choices; the American public had no idea what was going on, and the people who did know what was going on mostly thought deregulation was a great idea."<br /><br />I second that. This was meant to be the People's Inauguration...so why blame the economic meltdown on its victims?Mary Tasillohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02910441089776640717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7193349378617125108.post-53721221958531430612009-01-21T17:46:00.000-08:002009-01-21T17:46:00.702-08:00The Work of the Coming ChangeIn Monday's New York Times, Jesse L. Jackson, Sr. contributed a great piece on Dr. Martin Luther King's last birthday, which he spent working, never stopping the work of social justice and change. Jackson holds this as a model for our observation of Obama's inauguration, and this sentiment was threaded through Obama's inaugural address as well. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/19/opinion/19jackson.html<br /><br />What are you going to do to push for change in the coming year?<br /><br />As artists, how can we advocate for ourselves in tough economic times? Moreover, how do we ensure that our work is relevant to these times?<br /><br />Quincy Jones has started a petition for the Obama administration to appoint a Secretary of the Arts. You can find it here: http://www.petitiononline.com/esnyc/petition.html. The Book Arts List (archives at www.philobiblon.com) has been home to some lively debate about whether or not this is a good idea.<br /><br />On a related note, the recently formed Impractical Labor is now offering subscription-memberships. While it is still unclear exactly what forms this project will take, I applaud them for reviving the union idea. Their Research Institute "<span class="style1"> summarizes, analyzes, and interprets previously published works on similar topics (industrial history, technologies and handcraft, economics, art as service, sociology of work, & so on) and publishes these reviews as the <strong style="font-weight: normal;">ILSSA</strong> <strong style="font-weight: normal;">Reference Collection</strong>." This quote is from their website, where you can find out more: www.impracticallabor.org. </span>Mary Tasillohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02910441089776640717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7193349378617125108.post-28211455591399244212008-11-16T16:50:00.000-08:002008-11-16T17:10:18.479-08:00Gender on the Brain<span style="font-style: italic;">The New York Times</span> published an article this weekend about the declining percentage of women making up computer science students—10%, down from 20% seventeen years ago and from 40% in the mid-eighties.<br /><br />Meanwhile, I am reading <span style="font-style: italic;">Journal of Artists’ Books (JAB) 24</span>, which features a long interview between Tate Shaw and Chris Burnett about road literature and the artist’s book, coinciding nicely with Burnett’s talk on the same at Pyramid Atlantic last weekend. Inevitably Kerouac’s classic is referenced, not least because the famous scroll manuscript is currently on display at Columbia College Chicago’s Center for Book and Paper, the current home of <span style="font-style: italic;">JAB</span>.<br /><br />My own strong response to <span style="font-style: italic;">On the Road</span> at age 15 aside, there seems to be a gender divide in its contemporary reception. Particularly coming to it as adults, many women I know have little patience for the book.<br /><br />And I find myself asking: is there a gendered aspect to road literature?<br /><br />Over the course of a road trip covering 700 miles, Shaw and Burnett conversationally compile a prodigious list of 235 references—books of many sorts, pieces of art, fiction, theory. To the best of my ability, I calculate that thirty of these were works by women (with fractions figured in for works with multiple authors). This is roughly 13%, so it is safe to say that road literature is doing better than computer science by a narrow margin.<br /><br />My goal is not to fault Shaw and Burnett for this disparity. To be sure, any attempt at gender balance in academic and critical conversation is hampered by a deeply entrenched history of bias in publishing, academe, the arts, and the culture at large. And I wonder how the overall theme of the road trip ties into our gender norms.<br /><br />Burnett discusses stream of consciousness writing as linear, parallel to but never quite caught up with real time (20). On the other hand, comics artist Lynda Barry points to the act of writing as the actual carrier of the art, the image, the narrative (<span style="font-style: italic;">What It Is</span>, 2008, Drawn & Quarterly)--rather than simply its scribe.<br /><br />Meanwhile…yes, all this attention to the road coincides with the 50th anniversary of <span style="font-style: italic;">On the Road</span>’s publication, but it also comes at a time when the road trip’s death knells are sounding. The price of oil has sky rocketed. The limits of our fossil fuel supply are becoming clearer, as are the disastrous impact of a car culture on the earth’s climate. If I throw out the term “eco-feminism,” that says enough, right?Mary Tasillohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02910441089776640717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7193349378617125108.post-84856801102058824352008-07-03T19:48:00.000-07:002008-07-03T20:02:53.368-07:00Book Artists With a Backup PlanI hope I won't be spoiling the surprise by announcing plans for the zine <span style="font-style: italic;">Book Artists With a Backup Plan</span>, which is to be put into action by Katie Baldwin and myself--and some credit goes to Helen, as well, for incubating the idea. While packing up the last bits of Katie's house for a move, we were thinking of that gap between our training and the realities of the job market, and the backup plans we contemplate and enact when at a loss about how to put our skills to use in a way that will also pay the rent.<br /><br />Katie mentions her undergrad senior class theme of, "would you like fries with that?"<br />I think of my successors at UArts and their plans for a book arts pin up calendar.<br />As for me, every time I'm at a loss I think about how many pastry chef jobs are on Craig's List. However, I can't seem to get anyone to hire me to bake cupcakes, so I guess it's back to teaching.<br /><br />The zine is scheduled to coincide with the Hybrid Book Conference in Philadelphia in 2009. Watch for our call for entries, and in the meanwhile, be thinking about which back up plans you'd like to share.Mary Tasillohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02910441089776640717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7193349378617125108.post-81332572560487959402008-06-28T17:40:00.000-07:002008-06-28T17:50:07.938-07:00Democratically Activist Book ArtsPlease help my research!<br /><br />I am gathering information about all artists who are currently engaging ideas of the democratic multiple and/or activist practice in their book arts work. Any and all ideas and references can be posted as a comment here or emailed to matasillo at earthlink dot net. Thank you very much. I will be speaking on this topic at the Pyramid Atlantic Book Arts Fair and Symposium, November 7-9, 2008, in Silver Spring, MD. More information on the Symposium at <a href="http://www.bookartsfair.org">www.bookartsfair.org</a>.Mary Tasillohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02910441089776640717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7193349378617125108.post-55626309875133201512008-06-20T08:52:00.000-07:002008-06-20T15:21:22.217-07:00Mission Manifesto<span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-style: italic;">"book arts jet set"<span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-style: italic;"></span></span><br /></span></span>This phrase was initially developed to jokingly poke fun at fellow itinerant book artists.<br /><br />However, wider implications of this idea soon came to mind.<br /><br />The book arts face distribution challenges. As a complex, yet rarified, object that must be held to be experienced properly, one must be in the presence of an artist book to grasp it.* However, these books are often limited edition or one-of-a-kind works. They are too expensive for the average person to own. Thus, one must travel to a collection or gallery to experience them. Hence, to know the field, one must travel.<br /><br />Furthermore, the development of a professional community is also dependent upon the artist-critic-scholar's ability to travel, as the field is small and one naturally wants to interact with fellow book artists outside of a 5-mile radius.<br /><br />Travel is increasingly expensive. Many book artists never recoup the cost of their work. Many are working outside of the support of an academic institution. Hence <span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-style: italic;">book arts jet set</span></span> interrogates some of the very material and economic challenges of practicing in the field, as well as addressing other items of interest to friends of book arts.<br /><br />*Arguably one must also be in the presence of the painting to really get it, but a painting is much simpler to digitize than a book. Thus relatively few artist books have been digitized or reproduced in other formats.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-style: italic;"></span></span>Mary Tasillohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02910441089776640717noreply@blogger.com0