Road trip to Roanoke

Last weekend, which was brutally cold, we took a drive to Roanoke, VA. Our purpose was to go see Wilco in concert on their current tour. I had tried to get tickets for their DC show, but was having no luck. I scanned the concert dates and saw that they were going to be in Roanoke on the Saturday of a three day weekend and thought, why not?  I easily scored good seats. And I have to say, it's more fun to see music outside of DC. Of course we did see them in DC also, I was able to get tickets eventually, after the pre-sale frenzy was over.

This is my sketchbook record of the trip, scenes from 81.

But anyway, this is not about tickets, this is about Roanoke. The drive is about 4 hours down unexciting route 81. We griped about how we could be in NYC in the same amount of time or some other more exciting place. Neither of us had ever been to Roanoke and we had pretty low expectations. The only thing I could pull from my memory was that a friend had told me that someone had reproduced a miniature version of Graceland in their front yard and you could visit it.

This lion was in the window of an antique shop.

Once we arrived we started to think about dinner, we'd have to eat early, but the realization that it was Valentines weekend had us worried. We scanned menus online and were surprised to find so many interesting restaurants. I had been sure we would have to eat at an Applebee's or something. So we set off for downtown and found....a real downtown. Shops, restaurants, a marketplace, a museum, lots of people: it's a happening place.

One thing I have learned is that if you are ever in a situation where every restaurant is booked, your best bet is the sushi restaurant. And once again I was right. They told us we could have a table if we left before 7:00. No problem.

We ate dinner and  we saw the show, which was great, and just a short frigid walk from our hotel. Apparently Wilco had never played Roanoke before so the crowd was really fired up. The concert hall had amazing acoustics; we weren't expecting that either. The next morning we rejected the free hotel breakfast so that we could go back downtown and explore more. We had chicken and waffles at Thelma's, wandered into some shops and stopped in at the Taubman art museum.

The museum is easy to find because it has a Frank Gehry-like design. It is also free and has a very nice collection for such a small museum. They had an Audubon show, an exhibit about George Washington which was very nicely sourced, as well as a contemporary installation about tobacco farmers in Virginia. They also have a large selection of Judith Leiber handbags, which was different and interesting to see.

The glowing red restroom @Taubman

So, thumbs up to Roanoke; I would go back again. After all, we still have to visit mini Graceland.

Zendoodles/ Solid Sound

A couple of years ago I read about zendoodles, or zentangles.  It is glorified doodling.  Basically, you draw a shape, divide it into sections, and fill each section with different patterns.  I've done this with my students, and they love it, and they look pretty cool.  The method has done a lot to influence my sketchbook.  I keep a small "travel journal" in my purse.  I like to record places I've been to in it.  But along with traditional sketches and notes, I make a zendoodle, filling spaces with patterns and images of where I have been.  I kind of like them.  To most people they may appear to be just color and line, but to me everything has a meaning.  Traditional zendoodles are black and white, but my favorites use lots of color.
This is one I did at the Solid Sound festival this past June.  It was a rainy weekend, so there were not that many great opportunities to draw for the first day and a half.  Most of it was done on Sunday.  Half is devoted to T-shirts.

This is the one I did from the year before, same festival.

I like the 2010 one better.  But I was sitting in a sunny field drawing as opposed to the first one where it was damp and muddy - not very conducive to sketching.

people that say "whoohoo"

What is it about the people who are compelled to shout out stupid things during concerts?  I mean, I understand that people are happy and feel the need to express it.  I can take that.  Were having a good time, people are singing, laughing, dancing, cheering... But I mean the people who shout out something over and over, or worse, the ones who whoop and holler during quiet moments like acoustic guitar parts.

We are at the Solid Sound, which is Wilco's music festival at Mass Moca.  Tonight the temperature was in the low sixties and it started to rain, right about the time the show was supposed to start.  I guess they were hoping the rain would stop, which it didn't, but we were completely soaked by the time they started.  Despite this, everyone stayed put, waited and was in fairly good spirits.  But there was some big headed moron behind us who started with the yelling thing.  First it was kind of random "woohoos" and "yeahs", easy to ignore.  Then he needed to show his gratitude so he started saying "Thank you, Thank you for coming back".  He repeated this every time there was a pause.  At first people started snickering, then there were a few, "okay man", "we heard you" and "your welcome"'s.  But too no avail, he would not stop.

 He also called out songs, but he would get them wrong.  "Jesus, incorporated!"   Well, that got the crowd around him laughing.   Come on, were all a bunch of uber Wilco geeks.  "It's Jesus, etc., you idiot" someone replied.  I don't think he believed it, but he eventually changed his rant to "Play the Jesus song!"

Some of it, I just don't understand.  Every time Nels Cline played a guitar solo - yelling and howling.  Okay you like it, but wouldn't you like it more if you could actually hear it?  What is it really about; you listening to the music you enjoy or you making sure everyone knows that you approve?

Sometimes I think these people listened to too many live albums where the front man says, "We're recording this show for an album and if you make a lot of noise you might be on it." (Big hissing crowd sound). 

Collograph Prints

Okay, so I haven't posted since the winter break.  I've been busy with being back at school, but mostly preoccupied with the death of a close friend.  Some days it's hard to even look at e-mail, much less write something.  I was also hung up on photoing some art work.  But, I did that this weekend, so I can put up some recent work.  I've been taking a printmaking class, which I love.  Besides carving the occasional linoleum block, I don't get much done on my own.  If only I had a printing press of my own...

A hand colored collograph.  This one titled "I wrote my name on the back of a leaf and I watched it drift away."  A lyric from a song.  It's not the best, but the color helps.

  I have done a lot of work with gloves, but mostly in clay.  I was fascinated with an image from the 19th century of a woman's kid glove printed with a tourist map of London.  How ingenious, you could walk around looking at your glove, discretely getting directions.  What else could you put on a glove?  Answers to a test?  Secrets?  Maps for the memory impaired (don't misplace those gloves!)  Anyway this is another collograph printed in burnt umber, love that color.

This is two versions of the same plate.  One in burnt umber, one in two colors.  You can see the plate is starting to collapse in the blue version.  You can clearly see the lower layers through the shape of the barn.  Now I know better when constructing a plate, unless of course I want that look.

This is my favorite, it is a double ghost.  A ghost is when you run a printed plate back through the press to pick up the leftover ink.  I used the house and the glove together.  Looks like poetry.