We interrupt this blogcast to bring you news of an unexpected nature developing in Orlando! “The War of the Worlds” is about to hit this town like a firestorm and I fear that local residents might not be ready for the invasion.
Aradhana Tiwari, one of the Directors, of this intense and panicked staging gave this reporter the opportunity to observe the chaos and heated action first hand as it developed. I sketched as this group of individual actors became a unified group. Aradhana played the infamous Orson Wells radio broadcast and asked the actors to draw any images or write down words or thoughts that the broadcast evoked.
The radio broadcast is chilling to this day. It’s visceral first act panic brought back feelings that have been dormant since the Terrorist attacks of 9/11. One actor felt he would have never fallen for the hoax, but others like myself felt that the American public would easily be swayed even today. The radio broadcast has causes outbreaks of hysteria in other countries as well over the years.
To help bring the cast together as an ensemble, Aradhana asked Associate Producer, Erika Wilhite to lead the group in an exercise called View Points .
Aradhana explained to the cast how this production would be built around the abstract imagery of radio waves. Radio waves can be pulled apart and put back together and yet at the core they have a central DNA like signature. In a related exercise, the actors were divided into two groups and each group was shown a different radio wave. The groups were then asked to stage performances that demonstrated the imagery. One performance was built around two chairs. On actor would sit stare out into space and say “It looks like lightning”. Another actor would respond “Its not lightning”. This back and forth exchange continued and built its tempo and pace becoming frantic over time. Two other actors then joined in the frenzied action talking over others and moving in fast clipped fashion about the stage. The radio wave they had enacted was a multi layered waveform with many high and low peaks and valleys.
The other group entered stage left hunched forward emitting a shrill Eeeee noise as they slowly moved across the stage. The shrill noise grew louder as the group picked up its pace until the exited stage right at a full run screaming. They had demonstrated a linear wave form which built steadily in volume. Every aspect of the rehearsal was fascinating to watch and draw, I plan to return as often as possible to follow the shows progression.
Book Club
Terry asked me if I would like to sketch at a meeting of a book club she has joined. We drove to a beautiful house in Winter Park and walked back to the pool house where the meeting was to be held. The book they all had read was “Making the Mummies Dance” by Thomas Hoving. Thomas was the former director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City and apparently an A type personality who disclosed the cutthroat politics involved in making the museum run. I didn’t read the book so I can’t offer any insights other that what was discussed at this gathering. Most of the women did not like the book finding it to dry and technical. Many of the women did not finish the book in time for this meeting. They did seem to agree that Hoving’s abrasive personality did result in some sweeping changes at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
The discussion then turned to a book that had been discussed in a previous gathering. This book was written by an 65 year old woman who started putting ads in the personals because she wanted to fully discover her sexuality in her later years. Some felt sorry for the woman who was acting like the high school girls they pitied who would do anything for attention from boys. A heated discussion then erupted about whether sex and personal intimacy might be separate entities. Being the only man in the room, I wondered if I should chime in, but I had a sketch to finish.
Heather Henson at the History Center
Heather Henson the daughter of Jim Henson, of Muppets fame, gave a at a lunchtime bag lunch talk about her fathers work at the History Center. She began the talk by showing early black and white television commercials her dad was doing at the beginning of his career. This early advertising work was surprisingly violent and over the top. The dead pan expressions on the Muppets made the zany skits all the more funny.
There was some trouble with the audio so she began talking over the muffled soundtrack. She explained that Kermit the Frog had originally been made from parts of one of her mother’s coats. In the early days her mom had been much more involved in the day to day production work.
Answering a question from the audience, Heather explained that holidays in the Henson home involved creating everything from scratch. Christmas ornaments would be simple Styrofoam which was then hand decorated by the children.
Heather has formed her own puppet company here in town called Ibex Puppetry and I follow their work as often as I can.
MS 150 Bike Ride
I got a tip from Robyn a friend who is helping raise money to battle MS by riding in the MS 150 which is a bike ride that raises money for Multiple Sclerosis. MS is a horrible disease that slowly causes the loss of muscle control. The ride started at 7 AM at Bok Tower Gardens and ended at Caribe Royale Hotel in Orlando. I decided to make my way to the finish line to do my sketch. The finish line can be seen in my sketch way in the background at that tower of red balloons. I became instantly fascinated with this massage Triage tent where cyclists lined up to have their aching muscles soothed.
To the left of this massage tent was a huge area where hundreds of bicycles were stored and teams of cyclists gathered at tables celebrating the end of a very long ride.
The excitement around this event raised my interest again in bike riding. I may just have to get my bike repaired so I can take it on the road again. Right now my bike is hanging upside down from the garage ceiling with some broken spokes and flat tires. It deserves the freedom to explore the open roads again.
Retro Game Night
The Orlando History Center hosted Retro Game Night and Terry expressed an interest in going. Retro attire was encouraged so I put on a very old Hawaiian shirt that Terry’s dad once wore. Being a member of the museum, admission was free, non-members just had to pay a $5 cover. I wandered from room to room on all 3 floors to see every room filled with card tables all set up with every imaginable board game.
I wandered past 2 girls playing Rockum-Sockum Robots and one screamed when she knocked the other girls block off. I also notices a fast paced game of Hungry Hippos.
I decided to sit on a wooden bench in the stairwell to watch as people played the old video games like Pac Man and Space Invaders. The fellow in the blue tee shirt played for well over an hour. I could tell that he had logged in many hours on similar video games.
The monopoly pinball game also had a constant crowd. When the sketch was finished I called Terry since I was surprised she hadn’t showed yet. It turned out that she was at home and had forgotten about the event. I decided I might as well get home, but the place was really hopping when I left. It was so crowded that it was hard to move room to room. People really love retro games. I wouldn’t have minded playing Risk and taking over the world, oh well, maybe next time.
The Screaming of the Lambs
Over the weekend Terry and I went to Chuliota to visit Eileen and Lewis. Eileen gave us a wonderful driving tour of the surrounding area and she pointed out some areas I should return to sketch. When we got back to the house Eileen and Terry sat on the porch and gossiped and I knew they would be occupied and happy for hours. I decided to wander up the street to see some of the livestock that live in the neighborhood. I wanted to do a simple bucolic sketch.
When I approached this holding pen, all the sheep bowed their heads down in alarm. When I put down my artist chair, they all scattered and ran to the far corner of the pen. If I moved they would run to the oposite corner. I decided I would never get just the right angle so I stood and just started sketching.
When I was halfway finished with the sketch, an unexpected drama unfolded. Two rams who were in the larger open area behind this pen started ramming the door to this pen with their heads and curved horns. A male sheep on the inside tried to stop them by ramming the door in the opposite direction at the same time. The door was thrown open and the 2 rams charged in causing all the sheep to cry out and run. The rams focused on a single female sheep and began chasing her relentlessly. I wondered if I should run to the farm house and warn the owners, what was happening was criminal.
All the other sheep ran out of the pen leaving just the female sheep as she ran from the two rams. One ram would butt her in the side to direct her while the other pursued from behind. Luckily the rams were not smart enough to ever isolate her in a corner. As you might have guessed by now I simply kept sketching. The young sheep who had broken free screamed Maaaa Maaaa at the top of their lungs. It sounded to me like they were screaming for their mother in alarm. The female never let her pursuers corner her. The chase broke out into the larger holding area and the second ram gave up, leaving just one pursuer. When the sketch was finished I saw the female still trotting at a safe distance with her tongue hanging out. The ram was equally exhausted and overheated. She had worn her opponent down. He was to tired for any more advances.
Toni Taylor Studio
I sketched Toni Taylor in a clandestine way as she worked on a painting at the Orlando Fringe Festival. After talking with her that day, I discovered that she lives and works less than a 5 minute drive from my studio. I asked if I could see her at work and she agreed. Driving up to her suburban home there is no clue outside to indicate what is to be discovered once I entered the front door. I did notice several exotic flowers and I thought they might have appeared in her art. I picked up a fed Express package that was on Toni’s porch and rang the front doorbell.
Every room in Toni’s home has paintings stacked sometimes 2 high on every wall. I just wandered in amazement from room to room taking in all the gorgeous art. Toni joked that she is running out of wall space and she might have to start hanging art on the ceiling. Every piece has a gem like quality. This was the finest art show I had been to in quite a while.
The last room we visited was her studio. She set up in the corner of the room with a window looking out to the pool on her left. All her brushes and supplies are neatly stored in a bookcase right next to her. She explained that the paint box had been given to her by her boyfriend when she was just 14 years old. She later married this childhood sweetheart and he also gave her the easel she is using. She said she was upset about the easel at the time because her ex-husband had used the rent money to buy it and she likes to stay on top of bills and commitments.
Toni plays relaxing music while she works. After nervously attacking the pages for a while, I felt myself relax and settle into a zen like state where every line and tone landed where it belonged. I stopped thinking and just reacted to the environment with affection and care. Toni and I worked in silence for several hours. I lost track of time. When I felt I was just noodling, I called it quits, and we compared notes. Toni opened the package I had dropped off and it turned out to be a book in which her work is featured. A painting in that book is one of my favorites. It showed a woman from the back with multiple arms outstretched reaching out in a circle. I find I am hungry for conversation with other artists and Toni and I joked and laughed for along time and I was sorry when I had to leave.
Hot Dog Eating Contest
In Coney Island, Nathan’s hosts a 10 minute hot dog eating contest and this year Joey Chestnut won by eating 68 wieners. The Orlando take on this contest is a bit different in that the contestants have 10 hours in which to eat the hot dogs. When I arrived at Dandelion Communitea Cafe, Brian Feldman had eaten only 3 hot dogs and he only took a few bites from another politely using a knife and fork. If anyone asked who was winning, he would respond with, “How do you define a winner?” They were not competing it seems based on simple numbers but it was a more refined competition based on savoring the moment. Caroline Johnson, who is from Spain, was reading excerpts from her novel while Brian and Zac Alfson slowly tasted their vegan hot dogs. Caroline was also a contestant since she had a small mountain of uneaten hot dogs in front of her, but she never tried a hot dog while I was sketching. Eight hours into the competition, the contestants had honestly lost count of the number of hot dogs eaten. The hot dogs were wrapped in a pita like bun called a Snuggles which are made locally in Orlando by Toufayan Bakeries. Pittsburgh artist Dawn Weleski, acted as the MC. She would periodically interview members of the audience. She would ask the audience member to sit in the blue chair to the left of the staging area and then ask them to wear an Uncle Sam hat and white beard. Brian’s mom and sister showed up late in the competition to watch the relaxed proceedings. Another announcer named Gordon Winiemko took the mic and decided to MC shirtless. He threw the sweaty shirt right at me and I caught it and then didn’t know what to do with it. Putting it on the table would be unsanitary yet dropping it on the floor would be rude. I decided to drop it on the table, and the two girls eating salad right next to me didn’t seem to mind.
From here Terry and I headed downtown for the Lake Eola Fireworks display. There, during the fireworks show one mortar must have fallen over because it fired off not into the air, but straight across the lake at the audience. It blew up just yards from the shore sending hot embers showering over the crowd. I do not think anyone was hurt.
Fireworks Tent
I drove around town for several days with the goal of finding Orlando’s biggest Fireworks Tent. I finally decided this tent on Orange Blossom Trail and Colonial Drive is the biggest. The tent is right on the railroad tracks which probably makes the shipping of massive amounts of explosives easy. To see the whole tent I had to walk to the far side of a very busy intersection.
Very dark clouds started looming to the north and I started to smell ozone in the air. I was close to finishing the sketch, but realized I didn’t have any light blue in order to paint the sky. Since Sam Flax Art Store was only a few blocks away, I hopped back in my truck and ran over to get some more paint. When I got back on site, the cloud cover had thickened and I knew I only had a few minutes to paint in some clouds. When I was done and heading home the first drops hit the windshield. Interestingly the storm chased me the whole way home. In front of me I always saw the sun but if I looked in the rear view mirror, steely blue clouds stretched back to the horizon. If I had to stop for a stoplight the rain would overtake me, but when I drove forward I would slip back into the light. Have a great 4th of July.
Summer Bash Party
I attended the International Academy of Design & Technology Summer Bash Party. I was attracted to this event because I heard they were going to hold a sand castle building contest. I imagined engineers and artists working together as teams to create astounding architectural and sculptural wonders. What I found when I got there was a sad pile of sand with one ten year old girl digging a small hole with a plastic shovel. I stopped back several times and not a single sand castle appeared.
Several young women in tight shorts and white tee shirts did offer me a free drink however. They were Red Bull girls and things started looking up. My attention wandered to the sidewalk chalk artists. These students attacked the task at hand in the blazing noon day sun with gusto. The young woman in the foreground used a two fisted approach as she layered in the yellow and orange hair on her Henai creation. The artist in the black skull cap took a more somber view and half of his sidewalk square was filled in with pure black chalk.
On the stage in front of the entrance of the school, a group of man dressed in red sweats began a strength demonstration. They tore phone books in half, busted baseball bats and crushed a tower of cement blocks. Between bouts of destruction, they explained that they were destroying things for Jesus. Each of them at one point was at the top of their game living the plush life of a sports star, when for each, an unexpected injury bought them down and made them realize they were living only for themselves. When they discovered Jesus their lives were turned around. I applaud their dedication to destruction, but they would have been far more entertaining without the lecture.