Lost in the City

Going out in today’s mail a series of 16 pieces of mail art titled Lost in the City.  They include public transportation maps from buses, subways and streetcars.  The material also includes San Francisco MUNI transfers and even a subway ticket from Stockholm that I’ve saved since college.  It’s the time of the year when our cities are full of adventuresome tourists getting lost in the city.

Public Transportation

Public Transportation, mixed media on canvas, 24”x24”

I’ve lived car free since the 1980’s.  When I am feeling broke, it’s fun to estimate how much money I have saved over the years by not owning a car.  I do drive and rent cars for road trips and also use the car sharing service zipcar.  There are times I want to do suburban shopping errands as well as other times when a car makes life easier.  Living in a compact city with decent public transportation makes it all possible.  Out of both necessity and some genuine admiration, I love public transportation. 

When I travel to different cities I always seek out the adventure of public transportation.  There is something magical about emerging from a subway station in a strange city for the first time.  I still can remember the moment I emerged onto a Barcelona street and beheld Gaudí’s la Sagrada Família.  Many of my dreams play out on public transportation.  I often dream about stations and trains over and over for months before I first see them.  This has happened for me in places like Frankfurt and Washington, D.C.

This new piece is made up of public transportation maps from around the world.  From my familiar MUNI and BART to DC’s Metro, to London’s Underground and many more.  You also might spot a few bits of MUNI Fastpasses, transfers and BART tickets.  I also have a DC Metro Ticket with President Obama on it.  That one stayed on the refrigerator door.  I couldn’t cut that one up.

Prints and other goodies based on Public Transportation are also available from Society 6.

Zine Fest 2011

The annual Zine Fest that happens in San Francisco is becoming an event that is getting a permanent spot on my calendar. It’s growing, yet is still small enough to feel accessible and manageable. I am not a fan of massive events. Labor Day Weekend is one of my favorites in San Francisco. It feels like half the City is at Burning Man. The rest of us have the place to ourselves and get to have this really cool event.

There were some familiar artists at this year’s Zine Fest but quite a few I had not seen before. Some of the highlights of this year’s event include:

• The disturbing and very wrong (and hilarious) work from Poopy Lickles.
• After recovering from that, at the next table was the cool mail art from Jennie Hinchliff.
• I really like Charlene Fleming’s work. She is filling small sketchbooks with beautiful San Francisco illustrations. A few are available as prints. Hopefully there will be an art book in the future that is essentially a reproduction of one of her sketchbooks.
• I couldn’t tell if Ray Sumser had crashed the event. Not that anyone seemed to mind. He was set up outside with his rather obsessive and wonderful work titled The Comicosm. (But I am never one to criticize obsessive behavior when it comes to art).
• If I were going to select a Best in Show award it would go to Josh Ellingson. I just loved the image (seen above) from his BART poster series. You can buy a print from his website.