November 2010 Archives

As wu tang said in the's 90's!

"Life as a Shorty shouldn't be so rough"

But the reality for a lot of the kids that end up in the RITS is exactly that.. rough!! So many different lives, faces, races, gangs, sets and cultures that find themselves all in the same situation; trying to fix mistakes and regain freedom.

In my class (STUDIO PREP) I try to stay open to new ideas, and try to make the class as fun and educational as possible. For those who don't know studio prep is a class that covers everything from entry level recording with pro-tools 8, studio gear set up ,Mc writing and poetry.

For most of our kids this is the first time they are sitting down and writing that first rap, their first R&B hook, brainstorming topics to write about as a group, or sharing real life experiences with each other. These are all powerful things we put into our music. I enjoy watching them work together to reach that final product. And if you thought wow, that's great well it gets better...after the season of classes is over they get to present and perform in front of their peers! Many performances at the RITS are usually first timers that have never even spoke in front of a big group of people,nevermind 3 whole songs in front of a tough crowd! They did great.

I remember performing my first song(in my younger days..lol) and it felt like an eternity getting those bars out. Still, that experience set off a chain of events that made me the man i am today. I pray this experience with them will do exactly that. Whether its on a hobbies tip...or full blown artists doing it big, our goal is to empower youth through ART, and help them discover their true talents.

Art is an outlet for expression and these youth have a lot to express. From their views and opinions on life, to the pain and hard times they have had to overcome.

Im very proud of our work at the RITS and all the instructors from AS220 Youth that teach out there. We have awesome classes and staff. But it is our ability to build relationships with youth that allows us to continue all our great work with them when they are released!!

Signing off... Your's truly Plan B

So this past week youth in beat making where working on making custom beats for Zu-krewe.They previously where working on individual projects, but now they had a chance to work on. Some beats for artists they know..The hardest thing about making a beat for someone is knowing when the beat is completed. Is there there to much going on, in the beat.? Or is there not enough? Does the bass line compliment the chorus's melody? Are there enough drops in the beat? Hi-hat or symbols? Strings or synth? Rhythmic patterns or poly patterns..Red Drum machine or Kong Drum machine? There are some of the choices are youth are diving into.

Thanks to the new Reason 5..it has simplified a lot of things for our first time users. And a lot of our producers here are first timers..but u wouldn't think it listening to their beats!!!

If your interested in coming to beat making call Plan B at 401 467 0701 or hit him on the hip at 401-954 2476

One stop shopping! Stock up on Thanksgiving foods from local farmers, like carrots, greens and cupcakes (okay, maybe cupcakes are not considered Thanksgiving food, but there is always room for new traditions).

Browse the selection of fine wares and goods from AS220 Cottage Industries, Youth Studios and Residents. Find the perfect gifts for everyone this season. Laser cut birdhouses, wine racks, snowflake stickers, tshirts, photographs, cards, planners and prints. As always, the funds raised support programming at AS220 or Resident Artists, extra feel good points for gift giving and dollars for your arts organization.

Stop by AS220 Foo(d) next door to taste some of the market ingredients made into soups, sandwiches and delicious entrees for vegetable and meat-lovers alike. Warm up with hot apple cider or locally roasted coffee. Enjoy vegan treats while you're there!

Chances are, if you are not attached to your phone, or some other electronic life organizing device, your good old reliable paper based planner is about to near the end of its days.

The batteries will never run out, software updates won't plague you endlessly, we have a Timeless solution to keeping yourself and you life in order. Yes folks, now is the time we find ourselves full of holiday parties and plates of cookies in our pre-resolution phase. Act now to be prepared to write down all your January to-do lists.

We call these TIMELESS, because you write in the dates and circle the months, heck if you can't wait until January you can start tomorrow. Wire bound with a matte cover, and super glossy numbers printed on the cover, each planner has 13 month a glances and four weeks follow each month. Be sure to specify Red, Brown or Blue cover when ordering online.

For only $15.00 you can get yourself a Timeless Planner, for $25 you can get yourself and a friend Timeless Planners.

Purchase through our Online Shop! All sales support the AS220 Community Printshop.

$25.00

Arley-Rose Torsone

it's going to be o.k.

2010

12" x 12" letterpress

Unlimited edition

We are pleased to offer our first letterpress print in from the Editions Project from artist, type designer and musician, Arley-Rose Torsone. Her past typographic endeavors have included, Grandma's Crooked Finger, Large Tin Letterforms, Pretzel Font and the infamous Poop Font. See more work at arleyrosetorsone.com

Making a bold statement in black hand drawn type on lush white 100% cotton paper, Torsone declares something we're sure you have heard before and may need to hear again.

Priced at only $25.00, think of all your loved ones, friends, and the holidays!

The AS220 Community Printshop is proud to announce the newest print from the Editions Project. Both local and traveling visual artists are invited to collaborate with our printmakers on the Editions Project. These artists benefit from broadening the scope and accessibility of their work, and in turn our technically proficient printers gain new vehicles for their craft. This type of working relationship has a long history in printmaking, but often the roles of artist and printer are obscured. The Community Printshop is reviving the process with AS220.

Purchase through the AS220 Online Shop!

Events For Thursday, November 18th - Friday, November 26th

Thursday, November 18, 2010 / 9pm / $7
Infinite Children, Spindrift, and Volcano Kings

Friday, November 19, 2010 / 5:30-8:30pm / Free
Artist Talk by Bert Crenca
At the Main Gallery & Performance Space, 115 Empire St

Friday, November 19, 2010 / 9:30pm / $6
Tonic Thief, Zulu Lulu, and Chowdah

Saturday, November 20, 2010 / 11am-2pm / Free
Farmers Market

Saturday, November 20, 2010 / 4-7pm / Free
Irish Traditional Music

Saturday, November 20, 2010 / 9pm / $6
imadethismistake (LP release), Weak Teeth, Math The Band, and Barnswallow

Sunday, November 21, 2010 / 9pm / $4
Free Speech Sunday at AS220 featuring: Singer/Songwriter & Poet Open Mic

Monday, November 22, 2010 / Closed

Tuesday, November 23, 2010 / 6-8:30pm / $6
Life Drawing

Tuesday, November 23, 2010 / 9:30pm / $6
Sunset Overbrooke, AB, and Gary Petersen

Wednesday, November 24, 2010 / 5:30pm / Free
Tour of AS220 with Founder and Artistic Director Bert Crenca
Meet at the AS220 Bar, 115 Empire St

Wednesday, November 24, 2010 / 9pm / $6
Big Sky Sun Machine, All About Buttons, Rose Liter, and Ryan Casperson

Thursday, November 25, 2010 / CLOSED

Friday, November 26, 2010 / 9pm / $6
Dying Is The Only Way To Fame, Pregnant & Scared, Fake Apple, and Green Oedipus

Heres a bunch of Foo Fest 2001 snapshots by Frank Mullin rescued from the archives, scanned, trimmed and uploaded for all to enjoy. Feel free to leave comments on the Flikr if you recognize people or want to share some memories of this party -now nearly a decade past!

'Tis the season to be crafty and this December the labs is offering two fresh new courses that are fun, exciting, and a great opportunity to craft a gift for a loved one. These classes are also special because they will be the first classes held in the mercantile building. That's right! We have a brand new space, and we are very excited to get things going there.

Introduction to Laser Cut Press Fit Design

In this class, students will learn about the basics of press fit design using the Lab's Epilog Mini Laser Cutter. Students will fabricate and build a wine rack, decorative box, or birdhouse! Additionally, the students will have the opportunity to customize either project is unique etched graphics. This class will introduce the student to the concepts of press fit design and assembly. Students can chose to make either project and all materials will be provided. The class is comprised of one 3 hour session and you will take your project home at the end.

Check out Elliot Clapp's Birdhouse Design over to the right (you can make this!!!)

Sign up here.

Vinyl Cut Sign and Sticker Making

Learn the basics of using the vinyl cutter to make stickers and signs. Class includes the software tools and mounting techniques used to produce professional looking stickers and signs. This is a hands-on workshop and will certify Labs members to use the cutter on their own.

Sign up here.

And of course, and old favorite and staple to the labs is being offered this December. Get certified and trained to use AS220's house laser cutter! Hint: It might be a good class to take after taking the laser cut press cut class.

Intro to the Laser Cutter - Sign up here.

For more information on classes in the labs, contact james@as220.org

Have you stopped by the AS220 Galleries lately? Any of them? Because if you have, you've no doubt seen the sprawling show You Can't Call Your Own Baby Ugly by none other than AS220 founder and spiritual guide, Umberto Crenca. I could tell you about the explosion of enormous semiabstract ink and paint works, the hundreds and hundreds of Bacon-meets-Dali mind warp doodles, the walls of painted wood and metal pipe projections, or the jet-black whittled pear tree sculptures and not even come close to elaborating the entirety of this show. It's all from a man whose expansive endeavors in running AS220 often overshadow his prolific and wide-ranging artistic output. I sat down with Bert the day before his big opening to ask him some questions about what the show means to him and how he thinks about his work. Along the way we discuss the merger of art and life and that silly little construct called time.

Catch the words from his own mouth at his Artist Talk this Friday, November 19 at the Main Gallery on Empire St. from 5:30 to 8pm.

So this show is on occasion of the 25th anniversary.

It's a combination of celebrating my sixtieth birthday and twenty-five years of AS220.

So in that way, what does the show mean for you?

Well first of all, I feel privileged to have all the galleries of AS220. I know I'm the founder of the organization and have been showing up for twenty-five years, but I still feel privileged. I think it's a great opportunity to be able to exhibit here, and to have all the galleries is over the top.

I think also what people will see here is a tremendous amount of work. I mean, hundreds and hundreds of pieces of work. Sometimes people have difficulty distinguishing me as an artist from my work at AS220, so part of my intent with this show is to help people fully realize that I am a very committed and very prolific artist and set that identity, fix that identity in people's minds. So that was a huge part of this. I had done a show a few years ago with an artist from Spain named Detritus, and we called that show Just an Artist, Not an Artist, and that was my first move in that direction to start getting the larger community to fully accept me as a full-blown artist. I never have any resentment about that, but it's just the reality that given the popularity and the renown of AS220, people have the tendency to predominantly identify me with that work. I hope that this does that, that people will come to a different realization.

I have also self-published a book with the help of a couple great artist and designers, a book of some of my doodles. Again, the whole theme of the show, You Can't Call Your Own Baby Ugly, the name of the book You Can't Call Your Own Baby Ugly, and given the nature of my work over the last five years, which is primarily generated from my imagination, it's very raw in a way, in terms of what it expresses psychologically and emotionally. And I think so many of us on this planet have a tendency to beat ourselves up internally about who we are and how we see ourselves and our place in the world - are we good enough? Are we too fat, too skinny, too tall, too thin, not smart enough, not handsome enough, not whatever? And I think for me, I like to externalize that stuff in my artwork, so often people respond to the work as being kind of aggressive psychologically and emotionally.

It's visceral.

Visceral is a good word, and in fact it is. And I don't have an issue with that. I'm comfortable with that. And in some ways I think my whole life has been dedicated to getting people to liberate themselves from a lot of the crap and self-imposed baggage, both as artists and in the general community as people. That's reflected in my work as well: that idea of, liberate yourself! It's okay to have ambiguous feelings about your sexuality, to have ambiguous feelings about politics, it's okay to not always feel pretty inside. It's okay! It's totally okay. So I think a lot of what's project in the psychological and emotional content of my work is about that.

Talking about showing your artistic identity to the patrons of AS220, do you ever experience that break between the business-Bert and the artistic-Bert that other people see? Or is it more that your endeavors in one inform your endeavors in the other?

Absolutely. It's a blur to me. There's no separation to me in the art that I produce as a product - and I don't mean product from a commercial point of view, but something that I create, an object - I make no distinction between that and all the rest of my activities in my life in terms of me being an artist. I feel that all of the same skills that I apply in making artwork I apply in my dealings with people, whether they be bank vice presidents or they be kids in jail, you know? It's all the same skills and it requires a certain sensitivity, a certain compassion, a certain intelligence and a certain openness, and that is what I feel when I approach a blank piece of paper.

I started AS220 at 35. I had had a whole number of different lives. I had had a zillion different jobs, so what I chose to do with AS220 was a choice. It wasn't something I just fell into on some certain track that I did not have complete control over. I had complete control for the first time in my life to live in an unheated space, and create something that was open to anybody and everybody on the planet. And so for me, the distinction between being an artist and what I do at AS220, and what I do when I'm interacting, or working deals, or any of that stuff, that was the whole point of my dematerialization in 1985 and my creation, my work to create AS220 was the idea that it was one life, not a 9-5 life and then an after 5 life and then a weekend life, which is the way I was living. And not all the people that I was involved with prior to AS220 really fully understood where I was mentally and emotionally. So although they may have been comfortable in the lifestyles they were living, I was not. And I fully wanted to dedicate myself to being an artist. Through both working at AS220 and what I do in the studio I feel I have accomplished that.

Can you introduce us to your exhibition group? Who is Umby Baby or Bert Cranky?

Umby Baby was a term that a nun that I had as a teacher in the sixth grade called me. In the sixth grade, my mother was in a mental institution. It was one of the most traumatic moments and most defining moments of my entire life. And I think it was that time that she was put in the hospital that she was literally carried out of the house in a straight jacket. So it was the most dramatic and most defining moments in my life as a person, as a human being. And I call upon that time almost on a daily basis, that moment in life. I can't talk about it enough, I can't deal with it enough, I will never get over it. At the same time, I have no regrets about it. Also, by the way, my mother conquered mental illness, and spent the last ten, twelve years of her life completely happy and completely in control of her mind. That was an amazing thing to watch her battle that and win that fight.

So that sixth grade nun is the person who got me drawing, who got me into music. She also wacked me around. But she also hugged me and let me cry for hours and hours in private. The notion of being an artist was put in my head by that woman. Her nickname for me was Umby baby.

So these different characters are specific incarnations of you throughout different points in your life?

No, they're all the people that make me up. So Umby Baby is one, a very defining one. Ump was what my mother called me. My wife calls me Umberitcus Maximus. Many people call me Bert. My formal and proper name, and the one that I cherish and feel that I have to live up to every day of my life, is Umberto Crenca. I was named after my grandfather, who, even though he died when I was about 5 or 6 years old, left an amazing impression on me. He was just a man of such character, as was my father. All of those names have heavy meaning for me. And I am cranky, I have been called Bert Cranky many times by numerous people, and it got reinvented and reinvented many times and I'm certain that I'm responsible for that in my behavior and lack of patience some times.

I have really incredible models in my life, and some of them are in the work. I've done portraits of people in this show that have set a standard for me that I will never fully achieve. There's a portrait of my wrestling coach that was insane in terms of his expectations for me, and he really molded me. There are a whole bunch of people that I have yet to document, but they will come. You know, in my work there are all these different series of work, and I keep adding to these different series. So that's why the work is not for sale. You can buy the entire body of work for a two million dollar donation to AS220 to create an endowment for its youth work, and I'm very, very serious about that. That's a very challenging thing to endow that work and I would love to be able to do that. And if I had a big empty studio, if all his work disappeared, then I would be so intensely compelled to fill that studio up with work. These are my friends. These are the people I live with. These are the people who are most honest. These are the people I'm most comfortable with. These works of art. I don't like parting with them. The idea of selling work to me is a weird thing. It's weird. Like...selling these....It's weird, you know? But I could use money, you know, money's okay. It's the way we do business.

It seems like that close relationship to the works is really tied to your process - functioning without references, just pure expression. I was wondering: Allen Ginsberg has said that it sometimes takes him ten years before he can go back and see a piece that he's done and really see what it means to him. How long is that period of gestation for you, before you can go back and start to try and see what you've put into a work.

Well first of all, you referencing Allen Ginsberg is very touching to me because he's a tremendous inspiration and I think he's an absolute genius and one of the most gentle, creative minds we've had in our history.

I think time is a very arbitrary construct. So I don't think gestation is something that happens post-. I think it's something that's been happening before you were born and throughout your existence. To try to identify influences in a linear way or to reflect on things in a linear way is a complete injustice. It's a convention; it's something we have to do to be able to talk to each other and try to rationalize all this craziness. But I think it's completely inadequate. I don't think there's any before and after. I don't think there's any mystical world or physical world. I think it's all the same. All things happen all the time. The future, past, and present are all part of everything.

So when you talk about reflecting or gestating or when you begin to understand what things are...well beginning to understand something I think is a different issue. I think that has a lot to do with maturity and life's experiences and how we as a species evolve. So sometimes things that are revealed through our subconscious in things that we make we may not be able to articulate or understand until we reach another level of experience or maturity.

So if that's what you're talking about, the number ten seems pretty arbitrary, but there's a lot more things that we sense in this world that we can't begin to articulate or understand. There's a lot more that we have lived. There's a lot more that this idea of the past has influenced us. The future is influencing us in the present. What we smell, taste, feel, hear...there's a billion more messages. Think about people that are autistic and have trouble screening the input. In some ways they are more in tune with reality (that's a weird thing to say, too), but in some ways they're more in tune with the complexity of reality and it makes it impossible for them to function in some cases. So it takes time to be able to distill from all of these experiences and all of this information.

The past is still influencing the present; the present is influencing the future and informing the past. These things are just one big blurry, mushy thing to me that I love. And it's a tremendous realization for me that this idea of time and past and present and future is something that I don't need to concern myself with. They're all very inadequate ways that we try to describe things and communicate with each other about ideas. It's all very inadequate. It's a construct! I have a quote in the book that says that in the process of creating, time is not suspended, the construct is demolished. When you're fully engaged in creating, which to me is one of the purest acts a human being can accomplish, that when we're deeply immersed in that without the distractions of the job or the responsibilities, and you're really completely focused on the creative process, I think the construct of time is just demolished. It doesn't exist not even as an idea. Picasso used to say people used to criticize him, "how can you smoke, it's so unhealthy for you" and he says "I smoke when I create and when I'm creating I'm immune to these things." You know?

Really, you should go check out the show. You Can't Call Your Own Baby Ugly runs through November 27. Also, don't miss Bert's Artist Talk in the Main Gallery at 115 Empire St. on November 19, 5:30-8pm!

The Delgado has been just bursting with talented lyricist and musicians these past few weeks..

Artist like Inphamist, Justin L, Yerri, Lady Luv and many more have been laying down nothing but fuego ( hot fire) .

Also, the oh so gifted and helpful Mike Moore taught a four day Pro Tools Prep Intensive here in the Delgado. The only student who took advantage of this great opportunity was Mr. Cedric Russell. For 4 days straight, Mike and Ceddy explored the wonders of Pro Tools and recorded youth artist. Because Ceddy has shown crazy dedication to AS220 and more importantly his own music, he is going to be coming on board the Delgado Studio engineering team later this month. If ya'll don't know ,Ceddy's amazing at everything he does and is going to be dropping his own mixtape very soon. About 80% of the beats featured on the project Ceddy produced himself here at the studio! GET EM CEDDY!

Stay tuned next week for an update on James's Audio Engineering workshop which is happening tonight from 7PM-10PM and again next Wednesday in the Delgado Studio.

For more info email James

Peace and love

<---Anjel