The Audubon Market has returned to the parking lot at Stardust Video and Coffee 1842 East Winter Park Road. This market opens every Wednesday night and runs from 5 PM to 9 PM. This is a small local market with live music, a massage station, a fortune teller, a table of delectables like candied apples and other sweets, hand crafted jewelry and clothing, plants, the list is endless. Most importantly it is a place where friends can mingle and talk.
I bumped into Karrie Brown who was selling some of her hand made feather hair pieces. Karrie introduced me to the caricature artist at the event named Marie Bolton – Joubert. Marie is a whirlwind of constant activity. She introduced me to a cause she is backing which involves the shooting of 2 dogs here in sunny Central Florida. She showed me a courtroom sketch she did of an early hearing in this case and now I am planning to go to the court to see if the shooter is acquitted. I should post about this hearing in early November. Then she insisted I sit down and she whipped out a caricature of me in a matter of minutes while talking the whole time. The caricature is great!
I neglected to mention that the reason I went to Stardust Video and Coffee was to attend Dr. Sketchy’s but once I discovered all the activity in the nighttime market I had to sketch the market and I never went inside. It was boiling hot outside as well and I had to wipe the sweat off my hands several times to keep from smearing the watercolors.
Lesley Silvia working at Stardust
I met Lesley Silvia and her husband Jared at a Kerouac House event. As I have been sketching more and more in Orlando’s more artsy cafes, like Infusion Tea, Dandelion, Seven Sisters, and Stardust, I have become curious about all the people who sit and use their laptops for extended periods of time. Lesley works on her photos and graphic design work using a laptop and Photoshop or Illustrator, InDesign and on rare occasions Painter. She had arrived at Stardust before me and had just finished a dinner of nachos. She and her husband who is a writer, usually work together. Silvia enjoys working in Stardust because it has free WI FI and she feels Dandelion and Infusion have a more mature crowd. Stardust is a more comfortable fit for a young edgy artist. She also likes to work in Winter Park’s Central Park sitting on a bench in the shade, or she goes to Borders and looks through a few magazines for inspiration before she gets to work on the laptop.
As I sketched, Silvia was working on a series of photos called Pinatas. This series resembles crime scene photos where people are shown injured or dead with candy in place of blood. It is a unique and somewhat unnerving series of photos. Her graphic design work is inspired by the Swiss, it is clean neat and tidy.
Silvia was just 10 years old when she took her first photography class. She and her brother learned to make the pinhole cameras at one of the art camps they attended. Her work to this day plays with photography’s earliest forms. Her father helped her with a little bit of photo composition at an early age although at the time she didn’t know photography would be her passion. I high school she discovered that photography was really fun and took every class offered. In college she got a BA in Studio art with a minor in philosophy and her independent study focused on photography. Like most artists she has many facets including an interest in sculpture and graphic design.
Silvia is a full time course director at Full Sail University teaching Digital Photography. She gets freelance work through word of mouth and serendipity. She has shot some weddings and portraits. She shot photos for an Australian Rock Band who was later signed by Columbia Records. The record company asked her to take the rock band pictures off of her web site. She just removed the groups name and the lawyers stopped hassling her. Past clients include Scottish Highland Games and Mega Con. Her favorite assignments are outdoor shoots using natural light and shot with film.
Stardust Video and Coffee
I drove to Stardust Video and Coffee thinking I would sketch the Audubon outdoor market but the market was nowhere to be found. Rather than call it quits, I went inside and ordered a Coke. Stardust is a quirky artsy hangout located at 1842 East Winter Park Road.
One room had a wall stacked with VHS videos and large tables made from old doors which have been varnished and smoothed. The room I sat in has a small stage area with red glittery curtains. A group of five or so people sat at tables busily tapping at their laptops. The central area of Stardust has the food counter which I sketched. I ordered a pita plate and I was handed a VHS video titled “Pushing Tin” starring John Cusack and Billy Bob Thornton. The waiter used this to find out what table to deliver the food to. My plate arrived within minutes. The pita was warm and toasty and the humus delicious.
A woman who had been focused on her laptop walked by and noticed me sketching. She started to tell me about how as a child she used to draw with her left hand. Back in those days parents didn’t want their children to be left handed so anytime she would pick a crayon up with her left hand her parents would slap her hand. Today she is right handed. She said she could still draw a bit with her left hand but if she tried to draw with her right hand, Nothing.
Oil paintings hung on the wall by Jennifer Payne. Exhibits seem to change fairly often. The light in the room slowly got darker as the sun set. By eight PM the place was getting packed. The core group of laptop users in my room were still at work when I left to go to Will’s Pub.