Earlier this month I participated in SOMArts Community Center’s show “MOMENTS (Bringing Back the Now)”. At the opening, Justin Hoover, the newly hired director of the gallery space, re-created the 100 Performances for the Hole that he formerly curated out of his Garage San Francisco’s Pacific Heights Neighborhood.
For 100 Performances for the Hole Take-Two, the dimensions of the hole were expanded, and moved from an automotive trench to a sand casting pit.
I issued four instructions to the group:
The hole is defined as the cut in the cement.
You may not get in the hole.
Any bill that lands outside of the hole must be kicked into the hole.
Any bills that you snatch with your sticky hand are yours, any bills left in the hole after the two minutes are mine.
“Free Money, Stick Fingers” involves the art market, memory of childhood games, issues of control, gift giving, and philanthropic aims.
In addition, there is a cameo appearance of “Free Money, Sticky Fingers” toward the end of the short video “A Day in San Francisco” by Rossita Dove.
Check out the Photos and the press release (below) for more information about the exhibition.
100 Performances for the Hole – Take Two is the opening event (#1 of 3) of a month long exhibition called: MOMENTS (Bringing Back the Now). This show features a series of live art events that transform the gallery into a contemporary art laboratory exploring the intersection between visual mediums, performance art, and time-based sculpture.
Conceived of by SOMArts Curator and Gallery Director Justin Hoover, this exhibition examines the state of contemporary live art in the Bay Are by inviting the collaboration and participation of over 100 performance artists working in a variety of styles and methods. MOMENTS (Bringing Back The Now) is structured around three events examining performance art today: a series of 100 two-minute, site-specific performances performed one after another, a ballet with heavy machinery that was inspired by a previous performance choreographed by youth in a housing complex, and a series of time-based and mobile/ephemeral sculptures.
According to curator Justin Hoover “the lived moment is often greatly under-appreciated, in life and in the arts. Largely, in the mind of the public, fine art is relegated to objects and environments, and rarely is the emotionality and the nuance of a lived moment evidenced as an artwork. In the contemporary moment, art has long surpassed the realm of objecthood and some of the most innovative new forms reside i experience. By highlighting local performance artists and performative installations, SOMArts gives Bay Area artists and audiences a chance to exchange ideas and build attention around a developing form that rarely finds its way into a gallery. MOMENTS (Bring Back the Now) brings immediacy back to the experience of contemporary art viewership.”
Additionally, this exhibition will work in conjunction with the Bay Area Video Coalition (BAVC) to upload this live program directly to cable television.
100 Performances for the Hole – Take Two breathes fresh life into a formerly disused part of the SOMArts Main Gallery, namely what remains of the mechanics pit from the building’s former life as the Union Machine Company. Through a simple hole and an open call for ephemeral performance artwork, 100 Performances highlighting the contemporary timescape of today and invigorates a wide swath of the performance art community, one that is vibrant, innovative, playful, and elusive. This tour-de-force of the ephemeral is juried by Kevin B. Chen, Peter Foucault, Justin Hoover, Jackie Im, Lex Leifheit, and Lucy Kalyani Lin.
Payment For A Crispy 100 Dollar Bill By Pete Ippel
For Justin Hoover’s project Radical Practices: The Seduction of Duchamp, Pete Ippel auctioned off a crispy 100 dollar bill with opening bids starting at $5.00. Ippel’s project brings into question context, gift, value, and the art market. The unaltered bill sold for $115.00, the proceeds were split between Justin Hoover (auctioneer) and Pete Ippel (artist). Video documentation to follow.
Sensing demands a market. Values are automatically assigned to a stimulus as a function of their reception. This fundamental law of being, embodied at an unconscious level, manifests in every aspect of human existence.
To have a body unaware of the market of stimulus is to have a body damaged by its environment. In a fleeting glance to the heavens to spy a bird taking flight, a sunbeam hits our eyes. Do we not cower to the ray’s power to blind yet marvel at the universe it illuminates? The internal mechanisms built to protect our vision restrict the size of our pupil because our unconscious knows the cost of failing to do so. Staring directly into the sun is a sizzling reminder of blue spots that a retina is merely the ant on the sidewalk and our natural lens a child’s magnifier.
It’s no wonder that we fall prey to the intoxicating glow of the liquid crystal display. We are drawn to the screen as a moth to a lamp. Attracted by the promise of information, yet burned by the theft of time. It’s our choice to turn on the back-lit window, to navigate it. Yet within the journey to the content of our desire, there exists distractions at every turn.
The conscious and the unconscious market are always present, and it is the charge of the sensor to be present and aware in each moment. Unlocking myriad economies is the crux of Market Forces.
The exhibition commands the attention economy, the cognitive economy, and the social economy by parting space into three distinct arenas.
Attention Economy
Physical objects in space, whirring – clicking – bouncing, emulating natural systems in their fabrication demand the viewer at an unconscious level to observe.
Cognitive Economy
When objects are common, uniform, static they become background. Cans on a supermarket shelf, the logo of the auction where you bid daily, the face of the homeless man you constantly ignore. In the cognitive economy artists succeed when they inject just enough dissonance to be perceptible, so that the viewer becomes aware of the behavior in question.
Social Economy
At times Utopian in its scope and generosity, the social economy succeeds when sharing concepts, ideas, and experiences trumps individualistic, ego-based thinking. Cultural posturing, intellectual flexing, and acute misunderstanding, while uncomfortable, are the necessary market pull-backs obviating utter collapse. Only through rigorous effort will the social economy transcend the emotional rise and fall of communication-breakdown and maintain a positive trajectory.
As a whole Market Forces reverberates with the promise that each economy, attention, cognitive, and social, is a valid space for artists to operate.
For Justin Hoover’s project Radical Practices: The Seduction of Duchamp, Pete Ippel auctioned off a crispy 100 dollar bill with opening bids starting at $5.00. Ippel’s project brings into question context, gift, value, and the art market. The unaltered bill sold for $115.00. Video documentation to follow.
Pete’s gift to the Fraternity is quite unique. In addition to naming Phi Delta Theta as a beneficiary of an IRA, he plans on providing Phi Delta Theta with artwork. After reminiscing about the Fraternity house at Cornell—the plaques on each of the doors with names of past tenants, the knight statue, and so on—Brother Ippel decided to donate his artwork as a nest egg to pass forward.
“I may not have huge stacks of cash to donate but I do have huge confidence in my art…,” he says.
“It’s like buying stock in [myself]. I’m a talented artist—here’s the artwork I made at a particular time in my life and it’s a gift.” With his apparent zest and love of life, Pete Ippel has proudly joined the Living Bond Society.
“Phi Delta Theta has been such a great experience for me,” he says, “that I want to support it and keep it going for those that come after me.”
During his tenure at Cornell University, Pete’s efforts with the social advocacy group Renaissance and the New York Alpha Chapter of Phi Delta Theta resulted in many positive changes on campus including development of the CU Tonight Commission, creation of concerts and a greater variety of activities (Slope Fest) during the Slope Day celebration, and establishment of the first alcohol-free fraternity housing on Cornell University’s campus.
Presently I am applying for the Artadia grant for residents of San Francisco. I’ve been working on revising a 300 word artist statement. A wonderful byproduct of sorting out my computer files, and getting everything indexed on one machine is that I can see my growth. Below are a variety of iterations on an artistic statement of purpose starting with the most recent and working backwards:
October 2009
I am a blue whale with information filtering baleen who is constantly seeking a nutritious meal. My ultimate desire is to discover where abstract relationships inform and enrich so that all will benefit from my research and explorations. I create art to draw relevant connections and to comprehend the delightful complexities of life.
I strive to express my intent clearly so there is maximal perceptual effect with succinct and prescient information, regardless of the medium.
Interactive social space, the augmented reality of the ubiquitous Network, is my ocean. As boundaries converge between online and offline the essence of interrelated nodes is revealed. The strongest pathways are those that are nurtured by human interaction.
In my practice, photography and writing are constant while drawing, installation, and performance punctuate my narrative life-stream. Each lived act is a moment to make artistic decisions.
As an athlete I know that discipline and creativity go hand in hand. As an artist I train every day. By utilizing the camera and the Internet to increase my facility, the tools become transparent and embodied. Just as a basketball player responds spontaneously to a defender so does the artist to afferent stimuli.
I achieve success when my technique provides self awareness and the act of living leads to radiant moments of intuition. I am set free and liberated from the restraints of time and space to make artistic choices in the present.
The news become the nows: convergence and singularity come to fruition and temporality folds in on itself. Being and focus are only manifest from cyclical revisiting, assessing, and growing; an iterative process that advances the conceptual underpinnings of my work. When I effectively transduce the energy of inspiration to the generative moment that follows, the resulting forcefulness of expression is undeniable.
June 2009
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.
I have an expanded view of the role of the artist, and as such I have executed projects that integrate digital drawing techniques, various mounting methods, collage, and found objects. My art 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.
I have continued to create new art through all of this, and still maintain an exhibition record complete with solo shows. My commitment to pursuing a life as an artist is unquestionable.
August 2004
Pete Ippel Artist Statement
Hypermodernity is the conceptual groundwork for my present body of imagery and videos, insomuch as it serves not only as a thesis, but also as an explanation.
HYPERMODERN: pronunciation: ‘hI-p&r’mä-d&rn. From Latin hyper-, and modernus, also from Latin modo, just now. 1 : above : beyond : SUPER- involving recent techniques, methods, or ideas : UP-TO-DATE.
In my own words: A forum for expression and research influenced by technology.
Whether the work manifests itself as a website, performance, action, sculpture, video or two-dimensional piece, it is likely touched by some aspect of mediation through the mechanical or digital. This mode of production has lead to an artistic practice and a series of works that speaks to the personal, yet maintains an open avenue for viewer affect.
May 2003 first year MFA review
Peter Ezekiel Ippel
PERSONAL STATEMENT
Issues of mediation, sexuality, technology, and computer / human interaction lie at the core of my work. Leaving behind the rural beauty of Ithaca, New York to live in the ultra-urban environment of Market Street, the busiest area in San Francisco, has led to analytical artistic responses where creative intervention in the cityscape is a primary concern. The constant inundation of imagery, the influx of information, and the decrease of human contact both in the physical and virtual world have acted as a catalyst that drives the artist to divert the bombardment, and solidify the role that an activist / artist plays in society.
Utilizing the web as the primary vehicle to promote and display artistic agendas, “hypermodern.net” acts as an online melting pot where the interplay among destruction / construction of identity, corporate fronting, and virtual space all combine to form an amalgam of artwork that serves as a forum to open communication and spark a dialog among those that view it.
For certain individuals Ebay has become a lifestyle, an extreme use of the service where people are a slave to their auctions, so dependent on checking up that it interferes with daily functioning. According the DSM-IV, the manual for diagnosing psychological disorders, this would be a criterion for a type of obsessive-compulsive behavior. Commodiphilia, diagnosed as assigning value to valueless objects in the off chance that it may be worth something to another disparate individual, is an artist coined term that references both the commodity, and the sexual perversion of pedophilia. “Obay.info” critiques the mega-consumerist culture that surrounds Ebay, and is both a visual pun and a cautionary piece that succeeds when the user questions why they are so involved with buying and selling of the most mundane possessions.
“Free Memory” is an event created to open a discourse between what memories consists of in terms of ephemeral human thought, and that of a data driven memory model of a computer. The event is initiated by the anonymous gift of a floppy disk to passers by and concludes when the box of disks is empty. Unbeknownst to the receiver, the artists memories, documented in photographic form, are present on the disk thereby transferring both ephemeral, and concrete memory.
A Perecian celebration of the everyday, “Market Street All-Stars” elevates the members of the1049 apartment building by placing them in their own online comic book series. The stories driven by actual events will humorously depict what goes on in these single men’s lives with an edge of social commentary and tongue in cheek gravity.
Most recently, identity and signifiers have become paramount in the conversation between the warm organic body the cold flatness of the machine. Rejection, rejuvenation, and the sloughing off of routine have resulted in the video documentation of internal contradiction. The disparate relations among the individual personalities mediated by their conversations result in a series of short pieces that enter the greater mind space of day-to-day existence in a confusing technological world.
It is becoming more apparent that the Freudian and Lacanian discourse revolving around humor, respect, and social status are currently of the utmost concern. Literally playing the role of the jester, humorist, asshole, and nerd all has allowed for explorations into other art making practices separated from those bound to the computer. By unplugging, the same concerns of mediation, sexuality, technology, and computer / human interaction are examined in a more visceral and perhaps more thorough way.
October 2002
Issues of mediation, sexuality, technology, and computer / human interaction lie at the core of my most recent work. Leaving behind the rural beauty of Ithaca, New York to live in the ultra-urban environment of Market Street, the busiest area in San Francisco, has led to analytical artistic responses where creative intervention in the cityscape is a primary concern. The constant inundation of imagery, the influx of information, and the decrease of human contact both in the physical and virtual world have acted as a catalyst that drives the artist to divert the bombardment, and solidify the role that an activist / artist plays in society.
January 2002
During my undergraduate years, I have developed my academic, artistic, and visual concerns in a manner that is both representative of my growth as an artist and as a person. As I have been engaging with my surroundings and creating works it has become evident to me that I am interested in three main juxtapositions: memory and fantasy, virtuality and reality, and tactility and non-existence. These relationships deal with perception of surroundings, and when combined with narrative and the art object have led to many successful works.
As a dual degree student at Cornell University, and the owner of my own business, I have had the opportunity to explore academia and the professional world to a great extent. I am enrolled in two colleges concurrently (College of Arts and Sciences in the psychology department, and the College of Architecture, Art, and Planning in the fine art department). My goal when I decided to take this course of study was clear. I wanted to draw as much from the university as possible, while maintaining a rigorous academic schedule, and having a full life within the Cornell community.
Clearly, I have maintained that vision, and this spring I will be continuing to pursue the digital realm with upper level classes in three-dimentional animation and digital music composition. The instructors are leaders in their field, and I am quite excited to develop my skills further. My own thesis show, scheduled for May, will maintain it’s current trajectory down the digital path, and this spring’s projects will be a progression toward an installation that will be both thoughtful, and provoking.
The ambition that I have to continue my education at the graduate level is unparalleled. As the book is closing on my career at Cornell, I look forward to continuing my studies that will lead to a masters of fine arts degree. The constructive criticism that I will receive from peers as well as faculty will be invaluable in the continued discovery of digital media. With the constant shifts in technology, as well as the social climate, there is no doubt in my mind that I will be working hard at documenting, exploring, and experimenting with the contrasts in life. As a professional, practicing artist, I have the desire to push the perception and interpretation of digital art and to question what is acceptable, while continuing to delve into the relationships between memory and fantasy, virtuality and reality, and tactility and non-existence.
After reading Hawking’s A Brief History of Time, my aunt Linda’s recent death, and the subsequent re-connection with family, I have been spending much of my energy thinking about cycles, relationships, temporarily, directionality, and scale.
Convergence, overlap, pattern, and sequences also draw my attention. I will be releasing my writing in the order it was written starting on August 24, 1993. The works will be available inside hypermodern.net organized with relevant categories and tags. Individual spiral volumes will also be grouped in series. The format will likely change as I discover the optimal way in which to make individual entries navigable.
The purpose of Preblog is to take longitudinal data that wraps around August 1997 and to discover a paradigm shift around public/private, young/mature, and pre/post Internet access that started when I got a laptop, left for college, and was granted access to the Internet. For a complete project description you can find the initial proposal to Rhizome which unfortunately did not lead to a grant.
Encyclopedia Britannica states that a memoir is:
History or record composed from personal observation and experience. Closely related to autobiography, a memoir differs chiefly in the degree of emphasis on external events. Unlike writers of autobiography, who are concerned primarily with themselves as subject matter, writers of memoir usually have played roles in, or have closely observed, historical events, and their main purpose is describing or interpreting those events.
Preblog skates the line between a memoir and autobiography in a few key areas, specifically addressing the following:
artistic maturation
digital crossroads
interpersonal relationships
family life
athletic performance
humor
romance
development of self
goal setting
positive self-talk (affirmation)
For many pioneering artists and scientists, impactful research begins with experiments on the self. I intend, in both a qualitative and quantitative manner to evaluate these writings to create a data-set that will be MINE (personally) and that I will MINE (data). Essentially hypermodern.net is becoming what I have always intended it to be: a reflection of the lived intuitive artistic experience to be culled for inspiration and understanding. After all, we have nothing to lose but our illusions.
Nothing To Lose But Our Illusions: An Interview With David Edwards
by Derrick Jensen
Originally published in the U.S. in The Sun magazine, June 2000
If what’s wrong for me, on a fundamental level, is wrong for the planet, then saving the planet isn’t about trying to be righteous and green; it’s about saving your own life, and the life in the world in the process.
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.
Preblog: Time capsule to Midwestern Teenage Life Before the World Wide Web – Blogging as a 15-Year-Old and 30-Year-Old at the Same Time
San Francisco based artist Pete Ippel travels to rural Illinois to unlock the fire-proof safe that’s been buried in the closet of his childhood home since 1997. Ippel investigates and interprets nearly three years of the pre-web, Midwestern teenage experience of the middle 90s contrasting it with his technology-laden life in Northern California. Ippel will “Preblog” his journals and images systematically posting a transcription to http://hypermodern.net/tag/preblog/ three times daily.
Project Description
Inspiration:
The Atlantic magazine has asked the question “Is Google making us stupid?” Don Tapscott in his text Grown Up Digital argues that “If you understand the Net Genration, you will understand the future”.
My personal history has a fortunate crossroads in it that is incredibly stark: life experience pre vs. post Internet access is divided and recorded.
In “Preblog” I will be simultaneously blogging as a 15-year-old boy and 30-year-old man.
The core concept of the “Preblog” is to explore the following dichotomies: childhood/adulthood, private/public, rural/urban
Transcribing and analyzing nearly three years of daily writing (30 months Dec 1995-August 1997) in one year will be a challenge. I take solace in author Jim Collins’ statement that, “Creativity and discipline go hand in hand”.
Each Preblog post will be composed of the following:
1.) A tagged and linked Wordpress entry of the handwritten text
2.) A scan of the actual journal document in .pdf format
3.) Access to a downloadable .doc transcript of the journal entry
4.) Accompanying analog photos, rephotographed or scanned
5.) A contemporary response to the text by the artist
6.) A community comments section
Preblog entries are located in a Sentry fireproof file safe in Morris, Illinois.
Artist and athlete Pete Ippel lines up for a race in Morris, Illinois, April 1997 Photo: MCHS yearbook staff
Production Timeline
1.) January 4-10 Fly to Chicago, drive to Morris, Illinois. Document surroundings photographically.
2.) January 11-17 Gather analog photos, prepare for transport of documents.
3.) January 18-24 Fly to San Francisco, California. Document surroundings photographically
4.) January 25 – December 31 Actively transcribe, preblog, analyze, share, and reply to comments.
Process:
1.) Journal pages will be removed from their spiral binding
2.) The frayed edges will be cut off
3.) Supplemental inserts (playbills etc will be unfolded and unstapled)
4.) Utilizing the Fujitsu ScanSnap, both sides of the sheet will be scanned in one pass
5.) Each page will be placed in a sheet protector and clipped into a three ring binder
6.) Each journal entry will be given an accessioning number
7.) A corresponding transcript will be typed for each handwritten journal entry
8.) The text of the transcript will be posted to hypermodern.net with the downloadable .doc file and .pdf scan
The Preblog process will be successful because I have great familiarity with the tools I will be using, and I have the discipline to transcribe three entries a day. Each entry to the original journal is one hand written page which translates into approximately 150 words, so three posts a day at 35 words per minute typing speed plus formatting, analysis, and scanning will take approximately 1.5 hours per day.
Project Budget
1.) Round trip airplane tickets San Francisco to Chicago $500.00
2.) Fujitsu ScanSnap S1500M for document .pdf file creation and analog print photography digitization $500.00
3.) Artist Fees 13.30 dollars / day for 300 days. $13.30 / 3 posts a day = 4.4 dollars per post. $4000.00
Total commission $5,000.
History
After being dumped at the holiday dance when I was a sophomore in high school in 1995, I was searching for answers…I wanted to figure out why it happened and to grow from the experience. I took to writing. I updated my journal every night before bed. If I was away, I wrote on napkins or hotel paper. Ticket stubs and playbills were stuffed between pages. I wanted to document my thoughts to grow.
I recorded events in order to better understand my world, when I left for college in upstate New York, the hundreds of pages of documents were packed in a fire-proof safe in my bedroom in Morris, Illinois.
Two days before my departure for college, I received a Compaq 1535DM as a gift from my parents. I didn’t sleep for the next 36 hours because I was exploring my new Pentium 133mhz laptop and how to use it.
A few days later during Cornell University orientation week’s, “Travelers of the Electronic Highway” course, my journaling practice would be forever altered. It was the first exposure I had to the Internet.
I received a network id and an email address in August 1997. The computer replaced the hand written pages of my journal as I began to think of my emails as a flowing life record that I could index and search. My behavior changed, and I frequently scrutinized my new college friends’ status on Instant Messenger.
By 1999 I was hand coding HTML documents and posting my art to the web. I explored broadcasting live videos online through my web cam, and delved into Yahoo Personals with the thought if I was doing this and posting as my “real self” I’d find people with the same commitment to authenticity online and offline. At this point, meeting people online still was perceived as socially dubious.
In 2001 during a graduate seminar on human computer interaction I was introduced to social networking and created a profile. This was a key moment as the personal vs. public social space continued to merge as peer-use of social networking sites exploded.
In 2002 my undergraduate studies culminated in a thesis presentation that presented sexualization of technology, questioned romantic distance relationships mediated by the Internet, and explored instant creation and sharing of experiences both online and offline (Priorities).
Graduate studies in art took me to San Francisco the following August, a drastic change from the rural life in Ithaca and Morris. It was here I discovered the blog. In fall 2002 I made the switch from a standard hand coded HTML, to Blogger. I began questioning issues based on the commodification of objects (Obay), as well as the anonymous gift (Free Memory), and began quantifying social networks (Age Hotness Correlate).
In spring of 2003 I purchased a Nokia 3660 camera phone that could upload images, video, and text instantly to the web thus making mobile and “studio-less” art creation a reality. That summer I also began working as the residence manager for the San Francisco Ballet School, and started to become very aware of the way young people create and consume media.
Presently I run Wordpress and have benefited greatly from the open source community. I am confident that there is much insight to be gained from looking back at both sides “being digital” and critically analyzing the texts from December 1995-August 1997.
Over the past twelve years I’ve experienced profound changes in the way I live, think, and navigate in the world as my experience has become more connected, more open, and more collaborative. I intend to combine curiosity with disciplined research. By sharing my data, it is my desire to gain a greater understanding of the longitudinal effects of Internet use.
EDUCATION
SAN FRANCISCO ART INSTITUTE, San Francisco, California
M.F.A., New Genres, 2004
CORNELL UNIVERSITY, Ithaca, New York
B.F.A., Combined Media, 2002 (photography / digital art)
B.A., Psychology, 2002 (perception, minor concentration: cognitive science)
ADDITIONAL STUDIES
City College San Francisco, 2005-2007 (advanced classes in conversational Spanish, culture, and civilization)
HONORS
SAN FRANCISCO ART INSTITUTE
Student Leadership Award, 2004
Board of Trustees 2003-2004
Graduate Council 2002-2003
CORNELL UNIVERSITY
Dean’s list, spring 2001, spring 2002
Edith and Walter King Stone Memorial Prize for Promise in Art, 2001
National Dean’s List 1998-2001
TEACHING POSITIONS
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA BERKELEY, Berkeley, California
Academic Talent Development Program, summer 2008
MARIN SCHOOL OF ART AND TECHNOLOGY, Novato, California
Art instructor, Fall 2004
SAN FRANCISCO ART INSTITUTE, San Francisco, California
NASA Space Practicum Teaching Assistant, spring 2004
Video Editing Teaching Assistant, spring 2004
CORNELL UNIVERSITY, Ithaca, New York
Cornell Adult University, instructor, website design, summer 2002
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
ICTHUS GALLERY, San Francisco, California
2008, The Fantastic Solution to Global Warming and other Conundrums
2006, Metaphors Be With You
2006, Hypermodern Art Show
EXPERIMENTAL GALLERY, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York
2002, Priorities: Installation, Audition, and Digitalia
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
GARAGE BIENNALE, San Francisco, California
2008, Weather Reconnaissance
2008, 100 Performances for the Hole
2004, Party for Benevolence
PACIFIC SCHOOL OF RELIGION, Berkeley, California
2005, Art and Spirituality
ANTI – CONTEMPORARY ART FESTIVAL, Kuopio, Finland
2004, Yuk Video Screening
NEW LANGTON ARTS, San Francisco, California
2004, The ‘How To’ Intensive
FORT MASON CENTER, San Francisco, California
2004, San Francisco Art Institute MFA graduate show
PACE DIGITAL GALLERY, New York, NY, 2004
2004, e Bay–Buy or Sell or Buy
YERBA BUENA CENTER FOR THE ARTS, San Francisco, California
2004, Playshop
CELL SPACE, San Francisco, California
2003, San Francisco Art Institute Print Show,
SAN FRANCISCO BUREAU OF URBAN SECRETS, San Francisco, California
2003, Creative City
BOOM TECHNOLOGY FAIR, Cornell University, Ithaca New York
2002, Sound Thinking: computer as creative audio tool
2001, Fine Art Applications of 3D Internet
WORK EXPERIENCE
SAN FRANCISCO BALLET, San Francisco, California
Residence Manager 2003-present
UNIVERSITY HIGH SCHOOL, San Francisco, California
Coach (Basketball, Track & Field) 2005-present
HYPERMODERN.NET, San Francisco, California
Independent Contractor, 1999-present
UNIVERSITY PHOTOGRAPHY, Ithaca, New York
Darkroom Assistant, Photographer, summer 2002
SIGNAL INTERACTIVE, Chicago, Illinois
Production Artist Intern, summer 2000
MOTOROLA, INC., Arlington Heights, Illinois
Web Design Intern, summer 1999
PALEONTOLOGICAL RESEARCH INSTITUTION, Ithaca, New York
Assistant to the Director of Collections, 1997-1999
FREE MEMORY is an event created to open a dialog between what memories consists of in terms of ephemeral human thought, and that of a data driven memory model of a computer. The event is initiated by the anonymous gift of a floppy disk to passers by and concludes when the box of disks is empty. Unbeknown to the receiver, the artists memories, documented in photographic form, are present on the disk thereby transferring both ephemeral, and concrete memory.
More About Obay, the legal battle, anonymous late night phone calls, and Canadian bus stop mystery. For certain individuals Ebay has become a lifestyle, an extreme use of the service where people are a slave to their auctions, so dependent on checking up that it interferes with daily functioning. According the DSM-IV, the manual for diagnosing psychological disorders, this would be a criterion for a type of obsessive-compulsive behavior. Commodiphilia, diagnosed as assigning value to valueless objects in the off chance that it may be worth something to another disparate individual, is an artist coined term that references both the commodity, and the sexual perversion of pedophilia. Obay.info critiques the mega-consumerist culture that surrounds Ebay, and is both a visual pun and a cautionary piece that succeeds when the user questions why they are so involved with buying and selling of the most mundane possessions.
Sound Thinking DJZN TBA Album limited edition of 10 disks,Priorities: Installation, Audition, and Digitalia. Pete Ippel Bachelor Of Fine Arts Thesis Show. Cornell University, May 2002.
Love Box exterior installation view,Priorities: Installation, Audition, and Digitalia. Pete Ippel Bachelor Of Fine Arts Thesis Show. Cornell University, May 2002.
Priorities: Installation, Audition, and Digitalia. Pete Ippel Bachelor Of Fine Arts Thesis Show. Cornell University, May 2002.
Chatting installation view, Priorities: Installation, Audition, and Digitalia. Pete Ippel Bachelor Of Fine Arts Thesis Show. Cornell University, May 2002.
DJZN and Cynical music and video webcast,
Priorities: Installation, Audition, and Digitalia. Pete Ippel Bachelor Of Fine Arts Thesis Show. Cornell University, May 2002
Love Box interior installation view,
Priorities: Installation, Audition, and Digitalia. Pete Ippel Bachelor Of Fine Arts Thesis Show. Cornell University, May 2002
1. Watching a 3am football game at Cornell in the snow and seeing people act like kids again.
2. Hugging Jennifer, putting my nose in her hair and smelling strawberries.
3. Feeling my body relax when my head hits the pillow at night.
4. Remembering the joy in my father’s face on the first day of kindergarten.
5. Hannah’s eyes when her head is tipped down.
6. Having sled day with my boys at home.
7. Getting packages from people, love in the mailbox.
8. Wearing my Ezekiel hat and thinking about how much it means to me.
9. Blueberry cheese muffins from the dragon.
10. Putting my hands in things that are squishy, i.e. pudding mashed potatoes.
11. Being a respected person by my peers.
12. Taking pictures of friends without them knowing (candid shots).
13. Going to the top of the clock tower for no reason, just the view.
14. Walking alone and thinking about how smart I feel in the plantations.
15. Driving Cars.
16. The nape of the neck.
17. Cuddling with someone I care about.
18. Dancing at a party and getting noticed.
19. Learning new dance moves.
20. Bragging about how cool my parents are.
21. Being so dead set on moving to California.
22. Knowing I could quit school now and get a really great job.
23. Understanding that my family loves me no matter what.
24. Nature at Cornell and walking home at night is so beautiful.
25. The understanding that I can, in 15 minutes learn and understand a new computer program.
26. Knowing that I value relationships over grades and act accordingly.
27. Having the audacity to dress the way I want and know that people wish they were me.
28. My confidence in all my skills.
29. I love going to a new place and making new friends, especially with common interests.
30. Hot, steaming fajitas with crisp vegetables.
31. Day dreaming about how I am going to have a beach front house and make money typing on my laptop in my boxers.
32. Working hard and getting a cool drink in the summer.
33. Cheese Fries the old way at Tasty Dog.
34. Eating tons of candy with the knowledge it will never turn to fat.
36. Being 165 pounds of twisted titanium.
37. Listening to the three Gymnopedes by Sate and relaxing.
38. Changing my earrings and sunglasses to redefine myself.
39. Everyday is Halloween.
40. Trying new art supplies for the first time.
41. The memory of sledding down the steps in a big snow storm.
42. Trying on clothes and buying parts of an outfit for cheap.
43. My mobile from the Viking museum in Denmark.
44. Natalie’s smile and her laugh when I tell her a really stupid joke.
45. What did one burp say to the other burp? Letís be stinkers and go out the other end.
46. Asking pops to go to 7/11 for an ice cream cone.
47. All the Ladies I saw in Sweden, and enjoying the culture.
48. Comfy shoes and socks.
49. Playing basketball on Laguna Beach.
50. Lying on a blanket with Collene in a field of dandelions.
51. Styling my hair in spikes.
52. Dick the barber from the Sanitary Barber Shop calling me Ivy.
53. The first time I told Jennifer “I love you.” at Aux Sable Locks.
54. The smell of Hershey PA.
55. Sleeping in the Arts Quad freshmen year.
56. The joy of getting Doggie to turn on.
57. Riding the Big Wheels with Gary and Sam.
58. Going to the pool every summer with Oliver Wendell Holmes School.
59. Really God-Awful Bright Hawaiian shirts, especially in polyester.
60. The Tripping Game.
61. My mother drawing pictures on the brown bag for lunch.
62. Soft peanut butter and jelly on white bread, very squishy.
63. Jell-o jigglers and Jell-o.
63. Jumping off the second platform at Rhem pool in floaties.
65. Cards (asshole and euchre) with the CC team.
66. Cross Country sports followed by McDonald’s.
67. Comfortable blanket warmth on a cold night.
68. Sleeping nude.
69. The shock of going from the sauna to the pool.
70. Watching cartoons late at night with Mikey.
71. Late night snacks.
72. Popcorn on my nightstand from The Mom and Pops.
73. Holiday magic singing carols to the bears and putting my face into the wooden walrus painting.
74. Climbing Open Bible at Mississippi Palasades, Eagles flying.
75. Surprise Birthday parties.
76. Drinking a few beers at the chapter house two years in a row at 12:01 AM.
77. Getting a free pint the second year at the chapter house when I am 22.
78. Putting pennies in the floorboards at 243 S. East Ave.
79. Disney world as a junior in high school, feeling young again.
80. Skateboarding to work at Signal Interactive.
81. New years eve and the craziness of Berlin.
82. Watching people open gifts that Iíve given them.
83. Wrestling with family members, especially pops, Bridget and Matt.
84. Having Matt Bridget and Marianne see me at Heps Freshmen year at Brown
85. Collapsing into Jen’s arms after a tough race at conference senior year.
86. Running with my father one year after he almost died from staph.
87. Playing on the power pad for Nintendo with JP in track and field.
88. Knowing how bad things could be (i.e. last spring) to how good they will continue to be.
89. Kissing and necking Erika in Dickson while the guys were outside messing around in the hall making noise.
90. Dinner and Dancing in the Prairie State Games with Lia.
91. Climbing around Louie’s rock gym roof.
92. Being able to make people smile and laugh.
93. Writing songs on the spot in my head and then singing about anything.
94. Summer trips to Warren Dunes.
95. Haunted Trails, Gradyís and mini golf in general.
96. Chuckie Cheese for Ski ball with The Mom and Rob always putting our tickets together in a cool way to get a family prize.
97. Indoor Kitchen Basketball from J Bikowski and itís legacy at home.
98. Being recruited and accepted to Yale, Penn, and Cornell.
99. Building the giant snowman, mud sliding , dressing up with the boys of Dickson.
100. All you can eat at Oakenshields and dancing at the dinner table and making fools of ourselves as the track team. The best food challenges and the dining hall classic, and bragging rites.
Back in 2001-2002 I was experimenting with 3D Internet technologies. I was using Active Worlds in an artistic context as well as toying with Viewpoint and Cult 3D. The Cult 3D plugin works on Internet Explorer, and Firefox. Viewpoint Player works in many browsers as well.
The above is a model of a demon maped with my face and the sound is a distorted recording of my laugh.
The Hook-Man avatar I created to stand in for me in the online realm. He moves and groves, and you can make him dance by launching the viewpoint application.
This is part of the Active Worlds environment I developed with Marcia Lyons. We used it to display students’ 2d work in a 3D world, with schedued classes online. It was a precursor to Second Life.
For three weeks in July, I spent my Wednesdays taking BART over to UC Berkeley to teach in the secondary division of Academic Talent Development Program. I’m very happy with the final projects, please take a look at the completed ATDP page on hypermodern.net where I outline my course (complete with downloadable syllabi), and display student animations ranging from the hand-drawn to claymation. Also there is a photo album for the digital photography class.
Yesterday Al Gore Spoke in Washington DC to issue a generational challenge to repower America. He wants to commit to producing 100 percent of our electricity from renewable energy and truly clean carbon-free sources within 10 years. Here’s the a simple example of why we have to do it, as the same issue is causing economic, national security, and environmental chaos.
We’re borrowing money from China to buy oil from the Persian Gulf to burn it in ways that destroy the planet. Every bit of that’s got to change.
But if we grab hold of that common thread and pull it hard, all of these complex problems begin to unravel and we will find that we’re holding the answer to all of them right in our hand. The answer is to end our reliance on carbon-based fuels.
Over the past five years, I’ve been working very hard to make Jackson Manor very livable and professional, and I’m happy to say that with all the support, it’s been a great learning process, and ultimately a resounding success. Nearly 20 dancers have gone on to San Francisco Ballet and scores more are professional dancers throughout the world. Check out the San Francisco Chronicle article on the day-to-day life of 26 pre-professional dancers under one roof.
I am so very thankful for the support and contributions of Patricia Swanson, Kirsten Gamb, Jason Blackwell, Andrew Harvill, and especially Jim Sohm for being such a great mentor, and helping me develop as a manager through his calm and fair example.
“The Fantastic Solution to Global Warming and Other Conundrums” An art show by Pete Ippel May 16-31, 2008 Opening Reception: Friday, May 16, 6-9 p.m. with DJ music and indoor-jumping photo souvenirs for guests. EDITORS: You, your reporters and photographers are welcome to cover the event.
Icthus Gallery 1769 15th Street (between Valencia and Guerrero), San Francisco, CA Gallery hours, weekdays, 10 a.m. – 5 p.m.; weekends, by appointment Admission, Free
For more information, contact, Pete Ippel, artist Phone, (415) 425-8863 E-mail, pete at hypermodern.net Web site, http://www.hypermodern.net/archives/fsgw/ “The Fantastic Solution to Global Warming”, 40 x 60 inches (101 x 152 cm), gouache, ink, pencil, and watercolor on paper
SAN FRANCISCO, Monday, April 28, 2008 – The Fantastic Solution to Global Warming and other Conundrums is an exhibition of new artwork by San Francisco based artist and athlete Pete Ippel. In this collection of drawings, photographic prints, and videos he explores themes ranging from nuclear waste processing to the pairing of art and sport.
In Ippel’s brightly rendered, fantastical 2-D world, a box of lightning, some incandescent light bulbs, and a gigantic, biological-organic turbine are coupled with wind, tide, hydroelectric, nuclear, volcanic, solar, and geothermal power sources to sequester carbon dioxide. Under intense heat and pressure, in a star-powered fusion-cooker, diamonds are produced, thus solving the dilemmas of green house gases, vacant mines, and human rights issues associated with diamond mining.
The exhibition also highlights artifacts, photographic prints, and video informed by Ippel’s work as an athlete and a coach. After completing a successful collegiate track and field career as a high jumper in New York, Ippel made the move to San Francisco to pursue a Masters of Fine Art in the New Genres Department of the San Francisco Art institute.
It was here in the Bay Area, inspired by local artists Tony Labat and Tom Marioni, where Ippel began to craft projects that married his passion for jumping to his artistic practice.
“The Jump Series” grows out of the tradition of New Genres where actions are performed for the camera. The body of work is based on the premise that to push of one’s self off any surface and into the air by using the muscles in one’s legs and feet is a glorious and enjoyable act; essentially human flight. The modes of lift-off on display include skateboarding, high jumping, jumping off of architecture, leaping into panoramic scenes, jumping over objects, and choreographed jumps with other individuals. Ippel utilizes a tripod and a remote control or the camera’s self-timer to execute this body of performative photographs.
TSP Athletics, also on display, is a competitive vertical jumps team, social club, and acts as a collaborative vehicle to generate images of athletes in flight. It blurs boundaries between art and sport while acting as a vehicle to temper the shock of moving away from traditional competitive athletics.
“When you have something obscure like the high jump that has been your top priority for so many years, it’s foreign when it’s gone,” says Ippel. “Because I went directly to SFAI from Cornell, it was quite a challenge to no longer have the support of my team, nor be able to celebrate my athletic gifts in competition. I went through a real period of grief.” Ippel satiated his needs by creating a one-person team and traveling alone to meets a few times a year. “I made a uniform, started a website, and I kept in touch with my jumping peers. When I was at the meets after being away for so long, I started to see the beauty of the action and the camaraderie and wanted to capture it, and still keep it active in my life.”
The project has developed as an answer to what collegiate athletes do upon graduation to keep in touch, keep jumping, and make art.
Since its inception in 2004, TSP Athletics has grown to include former NCAA qualifiers and university record holders. Ippel’s plan is to produce limited-edition prints with participation by distinguished jumpers who are invited to be athletes-in-residence for TSP. In the frame of social sculpture these artists/athletes will each, contribute to the TSP Archive to add to its expanding collection of images and memorabilia.
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY Pete Ippel was born in Oak Park, Illinois, USA 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 earned 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. He’s also the residence manager for the San Francisco Ballet, a fitness professional, coaches basketball and track at University High School, and still high jumps from time to time.
Pete Ippel utilizes a box of lightening, a gigantic biological-organic turbine, wind, tide, hydroelectric, nuclear, volcanic, solar, and geothermic power to sequester carbon dioxide and produce diamonds, thus solving the dilemma with the green house gas, carbon dioxide, vacant coal mines, and the problems with blood diamonds in Africa.
Materials: gouache, ink, pencil, watercolor
Dimensions: 40 x 60 inches (101 x 152 cm)
Today I was called by Dan Lauckner from C·T·V Southwestern Ontario, he found Obay.info and used the Whois database to get my contact information just like Jakub. There is a potential that he may call back Monday for more information.
I also received comments from the author of the blog “And She Knits Too”. She has a couple of posts one about the posters with images of the little girl.
She also reports that there is a phone number to call now 1-888-YOU-OBAY. In the comments of “And She Knits Too” there are a bunch of great theories about drug companies and propaganda and how drug laws are different there than in the USA.
My son used to have his own hopes and aspirations. Now he has mine. Thanks Obay!
The text on the bottle reads:
If they can’t see it your way, it’s time for Obay.
My interest is piqued, as I have received two emails asking about Obay Pills, the first on February 12, 2008 from a Canadian named Jakub which included the above photo. The second on February 13, was from a Toronto journalist named David Silverberg who wants an interview. I have already responded to both inquiries and am anticipating a response.
I have now done a few web searches, since then and there’s a lot of buzz about the project at Yahoo Answers and Above Top Secret.
I have endeavored to send an answer to the Yahoo Answers group, but because the question is over 5 days old it no longer is accepting direct posts. The question is still listed as “undecided”, and I have sent my answer to the customer service folks at Yahoo. Hopefully they will post my reply as listed below:
I interpret the bus stop poster “culture jam” presently in Canada as a parody ad campaign which critiques adults and calls for more active parenting. By using a pun, Obay and it’s relationship to obey a direct command, the group responsible wishes to show how drugs are no substitution for “present” adults responsible for child rearing. In addition the Obay Pills bring to mind how overly zealous parents can map their wishes onto the lives of their children, especially when they are making the medical decisions for their offspring. The ad seems to be in response to the drugging of youth and the increase in diagnosis of ADHD. Regarding who would fund such a campaign, I look to the ongoing war between the Church of Scientology and Psychiatry professionals, and will be interested to note who funded the campaign.
The project for which I am responsible: Obay “The Commodiphile’s online Marketplace” http://obay.info also comments on mental states and is the top Google hit and likely where people are getting the false notion that I created the Obay Pills Campaign. The following is the explanation of my intent with http://obay.info and a brief time line:
For certain individuals Ebay has become a lifestyle, an extreme use of the service where people are a slave to their auctions, so dependent on checking up that it interferes with daily functioning. According the DSM-IV, the manual for diagnosing psychological disorders, this would be a criterion for a type of obsessive-compulsive behavior. Commodiphilia, diagnosed as assigning value to valueless objects in the off chance that it may be worth something to another disparate individual, is an artist coined term that references both the commodity, and the sexual perversion of pedophilia. Obay.info critiques the mega-consumerist culture that surrounds Ebay, and is both a visual pun and a cautionary piece that succeeds when the user questions why they are so involved with buying and selling of the most mundane possessions.
May 2004 Artist talk and exhibition catalog “Buy Sell or Buy” at Pace University, New York, curated by Jillian Mcdonald
November 22, 2006 contacted by Intellectual Property Counsel
eBay Inc. to disable links and disclaim affiliation between Obay and eBay
December 2006 changes instituted to the satisfaction of Counsel.
January 2008 discovered citation to the artist coined term “commodophilia” [sic] in an exhibition catalog of artist residencies (Nicky Bird) Stills Edinburgh 2004 written by Iliyana Nedkova. http://www.stills.org/
Febuary 12, 2008 contacted by a curious Canadian about Obay.info’s affiliation with Obay pill posters.
February 12, 2008 web search provides multiple sightings in Canada of Obay pill posters. Postings on Yahoo answers and Above Top Secret
February 13, 2008 contacted by Toronto journalist David Silverberg through http://hypermodern.net asking if I am affiliated with Obay posters in Canada.
February 13, 2008 responded to curious Canadian and David Silverberg with the creator of obay.info Pete Ippel’s analysis of the Obay pill campaign. Also submitted answer to Yahoo Answers through their online help page, as the question was still “undecided” after 5 days yet closed to more answers.
I hope this clears up any questions you may have please contact me if you have any more.
Best wishes,
Pete Ippel
Artist and creator of Obay.info
…but some of my friends are: Casey Matteson, Jeff Geiger, Ryan Bennett, David Taylor, my Dad + Mom + myself. Casey would do anything for me, almost. Jeff I can talk to. Ryan and David make me laugh and are just good friends. My family give me lots of support. I am my best friend? Well I don’t know. I get along alright, I don’t really have any friends that are girls, but I’d like a few.
…when my family fights mostly my brother and sister (both Rob’s kids). It also bugs me when I go to a store and buy something and then a week later it is less expensive. It bugs me when store clerks treat me as an idiot with no money, I’d like to be treated with the same respect as adults. It bugs me how the world is going into depression, anarchy, and destruction of our homes and neighborhoods. It bugs me how there are so many killings and gangs.
Topic of the day was a father being denied his child for being gay:
It’s a hard topic to decide. It’s not normal to be gay so I would probably side with the grandma, but as long as there is no abuse, I can’t see why not. I would predict that the courts would side with the grandma.
My mom is picking up my Rollerblades today so soon I’ll be skating to school. The worst teacher I have ever had was Mrs. Higgins, she was such a BITCH. She was like a slave driver in those olden boats where everyone had to row or be whipped. She was intimidating 7′0″ with shoes on (almost). Her big Afro and top set of teeth were a sight compared to Medusa herself. She was such a perfectionist. I have trouble writing and if I didn’t type my reports I would get a C or lower because of it. She didn’t assign much homework but what she did was difficult.
Mrs. Black on the other had was sort of nice but she assigned so much homework and vocab test SHIT! they were hard. We had to memorize dictionary definitions and punctuate them perfect.
You know the perfect teacher would be none at all. Just kidding, the teen-age side of me would say a 22 year old model straight from college who would be very good at teaching all subjects. Mrs Ciota was my favorite teacher partly because she was Looney, or so everyone thought.
I can’t think of one that outshines them all. I go to the Illinois Story Telling Festival every year and there are stories for young and old. A lot of the stories I’ve heard come from family. My dad’s dad was in the Air Force but died before I was born. Some of the best stories and poetry come straight out of my head. That’s something I’d like to do in this class is write poetry.
I remember my first day of school. I got my school supplies the night before and before I went to bed that night I paraded around the house in the clothes I was going to wear the next day with my backpack on. The next morning I woke up early and got ready. The bus stopped in front of my house and I can remember my father’s reaction of me going onto the bus. He was smiling a huge smile and waving frantically. I really remember it well because it is one of the only times I can remember our whole family happy.
I have a joke about the William Tell Overture. There were these two guys that loved charades. One went to the others house and saw 8 women back to front. He guessed William Tell Overture…Titty Rump Titty Rump Titty Rump Rump Rump. It brings back memories at grant park when I lived in Oak Park and saw the fireworks. We laid on blankets. The smell of hot dogs + beer blended nicely to make an atmosphere. The end was grand, cannons roaring, fireworks blazing, and it was spectacular.
I got a thought of the day for you. I got it from a friend: “As you walk through life, you may be solo but not alone.” Deep! My favorite fast food place is…? I like most junk food but try not to eat too much of it because I’m trying to become a better athlete and get in better shape, even though I’m pretty fit as it is. I didn’t think the speaker was that bad or good today, he was about average.
I’ll do yesterday’s topic today. The things I would save would be my bike, my photos of family and friends and (this is going to sound immature) my Teddy Bear. The story on the teddy is as follows…I got it when I was christened from my aunt and uncle David and Linda. When I was younger, I started sucking my fingers. I sucked the middle and ring fingers when I slept, I picked the fur off the teddy bear and held it in my fingers (under my nose) as well as the bear. How childish, it brings back memories.
My family is very extended. I just moved into my first house. First, my mother and father got divorced when I was about 5. My dad remarried a Mexican woman with a daughter from her previous marriage. I stayed in Oak Park till the 4th grade. I moved to Morris Partly because my mother started the Gebhard Woods Dulcimer Festival and partly because she had a boyfriend in Bloomington. They broke up and my mom had other “Friends”. Last year she met a man from England he was over for a job in Bell Labs. He liked folk music and that’s how they met. They got married a few months ago, and now as I said before I have an international family. By the way, Rob, (my stepfather) has two kids David and Hazel both are a pain in the ass. They constantly fight. Hazel broke a window and David broke an antique vase in the time they have been over. They’re leaving in two days. Thank God.
