Support Jain's art!

Long-time readers may recall that I am a huge fan of the work of local artist (and friend) Jain Faries. Jain is best known and makes her living from her work in fabric, which you can see here and which though I appreciate it is not the sort of thing I seek. The art she creates that I love is her weirder stuff, some of which you can see on her personal site and at the occasional convention.   She gave me one of her "balls onna stick," and I adore it; for more on them, read this earlier post. 

Lately, though, Jain has expanded into small, hand-built libraries, one of which she made for me and gave me as a Christmas gift.  Here it is standing up; sorry for the crappy photography and the glare off the protective plastic sheet, which I left in it.

As always, click on an image to see a larger version.

For a sense of the size of this wonderful creation, here's a (less glare-covered) picture next to a Mac Magic Mouse.

Every compartment in the library is a little box that you can remove.  On the back of each box is a burlesque image.  Jain made every single wee volume, each of which features different texts or images and a variety of binding styles.  Yes, that's a skull in the lower center, and an acorn above it. 

Why? 

What does it all mean? 

What I love about this piece of art is that I suspect no one, including Jain, can definitively answer those questions.  Each viewer mixes her or his perceptions with what Jain builds to create her or his own meanings. 

Jain's weirder art generally does not sell as well as her more conventional stuff.  That's a damn shame.  I think this little library and others like it should be going for many hundreds of dollars in galleries and at conventions. 

If you like what you see, contact Jain, bring real money, at least a couple hundred bucks, and commission her to build something for you--but leave the commission just that vague.  You'll be glad you did.

This is not, by the way, a paid advertisement.  I even violated my own rules for the blog and wrote this without first consulting Jain.  Jain's first knowledge of this blog entry will come when she stumbles upon it.  I simply feel strongly enough about the quality of her work that I wanted to pimp it.  If she's a bit embarrassed by this post, she'll just have to get over it. 

Imagine the hours of enjoyment you could have exploring your own little library. 

Now, make that dream a reality. 

An artist you need to know: Mikel Robinson

The Friday night of Thanksgiving weekend, a group of us bundled up against the cold and went to check out the Carolina Designer Craftsmen Show. I'd stopped going to this show about a decade ago, because every year it looked the same and little of what it offered was of interest to me. For the most part, that was true again, though I always find interesting the work of potter Steven Summerville, who in the interest of full disclosure is a friendly acquaintance and a very good friend of Jain's. As I was making my way up and down the aisles, though, I encountered the work of an artist whose booth in the rear left that made the whole trip worthwhile: Mikel Robinson.

Rather than attempt to describe Robinson's work in any depth, I'll let him do it via his Web sites: his main site, his blog, and his Etsy store. Suffice it to say that his art rocked me backward on my heels, then drew me forward for closer inspection. His multimedia assemblages repay close attention, and the emotions in them are strong but never cloying.

I admired his work enough that after the show I contacted him and bought some pieces. A bit later, I went to his apartment to pick them up. His wife, Kristina, met me and led me to their place, which is an awesome space in a repurposed old building. We chatted, I got to meet their eight-month-old son, and I learned that they are both cool people who are now on my big-group party lists.

If you're hunting for a last-minute Christmas gift or a birthday present, art is always a good idea, and you would be well served to check out Mikel's work.

Oh, yeah: and Jain's art balls, which I adore and which should be making her rich instead of selling only rarely.

A few quick things before I go

I head to the airport in eight hours, and I've yet to write, pack, pay some bills, and do some work. Typical. Starting tomorrow, I'll be reporting from San Francisco for a week.

Until then, I leave you with these brief notes.

You can now see Jain's art balls online at her site. To go right to the gallery of the cool creations, click here. Waiting for Sam, one of the niftier pieces in a collection of great creations, won an art show award at WorldCon and could be yours for a mere $245 (as the online gallery now shows). Someone needs to nab this one before Jain wises up and raises the price. (Okay, yes, I'm pimping Jain's art balls again.)

While I'm in a pimping mood, if you are anywhere near the five U.S. cities where Blue Rodeo will be playing, treat yourself to a great show and catch them in concert. I would if I lived anywhere near them.

If you're in San Francisco, you could do worse on a Sunday afternoon than to come by Borderlands Books, listen to my reading (or pretend to do so while you catch up on your email and text message backlogs), buy some books from the great folks there, and then join us for ice cream afterward. If we get a good crowd, I may offer the double treat of both reading a few pages from Children No More and doing a bit from the Science Magic Sex show. I hope to see some of you there.

Pimping Jain's art balls

That title sounds a bit dicey, doesn't it? Jain sometimes refers to them as "balls onna stick," but that's really not much better. (In fact, that's kinda ouch! and not an image I want to keep in my head.)

Regardless of what we call them, these are the nifty pieces of art that I've mentioned in a few recent blog entries and that were on display and for sale in the convention art show. Several folks have written me for more information on them, so I thought I'd show you a few pictures so you can get a sense of them. Seeing them in person is really necessary for full appreciation, because cool stuff is on all sides of each one, but this is as close as I can get with the data available to me right now.

First up is one you can't buy, because Jain gave it to me for my birthday. It now sits to the left of my main monitor in my home office. To the best of my knowledge, it has no title, which is fine by me.

















This one, Heroes of the Revolution, is also no longer available, because it's traveling home with a very happy purchaser who fell in love with it at this con.














This fine weird beastie, Rats, Bats, and Bunnies, could be yours. If you're interested, contact me through the site, and I'll hook you up with Jain. The prices are more than reasonable--in fact, I think she should increase them--so act now!










Waiting for Sam, this next bit of oddness--and, no, I don't know who Sam is--is also still available. I find it rather cheerful; don't you?

The Anticipation Art Show judges also liked it a great deal, because they awarded it a blue ribbon--one of only eight for the whole show. So, you could have your very own award-winning piece of art!














Last but not least is What's In Your Hand, a piece that, like so many of these, makes less sense but becomes even more cool as you study it more closely.










That's not all of them, of course, but these five should provide you with good sample mental images the next time I mention Jain's balls.

And if you visualize any other image, that's just not my fault.