Barn

Kris Ellestad rocks out.

On July 10 Small Pond Arts played host to Calgary's Kris Ellestad for the Picton Picturefest Afterparty, closing out four days of film screenings, youth workshops, parties, and merriment. Kris and his awesome band played in our Art Barn which had seen (and heard!) fabulous music nearly a year ago during Splashdown! --but this time it was on a fresh new cement floor. This renovation was a long time coming and involved a lot of very hard work by many helpful folks.

The Art Barn in the spring of 2010.

Prior to the reno, the barn (which hitherto housed horses) had already been put to use in several artistic ways: it was studio space for painter Amitesh Verma, it became a museum during Stickfest, and Krista held a lantern-making workshop in there during Culture Days last fall. The space was great, but the floor was uneven, having been chewed up by hooves and horeshoes over many years.

So we enlisted our friend, David Riley, for his expertise in construction and he told us the first thing we had to do was dig a channel around the inside perimeter of the barn. Great! How hard could that possibly be? How long could that possibly take?

As noted in this post, the soil in much of Prince Edward County is incredibly rocky, and digging deeply with mere shovels isn't always an option since you're likely to hit bedrock after only about two feet. So, to answer the first question above: pretty hard, buddy; and to answer the second: seemingly forever.

Honourable Barn Channelers.

Above is a montage of most of the helpful people who helped us dig the Barn Channel. Clockwise from top right: Krista, me, artist residents Nina Hartt and Kris Forge (Toronto), artist residents Urs (Germany) and Kim Thompson (Toronto), a few young ladies from the Otesha Project that camped overnight, and, dead centre, artist residents Catherine Mellinger and Joel Brubacher (Toronto). We thank you all.

Many of the rocks excavated from the channel were hauled over to our new outdoor bake oven site (more on that in the future).

Kingbirds freak out.

Babies need feeding.

Unbeknownst to us, a pair of Eastern Kingbirds (Tyrannus tyrannus (I'm not kidding!)) had made their nest in the downspout of the barn's gutter, but we decided to let it stay just in case there were eggs in it. Needless to say, that whole family (now with three chicks!) put up with a lot of noise during the reno.

String Theory in practice.

Several weeks later (we worked hard but intermittently...and we also concurrently began work on our bake oven!) we were ready to install the foam forms that would contain the concrete as well as insulate the floor against winter frost. Dave and I used a laser level to mark lines around the inside so we would have a consistent point to measure down from, ensuring the tops of our forms would be at the same height. String was strung to help with these measurements.

Formed forms.

This stage didn't take nearly as long as the digging, but it did require a relative degree of accuracy, if not absolute precision. I left the mathematics to Dave.

14 yards.

Believe it or not, after weeks of taking out dirt, we now had to put it back in. To stabilize the foam forms and provide a ground the cement can grab onto, we ordered a bunch of screenings (i.e. gravel) from local suppliers C.B. Fennel. That pile is 14 yards (I'm still confused about that measurement) and, apparently, too much --but we used lots around the outside of the barn (with cardboard underneath to prevent vegetative growth) and some will go into our bake oven, minimizing wastage.

In the last shot you can see the right hand door that we had to remove so we could get a good pour without having to over-customize the forms. This door slides inside the barn (the other on the outside) and will have to be cut shorter before we put it back.

The gravel channel.

Not shown above is all the gravel that had to be brought in and raked to cover the floor's surface, bringing the top of the gravel four inches down from the tops of the foam forms (minutes before the cement truck arrived, this was changed to three inches, requiring less concrete).

Here we go...

I can't remember the yardage on the cement, but it was significantly less than that of the gravel. Once again, Fennel's came through with the delivery.

Maximum insertion.

This is as far as Dennis, the cement delivery guy, could get into the barn, requiring somebody to haul the cement to the far corners of the barn in a wheelbarrow.

That somebody was me.

I'm not complaining, but a wheelbarrow full of wet cement is heavy --but it had to be done and I was up to the task. Another friend, Peter Blendell, came by to assist in the pour because he had even greater expertise in this than Dave. It was a day of glorious teamwork.

Action!

Cement waits for nobody so you have to work quickly, spreading it around to the desired areas, making sure it gets into all the nooks and crannies of the gravel. Dave and Peter did most of this, ankle deep in cement, but Krista (in the green boots) was there with a ready shovel, helping out.

Smooth operators.

Dave and Peter run the screed across the cement, smoothing it out. It's not as easy or as fun as it looks because wet cement is heavy and hard to push around.

Cemented into a corner.

We split the floor into two halves, making the pour more manageable; we did the far side first, then the near. It was actually kind of fun watching both Peter and Dave Spider-Man their way out of the tricky corners.

Almost done?

Nope. Although the floor looked pretty good even at this point, there was still one more task to perform...

Smoother operators.

Peter and Dave started, to  show us how, then Dave, Krista, and I continued, then Krista and Dave finished the floor by trowelling the cement into as smooth a finish as we could manage. We're quite happy with the slightly imperfect, handcrafted finish.

Finished, but for the decorations.

The finished floor is more reflective, giving the space a brighter look. Also, removing the three non-supporting posts in the middle gives us more room to play with. Here Krista readies the stage for the band with her wonderful patchwork banner and paper lanterns.

My apologies for this hastily-patched-together panorama and for the lack of proper "before and after" shots, but you can click here to see the space as it was the last time we had musicians play in the barn.

Kris Ellestad rocks out (reprise).

The audience was outside and the weather was amazing (if buggy).

Beautiful music.

Seriously: go to his website and check out some tunes.

Low-tech music videos.

Local illustrator Carl Wiens had recently acquired a few reels of 8mm home movies and brought them (along with his gorgeous vintage projector) to show them on a makeshift screen on the sliding door to the right. The band couldn't see the images, but it was uncanny how, quite often, the music seemed to sync up with the movies, creating a score to decades-old memories, sometimes funny, sometimes poignant, always fun.

One small step.

We had about a wheelbarrow's worth of cement left over from the floor pour, so I quickly made a form out of some leftover wood and made a step to make climbing up to the Silo Patio a little safer.

Unacknowledged Legislators of the World

Things are really going gangbusters here at Small Pond.  Between Milé's multitudinous art openings (Field to Canvas featuring prominently amongst them) we’ve had some very cool residents coming through.

Portrait of George Emlaw, part of Milé's Field to Canvas exhibit,
on now until the end of 2011 at Angéline's Restuarant, Bloomfield

Négar Mokhtassi and Kori Okamura are a couple of musicians who came to Small Pond with the intention of writing some new songs and enjoying some R & R as spring blossomed in The County. They enjoyed the intense acoustics of playing music in the silo, and were even inspired to write us a theme song! When not jamming, they cruised around enjoying the beach and some of our favourite antique shops.

Joel Brubacher and Catherine Mellinger were the next residents to arrive. I know Joel from the puppetry community in Toronto. He came to Small Pond with the goal of making a whole bunch of new puppets, and his lovely lady Catherine spent her time writing (on a typewriter!) and working on some amazing collages.

Joel working in the great outdoors - the best studio of all!

 

Catherine collaging in the garage a.k.a. puppet studio

Joel and Catherine did some bike-riding (we've got a few loaners), enjoyed some tranquil moments in the hammock, and in the evenings taught us some awesome card games that got very intense… despite which we were still friends at the end of the week. They made a really cool installation on our artists’ trail; my prediction is that their “Theatre of Possibilities” will become a favourite photo spot on the property.

My sister Meagan in the Theatre of Possibilities

This past weekend we held a banner-raising party, and had a full house of people staying over, plus a good forty visitors. Friends, family and visiting artists enjoyed the celebratory atmosphere as we watched our young friend Jacob Wiens help raise the new banner by shooting arrows into the silo with the top ropes attached (read about last year’s banner here).

Jacob and the newly-raised banner

The banner raising was followed by a barbecue, an impressive and delicious silo-cake, and a very satisfying and hilarious piñata-smashing!

Silo cake by Vicky Roy of Chesterfield's Homegrown Cafe

After giving the little ones a chance...

... illustrator Carl Wiens successfully decapitates
the piñata with his mighty swing.

Last night 14 cyclists from The Otesha Project camped out in our woods. This group of young volunteers are spending their summer riding all over Ontario, living as a sustainable community and performing a play on environmental and social justice issues to schools and other community groups.

The Otesha Project rolls into the Pond

They helped us out for a bit with two of our current building projects: digging the foundation for our outdoor cob bake oven, and putting a new floor in the Art Barn, which will dramatically improve the building as studio and performance space.

Dig this: The Otesha Project crew digging the bake oven foundation

 I love how people seem to universally connect with Small Pond. It’s a gorgeous spot, to be sure, but I’d like to think that they are drawn to the place for more than the wildflowers and the fresh air; I think creative people are drawn here because we freely grant them permission to be themselves, to find inspiration, and to be what they cannot deny: artists, creators, the unacknowledged legislators of the world. Being an artist is not always an easy path, but one that we fully celebrate here. No one is an oddball at Small Pond; we are a collection of beautiful misfits, and in our togetherness we discover that there is simply no other way to be.

Stickfest

"Should you sit around waiting until something’s become a tradition, or shouldn’t you rather roll up your sleeves and get to work developing one?”
– Rainer Werner Fassbinder

In 1988 the citizens of Epping Forest, a small town in the UK’s Essex County, held their first celebration in honour of the common stick. With the slogan “Rectus Extra Vester Porta” (right outside your door) and beloved mascot Hickory Dick (designed by Niall Eccles), the festival was a sensational hit, attracting media attention across England. Eventually, more English towns caught Stick Fever and it soon became known as the International Festival of the Stick, with festivals throughout the UK numbering in the dozens. The rest of Europe soon followed, bringing appreciation of the lowly stick to more and more people each year, and by 1996, more than thirty-five countries were hosting stick festivals.

But not really.

We made it up.

We decided that the International Festival of the Stick would be an inclusive, community-oriented event that everybody could afford to attend, the price of admission being one stick. As an early-bird promo, when people visited us, we put a stick under their windshields that had written on it "This stick is your admission to Stickfest 2010 at Small Pond Arts”. Likewise, these stick invitations were left in mailboxes, at local cafés, etc.  Our initial idea was that whoever brought that stick to the festival got a treat, but then we decided to just give treats to everybody. When someone arrived without a stick, that was okay; we gave them a stick.

Krista spent a week trimming branches from the fallen Hesperus to make the River Styx out of sticks.

Another outdoor stick-based installation was Caitlin Dalby’s beautiful giant nest. This was made back in May and is a permanent installation on our artists’ trail in the woods. People love climbing into it and having their picture taken.

The centerpiece of Stickfest was The Museum of the Stick in our barn where we featured all kinds of sticky items:

I made three drawings --using lipstick-- of musician Tony Levin playing the Chapman Stick.

Local illustrator Carl Wiens contributed an illustration of The Amazing Stick, encapsulating the versatility of sticks since their very beginnings.

My sister, Lena, had made some delicious mini sticky buns for all to enjoy:

Also in the food part of the display were a beef stick, Fun Dip with its famous hard candy Lik-A-Stix, and Hickory Sticks in all their salty goodness.

In a series of three shadow boxes were displayed a lipstick, a deodorant stick, glow sticks, incense sticks, matchsticks, chopsticks, a memory stick, a ChapStick, and a glue stick.

Krista’s Punch puppet is holding a slap stick, there’s a joystick, a traditional East Coast ugly stick, a pogo stick, a candlestick, and a beautiful talking stick carved by Belleville artist Peter Paylor.

Other museum items included a pair of drumsticks (the musical kind, not the part of a fowl’s leg…or the ice cream confection), another beautiful carved stick by Peter (this time a salmon carved into a piece from one of our own trees that fell over this summer), stickers, a walking stick, a didgeridoo from Australia, a yard stick, a rain stick, and an Olympic hockey stick.

Then there’s my favourite part of the museum: the Mascot Gallery. Children from all over created extremely imaginative interpretations of Hickory Dick.  I really wanted to have a children’s component to the museum and I was so happy to receive and install so many amazing pieces of art.

We also set up a painting station where visitors could decorate their own sticks, all the while listening to sticky music on the stereo (including Gregory Hoskins and the Stickpeople, musicians playing the Chapman Stick (including Tony Levin), and, of course, Styx). Some of these painted sticks were later incorporated into the River Styx.

When the crowd was at a critical mass, we began the entertainment portion with readings. I was up first with a reading of The Trees by Neil Peart, Krista read her poem Sugar Maple, and finally, Colin Frizzell read a brilliant piece which he wrote specifically for this Stickfest, called The Glory of the Stick.

In the bottom right of the photo above is Dianne Lee, who created Stick Cozies, complete with instructions, for people to keep their sticks, well, cozy.

After a while, folks gathered around the fire pit (fortunately no sticks were burned that day) and partook of carrot and celery sticks. Some people even took to whittling sticks and knitting.

Some people even learned to walk on big sticks.

We were really impressed that our community so willingly took to Stickfest and came out in such great numbers.  We’re already looking forward to Stickfest 2011 – aren’t you?