Some of the Streets Critters have Visited



St Pete, FL



Davenport, Iowa



Williamsburg, VA



Long Island, NY



Hamden, NY

Follow the adventures at Critters on Zonkey Street!

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An Interactive Christmas

... in August??



Well, yes in August because i'm preparing for this seasons Moosifesto! That's right, we will be returning to Wake Forest Coffee Company this year for Moosifesto. We missed last year due to another Wake forest project, the Critter Cubes. But this year we will be back and with an exciting interactive project...

i submit to you,
The Crittermas Advent Calendar!
(currently in beta)



Beta, because this isn't the actual Crittermas Advent Calendar but it is a prototype. The concept is simple:

The wall of Wake Forest Coffee will be covered with Critter Bookshelves. Placed on the shelves will be 24 wrapper Crittermas presents. Presents will range from Critter ornaments to signed copies of my book (shameless plug), CD filled with Crittermas music and more!

Each day, a special coffee cup with a number attached will be place with the other cups. If a customer gets a coffee with a number on it, they will get to open to corresponding Crittermas Advent calendar present!

How very exciting, yes I know!!

So now I'm off like Will Farrell to make 24 Crittermas gifts to place in the Crittermas Advent Calendar.

I Wish I Didn't Have to Sleep



Taking a break from writing and making art, I thought I would take a little time to "play" drums. I'm really a bass player but drums, even though i'm not smiling, are really, really fun!

Wish I had time for a band but too many muses spoils the soup. It was Keith Haring who said, "I Wish I Didn't Have to Sleep."

Plus hockey takes precedence ;)

Critters at CAM Raleigh



Today, CAM Raleigh had a special teacher preview thingy of the upcoming Rebecca Ward installation.

Above, Rebecca Ward was busy at working taping up the joint. The installation isn't finished but you can tell already it's going to be cool!



A few Critters made an appearance.



I would say that photos don't do the work justice. Sure, it looks cool in the photo but you don't get the feeling of vertigo that it gives in real life :)




Cool how the tape comes right off the wall.



One of my goals is to have an exhibit at CAM Raleigh.. it's only a matter of time.. I'm patient.. sort of...

Till then, you might want to swing by CAM, check it out and pick up a Critter or two :)

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Drawing Ke$ha



Bought three cans of silly string at 5 Below today with the hopes of using it in someway to create art. Here is my attempt to draw a portrait of Ke$ha on the bathroom mirror.

REGION 3 Exhibition Gaddy-Hamrick Art Center



This is me standing next to the piece I entered in the REGION 3 Exhibition at the Gaddy-Hamrick Art Center. Today was the closing reception and they gave out prizes! How very exciting, I know. But I didn't win anything. Sad face ;(



You ever get that feeling that something doesn't quit fit? Like maybe everyone else is wearing shoes and your wearing sneakers? I kinda felt like my piece didn't exactly fit. Most of the other pieces were like, I don't know, real art.




But I'm still happy with my art even if it doesn't fit in. And i finally got a photo of my art with a solid white background.

And then I drove home in a thunderstorm with the top down on my jeep and i got really wet. Which was actually kinda fun.

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The Zonkey Army



This was a test zonkey and if you saw his last adventure, Zonkey in the Pond, then you know how he was designed to float in a pond or pool or fountain or something. And he kinda, sorta does float so I decided to make a few more.. in fact.. a zonkey army!



Here you see phase one of plan, create zonkey army! I gathered enough wood to create 10 zonkeys.




Unfortunately, when i went to attach the heads, things didn't go as swimmingly as i had hoped for. One by one the nails split the heads apart. Very frustrating I can assure you.




In the end only four zonkeys survived phase one. We were losing the war before we even set out to battle.



But 4 is better than none and with the original zonkey, we have a total of 5 zonkeys.

So now there are 5 zonkeys ready to float.

Stay tuned...

The Cup Shelf



Just about done.. at least I think I'm happy with it.

This actually is two photos combined into one. The piece is too large for me to get back far enough to take just one photo.




I resolved the wrong size cup issue by replacing a row of cups with a row of paint cans.




After painting all the cup I ran out of spray paint... so i placed them on the shelf too. I think they are a nice addition, don't you?



The piece is balanced off with two Critters. Yay! Critters! This gator...



And the white tiger which was designed for the early piece that I took apart to make this piece.

A Couple of Cups Can Drive Me Crazy



I was so please with the way this piece turned out that I decided to use a few more cups in my next piece.



However, I didn't plan for the cups when I built the frame... So the cups didn't fit snuggly like I wanted them to.



So I decided to scrap that piece for now and build a new frame with the cup size in mind. This frame was much bigger than the other frame...




So I needed more cups.



So I got more cups and spray painted them fun, funky colors...



But what I didn't realize was the new cups weren't the same size as the old cup. Are you kidding me!

No, I'm not. Look at how the cups on the right come all the way to the top of the frame while the cups on the left leave a gap.



So... I'm going to have to go out and get some of the right size cups and go back to the spraying board.

to be continued...