INSIDE THE COLOSSEUM

Near the end of my time in Denmark, I agreed to join a spontaneous weekend trip to Rome with a few ladies from the residency.  I've neglected to share what I took in while there, and soon after I was there, but will put up some posts in the coming days/weeks.  The Colosseum is a crazy powerful place to walk through and especially so with no tourists!  The best time to go is about half an hour before closing as the tourists start to clear out.  In the last ten minutes I felt like I had the entire place to myself.

I see before me the Gladiator lie;

He leans upon his hand, —his manly brow

Consents to death, but conquers agony,

And his drooped head sinks gradually low, —

And through his side the last drops, ebbing slow

From the red gash, fall heavy, one by one,

Like the first of a thunder-shower; and now

The arena swims around him, —he is gone,

Ere ceased the inhuman shout which hailed the wretch who won.
-Byron

FABERGÉ ABROAD : PARIS IN PAPER

As a child I made several scrapbooks commemorating important trips and, within, pivotal artifacts that signified the real, tangible trace of experience. A ticket stub to to the Royal Tournament, an autographed headshot of Lionel Jeffries (I'd love to cover this song), a shiv of gold paint scraped off a chair in the Buckingham Palace waiting room; these seemed to hold special powers of marking time.  When I look back, I don't remember the moments, I remember the scrapbook.

A month in Paris has been seen by all, in all photos by everyone and anyone who has ever stood in front of the Eiffel Tower pretending it's a hat. I hereby submit (in no particular order) my stubs, refuse, scraps, billets, flyers, and whatever other pulpy detritus made its way into my possession.

ARTISTS

While visiting Heather Goodchild during her residency at the Cité des Arts Internationale, I piggybacked a hobnob during the Cité open studio party and met some wonderful artists. Tero Puha was a very nice Finnish guy who I saw at every Cité party; the images of his work intrigued me at first glance. David Rodriguez snuck me in to the Salon de Montrouge, and I had a chance to see his wonderfully pornographic tins up close.

EVERYWHERE

This was another project featured at the Salon de Montrouge. The idea is to post photographs of this slip of paper in places all over the world, then aggregate those photos on the website. I suppose I will have to do that now to honour my commitment.

BROCANTE

It's no secret that The Wardens love a good brocante - French fleamarket - and I happily tagged along to soothe the persistent sickness of the hapless hoarder. I had it in my head that I would like to learn to draw, and thereupon sought out any manner of image I might like to recreate. I think I'll start with a moustache.

BUSINESS CARDS

Note to artists: your desire to appear legitimate in certain circles is trumped by the abstract nature of your self definition. If you give these to me late at night at some party, I still won't remember.

CATACOMBS

It was inane to think I would re-learn French over the course of an hour. I even second-guessed the choice up front, opting to take one of each, as if I might compare the two. The choice of image from the actual ticket stub is no less confusing than the displaying of literally hundreds of thousands of human remains as a tourist attraction, deep underground.

GOODCHILD'S OFFCUTS

Heather cut and painted these shapes, I assume for the open studio. Perhaps she will add an editor's note in parentheses to clarify. I crashed in her spare cot one night, and I could hear them peeling off the wall and falling with a light clatter among the early hours. 

KING KRULE

I walked past the Eiffel tower one day, walking and walking, into a district I had neither seen nor returned to since, and shoplifted a pair of running shorts. Heather was mortified. "I don't want you getting yourself thrown out of the country!" Afterwards, I hopped the metro clear across town and met up with a young Asian woman from Craigslist who sold me a ticket to the King Krule concert. After she left, I took off my jean shorts and sprinted down the Champs Elysees. The concert was lovely but overcrowded and hot.

MUSEUMS

I overdosed on museums in Paris. Painting after painting after painting. Hundreds in a row of hundreds. I began to feel incredibly guilty. How long did it take this artist to finish this piece, which I mull over for mere seconds before dismissing it? I did have some favourite collections though. On either side: the Musee de la Chase et de la Nature, featuring images of attack, ornate weapons and an animated boar's head; the other, the Musee D'Orsay where I investigated theatre director Artaud's interpretations alongside Van Gogh's captivating canon.  I ventured to each on the first Sunday of the month, meaning free admission but lengthy lines. The others: Rodin (a favourite from my first visit at fifteen), Carnavalet (the history of Paris), Palais de Tokyo (free-for-all destruction garbage town) and Pompidou (paintings; contemporary wing closed).

PIED DE COCHON

The oldest all-night bistro in Paris. I went twice; once on a whim with friends Matthew and Tatevik, and again with Goodchild to celebrate Juliann Wilding's birthday. On both occasions we ordered a massive seafood platter, replete with mollusks and crustaceans.

HAND-WRITTEN NOTES

I think this was from the Pompidou. I forget the exhibit, but it doesn't matter. The quotes still resonate without their curatorial context.

TRANSIT

I rented a chambre de bonne near Iena. I could see the Tour Eiffel out my window. I used the metro occasionally but Matthew lent me his Velib membership and I was liberated via bicycle. I mastered the system and conquered the city, despite some early setbacks. I learned early that I could not rely on the Eiffel lit up at night to guide me, as it dims at midnight. This is also my way of saying to Matthew: sorry, I just realized I still have your Velib card. I'll pop it in the post. 

ZOLA

An entire novel in French. Get real, Fabergé.

BABYGAMA

Atmospheric firing was by far the most exciting part of my time at Guldagergaard in Denmark.  Fueled by firewood (hard and soft), we fired this small anagama (babygama) for 5 days with a team of 8 people.  Stoking the fire around the clock until we reached approximately 1400ºC (2550ºF), the heat of the burning wood solidified the clay but also produced fly ash and volatile salts that settle on the clay surfaces.  The complex interaction between flame, ash and minerals of the clay body creates a natural ash glaze on the pots.  

I had several porcelain works in this firing that went in the kiln totally raw.  I made the forms, applied nothing to the surfaces, and the results were so amazingly dynamic.  Colours of blue, purple, soft pinks and greens, translucent white, and a variation of texture ranging from smooth and glossy to rough, sharp and crusty.  These works will remain a surprise until they are unveiled at a future exhibition.  But, i've included some images here of others works that were in the firebox, meaning tucked as close to the fire as possible, where they became buried in embers and wood ash.  These pieces were by far the most exciting objects in the kiln; crusty blackness, vibrant turquoise, and dramatic crystal growth cover the ceramic surfaces.  Wood firing doesn't have to mean earthy, brown results.

A Japanese term meaning "cave kiln", an anagama is a single chamber kiln in a sloping tunnel structure.  Ancient anagama's were sometimes built by digging tunnels into hills and banks of clay.  These kilns consist of a firing chamber with a fire box at one end and a flue at the other.  The firebox located at the front door of the kiln is not actually a box, but rather a space for the main fire.  Wood is stoked through the front door, but also along the side where fireboxes are created between shelves of ceramics.   The chimney/draft system pulls the flames from the front of the kiln to the back, and the side stokes help to heat the kiln a little more evenly.  Some really exciting "collaborations" happen when the flames knock pieces over and into each other, fusing work together or onto shelves.  Check out this diagram to get a better idea of what's inside.

This firing really changed me because of the deeper connection I developed to the natural elements and the vigorous, focused process of bringing the kiln to temperature with actual fire.  There is something to say for setting an electric kiln with a computer, hitting "start" and walking away, it's amazing, totally care free, but there's something so magical about being with the kiln for every second, listening to it, feeding it, and watching the flames. Atmospheric kilns can also reach higher temperatures than electric kilns meaning the material melts just a little bit extra creating super vitrified, beautifully complex, yet subtle surfaces.  

I loved being outside, in good weather and bad, the camaraderie and conversation, splitting wood, the element of surprise, snack plates and celebratory wine.  Now I will be on the hunt for a wood kiln near Toronto.