Artist Talk

Claire Pentecost

Rescheduled from February 6, will be talking on March 5, 2008 in the Art Center Lecutre Hall. Her work is still up in the Inova/Kenilworth gallery. If you would like to check it out, the gallery is open W-Sun from noon to 5pm.

The talk is at 7:00pm on Wednesday if your interested.

Meeting on Friday

There is a meeting coming up that EVERYONE should attend.

Friday the 29th

2:00 p.m.

MIT B51

We have a gallery for gallery night, everyone who intends to participate needs to come. If you cant come please talk to Amanda or myself and let us know that you won't be there so we can anticipate you for the show.

See you on Friday!

-Tom

Artist Talks on Campus

Charles Green
"The Atlas Effect: Image Collection and Circulation in Contemporary Art"

Tuesday, March 4, 2008
2:30pm
UWM Library 4th floor conference center

More info


Lyndell Brown and Charles Green
"One Side of the Wire: Images from Iraq and Afghanistan"

Wednesday, March 5th
2:30pm
UWM Library 4th floor conference center

More Info

No Commision Restaurant Exhibit

Milwaukee area restaurant, opening in spring, needs art for its walls!

The atmosphere is casual, sophisticated, and fun. Our wall space is 20'-25' tall so we're looking for medium to large scale pieces. No commision taken. Open to all media.

Artists interested should send up to 4 images, name, phone and email to photodonotbend@hotmail.com.

C.R. Davidson

Hi everyone, I just talked to Catherine the gallery owner for C.R. Davidson Art with Tom, Trisha and Mary joining me. Thanks you guys for coming, I know Catherine was excited to meet you.

I wanted to give everyone an update of the details of the show, and some of the ideas we talked about, and show the pictures I promised of her gallery.

First, the Show will be April 15 - June 15. This is a few days before the opening of gallery night, and the end date could change. The day to install is the weekend before the show opens, April 11 or April 12. We can pick one of these days as a group on Friday. The show on gallery night and day will be open Friday 3-9pm and Saturday 11-5pm. If you have friends or family coming to the show, Catherine wanted me to let you know that she locks her doors at 9pm, so please have them come earlier.

Catherine is hoping to meet almost everyone before the show, if you have time during the week or the weekend, schedule an appointment to visit her gallery and introduce yourself. I can always go down with a group of you if you would like, and introduce you to her. Catherine’s email is crdavidsonart@hotmail.com and phone number is 414.303.9389.

We also talked about on Saturday the 19th for a couple of hours each artist would give a brief statement of their work. I think this is great! It’s a chance to be able to talk about your work, and practicing talking in front of others about your work. I’m in portfolio right now, and this will be extra practice for my source presentation I have to give to the class. So I guess what I’m saying is, this is another great opportunity.

I have mentioned postcards before, and we can make them. Catherine has a client list that she can send them out to and we will have a pile to leave at school, work, wherever. I hope on Friday the 29th we can decide and finalize all the details for creating them. So we can get them printed and sent out in time.

We also talked about having name tags for the show, because there will be so many of us we want to stand out with our work. One idea she suggested was we each create our name tag with our work that will be on the wall. Creating a visual guide between artist and work, so guests will know which one is your piece and ask questions if they have any. I thought it was a great idea and maybe we could all do that.

Another idea that was mentioned is having a small proof sheet of more of our works. The size would approximately be 4x5 and it would have your name on the cover with a small bio or artist statement of the works in the binder, and then about maybe 5 photos. Tying it all together with a ribbon down the side. This would be for if someone was interested in your work and wanted to buy more than what you had on the wall they could look through this little proof book and Catherine would contact you to print off another photo.

We had talked about framing, pricing, refreshments, etc. which I will explain more at the meeting. So if there is questions you can ask directly.

Catherine is terrific, I can’t wait for you guys to meet her. I asked her if she had time and wanted to stop by at the meeting she was more than welcome. So hopefully she can make it and see some work and visit with all of you, and help us with any questions or concerns anyone might have.

On Friday February 29th at 2:00 we will meet in the critique room B51. Please bring any questions you have about the show, your work you would like to submit or are thinking to submit. The work can be proofs, contact sheets, or small prints. Just enough so we all can get an idea of what you would like to do.

Hope to see you all Friday, and maybe Catherine can stop by, enjoy the beautiful weekend!

Eclipse Outing

Well we had a spur of the moment, eclipse fueled outing last night. Howie Kuhn, Corey Gaffer, and myself went out for a couple of hours. We shot the eclipse from about half way covered until it was gone, we then headed down to the pier and slid around on the ice and threw snowballs. Good times.

Go ahead and click on that series of the moon if you want to see a bit more detail. Keep shooting everyone!

Gallery Info

I just spoke with Catherine the gallery owner. What she is looking to see from the artists that will be participating is this...


A selected portfolio page from each artist or

a few printed single images

a simple bio

artist statement

Again this might be easier to compile everything into a slideshow. Or if everyone has a print that they want in the show I will collect them with all the information requested.

If anyone is free on Saturday let me know, I am meeting Catherine then and discussing prices, installation, etc.

Very excited! More soon.

Gallery Night & Day April 18th & 19th

I am so excited to announce that the Focus organization will be showing on Gallery Night. The gallery that we will be showing at is C.R. Davidson art. The gallery is located at:

207 E. Buffalo St.
Suite 210
Milwaukee WI, 53202

She is very excited to show our work. She asked me for the members that are participating in this show to give her some images to look at; a small portfolio. So she has some kind of an idea of what to expect in her gallery. My thought was to put together a slideshow of all the images with your name, approximate dimensions, and wether it would be a digital, gelatin silver print, etc. This way all you would need is to either scan some photos or give a jpeg file, instead of 30 portfolios handed to her. If anyone has another thought in making this easier let me know.

I still have to meet with her and talk the business side of things, but we will be in the listing on the website and printed in the booklet for gallery night. If you don't know the website for gallery night click here.

After I meet up with her I will have more details and possible questions from her that will need answering. I will keep you up to date on the details.

Chicago Artist Resource search engine

Besides MARN (milwaukee artist resource network) http://www.marnonline.com which is yahoo email based there is CAR. Chicago Artist Resource is a website of information. I mainly use there call for artist search engine. You can narrow specific information down from a short list of questions giving you a list of galleries, grants and artist residences looking for your art.
http://www.chicagoartistsresource.org/

MARN's 2007-2008 Workshops

Check For Updates Soon
We are still in the very beginning stages of booking or 2007-2008 
workshop series.

Focusing on the business side of art, MARN has gathered regional 
experts to lead workshops designed to further the career development 
of artists in any media. Beginning October 16, the workshops will be 
held at Hotcakes Gallery, 3379 North Pierce Street (unless otherwise 
noted).

Cost (unless otherwise noted): $10 MARN members / $15 non-members / 
$5 Students (with valid ID) per workshop.

To pre-register, pay now with PayPal or a credit card below mail a 
check along with your name, contact information and the workshop(s) 
you’d like to attend to MARN, P.O. Box 713, Milwaukee, WI 53201, or 
RSVP to brenner@marnonline.com and pay at the door. Space will be 
limited and priority will be given to those who pre-pay.




WRITING AN EFFECTIVE PRESS RELEASE
David Luhrssen (Editor, Shepherd Express) + Bobby Tanzilo (Editor, 
OnMilwaukee.com)
February 21, 2008 - 6-8pm
pay now - $15 (non-member) • $10 (member) • $5 (student)

David Luhrssen
David Luhrssen is Arts & Entertainment Editor of the Shepherd 
Express, co-founder of the Milwaukee International Film Festival and 
co-author of two books, A Time of Paradox: America Since 1890, and 
Searching for Rock and Roll.

Bobby Tanzilo
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications 
from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis 
Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side. He is managing editor of 
OnMilwaukee.com and has written for Chicago Tribune, Milwaukee 
Sentinel, Playbill, Consumer's Digest, Village Voice, Il Monferrato, 
Italian Americana, Shepherd Express, The Italian Times and other 
publications.


LEGAL ISSUES FOR ARTISTS
Elizabeth T Russell (Attorney / Author)
March 20, 6-8pm
pay now - $15 (non-member) • $10 (member) • $5 (student)

Elizabeth T Russell
Elizabeth T Russell holds an undergraduate degree in music. On a 
bassoon scholarship, she earned her law degree from New York's Pace 
University School of Law, where she served as a member of the Pace 
Law Review. She is the author of Art Law Conversations: A 
Surprisingly Readable Guide for Visual Artists (Ruly Press 2005), 
which was named to CHOICE Magazine's 2006 list of Outstanding 
Academic Titles.

Ms. Russell is a member of the Copyright Society of the U.S.A.; the 
Entertainment, Arts and Sports Law Section of the New York State Bar 
Association; and a board member of the Sports and Entertainment Law 
Section of the State Bar of Wisconsin. She is admitted to practice 
law in New York, Connecticut and Wisconsin.


PROPERLY SHIPPING AND STORING ART
Keith Nelson (Preparator, Milwaukee Art Museum)
April 17, 6-8pm
pay now - $15 (non-member) • $10 (member) • $5 (student)


MARN's workshops, Mentor program, exhibitions, community outreach and 
economic development activities would not be possible without the 
vision and financial support of Brico Fund LLC, Greater Milwaukee 
Foundation's Mary L. Nohl Fund, Milwaukee Arts Board and Wisconsin 
Arts Board.

Free Call for Artists: Deadline Febuary 29th

SPACKLE GALLERY
Open Call for Artists.
Deadline: Feb 29, 2008
Be Part of Our Grand Opening Exhibition!
March 14-April 13, 2008

Seeking Small Works!
Founded in 2007, spackle is a collective gallery established,
supported and
managed by Milwaukee based artists. spackle exists as a professional
venue for
young and upcoming artists to exhibit, develop, and advance
innovative art of
diverse media and content.
The public is invited to submit work of various media, ie paintings,
drawings,
sculpture, prints, photographs, etc. The gallery will accept almost
any media
provided it is approved by the curatorial staff.

Size requirements for each art work (negotiable)

:
2D Maximum 12"x12"
3D Maximum 12"x12"x12"

Application items:
CD- including 5-10 works (or more) JPEG format 72ppi
Image List including title, size, media, year created
Application materials will not be returned unless accompanied by a
self-addressed stamped envelope.

DEADLINE: February 29, 2008

Submit all work to:
spackle2674 Kinnickinnic Ave
Milwaukee, WI 53207

Contact: info@spacklegallery.com
www.spacklegallery.com (under construction)

Meetings

The next 2 focus meetings will be held at the following times:

Friday the 15th at: 2:00 in MIT B51
Wednesday the 20th at: 7:00 p.m. in MIT B51

Please bring prints you would like in a show, as well as any logo ideas. We will vote on our logo during these 2 sessions.

Thanks, see you there.

-Tom

1

Here is a little history on Focus. Please continue to read the rest of our blog for more information.

Ok, moved to normal Helvetica, nothing slim, condensed, or extended. Should be more recognizable from a distance. Brought the split together and changed the C to half gray. Lastly this one is made in illustrator, so this logo can serve as a logo with text, and a logo alone, we can loose the FOCUS, for times when we can utilize it for recognition in other venues. This could include being a small backdrop to page numbers in our publication, being used in places we wouldn't have a big letterhead as we would in a poster, or anywhere where we want a big logo at maybe 20% opacity in the background.

I've gotten lots of good feedback on this one from peers and instructors alike.

Forgive the compression, this is made in illustrator, so it is sizable to whatever size we would ever want it at. I think the blacks and grays still need some work, I might even need to rework the whole thing again based on additional feedback. Let me know what you think.

Its still not there, but its getting closer.

Another Logo Suggestion

A split prism is something that hasn't been addressed yet. I'm not sure I've done it any justice at all, but its an idea everyone is welcome to play with. Most people would be able to relate to it as well, many of our first experiences with cameras probably involved sliding that image back and fourth through the prism until it fit together like a puzzle piece.

Logo

This is more along the lines of what I'm looking for in a logo.

Something simple, something scalable, something reproducible, something clean, and something memorable.

Suggestion from Naomi

Naomi asked me to post this link as a suggestion font for our logo. No pressure! Just a suggestion.

Thanks Naomi!!!

Happy snow day everyone, I hope you all had as many adventures as I did!


-Tom

Gallery Links

I think it would be a good idea to post your various accounts on here so everyone can look at everyones stuff. Yes? yes.

Things like
Flickr
Photobuckets
Deviant Art

any pages like that.

Revised Logo

Just a revision.......

Logo

I guess my design here is a bit different than Trisha's. Just thought I'd give it a shot. Let me know what you think!

Night Photography

I wrote a tutorial for a website a while back relating to my night photography. It'll be useful if you're wondering about reciprocity failure, or the moons actual reflectivity. Give it a look!

Just click on it for a full view. I don't expect you to get out your loupe and push it up to the screen. Sheesh, even in the full view its a bit hard to read. Here is a link to the original, on DeviantArt, the full view there will be correct if this one doesn't do your eyes justice.

First Meeting

Well folks, its the evening after our first meeting and I'd like to start by extending thanks to everyone who made it to campus on a Friday for photo club. We had around 15 people today, a great start. Lots of great ideas were covered, I'll briefly go over what we talked about today in the lines below.

Four people were chosen to be the officers of this new student organization, they are as follows:

President: Tom Harris
Vice-President: Amanda Donajkowski
Secretary: Erin Therrien
Treasurer: Elizabeth Beveridge

Thanks for stepping forward to this guys.

Secondly we've chosen a title for ourselves at long last. Thanks Jeremy for suggesting focus it beat out the others in a nearly unanimous vote.

Next Liz Beveridge took on the challenge of creating a publication for ourselves this semester. A volume of our photography with some accompanying text is what it sounds like at the moment.

Sara Anderson decided she'd take the task of signage under her wing and get going on some posters. Thanks for that Sara, I'm looking forward to see what you come up with.

We got everyone who came to the meeting today invites to be authors of this blog, so you all should be able to post here freely after you confirm the email you ought to have received.

Scott, one of our photo I students suggested we look into getting some space to hang work in the basement here. We'll get started on the walls just west of the doors to B84, they are blank and could use some of our art.


As far as a logo is concerned, it looks like Miss Buster has already gotten a heading on something, everyone that would like to try their hand at photoshop, illustrator, or simply a pen and paper is welcome to get things sketched/printed for our next meeting where we'll do some more voting to decide on one.

Future meetings: As of right now our next meeting is planned for Friday the 14th of February at 2:15 in B51 again. We're going to be doing a supplementary meeting possibly Wednesday nights for people that can't make Friday. You don't have to come to both meetings unless you REALLY want to hang out with me more, but a phone call will do just as well! I joke I joke, come to both if you want, but we'll likely be covering the same ground.


Finally thanks again to everyone that had great suggestions today, as well as everyone who came. I'm more than excited to establish some cohesion here in the photography student body. We'll make some memories this semester, and work with each other to get our names out, and get some killer images.

Have a fantastic weekend my friends.

Getting the creative juices rolling...

I was playing around in PS with some of the elements we'd talked about today regarding a logo and here's what I came up with. Feel free to love it or hate it, I just want to simply get some ideas flowing. Please everyone post any ideas that you have!! I believe that if you click on the logo it will open in a new window a bit larger.

-Trisha