"I Am Lonely: The Solitary Frog's Lament": Toads for Jade

My brother John Kennedy, of Santa Fe New Music, was just in town to audition musicians at the IU Jacobs School of Music for the Spoleto Music Festival held in Charleston, South Carolina. His visit here once a year gives us a rare chance to have dinner together and share stories.

This year John carried letters from his daughters Jasmine and Jade. Jade is an artist, and I really need to scan and upload her handwritten letter to convey its beauty. (There are many subtle colors in the round organic forms living behind the lines and words.) She had this to say:

On Sunday we got toads! They are so cute! One of our toads is named Sandy. Today me and mom were playing with Sandy and she hopped out of the cage and I couldn't find her because she was behind the cage. Jazzie's frog is Kermit. Mine is Carrot. I might change it later, Well bye!

Jade and Jasmine might like playing a computer game designed by Elena Bertozzi, "I Am Lonely: The Solitary Frog's Lament", available at the Ardea Arts website:

This game was created over the summer of 2008 with an Undergraduate Research grant from UWW. Biologist Jeff McKinnon wanted a game that would interest high school students in Wisconsin frogs. The game teaches players how to identify 12 frogs by their calls, habitats and markings. We are very proud to have made it to the finalist round of the Serious Games Showcase in Orlando Florida. Make sure your speakers are on.

I just played the game and I'm happy to say that I found my solitary female toad a mate. They have exchanged gametes, and more Wisconsin toads should result. Oops, played again and left my toad in a very dangerous place, near a turtle! Must go back and try to get it right. There are wonderful frog and toad sounds in this game.

Alberto Casiraghi of Pulcino Elefante Press

In another captivating segment of the film Proceed and Be Bold!, a documentary about printmaker Amos Kennedy Jr., Elena Bertozzi introduces Kennedy to Alberto Casiraghi, the founder of Pulcino Elefante Press in Italy. (The image of Casiraghi's art here comes from the Musicartz Berceto website.)

Here is more information about Casiraghi, from Ardea Arts , where he is a collaborator:

The founder of the Pulcino Elefante Press, Casiraghi letterpress prints small editions of books in collaboration with individual artists. He has also published several collections of poetry (In the Close Distance; The Cherries are Distracted; Poetry of the Reserve). Among his books are Ordinary Reliquaries and In the Whale Fields in collaboration with Antonio Papaglia.

He has produced a prodigious number of editions. The catalog of his books published by Vanni Scheiwiller in 1997 includes his first 1743 books. Last year he published over 500 books in editions ranging from 9 to 42. In his own words, Alberto is the bread baker of publishers, the only one who prints fresh books daily.

I love the way the film brings together two dedicated printers, one in Alabama and one in Italy, with Elena Bertozzi helping them cross the boundaries of geography and language. They find a way to collaborate – co-elaborate – around their common obsession.

Elena Bertozzi of Ardea Arts

Amos Kennedy's friend and lover Elena Bertozzi plays a large role in the film Proceed and Be Bold!, discussing his work, their relationship, and showing a bathroom in her house where the walls are covered with his posters. She opens a wooden trunk of handwritten letters she's received from Kennedy, talking about the anomaly and value of that form of communication (and later, in another context, she answers him with a digital love letter.)

Bertozzi completed a Ph.D. in media and communications in at the European Graduate School in Switzerland, with a dissertation called "At Stake: Play, Pleasure, and Power in Cyberspace." Before that, she earned her M.S. in immersive mediated environments and telecommunications at IU in Bloomington. Now she is an assistant professor of multimedia arts and digital communication at the University of Wisconsin in Whitewater.

Bertozzi is also director of Ardea Arts, "a bridge between the print and digital worlds." The group defines itself as "artists, designers, writers, musicians, educators and information professionals. Some of us are on the cutting edge of new technologies while others of us are in the Luddite camp, but all of our work is firmly grounded in craft. We aim to create products which simply and elegantly fulfill their function."

I find it fascinating that these artists have a connection to IU, and I'm enthralled by their mission – it unites creatives and enables them to collaborate without defining and delimiting them on the basis of "new technology" fault lines.

And I must say: I do like Elena's name! Come to think of it, I like Kennedy's, too. The "play of the signifier" leads me to more "living ghost" members of my artistic family.

"Proceed and Be Bold!" Letterpress Printer Amos Kennedy, Jr.

I had a chance to see the new movie Proceed and Be Bold! last night through the Ryder Film Series at Indiana University. The film is a documentary about "humble negro artist" Amos Paul Kennedy, Jr., a letterpress printer who used to teach at Indiana University in Bloomington.

Once a computer systems analyst, Kennedy left that job in mid-life when he became fascinated with letterpress printing. Now he lives and works in Gordo, Alabama, where you can contact him (letters are preferred) about purchasing his work; he guarantees that "no two prints will be the same." His love of printing, subversive sense of humor, and artistic independence are evident in the documentary, which was made by Brown Finch Films, a Chicago-based filmmaking collaborative run by 3 young women: Laura Zinger, Michelle Kaffko, and Stacey Simcik.

There's a scene in the film where Kennedy is interrogated by campus police after mailing a postcard – one of his many provocative "nappygrams" concerning social justice issues – to the affirmative action office at IU, with the message "Affirmative action is a joke!" At the end of the interview, Kennedy says: "I think we've established what this is: this is ART. ART."

The film interviews a number of Kennedy's friends, collaborators, and family members. Some of my favorite comments are observations by Kennedy's parents, his son, and his friend Elena Bertozzi. The photo of the artist here comes from the website for Just Seeds, a Visual Resistance Artists' Cooperative.

As Kennedy puts it, "Now I just make stuff, that's all. And I tell people that want to do art that they should just make stuff."

Proceed and Be Bold! is a terrific film for focusing on artistic independence, innovation, and the revival of letterpress printing. It is also a testament to playful, insightful artistic collaboration. Click on the film's title to see a trailer; it's showing through the Ryder again tonight.