Art, Mosaic, Water and Community

As you know, I've been in progress on the Artesian Well Community Mosaic project for several weeks now.  I spend day after day residing at this amazing natural resource, slowly adhering mosaic fish made during a community mosaic weekend, and filling in around them with a variety of tile, glass, shells, mirror, and found objects donated by local people.

(Product placement: Laticrete donated the very high-quality thinset being used for this project.  Thank you, Laticrete!)

Originally, I planned to fill in the background on my own, to ensure a consistent design and quality application of materials.  However, a tight deadline and experience spending time at the well lead to a change-of-heart.  I began inviting people to sit and apply pieces to the concrete forms and found that it felt more inclusive.  Soon, many more people began to join me on a daily basis, so the project has been moving along at a stronger pace, and the whole aesthetic has changed.  Karen comes almost every day to take her mind off of her ongoing lack of employment after losing a State job.  Thor has become an invaluable member of the "team" as he is also seeking work, along with processing the death of a loved one.  He says the meditation of mosaic is very therapeutic, and he is even smoking less.

Other volunteers include Darla Lynn, from South of Portland, OR - over 2 hours away!  Also Teasy, Robin, Jessie, Kaytrin, and more and more.  Today, a whole family sat down and created a little seascape at one end of a concrete bench.

Meanwhile, I am a sympathetic ear for many of the folks who visit the well.  They tell me how important this untreated water is for them.  Most of these people feel possessive of the space.  Some come from places like Seattle and Tacoma on a weekly or monthly basis, filling enough 5-gallon jugs to last until the next trip.

Carol and Donna discuss the essence of water after a Native American blessing, which takes place on the 11th of each month at noon.

But, every day, homeless youth come to the well to brush their teeth, wash their hair, and sometimes to rinse their clothes, laying them out in the sun to dry.  These folks also feel a sense of propriety, but often, you can feel the disdain when someone of privilege comes to fill jugs, to find a band of young people using the place to clean up.  On one hand, many people of all class levels come to this one place, and most are kind and friendly to each other.  On the other hand, I constantly hear animosity and misinformation in the things people say to each other at the well.

People say that the City only purchased the well to take possession of the parking lot so they could generate more revenue.  Others say they did it so they can police the space and control behavior.  They tell each other that the City painted over the murals.  If I ask where they heard the information, they can't answer.  One man asked me, "Isn't it obvious?"

I understand that disenfranchised people feel a reasonable distrust of authority, but these attitudes are not based on any real information, and they are polarizing.  It is sad to see so many people coming to this place for the same purpose, but looking at each other with suspicion and fear, and spreading paranoid rumors.

I hear people complain that "they took the Olympia out of the well" when they took steps to improve the space, turning it into a mini-park.  I hear others complain that the improvements are so industrial looking that they are an insult to the spirit of the Artesian Well.

As the mosaic has come together, people have been very supportive.  For those who felt the concrete forms were ugly, they are excited to see them covered in sparkling color and design.  For those who felt it was too "yuppified", the inclusivity of the process has made them feel that it is by and for the community, and everyone who has worked on it brings people by to show off their contribution.  So, my hope is that by facilitating this process, I will create a convergence point.  The well is an incredible natural resource, accessible to everyone.  It is a gathering point; a crossroad for people from all stations of life and for all opinions.  Here the twain shall meet: at the well.

It took 2 weeks to complete this section of the project.  I expect to work at least 2 more weeks to cover all of the concrete forms.

Putting the Art in the Artesian Well

That's me in the silly hat, with Darla, who drove from South of Portland to help out.

On Friday, I got to the well early and set up my canopy.  It didn't rain as hard as on Thursday, but the canopy really helped to keep the area dry.  My first visitor that day was a man who was convinced that all of the small mirror pieces contained video surveillance units.  He accused the next visitor of following him, then asked me a lot of questions about my religious beliefs before commenting that I was wielding a sharp implement and moving on.  In fact, I was using a carving tool to get thinset from between tesserae.  This process is pretty easy the morning after I adhere the fish, but I have learned the hard way that it is nearly impossible by the next afternoon.

It was cold on Friday, though not as nippy as Wednesday and not as wet as Thursday.  Darla Lynn arrived at about 10am and it was great to have company all day, and the extra help filling in the space between fish.  At one point, a very sweet woman came along and asked if she could put some pieces on.  Darla helped butter the backs and let her place them.  She put a cluster of green glass tiles on, with some backwards, but she was so happy it made me want to open the whole process up and make it more participatory.  Considering I have only a few weeks to complete the project, inviting the community could help me to meet the deadline.  What I lose in consistent spacing, I gain in speed and connection to the people who use the well.  I told her she can help me again when she finds me there.

The sun came out in the afternoon, so I kept working until 6:45.  I had worked over 9 hours.  I was incredibly sore and drained from interacting with people all day.  I took Saturday off to be with my family, but I returned to the well on Sunday because I was worried about the thinset that had squished up between the fish on Friday.  This is when I discovered that it is vital that I do not apply new fish unless I am able to return the following morning.  (I also discovered that someone had urinated on the plastic covering over the pillar.)  I spent 2 hours carving out very hard thinset, until my hands were aching and a little bit bloody.  By the last fish, the thinset was like concrete and I gave up.  I'm thinking of using a lighter shade of grout so that it won't be too obvious.

Today (Monday), Alan came down to do some filming.  He has been documenting the whole process.  Later, I had two volunteers show up to help fill in the background, plus Lisandro!  We didn't have quite enough tools and containers for everyone to work at once, but I was being whisked away by a photographer from a local magazine, so it was wonderful that I had helpers to continue working in my absence.  I think, with planning, I could accommodate more volunteers and that we could get this project finished very quickly.  Today, it felt like all I could do to keep people supplied with thinset, tools, and materials.  From now on, I'll apply new fish first and start the grouting process while others fill in the negative space.  It is wonderful to have help, and it really increases the fun factor.

Artesian Well Mosaic installation day 2

I returned to the well yesterday with renewed enthusiasm and a thick, wool coat, hat and hooded rain slicker.  It was pouring rain, but at least I was warm to the core.  I assembled a tarp over my work space, unwrapped the post I'm working on, and got started.

Lisandro came down to help, and it was very nice to have two of us digging out yesterday's thinset, making the work faster and less tedious.  Here is a photo of the thinset squished up between tesserae:

The flat spots are where it pushed against the tile tape that held the fish together until they could be set into mortar.

Here is Lisandro, scraping away at thinset with one of my carving tools:

Luckily, the thinset came out very easily.  The gloves were a good idea.  I realized that scraping thinset is just going to be how I start each work day until this is over.  Since the tess are all different sizes, some with slight curvature, in order to ensure full adhesion, I have to put the mortar on in a thick bed, and it is going to squish through.

So, here is the first fish with thinset carved out, so that grout can be applied later.  Ain't it cute?

The rain was incessant yesterday.  Poor Lisandro was soaked and left after lunch to avoid being miserable and getting sick (smart.)  Thanks to our friend Tara, who went to meet Anouk getting home from school, I was able to work until 3pm.  Since the rain blew in at an angle, I worked under the kiosk, on the surface facing the camera.  An overhang and the tarp kept that spot dry, but I had to dry each piece with a towel before putting it into thinset, and rain was getting into everything.  It was a slippery mess.  (But at least my thinset wasn't setting up super fast like the previous day.)

With a brimmed hat and big hood on my head, every single time I went to stand up, I forgot about the metal bar over my head.  Whack!

Furthermore, several times, I walked right into the door of my wagon when I went to get supplies.  I felt like an idiot, and I have multiple bumps on my head today.

Today, a mosaic artist from Oregon is driving up to assist me.  It is pouring rain again, so I'm taking my big canopy.  I find that having an assistant really makes the work go faster, plus it helps to have a buffer from the public.  Most of the steady flow of people filling containers are perfectly sane and sober, offering a jaunty "Good Job!"  or whatever friendly encouragement comes to mind.  But there are also a lot of colorful characters, staggering and slurring, announcing, "I'm here to help with the mosaic!"  When I try to explain that we are all set, thanks, they are offended and either tell me about their bid for City Council or attempt to ride off on their bike in a huff, only to have a shoe come off, fall on the concrete, and complain that I'm not helping.

So, I very much welcome company, if only to explain the project to everyone and help me keep on task.  With only a few hours each day to make progress, every conversation sets me back.  I wouldn't say no to a soy latte, either.

Artesian Well mosaic installation, Day One

I had a late start this morning.  The car needed to be packed with buckets, mixer, thinset, materials, tools, dropcloths, etc.  Then a business matter came up that I needed to take care of, and by the time I got to town, it was 10am.

Luckily, there is a water source right there at the job site.  And I cleared with LOTT (our water treatment center) where I could rinse my buckets, so that is all kosher.

I had this plan: to smear dry grout into the grout lines of the taped fish before applying them to the thinset, so that the thinset would be prevented from squishing up between the tesserae.  This did not work out.  The powder fell out all over as I tipped the fish into the thinset bed, and mixing grout and thinset together just made a mess out of the process.

So, I abandoned that idea right away.  When I used my notched trowel to even out the mortar, it didn't fill some of the odd, curved shapes (like sea glass), so I began laying the mortar on with a spatula.  Thinset is squished all into the grout-lines, quite visible through the clear tile tape.  I have no choice but to go back later and carve it all out.

While it was pretty darn balmy out here in my neck of the woods, it turned out to be cold and windy in Olympia.  I was shaking like a scared rabbit out there, hunched over, dropping my pieces every which way (usually into my thinset bucket.)  The mortar was setting up much faster than usual, probably because of the wind, so I tried to work as fast as possible.  It was a mess.  The lay of the tesserae is much more rudimentary than I would prefer, and there is thinset stuck to all of the surfaces.

My phone alarm was set for 1:30 so that I would have time to clean up and race back to Elma to pick up 3 girl scouts and get them to their meeting on time.  That is a very short, frantic work day.

So, I expect to have quite a fix-it job tomorrow, but I will also be more prepared.  I'll take layers of clothing to be prepared for any weather.  I'll be sure to get a caffeine fix before arriving - something I did not do today.  I'll get an earlier start.  I'll take my knee pads so that I am not in extreme discomfort the whole time.  I'll slow down and take more care with the layout.

I only managed to cover about 2/3 of one side of one pillar, so there is still time and room to turn this around.  On Friday, a mosaic artist from south of Portland is going to drive all the way to Olympia to work along-side me!  It will be very nice to have the help and the company.

Not that I didn't have company; the stream of visitors filling water jugs was nonstop today, and most people wanted to talk.  Predominately, they wanted to know what the heck I was doing to the well?  Some felt compelled to share the history of the well, and one person relayed a detailed description of a new kind of building material he wanted to invent, along with a method of creating free housing for people in need.  If I understood correctly, the structures would be made of corrugated cardboard and the exteriors would be mosaic.

So, it was a day of reckoning of sorts.  I've worked really hard on this project for the past 6 weeks, but it is clear that I am just beginning.  But, when it is done, it will be a really fun place to fill up your jugs.

Oh, and there's the homesteading thing...

I know it has been forever since I've written anything about how things are going on the farm.  The public art project has taken over my brain lately.  But, we still have to attend to animals, bees, and the massive garden.

So, just a quick summary:
We have 3 ducklings and 2 chicks.  They are in a rabbit cage in the barn with the goats, kept warm with a heat lamp.  But, they are growing fast and I need to figure out a safe way to give them some room very soon.  Unfortunately, the one duckling that I suspect is female has a deformed leg (or more likely, suffered a fracture early on and it healed wrong.)  I tried to create a splint to support her foot and leg, but she pulls it off every day.  She is still eating and drinking and growing, and the other ducks seem to protect her, so I am hoping she will be able to live a decent life with only one good leg.  We have tried to hold her a lot so that she will be more comfortable with us when she needs our help later, but all of the ducks are skittish.

We have a tractor-mower now, for keeping the lower pasture tended, and it has a system where we can catch the trimmings in big bins, easy to dump into the goat yard.  This provides fresh food for them and saves having to buy hay.  The tractor also has a little trailer that will help us haul wood, mulch, weeds, compost, etc.

Another new acquisition is a pick-up truck.  This is essential out here.  I had been carrying hay in the trunk, which is messy and inefficient.  The truck is only for hauling, not regular driving, and it makes life a whole lot easier.

We picked up two new hives of live bees in mid-April.  They are happily installed in their fancy new hives that Mike worked on throughout the winter.  We think the hives we lost this past year succumbed to mold, a common problem in this area.  But the new hives should help keep moisture out.

This time of year, it is important that we till, fertilize, weed and plant in a timely manner.  Having two big projects going right now makes it very hard for me to focus on the farm.  I manage to keep up with slug hunting and some weeding, but Mike has had to do the rest on his own.  He spends all of his time off work mulching, turning soil, amending, fixing and building new beds and structures.  Yesterday, he created a table for starting seeds in the sunroom, with a grow-light attached.  All of the beds are ready for planting, so I need to find time in the coming weeks to help with that.  If I don't, his hard work is for nothing and we don't have food in the coming year (or we spend a lot more buying things we could grow.)

Right now, I'm still making our morning smoothies with ingredients we harvested last summer.  We still have winter squash to eat and a lot of canned peaches and jam, plus many jars of honey.  There is so much summer squash in the freezer still, I will probably start feeding it to the goats and chickens.

So, while I have been writing more about the Artesian Well mosaic project, the little farm is still in progress and going well. 

So Long and Thanks for All the Fish!

The community-participation aspect of the Artesian Well mosaic project took place this past weekend, in partial conjunction with Olympia's Spring Arts Walk Festival.  I anticipated a good turnout on Saturday, because it coincided with the festivities, where many downtown streets become pedestrian-only, filling with jugglers, musicians, and citizens interested in enjoying the art and fun atmosphere.  I wasn't sure what to expect on Sunday.

We were not disappointed!  We managed to set everything up early, and we had participants coming by already, so we had several people already in progress on their fish well before the official noon start time.  From there, it was a full house all day, with people always waiting for a spot to open up.  We had to improvise and set up extra spots.  Volunteers found extra chairs and we accommodated as many people as possible.

I was very impressed that so many volunteers showed up and jumped right in to help.  Alan Rodgers was there when I arrived, and helped Lisandro and I with the whole set-up, both days.  After that, Jamie, Karen, Tina, and Bryn jumped in, helping new participants find spots, cutting and laying down contact paper, explaining the process, nipping when necessary, and wrapping and stacking the completed fish.  Frank Lynam helped with clean-up both days.

We had snacks and beverages provided by Grocery Outlet, and Vic's actually delivered pizzas for the volunteers both days!  It was most appreciated, since we really didn't have time to take breaks.  We just took it in turns to go off to the side and wolf down a slice.

As busy as it was, it all went off without a hitch.  We had plenty of materials, we managed to rotate people through at a good pace, getting new people set up quickly.  Two sets of wheeled nippers walked away on Saturday, which was disappointing, but that is the worst thing that happened, and it is quite minor.

Many people worked in groups, often teaming up on one fish.

Pizza delivery accomplished, time to make a fish.

Getting started.

Beautiful fish!

Dad and daughter working side-by-side.

The crowd rotated through, changing throughout the day.

I think it took, on average, about an hour for each person to complete a fish.  A few people spent half the day, using smaller pieces and putting careful effort into their creation.  Some people went with larger pieces and more abstracted fish.  We gave them some simple guidelines (take care with sharp edges, leave space between pieces, try not to mix up all of the colors, have fun) but it was impossible to really exercise quality control.  I will spend today and tomorrow adjusting each fish and covering the surfaces with tile tape.

This weekend was both exhausting and invigorating at the same time.  The fish-makers were all so excited, they expressed over and over that this was one of the most fun experiences they'd had in a long time, that they loved how the design incorporated the community, and they each took photos of their fish so they can find it easily when the whole project is finished.  People working on mosaic under that canopy over the weekend included a wide cross-section of the community, from all socio-economic and ethnic backgrounds.  We had fish made by toddlers and elderly people.  Whole families worked on one fish, and a couple of adults came by both days because they had so much fun the first time.  At the end of Saturday, we had made 82 fish.  (I haven't counted Sunday's yet.)

Vince Brown and Monica Peabody came by and played music for us on Sunday!

So, the community mosaic project was a great success.  Now for the serious work of transferring all of that hard work onto the concrete forms around the well, filling in the space between them, and getting it grouted.  My biggest fear is that there are some people who will sabotage the work while it is in progress.  I will have to leave ungrouted mosaic untended, and it might be tempting for some people to pry the pieces off and ruin the work before it is finished.  I certainly hope that will not be the case.

Thank you to everyone who came to help, both volunteers and fish-making Olympians!  I could not create this project without you!  And extra special thanks to Lisandro for organizing the donations, helping to keep track of materials, and volunteer recruitment and scheduling.

Artesian Well Community Mosaic - Next Week!

I meant to keep updating this blog about the progress of the community mosaic project, but I've been pretty overwhelmed with getting ready, and documenting the process hasn't been a priority.  I feel utterly grateful to have an intern, Lisandro Perez, who has taken on donations acquisition, volunteer organizing, and keeping track of the pallet at Furniture Works.  Meanwhile, I've been trying to get the word out to all event calendars and print media, going through all of my own materials to contribute as much as I can, and going to community groups to do the project the way it will be done next weekend so that I work out the kinks ahead of time.

Luckily, every group has done a great job making mosaic fish, it has been fairly simple to explain and execute, and only one person has cut themselves on a piece of glass.  Fish have been made by students at Choice High School, a McCleary girl scout troop, and the Olympia Senior Center.  We have 40 fish made already!  Meanwhile, Seattle Mosaic Arts graciously offered to create some fish to contribute.  Claire, the owner of SMA, originally convinced me to try her contact paper-tile tape method, and I can't tell you how helpful that is.

We were becoming anxious when we had only 2 weeks to go and only a fraction of the materials we would need to cover the surfaces of the concrete forms.  But then, Advance Glass and Spectrum Glass both pledged donations of surplus stained glass!  I will drive to Spectrum Glass in Woodinville tomorrow to pick up 150 lbs of glass, which is a huge relief.

So, everything is coming together.  I hope we have an enthusiastic turnout to ensure as much community participation in this project as possible.  Don't forget: noon to 4pm on Saturday and Sunday April 28th and 29th at the Artesian Well on 4th and Jefferson in downtown Olympia.  Also, we could still use a couple more volunteers.  If you are interested, email Lisandro: artesian.well.mosaic@gmail.com.