Janet Cooling: Still Life Meditations

Janet Cooling describes these mixed-media works on paper as grounding meditations that represent infinity. It was fun to document both these recent paintings and the dialogue with her about them.

I have footage of Janet and various phases of her painting from 1997 onward. I hope to digitize it and edit it into several YouTube videos, now that I finally have a new iMac. Today I got an updated firewire cable, thinking I would then be able to import it. (The old cable didn't fit the new computer.) For some reason only a few minutes of it imported... Yikes. I'll solve this yet.

When I first started documenting Janet's work, there was only linear video editing, no funding, and I had never heard of YouTube, if it even existed. Now we have easy digital editing, no need for funding, and YouTube! All I need is to get it to work. And get to work...

Who Does She Think She Is?

This is a great trailer for a documentary film about women balancing their lives as artists and mothers! I can't wait to see the full film, which is in my netflix queue. I already know, these are the voices of my sisters. My friends and I have been living this for decades. We are not alone! www.whodoesshethinksheis.net.

Old Fashioned Fireworks!

This small town family fireworks celebration is never to be forgotten! Now part of our family's personal mythology, it is also a window into a simpler time in America's history.

My first effort at editing my video footage and putting it on YouTube, in retrospect it is also from a simpler time, just like the fireworks themselves...

p.i.c.a.s.s.o. : Guernica in a new way...

The pictures in this video are originally by Picasso and they all lead to his main painting - Guernica. Sound was written especially for this movie. This is Guernica like we have never seen before. I have spent much time with the original Guernica, as well as with sketches and studies for it I that I saw recently in Spain. There is something however about the combination of animation and music in this brief video that conveys drama and emotion in a completely unique and impactful way.

It was sent to me on Facebook from iArt Galeria de Arte, in a format that did not indicate it was a YouTube video. It was so remarkable that I posted it on my Facebook profile page. My Facebook friend Karen Keimig Warner saw it there and posted it on the Arts Media Lab blog of Palomar College, http://artsmedialab.blogspot.com. When I saw it on the AML blog I realized she had somehow located it's YouTube provenance, which then allowed me to post it here.

I am trying to grasp the webness of the internet. I may never understand it. All I know is that videos like this one are important to keep circulating!