William's summer

Expressionist tree "planting"

First thing this morning I removed the last elements from the gallery. Free of this responsibility, there was only one thing left to do - get to work on another film. Today I built one of my characters (a trickster at the crossroads) and the forest set. I'll be shooting soon in the newly updated (many new sets are being installed) YAAG high fidelity MOS Sound Stage. 

Exhibition closes

After a run of over seven weeks, my exhibition at the Art Gallery of Regina closed today. Somehow it came to the end of its run without any major technical mishaps and without any of the work being damaged or stolen. Who'd have thought? Again, a huge thank you to the curators Elizabeth Matheson and Christine Ramsay for considering my work worthy of such a show, and to Ken Wilson and Brent Pylot for the amazing catalog that came out of it, and to Jess for turning the darn thing on every day, and to the gallery and the other installers and destallers and Holly and everyone who helped with the gallery.  Also I won't forget everyone who helped me get work created over the past few months including Margaret and William and Erik Sirke, Brian Gladwell, Frans,Lotz Sunny Adams, Geremy Lague, Any Electronics, and the list goes on and on. We started taking it all down at the stroke of five and it was basically gone two and a half hours later. Now the task of putting it all away.....

Jellied Salad with Joanne McDonald

On Thursday night we went to the Chicken and Wine talks, hosted this month at the MacKenzie Art Gallery adjoining the Candahar barroom art exhibit. There was beer but no wine. The setting seems perfect except that the sound in such a large space is challenging and I found myself missing things that were said. All three talks were very interesting. I went primarily to see my old friend Joanne McDonald:talking about Jellied Salads, something we've talked about informally many times. The other talks were Amber Goodwyn on "Eight Things I Learned While Publishing A Smut Zine" and Cloudesley Rook-Hobbs on "Tort Tarot Law" which was far more insetting than it sounds. I talked with him afterwards about the nature grifting and its commonality with fortune telling and lawyers.

Tickets for Caligari LIVE

We purchased our tickets for the performance of Jason Cullimore's score for "The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari" at the Conexus on October 16. Spread the word! This is the central event of this fall's Caligari Project festival and will be the coolest film event of season. Here is where you can order yours: http://www.conexusartscentre.ca/index.php?id=75&EventID=1072 

Zaheer defends

Zaheer with his supervisor Sheila Petty at the University of Regina

Congratulations to Zaheer Shahid on the successful defense of his MFA thesis and paper. Maureen Bradley came on board as the external examiner via on-line conferencing. Thanks Maureen, it was great to see you again. 

Singing a German song

Nearly finished a new project about the baker; just a bit of lilting singing and it's ready for the world!

I need a funny quip

From on the set of Chrystene and Berny's film, a still in need of a quip. Help. 

William's birthdays, 2001-2016

William wondered what he did on each of his prior birthdays. We could remember many of them, but not all and not necessarily in order. Here they are:  

2001

2002 at home

2003 at 13th ave play centre

2004 Omi backyard

2005 Grandma backyard

2006 at home with lots of lego

2007 candy cane park

2008 bug hunt in park

2009 Science Centre after BC trip

2010 backyard

2011 multi events

2012

2013

2014

2015

2016 Teagan visits AGR

Another day on set

I started my recording of voices for my new Frankenstitch film this afternoon and collected a few of the props I need for it this morning. This evening Margaret and William came to Chrystene and Berny's set and saw the cool backdrops and lighting.

On set with Chrystene Ells and Berny Hi

This weekend I'm playing a small silent role in the German Expressionist style film being shot on the soundstage (!) by Berny Hi and Chrystene Ells. Lots of fun (but with so much emphasis on the look, there is naturally lots of waiting around as well).

Cats to the vet

Our cat Sylvie had something wrong with her ear. As neither cat had had their shots this year, we booked an appointment for both of them this morning. Naturally we were late because Nick has an intuition about being taken away we took 20 minutes to catch him and put him in his carrier. Once in, he caused no fuss and was fairly easy for the vet to handle. On the other hand, Sylvie was a nightmare to travel with and treat, even though she is very easy to work with at home. She had to be wrapped in a towel to be treated because she fought so much. Nick, unlike when he is at home, was completely compliant. Anyway, end of the story is she has some drops for an ear infection and we have the usual stuff for worms and so on.

Image density

I got film back that I shot two weeks ago with Kiki and William. I had only one shot at this and there were multiple uncontrollable conditions including the way the lens was attached to the camera. I have what might be a very interesting image, although it also might be terrible. I needed to know that I at least HAD an image before I throw more money into a transfer. It is a bit thin but worth a shot. 

Watching German Expressionism

Over the past year, whenever possible, William and I have been watching classics in German Expressionism. Many of these have been during the monthly screenings curated by Christina Stojanova at the RPL as part of the lead up to the Caligari Project. Others have been on our own. Here is what we've seen:

Hands of Orlac	Robert Wiene
Metropolis	Fritz Lang
Three Penny Opera	G.W. Pabst
M	Fritz Lang
Cabinet of Dr Caligari	Robert Wiene
Nosferatu	FW Murnau
Warning Shadows	Arthur Robison
Pandora's Box	G.W. Pabst
Faust	FW Murnau
Waxworks	Paul Leni
Westfront 1918	G.W. Pabst
Blue Angel	Josef von Sternberg
Dr. Mabuse, the Gambler	Fritz Lang
The Testament of Dr.. Mabuse	Fritz Lang
Kameradschaft	G.W. Pabst
Diary of a Lost Girl	G.W. Pabst
Sunrise	FW Murnau
The Last Laugh	FW Murnau

Pickles

Margaret made pickles today. She's been doing really well with these for the past couple of years. There was a bad patch when she had some fail, perhaps because of water quality or pickle size or age, and this put her off making them for a period. However, the past couple years have been excellent. This year is a bit of a shift in that Gertrud brought her a couple of batches of small cucumbers from the farm, rather than her relying on store or farmers market product. The weather on the farm has been a bit rainy and has slowed the maturing of the cucumbers, resulting in a larger window for picking them at the opportune point. The smell of the vinegar drives me a bit crazy, but I love the idea of these being home made. 

Sara Ski at Regina Beach

While William slept (he's such a teenager now), I took Margaret to work, picked up peaches from my mom's church, delivered some and picket up cucumbers from Gertrud, went to the university library and signed out "Last Laugh", and came home and got back to work on my Frankenstich script. When William arose, we picked up Margaret and raced out to Regina Beach where Sara Ski was doing a clown/puppet/accordion performance as part of their Arts Frenzy. Great fun and well worth the trip. I'm looking forward to seeing Sara and Mooky performing around Regina and suggest taking in every performance you can. We lunched at the Mexican restaurant and returned. I felt my own age (perhaps returning to my own teenager ways) as I collapsed on the couch for a two hour nap. Wish I could do that every day. 

new fish

When I finally got William out of bed this afternoon, we ran the same errands as yesterday but with more success. We picked up his record player. Apparently the speed control is a strange magnet disc with a second disc that rotates against it that likely contains a series of magnets. We also bought a new fish, a mottled goldfish William named "Gilligan". Only once we put it in the tank did I realize that it blends perfectly into the bottom rocks we have. Perhaps I should swap out the rocks. 

meteor shower

At midnight last night we drove about 10 km off the end of Dewdney and parked on a rather muddy (but not nearly desolate as you'd imagine) road to watch the meteor showers. Clouds came and went but we ended up seeing quite a few. I tried taking photos but didn't get lucky enough. However, even though there was no light source for over a kilometer, the ambient light from the city  (to the left of the frame) and a farm (almost invisible the eye but straight in the distance) allowed me to take some pretty interesting 20 second exposures (with iso cranked to max) of more terrestrial objects. This is boosted about one additional stop in photoshop, but none of the colours are adjusted.

Goldfish afterlife

Our goldfish "Mist" was still hanging on this morning, breathing occasionally. When I fed them, she was even trying to eat the bits that floated down towards her, but she was basically immobile. By noon she was dead. William and I gave her a "burial at sea", more or less (the creek must eventually connect to the ocean, doesn't it?)

On a much better note, my sister had surgery today and is said to be recovering well. 

Dying fish?

I believe our fish "Mist" is dying. We bought it, along with a brown one I named "Hit" in June 2013.
Just the other day I was joking that the fish didn't die often enough and that I missed the fun of shopping for new ones. While that is true, I forgot about the painful two days that it takes them to die sometimes. Occasionally the rebound from a bad day, so I refuse to take them from the tank until they are completely dead. Mist is still breathing and moving a fin and mouth. Once in a while it even swims a bit, but things look bad. 

Expressionism PR

The library's support of the Caligari Festival has been wonderful so far. The monthly screenings have been well publicized with covers or full pages in the film guide and screens in the library itself. I grabbed this image to document the type of promotion they have been doing:

Canister toy development

William and I popped past Geremy's office for a visit. He showed us the two newest prints of the Canister toy. One is pretty close to the one in the gallery display. The next has hands but the head came apart. His research shows that he needs to increase the resolution but may have to go to a different printing place because the turnaround at the university is so slow that it is difficult to feel there is any momentum to the practice. I'm pumped to see the next version.

Laundryroom of Dr. Caligari

In a collaboration with Chrystene, Berny and I, we have cobbled together the promotional image for the Caligari ticket sales for the concert with Victor Sawa. This is an image of Victor that I took, combined with an image of Berny that Eagleclaw took, and some photoshopping that Chrystene finessed to combine them both with a frame from the original film.

We spent much of the day putting the new washing machine into place and rearranging the laundry room. One week without clean clothes seems to be our limit.
Saw Kevin for first time in a month. The summer has been so busy that we don't have time for our regular social lives. With no more out of town guests for the rest of the month, it might be a bit more normal. 

Hunter Gatherer Diner and Victor Sawa

For Carl's last morning in Regina we went to the ultimate hipster cafe, the brand new Hunter Gatherer. It was really amazing inside; beyond what I could have imagined from Margaret's descriptions. The food was also excellent.
Later in the afternoon, after Carl's flight had left, I worked with Chrystene to shoot some promotional images of Victor Sawa for the Caligari Project. 

New washing machine and big car repair

It's like I just opened the floodgate of my wallet and let it gush. In the middle of shopping for a new washing machine (our current one is 20 years old and sounds like the bearing are seizing, which would mean an expensive repair), we got the call from the shop with the news that our car is finally repaired. On the way home I stopped at the butcher and picked up a hundred bucks worth of steaks; it seemed like chicken feed compared to the rest of my afternoon of spending. Fortunately George and Simon moved it for me into the basement, almost ready to go. The evening was full of socializing and some game playing with Carl and Evie.

Brent Braaten is married!!

Congratulations to Brent and Kelly. We had only a short time for a drink and to catch up at La Bodega late this afternoon. A bunch of the old gang were there; wish we could have stayed but I had to rush off to introduce Metropolis at the RPL for the Caligari project.