Bessesdotter’s Studio at ArtsQuest during Musikfest in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania
Bessesdotter Studio at ArtsQuest
Free Labor?
A few days ago, artist Gregory Coates shared a wall post on Facebook by Takos Boikat about how artists should be paid. I shared it out on Facebook– and of course I champion the cause. I saw a few reactions to it on Facebook from artists about working for free–how often they are asked to do something in the name of getting exposure, or a famous artist/person will bestow a favor later. Often later never comes around, or the exposure turns out to be little if anything that really drives a career. I have had fellow artists ask me to help them find artists to work for free for them—or work for sub-standard wages. And sadly, I cannot count the number of fellow artists who tell me they work for very little or free.
Gregory’s post is very timely. A society must value the sensitive creative people in the culture—the ones who create are the ones with the ideas, the real drivers of culture and how the future will play out rests on the shoulders of the artists. It is a heavy burden. Risk takers, inventors, social engineers, visionaries, and the creators, this is what makes us extraordinary. Not always knowing the outcome of what we do, we take up the challenge and forge new paths, new ways of seeing, hearing and feeling.
The caves show work thousands of years old—the work of artists. There are arguments that the work might be spiritual—but we cannot know if the paintings were done for pure joy or for shamanic purposes. Whatever purpose the painters had no longer matters, what does matter is that they left images for everyone to see. Artists matter to society–lets reward them for their labor.
New Bridge Group
A conceptual art group is being let loose shortly in Allentown, PA – the New Bridge Group. NBG has arisen out of the need to bridge artists and community together.
Allentown and the surrounding area have generated groups of artists and like all groups they go through changes. In 2008, The Chen Arts group was started to provide a place for local visual and performing artists to meet, network and collaborate. The intention was to have open group shows. For a time that worked—artists drifted in and out. In autumn of 2011 a buzz was heard about the future of Chen—changing from the unstructured open format to a more structured organization. In the meantime, the city embraced some serious structural changes and altered the landscape to provide for an arena and remove some older buildings—one is the House of Chen restaurant where Chen Arts group based its name.
Members E.A. Kafkalas and Alison Bessesdotter of the Chen Arts group ran head-long one winter evening into a local sculptor Steven Condra. Alison and E.A. invited Steven to exhibit with the Metamorphosis show. They explained that the next Chen show would be themed Bridges Outside the Box, representing a change that was needed to start a new movement in town. Steven was intrigued—because he had also formed an idea about bridging artists together—snapping together the free thinking 20th century German expressionists with a modern twist called The New Bridge Group. Synchronicity was in full force; it was the mash-up of their concepts about building bridges between artists and the community. The intent would be to create and maintain a vibrant and productive artist group in Allentown with a tribal feel. When asked what that means, Alison explains that the tribal concept is about creating genuine relationships with true freedom of information, and a future of limitless potential bound only by their imagination. Audacious—it may well be, but the New Bridge Group/Chen Arts wants to change the world view of art and the relationship to earth and community. Alison says “The time is right for this, the core is in place and the only thing we need more of is you.”
The 2012 Metamorphosis show was organized by E.A. Kafkalas who is quick to explain, “the success of the Metamorphosis show was truly an effort of everyone involved in the production—it was not the effort of one person.” The show opened with the sale of 9 pieces of work from a diverse group of artists at the 2 week event in January 2012.
Today The New Bridge Group/Chen Arts are planning the next show Bridges Outside the Box. The show runs from May 27th through June 10th at the community room of the Allentown Art Museum. For information on becoming a member or just to see what all the fuss is about, see the NBGArtists Facebook page or http://www.nbgartists.org/ to find our next event.
Written Edges
Dawn spent this morning in the company of my kaleidescope, turning, spinning, shaking, dipping and tipping it catch the light fragments, hearing the small pieces inside flit-flutter like little laboring beetles tracking their footprints inside. A tiny pleasure while spent in moments of solitude before the daylight completely unfolds and the dogs expect to be greeted with a big heart.
No painting today, this is a day of errands until the afternoon or evening when I can zone into my process of drawing and painting, working a 22 x30 watercolor right now on the table. Ready to unveil it soon.
Finding my tribe
I never knew what was missing, an imperceptible feeling of some little chink out of my metal, a small scaley plate-like chip was blown off like a shingle from a roof-top in the winter howling. Asking for resolution brought solutions and people and ideas then no people and the essence of the art changed as it happened. it all just evolved, adapted together but seeing the evidence of it as i was full of living and not noticing was the real challenge. all at once the concept was so evident at the forefront of my mind, I came to see that i just knew, knew the history, the future and everything in between. Almost like the Bene Gesserit women of Herbert’s Dune novel, they inherited the information from all those who came before them. My work I feel//think embodies that often. All the abstract work of the people that are my tribe exists in me, like all other parts of my mitochondrial DNA, it blasts through no matter what I do.
Boundless 