New Sculpture at Franconia

I'm breaking my self-imposed pledge to not discuss work on this blog, but for a good reason I believe.
Last weekend, Franconia took delivery on an amazing sculpture by artist Mark di Suvero. The piece, called "Johnny Appleseed" was at Chicago's Millenium Park for a few years and now resides at Franconia. With the good karma that Franconia seems to have, a reporter/producer for the local paper just happened to come by the Park with his son while the sculpture was being installed and shot this video.


The sculpture is really beautiful sitting in the Park. Even though the trees are done with their color displays, it's still worth visiting the Park!

September, this golden month

I do love this month. I don't know a single person who doesn't have that "back-to-school, let's start all over again, this is really the new year" feeling in September. And it's doubly so for me this year, with my new position at Franconia Sculpture Park.

As per my self-imposed restrictions on blogging, I won't be talking much about the Park. (A reminder, my blogging rules are: No jobs, family or politics*...though that last one is so-o-o-o-o hard right now!!) I can say that I just have to break into a great big smile when I step out of the car at the beginning of my work day. You just never know what you're going to see that's new on the grounds. My "to do" list is long and the "someday" list is even longer, but I do hope to use Flickr, YouTube and other sites to allow others to see what I get to see every day.

I have been so distracted lately with my new work and other news (cough, Sarah Palin, cough) that it's hard for me to focus on anything. So in that spirit, let me just post about a few things that have caught my ADD-like attention lately:

These new labels from Paper Source just fill my heart with delight. They've priced them pretty high though: 8 labels for almost $5. Still, I might have to pick up one or two packets....there's nothing like getting a beautiful envelope in the mail.

BookGirl is on the board of a fine organization in Asheville, NC called Interlude Editions. They are holding a fund raiser this month to support their next artist-in-residence and are holding a raffle for this amazing collaboration. She writes about it here and also has a link to how you can purchase tickets. Asheville is in the heart of some fine book-making territory and participating artists in the collaboration include Dan Essig, Margaret Cogswell, Matt Liddle and Frank Brannon.

I don't work with leather much but I thought that this book by German artist/blogger Tulibri was beautiful in its simplicity. The best part? She made the cover from a pair of leather pants that someone gave her, even incorporating the pants seam into her front cover. Ingenious! She blogs in German and English...thank goodness!

Finally, I'll be doing a demo next Friday night (September 19) at my one of my favorite places in all of the world: Wet Paint Art on Grand Avenue in St. Paul. They've asked me to experiment with a Japanese paste called Konnyaku. The paste is a starch made from a root. When the starch is used on papers, they become so strong and flexible that they can be used as fabric. So that's this weekend's work (preparing for the demo)...I'll post some of my results here later in the week.

*Ok, I have to break this rule. The rumors are strong that Tina Fey will be playing Sarah Palin on tonight's premier of Saturday Night Live. If true, that is just excellent!

And now for the transition

The subtitle of my blog is “book arts, dogs, gardens, and transitions” and I’m afraid I haven’t served the last two items well on this blog. But I can say now that I’m in the middle of a new transition: I’m excited to have taken a job working with an wonderful group of people at Franconia Sculpture Park, just outside of the Twin Cities. I’ll be working on the administrative side while their Artistic Director keeps the artists supported on the large-scale sculptures that they build right on site in the park.

I’m excited about many aspects of the job. The park has a bit of that “Penland” feel in that there is creative work going on all the time. I’m looking forward to learning more about the materials and tools involved in big structures (I know that there is a blue-painted crane at the park and I’ve heard rumors of a pink fork-lift) and how a sculptor goes from studio-size work to really, really big sculptures. But my responsibilities will include keeping the money going in and going out in the right ways and working with the rest of the staff to help introduce the work of Franconia to more people. It’s not impossible that I could start a blog on the web site. In the meantime, you can search “Franconia” on Flickr and see some wonderful sculptures built in the park over the last 10 years.


After leaving my last job, I made the decision to take a full year off from work...an incredible opportunity for which I’ll never stop being grateful. I had the chance to rediscover my hometown, build a community with my book arts friends, and find meaningful volunteer work teaching ESL to immigrants through the Minnesota Literacy Council.

This isn’t a farewell post by any means. I like blogging too much! It does feel like this is a big enough transition that it deserves a mention, though. But maybe I’ll change the subtitle a bit. Perhaps something like “book arts, dogs, and gardens I love.” (You’ll have to come visit the Franconia site for updates on big sculptures!)