Stone Blind Interactive Installation

Vicky Kapo and I have been friends for decades, but it wasn't until she visited Las Vegas in early May 2016, that we took the opportunity to collaborate on a project. Although Vicky's background is in dance and choreography and mine in photography and collage, we have each incorporated community interaction in previous projects.

We visited a couple of sites in the Las Vegas 18b Arts District, home to the monthly First Friday Arts Festival. A boarded up home covered in graffiti art spoke to us of transience. This once solid site designed for occupation, has become unhinged, adrift from its mooring due to its lack of function. There are also homeless people in this neighborhood whom many choose not to see. In this context, the stones we found at the site, suggested the title for the work: Stone Blind.

Having first 'tied down' the house, we invite First Friday visitors to respond to the question "Where - or what - is home to you?". Some answer in specifics: "New Jersey", "Sin City", "Mexico", "Germany"... and others are descriptive: "Where my found family are", "Wherever love is reciprocated", "The location of my car".

The responses reflect the diverse cultural mix of First Friday visitors - locals, national and international visitors, toddlers in strollers and grandparents with walking sticks. Although the installation itself was transient, the messages live on as a poignant reminder of the importance of a safe, loving home that in reality, not everyone experiences.

Las Vegas 18b Arts District, May 6, 2016. 

Vicky Kapo ties down the house with stones found on the site.

Collaged "Seeing Stones" are interspersed with the stones on site.

First Friday visitors write or draw their interpretation of "home".

A project participant adds his messages of "home" to the temporary installation.

Participants add their messages of "home" to the temporary installation.

Participants' contributions festoon the ties at the conclusion of the project.

Visual Art Is Vibrant at Life Is Beautiful Festival 2014

"Love is Power. Power is Life. Life is Beautiful." The words are scrawled in red, encircling a cut out of a large, purple cactus flower. Pasted to the wall, the flower is surrounded by hundreds of other natural desert elements, with hand-written messages. For this year's Life is Beautiful festival, my proposal submitted to curator Patrick Duffy envisioned a collage installation created by the festival visitors themselves, slowly growing over the three days of the festival.
Attendance numbers were up for Las Vegas' second Life is Beautiful festival held during the last of the warm weather in late October. The focus on visual arts was again strong, with the exhibition venue moving to the previously shuttered Western Hotel, sharing space with the guest speakers in the Learning component. The Street Art Program, again curated by Charlotte Dutoit, brought new works to buildings in downtown Las Vegas. With many mural works from the first festival in 2013 still in existence, the face of downtown has changed dramatically.
I've put together a slideshow with Huffington Post, offering a tour of both temporary and permanent visual art features of the 2014 festival. I can't promise that it's fully comprehensive, but it gives a taste of the visual smörgåsbord available to festival-goers taking time out from the multitude of aural offerings. The first images were taken the evening before the festival opened, when some of the visiting street artists were putting the finishing touches on their works. For further information on artists, see the Life is Beautiful line-up.
The best festivals are uplifting, creating a powerful positive energy that lives on after the festival is over. In the downtown center of a city where stark reminders of the hard-hitting recent recession are still evident, the Life is Beautiful festival achieved that for me. As one of my collage participants wrote, quoting the Red Hot Chilli Peppers, "Destruction leads to a very rough road but it also breeds creation."

Less Popular Music

Indiana-based artist Aaron Nemec performed in the Off the Strip New Genres Festival 2012 on Sunday, and his show Less Popular Music opened on Preview Thursday at the Contemporary Arts Center.
Nemec received his MFA in the Electronic and Time-based art program at Purdue University in 2011. His projects explore the complex listener-performer relationship in pop music culture. Works in Less Popular Music include 'Solo Faces' - a video montage of facial expressions made while playing guitar solos, and 'Bass Rally III' - a radio transmission of bass tones, broadcast from the CAC window. Passing cars can pick up the signal on 101.3 FM.

Off the Strip 2012 ... the event ...

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In the Shadow of the Strip

"The Contemporary Arts Center’s Off the Strip New Genres Festival exists in the shadow of the Las Vegas Strip’s seductive glamour and addictive charms.

The city of Las Vegas is a nucleus of entertainment, risk and romance. It is known for its wedding chapels and since 1911, it’s liberal divorce laws - in other words, the full spectrum of relationships.

Beyond the Strip, Las Vegas is a vast, sprawling city, which most tourists visiting Las Vegas have little concept of. And beyond the city itself, is the Mojave Desert – a vast, inhospitable expanse that many city dwellers never visit.

Nevada in many ways is still the Wild West. It can be a tough place to survive in, let alone thrive in, but the city permits the possibility of fun along the way.

The artists in the Off the Strip festival, whether local, national, or international; have all created works that reflect the glamor, the grunge, the struggles and intricate relationships that are the foundation of Las Vegas and its burgeoning art scene."

- from my Introduction to Off the Strip 2012.

Co-ordinating an entire festival program has been an interesting - and sometimes challenging - experience, but I couldn't have done it without the skills of Demecina Gray, Contemporary Arts Center Gallery Assistant, and the great crew of dedicated volunteers. And most importantly, all the participating performers and video artists who made this such a memorable event.
At the festival opening party on Friday night at Emergency Arts. Multiplexer launched the Intercept 5:7 video program and 5th Wall Gallery featured Jevijoe Vitug's now-titled installation, along with the Nuclear Weapons Testing Legacy: A Tale of Two Cultures project.
And shown here at the weekend events at the CAC are performing artists Miguel Rodriguez, Artist Michael Barrett, Lou Lou Roxy, Amanda Haymond, Aaron Nemec, visiting Polish film maker Slawomir J. Milewski, and Justin Favela at the satellite venue The Mini Market.

Off the Strip New Genres Festival 2012 - this coming weekend...

I've been posting a little less often recently as I've been working to bring together the video and performance events for the Off the Strip New Genres Festival 2012. The main program takes place at the Contemporary Arts Center on Sept 1 and 2, with satellite events at Multiplexer and 5th Wall Gallery in Emergency Arts and The Mini-Market in North Las Vegas.
Performing artists featured are Artist Michael Barrett, Justin Favela, Amanda Haymond, Aaron Nemec, Daniel Oshima, Miguel Rodriguez and Lou Lou Roxy.
Video artists include Candy Warpop with director Ryen McPherson, Austin Dickson, Julia Holden, Jenessa Kenway, Kid Meets Cougar with directors Mike and Jerry Thompson, Slawomir J Milewski and Ronnie van Hout.
The festival will provide opportunities for Q&A with participating artists including attending UK-based experimental film maker Slawomir J. Milewski and artist/musician Aaron Nemec from Indiana.

Image above from The Ecstasy of St Agnes by Slawomir J. Milewski.

Vegas StrEATS July

I hadn't made it along in a while and I found that the Vegas StrEATS festival had expanded into the street. Always a good array of food trucks and stalls - and this time there was also the 'Shark Tank'. Punters could pay to throw a ball at a target, which if hit, would drop the bikini-clad girl into the tank. Someone should compile a list of "Very Strange Ways to Earn a Living in Las Vegas".

Helldorado Days Parade

The Las Vegas Helldorado event originated in 1934 and the parade is just part of four days of events including rodeo and a trail ride. It can be difficult to find a sense of community and history here in Las Vegas, but this parade along downtown 4th Street offered both.

Neon Reverb

I've been extra busy lately so only managed to get to see a couple of bands perform during the Neon Reverb music festival. They were the final acts on two different nights at two different venues....
Local "fuzz rock" band Candy Warpop played at the iconic Aruba Showroom on Las Vegas Boulevard. This band have upped the ante each time I've seen them, and they put on an intense, riveting performance. If you haven't been able to see them live, they have now released a music video 'Smilefucker' produced by Ryen McPherson.
I also got to see "band, belief system and business" Yacht perform at the outdoor all-ages venue 'The Junkyard' on Saturday night. Their sound was revisionist electro-pop accompanied by some energetic po-go dancing. Audience members were invited to stay and converse with the band afterwards about their creative ideology and any other topics of choice presumably.

Chinese New Year on Fremont St

The Fremont St Experience was a great place to celebrate Chinese New Year - the crowd often rivals the performers for entertainment value. Dragons of course, were everywhere, including a giant snaking version on the overhead VivaVision screen.