you win.

i got all the pieces remaining from my first run of awards for nothing back from printshop forever. if you are still reading this after the months of stillness, i think you deserve one. or rather, i will give one of you one of them.

i have had a fairly rugged and blue half year, so i will selfishly ask for comments that may make me feel happier. i don't want to fish for compliments; i want to shoot them in a barrel.

here's to the endless summer that will be 2012, change, growth, rebuilding and all manner of awards for nothing.

i will pick a winner from your comments on valentine's day.

it's alive!

photo by cortney heimerl

after all the hard work (and no small amount of picky photography by cortney), edition #001 of the awards for nothing project is now up and for sale in the printshop forever shop. i owe cortney a big debt of gratitude for figuring out how to release this huge edition. also, for being so articulate and complimentary in her release post about the project. thank you also to faythe and aaron for hosting our real-world awards launch, for documenting and for posting about it. also, big thanks to lish for posting on the craft: blog.

now, go and browse it up, buds!

at last.

100 awards, all done, packed in a box and ready to jet off to milwaukee for full packaging in the morning. of course, i had to test out the packaging right away. that accounts for the two on top. it all works!

below are the last additions to the run. it is too bad that i only came up with the notion of ligatures at the end of the process. next time there will be more!

awards for nothing, edition #001 will be available in person tomorrow night at sky high gallery in milwaukee. as of september 15, the rest will be released for purchase via printshop forever.

home stretch.

last night i stayed up into the wee hours working on a few very picky awards made from vintage fabric. i can't even think about what my hourly is going to end up being on this project. it's probably right of the decimal, though. regardless of that, the experiments and risks turned out some pretty lovely results (says me). also used for this batch: tapestry yarn, ledger paper, labelling tape, price tags, baggage tickets, elastic, dental floss, aitor's misprints, coupons and dental floss.

and, in very exciting news i manged to chase a ups truck down the block and collect my backing card delivery sent from nicholas in toronto. they look great! i foresee a long night and morning of fevered packaging and taping and stamping and sorting. i can't wait to see them all done and carded. but before that, this delivery means it is time to battle the chi-town traffic and get to milwaukee. see you there!

awards in person.

hey internet, you want to see the first edition of awards for nothing in person? if you are in milwaukee this friday night, then you are in luck! i will be setting up shop for the evening in conjunction with sky high gallery, printshop forever and the misanthrope specialty co.

my little pop-up shop will be piggy-backing on the opening of catherine ryan's new show, these things they do, at sky high. i am really looking forward to seeing her work in person. plus, with all of these projects and artists in one place, it's sure to be a raucous fun night.

friday, september 9
6pm-10pm
sky high gallery
2501 south howell ave.
milwaukee, wi

here's the link round-up for more details:
facebook event
sky high gallery posting
printshop forever posting

and those awards up there (pardon the glare) include materials like rick rack, cicada wings, my hair, wrapping paper, yarn, handmade paper, thread, seam binding, bio-rythm charts, topographical maps, price tags, moss & ttc tranfers.

box of nothing.

shannah gave me this perfect box to keep my growing pile of awards from getting crumpled or crunched on the road. i think it makes them look like a box of sugar candies. yes, it is time to leave this southern illinois oasis, pack the travelling studio (ie. junk pile) back into the car and shove off for our next destination. see you all in indianapolis!

sweet nothings.

i am now five days away from delivering my first edition of awards for nothing to cortney in milwaukee and more than halfway to my total of 100. the latest additions include materials like security envelopes, sheet music, handmade paper, doilies, nozzle checks, tissue paper, chopstick wrappers, seam binding, bias tape, thread, leather, rick rack and more!

while staying outside of st. louis, award making has benefited greatly from space to work in bruce and shannah's living room and material acquistions from shannah, bruce, the upcycle exchange and cranky yellow. autumn at upcycle was particularuly helpful is getting me the ribbons and sewing notions i have been short on. if you are in st. louis, you should totally check out the exchange. you should totally not check out cranky yellow because it is currently closed.

the experience of trying to do such a picky, scrappy project on the road has been a challenge to say the least. as much as i love the road, i am yearning for home and my studio.

nothing in particular.

here is another sneak peek at some awards for nothing. i made a huge materials score last night thanks to one of my hosts here in illinois, bruce. bruce makes art out of collections and experience a cling all too familiar to me. but he is currently having some sort of great change of impulse and has been clearing out collections. this task being easier when the materials will be used and loved, he loaded me up with scraps, envelopes, waxed wrappers, handmade papers and more.

i have a tonne to work with now. the last batch was so colourful, too!

and nicholas says my packaging is almost ready, too. now to make sure it collides with me as i move. nomadic life in the modern era takes a fair bit of planning (and luck). feel free to wish me both.

ps - i have recommended dave's book to bruce.

breakage.

one of the most heartbreaking elements of the awards for nothing project is breakage. the experimental nature of the project lends itself to disaster and yet every piece consumes completely one-of-a-kind materials. with so much unknown jamming into my machines, i feel like a potter waiting for the kiln to fire. it's never entirely clear what will emerge. i'm always nervous the result will come out busted.

i like to think these broken pieces pierced their own mylar coatings to maintain their ephemeral natures.

i might leave them in public places.

it's also worth noting that those broken awards are lodged on a stack of new security envelopes given to me by the great bruce burton (no web presence at this time). sorting and slicing through them last night really made me want to revive the project.

further nothing.

a little update from tulsa, oklahoma, where we are holed up in a large, strange hotel making things and stocking up for upcoming fairs. i am making lots of progress on the first batch of awards for nothing and wanted to share a few samples with y'all.

from this early batch, materials include wrapping paper, safety certification stickers, clothing labels, thread, gold seal, sheet music, shelf lining, tissue paper, motel coupon books, fringe, rick rack, butcher's twine, seam binding, eye lashes. it is interesting to feel how this project is making me see the things around me differently. the process is certainly teaching me a lot about the cognitive shifts that are possible when perceiving things. it's very illuminating but mostly in a way that i can not articulate yet.

speaking of hotel factories, the pile of scraps and bits below is what i woke up to this morning on my bedside table. the sordid aftermath of an all night craft binge.

nothing lasts forever (or awards for nothing meets printshop forever).

as those who follow this blog will know, i have more than a passing interest in stuff. why do objects hold such value in our lives? and why do certain objects hold more value than others? why does that value shift from person to person? where is the line between collecting and hoarding? these questions have lead me all over the place and are borne of my earliest days and experiences.

for over a year now, i have been percolating awards for nothing, a button-based gallery project that addresses some of these concerns by illuminating scrappy detritus and converting it into markers of worth. but finding a venue for the project's initial outing has been a challenge. enter printshop forever, a milwaukee-based one-year project of monthly artist editions that matches awards for nothing so much in aches. what's more? cortney thought so, too!

initially, i had envisioned editions of 1000 unique awards for gallery installation, but since printshop forever is an mostly online project that number didn't make sense. at 100 awards, this first release is still going to be the largest release she will deal with this year (thank you, cortney!). 100 is probably a more reasonable edition to start with, anyway. and it's nice to have conditions that force me to be at least mildly reasonable from time to time.

so here i am in albuquerque with a month (and roughly 1500 miles) between me and the launch of the project. i will be driving to milwaukee (with plenty of stops in between) to hand deliver my edition. i am lucky enough to be piggy-backing on an opening at sky high gallery there to release the first awards into the real world. but more about that event soon. for now, i am armed with a porta file that is quickly filling with scraps from portland, arcata, eureka, berkeley, oakland, phoenix and my mother's home in vancouver and the first awards are seeing the light of day...

breakthrough award.

this may not look like much but it marks a minor technological breakthrough at the sweetie pie labs. it also gave me another strangling idea for a major art thingy. how will i find the time to serve all my notions?