My SuperTool

Here's my SuperTool.

The assignment was to create a SuperTool from a minimum of 3 tools.

I wanted to use Words as a tool so I taped a piece of cardboard around a paint roller and cut out foam letters to make stamps

Then I inked the stamps and rolled the words on a piece of newsprint for practice. Then I drew that.

I replaced the handle of the paint roller with a pair of pliers that had screwdriver bits at the end and a joint that doubled as a socket wrench. I made the handles into a pencil and an end with an eraser. The wood grain before the eraser end is original to the paint roller handle.

I chose four phrases to repeat and then I read in a book that we make Art out of the things we most need to understand. I guess these phrases are really resonating with me right now.

Why do you stay in prison when the door is so wide open? -Rumi

Perhaps you were made...for such a time as this. -Esther 4:14

From here what you see you become. -Patanjali

If you can cease all restless activity, your integral nature will appear. -Lao Tzu

I'm not sure how many 18 year olds rolled their eyes at me that morning of the Critique.

Seven tools melded into one with a spiritual discipline bent is not what they like to think about at 8am. I'm not sure they were thinking at all.

I hesitate to write about the critique because I would never want to hurt any of my classmates' feelings. I will say that I was shocked and appalled into fits of giggles at who felt compelled to comment on whatever work was being presented. Joe structures these critiques by letting the artist offer an explanation, then he requires 3-4 comments more in depth than, "I like it," and then he chimes in.

One guy, Chazz who wears huge padded earphones all the time, felt the need to walk up to EVERY drawing and stand 4 inches from it (that is, so no one else could see it) and then offer a phrase like, "I get a sense of UNEASE from this composition." Or he would say, "I see a heavy reliance on line and not value."

Chazz was the last one to put up his drawing and HE DID NOT EVEN FINISH IT. I was speechless.

One woman (an adult student) forgot the rules of the critique and totally bashed one girl's (a young 18yo) drawing. Joe let her bash, and then let the artist retort, then let us all hold silence. Then he gently, kindly and knowledgeably argued both sides.

It was a beautiful act of true teaching.

I hope a few fellow classmates woke up to witness his diplomacy and stopped thinking about their hangover, their newest tattoo, or the fact that they remembered the cigarette but not the lighter.

Oh - that reminds me - one dude's tool was a combination of a lighter, a bottle opener and a corkscrew. The ultimate weekend companion.

Rock on, dude.