A plane crash and some art updates

The post isn't really all that Antarctic, but here are some fun pictures of a plane crash from 1971 to give you your fix of strange things down in the very deep south. It's an enormous pain to ship things off continent, so when this plane went down, the crash was more or less left where it landed.

And now on to the non-Antarctic portion of today's post!

One of my favorite things about traveling and/or ending up in weird remote places is that I get to more or less ignore all the practical, business-y aspects of being an artist and just play around with making things. I make art because it's a joyous compulsion, and I wouldn't be able to stop myself even if I wanted to. But I have yet to figure out how to fully make my peace with the idea of art as a commodity. When I get back from this particular adventure, I think I might just wait tables a few days a week and keep creativity and commerce as separate as possible.... Anyways, my "art career" seems happily far away and abstract from down here, but some of my Northwest art friends have done some pretty wonderful things recently and I am proud of them and would like to share.

People often ask me how I first heard about working in Antarctica and how I subsequently ended up down here. The short answer is: Tia Kramer.

Tia and I met because we both had art studios in the same warehouse space. Tia is a wonderfully talented sculptor and jeweler, and she is also my creative mentor when it come to all the organizational, business aspects of making things for a living. She also always has tasty snacks, and has saved me from low blood sugar many times over because sometimes when I am working, I forget that I need to eat. She was recently interviewed in American Craft Magazine! 

Yay for seeing fabulous artist friends receive the recognition they deserve!

One of my favorite things about writing for an arts magazine is that I get to meet my art crushes. Last summer I got to sit down with Stacey Rozich for an interview for Redefine Magazine, and Stacey's stuff has been circulating like wildfire over the last few years. Stacey recently worked on this incredible video for Seattle's Fleet Foxes. Amazing! I have fallen hopelessly in love with it, and will hopefully be doing some sort of a mini interview (because I have so much free time, right?) with Stacey about the process of working on it.


The Shrine / An Argument from Sean Pecknold on Vimeo.

Annnndddd, last but not least, AJ Fosik! He's been one of my favorite artists for years, and I got to chat with him about his work before heading down here to the ice. 

Two Months

 I realized this morning that I've now been in Antarctica for two months. Two months of stepping outside and looking at views like this, and it still renders me speechless every time. Which, I think, is exactly how it should be. Sometimes it seems like I've been here for three days, and other times it seems like at least nine months. Time becomes pretty subjective when you haven't seen sunrise, sunset or stars in 60 days.

My dad recently forwarded me this amazing Herbert Ponting Antarctic photograph. I would love to get to see something like this-- if only I could, say, be down here on the artists and writers grant... I'm just going to just keep mentioning this repeatedly in the hopes that the universe, as it is sometimes wont to do, might deliver if I ask it enough.

It's my day off and I'm currently camped out in the coffee shop working on six (I mean this literally, not figuratively) different art/writing projects, so I'm going to get back to those and just quickly post some images of various things I've been working on. And let's face it-- people just look at blogs for the pictures, right?

 

Poster design for Freezing Man, which is exactly what it sounds like. 

 

Poster design for the Fuels department's Mad Max Party, which I am RIDICULOUSLY excited about because I LOVE anything having to do with the apocalypse.  I have been skuaing various portions of my costume for weeks.

 My own submission for Under the Bed Gallery's "These Things Have Come to Seem Normal" show.

I'm also ostensibly writing a comic strip called "Family Meal" about dumb/silly things that happen in the kitchen down here.

OK! Back to work! And thanks to everyone who has gotten in touch about Under the Bed. Get those submissions in!

Antarctic Call for Artists! Under the Bed Gallery

Why hello there people reading this thing. I know there are actually a fair amount of you, because a few days ago someone told me that I could check visitor stats, and apparently I am not just rambling to myself on the internet (Hi four people from Russia! We probably live in similar climates!).

I've always been a bit uncomfortable with blogging because it seems a bit self aggrandizing and one sided, and I much prefer to communicate in ways that involve interaction. But I have come up with a way to make this a bit more participatory, and I've started something that I want all of YOU to be a part of.

The notion of collaboration has been on my mind a lot of late, and I have been mulling over ways to share the bizarre magic of this environment from afar. Inspired by such lovely endeavors as NEPO house, Vignettes and The Telephone Room, I am pleased to announce that I have founded the Under the Bed Gallery here at McMurdo Station, Ross Island Ice Shelf, Antarctica.

I’m currently putting together the inaugural local show “These things have come to seem normal after living this long on the ice” (for example: the fact that the discovery of a fruit fly is exciting enough to stop dinner conversations, routinely wearing shoes that have pressure valves to regulate insulating air pockets, eating 6 desserts a day, bartering with produce, and speaking entirely in acronyms), and am hoping that you lovely folks will participate in my upcoming February show, "Outside Notions of Antarctica."

I’m looking for your ideas of Antarctica—informed, idealized, or entirely fabricated. Any and all mediums happily accepted, so long as 1. you can ship it to me without violating customs agreements and 2. it’s small. As you might imagine based on the name, Under the Bed Gallery has limited space, so please keep 2D submissions to 8.5”x11” or smaller, and with 3D pieces… well, be reasonable. And know that anything shipped in a box takes a very, very long time to get down here. Feel free to submit poems, prose or any sort of audio, and if you have a performance piece that I can somehow make happen, let’s chat.

Send submissions to:
Tessa Hulls, NANA
McMurdo Station
PSC 469 Box 700
APO AP 96599

ALL SUBMISSIONS MUST BE POSTMARKED BY JANUARY 1, 2012!! Delivery times are wildly inconsistent down here, so it’s best to err on the side of caution. If you would like your piece returned, please include appropriate shipping and handling. Otherwise (and this strikes me as a much more mutually beneficial arrangement), I will install it somewhere strange down here and send you a picture of its new icy home.

If you would like to collaborate in other ways, chances are I will be very excited about any ideas you might happen to have… Want me to wear a People's Republic of Cascadia scarf and spread the word about the Northwest secessionist movement? Leave a copy of your book in the library? Send you a picture of something strange and provide you with absolutely no context? Shout your poem out to a seal? I'm probably down.

Please spread the word to interested parties! 

Under the Bed is currently set up as my studio. Here's a picture; it's quite cozy... I spend a lot of time down here.

Antarctic Erotica

Sorry it's been a while since the last post... I am still alive, well, and ludicrously busy, and I have been continuing to draw Antarctic comics. And about a gazillion other things. I have plans for some lengthier posts in the next few days/weeks, but for now here is a crazy landscape picture (I know, I've fallen a bit behind in posting those...):

and some pictures of "Mustache Alley," because people tend to have a sense of humor about organization down here:

and a comic about Antarctic Erotica:

I have a new project that I am VERY excited about, and it's going to require your participation... more on that soon! Like within the next 24 hours, unless I get distracted. Which, I will concede, happens pretty often down here.

Birthday contemplation

It's my birthday today (international dateline-- not only do I get to be in Antarctica, I get to be from the future, too) and I am feeling extraordinarily grateful for everything I've learned from the past, inspired by the present, and excited for all the adventures of the future. A big thanks to all you amazing people in my life who keep me inspired and full of wonder. It seems fitting today to share with you the comic that I always keep above my various art makin' spaces:

SKUA: Antarctica's Permanent Free Bin

In spite of the very limited number of animals down here on the ice, Antarctica does have its very own obnoxious pest: the skua. Skuas look a lot like brownish seagulls, and they brazenly attempt to steal anything and everything that seems even in the slightest bit edible. They've started to show up in earnest the past few weeks as the temperatures have been warming (it's been hitting the mid 20's, and is even starting to creep up into the 30's, which feels INSANELY warm to me. I never really posted about some of the colder days we've seen on station, but I have been outside in -40, just to give you an idea of the weird things that have started to seem normal to me), and they hang out near the loading dock of the galley quite a bit. They have a scavenging technique that involves using a "bait skua" that sits right in front of you and lets you get within a few feet of it, distracting you while its compatriots sneak up behind and to attack your food and shiny things. Fascinatingly wily, eh?

Someone made this delightful ceramic skua; he lives in the library. I read next to him a lot. 

 

Skuas are pretty cool animals, but there's a second and far superior sort of Skua down here. I shall try to explain to you, but it's hard to know where to start. Those of you who know me well will probably quickly understand why I find this to be, hands down, one of the most fascinating and overwhelming sources of creative fodder I have ever encountered. McMurdo basically has an entire building that functions as a permanent free bin. People are often abandoning things they don't want to lug back to the mainland, and no one really knows what to bring to Antarctica, so it's kept well stocked with... just... everything you could ever possibly hope to find. I draw very little distinction between the roles of artist and sociologist, so I've made it a part of my normal routine to stop by Skua every few days to document and ponder some of the best finds. 

Here's a picture to give you a general idea. This really doesn't do the randomness of this place any justice. There is SO MUCH treasure to be found in here.... 

 

And here's a comic, because I can't seem to stop drawing them. Eventually I'll learn to make them a little smaller so they'll scan better...
 

In other news, I continue to be inhumanly busy. I would say that I have about my usual half dozenish creative projects going, but I've never had to contend with a 60 hour workweek before. This is the first time in my life that I'm having to face up to the fact that even my ninja-like time management skills cannot make it possible for me to do everything I want to do down here. So I've picked my battles, and have given up some things that are usually pretty dear to me-- namely sleep (well, that's not really true: sleep has never been high on my list of priorities), bourbon, exercise and anything resembling a normal social life. 

That's how damn inspiring I find this place.

I have decided that, for my time here, I'm going to try to live as though I am here through the Antarctic Artists and Writers Program instead of being here as a cook. I will try to pretend I'm not at work in the kitchen 6 days a week, and that it is instead my job to draw and write and listen and paint 60 hours a week, and I will sleep in March. It will be just like one very, very long day. Which, really, is what this whole year has felt like.

I made another comic that kind of touches on the wonderful insanity of this pace:

Whiskey Gingers at the End of the World

Just in case I hadn't already taken on enough outside of work activities (I love ridiculously over committing myself to art and writing projects that I don't really have time for!), I'm writing a column about drinking in Antarctica for my friends over at The Alcohol Enthusiast. Check out the inaugural column for Whiskey Gingers at the End of the World.

I took an additional part time job bartending down here, so expect some good fodder and some whiskey related comics!