Wasted Time - Wasted Heart

An installation I created for the Summit Series Headquarters in Miami.

As some of you know, my boyfriend, Thayer Walker, has for the last year been a part of a unique team called Summit Series. For the last 3 years, Summit Series has brought the worlds young thought leaders, innovators and movers and shakers together in annual events. The next event will be on an ocean liner leaving Miami to a private island in the Bahamas. It's pretty nuts. For the past month, I've been staying with him in between projects, and I have a hard time not creating something aside from work when I have time. I was inspired to create "Wasted Time - Wasted Heart" with discarded cardboard boxes and reclaimed house paints.

ROAD TRIP PICS

Hi! As promised, here are some pics from my road trip from San Francisco to Miami.

LAS VEGAS

I loved Las Vegas, as surprising as that sounds. I thought it was a ridiculous city, but there were so many fun, extravagant and over the top things to see that it felt like Disneyland for adults. This pink gorilla suit is a perfect example of this. I think my favorite part of Vegas was all the themed hotels/casinos. If those weren't there, I wouldn't have felt the way that I do. As a former decorative painter, I was blown away by the level of faux painting that went into creating these places. Of course these are the pictures that I didn't take because I kept forgetting my camera. Thanks to Hannah, I at least have a picture of me with the pink gorilla man.

ROAD STOP I THINK IN ARIZONA

I LOVE THIS PAINTED SIGN IN TEXAS

New Orleans was most definitely my very favorite city on the trip. Oh my god! I haven't had such a visceral reaction to a place in a very long time. As we drove in, I just gasped at the architecture, narrow cobblestone roads, signs, smells...all of it. Of course the food was one of the best parts. One very memorable lunch was at a place called Bon Ton. We got there right when they opened. We were one of the first customers. Here is a pic of the interior of the restaurant.

And this is how full it got after about 15 minutes. Crazy. We had crab meat au gratin, crawfish jambalaya, crawfish etouffee followed by whiskey bread pudding. This bread pudding was insane. It was made with very densely compressed pieces of french bread drenched in a whiskey sauce. The whiskey was added after the sauce was cooked so it was straight uncooked alcohol. Sooooo goood!

MORE HAND-PAINTED FABULOUSNESS

I feel like this is the kind of thing you would only see in New Orleans.

Why is it that I'm so attracted to old abandoned buildings?

I love these old posts where horses would have been tied back in the day. It's too bad they don't still have the rings in the mouths where the reins would have attached.

While exploring the city, we came across a gallery specializing in all things animals. It was called Animal Art Antiques. Very self explanatory. In there, I saw two incredible 3-D models that had I had the money, would have bought in a second.

This particular cow model was made by a company called SOMSO. They are one of the leading companies in 3-D scientific models. SOMSO is located in Germany and there is a SOMSO Museum in Sonneberg. Sonneberg was never on my list of places to visit, but it certainly is now. Apparently they also have a toy museum and has long been a center for toy making. Who knew?

This beauty is made of paper mache!!! Paper mache, people! Incredible.

Okay. So normally I think these street performers are pretty silly, but I'm not going to lie. I couldn't possibly imagine holding this pose for more than 10 seconds.

MIA

Whoa! I can't believe how crazy fast time flies.

I have a lot to catch everyone up on....

So, I finished my internship in Panama on January 4th. In an effort to fit 2 months of time lapsed into a nutshell, I'll curate this post down to the bare minimum.

Out of all the work I've done at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, I'm somehow attached to this painting I did of a greenbanded goby (top) and a red-cheeked goby (bottom) for fish expert, Dr. Ross Robertson. It is a comparison of the two very visually similar species. The red-cheeked is a new species discovered in the waters of Honduras. The genetic difference of the two is about 11%. It was just so cool to put the fish side by side. Thus far, a comparison such as this doesn't exist.


Another project that I worked on with Ross is an app for an identification guide. Below is the opening page for this.

Panama was an unforgettable experience. It was mixed with excitement for experiencing something new with the difficulty of being so far from my loved ones. I found all of my projects very fascinating and gratifying. I hope that the very special friendships I made will be lasting. They made all the difference in the world and the Panama I know is largely due to them.

So what now?

I was back in San Francisco for a couple of weeks. My sister just had a baby!!! That makes me a first time aunt. Her name is Lelu Kim Schmidt. I can't tell you how special meeting her for the first time was. I was so happy to paint a piece for her to hang over the crib. Not to worry, it's painted on loose canvas so there is no harm in a heavy painting falling on her. It's 3 1/2 x 4 1/2 feet. We thought a sea scape would be perfect for her. She now has a space rug, animal curtains and an ocean scene over her crib. :)


Now it's the second week of February and where am I now? I have the month of February to myself before I begin my final internship at Cornell's Lab of Ornithology so I decided to drive from SF to Miami to spend some much needed time with my boyfriend who is currently here for work. I took a fun road trip with my friend Hannah Berman. For those of you who don't know her, Hannah is an amazingly talented designer. She specializes in letter pressed cards and her line is sold all over the country in various stores. It was great because the route we took was unfamiliar territory. I had never been to any of our major destination points--Las Vegas, The Grand Canyon, Albuquerque, Austin, New Orleans, Tallahassee along with a very special place in Florida called Cassadaga. We've affectionately named it "Psychic Town." It is a tiny town with a population of about 100. Of those 100, 40 of them are psychics. In the center of town, is a bookstore. In this incensed and crystal filled bookstore is a large white board with many names and phone numbers. As you look at the board, a name should stand out. This is the psychic that you should call in order to get the best reading. I can't actually even remember who my guy was, but what an experience. I didn't come away from it feeling worse or better about things, so I suppose that's the best I could hope for. I did end up with a puffy paint Rorschach butterfly used to analyze my person through chakra colors. That was fun.

Hannah also visited me in Panama. Below are some pics from the visit and the road trip. All of these pictures were taken by Hannah.

CASCO VIEJO

CATS ON A SIGN IN CASCO VIEJO

EVERY BUS IN PANAMA IS UNIQUE PAINTED IN THIS MANNER

One of the common themes of her photos was painted signage. I'm glad that it was documented. That was one of my favorite things in Panama--hand painted signs, murals on buildings and custom painted buses.

Okay....I lied. I'll be attaching pics from the road trip in a separate post. I was looking through them and there are too many that I want to tell you about. I'll try not to let 2 months pass before these go up!