The Livingston Street Studio was decorated for Halloween. I worked at the Shakespeare Theater as stagehands for Dracula: A Comedy of Terrors and Corduroy. When set for the play, Come From Away, was broken down a bunch of long foam pieces from that set were re proposed as tombstones. The foam already had wooden backing and supports on the back which could be used as stakes to get the tombstones to stand in front of the haunted house. There is a nice, abandoned planter that runs in front of the Livingston Street Studio. The planter area is overgrown with weeds, but for an abandoned cemetery, that was a great look.  My hope eventually it to turn that area into a food garden. In one night, dozens of tombstones were painted.

My roommate was the master designer of the display, and the initial theme was going to be Dogula, which would have depicted the adorable pup Boo-Boo as Dracula. My roommate had an entire box filled with magical Halloween themed decorations and lighting. We started by taping up some plastic sheets with black cats printed on them for bedroom windows. When the room light was turned on the cats became visible from outside.

Next, a spiderweb was added to the center window and a sheet was hung behind it with a nebula pattern projected for some mystical lighting effects. For my studio office on the corner, hand crafted red and yellow window decorations were crafted using a Cricut machine which was used to cut bats and pumpkins from black vinyl. I cut out a Dracula castle by hand with scissors and vinyl scraps were used by my roommate to make tree branches.

On Halloween day giant pumpkins were printed out. The display needed refinement right up until sunset when ghouls started to roam the streets.

In front of the entry door under the carport, a rusty old cauldron was moved that was found in the backyard. In the cauldron, a fog machine was placed along with some witch’s legs. Fog would rise from the cauldron which was lit by a demonic red spotlight making it look like a witch was being cooked. A dilapidated wooden fence which was probably destroyed from a recent hurricane added to the horrific effect of an abandoned haunted house.

A giant stainless-steel bowl was put on a small table for the candy.

Halloween morning candy was purchased from Aldi. I have purchased candy in the past to hand out in other neighborhoods I had lived in, but no children ever showed up. The Eola Heights studio is just 2 blocks north of Lake Eola, so there was some chance that children might show. I decided to get one big bag of candy. My roommate was more hopeful and got about 5 bags of candy.

While I was sketching, I had my back to the street. Any trick or treaters would have to approach me from behind. That might have been unnerving for some. One little girl creeped up on me and shouted Boo! I acted frightened and surprised and offered her candy which was still in the Aldi shopping bag. I rushed inside to let my roommate know that we were getting trick or treaters. One of the solar lights from the cemetery was used to illuminate the candy in the bowl.

At first the plan was to sit back under the carport, but I was already out in the driveway since I was sketching so we set up there. My roommate then set up a radio which played Halloween themed music like Thriller and Ghost Busters. The music brought in multiple hordes of trick or. My roommate was great at guessing who the costumed guests were dressed as. There was so much delight in the simple act of sharing candy and complimenting the handsome and beautiful costumes.

At first my roommate was very strict about insisting that the trick or treaters only take on piece of candy. As the crowds thinned, we started asking them to take 3 pieces of candy. The young ones started arriving zonked out like zombies since they were overstimulated and experiencing a sugar crash. A car parked in front of the house and a crew of ghouls piled out and swooped in for candy and then rushed back to the car.

Then silence. We could see crowds of ghouls walking towards Lake Eola but they were not walking down our street. Joy started to turn to disappointment. There was still plenty of candy left over. There was one Kit Kat in amongst all the fruit gummies. I snitched that last Kit Kat but blamed a tiny, adorable superman in a muscle shirt for taking it.

At 10pm we packed up. Boo-Boo, who was dressed in a black cape like Dracula was getting antsy. He needed to go for a walk. We both heard loud music coming from Lake Eola so we decided to walk towards the sound. Walking around the lake we passed to many killer clowns and girls dressed in tight costumes would coo at how adorable Boo looked. His high collar made him look like a dignified aristocrat who might suck your blood.

We followed the music to it’s source. Washington Street in Thornton Park was closed for a ticketed bar crawl. Everyone was in costume and festivities were just getting under way as crowds of killer clowns and sexy video game characters lined up to get through security. It was a golden sketch opportunity but I had already done my sketch for the night.

On the walk back to the Livingston Haunted House, BooBoola got even more attention. Overall, it was such a pleasant Halloween night.

At SECAC in Winston Salem North Carolina, I attended Life Disruptions as Opportunities for Artistic Growth, Session I, organized by Stella P. Arbeláez Tascón. The first speaker at this session was Zoe Nestlie from the University of Central Florida whose art is influenced by an emotionally abusive relationship. Her talk was titled, Making the Invisible Visible: Giving Form to Emotional Abuse in Intimate Partner Relationships. The relationship had her questioning who she was as she faced unsteady ground with every interaction with her partner. At first she painted the eyes of her partner in front of an image of a wolf. She felt however that image empowered her abuser.

She switched to creating an alter ego character who navigated the uncertain world of healing after abuse. The character was cartoonish but, in each scene, there were visible hints of the abuse happening. Besides the digital paintings, she began sculpting plush sculptures that hinted at the process of recovering from abuse.

The second speaker, Hallie Bahn from the University of Massachusetts Amherst gave a talk titled, Sand Through My Fingers: The Negotiation of Time, Labor and Control as an Artist-Mother. She was an animator and had given birth. She got a grant to work on an animated film using sand. She wanted to collaborate with her child in the process, but her child was not interested in any form of linear storytelling. Hallie would animate a scene usually with an animal and then she would film her child destroying the final image. The film became a process of creation and destruction. It was displayed in a sand box which encouraged children to interact. The resulting spears of sand she would then reform and use to animate another scene. Having come from a Disney Feature Animation background I had multiple questions, as did Stella. The film is still in production.

Sally Brown from West Virginia University gave a zoom talk titled, The Architecture of Absence: Grief, the “Empty Nest,” and the Generative Power of the Archival Pivot. Sally is a multidisciplinary artist whose work explores womanhood, motherhood, and the physical body through drawing, painting, and mixed media. Some of her pieces integrated drawings by her child along with her own drawings, many of which were expressionist self-portraits depicting her own body. Some paintings had breast prints along with drawings of the nude.  She had to deal with an empty nest she was making a major pivot inn her work moving forward.

The last speaker, Paige L Morris from Tyler School of Art and Architecture gave a talk titled, Tending the Rupture: The Politics of Care and Slowing Down.  I identified with her talk on a deep level. Paige is an interdisciplinary artist and educator in Philadelphia, PA. Building upon her foundation in glass, Morris utilizes material poetics, sound, and video performances to examine language, the complexities of love, and the human search for truth and meaning. Her practice actively investigates agency and desire as a method for unlearning her patriarchal conditioning.

She expressed the idea that a resume or CV should list things like overcoming grief among the achievements. A CV tends to only focus on achievements like shows. and job titles but life experience and resiliency plays into making someone a desirable hire. Page lost a sister and that grief at first made producing art seem meaningless. The demands of making enough money to survive tended to crush any hopes of creation. She has since become a beacon of creativity in her community by opening a shared art space with other artists which hosts shows. The space isn’t a non-profit, it is just a bunch of artists coming together to split the rent and mount amazing exhibitions. Her story was inspiring. All of the presentations tied together nicely being about motherhood and finding oneself in a patriarchal society while growing as an artist.

I went to a rehearsal for a Betsy Ross & Friends; History as it Never Happened! rehearsal at the Methodist church at 1600 Orange Ave, Winter Park, FL. I was invited to the rehearsal by Candy Dawson, a member of the cast. This was a fun original production written by members of the cast. If you don’t know, Betsy Ross was the woman who sewed the first American Flag. With that historical background, it was clear that this would be a patriotic production mixed with pop cultural references that would ring true with the Baby Boom generation. I am a baby boomer so it hit my funny bone hard.

As with many rehearsals, it felt like the director and stage manager were not entirely sure that all the pieces could fall in place in time for opening night. There is a certain magic that happens on opening night where any doubts disappear and the production happens without a glitch. Of course all in the cast are award of the subtle details that most members of an audience are oblivious to.

When I got to the church the doors were locked but luckily a father who was dropping off a child for the church school let me in and I happened across the church auditorium. All the actors were in the back of the auditorium getting set up with microphones and making sure make up and costumes looked good.

One skit involved Whistler’s mother and I was told the actress was well over 80 years old. She was a fire cracker and held her own acting in the part.  Though Betsy Ross acted as the host for the variety show each act was unique and hilarious. Being a small community production, everyone was excited but also relaxed since the stakes were not too high. Everyone just had fun and it showed.

Candy Dawson was playing the part of Lucille Ball and at first sight she clearly fit the part. She was getting help with her hair as she welcomed me to the rehearsal. Candy was also the author of one of the bits in the show and I was impressed.

The rehearsal was a good run through of the show with only a few pauses. Everyone seemed well rehearsed and they all knew their lines. It was great to sketch the rehearsal, but it would have been nice to see how the jokes landed with a live audience. I have no doubt that the auditorium was alight with laughter during the shows run.