Hello collectors and fans!
You haven’t heard from me in a while, so, I am turning over a new leaf. I will try to write in my blog monthly now that I am finally on a regular schedule. This post will be longer than normal, since I want t bring you up to speed.
Two years of graduate school and my exhibition schedule took up all my time from 2016-2018.
in 2018, I started a huge research project, The Mysterious Life of Amy Thomson McKean, based on my paternal Great Aunt who was a composer in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s. I had in my possession, for several years, Amy’s hand-written and published music, given to me by her daughter. Her daugher, Elaine, asked if my sons or I could play and record the music so she could listen to it. None of us were good enough to accomplish the task, so I looked for someone to do it for me. in 2015, I met a composer and musician, Mark Piszczek, at one of my art exhibits and we became friends. I shared the fact that I had my aunts music and he offered to transcribe and play a few songs. Mark asked a lot of questions, and I realized that I had absolutely no information about her, so when I took the music to Elaine (aged 89 at this point in time), I began gathering photos and asking questions. Elaine shared a little, but her memory was vague, and she shut down when the topic of why she stopped playing arose. Mark transcribed 60 songs over three years and shared the story, as it began to unfold, with his friend Charles Griffen, and musician and storyteller. Long story short, Charlie wrote a story and we all collaborated to create a performance that would tell her story, or something close to it. I created an Indiegogo campaign to raise the funds to pay the performers, Charlie and Mark for all their work and we were set to present on March 26, 2020. Covid 19 pandemic was raging and reached shutdowns became mandatory. We re-scheduled only to be shut down again. We hope to perform in 2022. So stay tuned.
I was settling in to a rhythm with the Amy project and creating art for exhibits when I was asked to teach at Valencia College. Three months into teaching face to face classes, Covid 19 shutdowns moed us to online teaching. After a year of scrambling to stay ahead and adapt course work, I now have a face to face, online and hybrid version of each course and expect that I will continue to tweak them as I teach and learn what the students respond to. I love teaching and how it has helped me to experiment more and explore my own work.
Another huge development during the 2019-2020 is that I became a grandparent. Alo’e Phoenix Nalu Thomas was born the day after my birthday, April 12, 2020.
Now you are caught up on my life!
