Critter Goes on Tour!



This is Critter the Cow. you may remember Critter from the Lost Critter Project. Critter was one of the 500 critters created and then hid in downtown Apex, NC. See photo below -->



The Lost Critter Project is over but Critter has found another project to take part in and this one, i had nothing to do with.

Turns out the owner of the blog Christy's Creative Space thought it would be a fun idea to send Critter on a Blog tour. Christy posted a photo of Critter on her blog and challenged her reader to give her a good reason to send Critter their way.

In return, the winner would give Critter a tour of the town, take him out and show him a good time and then a few days latter, have their own contest giveaway. The winner of that contest would do the same until Critter had made his way around 15 blogs to finally end up back here in apex, NC.



The first first place Critter went was to Texas were he visited the blog of PJ Hoover. My understanding is that Critter had a great time in Texas, were he spent some quality time with a couple of tortoise.

You can keep track of Critter's adventures at Christy's Creative Space.

Sayings from the Uncut

Uncut was a piece from the Halle Show back in April. On the piece I created several of my foam board creatures however, I didn't cut them out. I left them suspended in the foam board.

Now that I'm preparing for for the December Wake Forest exhibit, I thought I might release some of the critters and use them for the show. The thing is, a lot of the writings from UNcut and not on the critters and are being cut away. So, I thought I would take a moment and capture them here.

So, in no particular order, sayings from Uncut:

You could stop reading my art and go make your own.

Motty, one of the elephants from the periodic table of elephants

Motty's tail is a long and tragic story

You'll never know what life is about until you know at least 3 steps of the "we're all in this together" dance.. or the safety dance

Happy is not such a bad thing

I tell myself I don't make enough pancakes and that is my "real" problem

Hello Motty, you are a fine looken elephant

Walk with me and you'll know more about me then you ever will reading my blog

Like all big people, I thought the same thing when I was your age... too bad we all forget!

It's all pink when you think about it

If less is more, what is more? (third base)

If I "cut" this, you will never read this

The best thing about my art is that for 3 minutes you forget all about your bills

All you need is 2 cups of paint, a brush and bad 80's music all of which are easy to find if you search any local Food Lion

Stop reading my art, i'm not reading yours.

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Scheduled Art Exhibit for my Bus!

I just found out that the Art-On-The-Move bus is about to be part of a gallery exhibit!



The Art-On-The-Move 2009 reception will be held on Friday, October 23rd, 2009 at the Fish Market Gallery at the corner of Fayetteville Street and Hargett.

how very exciting!!

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How to Milk a Dinosaur and the Best Review Ever!



Ian,

My son (who is waiting to start kindergarten next week) asked me to read to him this afternoon and brought me "How to Milk a Dinosaur" I thought we'd read a chapter or two - well, he wouldn't let me stop. We did it in one sitting.

I didn't want to stop, either. You did a great job. It was tight, it was intelligent and funny, it was fun to read aloud.

Thanks for a great story!

Kathy V.

Get your copy of How to Milk a Dinosaur!
Available on Amazon!

the Lost Critter Project in the News



The Lost Critter Project has been getting some press. We were interviewed by the Southwest Wake paper, the Apex Herald, and NBC ran a spot on the 7:00 o'clock news!

Toys



When all the critters have been collected and the idea of drinking hot coffee starts to sound appealing again, I'll be exhibiting at Wake Forest Coffee.

This year I want to incorporate all the arts, not just visual. Along with a healthy collection of foam board moose there will be the illustrated book The Mooseifesto, the music CD, and interactive games and toys.

One of the toy ideas is to create collectible action figures. Here are a few of the pieces I've started work on.



The Pigrate... Here we see the Pigrate sort of stuffed into his plastic casing. I still need to work on the illustrated board that goes behind.



One of the moose from Moosifesto. This one will be on display in Wake Forest.



Moose stuffed into his plastic casing.

Facebook Lost Critter Project Fan Page

No need to be impatience...



The Lost Critter Project is now on Facebook!

Video, media links, and 100's of fan photos...



Become a fan!

500 Critters Released in Apex as Part of the Lost Critter Project



click here for high res version of this image

This August, 500 critters will be lurking around various locations in Downtown Apex, NC. These foam board critters will be left on benches, curbs, on top of newspaper boxes, on brick wall and even tied to poles and street signs. The lost Critter Project is a collaborative public arts effort between the businesses of Downtown Apex, NC and Apex High School Art teacher, Ian Sands.



Participating business are assigned a custom lost and found box that will be displayed inside their establishment. 50 foam board critters have been created for each business. Each critter holds a sign that reads: Help! I'm Lost! Thank goodness you found me! Please take me back to the (name-of-business). I miss my brothers and sisters!



To create the 500 critters, Ian Sands enlisted a team of art students. "We spent two weeks working on this project," Remarked Ian Sands. "The art room looked like a factory assembly line with students painting, others cutting and others gluing."



The Lost Critter Project bolsters Apex, NC’s reputation as a town of cultural arts and exciting happenings. Ten businesses are participating in the Apex Lost Critter Project. The participants are:

The Blue Tiger
The Red Canvas
All Booked Up
Studio 123
Green Pea Nursery
The Apex Chamber
Peak City Film Festival
Realty World on Salem Street
New Hope Valley Railway
Apex Yogic Living



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Making of the Lost Critter Project: Part 2

100 critters down... 400 to go.



The crew of the Lost Critter Project.

We met everyday this week and worked on the critters. There were plenty of jobs to go around... sketching, painting, outlining, cutting, gluing, labeling...





there are ten differnt critters. see if you can guess which is which..

The zonkey, yeti, cow, mouse, moose, squid, elephant, frog, cat and the raccoon which started out as a wolf but then we received a change request. However, 10 wolves we created before the raccoon change request was received. I believe this makes them collectors items.









This is a board of feet prior to cutting. The feet are probably the hardest parts to make, especially cutting them out. Also, keeping track of how many critters have been made and how many feet you still need to make can be extra tricky.





Here is a shelf of completed critters. They will sit here till next Friday.. day one of hiding...