Art Prize 2013, Day 3: Off the Beaten Path

Day 3 of our visit to Grand Rapids' Art Prize began with a trip out to the Frederik Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Park.  Last year we drove up there for just the Art Prize entries, but with our reciprocal membership (thanks to our Chicago Botanic Gardens membership) we were able to tour the Gardens as well for no additional charge.

The pieces at the Gardens were fantastic.  The above piece, Watching, is on the 3D short list, and was quite impressive.  You know who wasn't impressed?  My daughter.  She cried and whined through the entire exhibit.  One of the security guards was kind enough to let her use her sippy cup to help calm her down. Having a crabby kid in an exhibition of glass pieces is a recipe for disaster.  Needless to say, even though there were a number of wonderful pieces that we voted for, it was hard to enjoy the experience!

This is what my daughter liked at the Gardens - the water play area at the Children's Garden.  Literally, this was the only part of the visit that she when she was remotely pleasant.  So, we picked up lunch and took an afternoon break at Auntie's house.

In the evening, we headed up to the Monroe North neighborhood to some venues we had never hit before. Our first stop was Yoga Heat, and yes, it was hot in there.  We moved on to the Boardwalk GR Condominiums, which was full of art.  We saw some great stuff, including Circulation (above), as well as my pick for the WORST piece of art so far.  Worse than Creepy Jesus.  The ten-year-old girl walking around along with us said that she could have done that piece.  I won't name it out of respect for the artist, but child please.

Sunflower for Hank (seen in the somewhat lousy photo above) took over 300 hours to create.  The WORST piece looks like it took 90 seconds to - ahem - create.  By the way, Sunflower for Hank is made of duct tape.

We then took a walk over to Canal Street Park and the Sixth Street Bridge Park.  It was getting dark by this point, so my photos don't do the art there any justice.

I happen to know that using old tires as planters is really hot right now.  However, that really doesn't have much to do with this piece.

Finally, we hit a recommended venue, the Monroe Community Church.  I can't give anything but high praise for the venue.  The art was outstanding, they had a kids' coloring table, and I finally found my favorite piece of the week so far!

Again, the photo doesn't do the piece any justice!  This is Moses 1,2,3 by Paris Tavonatti-Wartick.  Often times religious art can be so overt, and even garish (Creepy Jesus).  This piece makes a statement so quietly, yet so clearly.  I have such a tough time with religious pieces, as religion is very private to me.  Yet this is my favorite religious piece of any Art Prize I have ever visited.

As much as I'd like to get into more detail, I'm being screamed at by a 2-year-old.  On to Center City for a busy weekend of art viewing!

Art Prize 2013, Day 2: Faith Renewed!

Our first day at Art Prize was a bit lackluster.  I guess I just wasn't "in love" with anything.  The most exciting part of Art Prize is falling in love with certain pieces, and the husband and I felt so underwhelmed.  After taking the Little Person to pick apples for the first time, we headed to Hillside and St. Cecelia's for a children's presentation called "Can You Think It?  Can You Dream It?"

Kevin Kammerkad had a fantastic show, with songs, dancing, and puppetry.  At 30 minutes, it's just the right time for my two-year-old, and we left with a free CD and activity book!  And it was completely free!  It was so far off the beaten path that it was a small group.  However, it gave the Person ample room to run in circles.

We then moved on to my husband's pick, the Women's City Club.  It's a beautiful venue with a quiet, contemplative gallery.  The ladies are always so generous, and they serve meals and drinks.  Their efforts are tremendous.  Now, travelling with a 2-year-old is complicated, and here is what she liked best:

The live music in the luncheon room.  Luckily my sister had already visited this venue, and was kind enough to take the Person around while my husband and I enjoyed the art.  Now, enjoy . . . a complicated word when discussing Site:Lab.  I am not going to include any photos, as I didn't love it there.  Site:Lab is just so polarizing.  I truly loved the video piece Sonnet 27, on the jury short list.  The vibe fit perfectly with the building.  Everything else I just wasn't feeling this year.  I really felt like Year of the Snake opened up the building in a way that took some of the darkness and foreboding out of it.  That building is damn creepy, and I like it that way.

Since we were strapped for time, we finished up at UICA, a venue we've been dying to get to for years.  It did not disappoint.

The level of creativity in one space was unbelievable. From Will You Still Need Me, Will You Still Feed Me? (the top picture, sculpture made with crayon) to WoolHouse (directly above), the forms used were so varied, the use of space so unique, I just had my faith in Art Prize restored completely.  We will be returning, because I actually felt like we missed something.  I really wanted to concentrate on the pieces even more.

What really made me excited today was the enthusiasm from the artists at UICA.  The vibe was much more personal, and the artist above, Jessica Joy London, was so willing to let the public touch an example of the art that it made me more excited to experience it.  Her piece, Natural Phenomena/Synthetic Wonder, had the colorful appeal that my Person loves.  The more color, the better.  Going to Hillside and Heartside was eye-opening.  We have yet to visit Center City and the more populist art, but we're feeling more excited about the coming days.

Art Prize 2013: Taming the Toddler

We had two hours today to motor through some major Art Prize venues here in Grand Rapids.  Motor is the operative word - the Little Person is 2.  2 = Fiercely Independent.  2 = I want to walk!  2 = Very little time for contemplation.

This is our third trip, and now that the Little Person is mobile, we had to come prepared.  The husband and I checked the Jury and popular votes, and made sure to note those in the venues that we were hitting in our brief tour tonight.

First stop:  Western Michigan University

Nothing like balloons to attract the attention of a 2-year-old!  The Person did well here, as it was our first stop.  It also wasn't incredibly busy, which helps.  The third floor was open, and we were able to enjoy the art.  This was about the only stop we were able to do so.

See?  Perfectly nice in the stroller . . . for one floor of one venue.  We went downstairs to see the multimedia presentations, took her out of the stroller, and had to leave.

Next stop:  87 Orange Photography & The Jon Hartman Photography Co.

Small venues are great for kids.

This artist, Jeohvany Huerta, is in the Top 50 for "One Dream."  He was pretty passionate as he pointed out the subjects of his piece, many of which were family members.

Then:  The Harris Building

Big venue = unhappy kid.  We booked through the "Connected" entry, then skipped the second floor.  See the downhill progression here?  Tired toddler, contemplative experience . . . no, they don't go together.

After a brief trip to the Hub to spend $45 on swag, we made it down to the GRAM.  My sister suggested we avoid the weekend . . .good call.  Fortunately there weren't a billion pieces, but many that we enjoyed, like Firefly.  Fine, I liked hearing the theme from Knight Rider.  So I voted for it.  Populism at its worst.

As we approached 8:00 (closing time), we made a final stop at West Coast Coffee.

Here's a great one for the kids:  "Pale" is made from Legos!   But no, not for my kid.  They had a fish tank in the coffee shop.  She liked that better than any of the art.

So, our first day of Art Prize is in the books, and it's going to be a bit more of a project than we thought. Tomorrow we head to pick apples, then back to the event in the late afternoon.

Kidnap My Child, Please

Support your sport . . . sure.  I'm sure that West Shamokin cheerleading is awesome.  Does the local population need to know your kid's name, though?  I drive all around the suburbs, and see plenty of stick families.  Yep, they're not my cup of tea, but at least it's not POSTING YOUR CHILD'S NAME ON YOUR CAR.  Even better - both first and last names!  I've seen cars with one kid represented by their first name, and the other by their last name.  We all grew up with "stranger danger."  Why, then, would you put your kid's name on your car?  Isn't that asking for trouble?

This is something that has annoyed me for ages.  It seems so unbelievably foolish.  Off the soapbox now!

It's a Pinteresting World

It's hard to decide when my life changed - was it the birth of my daughter, or was it my introduction to Pinterest?  What is Pinterest to me - is it a nice little filing cabinet for ideas?  Is it my go-to place to find new craft projects and recipes?  A total time drain?  I'll go with all of the above.  However, it's not a make-or-break for me, nor do I TRY RIDICULOUS THINGS.  Those Toy Story cake pops are super cute, but I'm not dumb enough to think that I'd be able to replicate them.  While Pinterest Fail is a funny idea, sometimes I don't understand why people even attempt some of this crap.  Often times they repin professional ideas. I leave it to the pros!

My husband is really into decorating for birthday parties, and our daughter's party was no different.  I found tons of ideas on Pinterest.  Above is the crayon wreath I saw on a party table.  Success or fail?  If you look at the photo, it looks like a win . . . but it was a fail.  It's sitting on my washing machine in this photo, not having been actually used at the party.  The crayons are super delicate, just having been hot glued onto an embroidery hoop.  I tried to transport it from one house to another, and the crayons were knocked off the hoop right away.  So, even though it looks pretty, it's on the verge of falling apart at all times.

And now for the paint chip utensil holder.  The husband picked up the fantastic Crayola paint chips at Menards.  I used glue dots for the crayon chip, and the heavier-duty double-sided scrapbooking squares to fasten the solid chip to the multi-colored chip.  Frankly, this turned out awesome.  Without the scrapbooking squares, it would have been a fail, but thanks to my mother-in-law for her advice on the scrapbooking squares.  And let's be honest - the Crayola paint chip made the project!

My final party Pinterest projects:  The "dripping" paint cans and paintbrush rice krispie treats.  The dripping paint cans look great, with paint cans purchased at Home Depot and cheap JoAnn's fabric.  We just taped the fabric to the inside of the can.  No problem there.  However, the rice krispie treats were falling apart.  It's as simple as it looks - Wilton candy melted, and we covered the treats with it (using a spoon).  Since they were so weak, I ended up putting them in bags for the kids to take home.  I suppose that was simply a presentation fail.

Now THIS I'm super proud of.  A good friend Pinned a link to using magazine holders (2.99 at Target) to organize plastic bags, foil, and the like.  Love it!  As you can see, I only bought two as a test, but will be adding more.  Notice how my lunch bags don't fit in the organizer with the foil, but do fit in the magazine holders.  And yes, I bought the Ziploc ones on clearance after Christmas, of course.

Here's the deal:  Pinterest is fun, but sometimes we forget that it's all in fun.  I've had very few failures because I'm realistic about it.  As much as I'm dying to try the DIY rosette headband, I also know that I'm destined for failure on that front.  Stay tuned. . .

People You're Gonna Meet

Last year, on September 1st, I wrote the following post about dealing with our differences, especially in regard to those that may think they're "better" than you.  Sadly, in the past six weeks, I've been reminded of who I wrote it for, and how she turned out to be someone who'd rather "fit in" than be true to herself.  So, here it is again, with some additional truths.

I was reminded yesterday that life is hard work, and friendships are even harder!  The hardest part?  Being a woman, trying to form and maintain relationships with other women!  The "R" word that Aretha instructed us about all those years ago often flies out the window.  So, I'd like to impart some words of wisdom to start out the day, and I'm hoping to share this with as many people (especially women) as possible.

You're Gonna Meet . . . 

people you love at first sight.
people who are mean for the sake of being mean.
people who have a lot more money than you.
people who have a lot more money than you . . . and aren't afraid to share it!
people who support you no matter what.
people with unnecessarily bad attitudes.
people you need to get to know before you can decide if you like them or not!
people you despise on first sight.
best friends for life.
family members you wish weren't family members.
people who annoy you.
bullies.
stupid people (everybody knows that the world is full of stupid people!)
people you learn from, good or bad.
people who frustrate you.
people with no manners.
friends who understand you.
people you're just never going to understand.
friends who listen.
people who take advantage of you.
people you didn't think you'd be friends with . . . but are.
people who inspire you.

I've learned a great deal about myself and my place in this world over the past couple of months.  My eyes were truly opened up to how women assert themselves. It's important to remember that we will all meet people that are simply not comfortable in their own skin.   We will have friends, co-workers, and acquaintances that need a special kind of validation that they don't feel they can obtain by just being themselves.  So many of us try to create alternate personas that are just a little bit "more."  Better clothes, a nicer car . . you're still you on the inside. Likewise, I can name people that get that validation by either broadcasting their lives or their opinions to the public.  Gotta love social media.  In the end, it's just a shell - a facade.  We are all still the same person inside that little cocoon, no matter what we present to the outside world.

Therefore, I add to the list of People You're Gonna Meet:

people who will tell you what they think you want to hear.
disingenuous people, and those that will lie without a second thought.
people who want to be anyone else but themselves.
people who will accept you immediately.
people who are comfortable in their own skin.


Don't give up.  Things will change.  For every person who frustrates you, there's another that will listen to you gripe about that person who frustrates you!