Expose Yourself
at the Florida Keys Community College Library/Gallery
Second Annual Fantasy Fest Photography Exhibit
Gala Masquerade Reception
Thursday October 18th 5-7 pm

Start your Fantasy Fest off right with

*Body Painting with Tony Gregory
*A Royal Appearance by Mitch Jones MissSouthermostGay.com
*Costumed Revelers cavorting to a RetroDiscoElectroFunkadelic Soundtrack
*Exotic Edibles
and the Infamous
*Wall of Shame: Home to Embarassing photos from Fantasy Fests Past.

Wear a costume or risk being costumed by the Wall of Shame design crew

I Can Fly by Deb Kik

Events This Week

Thursday, October 11 Artist Demo - Key West Artist Rick Worth will demonstrate acrylic painting at the first membership meeting of 2007-08 season. Free and open to the public. 1 p.m. Key West Art Center, 301 Front St., Key West. 294-1241. keywestartcenter.com.

Saturday, October 13 Artist Reception – Key West “Ropa Vieja.” New work including wood carvings by Andy Thurber. Reception 6 - 9 p.m. Gallery on Greene, 606 Greene Street, Key West. 294-1669.

Key WestDesnudo produtions "La Squishy Femme." Painting and photographs evoking feminine sensuality. 6-9 p.m. Gardens of Alexander's Guest House, 1118 Fleming St. markyp@markypierson.com

Tuesday, October 16 Writer’s Group – Key WestThe Writer's Den. Group critique session meets Tuesdays. All levels and all genres welcome. 7 - 9 p.m. Blue Mojito Bar & Cafe at the Hyatt, 601 Front St., Key West. Validated Parking. Contact Nina Aviles at ninaaviles@yahoo.com for details.

Thursday October 18th Gala Masquerade Reception for the Fantasy Fest Photography Exhibit
Florida Keys Community College Library/Gallery 5901 College Road Key West FL for more info call 305 809-3194

Enjoy!

You have only three weeks to get into shape for Fantasy Fest and the Gala Masquerade Reception for our Library Gallery photo show. Fortunately you've already got a few opportunites this week to practice your party skills.

Lon Michels, adjunct professor of Art at FKCC, is celebrating his birthday this evening with a shindig at the Tropic Cinema. Art Behind Bars celebrates their birthday with their time honored art auction and party at the Pier House this Sunday, and it's not even October yet...

All this party practice doesn't leave you much extra time, so we've repackaged some of our most popular classes into what we're calling a "mini-mester" . Starting next week you can take

History of Art, Ancient to 1400

Online with Kate Miller

Beginning Acrylic Painting
with Lon Michels

or learn to search like a librarian with Juana Careaga's Internet Research class.

Here's a complete schedule for the minimester and as always you can register online.

Events this week
Thursday September 27th
Lon Michels celebrates his birthday and the release of the documentary about his artwork, Gods and Butterflies Tropic Cinema 6:30-8:00
Sunday September 30th
Art Behind Bars celebrates their 13th birthday Pier House 8-10 more info
call 305 304 4772 or artbehindbars.org
October 1
Submission deadline for The Miami Herald Art Basel edition E-mail entries to artpaper@MiamiHerald.com; or by mail to Miami Herald, Art on Newsprint, 1 Herald Plaza, Miami , 33132-1693. For details check the video on uvu
Sculpture Key West 2008--Artist Application Deadline is Approaching! Call for entries for the annual juried contemporary sculpture exhibition held at two historic locations on the tropical island of Key West, Florida: West Martello Tower and Fort Zachary Taylor State Park. Mary Ceruti, Director of the New York SculptureCenter, will head the jury panel. Get your application here http://www.sculpturekeywest.com/artists-app.htm

Enjoy!

How to become a literary poseur without even trying
Pierre Bayard a Paris professor, has come up with one of the best book titles of the year, How to Talk About Books You Haven’t Read. Now what English comp student wouldn't want to snap that up ?
Trouble is, the book doesn't even come out in the US till the middle of October. But that hasn't stopped anyone from taking his advice and talking about his book which they haven't read.
The New York Times started the US buzz back in February with a generally positive review. Bayard was just encouraging intimidated potential readers to get over their guilt trip and engage with the social conversation that a good book stimulates.
The Brits took a more anthropological stance in the Times review.
" (W)e like our intellects to be approachable, unpretentious, fancy-a-pint-down-the-pub types." So what's the point of faking it? Only the French are snobs enough to care about having a literary conversation in the first place.
You can check out more reviews of the book at complete-review.com , where the US reviewer managed to get a quote from the actual book (could it be they actually read it?) "Most statements about a book are not about the book itself despite appearances, but about a larger set of books on which our culture depends at that moment. It is that set, which I shall henceforth refer to as the collective library, that truly matters... "
Alas, the reviewer takes a less salutory spin than the New York Times, concluding, "outside tiny isolated groups (high school sci fi nerds,NYC 'literati', etc.)most Americans are unlikely to find that they are not taken seriously if they are unfamiliar with certain books: there simply are no more canonical texts..."

Personally, I don't give a darn about the canon. What worries me is the ever expanding pile of books that I know I'll never get to read. So I'm sticking with Nancy Pearl's rules for when to give up on a book.
1) If you're 50 or younger, read 50 pages. Time is limited, and books are nearly infinite.
2) If you're over 50, you have even less time. Subtract your age from 100, and read that many pages.

Events this Week

September 18th Lettie Nowak begins her second oil painting class. 6-8 pm Tuesdays and Thursdays through October 4th. For more info contact Lemonade Art Studio
September 20th Walk on White - all the usual suspects...

Events to plan for

September 20th Submission deadline for Florida Keys Community College Library/Gallery Fantasy Fest Photo Show. Send jpegs of submissions to lori_kelly@firn.edu
September 30th Art Behind Bars 13th Birthday Party at the Pier House. For more information or to donate an item for the auction call 305 304 4772. for more info artbehindbars.org
October 1 Submission deadline for The Miami Herald is accepting applications for images to be printed in their December 5-9th Art Basel edition. E-mail entries to artpaper@MiamiHerald.com; or by mail to Miami Herald, Art on Newsprint, 1 Herald Plaza, Miami , 33132-1693. For details check the video on uvu
October 1 Sculpture Key West 2008--Artist Application Deadline is Approaching! Call for entries for the annual juried contemporary sculpture exhibition held at two historic locations on the tropical island of Key West, Florida: West Martello Tower and Fort Zachary Taylor State Park. Mary Ceruti, Director of the New York SculptureCenter, will head the jury panel. Get your application here http://www.sculpturekeywest.com/artists-app.htm

Enjoy!

Expose yourself at the Florida Keys Community College Library/Gallery

it's our first official "call to artists" of the season...

Photographers, costume designers and all round revelers are invited to submit their artwork for inclusion in the second annual Fantasy Fest show at the Florida Keys Community College Library/Gallery.

Please submit jpeg photos of work to be considered to lori_kelly@firn.edu by September 20th. Works chosen by the jury will be featured at an all star reception Thursday October 18th, 5-7 pm.

Any work not chosen by our esteemed jury is welcome on the famous "Wall of Shame", home to random pictures of unfortunate costume choices and embarrassing excess. For more information contact Lori Kelly at 305 809 3522.

Been living under a rock somewhere and have no idea what we're talking about? Check out Connie Groth's online Fantasy Fest photogallery.

Events this week

Saturday September 8th New Art South Florida reception for Monroe County artists Leo Gullick, Richard Haden and other recipients of the 2006 Florida Cultural Consortium Fellowships 7 to 9 pm at MOCA Goldman 404 NW 26th St Miami FL, Admission by donation , RSVP 305.893.6211 check the MOCA website for more info.

Auditions for Nutcracker Key West Tennesee Williams Theater on the FKCC campus. 10:30-6 for more info call 305 294-2943

Events to plan for

September 18th Lettie Nowak begins her second oil painting class. 6-8 pm Tuesdays and Thursdays through October 4th. For more info contact Lemonade Art Studio

September 30th Art Behind Bars 13th Birthday Party at the Pier House. For more information or to donate an item for the auction call 305 304 4772. for more info artbehindbars.org

October 1 Submission deadline for Art Basel The Miami Herald is accepting applications for images to be printed in their December 5-9th Art Basel edition. E-mail entries to artpaper@MiamiHerald.com; or by mail to Miami Herald, Art on Newsprint, 1 Herald Plaza, Miami , 33132-1693. For details check the video on uvu

October 1 Application Deadline for Sculpture Key West juried site-specific work, limited artist assistance available. Special funding opportunities for large-scale works exceeding 100 feet. Application fee $25. Applications and more information are available online http://www.sculpturekeywest.com/

Enjoy!

Thanks to everyone

who braved thunderstorms to attend the Thinking in Three Dimensions opening yesterday. The chapbooks on display, a collaboration between Key West High School Students and Sculpture Key West, drew some interested viewers.

But the surprise hit of the show were the new gallery pedestals delivered this week by local wood artist Jimmy Wray. We're going to have to choose some pretty flashy artwork to outshine those pedestals.

Library News
Gavin McKeirnan, of Librarians a Go Go fame, has transferred to the new Instructional Technology Department. She's busy working with Julie Bailey to drag us into the 20th century and can now be contacted in our spanking new technology center at
Gavin McKeirnan, Manager
gavin@firn.eduKey West Campus Room A210
ext. 139 (on-campus)305-809-3130

Events this week
September 4th Women on Film Festival First of a three night film festival at the Tropic Cinema 416 Eaton Street. Get your tickets now at http://www.womenonfilmfestival.com/ since they sold out last year.

September 5th Women and Words Round Robin Poetry reading featuring local literary luminaries like Sheri Lohr, Rosalind Brackenbury and FKCC professor EJ Miller Laino at Voltaire Books, corner of Eaton and Simonton.

Events to plan for
September 30th Art Behind Bars 13th Birthday Party at the Pier House. For more information or to donate an item for the auction call 305 304 4772.

October 1 Submission deadline for Art Basel The Miami Herald is accepting applications for images to be printed in their December 5-9th Art Basel edition. E-mail entries to artpaper@MiamiHerald.com; or by mail to Miami Herald, Art on Newsprint, 1 Herald Plaza, Miami , 33132-1693. For details check the video on uvu

October 1 Application Deadline for Sculpture Key West juried site-specific work, limited artist assistance available. Special funding opportunities for large-scale works exceeding 100 feet. Application fee $25. Applications and more information are available online http://www.sculpturekeywest.com/

Remember a few weeks back we found this mystery painting hanging in the library?
Nan Klingener came by to check out our Mystery Art display in the Library Gallery and immediately identified it as a Gregory Valdez. Apparently Elizabeth Bishop wrote an essay about him while she was in Key West and helped promote his career with galleries in New York.


What a great historical and literary connection!

I found this watercolor hanging in the faculty hallway. Looks like it was signed Thoms, and I thought it might be student work.
But Nancy thinks it's from Walter Thoms who used to design all the posters for Goombay. She's passed the word to exiles Ann Boese and Donna Smith in Savannah and they're going to confirm and perhaps track down his daughter who might still be living here.

Friday morning we're inviting staff, faculty and the extended FKCC family to add their institutional knowledge to the mix and review the collection as part of our Fall kick off. If you want to contribute your expertise stop by soon, because we're putting everything back in the closet in preparation for our first "real" art show of the year.

Thinking In Three Dimensions is a fertile mix of artists from Sculpture Key West and Key West High School artists, writers and photographers. Chapbooks and photographs will be featured in the Library/Gallery from August 20th through October 1st.

We're having a little party Wednesday the 29th at 5 pm to celebrate our first official show of the year, so do stop by. You know it won't be the same without you.


Events this week

Thursday August 23 Visual Arts Networking Session - Local Arts leaders plot and plan 5-7 pm at Studios Key West 600 White St. 296-0458

Following the 7:30pm showing of Becoming Jane, Jane Dawkins, author of Letters from Pemberley and More Letters from Pemberley will discuss the life of Jane Austen and sign copies of her books. Tropic Cinema 416 Eaton Street http://keywestfilm.org/

Friday August 24 Naturalist Expressions in a Time of Global Warming. Three Naturalist Art Photographers: Tara Candra Bolt, Joe A. Frankie and Nancy Forrester - Exhibiting recent innovative works on canvas, tile, paper and digital media through October 1st. The Gallery at Nancy Forrester’s Secret Garden, One Free School Lane, 500 block of Simonton St. Key West. 294.0015. nfsgarden.com.

Saturday August 25 Key West Writers Guild Kellys Caribbean Bar, 301 Whitehead St. 10 - 12 296-3646

Sunday August 26 Monica Haskell ( who knew? ) sings the standards with Larry Smith at the Wine Gallery Bar, Pier House 9 pm

Events to plan for
October 1 Application Deadline for Sculpture Key West juried site-specific work, limited artist assistance available. Special funding opportunities for large-scale works exceeding 100 feet. Application fee $25. Applications and more information are available online http://www.sculpturekeywest.com/

Enjoy!

They say everyone has their own unique organizational style.

Steven, our library specialist, describes his style as OCD symmetrical, as evidenced by his total redesign of our work space. By next week he'll have everyone tucked behind clean, well lighted desks with ample storage capacity.

Everyone that is, but me. I'm sticking with my archeological organizational style. All my piles are organized by strata ; earlier things towards the bottom, later things on top. It drives Steven, and most card carrying librarians, crazy but I know where everything is.

I got some reinforcement for my non-Dewey tendencies this week from no less than David Weinberger, Harvard Scholar and author of Everything is Miscellaneous: the power of the new digital disorder. He goes beyond gee whiz Internet hype to think about why human beings like to put things in categories and how we are adapting to this new disorganized fluidity.

Linnaeus, the father of scientific taxonomy, organized all possible smells into only 7 categories (fragrant, goaty, ambrosial, foul, nauseating, aromatic and garlicky, in case you are interested) and we celebrate him as a founder of scientific method. His categories seem absurdly reductionist now that we can slap multiple keywords into any search. But what does that change say about how humans do science, or how we think logically?

You can listen to smart folks like Jimmy Wales from Wikipedia and Craig Newmark of Craigslist discuss these topics and more in podcasts about the book.

Mad Scientist Art

There are a slew of new books and articles out on Ernst Haeckel. What with the Nazi connections, the fraudulent science and the creationist credos, he's tailor made for the gossip that passes for cultural criticism.

But the re-issue of his book Visions of Nature is worth spending some time over. With replicas of his working notes, full color prints and loads of scholarly commentary, the book is a fascinating look at a time when visual reproduction was scientific fact. Haeckel fudged many of his illustrations, sometimes to reinforce a theory, other times to highlight aesthetic similarities. Although we may no longer count his taxonomic illustrations as scientific fact, they're influencing artists from Issey Miyake to Taxidermia Wurzeltodensis. And they're darn pretty, in a rather creepy way.

Local Artist makes good
Congratulations to Connie Groth winner of Double Exposure's photo competition. Check out her award winning photo entitled "One Perfect Day" on her web gallery http://cjgroth.photoworkshop.com/

Events this week

Thursday August 16th

Walk on White Studios Key West features sculpture in the garden with Jim Racchi and Barbara Vogel. Wave Gallery showing beach pictures by Pat Payatt.

Friday August 17th

Grant workshop for visual and media artists on applying for $15,000 South Florida Cultural Consortium fellowship. 1 p.m. Gato Building Conference Room, 1100 Simonton St., Key West. RSVP 295-4369.
Jane Newhagen signs her new book 'Sand Dollar" at SoDu Gallery 1100 Duval St. 6-8 pm

Sunday August 19th

Out of the Book a short film series on writers and their works featuring David Black in a dramatic reading of Ian Mcewan's On Chesil Beach. 4:00 pm Sponsored by Voltaire Books and the Tropic Cinema. for more info 305 422 4183.

Events to look out for

Thursday August 23

Visual Arts Networking Session - Local Arts leaders plot and plan 4-6 pm at Studios Key West 600 White St. 296-0458
October 1 Application Deadline for Sculpture Key West juried Site-specific work, Limited artist assistance available. Special funding opportunities for large-scale works exceeding 100 feet. Application fee $25. Applications and more information are available online http://www.sculpturekeywest.com/

Ongoing Michael Shields wants all and sundry to know that his blog is up and running at http://javalounge.blogspot.com/.