Embedded Histories - Short And Long

Embedded Histories - Short & Long

Ro2 Art is proud to present Embedded Histories - Long & Short, a solo exhibition featuring new works by artist Brad Ford Smith.

Each postcard sized ink drawing is made en plein air, capturing seemingly idyllic landscapes around the city of Dallas, Texas. The artist contrasts these present day views with references of forgotten moments in history occurring on those same sites. Through these sometimes jarring juxtapositions, the artist questions how collective memory shapes local identity. Each ink rendering, whether of a sidewalk or a train trestle holds layers of embedded history just beneath the surface. The artist seeks the past to discover truths about the city he calls home. 

Over the last three years my artwork has shifted away from the tongue and cheek, pseudo-science of the Nomadic Fungi Institute to a stripped-down investigation of the city I live in. This shift was not a deliberate, intellectual decision on my part, but rather an attempt to disperse personal chaos generated by our current social and political climate. It became critical to me to not add more disinformation into the world.

 

I found myself asking a basic question: What the hell is true? Where do I find certainty?  The simple answer was to look under my own feet at the physical ground I stand on. This piece of earth I know to be solid and true. It is my home. But take a step and ask again. What is this piece of earth? And what about the next step?  It didn’t take long to discover just outside my door were deep layers of embedded history.

 

In order to concentrate on the history and the physical experience of creating onsite, I reduced my art medium to the simplest of drawing materials: pen, brush, ink, 4” x 6” watercolor paper and a folding camp chair.  With these tools stowed away in my backpack, I can access places near and far where the separation between history and time runs thin.

 

These thin spots at first were hard to find. There is a lot of hype in our community that I had plow through before finding these thin places. But eventually the surface debris was pushed away, and a baseball field becomes a POW camp; a corner lamp post becomes a lynching post; a golf course becomes a thriving Caddo village; an abandoned swimming pool becomes the Fort that helped push the native people out of Texas.

 

On Sunday, January 10th I sat across from three resting bulldozers. Between us are the scattered piles of logs that once composed  the GC & SF railroad trestle. For 125 years this trestle successfully spanned the Trinity River. As I draw, I am connecting to what was, what is now, and what will be no longer. The freshly splintered wood perfumes the air with creosote and cypress sap. Then the wind turns, and the pungent diesel fumes fill my nose and sting my eyes. 

 

I try to work from an unbiased viewpoint that is not influenced by politics, religion or ethnicity. Focusing on the history that drew me to that place and the experience of being in a place of history. If a Freedmen’s Town is now a dilapidated, East Dallas shopping complex, or a grassy field in the Trinity River bottoms is the first place to announce “Elvis has left the building”,  these are facts, overlooked, forgotten, swept under the rug history. It is the embedded history that I am there to connect with, and by doing so, these locations are transformed into personal icons of who we have become.

Brad Ford Smith

Embedded Histories - Short & Long

Where: Ro2 Art | The Cedars

1501 S. Ervay St. Dallas, TX 75215

When: March 13 – April 10, 2021

Opening Reception: Saturday, March 13, 12-5pm. 

www.ro2art.com

Stay out of the mud,

Brad

Nomadic Fungi: Germination to Propagation

In the honored tradition of State Fair sideshow barkers ...

Step right up and see giant fungi eat cars right before your very eyes! These remarkable oddities of nature will thrill and chill you with their voracious appetite for automobiles. See the future of our civilization disappear as these mutated mushrooms eat car after car after car. Will anything stop these carnivore fungi before it's too late? Are we doomed to return to the days of horse drawn wagons? Is your car at this very moment being infiltrated by this sly predator?  Or is your car already being consumed from the inside?

The Nomadic Fungi Institute is thrilled to present:

Nomadic Fungi: Germination to Propagation

Nomadic Fungi are a mutated species that have functionally adapted to feed on automobiles. They have the capacity to infiltrate cars and extract nutrients directly from them by rapidly biodegrading materials made from oil, plastic and synthetic rubber. These voracious fungi constitute a serious threat to our nation’s transportation system and ultimately to the American way of life. This exhibition at the Texas Discovery Gardens brings together the most comprehensive collection of information currently available about the growth and propagation of nomadic fungi.

For the full Press Release and photographs please visit the NFI Press Page

Press Release - Image Library

Opening Saturday Aug 11th 1:00- 4:00pm.

Runs from Aug 11th - Oct. 28th, 2018.

Texas Discovery Gardens

Fair Park

3601 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd
Dallas TX. 75210

214-428-7476

Opened For The White Rock Studio Tour

Well, I got so busy with the White Rock Lake Artists Studio Tour I didn't have time to post these photos of my clean and sorted studio.

The studio tour started out pretty slow on Saturday. The humidity was so high that people were covered in sweat and ended up going to only 2 or 3 studios before calling it a day. 

Sunday threatened rain but then turned into a very beautiful day, then people drove up, walked up, peddled up on their bikes. It was strange to be standing in my studio and to see it filled with people.

Happily artwork did find new homes, people signed up for BFS blog, and I reconnected with several art friends.

One unexpected benefit, I got in a lot of practice on my elevator speech. Short and to the point.

So, now I just need to trap a wealthy art patron in an elevator and I'll be set!

Cleaning The Studio For the Studio Tour

Cleaning is a lot like making art, there is always a point, despite all the hard work, when it just looks like crap. That's when you keep pushing, make some decisions, make some changes and then things fall together. Almost like you knew what the hell you were doing from the very beginning.

I am participating in the White Rock Lake Artists Studio Tour this year, that's why I'm cleaning up my studio. It has nothing to do with the fact that the studio has become a pigpen. There's something comfy about dust bunnies, old news papers and clusters of dirty coffee cups. It's like I never moved out of my collage dormitory. Well... now that I think about that dorm room, it was pretty disgusting and now my studio is a pigsty!

So this is my studio after a whole day of cleaning. It looks pretty bad. One thing that always throws me is that in order to clean my studio I also end up cleaning the shed, the kitchen, the office and the living room. It's not just a matter of putting away a few odd tools. There's also piles of books, at least one load of dirty dishes, shoes, furniture, nicknacks, and why the hell is this Christmas wrapping paper doing out?!

Once everything is cleaned and put away I'll start pulling out stacks of artwork and sorting through what I want to show during the tour.

The studio tour is Saturday and Sunday Oct 12th and 13th from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm. There are 45 studios and 5 art centers on the free self guided tour. All are based around White Rock Lake. You could hit most of them in one day on your bicycle!

Here's a link to the MAP

Hope you can drop by, Brad

The Gate Way To The Studio

As the opening day for the White Rock Lake Artists Studio Tour gets closer I'm working on my To Do List. Today that list included cleaning up the yard. As you can see from the photo above we practice a more natural approach to the typical Dallas manicured lawn.

The house built by my parents in 1956 is snuggled under a canopy of pecan trees that keeps everything cool and shaded. The ground is basically overgrowth. We planted a few things like lantana, sage, cacti, and a fig tree. Most everything else was inherited or miraculously sprouted on its own. Not to brag but this summer I mowed twice.

Back to the tour. Thinking about crowd control and traffic patterns. How do we get people from the curb to the studio. Each studio on the tour will have a small yellow sign that says Studio Tour. It's been suggested to hang balloons from it just to make it more visible.

Using a yellow ribbon to act as a guide, we laid out a path that takes everyone from the curb, down the driveway, around the side of the house to the back yard. From there they just follow the sidewalk to the patio, through the beveled glass french doors into the studio.

The studio tour is Saturday and Sunday Oct 12th and 13th from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm. There are 45 studios and 5 art centers on the free self guided tour. All are based around White Rock Lake. You could hit most of them in one day on your bicycle!

Here's a link to the MAP

Hope you can drop by, Brad

White Rock Lake Artists Studio Tour 2013

In 1992 three artists decided to organize a self guided studio tour of artists living in East Dallas. It went off so well they did it agin the next year. 21 years later the White Rock Lake Artists's Studio Tour is a 2 day event that showcases 40 artist's studios and 5 art centers. It covers over 30 art disciplines from kiln formed glass to custom furniture. From incised pottery to photography, and lets not forget painting, printmaking and sculpture.

I live almost in the heart of the WRLAST, and have enjoyed making friends with the artists in my neighborhood. By seeing how they set up their studios I learned a lot about space management and found new sources for supplies. Plus there is something special about seeing artwork and artists in their natural and very personal environments.

A few years back, after much prodding by artists friends I contacted WRLAST about joining the tour. After three years on the waiting list I am finally on the tour!!!

So here's some details:

Tour dates; Oct 12th and 13th

10:00am- 5:00pm
This event is free and open to the public
Studios are located in East Dallas around the White Rock Lake

Here are some links you'll need:
WhiteRock Lake Artist's Studio Tour website
Tour map with PDF download

Tour Map for your iPhone icihere.com

Maps are also available at all the studios on the tour.

It's going to be a great weekend. Drop by and say Hi. Stroll the neighborhood and see some art.

Discovering Free Dallas Art Fair Tickets

The fifth annual Dallas Art Fair is just around the corner, and with 83 galleries in this years line up, 40 of which are first time participants, I am starting to get really excited to see some new and exciting artwork.

While perusing the local media coverage for this event I discovered two wonderful things which I am very excited to share with my BFS Blog subscribers. First is the new art and entertainment website CultureMap. They have been around for a while but I just found out about them.

The second discovery is that CultureMap in their post Enthusiasts Experience Dallas Art Fair for Free on Professionals Day posted a pass code that allows you to purchase free tickets to the Dallas Art Fair!

NOW you have no excuse to miss the most important art event in the DFW metroplex!

Filming At LRTX With Mark Birnbaum

I spent a crisp Sunday morning at La Reunion TX with the filmmaker Mark Birnbaum. You might recall previous posting about his videos on this blog.

He was there shooting footage for a short film that will highlight the natural setting of LRTX.

And how the artwork is integrated into the landscape. I was there to mostly carry his tripod, but also to take advantage of this opportunity to learn more about the art of filmmaking.

Panning the horizon, the sun cut beautiful blue holes in the cloud cover turning the dry prairie grass into a field of shifting gold.

Back at the studio, with the raw footage downloaded into one of the dozen backup hard drives, Mark cuts and splices the best of the footage and sound recordings, then adds a few lines of text. We watch the results over hot cups of coffee and homemade oatmeal cookies. The video will be posted on the LRTX website soon, I'll let you all know when that happens.

Aurora 2011: A Thing To See And Do

Water Walls Dallas Arboretum

I have felt for a while now that I should be spending less time at the computer. All those hours logged on has left me feeling a bit like a big wooden log. So, it's up early, a balanced breakfast, walkies, perhaps a bit of yard work, and get involved with a few art events to get me out of this damn house!!!

Aurora 2011 is one such event. This year it's being held in the Dallas Arts District. 97 light and sound installations will turn the 19 block area into a night of color. The big power switch will be flipped on this Friday, October 28th at 7:30pm-12:00 midnight. Here's the Art and Seek post.

Fountain Place Park Dallas TX

I missed being part of the Aurora 2010 because I was in Italy, which I enjoyed completely and blogged about maybe a bit to much. That said, I have been waiting all year for the next Aurora event. This time I am in town, busy at my computer spicing together bits of video... So much for getting out of the house, or the walkies, or the balanced breakfast.

White Rock Lake 2 AM

I am producing 2 videos that will be projected onto the west garden wall of the Meyerson Symphony Center. Both videos are about water. One is natural footage of ponds, streams and puddles as seen in the top 2 photos above. The other video uses the same footage and manipulates it by re-filming the clips multiple times to produce color separations and distortions, as seen in these bottom 2 photos.

Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth

This will be my first time to show any of these videos publicly. Very excited about it, and about seeing all the other installations, too!

Eyeball Exercise Coming Soon At The Dallas Art Fair

The Dallas Art Fair opens to the public next Friday! I've been really jonesing for this event. This is the third year of the DAF. Each time it gets a little bigger with a few more galleries signing up. Plus there is the Suite Art Fair being held over at the Belmont Hotel. (I'll be stretching the corneas there as well)

The beautiful people at Art and Seek are once again indulging my rambling prose, so keep an eye out there for my latest misspellings. I'll post links here on my blog to any posts I make there.

Tonight, I'm doing some warm up exercises at the local art gallery openings.

Oh How the Arts Move Us Around and Around

It quickly becomes obvious how fluid the arts are when you start sending out Press Releases. Having gone through this process quite a few times, I have come to expect the "Failed To Deliver" E-mail responses. News papers, magazines, and online editorials have become a turnstile of writers and editors. Culture centers trade out employees as if they were sports teams.

I updated my contact list back in September while sending out Press Releases for the SculptCAD Rapid Artists show. It is now 4 months later, and I am doing the PR thing for the sculpture class I am teaching at the Creative Arts Center.

This time around, the Failed To Deliver E-mail responses reminded me of how many galleries are simply gone, and how many friends have moved on to other lines of work because of the continued downsizing of News Papers, Radio, TV, Museums, Non-profits, Schools, Historic Agencies, Government Supported Organizations...

It all makes me very concerned for the future of our culture and the long term loss of history.

So, I would like to send out a big THANK YOU to all the Cultural and Historic centric people out there that have worked so hard to promote and support the inspired side of human nature.

All the Best to each of you in 2011!
Brad

Shout Outs and Link Love

One of my favorite resources for art information in the Dallas Fort Worth area is Art and Seek. On Thursday they posted a short article which included a shout out to my blog! The post also noted 2 other local art blogs Art This Week and This Week In The Arts, both of which I highly recommend, and are now listed on my Blogville Link List.

In honor of Art and Seek spreading the link love, I am highlighting 2 Texas artists from my Artists of Note list. Each have created wonderful sites.

Brad Tucker - His site begins with a standard artists website title page, but as you dig into it, you realized he is having lots and lots of fun making all kinds of wonderful things.

Tracy Hicks- It starts with frogs in jars, but it is so much more than that. This is a wonderful collection of art. Really beautiful to look at and think about.

Also in the spirit of supporting artists, bloggers and online art magazines in my own small way, I am creating a page on my blog that is dedicated to cultural linkage. So stay tuned for that.

Thanks again to Art and Seek. You Rock.

Flickr meet up at the Dallas Museum of Art

DMA sculpture garden at sunset

I have been using a Flickr account for a few years now as an online portfolio. It has been working fairly well, no real complaints, but I know there is a lot more that I could do with it. So, with that in mind, Nicole Leigh leader of the Dallas Museum of Art Flickr Group and myself are hosting a Flickr meet up. 

We are inviting all local Flickr users to come down to the DMA Sunday July 11th at 2PM, for a coffee talk and laptop discussion about tips and tricks for making Flickr a better tool. With the free wifi at the DMA, everyone who brings their laptop will be able to pull up their sites, explore, and make changes in real time.

If the results of this event are positive, we might have another meet up next month. Let me know what you think... and, if you have a Flickr site send me a link.

Submitting to the Urge to Pecha Kucha

I sent in my Power Point to be formated for the up coming Pecha Kucha Dallas event. So that means I am going to be 1 of 11 people asked to present a 6 minute and 40 second presentation (that's 20 slides, 20 seconds each. Check out the links to get the whole idea). Here is a link to show you how to pronounce Pecha Kucha.

This will be the 3rd PKN Dallas 6/24/10. Each event has been held at a small donated venue. This time it will be at the Dallas Center for Architecture. The 150 seats sold out in just a day or two, so I didn't get the chance to notify my friends about it.

Each presenter is free to speaking about any topic as long as it stays within the time limits. With 4 artists, 2 art conservators, an architect, a furniture designer, a comic book writer, and a muralist, I assume the focus will be on art and creativity. But who knows, at the first event, one presenter spoke lovingly about his collection of Puma Sneakers.

I'll be rambling on about small personal epiphanies; moments of insight, clarification, and confirmation.  Rambling being the most accurate description in that last sentence. It has been fun sorting through old photos and memories to put together my 6.40 minutes of fame. It has also been weird seeing these moments organized and prepped for public display.

Hopefully I won't be the last one to be called up on stage.

Color Correct Photographic Reproductions

After 4 failed attempts at photographing the drawings in the Book Page Collection, and getting sad color reproduction, I finally found a friend that has one of those top of the line Epson scanners. With in an hour I had all the drawings scanned in beautiful living color. They are now posted on my Flickr page.

It's Worth the Risk Parking

Alison Starr

It was on one of those cold rainy days that we are having so many of, when I turned the corner and saw the sign for Mokah Coffee Bar and Mokah Art Gallery. Cold, wet, needing hot coffee and a good dose of art I ambled inside.

No Parking Any Time is the title of the group show that is up through March 6th. Kathy Lova, Alison Starr and Du Chau have filled this surprisingly will put together gallery space with sculptures and wall installations that are derived from found objects.

Du Chau

Each artists is working with a source material that is commonly found in our everyday environment, such as sticks, stuffed animals or plastic shopping bags. These base materials have been transformed through various processes to become something new but still recognizable.

Kathy Lovas

This juxtaposition creates a wide variety of tactile sensations and narratives. Du Chau's porcelain tree branches convey nature's beauty and it's fragileness. Kathy Lovas' plastic rapped bunnies expose the scary interior of what we consider to be cute and cuddly. Alison Starr uses her sewing skills to transform pounds of plastic shopping bags into beautiful icons of mass consumerism.

So even though the card says No Parking Any Time, ignore that. Grab a hot cup of Joe and spend some time in the gallery.

Make Space: Installation/Open House at La Reunion TX 2010

Brad Ford Smith

It was a beautiful blue sky, puffy cloud day, perfect for the Make Space: installation event at La Reunion TX. I got up there early to do a few finishing bits to my sculpture and clean up around the site. Then I spent the rest of the day talking to people, petting dogs, and enjoying the sun shine.

Below are photos of some of the sculptures made by the other artists for this years event. If the names are high lighted they link to the artist's web site.

Anne Albagli

David Blood and Oliver Bradley

Scott Horn

Nicole Horn

Kevin Obregon

Unfortunately I did not get a photo of Sandra Groomer's installation, but there should be some posted at the La Reunion TX site soon.

First Stake in the Ground for the Privet Sculpture Project

The structure will be staked to the ground using thick privet branches. It will be interesting to see what condition they are in after a year in the dirt. The dirt at this location is on about 10" deep then you hit lime stone, which is the reason this area is called Chalk Hill. The photo also shows some of the long privet branches that have been harvested to create the arched structure.

Location for the Privet Sculpture Project

The opening for Make Space: Installation at La Reunion TX is this Saturday, Feb. 27th. With all the rain and snow it has been hard for any of the artists to get out there, but I do have my sculpture sited now, and I have started the framing out of the structure. Above is the concept drawing superimposed at the site.

There has been some interesting issues around using privet as a building material, I'll blog about that later. Right now I need to get into my muddy boots and rain coat, pack up the truck and head out to La Reunion TX.

Spreading the Seed

Frass, Droppings, Spore, Poop... What ever you call it, this is a big stinking pile of privet seeds.

One privet bush can produce thousands of seeds every year. These hard round black seeds have a multitude of ways of finding fertile ground. First is the structural nature of the bush itself. It grows in long arching branches that sprout from a central root ball. These branches drop seeds away from the root ball onto new open ground. The branches are also very wiry so in high winds they can act like whips to fling seeds further a field. Due to the small round shape of the seeds, they are easily washed into storm drains and creeks, this being probably the most common form of seeding in urban areas. Birds and some animals can eat the seeds, which are resistant to the acids in the digestive system, so they are excreted later in perfect condition to sprout in new locations.

Please note that privet seeds are slightly poisonous to humans, but they will kill a horse if eatten them.