The Zora Neale Hurston Festival is held in the final weeks of January. The festival is held in the small town of Eatonville which is just north of Lee Road. Eatonville is the the oldest incorporated African American municipality in the United States. Zora Neale Hurston is one of most significant authors of African-American culture in the world, and many of her works celebrate her hometown of Eatonville, right here in Central Florida! 2010 marked 50 years since Hurston’s death.
The event features museum exhibitions, public talks, panel discussions, workshops and concerts. It culminates with a three-day weekend Street Festival of the Arts, which features everything from literacy programs for children; performances by local, regional and national acts; Juried Arts competitions, presenting fine artists with their original artwork in competition for cash prizes; an international marketplace, where visitors purchase wares from around the world, an international food pavilion featuring an array of food options and more.
When I got to the Eatonville, I found Kennedy Boulevard, the main road, closed to traffic. I pulled into a small churches dirt parking lot. I walked down the boulevard past a local bar and many small somewhat rundown wooden homes. Soon there were vendors tents and I walked the length of the vendors area looking for a subject for a sketch. I finally settled on this collection of large wooden sculptures. The proprietor wore a brown leather jacket and light brown pants. Once in a while he would move some of the larger pieces, I suppose figuring the new arrangement would draw in more costumers. Periodically people would look over my shoulder to see what I was up to. One woman told me all about a silk painting she had bought for really cheep. She later returned and showed me the artwork she had bought. The image is created entirely with thin strands of colored silk pasted down in a spiral pattern. The silk caught the light and sent it back to the viewer with a bright shimmer. Another family stopped to look, and it turns out the young boy has been teaching himself Flash animation on the computer, so I explained about how I had worked for Disney Feature Animation for ten years. They asked me for advice on any books about animation I might recommend and I gave them my top pics.
There was plenty of color to be seen at the festival although my sketch seems to only demonstrate a sea of brown. I ordered some food from a vendor and listened to some gospel music before I headed home.
The Doggie Door
Debbie Hayle invited me to go to the Doggie Door (329 North Park Avenue, Winter Park) to go to a meeting of the Cavalier King Charles Spaniel club. The King Charles Spaniel is the same breed of dog that Charlotte York became obsessed with in “Sex and the City”. When I arrived there were a few dog owners in the store but over time more and more Spaniels and their owners arrived.
Debbie had a cake made with a photo of her first Spaniel on the frosting. These dogs are a very excited and active breed. There was plenty of sniffing and tail swishing going on. Some owners were not content with just one dog and they walked in with a pack of spaniels. The bull dog in the sketch is actually a ceramic sculpture.
One little spaniel started growling and snapping at the other dogs. The owner immediately took the dog outside. Debbie had invited a professional animal trainer to come in and give a talk. He approached the woman with the aggressive dog and then demonstrated how she should be training him to stop the aggressive behavior. Rather than remove the dog from the situation he simply tugged at the collar to get the dogs attention. He would then reintroduce the dog to the situation where the aggressive behavior was initiated. If the dog behaved he was rewarded, if it was aggressive again he tugged again to get the dogs attention. The dog soon knew without a doubt what the trainer wanted it to do. Within a minute the dog was no longer being aggressive towards the other dogs.
A DRIP Day-glow Paint Surprise Party
This sketch was done a while ago as DRIP prepared to perform at the City Arts Factory. Evan Miga is busy preparing the printing press while David Traver is working on hanging mirrors from the rafters. Samantha Hudson is the dancer waiting in the wings. For this performance the dancers used the press to print edible ink on small cakes that were then offered to the audience. After this sketch was done Jessica Mariko asked to see what I had done. As I was showing her a City Arts staff member approached me and said “Excuse me this is a veeery exclusive event, you will have to leave.” Then with a flick of his wrist he said “Shoo!” My sketch was finished and I was ready to go anyway, but once again I found myself not welcome.
Months later I was invited to go to a surprise birthday party for Evan. The party took place in a small children’s art studio off of Colonial Drive called “My Art Studio” ( 4401 East Colonial Drive, Suite 106). I arrived early as instructed with a towel and a change of clothes. I entered an empty room where dancers were painting Happy Birthday in day-glow green paint on the walls. I helped by painting a blazing sun under the birthday lettering. Terry stopped in but she was still in her work clothes. I suspected things would get messy. I decided to leave my sketchpad in the safe room. When the main lights were turned off and a black light turned on the lettering glowed vibrantly. Jessica informed us that Evan was on the way and so we all hid behind a table for the surprise. We all crouched behind the table in the dark for the longest time, the anticipation growing. The plan was that Christie would walk Evan to the center of the room and then the black light would flick on and we all would shout surprise while stripping Evan and getting him into grubby work clothes. Then he was doused with a full bucket of watery paint and hit with silly string.
Paper was taped to the walls and we all painted at each and had to move on when the music changed. The music changed often until there was barely time to get one stroke on each page. Soon we were just throwing paint at the walls. Then the paint war began and I was caught in the cross fire! Everyone started throwing sponges soaked in paint at each other. Then paint was thrown straight from the bottles. Syringes were used as high power paint pistols. Before I knew it I was soaked head to toe, a living day-glow Pollock painting. When there was finally no paint left, Evan started hosing people down. For whatever reason this room had a garden hose and a drain in the center of the floor. He hit me with the cold spray and I washed the paint off my head and arms as fast as I could. Afterward we all lay down on the wet floor and had a group photo taken with Evan in the center. DRIP certainly knows how to throw a creative birthday party! It turns out anyone can plan a paint party at “My Art Studio.”
Rebounderz
Rebounderz (408 South Ronald Regan Boulevard, Longwood) his an indoors trampoline arena with 7,460 square feet of rebounding surfaces. The trampolines not only cover the whole floor, but also the walls. This was my second time going to Rebounderz. Katie Windish first told me about Rebounderz, and I finally went, thanks to a facebook invite from Amanda Chadwick. The first time I went, I didn’t do a sketch, I simply jumped for as long as my body would allow me. You rent shoes just like in a bowling alley and are given a wrist band with a number which allows the staff to know how long you have been bounding. I was given a quick series of lessons from one of the “referees”. I was taught how to roll and advised against landing straight legged on any of the green mats. I was told that if I wanted to do somersaults, I should ask for more advice. I had no intention of doing somersaults.
I limited my activity to bounding straight up and down trying to gain more height by throwing my arms up as well. Within ten minutes I was exhausted. I tried bounding off the walls, but I tended to just go splat and then slide straight down till I found myself seated on one of the mats. While seated I watched one guy bounce off a wall and then bound off the floor trampoline and complete the circuit by bounding off the other center pyramid shaped trampolines.
During the course of doing this sketch two girls had to be helped out of the room being supported by a friend and one of the referees. They hopped on one leg just like a football player being guided off the field. I don’t know how serious their injuries were. You might notice that the line work in this sketch is a lot more hectic than usual. That is because when seated on the green mat, I would be violently bounced around anytime someone bounced on the trampoline in front of me. Rather than loose patience, I simply learned to stop drawing when they bounced and then put down a quick pen stroke before they bounced again.
How often is it that you get to do something completely new? Rebounderz was certainly a new experience for me, and it is a really good workout.
Spring Awakening
Jeremy Seghers invited me to go to a rehearsal for “Spring Awakening” written by Frank Wedekind. The reading took place at the offices of Broadway Across America right near Lake Eola. When I walked into the conference room where the rehearsal was to take place, I was surprised at how many of the actors were high school aged. Everyone introduced themselves around the table and talked about what shows they had last been in. Many of the students were working on a production of “Rent” for the Fringe and many also all seemed to be putting on a high school production of “Moby Dick.”
As we all waited for the last of the actors to arrive, Sean, picked up his green water bottle and the cap flopped off spilling his water all over the table. He jumped up screaming and apologizing as he ran into the next room looking for paper towels. He had been nervously talking to Sarah who was wearing a loose low cut shirt that made her look like she had just come from a job as a bar maid. His comical timing and actions were worthy of Chaplin. Everyone burst into laughter. When the reading started the mood grew more serious. Spring Awakening deals with a group of German students who for the first time face their sexuality and passions. One scene between a daughter, Wendla, played by Sarah Villegas and her mom,Frau Bergmann, played by Nicki Darden was both humorous and sad. The daughter wanted her mom to explain how babies are born. Although the mom wanted to tell he daughter everything, she found herself unable to.
FRAU BERGMANN: Come here, child, come here, I’ll tell you! I’ll tell you everything–… In order to have a child — one must love — the man — to whom one is married — love him, I tell you — as one can only love a man! One must love him so much with one’s whole heart, so — so that one can’t describe it! One must love him, Wendla, as you at your age are still unable to love — Now you know it!
In the next act the daughter finds herself in a hay loft with a boy and then ultimately pregnant.
In another scene Sean Flinn contemplated a painting by Palma Veccio titled Venus. His impassioned plea to this goddess was so lascivious as to make any audience member blush. This play has often been banned for its sharp, pointed look at the hypocrisy of a society that felt that children should grow up ignorant of their sexuality. The play also deals with very serious issues of rape and suicide. The language in the original play is beautiful. Originally staged in 1906, the play is amazingly contemporary. In 2006 the play was bought brought to Broadway, this time as a musical by Duncan Sheik and Steven Sater.
This reading of Spring Awakening is a joint venture between Heidi Dog Productions and Kangagirl Productions. This reading will be a continuation of a series of “Queer Quills” readings. You can see this staged reading on April 18th at 7:00 PM at the Breakthrough Theater (421 West Fairbanks Avenue Winter Park). A suggested $5 donation will benefit the Paul Wegman Scholarship for actors at Valencia Community College.
Writers Workshop – Non-Realistic Writing
Alicia Holmes, writer in residence at the Jack Kerouac House, held an abstract writing workshop. This workshop was organized by Mary Ann de Stefano of Mad About Words. When I arrived at the Kerouac House, the writers, all of them women were already hard at work. They had been encouraged to incorporate some element of the mythical into a short story. I started sketching as everyone was writing in the living room. When I was half-finished with the sketch, Mary Ann called all the writers into the living room to share their work.
One woman wrote a story told from the point of view of a modern day Medusa. She complained of all the statues that littered her front lawn. Neighbors would stop over and admire how lifelike the statues were. Medusa, of course knew they had all been alive. She considered a plane flight to get away from her troubles, but imagined getting upset with fellow passengers and turning them all to stone so that mode of transportation was not an option. If she got upset, the plane would certainly drop from the sky like a meteor.
Kathryn Sullivan, wrote a haunting story about looking at a painting in a museum. Her mind wandered and she felt at peace as she approached the work. In her mind she imagined the work as peaceful and violent all at the same time. She felt that if she reached out, the painting might heal her. She was transfixed and drew closer. Suddenly alarms sounded and a guard asked her to step away from the painting. She had reached out and touched a Jackson Pollock painting. The painting was titled “Lavender Mist.”
The Pollock Project
I went to the Mennello Museum of American Art to watch and sketch Beth Marshall’s, “The Pollock Project“. This performance was a unique collaboration with drama intertwined with performances by the DRIP dance troupe. The first evening I focused all my attention on the beginning of the performance which took place outside the front steps of the museum. I had seen this DRIP dance routine in rehearsals so I was curious to see the final performance. I had not realized that audience members were encouraged to sit right underneath the Plexiglas canvas as the dancers painted it. As soon as Jessica Mariko told me this I put down my seat and staked out my claim on this prime seating real estate. I started a sketch from this vantage point but ended up erasing it since I felt I would need a much larger sheet of paper to catch the wide angle view. When more people crowded under the Plexiglas “canvas” I decided to pull back and sketch from a short distance to catch the audience. I was still working on the sketch when the audience went inside the museum for the second act. Stubbornly I remained behind to finish my sketch. When the audience returned back outside I was still hard at work.
I returned for the second performance so I could experience the show firsthand as an audience member. This time I remained under the Plexiglas to watch the DRIP dancers as they went through their ritualistic dance and painting routine. A little boy seated behind me said to his mother, “It looks like syrup.”
Inside the museum the drama unfolded as Hans Namuth, a photographer, interviewed Pollock in front of the two original paintings on exhibit in the museum as part of the Auspicious Visions exhibition. The interview gets heated when Hans mentions to Pollock what some critics said about his work, for instance a 1959 headline read, “It’s a bad joke in bad taste.” Pollock goes ballistic, angrily pacing around the room defending his work. He storms out of the room and shouts back that he wants the photographer out of his house. Lee Krasner, his wife, manages to calm him down and in a more levelheaded way he tries to explain himself to Hans. He explains that his pictures do not have a beginning or an end, that style isn’t important. His method is a growth out of a need. Lee explains that Pollock’s painting are numbered rather than named since Jackson doesn’t want people to have a preconceived notion of what they are looking at. Where he to title a painting, “Horse”, then people would find a need to see a horse.
I felt that John DiDonna gave a memorable performance at the temperamental Jackson Pollock and Douglas McGeouch’s quiet demure performance as Hans Namuth stood in stark contrast, offering a calm in the storm. Jennifer Bonner with her thick Brooklyn accent was a believable Lee Krasner, who had her hands full trying to keep Jackson steady through his violent mood swings. The small gallery room was crowded with the audience all standing on the outer walls trying to leave room for the angry Pollock. The tight space added to the claustrophobic feel of the drama.
The third act takes place back outside where Jackson Pollock paints while Nemuth shoots his film footage. It is during this act that the collaboration is in full effect. The DRIP dancers, now free of the ladders are given full reign to express themselves through dance. Jackson dances around the canvas creating his “action painting” as the dancers perform. I was particularly moved when audience members each read a quote about Jackson Pollock. It left me feeling that no matter what critics might say, it is the people viewing the art who will finally decide its worth over time.
Sketchy Broads – Alice in Wonderland
The Cameo Theater hosted Sketchy Broads as they posed in an Alice in Wonderland setting. The event cost $7 to sketch and $10 to take photos. Sketchy broads is a sketch club consisting of three costumed models. Megalo Music was playing a mix of Alice themed music all night which made sketching even more fun. When I arrived I was a bit frantic because my cell phone had died in my pocket and I hadn’t mentioned to Terry that I would be out sketching at the Cameo. I asked John Ageeb if he had a cell phone and he was nice enough to go all the way back to his car to get it. It turned out he left his cell at home. I then asked Geoff Sprague if he had a cell and he let me borrow it. I suddenly realized I didn’t remember Terry’s work phone number, I always just instant dial the number. I ended up leaving a message at my home phone.
When I entered the model who played Alice was busy helping the rabbit putting on his makeup. This in itself would have been a good sketch but they were finished before I committed to the sketch. I loved the outfit of the female Mad Hatter. She work a shiny black girdle and vibrant shirt and stockings. An artist complimented her saying she was a better Mad Hatter than Johnnie Depp.
Perhaps seven or eight artists showed up to sketch at this event and there was plenty of room for more. I did my first sketch from the side lines so I could get a view of some of the artists at work. the models kept knocking down the paper mache mushrooms between poses.
There were three photographers wandering around as well. I kept getting blinded by flashes and strobes. On photographer set up a huge light right next to me which blocked the light that had been on my sketchbook. I struggled on but I was getting distracted. I am encouraged however that there are new venues being offered for artists to explore in Orlando. The models were professional and held the poses while staying in character sometimes for 20 minutes at a time. As scatter shot as this first event was, I am sure to return to see what they come up with next.
Tilikunundrum
I decided to get up as early as possible on a Saturday morning to sketch Brian Feldman as he began his eighteen hours of confinement in a stranger’s bathtub, one hour for each year Tilikum the orca has been held captive in a space of comparative size at SeaWorld® Orlando. In a YouTube video, Jean-Michel Cousteau lamented the tragic death of a Sea World® trainer. Perhaps the time has come to stop keeping these beautiful mammals in captivity. Terry and I had the opportunity to see a pod of orcas as they hunted and played off the coast of Washington State. Terry, who grew up in San Diego, loved to watch Shamu perform at SeaWorld®. After seeing orcas in the open ocean, however, she no longer has any desire to see them jump through hoops for fish handouts.
I got to “Sea House®” at about seven in the morning. There were quite a few cars parked in the street outside the home, so I knew I was in the right place. The sun was just beginning to warm up the sky. I knocked once and then opened the front door. I followed the sound of splashing water and made my way to a tiny bathroom where I found Brian’s father sitting on a toilet trying to bring up some YouTube videos of the SeaWorld® Shamu show. Brian was just getting into the tub to begin his performance. On the laptop screen there were two video streams. There was a major problem however, the tub had no stopper! Brian tried to keep the water in the tub by pressing his foot over the drain, but I could hear the water flowing out into the drain. Brian’s father put out a request online for anyone to get a stopper. Brian had to lean forward every few minutes to refill the tub. Once he turned the wrong knob and the shower sprayed down on his head.
After I was halfway finished with my sketch, Lili McDonald arrived at the front door with a brand new tub stopper in hand. She was an instant hero. Brian’s father had to get to work so he said goodbye. Lili took his inglorious seat and took over laptop duty. For the duration of his performance Brian had the bombastic “inspirational” music from the SeaWorld® Shamu show playing in the background. Lilli, who is techno-savvy, set up the YouTube video to play in a loop so the music went uninterrupted. Having to listen to this music over and over again is enough to make any thinking breathing mammal go postal. I applaud Brian for the unconventional way he demonstrated against keeping orcas in captivity.
I later spoke with Mary Hill, who once worked at SeaWorld®. She pointed out how devastated she was by the conditions of the animals kept in captivity. They were treated humanely, but in the wild they have ranges of thousands of miles. Being restricted in an enclosure is hard for any animal. She used to conduct backstage tours for guests. Backstage there is an area where polar bears go when guests are no longer in the park. She told me there was super thick one-way glass which could keep the bears from seeing or smelling handlers. One bear was particularly neurotic. He would pace in a set pattern all day and rub his head up against a fiberglass “rock” until all the fur on his neck was rubbed raw. They would move the “rock” but then he would just reverse his pattern and then rub the fur off somewhere else in the process. She went into work early in the mornings just to sit with her back against the thick glass, and she would meditate and pray for the animal. On the second day of doing this, the bear sat with his back up against the glass where Mary sat. It is as if he knew she was there sending him good will.
The death of the SeaWorld® trainer is tragic and perhaps it will cause this multi-million dollar industry to rethink using orcas as a form of entertainment if only for a moment.