Art and Gift, A Voyage Begins

The third and final film in a trilogy telling of the gift of all my artwork (introduction here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iN_PDl8OBxc to those who value the work, thereby rescuing the art from landfill following one eviction too many from art studios, due to owner's plans and development for the building. After my eviction by a developer landlord from the Dutch Boy paint factory art studios, I was given a much smaller space by my friend of twenty years, a friend who had collected much of my art. In order to make that move to a much smaller studio, I had to sell a great deal of my work at prices far below market value at the time of that move, which was almost six years ago. The space my friend offered, she offered at a price well below market value. Now ensconced in the old Bank of America building, my friend sadly died. Her son inherited, he "had other plans for the building," so once again I had to move. He kept the rent the same low amount I had paid his mother until the time of my move. He offered me another space in another building about 1/4 the size of the smaller space I had squeezed into after eviction from the Dutch Boy. With enough space for my work, the rent would have gone sky high, well beyond what I could have paid. Just finding space large enough would have been a dicey situation, one that I had explored to no avail, especially given that neither commercial nor residential rents have come down in my area, despite the near depression economy.
It is difficult to say in a situation like mine whether the tragedy is the loss of studio/gallery/work/storage (all of that is what a studio is or can be to a visual artist), or whether the tragedy is the necessity of saving work from land-fill by giving it to others. It is both. The loss is of countless hours of grueling intellectual and physical work that goes into the making of any art---in my case countless paintings, sculptures, works on paper, and the objects that go into the personal collection of an artist, all grist for the mill, all muse, all props that hold the theater together.

Paul Digby, Vincent Andelmoth, Aki Sasaki and friends, and Danny Zingarelli and friends created hauntingly beautiful music which graciously they allowed me to use in my film.

The poetry of Lucille Lang Day rings true and clear throughout the film.

Poet Mary Rudge speaks eloquently at film's end of changes and passages, "Every time a person dies, a book is lost."

There are a couple of places where sound got lost in transit, and strange electronic brownies stole original intent of sound. Please bear with me, none of these moments last more than a few seconds...maybe together we can see it as the new wave of avant-guarde :)

Category:

Film & Animation

Tags:

• Chandra Garsson
• art
• gift
• eviction
• painting
• sculpture
• Vincent Andelmoth
• iNsCissorS
• Paul Digby
• Aki Sasaki
• escape (window)
• slave unit
• Danny Zingarelli
• P.C. Munoz
• Lucille Lang Day
• Jan Steckel
• Dan Fontes
• Lana Jean Rose
• Lulu Hanna
• Egmont van Dyck
• Anna Bates
• Terry R. Flowers
• Mary Rudge
• mixed media
• Mim Weisburd
• Pamela Wilson
• Liz Grilli
• Beth Blevins
• Suzinn Weiss
• Cara Joy De Celles
• Rahele Ranjbin
• Micah
• Urban Ore
• Dutchboy
• Bank of America
• Oakland
• artists

[Goudenogen]

If you mean my artist's book after saying that an artist always needs flat files, that one is a portfolio book of art I made to go with the poems of artist and poet Leah Korican, it is called Spring, Poems by Leah Korican, now in the collection of Terry R. Flowers, featured within the film. There are 2 very brief places in this film where the sound was severely compromised, apologies to all. I have found that those areas can be listened to as sound sculpture or against any other sound of choice.

[Goudenogen]

The lines are from Lucille Lang Day's poem, Laurent Explains to His Model, from one of her many beautiful books of her poetry, The Curvature of Blue. Her voice reads several poems, but this I repeated as motif in order to show how an artist feels about their work as they create. Thank you for commenting, and for asking.

[dianatoad]

Chandra, I love your film. I loved seeing your wonderful artwork and meeting some of your terrific supporters who were so heartbroken on your behalf. I thought including David Rose in the film was a beautiful choice. The music and poetry were fantastic. Where did those lines about "to be an artist, you must be crazy. To paint a woman, you must be in love..." come from? I saw the book in the film but am a little too near-sighted to read the title. Anyway, great job! -Diana Shapiro