One Night Eight Years Ago in Knoxville TN...

Fastest Chopsticks (2005)

We were in town to participate in an a/v showdown for the "Unreal Tournament" at the University of Tennessee Knoxville / Downtown Gallery. We were grabbing a sushi special bite before our match against the indomitable Ed Cooper / Projexorcism and splendid Faze Exile on audio.

just for fun

An animated gif I made as an in-class demo for Video Art II, inspired by Terry Gilliam's Do It Yourself Animation Show.

Kiln and Convection Technology

Eighteen years ago during the spring of 1995 on a small island in the Mississippi River off the shores of St. Paul MN at an abandoned power plant a group of artists observed Beltane using the medium of fire.

Without knowing that Beltane translates as "fire of the god"(1), or 

that cakes played an important role in Beltane, or that one piece of cake would traditionally be marked and he who received it would be sacrificed to the fire...

         I cooked giant pancakes with a marble hidden inside.

Earlier in the day, I had dug a pit and assembled a stove with a sheet of salvaged stainless steel and some bricks.

Earlier in my life, I had unknowingly come to understand convection principles through observing my mom opening and closing the damper to control the heat of the kiln. When my giant pancake stove needed more heat, I intuitively pulled out a brick to create a heat transfer current that would stoke the fire thus raising the temperature of the cooking surface.

I used a snow shovel to flip the pancakes.

(1) Cormac derives the word Beltaine from the name of a god Bel, or Bil, and the Old Irish word tene, “fire.”

Ancient and Contemporary Mediums

This is Jackson Li (Li Jiansheng) director of the Sanbao Ceramic Institute and Museum (Jingdezhen, Jiangxi, China) discussing characteristics of Minyao pottery traditions of present day China. Here he connects the personality of this pot to the work of ceramic artist Marie Woo, from whose collection it comes. Last weekend's Chinese Folk Pottery Symposium at the University of Michigan Museum of Art was the culmination of decades of Marie's research into the traditions of Chinese folk pottery. She has followed this quest deep into China numerous times to uncover the surviving practitioners of ancient ceramic vessel-building and firing techniques. For various reasons, industrialization is bringing about the end of these these centuries-old traditions, creating an imperative to act quickly in regards to their study and documentation.

My mom is Marie Woo. Her ceramic art and research (in tandem with my father's architectural work) is the ground upon which my own art practice stands. I am humbled by the social and cultural history of clay as a material as I extend my reach in the studio with the contemporary digital tools of moving image art.

Most Recent Class

A compressed seven-week term provided a great opportunity to pilot my experimental animation class at Oakland University this summer.

This laboratory-style workshop was designed to support both the study and production of experimental animation. The students studied experimental animation history and contemporary work in the field, and investigated 2D animation techniques incorporating both analog and digital strategies.

Class time was used for lectures and screenings, discussion of animated works viewed as well as readings, technical demonstrations, production and critique. The students undertook a series of structured studies and produced mid-term and final open projects.

The shortened and intensive time frame of the summer term supported an exploration of multiple teaching/learning strategies with a quick turnaround time that made for fluid modification and fine-tuning. On the flip-side, however, the compressed workload did not allow students time for post-critique revision of their work.

It was refreshing to teach a group of advanced students from a variety of disciplines including photography, painting, cinema studies, and new media. The course culminated in a final show at the laSalle Auditorium at Cranbrook Museum of Art, and featured projects made by the students as well as animations by established historic and contemporary artists, selected by the class, that we watched in class or which were posted to their blogs.

It was a great experience and I am looking forward to teaching this class again during the Winter 2013 term.

First Teaching Gig

A newly harvested gourd has skin that is smooth and even or textured with a regular rhythm. Fresh and vibrant color provides evidence of the life energy of its growth cycle.

In the fall of 1996 I was invited to teach secondary-level art for a semester at Kingswood School-Cranbrook. My high school mentor/advisor/art teacher called on me as someone who had taken her entire curriculum and who, she thought at the time, could teach it.

I taught three sections of beginning drawing, three sections of painting, two sections of photography, and one advanced drawing class.


At lunchtime, I would lay down behind my desk and take a nap.

One of the first things I did for my classes was to set up a large and elaborate still life of gourds and other autumnal vegetation. The arrangement spanned the length of three or four drafting tables in the center of the room, and was the focus of our studies for a week or two.


Sixteen years later, I find that the three largest gourds from the study have been enduring in the garage at my parents' house all this time. Seeds and other debris rattle around inside the dried husks, punctured in places and scarred with mildew and other growths. The surfaces are worn, with lots of color, texture and character.

It is very difficult to toss them into the compost, but seems like an opportune time to usher in a new era.

One thing that has remained consistent throughout my teaching career is the satisfaction I derive from positively impacting young artists. Without this, I would have left the profession a long time ago. It is hard to feel like I am doing something useful with so many disparaging opinions of not only post-secondary teaching and the state of arts education, but also of the general value of art to society.

Many outside of the academic system look upon it as bloated and broken, while those inside either struggle against giant bureaucracies to change things for the better, get good at playing politics, or just give up.

Like every one of my teaching peers, I learned how to teach by teaching. There was little-to-no training. Everything I figured out came through a combination of my own experience of being a student, anything I could get my hands on to read, and trial-and-error. After sixteen years (give or take one here or there), I can definitely say that I am now a good teacher. But it didn't come easy.

Yesterday, I walked the grounds at Cranbrook for the first time in many years. Memories emerged of learning the concepts of basic design and how to make a perfectly exposed photograph, then came a feeling of connection to place and lineage both, and a sense of carrying on and expanding the tradition of something greater than myself. It was somehow reassuring. But such a tiny moment amidst giant tides of uncertainty.

A Painting. A Hat. And Kimsooja.

I visit my friend Terrence Campagna at his studio on Cass Avenue in Detroit. We catch up over tea and baklava, relaying to each other the large and small changes in our art practices that have grown out of large and small life changes. We go outside for a walk and immediately encounter two paintings laying on the sidewalk next to the street. Heading up Woodward, I bemoan the fact that I left my hat at home-- misled by the two-day thaw and now the wind leads me to regret. Not one minute goes by before a gentleman is walking our way with a small handful of knit hats for a dollar. "This one is your color," he says, glancing down at my dark plum pants as he hands it over. Ten more steps up Woodward and another gentleman who witnessed the exchange approaches, saying "My turn! Wannaseewhatigot!?" We laugh, walking on to the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit.

The day before, I'd been up at school for a meeting and stopped by to pick something up at my office, only had forgotten the key. My neighbor Valerie, a professor in Communications, was there in her office and we smalltaked grading and research until she excitedly told me about a video artist named Kimsooja. Now, coincidentally, with Terrence, at MOCAD, I find myself seeing her work for the first time. And I am finding it refreshing.

We walk back to the studio, and the painting of the grasshopper has been taken.