Monday, December 12, 2022

 Signs of Change: Pop Up Arts

Tucson, AZ: Signs of change are everywhere. The proliferation of the digital town square, several billion voices roaring on soapboxes. Everyone wanting just a few seconds of your time. Occasionally interrupted by a work of art, a beautiful song, a smiling face. The digital sphere has become essential in engaging the world. Piercing the digital fog has become a radical act.

This fall a few of us got together to paint some simple signs that said “Vote”. We installed them throughout the city amidst the other political signs, with the intention of reminding everyone to participate.

So many people don’t vote, it takes too much time, they forget, they aren’t registered or had their right to vote rescinded. So we made the signs whimsical, colorful. It wasn’t a demand, rather joyfully encouraging people to do something that might make them feel better, maybe even give them agency.

When we went to take the signs down many were missing. We discussed the space in our cultural environment these signs had temporarily occupied. Did they change the landscape? Were they noticed? Did they have an impact? 

We did this as individuals, without any group or institutional support, a tiny voice in an ocean of roaring thunder.

A pop up dissident moment. A sign of change.



Tuesday, September 13, 2022

Exhibit: Judaica inspired Drawings and Paintings

 

Beth Shalom Temple Center Art Gallery
presents
“Judaica inspired Drawings and Paintings ”

by
Michael B Schwartz

Aug. 30 - Oct 27, 2022


I put together a combination of drawings and paintings created over the past few years that somehow incorporated Jewish ritual objects. These are observational and narrative works in charcoal, pen and ink and acrylics.

Some of the works are like talismans or wall amulets, good luck charms for houses. The more abstract works are influenced by Torah breast plates. The decorative elements in Judaica have symbolic and mystical meanings in some cases, other pieces are more formal.

I created these from a cultural perspective, with consideration of the stories and history of these objects. Who owned them, what were their daily lives like? Who made them? 

A special thank you to Marcia Wiener and Beverly Lake.

To purchase works:
Works are for sale and available as prints or cards. To have a price list emailed to you drop me a line on my website. 

To Visit the Exhibit:
Call (520) 648-6690
Monday & Friday 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Wednesday 12 p.m. to 4 p.m.
Location:
1751 N Rio Mayo, Green Valley, AZ 85614
https://www.bstc.us/

 

Shabbat Light

Hamsa

Mezuzah

Torah Scroll Covers


Spice Container
Shield of David


Eternal Light

Tuesday, May 10, 2022

Art.Ology Investigates: Hires Root Beer

Art.Ology Investigates: Hires Root Beer


 

Hire’s Household Extract - The Honest Root Beer
Charles Hires Co., Philadelphia

 

One of the discoveries in the Art-Ology project was a 1930’s Hires Root Beer Syrup bottle. This was among various materials indicating a possible barber shop at this site.

This little bottle sold for .25 cents and made five gallons of delicious root beer. It came in a catchy package, and one could go further by collecting various types of bling associated with the product. Most popular among these were the finely printed lithographic Victorian  Trade  Cards which circulated from 1883-1910.

The company founder Charles Elmer Hires (August 19, 1851 – July 31, 1937) was a brilliant and well organized businessman. He eventually became the first to broadly distribute sodas. This guy understood systems.

In addition to storage and production areas, his factory on Arch Street in Philadelphia included large mail order and printing areas. There is a ton written about the company, its marketing and advertising approach still having a significant impact.

The term “beer” was not popular among the more conservative members of the  Philadelphia Temperance movement. It’s reported that the founder of Temple University, Rev.  Dr.  Russell Conwell, had asked Mr. Hires to “create a beverage that might be sold among hard drinking Pennsylvania miners, in  the interest of the (Temperance) Movement.” 

Perhaps Mr. Hires knew how to appease those who might otherwise come bearing axes. He certainly had something much more grand in mind. His root beer formula was said to have healing qualities. He desired to create “a home-made root beer, such as our forefathers used in “ye olden time.” This mixture of of wild roots, berries, including, pipsissewa, spikenard, juniper, wintergreen, sarsaparilla, and hops was almost certainly a First Nations recipe, passed on through the generations as “root tea”. He managed to adapt this formula into a mass produced GMO free 100% organic syrup.

What stands out was the system of organization that seems to mirror an artistic practice. He had areas in his factory for; Communication, Storage, Production, Distribution, Packaging and Planning.


Hires Root beer evolved into Crush soda and eventually was renamed as Dr Pepper.

The root beer syrup bottles discovered here, in Southern Arizona, were mixed into five gallons of something nutritious and delicious. We can practically hear the ice cubes being added to cups and the drink slowly poured for guests while waiting in the Arizona room for their hair to be cut, listening to the latest news and gossip. These were the days before air conditioning, when electric fans and chunks of ice, delivered by rail a few blocks away, had to do the trick.

Each artifact discovered has a similar story, giving form to history. As we invent pathways out of our carbon past, the systems employed by Mr. Hires can prove a source of inspiration.




Hires Victorian Trading Cards


Sources:

Schmidt, David
Hires and the root of root beer
http://lowermerionhistory.org/?page_id=339

Sourapas, Steve and Fowler, Ron
Hires to You, The Illustrated History of Hires Root Beer
http://hiresbook.com/

Yates, Don
“Charles E Hires company, 1870 - present, Philadelphia Pennsylvania”
Summer 2005, Bottle and Extras Magazine pp. 50-57

Temperance Movement
https://www.britannica.com/topic/temperance-movement

Notes:

 
1. Rev.  Dr.  Russell Conwell,  the  founder  of  the Temple University, asked Charles Hires  to  help  him  develop  a beverage that might be sold among hard   drinking   Pennsylvania miners,  in  the  interest  of  the Temperance Movement.”
https://www.britannica.com/topic/temperance-movement

2. The Prohibition Party, 1888
Prohibition, as the extreme wing of the temperance movement, is one of the hallowed reforms from the 1840s. As the wave of state prohibition laws passed in the 1850s began to be repealed, prohibition agitators began to organize formally; the Prohibition Party founded in 1869 and the Woman's Christian Temperance Union of 1874 represented the two strategic approaches. When a second wave of state prohibition in the 1880s receded, both were superseded by the Anti-Saloon League, founded in 1893. Carry Nation yielding an axe comes to symbolize the smashing of alcohol, emergence of prohibition moment.

 

3. Much  of  Hires  early  advertising  was done  with  Victorian  Trade  Cards. These were artistic masterpieces, created by some of  the  most  talented  lithographers  and artists  of  the  time. The main period for Hires trade cards was from 1883 to 1910.



Friday, February 4, 2022

An introduction the concept of “Artology”

An introduction the concept of “Artology”
Art.Ology Communique 1: 2.4.2022


art (n) : something that is created with imagination and skill and that is beautiful or that expresses important ideas or feelings

ology/ol· o· gy : a branch of knowledge 

art/ol· o· gy:  the study and documentation of something created with imagination and skill and that is beautiful or that expresses important ideas or feelings

Breakfast


An Artologist seek to draw connections and gather data that can be applied across practices. An artist and scientist find great joy in observing the artifact. In this practice data is accessible, participatory and traditionally suggestive.

This emerging field of Art.ology we find people engaged in ecological arts, community cultural development, theory, entertainment and education. Practices born of necessity to confront the impacts of the climate emergency. For decades eco and social practice artists have collaborated with scientists, seeking to establish a common language. This field is one of the many organic roots, branches, natural outgrowths.

For example researchers indicated that there is a measurable connection between the energy of eurythmic dancing and plants.

A New Journey

Art.ology: Story Vessels is an experimental project that illustrates the relationships between specific paintings, artifacts recovered in an archeological pit, and the viewer. The artifacts become batteries, the paintings morph into portals. 

This project began by accident over the pandemic. Blessed with a yard, it was time to build my backyard back better. One day I unearthed a root beer syrup bottle from the 1930’s. As I dug I found more curious objects.

(to be continued)

 

ArtOlogy: Unearthed Bottle

Click Here to Support this project.