La Casa Grande Colectiva

Tag: art

  • UPDATE: mural at the independent media center

    Below is the mural from about a month ago.  The mural is a project by local artist Chris Hampson.

    Mural progress at the independant media center Mural progress at the independant media center

    Chris decided to divide the mural into “picture frames” for people to fill in. (2 weeks ago)
    Mural changed Mural changed

    There was painting party which I was unfortunately out of town for.  Below is the mural after the party.

    Mural after painting workshop Mural after painting workshop

    It seems that the mural is an evolving collaborative project that is meant to engage as many people as possible.  Today I found this excellent panoramic photo-stitch of the mural on Daniel Schreiber’s blog about local art happenings (and chocolate). Super cool.

  • On the road: Minneapolis

    On Friday I left lovely Urbana for a two-week tour of the Midwest, in conjunction with elizaBeth Simpson and the Change of State Performance Project.  I hope to post occasional updates on this fortnight of adventure.  I also hope Urbana folks can come on April 21 or 23, when we hit Urbana, and that you can invite whoever friends near Iowa and Chicago and Milwaukee are arty enough to handle our art art art. 

    The theme of the tour is WATER; Qilo and Andrea perform a play about water & its politics, Beth has created a seaside multimedia romp, and I play an udderbot solo piece called hoprock.  The udderbot is a musical instrument we’ve invented which must be filled with water to be played; check out the blog ‘n’ wiki when curious.

    Stop One was Minneapolis.  Staying in a house with hairless cats, who are more like giraffe-bats, eating ginger snaps, studying maps.  A hurried visit with Philip Blackburn, a soft-spoken and highly-accomplished sonical practitioner who’s planning to plant a circle of 52 different varieties of apple tree in his backyard.

    Then we had a show this afternoon, and a good audience came, despite the inclement Easter.

    That’s all for now.  Maybe one of these other folks will lend me their camera for further illustration…

    Hold down the fort!

  • Recycling House Mates

    Hi, my name is Don Thorsen and I’ve recently moved into La Casa, here in Urbana Illinois.  Maria put up on our wall a poster of C-U from around circa 1972(?).
    Urbana-Champaign poster
    And I was able to pull from my just moved belongings a drawing from 1974 of “Earthworks”  the co-op grocery store also shown on Maria’s historic poster.
    Don's drawing of Earthworks (1974)

    The ideas and ideals of community, versus say commodity, have been around longer than any of us, but I’m pleased to once again be a part of a household of active, interesting folks!   Be seeing you around.