CVA Art Sale

Friday, Dec 4th through Sunday, Dec 6th, CVA held it's annual Holiday Art Sale. Friday night was the "Preview Party" where you could pay to get in and get first dibs on reasonably priced artwork. Saturday and Sunday, the sale was free to attend. I was there part of all 3 days.

On Friday during the Preview Party, I snapped a few photos.

404 full of work just before the doors opened.


CVA students putting the final touches on the layout.


Work in the silent auction.


The sale filling up.


Silent auction.


People looking for a deal.

The weekend was a lot of fun, and hopefully a success for CVA. 50% of each sale goes to the student / faculty / alumnus who is selling the work, and the other 50% goes into the CVA Scholarship Fund. I sold a big piece in the silent auction and a few small ones in the sale, so I was able to help out and earn a few bucks of my own.

Happy winter everyone!

Good-Bye, Old Friend

It just didn’t pay to keep my old Epson 4000 printer. It’s been leaving black marks on my prints recently, so I’ve just been using it for test prints. Plus, I can print at the U of M on great 4800s (for a small fee).

So this weekend, I did this:

My printer waltzed out of my house this morning with Arturo, a nice young man. Treat it well, Arturo! You’ll be missed old buddy:

CVA Holiday Sale: Set-Up

Last night, I helped set up for the CVA Holiday Sale for a few hours. CVA had an official “alumni” night, and there were 6-8 alumni that came in to help out.

Jamie shrink-wrapping


Kim and I worked on hanging all the work on this wall


Bins of work, and more being hung


Megan, Jamie, and Carmen mulling over the layout


After Kim and I finished hanging everything on the east wall of room 404

Preview Party TONIGHT from 5 pm - 8 pm. Tickets are $25 at the door. Holiday Sale Saturday and Sunday; 10 am - 4 pm on Sat, 12 pm - 4 pm on Sun. The sale is FREE. See my last post for more details.

Oh, one last thing: I’m thinking about getting this for Grandma. I think she’d LOVE it:

CVA Holiday Sale and Art Auction

This weekend is the College of Visual Arts Holiday Sale. Here's some info:

Preview Party
Friday, December 4, 5 pm - 8 pm
$20 online tickets, $25 at the door

Holiday Sale
Saturday, December 5, 10 am - 4 pm
Sunday, December 6, 12 pm - 4 pm

Mark your calendar for CVA's newly expanded Holiday Art Sale December 5 and 6. This year's sale promises to be ripe with fresh artwork for you to peruse and purchase. Your best bet at snatching up the hottest artwork is to attend the Preview Party on Friday, December 4. Preview tickets are $20 purchased in advance online, or $25 at the door.

The sale features artwork by students, alumni, faculty, and staff. Selected sale artwork and prints from the CVA Art Archives will be included in a silent auction. The auction closes at 3 p.m. on Sunday. Proceeds benefit CVA scholarship funds.

The CVA Gallery is located at 173 Western Ave N, St. Paul MN, 55102. Click here for directions on CVA's Website, or click here to see where the gallery is on Google Maps.

I'll be there for a brief bit on all 3 days. I'll take a few photos when I go so you can see what the hubbub is all about. I have a few pieces in the auction, 1 piece in the sale, and a few books in the sale. See you there! (Or check back next week to see some photos if you can't make it.)

Diane Arbus: Secrets...

A photograph is a secret about a secret. The more it tells you the less you know.

- Diane Arbus

One More Shot From "Here and Now"

Andy Mattern, one of the new Graduate Students in the Photo Dept at the University of Minnesota, documented some of the work at the "Here and Now" Contemporary Photography Exhibit at the Katherine E. Nash Gallery. He grabbed a photograph of my work, and it's nice that he did that in the evening when the light isn't streaming through the window just to the left of my pieces. Here's the photograph he made:

(Click the image for a slightly larger view)

The show just came down, so if you missed it, you missed it.....

Robert Frank: Criticism

Above all, I know that life for a photographer cannot be a matter of indifference. Opinion often consists of a kind of criticism. But criticism can come out of love. It is important to see what is invisible to others - perhaps the look of hope or the look of sadness. Also, it is always the instantaneous reaction to oneself that produces a photograph.

- Robert Frank
U.S. Camera Annual, 1958

SPE Midwest Reception

This weekend, the Society for Photography Education (SPE) has it’s Midwest conference in Minneapolis.

This Friday night (Oct 30th), there’s a special reception for the SPE members at the Katherine E. Nash Gallery. (If you’ll look a few posts down, you’ll see that I’m in the current show at the Nash.) So swing by the Nash this Friday from 5:30-7. I wasn’t able to make the opening reception 10 days ago, but I hope to make it to the reception on Friday.

Click here to learn more about SPE Midwest.

New Layout

I spent part of Friday and Saturday tweaking html code and playing around with the layout of this site. What do you think?

Robert Adams on Making Photos

No place is boring, if you've had a good night's sleep and have a pocket full of unexposed film.

- Robert Adams
Darkroom & Creative Camera Techniques, May 1995

Work Up at the Katherine E. Nash Gallery

Yesterday, the photography show “Here and Now” officially went up. And it looks GOOD. It’s on display at the Katherine E. Nash Gallery on the University of Minnesota campus. The opening reception this is Friday from 6-8:30 pm, but unfortunately, I won’t be able to make it. So I snapped a few photos of my work at the Nash when I stopped by yesterday:

My work next to Caroline’s

So I won’t see you at the opening, but make sure to swing by and see the show between now and November 12th. Gallery hours are Tuesday through Saturday, 11 am - 7 pm.

Why Did I Ever Stop Doing This?

I haven’t built my own frames since undergrad. It was time to give it a whirl again. Man, I missed it. I needed 6-8 frames that were 24” x 24”. So I got to work.

. . . . . . . . Day 1 . . . . . . . .


Stairs to the CVA Sculpture studio


90 feet of 1x3 inch poplar "rabbited out"


36 two-foot mitered pieces


“Manly” blood blister
(from a not-so-manly tape measure... oops.)

. . . . . . . . Day 2 . . . . . . . .


Frames taking shape


9 frames (before puttying and sanding)


After putty and sanding
(with enough left over for a tiny frame)

. . . . . . . . Later Days . . . . . . . .


Applying tung oil in my garage


Picking up matboard and foamcore at Tradewinds


Framed up


Installing D-rings and wire


Delivered to the Nash for installation

- Lumber: $91
- Glass: $64
- Foam core and mat: $140
- Tung oil: $9

- Total: $304
- $50.66 / piece (with 3 frames to spare)

So for that price, I have 6 framed pieces ready to hang. AND I have 3 extra frames all ready to use in the future.

“Here and Now” on the University of Minnesota Website

I guess the title says it all. Click here to see the little write-up.

Again, you're all invited to the public reception that has been scheduled for Friday, October 16, 6-8:30 pm.

"Here and Now" Postcard

Reception: Friday, Oct 16, 6:00 pm - 8:30 pm. Stop by the Katherine E. Nash Gallery on the University of Minnesota Campus. I'll have 6 photographs in the show.

Susan Sontag: "Bad" Photographs

It is not altogether wrong to say that there is no such thing as a bad photograph - only less interesting, less relevant, less mysterious ones.

- Susan Sontag

A Few New “Vacation Photos”

Last month, I posted some Holga vacation photos. I made a few more photos on a different summer trip to a different lake a few weeks ago. Here are some from the recent trip to the lake:

“Ben in the Pool”


“Hose and Pool”


“Trade Lake”


“Picnic Lunch (Grapes, Yogurt-Covered Raisins, and Hot Dogs)”


“Scout: Always Fetching”


“The Tree by the Lake”

78 Photography Rules

78 funny photography rules and useful advices created by Latvian photographer Ivars Gravlejs. (Taken from Gawno.)

ALARMA! Don’t take it serious, please.