Silo Heart Banner, 2019

2019 Silo Heart Banner.

While 2019 marked our ninth year here, it is technically our tenth season of operation and, thus, this is our tenth banner. During our usual brainstorming session, I joked that we should do the heart banner from 2010...

2010 Heart Banner.

...but it seemed weird to repeat a design no matter how much we loved it...and we DO very much love that design; it's become sort of our "third logo" (after the oval and circle logos) and the graphic of our silo with a heart banner (below) has shown up on various Small Pond projects (both real and imaginary)...

Silo logo.

...so then I suggested, jokingly, that the logo of the silo with a heart banner should be on the tenth banner. We laughed. And then decided that it was just crazy enough to work both as a humourous and and appropriate approach. But I can guarantee that our 20th and 30th banners won't be an ever-decreasing heart-silo fractal.

Gridded.

After the successes we had using tape and spray paint for the Triskelion, the Don't Give Up, and the Snowy Owl banners, Krista and I used the same technique for this year's banner. This time, though, the grid was more carefully plotted and tighter overall, giving us a more accurate graphic than last year's Snowy Owl (I take the blame for any proportional weirdness on that one).

Taped and Drawn.

We decided to enlarge the heart for greater visibility and impact, and I free-handed it.

Spraying the silo.

Krista once again took care of the painting duties in the workshop.

Spraying the heart.

Old puppets and lanterns monitor the progress.

Removing the tape.

Next to the raising of the banner itself, this is probably the most exciting part: seeing the design revealed for the first time.

As usual, the best shots of the banner are obtained as the sun goes down.

Snowy Owl Silo Banner, 2018

Snowy Owl Silo Banner, 2018.

Krista and I like birds, and over the past eight years we've identified over two dozen species that visit and/or hang around at Small Pond (we have a few bird books and a decent pair of binoculars). Sadly, owls aren't among that group. So why an owl, then? There are a number of different owl species that visit and/or hang around Prince Edward County, and the Prince Edward Point Bird Observatory does a regular banding of them, so, somehow we got inspired by that (and our great admiration for owls, of course) and we decided to "put a bird on it" one more time (we previously put a pileated woodpecker on the Silo, thanks to Leanne Shea Rhem).

Preliminary sketches (with saw-whet owl).

The design was originally going to be a close-up of a saw-whet owl's face done in a very stylized, but still recognizable, way. After playing around with a few designs I came upon a different, more minimal, composition featuring the shape of the bird and a contrasting background colour. The face of a saw-whet owl is almost unbearably cute and it would have been nice to see one at that scale, but we decided a snowy owl would better suit the new, simpler design.

Refined sketch (with minimalism).

I wanted the bird at rest (so as not to be mistaken for this album cover) and I wanted it looking at us, rather than in profile. I settled on an almost-full-frontal-but-kind-of-three-quarters view, tweaking the shape a bit to be more curvy, but still properly owl-like.

Near-final composition (with crescent moon).

Clearly, the top left quadrant of the design was sorely empty and adding the moon was the logical remedy. That crescent moon went through a phase change to full and now is a bolder design element. Also, full moons on clear nights around here are so bright that you can set up your favourite comfy chair outside and read by the light of the moon, so it's nice to sorta pay tribute to that, as well.

The spots on the owl's wing tips transformed into little hearts (they already kind of looked like hearts, and our first banner featured a big, red heart, so that was a playful little design choice). And there's nine of 'em to mark this, Small Pond's ninth, season.

Blank Canvas (with tape measure).

Krista once again sewed the sheets together and made channels on two sides for the ropes to go through. Last year's banner lasted well up until the last wind and ice storm (mid-April, 2018!), and that was our longest-lasting banner yet (true to its message, it didn't give up –it was killed!). Krista's made some sturdy banners before, but something tells me she's getting better at it every year.

Poor man's grid (with optimism).

I was then charged with the daunting task of drawing the final, refined design on the very large banner surface. We measured out a loose grid (marked at the intersections with masking tape) and I did my best to get the proportions right. I would have done better if we marked off more grid points.

Pencilled owl (with paper moon).

My pencil lines appear faint, here, but they (and the paper moon template) were enough for Krista to then use as a masking guide to protect the owl from the spray painted background. Rather than sewing coloured fabrics for the designs, Krista has been masking off and then spray painting the banners since the Triskelion in 2016. The rattle can colours hold up exceptionally well in the sunlight, the rain, and even the ice and snow.

Panorama (with bike).

We raised the banner, kicking off another season of Small Pond Arts shenanigans, in our traditional Silobration style, with friends, food, kids running around, and a hearty game of Kubb.

Twilight (without vampires).

Just after sunset, while the human eye can still see in the dim light, the banner looks like it's illuminated from within. This isn't a very good photo of that effect, but the stark white of the owl and the moon, contrasted against the dark blue banner background and darkening environment is quite a striking sight. Come by and check it out!

Twilight (with Moon and Venus).

One week after its raising, our snowy owl is already courting the full moon.

Bonus sunset shots:

Spring Sprang

Our eighth spring at Small Pond Arts has come and gone. It was the rainiest spring we've experienced since moving here in 2010; while many people on our island experienced flooding, we are high up on a hill and lucky that the worst outcome has been having to mow the grass every five minutes! 

We kicked off the season with our annual banner-raising silobration.

Photo: Melanie Dailey

The symbol on this year's banner is a hobo sign; from the 1880's to WWII, hoboes placed markings on fences, posts, sidewalks, etc, to aid their fellow travellers in finding help or steering them clear of trouble. We found this symbol especially poignant - a message of encouragement from one person to another.

We have been overrun with rabbits this spring; we easily spot a dozen bunnies a day, with lots of adorable babies running around. This cuteness just doesn't get old!

We also had a very special visitor pass through: a snapping turtle moseyed across the lawn one day.

We've had a few artists in residence so far, and the busy season is upon us with some 20+ more artists passing through in the next two months.

Montreal artist Stéfanie Meunier works mostly in digital formats, but spent two weeks at Small Pond working analog with sketching and painting, and enjoying bunnies appearing at her feet while working outside the art barn.

We made an outing to Little Bluff Conservation Area to check out this wall of drift wood that the high waters had pushed onshore. Normally it's only pebbles on this beach, so this was quite an unusual site!

We held our second annual Cardboard Camp getting ready for Skeleton Park Arts Festival. It was totally fun and an inspiration to be working alongside such talented artists.

L to R: Chrissy Poitras, Nella Casson, Kevin Merritt, Holly Gilmour, Krista Dalby

This year our theme was Boxtopiaville. We created an urban environment with all the necessities, like a cat cafe...

... A bike shop, with a nod to our cardboard sponsor, Bloomfield Bicycle Company...

...And a Wheel of Fate that was eagerly spun by many.

Artist: Kevin Merritt

I also had the pleasure of working with Aleks Bragoszewska of Bird Bone Theatre to help animate the Porch Jazz Parade.

And furthermore in cardboard news, I received an honourable mention at Art in the County for my sculpture, Corrugated Cohen. Sweet!

Corrugated Cohen by Krista Dalby

Now it's time to eat our Wheaties as we launch into full-on summer mode. If you're in the area, come for a visit!

Season 8 "Street Ads"

Because of its complexity and a severe lack of time (mostly focusing on two very large portraits), I didn't get around to executing my idea for an April Fools' gag this year, but I have fun with them (my favourites being the Vaporators and Video Games gags), so I'll make sure I do one next year, even if it's a different idea.

That said, I did create some "street ads" for our upcoming Season 8 starting in May that are sort of in an April Fools' vein because they're not real but meant to appear so (just like our Season 6 promotion gag). And no, I have no idea how much it would have cost to actually buy these ads.

I started by designing a poster in CorelDraw using photos of various Small Pond scenes (the silo, bike, and the Milky Way, our first barn quilt, and a large triptych I painted last year), but the key element was the 1970s-inspired Season 8 logo to stand out front and centre. The '70s angle was to tie in the "celebrity endorsements" I had in mind (see below) –plus, I like that aesthetic.

Next, I took a number of photos of bus shelters and streetcars while on a short visit to Toronto with PhotoShoppery in mind (angles and lighting were key concerns). As usual, I shot way more than I needed so I could pick the best ones for the project.

Stopped at a red light, camera ready, I got this nice shot of a TTC streetcar showcasing the ad panels.

This narrow, horizontal layout made including the photos difficult, and since the logo and the date covered the "what," "when," and "where," I eliminated the pictures to be as concise as possible.

This was shot near our old neighbourhood at the intersection of College and Ossington (I was heading northbound). I liked the angle and street elements, but knew that the foreground glass was going to make this one a real challenge –a challenge that would end up making this one look the most realistic if my digital surgery skills were up to the task.

As you can sort of see, a lot of work went into recreating all the elements that would be in front of the poster were it really inside that bus shelter. It's never just a matter of cut-and-paste! I wasn't too worried about obscuring the poster too much (it would be seen clearly in the first photo up top) –in fact, the poster itself is a bit of a MacGuffin since the logo was the most important feature as far as legibility was concerned. 

Of course, what's a fun PhotoShop project without bizarre anachronisms? Celebrity endorsements are one thing, but time travel is way beyond our capability for now. In any case, John and Debbie seem to be enjoying the only Small Pond shirts we've ever "made."

The Cardboard Queen

I'm sometimes known as the Puppet Lady around these parts, but these days perhaps a better name for me would be the Cardboard Queen. I love everything about creating with cardboard: its versatility, its low-art panache, its total free-ness and, of course, repurposing what is essentially garbage into something magical. 

June once again found me building Boxtopia - a creative cardboard kingdom for kids - with my dream team of artist friends at Skeleton Park Arts Festival in Kingston. I’ve been doing these installations for a number of years and it has become a real staple of the festival. This year our theme was "Rock ‘n’ Roll Arcade." Leave it to my awesome crew of cardboard collaborators to come up with such a rad idea. 

Boxtopia was a pretty happening place! There was a jam space...

A sweet DJ booth...

Plenty of games...

A Bowie-inspired hair salon...

And, of course, a place to get a tasty cardboard snack.

Most of our creations were made during Small Pond’s inaugural Cardboard Camp in the spring. I really enjoy working with other creators in the same medium, because we all have our own style, and I always learn a ton from collaborating with these folks. Plus, they are just so much fun to be around!

L to R: Krista Dalby, Chrissy Poitras, Kevin Merritt, Holly Gilmour, Nella Casson

As much as I love working large-scale, much can be said for working small. Last winter I had a hankering for a some artistic experimentation, and wound up creating this boxboard sculpture of Canadian poet Al Purdy. 

A few months later I decided that I should try entering it in a juried art show, Art in the County, which was a first for me. I was really happy when it was accepted into the show, and somewhat incredulous when I received a juror's award. Then I learned that the sculpture sold - another first. I don't know if I'll do any more work like this, but I'm feeling the gentle nudge of the universe reminding me that as an artist I should always be experimenting and reaching beyond my comfort zone. Good things happen there!

Most recently, I worked with Fixt Point Theatre this summer, designing their set for the theatre production of Tale of a Town – Prince Edward County, a play that I co-created with director Katie Swift and the artistic team. 

The Tale of a Town - Prince Edward County, featuring Chelsea Riesz, Kelsey Dann, and Nick Di Gaetano.
Photo by Johnny C. Lam

Naturally, I decided to make the set and many props out of my favourite material – cardboard! I was nursing an injured shoulder at the time of building the set, but thankfully my super-talented sister Caitlin was visiting at the time with her wife Helena, and the two of them helped make it happen. I don't know how I would have done it without them!

Me looking quite at home amongst scads of cardboard.
Photo by Johnny C. Lam

My goal with the set was to make the cardboard look as cardboardy as possible, ripping it and distressing it to show off its beautiful textures. I was really pleased with the result. I loved working in such a large scale, and doing something longer-lasting than my usual installations. I’m now nurturing some big dreams for large-scale projects… stay tuned!

Thanks for reading,

Krista Dalby, Cardboard Queen