SPRING AHEAD: An Outdoor Report

It's Spring again on the Oxbow campus, so we thought this week we'd give you a taste of what's been happening outside the studio walls...

A couple weeks ago, 15 strapping young Oxbow students shoveled ten yards of compost onto the school's biggest garden. In case you're new to the world of compost, that's about 10,000 pounds of dirt--no small feat. The plot, sometimes affectionately referred to as "The Annex," "The Colony," or "The Back 40," is a piece of land owned by our neighbor a little bit down Third Street. We've been very lucky to be able to use this land, as it's more than doubled our campus growing space. Our neighbor's mother grew up there, and tells vivid stories of how her mother (an  Italian immigrant) cultivated enough food on the plot to feed their family of 10. When we first started gardening there, the family gave us a small bag of magic beans--magic because they are a true heirloom, grown and saved from beans our neighbor's grandmother carried with her from Italy (in the 1920's? 1930's?). We've been having some trouble getting the garden up and running over the last couple years, mostly because the soil needs a lot of work. So we've been chipping away, one row at a time, applying compost and amendments in too-small doses and seeing too-small yields. Gone are those days! We are about to see this garden take off...





Our giant load of organic compost was generously donated by the Napa Recycling and Waste Services, who make compost from Napa household food waste, and it's going to make things so much better for our garden. Next week we'll turn the compost in, shape the rows, and start seedlings in the greenhouse. With a space this big producing food at it's full potential, we'll be able to make a significantly larger contribution to the Oxbow dining program. And of course we plan to plant a whole row of the magic family heirloom beans. 

The rest of the Oxbow gardens are already in full Spring swing, with veggies planted by OS29 ready for harvest. Check out this prize-winning cauliflower:

In other exciting outdoor news, our new batch of Ox-Chix have started laying. With the days getting longer and our girls pigging out on kitchen scraps and bugs, we'll soon be getting about two dozen eggs a day. Our flock is quite stylish, with six different breeds laying eggs in a lovely range of colors: greens, blues, rusty browns, even ecru. We had to build an addition to the "coop condo" to accommodate the busy layers!

Oxbow students rotate through Ox-Chix duty on a weekly basis, and are responsible for making sure that the chix have food and water. The kids on chix duty also bring the hens special scraps from the kitchen, and collect the eggs, which go directly to the dining hall and are served for breakfast the very next day. Aren't these just the prettiest eggs you've ever seen?







And finally, last Friday we took a Spring walkabout on the Marin coast. It was a spectacularly warm, clear day, and a great time was had by all. What a treat to spend the day off campus, outdoors, TOGETHER. Happy Spring!

IN THE LANDSCAPE WITH THE LANDSCAPE

Reed talks to the class

This week marked the end of OS30's first Visiting Artist Residency with Reed Anderson. Our post today is a collaboration, written by Amanda and Lena:

AMANDA: Through this ten-day visiting artist residency, our class of 46 students got to know Reed Anderson: a spunky, table-dancing, multi-media artist from New York who’s main work is a combination of printmaking and stenciling (check out Reed's work here). We started out our first class by working with how handshakes and human interaction plays into art and visual movement. We created a collaborative “class handshake” involving everyone, that we were then required to perform each and every class as a group. This also tied into a movement exercise that took place outside in groups of two, where we paired up to practice how movement is fluid and creates different sensory experiences:

Mia and Maeve try out a movement exercise

Lena works on her stencil

AMANDA: The next class involved creating a piece that “created itself,” using paper as a tool to make an art piece through folding, cutting, and spray painting.


LENA: “I am not teaching art, I’m teaching life.” Reed Anderson told me this while I was ready to throw out a piece of art I had been working on because of a deep internal hatred I had obtained for it. He made me continue with the piece as though I hated it and wanted to hate it even more. In the end I liked the piece and learned that, like life, I can’t just stop doing it because I don’t like it right now.

Gabe presents his work

Chloe's finished piece

Iggy, Brem, and Trace admire their collaborative work

AMANDA: We continued in the next assignment by creating a still life within our environment utilizing found materials, which we then drew from one perspective and took a photograph from another. Our final art assignment was to document a habitual movement that we do in our everyday lives. For our last class session we collaborated on a sculpture, drawing, and painting project which involved the classroom furniture, butcher paper, and a garage door to ultimately display it. Anderson's unique teaching style never failed to engage and incite curiosity for assignments. 

LENA: Through this intensive 10-day residency I learned a lot about the process of creating art from itself and from materials surrounding us in the world we are forced to survive in. Anderson gave us a range of experiences in class, from exercises that inspire to making handshakes for no apparent artistic reason; everything we did had an overall purpose. Each piece of each class with Anderson came together to leave a mark on my ever-growing young mind that I will not forget in my future of art, Oxbow and the world beyond.

Sculptures for Poets

For the Narrative unit in Sculpture, students consider the power of memorials when they are assigned a poet for whom they design and construct a monument. Some are familiar names while others are more obscure. Regardless, it's pretty clear that each student forms an exciting relationship with them and their work. Below are some beautiful sculptures and their thoughtful descriptions: 

Eliot, Berkeley CA: Philip Nikolayev. Eliot was drawn to Nikolayev's futuristic language and resonated with his subject matter. With this monument, Eliot wanted to illustrate the philosophical thinking of Nikolayev through a blend of tradition and experimental techniques that echo the poet's work. 

Lydia, Freeport Maine: Sylvia Plath. Focusing on Sylvia Plath, Lydia created an interactive sculpture on a roll of paper towels to reference Plath's consideration of herself as disposable. Be sure to watch the video for the full effect!

Mai, Napa CA: Wendy Videlock: For her Wendy Videlock monument, Mai integrated Videlock's numerous roles in life (artist, mother, wife) into one sculpture to showcase the different aspects and expressions informing Videlock's work. 

Making Colors

First off, apologies for the delay--we usually post on Fridays, but last Friday was Early Break, a long weekend where the students leave campus to refresh and regroup. We'll post twice this week--today (Monday) AND Friday!

So, today we'd like to show you a snippet of a painting project called "Place." Students work on a series of paintings that are inspired by a place of significance, and to get the ideas flowing, they first complete the following assignment:

"Think about a place that is special to you. Tap onto the memories, emotions, and associations this place embodies. Mix 25 colors that, for you, evoke how this place looks and / or feels. Do not be limited by local color alone. Use color to describe your feelings about this location in addition to its physical attributes. Name each color. Write a journal entry about how you determined the color palette for your place. Address how your perceptions and associations regarding color are tied to cultural context, personal experience, and memory."

Below are two of these wonderful color palettes, created by Rose from Maryland (top) and Libby from Georgia (bottom). Enjoy!

New Media + English

The first month at Oxbow is a busy time as students rotate through our studios working on several short term projects with overriding themes. The first, Observation, is team-taught by an art faculty and a humanities faculty: Painting meets Science, New Media pairs with English, and Sculpture and History come together for some meaty philosophical conversations. 

Students in New Media employed visuals and text to record the world around them as actively participating artists and storytellers. By asking questions about their relationship to the new world around them, they contemplated what it means to be a "seer" through the course of a day and how to communicate these significant moments through the language of film. 

Below are some examples by Katie from CT, Michael from MA, and Elijah from CA, of their visual and aural montages using rhythm, timing, association, and extensive editing.

What I Live For

This week we are pleased to share something very special with you. It's an assignment the students do in response to the Walden chapter "Where I Lived and What I Lived For." This is the chapter in which Thoreau presents what is essentially a manifesto on why he went to live in the woods; it's the chapter, one could argue, that acts as the thesis of the entire book. Students are asked to write their own "manifestos" in response to the question, "What do you live for?" We celebrate these pieces of writing by honoring Thoreau and getting out of town to take a slow walk in the woods. At the end of our walk, students read their work aloud, projecting their declaration into the welcome arms of nature and their peers. It's a moving experience, and a real gift, to witness this tender and generous moment. We are excited to be able to share a snippet of this moment with you today, as we've had some students offer to share their work here on the blog. 

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What I Live For by Brem

It is fleeting, and when I know what it is, it’s gone. I can only be reminded of such a thing, because when it’s present it pervades one’s being with such a thick, blinding glow, one can not know anything else, but can only drown in it.

Wonder for what that once was, leaving you with a warmth in your chest. Wanting to cry because it’s left you, but beaming because you once knew it. And you don’t know it – but you’re in it – drowning again, being thrown from a cliff.

Such invisible glows linger like ghosts of things you once loved, but they are so unclear that mere hints of its shape evoke shivers, and I live, blinded, suspended, submerged, trying to make them out.

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Freedom by Chiara

Life.

Never-ending circles drawn in the red dirt

with the end of a child's stick.

I live for the circles, the cycles

that inhabit my soul

and fill my chest up

with endless emotions.

The cool creekside air

creeping into my lungs like a

summer disease.

A clatter of laughs spills

out of small wooden windows.

The inevitable serenity that envelops my soul,

calming my brain into a deep blue haze.

I live for the warmth.

The smiles smeared on our faces

like children in a blurry memory.

Barefoot journeys

and soil between my toes.

These are the moments I hold

in the tunnels of my tattered heart.

Whole I am now- one with the earth

and she whispers stories of my past

into my ears as as I float through the distance.

Forgetting.

Everything fades to a

dull golden glow,

and night is called into the sky,

my thoughts become glistening stars.

Scattered across the matte black canvas

of my life.

I live for the moment

that purity fills my veins once again,

and my bones fall into a slumber.

Anxiety's curse,

hushed with pursed lips,

blowing out the steady flame of a candle.

I live for those rich smells.

Rain trampling dry soil

with tiny teardrop feet.

Warm tortillas- fresh from

that simple white stove,

in the cabin tucked behind

watchful pine and juniper branches.

I live for this comfort.

Open arms and warm embraces.

Goodnight kisses and midnight grins.

Hot water and woodsmoke.

So many souls

in one old house.

In the tranquil morning light,

the sparrows and doves cry out to me,

gently welcoming me to a new day

like a fragile newborn.

I live for the days I am born again.

Into the sun and the land.

It is here that I feel at home.

My body-

content with nature.

I live for the sound of my grandfather's flamenco guitar.

The elegant sway of my grandmothers singing.

The tip tap of nails against hard wood floors.

Tradition.

I live for this greatness-

the wide open.

The illumination of the world

that my emerald eyes hold

in those single precious moments.

The feeling in my heart

as it truly embraces the freedom

I have somehow forgotten. 

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So, dear blog readers, what do you live for?

THE THIRTIETH CLASS

OS30 has landed! With 46 bright and eager students, we have one of the biggest and strongest classes in recent Oxbow history. And we are thrilled to have them here. Despite the terrifying implications of the California drought, the weather has been a dream, welcoming this new class with clear skies and wide-open studio doors. We're off to a great start with OS30--this weekend, on an afternoon walk down the pad, the sound of the Walden audio book wafted out from behind easels in the Painting Studio while students vigorously multi-tasked, grappling with atmospheric perspective and Transcendentalism in the same stroke. Yesterday students finished their first Oxbow project, the culmination of the inter-disciplinary Observation unit, and the work looks great--vibrant, lively, and passionate. If you're new to this blog, welcome! And stay tuned for weekly updates as OS30 navigates their Oxbow journey. 

Holidaze

The Ox-Blog is on vacation! We'll see you back here in January to welcome OS30.

OS29 /// OUT

BON VOYAGE

we'll miss you

you'll always be part of the Oxbow family