Arranging an
exhibit’s closing for last night, at the same time as an opening for today,
gave me plenty to do! If you read previous posts, you’ll see that two major
projects dominated my time for January. I sweated it and loved it! Instead of
writing about them in chronological order, I’m going to start with the opening,
since that is the most current for later today.
OPENING
 |
| This poster courtesy of Quan Lavender |
Quan Lavender
invited me to exhibit at Art India, on the Shekhawati sim. Aside from the honor
of being invited to display in this sizeable room, long like a landscape
painting, it also has a personal history for me. It’s probably no surprise
to people who know my cities at Sparquerry and ACC Alpha, that I have a great
interest in India. A couple years ago, I actually rented a little gallery on
the Shekhawati sim. It felt magical to be a part of the Indian virtual world.
Now, years later, I am back.
About my exhibit:
"THE MINIATURE GOAL"
What if our physical world shrunk in proportion to the resources we drain
from it?
We deplete
resources all across the globe, yet in our homes we may feel few repercussions.
Though we don’t actually visit the oil spills, the cleared forests, or the
mines, let’s imagine how it would appear, were our everyday life reflected
proportionately to the current depletion. If our bedroom walls were to shrink
at the same percentage as the forests or the extinction of species for
instance, how high exactly would our walls become?
In my
exhibit, I invite visitors into the miniature world we are in the process of
creating. Abundance is shortly to become a historic commodity. A powerfully
dangerous monster is being set in motion. Do we simply suppose the scientists
can slay such a creature once we create it? Though we cannot cure the common cold,
somehow we believe we will be able to cure an ailing planet.
Our disproportionate appetite for resources makes it clear
that our progress, and therefore our goal, will succumb to a miniature plan. We
will eventually come to realize that the planet's current ecosystems are being
damaged to a point where we may not be able to save them. Where does that leave
us when we become so small?
-Haveit Neox. 2014
My opening is at
2 pm SLT today, Saturday. There will be the live and beautifully exotic music
by Nnoiz Papp at the reception. Quan is also presenting at the same time Trill
Zapatero’s “Wal Mart” in a sky gallery, and the digital illustrations of
Ranadeep at the Art Bazaar. There is plenty to see AND hear at this opening of
three artists. See Quan Lavender’s blog for more information:
……………………………………………………………………………………
CLOSING
 |
| A scene from the fiery collapse of the Paper Observatory and the metropolitan dish below it. |
30 minutes before going to a marvelous farewell party that
Secret Rage was throwing for the Interim Project participants and visitors, I
had begun saving the paper observatory in linksets. The strong winds outside
were worrisome, because that frequently means the electricity could fail. The
LEA builds would have to be removed by midnight, and I hadn’t yet saved the
city below the observatory. But since the observatory in the sky and some of
the statues were already safe in inventory, I joined the enthusiastic party celebrating Secret’s spontaneous idea of the interim project
that worked so well for all of us. I left the party around 9:30 or so, figuring
there were still over two hours to carefully pack up the city. But then, a few
people contacted me asking when the show was going to start. I thought they
were jokingly referring to the destruction show I’d performed for Second
Libations in 2011.
Bit by bit, I saw people gathering in the corner of the sim,
and then it hit me that the announcement I’d sent out earlier in the day must
have been misleading (though I had suggested in an earlier post that I might do a tear down event, I never did get the time to entertain such a plan) . What I had meant was that the activities were portrayed by the
fire and dioramas that I’d built during the month. I had no plans to perform. More
people were arriving, so at 9:45, I felt compelled to announce that I would bring the Observatory
down as a performance in 15 minutes, at 10 pm. My hands were shaking, my brow sweating under the pressure, because it meant relinking much of
the building which was too large to make physical (only about 35 pieces can be
in a link for physical effects). I rushed to delink, and relink, to
simultaneously decide which parts should come down first for the performance.
There would be no time to save the city in inventory the way I wanted, but this
was the case of priority. So I plunged in. My friend Lilia Artis suggested I
add more fire throughout the city, and I spread it all over. This looked
wonderful, but the difficulty comes with trying to select building parts,
because the fire has extensive invisible margins of alpha layers. I hate
building around accumulations of trees in SL for this reason. It was with great
difficulty finding my way around these ghastly prims. “You’re getting a good
dunk in the ocean after the show!” After
the sky observatory fell, section after section, I felt that the show was over.
But Lilia contacted me, and suggested that I also bring down the city. And so I
did. But not the whole thing, because what remained gave a good sense of a ruin.
As this had not been rehearsed, the process of the collapse of
the city and the observatory was nearly unpredictable. I made a fast,
approximate guideline in my head on the spot. But I was mostly guided by the
results, each phase requiring me to consider other angles. The falling debris delighted
me. When I let go of the edit window, I watched as if someone else had set the
trigger. Massive walls and shards licked with fire fell down to the ocean below a sky of rich
orange and dark purple, and I anticipated what might come next.
The closing,
thanks to Lilia, and thanks to the visitors, turned out to be an energetic end…
quite different from my original plan to pack calmly. So, as the Paper
Observatory came in with a sudden burst of Secret Rage’s spontaneous, immediate
and unexpected invitation, so too the Observatory exited in a spontaneous
swoosh. I… had… fun!! Thanks to everyone for that!
Just a side note: I didn’t
end up drowning the prim fire in the ocean. Instead, I took out a book of matches,
struck one, and blew out its flame with gusto saying: “SO THERE!”
xxx
