Letter of Interest for Tournesol Award

So the Headlands Center For The Arts has a new online application program called “SlideRoom” it’s super easy to use, and it works great. I really hope more organizations start to use it. I imagine it would really work well in the art school application process…it makes a slide list receipt/confirmation of upload that you can print out as well. How handy.

The one thing that I wish was that it was more intuitive to shuffle the order around. Once uploaded, the images were not easy to move, so they stayed in the same sequence as they were uploaded.

I just finished up the application for the Tournesol Award ($10,000.00 and a studio in the Marin Headlands *my favorite place to bike*) below you will find the submitted letter of interest.

Dear Tournesol Award committee:

The Headlands has been an integral aspect of my life in the Bay Area. I am an avid cyclist, and last Saturday I was riding my mountain bike on the Miwok trail north of the stables, when I encountered a rough-skinned newt sauntering across my path. I took pause to study his movements and the intricate texture of his skin. It’s experiences like these that ONLY the Headlands can offer and inspire the way I think about the world.

I have an expanded view of works on paper, and as such I have executed projects that integrate digital drawing techniques, various mounting methods, collage, and found objects. My work is simultaneously influenced by technology, while intuitively responding to the embodied experience of life.

Each work has a self-contained reality and often a forthright sense of place. Through the choice of bright colors, condensation of space, and manipulation of visual cues, I create experiences that imply phenomena and images that exude their thing-ness. That is, the unique properties of the subjects depicted are emphasized. What my artwork lacks in verisimilitude, it gains in joyful complexity and honest wonder. I have been gradually getting larger with my practice. Presently I am working on an ambitious four by eight-foot piece of paper, and I want to move even larger, yet I have run out of wall space in my bedroom.

The beauty of our earth inspires me, and I strive to acknowledge the wonders of the natural world by expounding on intuition while maintaining a clear focus on my life as an artist.

As an athlete I understand the rigors of repeated practice, and it is undeniable that creativity and discipline go hand in hand. A residency at the Headlands Center for the Arts will have a profoundly positive effect on my artistic endeavors because I will have a studio that will be a consistent environment in which to work, as well as a nourishing community of peers that is following a similar life path.

Formerly, I have worked up to four jobs at once to pay for the extensive debt I incurred during my tenure at Cornell and the San Francisco Art Institute. I have continued to create new art through all of this, and still maintain an exhibition record complete with solo shows.

Starting in June, I will be working solely for the San Francisco Ballet as their residence manager, and as such, I will be free from noon to seven daily to work in the studio. It will be the first time since graduate school that I will have a block of time dedicated to artistic creation. I aspire to spend that time working at the Headlands Center for the Arts.

My commitment to pursuing a life as an artist is unquestionable. By winning the Tournesol award I will engage in a more complete art practice. It will be my distinct honor to represent the Headlands Center for the Arts as I continue to move forward with my professional art career. Thank you for your consideration.

Yours sincerely,

Pete Ippel

Published by Pete Ippel

Pete Ippel, the son of a dancer and a musician, was born in Oak Park, Illinois and has been surrounded by the arts since birth. He moved to Morris, Illinois in 1989 and started to participate in athletics rather than dance. After high school, Pete attended Cornell University where he received a BA in psychology and a BFA in photo / digital art making. He continued to follow his sporting dreams in the high jump, which culminated in a school record leap of 7 feet 1/2 inch in 2001. In May 2004 he attained an MFA degree in the New Genres department of the San Francisco Art Institute. Presently Pete is a practicing artist whose work is in numerous private collections and has been exhibited in New York, California, and internationally. Mr. Ippel resides in Working Artists Ventura, a sustainable artist community in southern California. In addition, he teaches art, is a web developer, an active blogger, and still high jumps from time to time. As a passionate problem solver and a pragmatic optimist, Pete’s art and his life are full of exciting challenges.

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2 Comments

  1. Pete… good luck! I don’t know very many practicing artists, though several good friends of mine at Berkeley are. So, I have no idea how you compare to all the other artists applying for the Tournesol but it strikes me that if anyone is deserving of it, you are.

    Whenever I visit your blog or ‘hear’ a Tweet of yours, it’s invariably thought-provoking, and more importantly: inspiring. The kind of creativity (and energy) you’re evidently made of should be bottled… and given away for free. ::chuckle::

    Has no one nominated you yet for a MacArthur genius award? What slackers. 😉

    best,
    Lloyd

  2. Lloyd, thank you so much for your kind words. I’d love a genius award…I feel like everyday that I’m alive I’m getting more experience that is really positively influencing my understanding of social, artistic, and technological developments. I’m on the verge of releasing much of my work through Creative Commons and planning to start broadcasting live studio shows by the end of June.

    I’m really excited. Thank you again for the encouragement, Lloyd.

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