Mary and Leah @ Parking Day 2008

Mary has been working quite hard recently to be ready for this years Parking Day event in San Francisco.
The event is this Friday from 9am until the street becomes a commute lane at 4pm.
Artist gather strategically around the city be like pirates and take over street parking spaces at usually high profile art venues like the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art located on Third Street between Mission and Howard streets.
Mary will be at one of these spots in front of SFMOMA Friday with her earth flags on display as well as her art pal Leah Korican. Mary’s earth Flags are a hybrid of the traditional Tibetan prayer flag, but still has the same message of earth prayer and symbiosis for humans and the planet. These flags are fabricated from recycled clothing and home fabric and then have messages of peace and anti consumer politics in the form of recycle messages and imagery.
She prints these images and messages from linoleum block print methods in her studio by hand and then sews each flag to a cord using an all-natural thread.
Recycle and reuse are familiar themes as well as living in harmony with the planet.
Leah’s work is another fringe upon the surreal and eco smart. She has combined her desire to integrate a renewable energy content into sculptures that are animated by sun energy. These surrealistic botanical inventions often resemble flowers that would fit into a sci-fi film or Alice in Wonderland.
Hope you get a chance to see them there.
Mary and Leah @ Parking Day 2007

New Tonka toy to draw

Soon it’s going to be the annual SF Open Studio tour this coming October 25th and 26th . I have been drawing recently, aside from the engine parts and fly fishing lures, some new Tonka truck toys I purchased on eBay.
They’re quite fun to draw and challenging to get their form, perspective and shading convincing enough that the trucks transcend being just toys to maybe the real thing. I guess that is why I am attracted to them as a subject. I remember having many of these very trucks when I was a child and would play with them constantly. I would project my self as a worker or a driver into the inside of the trucks cab and drive them around a dirt pile in the backyard. I would build buildings and pits to a fantasy excavation for a city complex. At the time, it was a way to escape and become someone and do something with out the true responsibility of being it for real. I think that is why I am interested in drawing these toys now, they allow an escape to that place I once could go to all the time and can forget other things around me.