Blog – Page 7 – Jes Lee

Oh what a weekend

March 2, 2015 by Jes

The first weekend after long weeks of at least one person being sick always seem to feel so good. And with all the art events going on this weekend, it definitely did not disappoint!

Friday, on my way home from work I stopped at Banfill-Locke Center for the Arts to meet their new education coordinator, Jennifer Kennedy-Logan, and see their latest art exhibit. Jennifer seems like a great person, and I am glad to see her joining the BLCA community!

The exhibit that is on display is a show of paintings by Linda Deg Lee and Mary Lingen. It is beautiful! Their work pairs so well together, from the use of color and geometric shapes, even down to the beautiful OCD satisfying way one gallery is filled with work by one artist working in angular geometric shapes, and the other is all circular flowing lines and shapes. It is quite appealing just to go look at bright colors in the middle of our grey winter.

Saturday started off as a busy day at work for me, and concluded with a wonderful evening out. We started with dinner at a local wood-fire pizza place, continued with a pretty LNL* at a sort-of hidden gem of a store/coffee shop that is I think relatively new to the neighborhood, and then continued on to art and cocktails. Who doesn’t love that??

First stop: Traffic Zone for the one of two displays of one show. This particular exhibit is a juried show if many alumni from the College of Visual Arts that recently closed. I have many friends that graduated from there, so I definitely wanted to see the show. Aki Shibata (she and I met at MCBA) was doing a collaborative performance piece with another artist. They each had a writing desk, one at each gallery displaying work for this exhibit, and wrote love letters to each other, having gallery visitors that were moving on to the next gallery, deliver and read them to the other person. I delivered a letter from Aki to her collaborator, John Colburn over at Form+Content gallery, and read it to him. It was a simple friendly, love letter, not steamy, or overly mushy. Just beautiful. It was a lovely experience! It also made me think about how I don’t write letters often enough, especially sweet ones to the people I care about. I’d like to change that.

Just around the corner from Form+Content is Cave Paper, run by two women I have also gotten to know through MCBA. They were open for visitors, so we stopped to look at the new things they had hanging up on their walls, and so I could buy some cloud paper seconds! I am in love with that paper, and have collected a couple of sheets each time I go there. Now, to start planning projects to actually use it!

We ended the night with cocktails at a friend’s place (I think Manhattans might be one of my new favorites!) and then walked over to the 801 Gallery to see an amazing show of three photographers and a painter. It was the perfect show to end the night with. So, the 801 Gallery is actually inside a building of lofts in Minneapolis. Many artists live there and have their studio work space there as well. So, along with the artwork hanging in the large, open hall ways of the building, there are many other little shows of artwork going on in people’s individual spaces. We saw so many great pieces! My very favorite, is the work by Sara Belleau. Her staged photography is just amazing and beautiful. She was selling books of the series that night as well, and thankfully I had enough cash with me to buy one. She even signed it for me. I can’t write about her work without sounding like a gushing fan girl…but I’ll just leave it at this. As an artist, once in a while you go out and see an exhibit of someone’s work, and it in many little ways renews your sense of being a creative person, and reminds you once again that there are amazing people out there, and amazing art, and kicks you in to not-giving-up.

Sunday was full of family, and some shopping and many books, as well as more photographs. But I will leave that for another post.

*LNL = Late Night Latte (I am testing my caffeine time limits. Evening coffee doesn’t seem to cause me to not be able to sleep later, so this may become a thing!)

Just a day

February 25, 2015 by Jes

Today is just a day. But I am finally feeling the most human I have felt all week, and that is saying something! And thank goodness for that small favor today. For today, for this chick, there is a doctor’s appointment, and a photo job drop off before work. There has already been laundry, and extra morning medicine. Today at work there will be more messiness than usual, and lots of energy.

And I keep moving along with all of it, looking towards the weekend. A weekend of art show openings to try to get to, and a new camera lens being delivered…

Yes, that’s right. I found a new camera lens online yesterday! While, new to me. It is a used lens after all. But one that will help with the nature photos this year, so that I don’t always have to borrow a lens from someone else. I’m quite excited to try it out! Perhaps this weekend will also hold a bit of photography as well. As long as the temperatures co-operate just a bit…

Long days

February 23, 2015 by Jes

Days stuck at home being sick can get really long. Today, after feeling like I would burst without a bit of creative time, packed up my laptop, notebook, and some sketching tools and headed back to bed. Yes, just like a little kid taking all their toys to bed with them. It helped though. I stayed put for most of the day, and am starting to feel a bit more human. I participated in Wet Paint’s Weekly Work-Outs by making a charcoal sketch of my hand. No, it isn’t great, I haven’t sketched for a very long time. But, I started sketching again today.

I also edited the black and white film photos I took of the swans a couple of weeks ago. I realize that it is not at all easy to photograph swans with black and white film, and that I should have brought color film with me. But I am still enjoying these. I have a 150mm lens for my Hasselblad, which is what I was using for these. Not as much zoom as the lens I had with for my digital. Next time, I think I will bring a different film camera with that has a bit more zoom capabilities. I rather like being able to get in really close to them. But, I do adore the square format and the graininess of these photos! Different mediums…

Hopefully I’ll be back out to photograph these birds again soon. This year has already brought about many changes and challenges and a dose of sorrow. But so every year goes. And perhaps we are wrong to think each year will be different in that respect. When really, the years are the same, with their ups and downs, but each has a different theme. Maybe the theme of this year for me will have something to do with nature. I don’t expect it will take me long to find out!

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Getting out

February 22, 2015 by Jes

Even though winter is one of my favorite seasons (with summer a close second…I am a girl of extremes) it is still so easy to get caught up into hibernation mode and spend loads of time in front of the tv under the blankets. This year I am trying to combat that!

A friend of mine decided that she was going to go to as many openings and theater shows as she could this winter. So, I am copying her.

Valentine’s Day Weekend was the first of this experiment.

Friday evening I stopped by Rouge Buddha Gallery to see Nicolas Harper’s newest work as well as some of his guest artists. I stopped at a tiny art gallery on the way home that had a sign outside saying there was an art opening, but it seemed quite private, so I didn’t stick around. On Saturday, during our Valentine’s Day wanderings, we stopped by Black Dog Coffee in St. Paul to see the Metro Sketchers work that is displayed there, while sipping hot chocolate and tea. On Monday, I was at MCBA helping take photos of artwork for the upcoming ‘This Is Book Art’ exhibit where I got to see and look close up at some of the amazing book art that is being delivered to the gallery for the show.

Having a weekend full of art filled up my empty spaces again. I have a list of other shows to see, and plan on continuing this well past the end of winter.

Of course, it would help if I felt better. This weekend I have barely made it off the couch, except for work. Being sick sucks, and I did miss a few fun things this weekend. But it happens, and life goes on, and I will eventually feel better. There is more art out there waiting for me.

Swans and water and mornings

February 9, 2015 by Jes

My uncle emailed me last week, asking if I would like to go photograph swans with him one morning over the weekend.

I have known for a long time that he does this when the swans return to this creek/pond close to his house.

I have also known for a long time that he goes out pretty early in the morning to photograph them.

But I have been curious about this habit of his, and curious about if I would really enjoy taking wildlife photos or not, if I could ever get myself out of bed that early in the morning for something other than work…etc.

So, before my brain could remind me that the particular weekend he was asking about was a work-weekend, and a roller-derby-weekend, and a celebrating-various-awesome-life-things-with-friends-weekend, I replied to his email saying “yes”.

We met Sunday morning, cameras in hand, and after a 1-mile hike from where we could park, we arrived at the water, with somewhere around 35 swans, and almost as many ducks.

I dressed warm, knowing we would be sitting in the snow. These birds didn’t mind we were there, and were quite happy that my uncle brought corn with for them!

Knowing that I would want to take photos of them flying away using a camera with more speed than my film cameras, I brought my digital Sony A77 with me…but I also stuck my Hasselblad 501c/m with my 150mm lens in at the last-minute. I haven’t developed that roll of film yet, but I hope to soon. For anyone super curious, the lens I was using on my Sony was a Tamron 19-270mm lens that I borrowed from a different uncle. I don’t own a lens with that much zoom…yet. I think after this outing, I will start researching which one I would like to someday own.

Being that close to the swans and the ducks was really cool! We walked around, getting different views of them interacting, eating, and showing off to each other. We knew eventually they would all take off, flying over us…and it felt like we waited forever as the wind picked up and the temperature seemed to drop…but it was worth the wait.

Do I need practice at taking photos of birds flying away? Oh, hell yeah I do. But it was fun! And I really like some of the photos I took. And I definitely will go back again, even though it is a bit early in the morning for me.

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1/5/15 – Sea Wall

February 4, 2015 by Jes

From my journal:

Tomorrow morning we start a long journey home. Today, our last full day on this little island, we spent the hours walking by the ocean wall, we ate green tea KitKats, grocery shopped, read while sitting out on the patio, ate lunch at a chicken and waffle restaurant, had more of Julie’s awesome Yakisoba for dinner, and enjoyed our last day of hanging out here. Everything is packed already. It is only a matter of time before we are back.

To the friends that took such good care of us, thank you a million times over!

Film photos from our last day:

1/4/15 – Kokusai

February 3, 2015 by Jes

From my journal:

Today we walked around Kokusai – downtown Okinawa. There were street vendors, Okinawan doughnuts, fresh brown sugar being chipped off a large block, fresh pineapple on a stick, traditional places to eat, sweet beans and mochi, the fish market, crowds, malls, sales, lots of sunshine, the kids being happy, the craziness of Japanese streets and markets, Hello Kitty stuff everywhere…it was so much fun! We walked until our legs and feet ached. We did a lot of shopping, and I took a lot of photos again.

Today was great. This whole trip has been amazing, from the roller slides, to the food, and all the fun stuff we did in between. The best part is experiencing all of this with friends who love exploring and trying new things as well as we do. I can’t wait to come back and visit them again!

Film photos:

1/3/15 – Koza Music Town

February 2, 2015 by Jes

From my journal:

Today John and I went out to do a little exploring on our own of Okinawa City and Koza Music Town. There were a few places open, though many were still closed for the New Year holiday.

We did find an arcade where we played Mario Kart (so much fun!) and a small punk record and clothing shop. We had a good time and were quite worn out after from all the walking! I took a lot of photos of the buildings and empty streets. There is such a mix of new and run-down here. I remember noticing that when we were in Japan before on the main island, but I feel like it is more prominent here. It was a beautiful day to be out walking! And more sushi for dinner!

iPhone photos:

Okinawa street…

There was a one-block stretch of buildings that had the craziest wall murals painted all along them!

Film photos from the day:

1/2/15 – Okinawa World

February 1, 2015 by Jes

From my journal:

Today we went with Julie and the girls to Okinawa World. It is quite kitschy, and set up almost Ren-Fest-ish. It is meant to show visitors the many aspects of Okinawa culture while simultaneously draining as much money as possible from you! Ha! I am glad we went though – we had great ice cream (pineapple sorbet for me!), saw giant turtles, a snake exhibit (that I walked through quite quickly!), a huge cave, glass blowers, potters, paper makers, and tried some local craft beer.

We had sushi for dinner at one of the local restaurants – it was amazing!

1/1/15 – Toguchi beach

January 31, 2015 by Jes

From my journal:

Today was the first day that the weather was crummy enough that I didn’t mind spending much of the day inside.

We did spend the morning out exploring one of the local beaches – Toguchi. It had caves to climb around, and at low tide you could walk out pretty far on the rocks. Even though it was cold and windy, it was still great to be out there.

After lunch, John and I went shopping with Julie. We found a set of pots that I fell in love with, and after some research and realizing they aren’t sold in the US, we bought them. We also did a bit of clothes shopping at UniQlo. I am not ashamed to admit that I am kind-of in love with that store!

We made fried rice for dinner. Eric and Julie have been cooking for us multiple night, and we thought it was definitely time for us to make something!

Back to more adventuring tomorrow!

Film photos from that day: