I have been accepted as an Artist in Residence at Wormfarm Institute!

I found out a few days ago that I have been accepted to be an artist in residence at the Wormfarm Institute from May 20th to June 15th in Reedsburg, Wisconsin! I am so excited. I will have a month to work on a farm and create some new artwork. This will be my first time away from home for a long period of time without friends or family. The residency will be an amazing growing experience for me. I will blog about my days there too!

I started the day out right with some Mango Sticky Rice! :0 ) I have tried 2 recipes so far that weren't quite right and finally the third recipe is perfect! Here is the recipe. The only thing I did differently is add a pinch of salt to the sauce and add some mint to the plate. Also, if you never have had this before, I recommend putting the mango in a fridge, it's super yummy to eat warm rice and cold mango together!

A rock painting I finished. I wanted to study the many colors I was seeing in the rocks at Lake Michigan, the shape was less important. This is 10.5 x 13.5 inches, watercolor and acrylic.

I painted my duck eggs I bought from King's Hill Farm. I loved the pristine shape of the eggs and the varieties of colors and sizes I saw in my dozen. But the painting did not turn out as nice as thought it would. I still liked the eggs though so I cut them out and created the piece below. This piece was 11 x 14 inches, watercolor, marker.

I hand sewed the watercolored eggs onto the fabric (something I have been wanting to try for a while now) and it worked wonderfully. I can't wait to do more with paper and fabric. This is 23 x 23 inches, fabric, watercolor, marker, paper.

Chicago's Twelve: 12 Artist's Mobilizing the Earth

My feet are the ones on the right, in the back, with the skirt!

And here is a little video Jacob and I made to show my process of attaching the paper potatoes together for Harvesting the Blue Potato.

The music in the video is by CocoRosie and the title of the song is God Has a Voice, She Speaks Through Me

Chinese Scrambled Duck Eggs, Beach, and Squirrel Eating Toast...

For breakfast today I made Chinese Scrambled Duck Eggs with Kimchi, and Spinach!

Chinese Scrambled Eggs

1 egg

1 tsp low sodium tamari or soy sauce

1/2 tsp sesame oil

1/2 TBS chives

Yesterday morning I went to the beach (and that is where I am headed after this post!) to enjoy the sunshine.

Since vegetables and fruits will be growing soon, I have started to read this wonderful book my Grandma gave me called Preserving Summer's Bounty: A Quick and Easy Guide to Freezing, Canning, Preserving and Drying What You Grow. Sometimes too many vegetables come in and I have no idea what to do with them all so I am trying to learn how to preserve them. I will be sharing what I learn as I read it.

"Once plucked from the plant, fruits and vegetables stop growing, but respiration and enzyme activities (which add up to aging) continue. The physical and chemical qualities deteriorate rapidly. As a result, appearance and flavor fade, and the nutrient content decreases, particularly fragile vitamin C. " (pg. 6)

That is why we should eat more fresh veggies from farmer's markets or our own gardens for better nutrients and quality.

I found this amazing rock that had broken into many pieces in the sand. I took every piece home with me and painted the painting below.

Seagull feets!

...and squirrel eating toast....

Welcome Spring!

Harvesting the Blue Potato will be on display at the Zhou B Art Center from April 20th to June 9th. The above image is a close-up of the piece, it's about 5 x 7 feet. The show is called Chicago's Twelve: Twelve Artists Mobilizing the Earth. I am super excited to be a part of this! The opening reception will be April 20th, 7-10pm, just in time for Earth Day.

I saw the wall I have to show my work and realized my piece would be swamped by white wall, so I am in the process of making it larger. At least 250 potatoes larger!

Here is 156 of them cut out.

After I am done painting them, I will connect them to the cycle with jute and wheat flour glue.

Jacob and I took a walk around our lovely home, Roger's Park. I looked up and in the trees was a spazzy little bird, a woodpecker!

He was on a pecking mission.

We stopped by Ruby garden because I wanted to see all the soil before the green comes. It is amazing how much one space can change in such a short amount of time. I can't wait!

This sort of flower was popping up in random places all over. It seems to be the only flower ready to bloom at the moment. *Anyone know what kind of flower it is? This lady was growing all alone in a 6 x 8 feet square of dirt.

*My friend Kristin let me know it is a crocus! "Usually the first to bloom in the spring!"

Finished!

Monsanto and the Farmer is finally finished!

In the end, the corn is hardly visible because it is being crushed by Monsanto. It is sad that so much of my work is not seen, but at the same time it reminds me of the work the farmers do that is not appreciated.

Monsanto owns the corn and the farmers are it's minions. Monsanto can destroy the farmer. I wanted Monsanto to be crushing many varieties of heirloom corn because they insist on only growing one kind of corn, and this corn can mix with the heirloom seeds and we can loose them for good. Mexico is especially proud of it's many varieties of corn, but Monsanto has succeeded in growing it's one variety of corn there as well.

The farmer offers the one kind of genetically modified corn Monsanto has them grow.

My Plushie Corn Babies and I

Finally! I have finished all of the corn. The blue corn was my final one. This is the happy face of a girl who knows her plushie corn days are behind her.

I'm also finished with the entire piece. I will take photos tomorrow when natural sunlight is coming through the windows.

To make the suit jacket sleeve for Mr. Monsanto I bought a giant suit jacket from the thrift store and chopped it up. Although the jacket was huge, one sleeve still did not fit around Mr. Monsanto's massive arm, so I had to sew both sleeves together. This was not easy but somehow I did it!

Here are the two sleeves sewn together.

More to come tomorrow!