Fall-ing

Hey,

Things are nutz over here.

So I’ve been doing a little woodcut, a little screen printing, a little drawing, a little sewing, writing some short poems, stuff, and getting along by assisting an artist with sewn drawing (my jam, yeah) and gardening (my jam as well). And hanging out with my awesome amazing wonderful friends a lot! Working on random art in my little room up here in Harlem. That post mfa whatsit. It’s going to be alright. For real. Sometime. Later on. Looking forward to seeing some good art this week. Fall is full of great art shows here. And I’m going a rad metal concert soon! Yay!

Just wanted to say hey mostly. i got off the dumb facebook for safety and personal reasons, for a bit, yay! That’s exciting. Ah I’ll bet yr proud! Haha! More time in the real world is good. Hard but good. This world is so beautiful and terrible! We are lucky to be here.

Hope stuffs great where you are dear.

Xo
K

PS
This is so cool, 2 friends sent me lovely writing today, both from the hairpin, both resonate with my current events. They are very much worth reading.
http://thehairpin.com/2013/10/running-blind/
http://thehairpin.com/2013/10/our-squid-ourselves#more

PSS…
Pics from gardens and the world (the view from a park i go to daily, a rose I tended, morning glories in a friends yard, wild purslane by the Hudson) and a preview of the latest woodblock print, which I’ll finish this week… a snake with the head of a wolf.

http://youtu.be/fwltEelhqWg This is my new favorite, Angel Haze is so so so awesome and I’ve totally dug the Lauren Hill song this is based on for like decades. It’s a cover and yet it’s not. An update? i guess its a cover though. I found it last night and wanted to share.

recreation

For Immediate Release:

recreation

Katie Simpson Spain’s MFA thesis exhibition.

Presented by The City College of New York, CUNY

March 18-22, 10-5.

Reception Wednesday March 20th, 6-8:30 pm

Meet & Greet, March 21 5-6 pm.

Compton-Goethals Gallery

The City College of New York

Compton-Goethals Hall, Room 134

160 Convent Ave.

New York, NY 10031

With a focus on different ways humanity navigates in and works with nature, this interactive installation combines recycled materials, fabrics, live plants, painting, sculpture and printmaking to create a strange situation involving outdoor activities. You are invited to experience this version of nature, recreations of natural environments and recreational activities, from the safety of Compton-Goethals Gallery.

This work is a reexamination of organized outdoor activities, exploring relationships people have with the natural environment. I am interested in the thin membranes of safety that lie between the natural world and organized modern life. Often humorous and culminating in installation or video, this work combines recycled materials, fabrics, live plants, painting, sculpture and printmaking. I re-create biological environments and the tools associated with them, like giant friendship bracelets or camping tools without function. These awkward works nudge at nostalgia of time spent in nature.

Events during the show also include:

Camp Craft Time: Monday March 18th, 1 pm (friendship bracelet and drawing party)

Short Talk/Meet and Greet: Thursday March 21st, 5 pm

Please be in touch if you’d like to schedule a tour of the exhibition.

Visit this blog for details about exhibition programing and behind the scenes information about the work: http://www.katiespain.wordpress.com

Compton-Goethals is located on the Southeast corner of W 140th Street and Amsterdam Avenue.   

Subways: 1 @ 137th St and A, C, B, D @ 145th St.  

When visiting CCNY please go to Cohen Library Archives Gallery to see an ink and acrylic drawing of mine in CCNY Women Make Art, an exhibition showcasing women artists affiliated with the City College of New York, in conjunction with International Women’s Day. The Archives Gallery is on the 5th floor of Cohen Library, in the NAC Building (Amsterdam and 136, on the north campus, close to Compton-Goethals Hall). Here is a campus map.

Also don’t miss my upcoming installation at DUMBO’s 111 Front Street, part of an awesome April group show curated by Risa Shoup of Brooklyn’s Invisible Dog.

 

Take good care!

Best,

Katie Simpson Spain

 

For more information about CCNY’s MFA Thesis Shows visit: http://mfaccny.blogspot.com/

recreation_spain_pr

Sashes and baby plants

Heyyy!

Here are some new pics!
Stay tuned for more!

K

Life Never Waits, in the Crown Heights Film Festival!

Hi!

The movie I made earlier this year, Life Never Waits, has been accepted to the Crown Heights Film Festival!

The film will show in Brooklyn, in Crown Heights.

November 4th it’ll be on the big screen, it’s a Sunday! At 2 pm come to FiveMyles, 558 St. John’s Place, Brooklyn (2, 3, 4, 5 to Franklin) and is part of the festival section for younger people (well, it’s got sculpture/puppets that look like toys and is not ‘adult themed’ so that’s cool with me dude…).

Here is a link to the film festival page: http://www.crownheightsfilms.org/festival.html

And here is a link to a post about it on the CCNY MFA blog! http://mfaccny.blogspot.com

If you can, come see it on the big screen!

Thanks for your support!

xok

A still from ‘life never waits’… want to see it huge and moving? Come to the Crown Heights Film Festival!

This Thursday, In Between!

You’re invited to In Between, a group show featuring recent individual works by members of the MFA Studio Art class of 2013: Sasha Cohen, Andrea Coronil, Gayla Martin, Shannon McBride, Katie Simpson Spain, and Alison White.

Dates: September 24th through October 5th in Compton-Goethals Art Gallery. Compton Goethals Hall, The City College of New York! w 140th and Broadway, on the 1, a, c and d lines.

Reception: This Thursday, October 4th from 5pm to 8pm.

 

 

 

 

 

 

plants i am growing and will grow

well hello there!

since i moved to new york city i have been itchy for gardening, particularly because of my garden based background. and because i love nature and i really truly can’t get enough of it. and i really like the idea of food justice. people need to eat (and have access to food that’s not just fast, like veggies) and be empowered to take growing and making food into their own hands. especially in dumb old usa… we have so much space in this country, we could just grow food. ok, some of us do. i actually do not right now.

i’ve been growing small things, basil, chives, lettuce (though i really should have more light to do that)… inside in the brightest spots i have. i’ll post some pictures when these stop looking so sad and wilty. i had hoped to be able to eat some of them soon – but i am just happy they’re alive at this point. they need sun and i do not have that, as i am at the bottom of my building, in the back.

if you check out my movie (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4wWtMXXrvFM) you’ll see my interest in plants is various. food plants, of course. and i am growing more, against glass, for another film. you’ll see! ooooo speaking of – i’m going to go put some sprouts on (aka put seeds in water for a little while then put them in the little janky sprouter i have)… be right back.

ok, so have you heard about kodekama? string gardens?

oh my gods! they are so awesome! plants suspended from strings, it’s totally the right kind of art/plant/stuff for me! i am not quite sure what i will do with this yet, but there is a lot of sculptural potential, and i am going to at least try it out. so i’m headed down to the most likely garden store (come on now new york, i know you’re old school but this is crazy! if i had the funds i’d totally open up a garden store here – there is so much need for that kind of thing, but i am in school and in the negative amounts of money, so i cannot).

anyhow, here is more information about kokedama:

http://www.designsponge.com/2011/04/diy-project-kokedama-string-garden.html

http://www.stringgardens.com/ (the care sheet is great!)

http://www.timeout.com/newyork/style-design/top-ten-gardening-stores

i will update you about what i make when i make something worth updating you about.

take good care!!!

k

the movie

hey there folks!

so, i am just finishing my finals, and so i am halfway done with grad school! ahhh! just 2 papers and 2 presentations left, then i will be a half-master.

here is a link to the video i recently made. it’s based on b-scifi-silent films, in format and somewhat in content. i made the sculptures and paintings in the video, and learned how to do all of it (film, video, lighting, editing, stop motion, etc.). I’d never made a movie before!

there it is!!!!! under this post!!!!

let me know what you think! i want to know!

love! k

ps thank you dirty three for letting me use this gorgeous song.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4wWtMXXrvFM

short spring

hi!!!

so, here i am, after not being very bloggy for a while. sorry about that friends. it’s been pretty nice out here, warm already, sunny, humid and dry (that’s an oxymoron, what i mean is it hasn’t rained much). so i’ve been trying to get out and see this new york thing as much as i can.
mostly though, i’ve been woking on a lot of stuff in school. school school school school school school.

i just got out of a fun and busy spring break, with some wonderful house guests, my parents visiting, and a couple of friends coming through new york (well more than that but 2 that i got to see). and making stuff and writing papers.

ahh, the papers. they’re kind of long. i am looking forward to being done with those. so i can research other things and work on the labor and time intensive art that i like to make. i love school, but it’s a lot of talk, and that is great, but i miss being in the studio all day. class is fun but very distracting from studio or other things.

speaking of that, i’ve been in the studio growing plants and working on how to combine this with my art! very exciting! i wish i had time to go see the art of people who are also doing this, because it is out there right now. i want to kick myself in the face because i mostly just do school work. but i’m doing everything i can do every day, so i will reserve the injuring myself for the art making process. thank you very much.

so, i’m still working on that stop motion animation that has completely taken over my life. i’ve had some completely awesome studio visits lately, from professors, visiting artists and other folks in my program. i am looking forward to taking 10000 more pictures, editing and finishing that thing (should refer to it as ‘the monster’). i’m getting there. slowly. and i need to start working on the soundtrack! anyone want to contribute? it’s a monster movie so i need anticipatory violins.

i’m thinking about noise, but structured music will creep in too. i’ve never used sound in art before. but i’d never made movies just 2 months ago, so here we are. well, actually i made a few as a teenager. hmmm. well, i don’t know if that applies to this project but it will probably apply to the next one. i am really enjoying using technologies i employed as a young person. like sewing. but hell i’d hardly used sewing in art before 9 months ago. so that’s a whole other ball of wax there, right. new new new.

other than that i am still working with plants. i got really excited to do some gardening in the city, and tried to figure out how to do that within my school or nearby, but have been having trouble getting in touch with the right people, or active people, or people who are working in this way already, or people who know what i’m talking about. gardening. like food plants. the days pass, and we get further into garden season… so i’m not sure that will fully happen this year. but hopefully i can just help a few people who are already doing it. also there’s the part about new york’s humidity and heat. so i’m not sure how practical my desire to work hard out in the wet heat is. so i am looking for some part time work indoors actually.

there are lots of people with little urban farms, in abandoned lots, and on rooftops, and there is a huge network of community gardens all over the city. i’m sure i’ll find something. so much already exists so i don’t have to worry as much as i do about soil toxins or revolution. i just want to help. in a broad and also specific way. new york was farmland once, like all of the other cities, and it is interesting to try to find a balance within modern and traditional food growing ideas. here are some awesome links, if you are interested in this too:

http://bronxfarmers.blogspot.com/, http://brooklyn.ny1.com/content/top_stories/158005/urban-farm-effort-helps-sprout-hunger-awareness, http://grist.org/urban-agriculture/peebottle-farms-the-dirt-on-the-dirt/ (i have a lot more links, so let me know if you want them, then i will post more about this thing more).

i wish i had a video to show you, but i will soon. i will get some good stuff to you soon though, give me a few weeks. i’m approaching finals now and getting ready for some excitement, like an open studio that i will post more about soon (i think it’s on may 11th and 12th, friday evening and saturday in the day). and i am looking forward to summer, camping, work, as will many long hours of quiet studio time, all of which i need. hopefully i will get a residency too. fingers crossed, but i haven’t heard back from one yet, and the other i didn’t get. got to keep on keeping on!

hey, you know that photo of rats above, well a bigger and differently arranged version of my rat pack will be in the ccny sculpture show that is opening next thursday. come to the compton goethals gallery to see the pack all next week,  the opening is thursday evening, the 27th!

cool, i’m going to go work on my papers now.

love, katie

ps i will post about the upcoming open studio more soon!

Art in April at Alma Chocolate

For Immediate Release:

Happy Spring! We officially made it through the winter! Celebrate with paintings that focus on growth, rebirth and life. And with chocolate, of course.

This April, please visit Alma Chocolate to see Katie Simpson Spain’s luminous acrylic paintings of plants and sprouts.

Come meet the artist on friday April 1st, from 5 to 7 pm at
Alma Chocolate: 140 NE 28th Avenue, in Portland.

http://www.almachocolate.com/

http://www.KatieSpain.com

December Show at HELD in St. Johns!

Hey!

I’m having a show at HELD in December!

Opening Last Friday the 26th of November! Come over!
I will be giving a talk about the art and process of making it! Dude!

7232 N Burlington Ave, Portland, OR 97203 (St. Johns)

Luminous plant paintings, from the Emergence show.

Posters will be available, as well as some really freaking cool little paintings of sprouts and such. Just in time for solstice!

You can see some of the paintings if you click here!

I hope to see you there!

I’ll add some details when I have more!

xoxo Katie