I confess that football, how to play it and why you'd play it, has always confounded me. Its not that I didn't have exposure to it. Examples of football fans were all around me! My Mother loved it, even her mother loved it plus my cousin's Craig and Ron Wolfley played professional ball. So,what was my problem? Weird artist I suppose. I was headed to Arizona to teach a workshop in Tuscon and as a bonus, I was going to get to visit with Ron. Before I took off, I did a bit of researching about cousin Ron's career. After all, I couldn't arrive totally clueless again! I had to come with some knowledge about his life as a football player. I learned that Ron played for the St. Louis/Phoenix Cardinals from 1985 to 1991 and that during his career, he was selected four times to go to the Pro Bowl as a special teams captain. Ron now co-hosts a morning, drive time talk radio show with Doug Franz called, "Doug and Wolf"(thank you Wikipedia for helping me )! I arrived in Phoenix on the 19th and the following evening, I was right in the thick of things with dedicated, Cardinal fans, at the Big Red Rage broadcast at Majerle’s Sports Grill. It was fun and great to see Ron in action! Sometime during the evening, I'm sure he glanced at me and thought, " Yeah, Georgia doesn't have a clue what we're talking about but it looks like she's enjoying the french fries"! It was all good! I was there to share apart of his life and hang out with his daughter, Savannah, who was quite at home with all the football fans and talk. What I do have a clue about, what I am sure of, is that I had a rich and rewarding time reconnecting with a cousin whose house I spent so much time at growing up. I also had the privilege of getting to know his generous and caring wife Stephanie and their children, Savannah and Vetter. Ron and I talked of many things, family, faith, failures and triumphs. Some hard, some funny, but all with deep caring and knowing that comes with a shared family history. It was such a pleasure! Thank you.
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"Quilted buildings! Of course I need to see those before I go back to Wyoming"! My sister-in-law, Alaina,told me about it and knew this fiber based, art instillation in the city of Buffalo would be a must see for me. Conceived and orchestrated by Brooklyn based artist, Amanda Browder, the project involved collecting donated fabric, community sewing days and installing the work. It was my last day in New York and the last week the instillation would be up! Besides getting to hang with family one more time, this outing was destined to be a great way to "wrap" things up. "Sew" (this is getting silly),I jumped in the car and left Grand Island for a short ride into the city. The first wrapped building, Clifton Hall, is located on the grounds of the Albright Knox Art Museum. The museum was the project's major sponsor so its selection as a site made perfect sense and it gave me a chance to go to Buffalo's premier art destination . I didn't have time to tour the museum but the museum grounds, with their impressive collection of contemporary sculptures, are worth a look in themselves (no cowboy or buffalo bronzes here). As I was finishing up my painting of "Laura"by sculptor Jaume Plensa, Alaina called to let me know she wanted to meet to see the next wrapped building with me and have lunch together. We met at the former Richmond Methodist Episcopal Church, on Richmond and West Ferry, took some pictures, talked about the project and then headed out for a tasty lunch. What a great afternoon and final LEAP 366, New York experience! Here's what Amanda Browder had to say about the project: "The overarching goal is to engage individuals and groups in the mystery of creation. Volunteerism of local citizens and artists is a segue to creating familiarity in contemporary art as well as the individual nature of the neighborhood itself. From material collection to construction and exhibition, I hope to encourage community volunteers to participate in ways that require collaboration and conversation about city, community, architecture and art". |
LEAP 366
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