It's a book a 'zine an art journal. It's here.
It's eight by eight inches. Ninety-eight pages. Black and white inside.
Perfect bound. Soft-cover.
It's fifteen dollars.

It's the work of twenty-eight artists.
Including, (pictured, from top)::
Jennifer Judd-McGee
Elizabeth Kaplan
Robert Larson
Maureen Fleming
Elizabeth Solomon
Scott Mason
Bret Wills
Julie Broberg
me,
and all of these talented people.

More info, here.

Yay! Thanks for reading.
tt

Friday Happiness::
.Apple cake and bread to bake today. And knowing that at this moment, a friend is making roasted acorn squash soup for our dinner tonight.

.The Avett Brothers on the radio this morning. "Ah, Brooklyn, Brooklyn, take me in."
I especially like the words "tell the ones that need to know"; doesn't that conjure up the people in your life that you love?

.Measuring everyone's height, grown-ups, too, in pencil, on our kitchen wall.

.The beautiful photos, at this joy+ride, from our neck of the woods.
When we were young, my brothers and I used to take picnics to the cemetery, and swim in the river that winds along its edges. I realize that sounds strange and morbid, now. But it didn't seem strange at all, then. It's actually one of my clearest and fondest memories.

.Way too much on our plate this weekend, but all of it promises to be fun. If you're local, come join us for the opening reception for Public Bookstore on Saturday.

Enjoy the weekend. Thanks for reading.
tt

Next year we're definitely going without the kid.

Now, I know that sounds really negative and grumpy (seems to be a trend for me), so let me rephrase that.

::

The New York Art Book Fair is awesome. All around. Tim and I were still talking about it way after we'd turned out the lights last night. There was so much to see and think about. So much great energy-the coolest looking crowd, and everyone so friendly. PS 1 is an incredible building, both for what they've done to it, and what they haven't.

And, we had the chance to meet two people whose work we admire greatly, and they are of course as lovely as one would expect them to be. The books they were showing were all so beautiful and interesting, it was hard to choose from among them. (I did come home with the first issue of Lines and Shapes, as well as Journal of Plants, which is exquisite.)

All around, everywhere we looked: the books, the 'zines, the posters, the photography! All of it so, so inspiring and original and, well...cool.

There it is, see, folks. Truth is, I'm a forty-two year old nerd with a thirty-three pound kid strapped to my back, walking around in my clogs just in awe of the hipness that is all around me.
(I am so starting to wear my engineer boots everyday, even if they do look like overkill in the line at Whole Foods.)

::

In all seriousness, this was an incredible experience for us, and we already can't wait for next years' show.

But we're definitely leaving the kid at home.

More tomorrow. Thanks for reading.
tt

Friday Happiness [Public Bookstore]

[work visible here by: Stephanie Dennis, Ilse Schreiber Noll, and Bret Wills]

The show is up, and we think it is excellent. Much black and white work in the exhibit, as this first issue of the 'zine is black+ white, so we were looking towards that as we edited the selections. But some color, here and there, lending the gallery overall a clean, cohesive look that we love.

We encountered some delays when we received the first printing of the book; we had used an online self-publishing site, and we were disappointed with the quality. So we started from scratch and went with a different printer.

Now, back on track, we are ready to move forward, and excited to get this project, six months in the making, on it's way.

::

We are also looking forward to this weekend, and the New York Art Book Fair, put on by Printed Matter. Can't wait to see all the inspirational work that others are doing. I have a feeling Tim and I will come home from the show reinvigorated and with our heads full of ideas for our next project.

::

Other than that event, this is one of those weekends where the girls' social schedule trumps ours, so mostly we'll be driving and picking up from various birthday parties. The thirteen-year-old crowd now apparently are no longer into sleepovers, so much, but rather into having parties that run well after the grown-ups around here are usually in bed.

I'm personally of a mind that if you are going to keep my kids up past ten o'clock, you should keep them overnight. Although, I'm not a big fan of sleepovers, either.

I'm a lot of fun, huh? Oh, don't worry. I'll get over it.

After all, it's the weekend, again. And this one promises to be cool enough for the first outdoor fire, a big scarf and my favorite boots, and definitely something cooked long and slow in the kitchen.

Certainly that's worth staying up late for?

Enjoy the weekend! Thanks for reading.
tt

Public Bookstore [Installation]

The time has come, and not a moment too soon.

Actually, it's about three or so days late.

But, we've gotten the first stage of Public Bookstore installed in the gallery. And oh, my, is it GOOD.

These pictures are from yesterday, and since then, we've cleaned up the place, put the finishing touches on (adjusted lighting, added descriptive labels, etc...) and hung some work. I say some work, because we have so much to show, we will display all the work on a rotating basis over the course of the show, which will run at least through the New Year.

I thought I'd show you these shots of Tim installing his genius display system. He had a huge helping hand this weekend when our friend (and Public Bookstore contributor) Bret Wills opened up his studio and worked with Tim. They rigged up a system of some old wood boards (from our friends' house, now undergoing renovation,) and a heavy-metal strip down the center. I could use up a hundred words to describe it, but it might make much more sense just to look at the photos. More soon to come of the actual, you know, artwork. Although I think Tim's installation may be a work of art unto itself.

But, I may be biased.





And a gratuitous shot of the one waiting out front while I take pictures.

More tomorrow. Thanks for reading.
tt

Public Bookstore [Introducing Stephanie Dennis]

We are thrilled to have Stephanie Dennis be a part of the first issue of our 'zine. As we begin this project with a black and white printing, we felt her drawings would be a wonderful part of the collection.

We first admired Stephanie's work when she was featured by This Joy + Ride(thank you Shari and Sheri!), which if you've been paying attention (ahem) is one of my most favorite photographic inspirations. I was particularly pleased that Tim shared my enthusiasm for Stephanie's drawings (and paintings, although they would deserve a color printing...) and we were excited that she was interested in being a part of Public Bookstore.

Stephanie has also agreed to exhibit one of her originals with us in the gallery show that will accompany the launch of the 'zine. When it arrived here in New York, and I opened the package, I actually gasped. I knew I liked the drawings, but was not prepared for how gorgeous it is first hand. Thank you, Stephanie!

More tomorrow. Thanks for reading.
tt

Public Bookstore [Introducing Beth Billups]

I was introduced to Beth Billups' work last winter, and just had to have one of her little love paintings,which then I just had to give to away to my friend, whose birthday just happens to fall dangerously close to Valentine's Day. Beth told me I wasn't the first person to do that: buy a painting for myself and then want to pass it on to a friend. I think Beth's paintings strike an emotional chord that makes you want to share them.

Never mind that I love Beth's blog as much for her bits and pieces about parenting her kids, and cooking, and moving the family across half the country this summer, as for her wonderful posts about works in progress and her process. Her paintings just absolutely charm me, and seem to put into visual form ideas and emotions that I connect with very personally.

Please go check out her work and her words and pictures. And then come in to the gallery next week to see one of Beth's encaustic paintings in living color.

I know you will be as charmed as I.

More tomorrow. Thanks for reading.
tt

New beginnings, and an introduction.

[drawing by Lois Cremmins]

Hello! Today is the first day of the school year, here. I know we are a bit behind the rest of the country, but for us, today's the day!

And so, five-sixths of our girls are out making their own way in the world again. I'm so pleased to report that it went off with out a hitch, with out a tussle, with out much fuss at all, actually. Little Miss A. will start a pre-K program in two weeks, and I'm sure that will be a different story (for at least one of us), but today, all is smooth sailing.

Which leaves me to focus now on the work at hand: Public Bookstore. Our release date is near, and thus I thought I would begin to introduce a few of our contributors to this first issue.

::

Public Bookstore [Introducing Lois Cremmins]

We first met Lois in 2007, and took an instant liking to her work, her home, and Lois herself. You can see more of Lois' paintings(and read an interview with Lois) here on the gallery site, and here on her own site. Lois provided us with a recipe for the bio page of Public Bookstore, and I have a copy of it written out and pinned to the wall behind my computer screen. I think it works well as a guide for not just art, but life in general. See if you agree.


[drawing by Lois Cremmins]

HOW TO BE AN ARTIST
By Lois Cremmins

Here is my personal recipe:

Be open - everyday - to observing, listening, reading and feeling.
Stop to record these things.
Mix them up with past, present, inside, outside and whatever else comes to mind.
Throw in some interesting composition and a whole lot of color.
Be true to yourself – no matter how weird or ugly the work is.
Don’t care if anyone likes it.
Do this and it will usually turn out alright.

::

More tomorrow. Thanks for reading.
tt

A post in which she (finally) talks about the gallery (and the beach).

Hi. Remember me?

Not me, the mother of many, lover of flowers and fruit pictures, follower of design*sponge, navel-gazing forty-something.

It's me, the partner in a small, contemporary art gallery, and co-curator of the first issue of a collaborative art journal.

I just thought I'd stop in to update you on what's going on downtown.

Well, we sort of took the summer off. The gallery is still open during the week, for a few hours, when Tim is in there, mostly working on this stuff. We were in-between shows, and when we decided to put off the publication of the book until the Fall, we looked around the back of the gallery and realized we have some pretty exceptional work from our various artists on the shelves.

So, we cleaned the walls and hung a few of them, in a sort of informal retrospective of the work we've shown over the last year. I put out a few of the postcards and posters we've printed in the window, and it struck me: we've shown excellent work. And built a community of artists that we're both proud to show, and eager to promote.

Which is how Public Bookstore began in the first place: wanting to be able to give more artists more exposure than we can in our little space here in Tarrytown alone.

So, while we may have taken a bit of a break as far as gallery hours this summer, we have not been idle. The book is complete and ready to go, and we can not wait to introduce it when we get back to business-as-usual in September.

::

Between then and now, though, we've got a lot of vacationing to do. Turns out I'm going to get to spend nearly four weeks in my beloved Maine in August, with some side trips for us to Ithaca, a friend's house in New Hampshire, and another short camping trip thrown in for good measure.

And today, we're headed off to a nearby beach in Connecticut for an afternoon swim and early picnic dinner. I'm loading the car, and picking Tim up from the gallery...See, I told you he's down there sometimes.

More tomorrow. Thanks for reading.
tt

Some scenes from a long weekend with not a lot to do.

I don't know if I mentioned that we have only one child around this weekend, and very few plans.

We have some work to do, though. The first issue of our art journal, Public Bookstore, will be published at the end of June. See how I phrase that, will be published. Positive thinking. Self-fulfilling prophecy. Etc...

We are very excited about this project; it doesn't really seem fair to call it "work". We are truly awed and inspired by the work we've put together, from an incredible group of artists. That we will have our names attached to something we are so proud of, including so many people we admire, is a privilege we take seriously.

But, we certainly are doing a good job procrastinating this weekend.

Gardening, napping, walking. Lots and lots of picture taking.

The neighbors must think I'm looney. The amount of times I've been "caught" standing on chairs and laying in the driveway and taking pictures of my feet. Oh, my.

Passing time waiting for peonies to open.

Seems like a decent way to spend a holiday weekend.

I miss the girls like crazy though. That is, when I'm not taking pictures.

Hope you are enjoying your weekend. Thanks for reading.
tt

Introducing :: Public Bookstore

When Tim and I first met, we had a lot of dreams about what our future would hold. Small, seemingly insignificant things held our hearts in their grip; huge, looming realities seemingly melted in the heat of our resolve to forge our own path through life together.

One of the small details was that we would need a car that could transport all of us. On weekends, Tim would lead me by the hand around dealership lots after hours, looking at embarrassingly large automobiles that could seat eight. The implication that we would not only have our children together someday, but would need the extra seat for when we had a child of our own, was one of the most romantic notions I could imagine, then or now. I still swoon a bit at the sight of a Toyota lot.

One of the big dreams was that we would fuse what we were passionate about with our need to earn a living. This dream first took the shape of a used bookstore slash meeting place, where we would sell art books, children's books, vintage books...plus wine, and cheese plates, and organic chocolate milks for the little ones.

We named it. We envisioned a logo, a storefront. We bought the domain name. (The artist I had fallen in love with turned out to also be a computer geek.)

Public Bookstore.

Well, that incarnation of the dream never materialized. But we've come pretty close in spirit with the community (and business) that we are building with Eyebuzz Fine Art.

When we envisioned our next project - what began in theory as a "zine", but we no longer want to label as such, as the idea has evolved somewhat - we wanted to give it an identity separate from eyebuzz, but which still held meaning for us.

Public Bookstore.

Click here for more info. And we hope you'd like to join us in this next endeavor. It's a work in progress...we'll keep you posted as we go along.

More tomorrow. Thanks for reading.
tt

ps: Believe me, I'm as outraged about our gas guzzlers as anyone, but my husband informs me that once you drive that shiny new car off the lot, it loses an awful lot of value, and we could now probably not even afford the trade in on the Suburu or Prius that I would prefer. Please be kind when you see me on the road. I wish I had a bumper sticker that reads: Don't judge me, I really do need all the seats.

pps: The image on the Public Bookstore logo is from an antique etching of the capture of Major Andre. If you can tell me where the subtitle comes from, I'll send you a gift. Leave me a comment, and the first one who can place "All nine kinds of pie" will receive a little something in the mail.