10 October 2008

porsche

porsche kicks ass and is the best brand of car u can not possibly beat it at all not even ferrari and merc. merc sucks jeza, well all the ones u like so hahaha u cant not any way beat porsche O.K JEZA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! PORSCHE ROCKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!PORSCHE ROCKS U HEAR OK DANM IT DANM ROCKS ROCKS ROCKS ROCKS ok

sincerely Harry
hi holly and hannah
Hi everyone,

Last night I went to desert island dances with Shauna, Tibby, Jeremy, Hannah, Harry, Che, Rachel, Frida, Eleanor, Nat, Darren, bern & Emma! and myself! We walked down the red carpet! So funny hahahahahahahaha! There was fake papparazzi! so funny! The show was funny too! there was just one actor and she was drawing stuff with chalk. She also did a headstand and was shaking. funny hahahahahaha!

See ya
Addi

darren

darren can u take a photo of the bus and post it thnks

Hi

Hi Ya'll

How r youse?

I'm so excited about going to Two Faced Bastard as well!!! It's going to be so kool!! Was it anyone's gold star besides mine? I'm so excited. I can't wait. This blog entry is so weird because i'm just qriting random stuff. Hannah says hi too. We are on the computer on Friday 10th. We are all split up so we're just doing random.

Bye,

Holly

hello, from harry

last night was sooo fun all the magnets stayed on so that was good and we have turend the van into a porsche. well last night 10 of us went to see desert island dances i thought it was a wierd pice of art though but it was quite funny mainly

09 October 2008

hi

so fun + exicting

HI ITS isabelle!
i am so exicted about going to two faced bastard so am i your bff mmc

Introducing.... the RED CARPET

making signs for the bus



























fred rox

fred is the best you tube channel ever
harry says porsches rock and i remembered the user name and password as well

Hi Guys

Hi Guys,

It's Hannah and Holly. We remembered the blog address and stuff so we r know posting stuff. We are so happy that we are going to be participating in the Children's Choice Awards. Hannah's first performance is tonight. She is watching Desert Island Dances and she is so excited. Holly's first performance is on Saturday. She is watching Two Faced Bastard. She is so excited.

Luv youse all so much
Hannah and Holly

Show Evaluation Form

The Children’s Choice Awards Evaluation Form

Show Title_____________________________

Did you enjoy the show?
5. Loved it.
4. Liked it.
3. Felt nothing.
2. Didn’t like.
1. Hated it.
0. I’d rather eat dog barf.

Did the show make you brain work?
5. A lot.
4. A little
3. Not at all
2. It was kind of obvious
1. It was stupid.
0. If the show had a brain it would be smaller than an ant turd.

Did the show make you feel things?
5. A lot.
4. A little.
3. Not at all.
2. It made me tired.
1. I was bored out of my mind.
0. I wanted to throw myself into the ocean.

How unique was the show?
5. It blew my mind away.
4. I’ve never seen anything like it.
3. I’ve seen a bit of stuff like it.
2. I’ve seen lots of stuff like it.
1. Been there, done that, bought the tshirt, gave it to my dog.
0. Stop bugging me with these questions, the show was like a wet fart.

Regardless of whether you liked the show or not, do you think the show achieved what it was trying to do?
5. Yes, it was excellent at what it was trying to do.
4. It was good at what it was trying to do.
3. It adequately achieved its goals.
2. It failed at achieving its goals.
1. The show bombed on all fronts.
0. Can I go the bathroom and wash my brain so I never have to think of this show again.

How many memorable moments can you list
1.
2.
3
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.

The Awards List

Most interactive
Most controversial
Most fun
Most enjoyable for old people
Most moving
Most ECO friendly
Most wacky play
Best presented
Most unique
Best choreographed dance
Most I don’t know why I liked it but I liked it anyway
Most creative
Most original
Best costumes
Best hairdo
Best character
Best music
Most emotive
The one that got me crying
Best sound effects
The one that made me pee my pants from laughter
The one that made me pee my pants from fright and fear
Most productive
Best role model
Most kid friendly
Most inspirational
The saddest
Most entertaining
Most imaginative
Most colourful costumes
Best setting
Best ideas
Most insightive (word by Vera(from da crew))
Everyone hated it but I loved it
Most romantic
Most immature
Best fiction
Most like a video game
Best shoes
Most detailed
Most spontaneous
Most confusing
Most evil
Best instrument
The most awesomeness
Most stupefying
Most spotty
The one that was better than chocolate
The most gangsta

Randomness

You are now entering the best blog in the world ever!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
We like chocolate pancakes.
Go www.youtube.com/fred
We're VIPs ur NOT HAHAHAHA
Go the randomness
Sorry, we're high on chocolate, kiwi's and pineapples
The moon is made out of cheese according to us HAHAHAHAHAHAHA
We rule the world

Patti Smith

So apparently Patti Smith really likes the idea of the Children's Choice Awards and the jury is invited to come before her VIP opening for a special press call to meet with her and check out her work. She thought it would be cool to have photos of her and the jury members as they evaluated her stuff.

08 October 2008

day 1

It’s 5AM Melbourne time and we start working today. I’m excited and can’t sleep – from jetlag no doubt, but I’m also anxious to get started. This is going to be an intense time, with hardly a moments pause. I’m going to get to know 40 kids really well, very quickly. I love the first day of meeting the kids when they’re an undifferentiated mass; they reveal their personalities so fast that the first hour or two when I can’t tell them apart always feels so full of potential. I know that I’ll develop some great friendships in the brief time I’m here and I really enjoy the mystery of not knowing with whom. Everybody is always asking me why I like to work with kids and, at the core, is simply their openness and the speed at which you can become friends.

The Children’s Choice Awards was conceived to fulfill an annoying obligation to a funder.
In 2006 I had received an Ontario Arts Council Artists in Educations grants and had to spend 5 weeks in 5 different schools. It’s a reasonable amount of money but the work is incredibly challenging – not the work with the students but securing schools to work with and coordinating the administrative side. It’s particularly tough for me since I was offering The Talking Creature, a project featuring the kids walking around their neighborhood and talking to strangers. Not an easy sell. By summer 2007 I had managed to do work with Marie Axler’s students at Malvern, Pamela Matharu’s students at a middle school on Bathurst right near Eglinton, Kathrine Parrish’s students at Marc Garneau and Anne Roccio’s Students at A.N. Myer in Niagara Falls. But after over a year I stilled owed another week and had to wrap it up or pay the money back. Well, the money was all spent so I had to either make it happen or get a day job. Getting the day job would have been easier.

Alley Jaunt was a summertime art show happening in garages around Trinity Bellwoods Park. It was a really sweet and smart event, getting people to explore their own neighborhood, and each other’s garages. Usually - from what I understand - the garage owners had nothing to do with art-making, they had just been approached by the Alley Jaunt people and were generous enough to offer their space. They invited me to participate and I proposed the Children’s Choice Awards. Now the challenge of finding the kids.

At that point, I had already done Haircuts by Children in Toronto and Los Angeles and Ballroom Dancing at Nuit Blanche. I had fostered a good relationship with Amanda Biber, a grade 5 teacher at Parkdale Public and I turned to her again to help recruit jury members.

Finding kids to collaborate with is hard work. Mammalian’s relationship with Parkdale Public was good but each project required it’s own sales pitch. Even Amanda thought Ballroom Dancing – an all night dancing party DJed by kids in a gymnasium filled with thousands of rubber balls – was going to be impossible. But with her commitment to chaperone and drive some of the kids, we made it happen. But even though this time I wasn’t asking a bunch of 10-year-olds to stay up all night, Alley Jaunt was happening over the summer and I wouldn’t have Amanda or easy access to the students.

In the last days of school, as summer was about to start, I showed up at Parkdale and tracked down all the students I had worked with on Haircuts and Ballroom Dancing and pestered them for their phone numbers and parent’s names. While a labour-intensive pain in the butt, this kind of data base is really important as Mammalian continues our commitment to the youth of Parkdale, but doesn’t not always want to burden the school administration with all the logistical details of coordinating the students. Sometimes we just want to make a bunch of calls and invite the kids and their families to participate in the events without pestering the school. But it’s tough to be a single middle-aged man asking kids for their phone numbers – it makes some people tense and the idea that it makes some people tense makes me tense.

One of the surprising challenges of working with kids on art projects is that, contrary to many circumstances that kids are in, with this one they are the ones who have the power. If they’re not interested in what I’m offering they goof off, walk away or simply don’t show. This is especially true in the summertime, when school is not there to structure their lives. And they generally don’t have day-minders so constant repetition and multiple phone calls are required to ensure their attendance. So I pestered them and their parents, worried that I wouldn’t have a jury. Some of my stalwarts couldn’t make it. Chime Dolkar, who had been involved in everything I had done with kids, including a cameo as God in the stage show Diplomatic Immunities was going to be out of town or something, so she and her siblings Tashi and Karchung couldn’t make it. The even-dependable Augustino Sores was doing his yearly sojourn to Portugal and Diem Vuu, one of the most articulate 10 year olds was doing some science camp. Eventually, I managed to assemble a decent core, helped by the fact that some of them asked if siblings and friends could participate. Now I was getting paranoid that my budget of $50 per kid for their services was not going to be enough.

So we spent a week discussing art, developing a set of criteria for judging the work and then we made a bunch of awards by dipping trophies I had bought at Value Village into a mixture of chocolate and paraffin wax and decorated them with candies and other craft items.

Saturday finally arrived, the weather was great and we all met at the school at 10AM and walked over to Trinity Bellwoods, hauling Lara in a wagon because she had a badly sprained ankle. We spent the day moving slowly through the very expansive show, stretching from Queen and Shaw, up a few blocks north of Dundas and east to Gore Vale. The kids seemed to be really captivated by the work. I gave them all clipboards and a sheet of paper with a complicated scoring system that we had devised together that most managed to complete. Khalil, didn’t even try to work with the system and I was concerned that she wouldn’t remember details for the deliberations, but I trusted that she knew what she was doing and she did.

They loved the participatory work; anytime they could make something or do something it was tough to pry them from the event. Some of the more critical and cynical of the kids chilled out and dropped their generally caustic demeanor and really got into the work. By 3 in the afternoon we finished the circuit and had to sit down for deliberations, which were a NIGHTMARE for me but fun for them as they argued, screamed and vied for their favourite works. It was very confusing to keep track of everything but under the direction of head juror and constant Mammalian collaborator, Camille Balda, a winners list was finally assembled.

The over-all winner surprised me. They chose Simla Civelek, a friend of mine, who had set herself up as a sort of itinerant gypsy poet in the back of a small camper van. She lay there looking like a belly dancer on rich colored blankets and offered the kids a menu with different poems. She began the performance by washing the children’s hands – something I remember the long-haul bus drivers doing when I visited Turkey. Then to finish she gave them a piece of Turkish Delight – the real stuff. The kids loved it, especially the poem about abortion.

They awarded the ‘funniest’ to a piece that featured fabric testicles and breasts with small stones knitted in them so that you could practice feeling for cancer. Accompanying these was a small zine that told the story of the artist and her boyfriend who had, coincidentally, both had a cancer scare at the same time.

The ceremony took place on a small incline at the north end of the park, right near that row of garages. It was well attended by the artists, with all but a couple showing up. The kids typical boisterous obnoxiousness faded quickly away as stepped up nervously to announce the winners. The final reason I love working with kids is that I get to feel like a proud dad over and over again, but I don’t have to save for anyone’s university tuition.

Kay, it’s 6:30, I’m going to go do some tai chi in the park and work-out with this rubber-tubing thing I bought at the Eaton’s Centre.

24 September 2008