Mid Summer Night's Draw

Well, hello my poor neglected little blog....

The last couple year's have been a roller coaster of life changes and new challenges. It's taken a long time but I am finally in a position to create some consistency in my life that will enable me to start being a PRACTICING artist again.

Those of you creative sorts out there, makers of all sorts will understand me when I say there's a particular kind of cranky you get when you are kept from working for too long.

More on the life changes later - but for now, I am THRILLED to announce I'll be participating in Hallwalls next drawing rally - the Mid Summer Night's Draw! I hope to see you there!

So many events, so little time....

This year I've been invited to participate in THREE holiday events - I'm really excited about it and have been busy making new work to debut!

Here's a sneak peak..

Your first chance to see it? Come to Rochester for Second Storie! I've been participating in this event for 6 (!!) years and its truly a wonderful time. The vendors are kind, the amazing ladies that organize it incredible. They work really really hard at creating a comfortable, "family reunion" atmosphere and its just a very lovely cozy place to be. 

The specifics:

Where: Visual Studies Workshop 31 Prince St Rochester 14607

When: Saturday November 30th 10-6pm

Are you in Buffalo? That gives you TWO CHANCES to catch up with me. The first chance is the Queen City Market. Last year they began and the reviews were fantastic - I'm very excited to participate this year.

Join me December 7th 11-5pm at Karpeles Manuscript Librayr @ 453 Porter Ave in Buffalo!

Or come by Last Minute Panic! The Western New York Book Arts Center is one of the best arts and educational center in this city. I think this is the 6th year of the event and I am happy to say I've been there for 5. I really love everything about this place, if you've never been there you owe it to yourself to come by!

Join us December 13 4-8pm and the 14th 12-6pm @ 468 Washington Street Buffalo

Naturally, as I've been working really hard and have been pulled in many directions (I have 5 jobs!) I managed to cut open my right index finger just this afternoon. Here's hoping it heals up quick because clearly - I've got work to do!

Craftivism 101

Want to up your creative potential? 
Skill Level: beginner and beyond. 
Course Prerequisite: Superhero like power of using your creativity for good.


Want to make things that will reach people outside the gallery walls? 
Do you want to put your creativity to better use, create things with a purpose, and somehow make the world a better place? 

Then check out my fall workshop: Craftivism 101: Art for a Purpose!

Adults & Teens; 4 Saturdays: 10/19, 11/2, 11/23, 12/7, 1:00-4:00 PM @ Arts Underground; $40

Do you make art projects that just sit around collecting dust?  Do you see problems in America or your local community but feel helpless?  Do you want to put your creativity to better use, create things with for a purpose, and somehow make the world a better place?  If so, then join others like you in this multiple session class with artist and Craftivist, Elizabeth Switzer.  

“Craftivism” (Crafing + Activism) is making with the hands and giving with the heart.  It’s about opening the minds of people in the community to inspire a dialogue for change.  It’s about giving a voice to those who otherwise may not have one.  It’s about using beauty and the imagination to bring awareness to the overlooked people and problems – and the mundane environment – that go unnoticed in everyday life.  So, if you want to contribute to a ripple with the potential to make big change with the causes that matter most to you and your community, join this class! 

http://springvillearts.org/sca/events/fall-workshops/

Artists & Cyclists

Tonight from 6 - 9 come join me down on Allen Street for Artists & Cyclists!

GObike Buffalo is teaming up with First Fridays Allentown and the Buffalo Infringement Festival to once again bring you Artists & Cyclists! 

We’re closing Allen Street to cars between Franklin and Delaware to make way for art, music, dancing, cycling and more.

Come check it out:

open art galleries

music by the 12/8 Path Band

breakdancing workshops and performances with Verve Dance Studios

hula-hooping with Ultra Hoops

Infringement performances at El Museo and Indigo Gallery

a live, participatory chalk mural

a bike decoration station

mobile bike repair

And DIY art vendors:

Heather Bivens: Weathered Heather

Linda Collignon

Debra Eck: DryadArt Studios 

Ani Hoover

Amy Meza Luraschi

Jan Nagle: Lily Pickford

Esther Neisen: Sweet Treats Gifts

Elizabeth Switzer: Crude Crafts

I'll be there selling my up-cycled inner tube bracelets (and MUCH MUCH more) at for $8 a piece - bring me your worn out inner tube and get yours for $5!!

See you there!

Buffalo BookFest

I'm back!

I hope you've checked in with me over at www.heyteacherleavethosekidsalone.blogspot.com to hear about my adventures in student teaching.

There's still lots more content to come over on that site (and this one too!) as you can imagine student teaching by day AND teaching night classes AND running a gallery is A LOT of work and left me pretty drained and not exactly what you might call articulate, so I didn't post as much as I wanted to.

I'm starting to come out of my funk just now, but the high temperatures and higher humidity level has made it hard to be that productive.

But, I've got an event coming up soon and I hope to see you there!

Buffalo Book Fest

Saturday, July 27 / 11-5pm 

at WNYBAC

468 Washington Street 

Buffalo, NY 14203

Now for a little glimpse at what I've been up to... 

I've been taking old pillowcases and converting them into reusable market bags. Much prettier than the kind you buy at the grocery store, don't you think?

Hey Teacher....

I'm sure its becoming very obvious lately that I've got very little time for making new work these days. I started back to school in the Fall of 2011 to be certified in K-12 Art Education and it has consumed just about all of my time.

For the next 5 months, I'll need to all but shut down production as I undertake my next big challenge - student teaching! I'm equally nervous as I am excited, and decided to document the process in a new blog.

I'll be keeping many details to myself in order to preserve privacy for all involved, well other than me. But I hope you'll follow along as I try to walk this crazy path and come out the other side, well, at all...

heyteacherleavethosekidsalone.blogspot.com

Second Storie Indie Market: TOMORROW!

Hello poor neglected blog..

I can't believe how long it has been. Much has happened in the past year. I went back to school (yes again) to work on getting certified  for K-12 art education while still teaching as an adjunct, doing the indie craft circuit, working for my Dad, trying to kick start myself back into curating and a handful of other odd jobs. I'm not good at saying no to things.

Right now though. I'm gearing up for tomorrow's return of:

SECOND STORIE INDIE MARKET

 

art + craft + food trucks

Handmade goods of all kinds for everyone 

on your list PLUS your favorite food truck vendors!

Visual Studies Workshop Auditorium
31 Prince Street
Rochester, NY 14607 

Second Storie has always been one of my absolute favorite holiday markets. The combination of the amazing vendors combined with the cozy atmosphere they provide makes for an event that feels a lot like a family reunion. 

I'll be there with all sorts of new items (and a few old favorites!) hope to see you there!

 

 

 

 

Buffalo Book Fair

I've become a terrible blogger.

In the last year I've only posted about 5 times. Sigh, I suppose this is what happens when you decide to go back to school part-time and still try to work as many jobs as you did before. But fear not friends, Crude Crafts not only still exists but is still a production machine!

This Saturday, July 28th I hope you will stop by The Western New York Book Arts Center  Buffalo BookFest!

What: A FREE day-long festival dedicated to printmaking and the book arts. The festival will feature an artists’ market and a complete schedule of outdoor adult and kid-friendly hands-on demonstrations of the book arts, including steamroller printmaking!

Who: Me, along with some of WNY's best and brightest - I'm excited to be in such remarkable company!

Where: Western New York Book Arts Center - 468 Washington Street in downtown Buffalo,  
When: 10am until 5pm on Saturday, July 28, 2012.

Why:  Because you heart handmade!

This will be WNYBAC’s largest event yet and is free and open to the public.

I'll be there with all sorts of new things, hope you can stop by and say hello!

(re)threads: Opens THIS Friday!

(r e ) t h r e a d s

Lily Booth

Elizabeth Emery

Joetta Maue

Elizabeth Switzer

April 6 - April 30, 2012

Opening Reception: Friday, April 6 from 5:30-7:30.

Curator's Talk @ 5:45

Houghton Gallery at 171 Cedar Arts in Corning, NY.

For the first time in years I am a curator yet again. I've been working on this project for a number of years and am thrilled to finally get to see it realized. The artists represented are some of my personal favorites that I am proud to call my friends. 

From my curatorial statement:

"The first and second wave feminist art movement left many artists with a fear of domestic or “feminine” materials, use of such things rendered ones work “essentialist” and therefore, irrelevant.

Working now in the post-MTV turned DIY generation, Lily Booth, Joetta Maue and Elizabeth Switzer make use of found fabrics and embroidery, while Elizabeth Emery uses found fabrics, which are then cast and bound. These artists enter into dialog with previous generations by making use of similar materials and, in the case of Booth, Switzer and Maue, using materials previously worked by another woman’s hands.

Histories of individual needlework and the more general history of women’s craft are the underlying theme of this exhibition. The materials used for these works were found – something already created for a different purpose and discarded, before being re-purposed.

These activities; sewing, embroidering, crocheting, and knitting, once meant to keep a woman’s hands busy are now used to tell intimate stories, chosen over the overtly political collective messages of previous generations. These entirely inefficient practices show the presence of the artist’s hand- a response to an overly slick, glossy, and mass-produced culture."

The gallery is located at 171 Cedar St., Corning.

For more information, call 607-936-4647.

Hope to see you there!

What Could Have Been

A dear friend of mine recently shot and edited this documentary as part of a class assignment. It is incredibly powerful and beautiful and I hope that she will continue to work on it.

Please take a moment to watch.

Buffalo on the Bowery

I am thrilled to announce my participation in Buffalo on the Bowery, an art auction to support two of my favorite organizations: Hallwalls Contemporary Art Center and PUSH Buffalo, hosted by the Charles Bank Gallery @196 Bowery New York, NY.

The event takes place October 11th, silent auction begins at 6 and the live auction begins at 8. I only wish my schedule allowed me to be there for the event, but I sincerely hope you can!  The event features some of Buffalo's best and brightest, organized by the incredible and unstoppable Julian Montague. I'm excited and flattered to be a part of this event.



From the website:
---

Over the last 150 years Buffalo, New York has experienced its share of highs and lows. But from the rise of and fall of a great industrial economy, to the population loss of recent years, the city has always hosted a vibrant and influential art scene. Buffalo on the Bowery is an auction of artworks by artists with strong associations to Buffalo, proceeds of which will support two essential Buffalo institutions both, in their own way, devoted to preserving the city and encouraging and supporting communities that foster this unique creative energy. Artwork by artists, both emerging and established will be represented.

People United for Sustainable Housing (PUSH) and Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Center are teaming up to bring this exciting auction to New York. Both grassroots organizations strive to improve the local Buffalo community, whether by directly addressing housing conditions on the West Side, or by providing an invaluable cultural asset to Buffalo’s downtown neighborhood. Outside of Buffalo, both organizations are notable on a larger level—they have great worth to the rest of the state of New York and far beyond. PUSH strives to create a replicable model of grassroots neighborhood organizing and redevelopment that can be employed in other low-income neighborhoods throughout the Rust Belt. Hallwalls is a center for contemporary art from all over the world and a sounding board for challenging ideas, expressed in an atmosphere of freedom.

We are pleased to have Buffalo-based artist Julian Montague serving as the curator for the auction. Julian is an active member of the Buffalo arts community, and has been showing regularly in New York City with Black & White Gallery since 2005. With support from Hallwalls—an organization with a strong history of promoting artists at critical phases of their careers—Julian’s selection will feature artworks by significant artists to whom we should all be paying attention. This event occurs at a grave moment for government funding of cultural institutions, which continues to be cut severely—most recently on a county level.

Tender Ardour

Apparently I've been too busy, or too lazy, or well, both -  to post images of my new apartment. So here's one from my friend Molly's blog Tender Ardour. This is a shot of the 'reading nook' in the front of the apartment. I promise to post more images soon..

And while you're over there at Tender Ardour, you really should check out her new cooking blog: My CSA Adventure. She joined a CSA this summer and has been cooking up some amazing results. I can personally vouch for the avocado and lime coleslaw, seen in the picture below. I'm thinking I need to make some myself...

New Photos

I did accomplish one thing this summer. My good friend, Lukia Costello came by and helped me out by taking some gorgeous product shots of my work. I had a bunch of traditional product shots another friend had taken earlier in the year- but I wanted some less formal photographs too. Below are some examples of the photos, some of the previous shots, and my own images are added in as well.

Of course we also had to get a shot of MacKenzie in there too! She wandered around all during the shoot, and eventually was all worn out and went off to nap. Sunday was her birthday- she's 4 years old already! But still a kitten at heart...

I'll be posting some new listings on etsy soon. I'm also working on a collaboration with the lovely JoAnn of Vintage Refashioned. I'll get some info and photos of that up as soon as possible.

In the meantime I'll be running a photo contest soon! Do you own something by crude crafts? Take a photo of it in your home or office - the best photos will win deals in my etsy shop! So get snapping!

Where did my summer go?

Seriously. How can it be August already?

I had such grand plans, as I always do of what I would accomplish this summer. But moving into a new place that was undergoing some pretty major rehab and working on a web design project pretty much consumed most of my time.

So, some little moments from the summer so far.

Last weekend's CSS workshop at VSW in Rochester. 

 I managed to ruin my favorite table cloth with an ink stain, but managed to cover it and keep it useful by hiding the stain with a multitude of little stitches.

 

The first tomato finally makes its appearance!

 

I taught a workshop on yarnbombing as part  of Camp Create at the Burchfield - Penney Art Center. The camp last over the course of a couple of weeks and different artists come in and talk to the kids ages (6-10, roughly) about their practice and shows them how to make something new. We decided to cover an easel and the kids learned to make small woven pieces on a cardboard loom. The rest of the easel was wrapped with yarn. The kids really got into it, especially two of the boys- which made it a lot more fun. And look at their awesome results!

Photos of my new place will come soon, I promise. For now though, I have to get back to work!

New items: Just Listed!

I listed two items in my shop today, one of my screen printed pillows and some of hand bound journals. More will be posted tomorrow so be sure to check back in!

The Piano

My father found this video and passed it on to me the other day, it has only a musical score, but is so heart-breakingly beautiful and does such a great job of communicating a story through images alone. I think I may have to show this one to my design students!

Yarnbombing: Success and Loss

We had such an amazing time Thursday night at The Western New York Book Arts Center! There was a great turn out and folks were really excited to engage in the process. The piece was finished and went up yesterday morning, but by this morning, it was already gone. I can only hope that someone who needed it to keep warm got a hold of it. I guess if you see someone wearing a super colorful patchwork "blanket" you'll know where it came from!

With the help of some new friends I now have many plans for public art fiber projects in the coming weeks. So stay tuned! In the meantime a few pictures of the process and the results.

Yarnbombing: Thursday April 28 @WNYBAC

Hello friends. Sorry I've been missing for a little while. My camera refuses to turn on and while I research a new one (suggestions please!) I've not been able to photograph all the fun stuff I've been working on.

In the meantime, I wanted to share this awesome video of a Paris yarnbomb. Yarnbombing (or Yarn Graffiti) is a non-permanent form of public art. In this video, artist juliana santacruz herrera uses fiber to transform the potholes in her area.



I'll be teaching a crash course in yarn bombing this Thursday, April 28 from 7-10pm at the Western New York Book Arts Center.

You don't need to know to knit or crochet to participate! I'll be giving introductory lessons and we'll be talking about ideas for June 11th INTERNATIONAL Yarn Bombing Day! The cost is only a $5 donation and we will have yarn and needles/hooks on hand (if you have your own please bring them so we can accommodate as many people as possible) so all you need to do is bring some creativity!

Hope to see you there!

Twitter

I gave in and joined twitter. I'm not entirely sure how to best make use of it. But I'm having fun finding all my friends and favorite makers. Follow along with me as I try to navigate yet another social media site! @crudecrafts

Thank You!

The Small Press Fair was just as amazing as ever. I am always so touched and overwhelmed by the outpouring of support from the Buffalo Arts Community. A special thanks belongs to Chris Fritton the fair organizer. I really don't know how he manages to pull it all off, but I sure appreciate it!

 

I'm deep in recovery mode right now but will be posting new items in my shop soon, so stay tuned!!