One Year Anniversary : The Meanng of Life

It is not quite a year since I quit my day job and just slightly more than a year since this blog was started. Many of my friends, so they say, are envious of my leaving work, but we all are too well aware of the hazards of not being steadily employed. All in all it has been a smart move, the bank account is still dwindling, but there is steady income albeit a fraction of my IT salary. This Fall maybe a bit overwhelming with teaching engagements almost every day of the week including weekends.

My Designs For Good adventures have changed direction over time. Initially when I was still employed and the bank account was fat, I gave products and services away because that was what I wanted to do, I could afford to do so, and it was good marketing. Over time as I began to expect and need some kind of compensation in return the direction of Designs For Good began to change.

Have Kiln Will Travel was my solution for a sustainable way of using my talents to provide my income while helping nonprofit and charitable organizations raise funds. The fused glass event/class which is the basis of  HKWT has been very successful, more so than I ever thought. My greatest surprise however has been how much I enjoy teaching, and how it feels a natural thing for me to do.

My life long measure of what activities are appropriate for me has been very simple... Does the activity drain me or give me energy. Funny... I remember very early in life how I learned this guiding principle. At the end of summer kids get tired and bored in the autumn heat. Having played their hearts out over the summer the various games just don't seem exciting anymore. I recall sitting in the yard with some friends, and I began to pull out my matchbox car collection which we would regularly play with for long hours in our imaginary city of made up businesses and adventures. My friends looked at me with disapproval and said they just didn't want to play with the cars. My reply, having seen this in myself more than once was - if we just start playing then it will BECOME fun. After playing for ten minutes or so one of them looked up at me and said... hey, you were right!

Watching the ebb and flow of energy in my life has made me what I am. I react to it as it directs my actions. I believe that this sensitivity to one's rise, fall, and realignment of energy is the answer to the age old question of (and hopefully not sounding pretentious) the meaning of life. There are many spiraling deeper meanings and levels to what I just said, but on the most basic level.... if you just start playing.... it will become fun.

Of course having fun isn't the measure of all things. Life is more complex than that. However, the sensitivity to and your ability to be guided by your energy flow is an ever deepening connection between who you are and your potentiality. That is, your ability to become something richer than you are now by bending your will to the energy that you are, and can more completely embody. Hmmmm... Embody is a very appropriate word here.

HKWT has not been wildly successful in fund raising thus far. I have only started that journey however, a journey that will require me to seek out and to work with governing boards of the organizations which I want to help. What HKWT has done - to me - has changed my direction entirely.

When I quit my job I was toying with a half dozen ideas. Photography was one of them. I love picture making and could sit endlessly playing with my digital darkroom. I did nonprofit work by shooting events and providing free prints, my time, and helping with marketing. However, because I was looking for a sustainable relationship many of my ideas didn't pan out once I actually started working on them. You can give things away endlessly, or, what I should say is.... professionally you can't give things away endlessly, and in the end those you work with must value your work, and yes, compensate you for it.

But that's the rub for everyone isn't it. How do you do what you enjoy and get paid for it?

There is no magic formula of course, and the path will look different for everyone. That is why so few find, and more importantly, stay on the path. No one, save yourself, can direct you. The refinement and balance of your energy with the realities of your life is the magic, and a trick you must relearn and perform every day of your life.

I've never been a morning person, and maybe will never be, but lately I've been playing with and somewhat succeeding at getting up early. Why bother? The answer is that the quality of my alertness and sense o f well being is enhanced if I get to bed earlier and don't stay up late drinking beer and watching reruns.  It is a calculated trade off. I enjoy staying up latter and totally unwinding from the day, but that has to be compared to the quality of being in the morning when I get to be earlier. Right now, I'm siding with getting to bed early. Every event, task, and interaction presents an opportunity for realignment.

I still don't know where I'm going, and that's a good thing. For now, I have refinements to make for HKWT, and because of that path I am now becoming a very good teacher.... so they are telling me. I have hopes of being able to pay the bills here forward, and look forward to wider horizons as I mature on this new path. I will remain vigilant towards the necessity of meeting the bills and then growing back my savings.... but dare I say that is only a goal, and not a directing principle which has control of my life.

Strictly from the fun point of view, aka where my highest energy level and excitement is.... I have started a series of glass powder paintings which will be the most grand works I've done so far... at least in my mind's eye, because thus far they have not 'gone to glass' yet. The digital art studies for these can be seen at my main web site. I'm still in process of abstracting the photos. They will become richer in color and more dramatic as I play with the sense of light and color contrasts. I will then take them to full scale pastels, then finally to glass.

Maybe these will open new doors, new departures points, or, maybe they too well be a completion and resolution. It is hard to say until they too have become embodied as their energy embodies me.

Happy Trails To You!

details, details, details

Now I know why the stereotype of artist not having good business practices probably has some truth to it. I've been spending the last few weeks weeding through the minutia of the why's and how to's of setting up an LLC. That's even less exciting than watching paint dry. Then there are the tax reporting issues. I've always filed jointly (with my wife), but now with an LLC and being self employed who knows what the tax attorney will tell us. That's another meeting.

Last week was mostly dealing with liability and property insurance for my many adventures. Seems that insurance companies still don't know what to do with you unless you fit neatly into one of their 'classes' for coverage. Thankfully, with a few phone calls to several groups that specialize in helping 'ceative' groups and individuals, I was able to find agencies that can be creative in setting up coverage for us round pegs trying to fit into square holes.

Fractured Atlas is one of those organizations as well as Springboard For The Arts. Thanks to these organizations I didn't have to spend twice the amount for coverage, and was able to trust that I might actually have a policy that isn't full of loopholes.

Without these organizations to help I can easily see why creatives sometimes avoid doing basic business practices. It isn't that creatives are lazy or ignorant of such... it's just that the business world in many cases just doesn't know how to work with creatives, and translates that into what appears to the creatives as (and in some cases actually is) over charging.

More details...

Last week I had my first test of the "Have Kiln Will Travel" concept. The test class at local high school was a success. This was gratifying since a few months of prep as well as thousands of dollars went into getting ready for the test. The amount of gear and glass going to a site turned into a bit of logistical problem. I ended up with a truckload of 80 gallon tupperware roughneck containers to hold all the stuff (including 6 kilns).

OK... now what. Do I have to load, then unload the truck full of gear after every event? No way! I just want to keep it locked up in my truck when I'm at the studio. Which means that I have to buy a set of equipment that is dedicated just for Have Kiln Will Travel and not for studio use. OK, no problem. But the gear must be covered and secured. So that means a $1500 topper for my truck!

Yikes! How many thousands am I going to pour into this?

Well, thankfully I think I'm done with all the major expenses. Now I'm off to create the web site for Have Kiln Will Travel, and I'll do most of that myself. I might call in a Flash expert to do a little work, and hopefully it won't cost too much.

It is ofen said that it takes money to make money... I guess that is even true when you are doing fund raising.

Designs For Good is Taking Off!

Boy... A bit overwhelmed at the moment.

Leaving for Iowa tomorrow to talk over a art glass commission of two free hanging panels of 5 by 4 foot, and to also meet with a store owner who may want to sell some of my craft-end items like FritFlowers as can be seen here.

I squeezed in the time to create a prototype of the glass panels. Even if the commission doesn't come my way I can still use it as an example piece at CAFAC for my kilnformed glass students.


I've started working with the owner of PawPADs as another Designs For Good effort. PawPADS is about.... Pawsitive Perspectives Assistance Dogs (PawPADs) is a 501c3 non-profit organization whose mission is to facilitate the power of the human-canine bond, and enhance the lives of others, through the process of training assistance dogs and the outcome of partnering them with people with disabilities.

My first mission was to produce a flyer for their fund raiser. Pretty simple layout with a bunch of paw prints in the background and a cute image of a puppy that I made into puzzle pieces using Photoshop.

It is an amazing amount of money, to the tune of $25,000, goes into turning a rambunctious puppy into a dependable helper for a disabled person.

Another project will be to do a photojournalism piece for them. For this project I will be following a puppy from beginning to the end of its training to illustrate just what is involved, and how the dogs achieve their goal of aiding a person in need.

I've got my eye on a few other nonprofits as well and I'll post those when we iron out some of the details.

On the Circular Obsessions front, I'm starting to get fan mail as a result of the Sculptural Pursuit Magazine Award. It is gratifying to hear from people. I'm really hopeful to sell a few of the works and it will be a wonderful experience to be able to donate a majority of the proceeds to worthy nonprofit ventures like PawPADs.

Oh... and I guess I have to officially announce that I am no longer working at my IT job as a Database Administrator. I quite. Yes, jumped over the edge. Designs For Good in now my full time obsession.

Wish me well! I couldn't be more excited about my future!

Creativity & Collaboration

In the post Why Designs For Good I discussed some motivational factors for giving my work or the proceeds from sales to nonprofit organizations. I stated that this act of giving is in no way selfless or some sort of bleeding heart liberal indulgence. Today's post is an example of receiving far more in return through the act of giving, and being open to 'outside' influences in your creative life.

Just the opposite of that openness is my Circular Obsessions series was a truly obsessively driven singular pursuit of realizing an inner vision by minimizing outside influences. This inner vision came with a set of very restricting standards the sum of which is hard to explain, but I'll list a few for discussion sake.

• Color was fairly restricted
• Almost all surfaces had to have unique texturing
  
• The disparate media types had to have a seamless integrated look
• Each piece in the series had to have at least two glass styles: cast glass, kilnworked glass or torchworked

There were many other criteria which I had little control over. Things just either looked and felt right or they didn't. The object 'resonated' or it didn't. When working with/through this inner vision thing you can't talk yourself into a compromise. If it isn't right it just isn't right, and no amount of rationalization will work to change that.

And what I mean by criteria which I had little control over will need to be a subject of another post. For now, just ask yourself.. what is my favorite color, and do you know why? Or why do some people like abstracts and others do not? Suffice it to say that on some very fundamental level we do not control our preferences for certain types of sensation, and my posit - as it pertains to my inner vision thingee - is that it was more in control of me than I in control of its driving aesthetic preferences.

At times I would obsess for a month over how to best hide a seam between two components. In extreme cases it may take over six months to get a glass component both structurally sound and aesthetically 'correct', with many failures along the way.

Working under these conditions is a sort of aesthetic tyranny, which you accept as the process of creation, but it can become oppressive as it seeks an end result which seems continually out of reach.

Needless to say, in this mindset outside influences such as: will it sell; what gallery will show it; or even the basic financial concern of the cost of production versus potential of return are not in consideration. All of which serves to illustrate the somewhat irrational aspects of the inner vision thing.

After completing the Circular Obsessions odyssey I turned my sculpture studio into a photography studio and really didn't have a plan for glass into the future, until I was invited to teach kilnformed glass at Chicago Avenue Fire Arts Center (CAFAC), and then some odd things started to happen.

This inner vision thing relentlessly pursued its end and thereby eliminated whole sets of creative potential. Even within the glass area I was restricted to a certain look which eliminated almost everything else in glass except 'the look'.

When I opened myself to 'give' my time to CAFAC the whole world of glass opened back up to me. In short order I found Powder Painting, created an extensive array of art glass tiles which I will be marketing, and most recently have begun experiments in enameling.

This is a copper foil lotus flower I recently prototyped as a small part of a collaborative sculpture which will help illustrate CAFAC's multi media emphasis. It is an example of how glass and metal can be integrated into a single work of art, and what students can learn at the Fire Arts Center.

Being primarily a glass artist I struggled for many weeks trying to make glass flowers, and they always looked.... well like glass flowers. They didn't fit the overall feel of the sculpture which is a collection of found objects mostly of metal.

The final lotus flowers could have multiple layers of petals where the lower layers of petals are only slightly enameled showing mostly copper, and thereby integrating into the largely metal sculpture.

OK, maybe I was just ripe for doing new things after completing Circular Obsessions, and maybe I just needed to get out more instead of being all wrapped up in the inner vision thingee.

That's true, but it was the opening up and the giving away in powerful combination which has totally changed how I now approach my work, and who I am as a creative person. I can see now that collaboration will be a key factor in setting directions, and collaboration will provide a rich open field of creative adventures which will far outstripped what I could have imagined before.

Giving my work away will open doors and provide advantages not available to the lone wolf artist I was. And again, nothing is really being given away. Materials must be paid for from the proceeds, and there are obviuos returns in the form of marketing and publicity.

My goal is to maximize the proceeds so that significant funds are generated for a nonprofit, and as discussed in other posts, that is not a simple process. To that end I will be contacting organizations like the Craft Emergency Relief Fund (CERF) for their assistance and advice, and potentially to organize an event for the sale of Circular Obsessions to benefit CERF.

One last note... Enameling is very expensive, especially on a large scale. A large panel of 30x40 inches may take several hundred dollars of enamel powder. So, being a glass artist and having just discovered Powder Painting for myself.... hmmm, can I enamel with my glass powders which are far cheaper than those wee little jars of enamels? Can I make 30x40 enamel panels with Bullseye glass?

Sure.. why not... stay tuned.

Macro Lepidoptera

As mentioned I have been working on the initial phases of several projects for Designs for Good and have taken the first steps on a new effect. But I’ll digress with some back-story first.

I have been attracted to butterflies since childhood. Some of the boys in the neighborhood would spend an afternoon catching them at our ball field on hot summer afternoons when we weren’t playing baseball. The ball field had a small wooded area over the homerun fence, and it was there we would sit for hours on end waiting to see those dashing flights of color.

We posted ourselves apart so that we could visually survey our several acre hunting ground and waited in the heat; waiting for one of us to scream Monarch! Tiger! or on rare occasion Zebra! Then we would be off at break-neck speed, leaping over gullies, dodging trees and brush, and squeezing through fences holes while swinging our nets to catch the prize.

That continued for several years and we amassed a collection of several hundred specimens. We learned about relaxing jars, killing jars, and how to properly prepare and mount the winged wonders. Our parish priest was a stogie-loving man and saved his Marsh Wheeling cigar boxes for us to store our prizes. My father worked at the HJ Heinz factory and (for whatever reason) he was able to obtain carbon tetrachloride to use in our killing jars. Today it is known for its adverse health effects. That was apparent to us young boys because it killed the insects in seconds once in the jar.

I’m old enough now that those times seem like someone else’s life. My color fixation today is focused mostly on glass and photography, but I have never forgotten my first color addiction. In my wanderlust years well over 30 years ago I found myself walking the tobacco lined back roads of Kentucky, and was struck by the large number of road-kill butterflies on the roadside. I collected the samples and put them in a jar with mothballs for preservation. The shots here are from those samples.

I used my Nikon 2DXs with a Nikor 105mm macro lens to capture these shots. Two studio flashes were used on either side for even lighting and the camera was mounted directly over the subject on a tripod. Little else was done to the images except a little ‘clarity’ and contrast added in Adobe’s Lightroom.

For my new project I’ll start with a clean set of macro images from a properly maintained collection without the dust and tears of my roadside collection. Then the fun will begin as I run the images though whatever strikes my fancy in my image-editing arsenal. The end product will be highly abstracted (as if macro wasn’t abstract enough) images ready for art prints.

I’ve been looking for an excuse to purchase Nikon’s on-lens wireless macro flash unit (R1), and this is the project for that. So now I can look like those CSI guys on TV.

I’m also tempted to rent a Nikon D3x for the project since I’ll then have a 24MP file to work with. My intention is to print these images poster size and larger, and will likely crop each images during final composition. This will leave me at least 12-18 MP to work with.

Now for the Designs for Good part of this.

The art prints will be sold and the profits will benefit a good cause. I haven’t identified a target organization yet because that will be the easy part and there are a lot of steps to complete first.

Dr. Richard Vogt of the University of South Carolina has graciously consented to allow me access to the Richard B. Dominic collection housed in the McKissick Museum. Information regarding this collection can be found at http://zebra.sc.edu/moth.html.

Now I have access to a collection and the technical and artistic aspects are mostly under control. I will need to focus on the business and marketing aspects of the project. Large art prints are expensive to produce, especially if I’m driven aesthetically to print on media such as cloth, vinyl or canvas. Ideally, a pre-production funding source should be secured.

I’ll be applying for several grants. This year the Minnesota State Arts Board is offering an Artist Initiative Grant in photography. The grants range from two to six thousand dollars. That’s a nice chunk of change which would help with equipment, travel, and production costs. I’ll look into other grants as well.

It’s time to start the process of finding Designs for Good sponsors. To be realistic I’ll have to accomplish a few projects on my own before any company or organization will consider a limited stipend. But it’s time to start that process.

Getting the prints in front of the public shouldn’t be a major hurdle, but the main idea is to raise money for charity, not to show art prints. I’m exploring options and have a grandiose idea of showing them at the Minneapolis Institute of Art (I seldom aim low). The MIA has a program designed for local artists and I’m hoping to fit into that program. The idea is to create a significant pool of money for a cause. The prints are merely an opportunity for patrons of a major institution to contribute and receive a very unique ‘gift’ in return.

Galleries seem hit or miss to me and are not my preferred approach. Various web-based marketing opportunities are also an option. At this point however I’m very optimistic that a museum or art center will be open to the idea.

So, there you go. Along with the CAFAC effort this starts the second Designs for Good project.

Relections On The Cost Of Design

OMG! The cost of Adobe's Creative Suite graphic design package is just too much, or is it? No, actually it isn't, because what you obtain is a whole integrated package which will enable a graphic designer, web master, photographer, and videographer to create absolutely amazing work sometimes with a push of a few buttons.

I made the commitment this weekend and bought the Master Package... ouch! And along with it bought packages from Topaz and Photomatrix. The images below are from outside my studio today. It is raining so I knew the wet ground and car would make an excellent subject. The reflections are great.





You can see the out-of-the-camera image (top) and the lower one after just a few minutes in the Topaz products. The latter has much more graphic impact and was accomplished in just a few minutes. If it were to be used in a Subaru ad I would have made the logo more prominent, toned down the purpleness of the building, and would do a little vignetting.

Product shots like cars are all about reflections and using light to mold the form of the car. In this case it was a cloudy and rainy day and perfect for creating the type reflections needed to bring contrast and detailing together. It isn't real intuitive, but some subjects actually look better on an overcast day. If you ever visit a photographer's studio you'll see that their lights are covered by large things called softboxes. These 'boxes' soften the light, and significantly change the characteristics of the highlights, just like clouds do to the sun. You'll learn that in lighting 101 classes. Then you add in the magic of your image editing software and then you have an image worth some money..... to someone.

It was a reflective day for me. It is a cold rainy spring day in Savage Minnesota. Sitting within the screened porch, covered with a blanket, a cat on top of that, and a cup of coffee warming my chilled hands.... I sat letting thoughts drift. While listening to the seemingly wistful spring call of chickadees and morning doves in the distance I felt the soft soaking rain in the air around me.

A mist of heat rose from my coffee cup which warmed my cold and stiffened fingers, and I wondered what exactly was I going to use these expensive tools for. My problem has always been that I think in terms too large for my own good. Like the project that Brian and I are discussing for example (see prior posts).

I have a few ideas for Designs For Good which are too new to even post about. It will be good, good for me and whatever good comes to others through my meandering and wanderings of how to best apply the skills given to me.

It is very rare I thought.... as I heard a call of a Loon coming from our creek below. The call echoed about the step hillsides framing the creek's valley, and faded back again into the sound of gentle rain. It must be on its way from the southern home to one of Minnesota's ten thousand lakes I thought. And yesterday I saw a Cedar Waxwing for the first time in over tens years of living here. It too on its way up north to replenish itself. The travel north is one of the most dangerous times for migratory birds.

We must invest ourselves to be replenished.

And tomorrow is Monday and back to reality in my 9 to 5.

I'm On the Cover of Rolling Stone!

Well, not really. My work has been chosen to be on the cover of Sculptural Pursuit magazine which like Rolling Stone for sculptors. I'm very excited and honored. The series I've titled Circular Obsessions has been in the making for many years. Hard to say when it really started. I guess like most artists it takes half a life time to form your aesthetic vocabulary, and the other half you might actually make something interesting.

The short of it is, I'm just attracted to round shapes in both two and three dimensions, and these form the core of my vernacular. When I approached color studies in glass I used the sphere as my form. To create the majority of the work a lathe was used as a natural tool for creating the family of rounded shapes. The lathe enabled me to prototype from sketches fairly quickly. I'd work pine to get the shape right, then turn the final pieces in various solid-surface materials like Corina. These materials don't suffer from expansion and contraction and grain issues. I love wood, but not for this series.

Many of the original turned pieces where subsequently cast in bronze, some were copper plated, and few cherry wood items where stained black and coated with powdered silicon carbide to match the dark patina of the finished metal pieces.

The glass spheres and kilnformed glass elements bring color and textural contrast to the finished works. Putting it simply and straight forward, the form of the sculptures are elaborate housings for the jewels of glass.



The image above is the one chosen to be on the cover of the issue due out later this year. It is called Aeon. Most of the works have short names that kind of relate to the the work, but I don't agonize over the meaning behind the names. You can see all of the sculptures here.

We completed the telephone interview for the article this weekend. Marilyn Noble, the managing editor allowed me talk her ear off. I sent a follow up email to apologize for the running monologue. It's not that often that I talk about my work. I'm usually just buried in the studio making stuff.

I guess I have been getting out more lately though. I dropped off a delivery of finished art glass panels to Heather Doyle who is one of the founding members of the Chicago Avenue Fire Arts Center (CAFAC see Related Links). She will be creating metal frames to complete the wall hangings. Heather will be teaching metal working at CAFAC, and it will be wonderful for me to teach and collaborate there when it opens later this year.

I'll be working with Heather and her students to create frames for the wall hangings and other sculpture pieces. The goal is to place the pieces in galleries and hopefully on permanent display to raise awareness and funds (when sold) for CAFAC. The work will be examples of what can be done by students when they come to CAFAC.

The powder painting image posted in a previous blog post and this image below will be examples of works which we will placed in galleries, and can actually be done by a student in one weekend class.



I also met with Brian Madson (as mentioned in prior posts) and we had our first discussion on the practicalities and barriers to creating a nonprofit media center. I was really impressed with his experience level. He has worked many media projects for some of the largest nonprofits in the country.

I can see at this point that Brian and I have our work cut out for us, and we'll need to take careful steps along this journey.

I also made two trips to J Ring Glass over the weekend to satisfy my addiction to glass. J Ring is the largest art glass supplier in the upper Midwest. They set the record for their largest single-day store sales this last Saturday. Given the recession we are in that was surprising to hear - I just had to help in breaking the record! Any excuse will do to buy glass!

And I did find some exciting glass. Bullseye is continually expanding their line. They created this ultra blue iridescent glass which I'm really excited about.

Why Designs for Good?

The main difficulty I have had in my creative ventures is the whole area of self promotion. I didn't realize it early on, but it was one of the reasons that I didn't finish my studies in the fine arts. I had very mixed feelings about going to art openings, meeting the right people, belonging to the right clique, bantering about talking about myself, then graduating and having to make a go of it by constantly thinking of ways to draw attention.

Yes, that's a fairly negative summary of what self promotion means, after all we all must promote ourselves in our careers no matter what the field. In my technical career as a database administrator I have no qualms about self promotion. Being out front with my technical skills is largely why I have had a good technical career.

Doing the same with my creative skills is another matter for me. I could go on to list a series of reasons why it is different. But for brevity sake Designs for Good is the resolution of my lifelong quandary regarding self promotion. My various talents become utilitarian by using them to promote a worthy cause.

My photography and graphic designs skills can become communication devices, my artwork can be sold to raise funds, my web and technical knowledge can be used to help an organization more effectively use technology.

This isn't some sort of selfless act of giving. I'm not a bleeding heart liberal. My skills are a gift to me. Some of what I do is so effortless yet the results can be at times quite exceptional. The energy flows in, and now I'm looking for it to flow out just as easily. It is not selfless because I have experienced that through the act of opening up and giving you do indeed get more than you give.

This act of giving and receiving in return is not limited to the physical exchange of some product between myself and my 'client'. As a matter of fact, that is not what I'm talking about at all. That is just the very end result. What I'm referring to is the act of receiving greater creative energy by not holding onto it, but rather letting it flow out in directions that you are not exactly controlling.

I firmly believe that our deeply creative moments are a realization or materialization or manifestation of that which is larger than ourselves. We do not know where in-spiration comes from, where conceptualization is born in us. Ideas just happen; creativity expands who you are when you suddenly see what you did not before, when you master a technique and do what you or possibly no one has done before.

Where does that come from? Surly we lay the ground work by years of practice and study, but the breakthrough moment is a gift.

Again, I could go into a lot of detail on the exact nature of what this 'flow' is and how it benefits me to give it away and not control it, but I'll keep this post short.

For me Designs for Good is my way of dealing with self promotion in a manner that frees me from being self conscious and there by not limiting or possibly disabling my creative potential.

I am not exactly sure where I am going in this venture. I have started out with the Chicago Avenue Fire Arts Center. Then there is this idea of a nonprofit media services company that needs a lot of work. I’m sure I will be doing smaller projects along the way.

The journey can now start now that the self promotion bugaboo is in a jar.

Hello World!

Funny, I do actually remember having my first Pascal program's output say 'Hello World!" all those years ago on my Apple //c.

This blog was created to share my many adventures in the arts and graphic design. I'll be posting or linking to how-to projects as they are created. For instance, I'm currently excited about the technique I'm calling powder painting, and will be posting advice on how to create your own masterpieces :) You can see more examples at my site.



For those who like hands-on education I'll be teaching the technique at the Chicago Avenue Fire Arts Center (CAFAC) later this year, as well as basic kilnformed glass techniques.

On the more serious side of this blog I will be exploring the use my various graphic art, photography, web, and other skills to aid nonprofit organizations. CAFAC (an official NPO) is one of my first forays and there will be more.

I recently met up with Brian Madson who has years of Marketing & Communications experience and apparently we both have been thinking the same thought. That is, to start a media services company which is a nonprofit itself, and whose mission is to serve other nonprofits. This is a very involved idea and the development of the idea will be the source of many posts here.

By chance I met up with Brian via the Minnesota Nonprofit Counsel. I submitted my idea to them and as you might expect they also knew Brian was exploring this idea and they put 2 and 2 together. That's networking, and that is why I started this blog. There is no telling who will cross this path when walking the Internet.

So there you have it. My first blog post.