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YouTube Video: “A Fly on the Wall at Artomatic”
|| 6/15/2009 || 4:36 pm || Comments Off on YouTube Video: “A Fly on the Wall at Artomatic” || ||

On Saturday June 13th, 2009, I attended the Artomatic “Meet The Artist Night.” As an experiment, I decided to place my digital camera on my exhibit wall. This time-lapse video documents what it would be like to be a fly on the wall at my Artomatic 2009 exhibit.

About midway through the video, I remove the camera from the wall and a friend takes a photo of me with a couple friends and then I place the camera back on the wall for the remainder of the filming.


Music used in the video is Azul (Gianma’s Drum and Bass Remix) by Natalia Clavier from her El Arbol EP (2008).



You can also view a somewhat better quality version of the video on Facebook.



I am mentioned in today’s Washington Post article “Artomatic ’09: Survival Tips From an Expert”
|| 6/5/2009 || 12:51 pm || Comments Off on I am mentioned in today’s Washington Post article “Artomatic ’09: Survival Tips From an Expert” || ||

In today’s Weekend section of the Washington Post there is an article titled Artomatic ’09: Survival Tips From an Expert*. In the article staff writer Michael O’Sullivan follows around Phillip Barlow, one of the DC area’s biggest art collectors, and asks him questions about how to go about exploring the 9 floors of art at Artomatic.

Near the end of the article Michael O’Sullivan writes:

Okay, spill it: So who does the collector like? Barlow wouldn’t give a Top 10 list or even a favorite floor. But he did express interest in — or lingered longingly in front of — the work of several artists. Here’s a partial list of his favorites:

Floor 9: Jessica Van Brakle.

Floor 8: Jared Davis, Nikolas R. Schiller.

Floor 7: Jeremy Arn.

Floor 6: Jen Dixon.

Floor 5: Mark Jude, Meinir Wyn Jones, Stephen Reveley, Michael Enn Sirvet, Steve Strawn.

Floor 2: Drew Graham, Kate McGovern.

Still, Barlow cautions against using his taste alone as a guide, adding that the secret to Artomatic’s success is volume, volume, volume. “There’s just so much stuff here that I can practically guarantee that something’s going to be new or interesting,” he says. “To someone.”

Read the entire article here. I plan on stopping by Artomatic this evening around 7pm. Maybe I will see you there?


* This article’s title in the print edition is different from the on-line edition. The print edition is titled Artomatic ’09: Survival Tips From an Expert while the on-line edition is titled Annual Artomatic Show Exhibits the Works of More Than 1,000 Artists.


Related Artomatic Entries:

+ MORE



A brief discussion about my IQ scores from 19 years ago
|| 6/4/2009 || 5:22 pm || 1 Comment Rendered || ||

A couple months ago I got the wild idea to contact my old public school district and ask for a copy of my permanent records. I was curious about what files they had on me and if there was anything in my permanent records that was worthy keeping or sharing. To my surprise (and simultaneous dismay), I found that they had kept my intelligence quotient score (above) in my permanent file.

At the beginning of my 4th grade school year, my mom had suggested that I take the school administered IQ test so that I might be able to qualify for the school district’s Talented And Gifted Program (TAG). The special program was for students who had an IQ above 130 and had scored well in standardized tests so that they could be provided a more robust public school education. So two days before I turned 10 years old I took the exam with Ms. Delia, the elementary school’s counselor. She had platinum blonde hair, a perpetual suntan, and would always wear funky, multicolored dresses. I still remember her generous smile and supportive words that she’d always offer me during my six years of elementary school.

The test that I took was the revised edition of the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children. According to her written note in the margin of the results, I hurried through the exam. I don’t remember if it was because I was a little cocky 9-year-old who thought he knew it all or if I was nervous about how my scores would turn out or if it was some latent ADHD symptoms that were never fully addressed. My guess is that it was a combination of all three. Regardless of my possibly reckless speed, the final result was that my IQ score was 131, which was one IQ point higher than I needed in order to be allowed into the TAG program.

From fourth grade until sixth grade, one day each week I was bused out to the TAG center to take “enrichment” classes. It was here where I first learned how to program in BASIC, where I surfed the internet for the first time, created my first pinhole camera, and even where broke my right arm. I look back at this part of my public school education very fondly and believe that it helped shape me in ways that I’ll never fully comprehend.

However, I am posting this discussion today because I am curious about how much my intelligence quotient has changed over years. If I were to take the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale, how would I fare? Would my IQ be very much different today than it was nearly 20 years ago? Would I be less intelligent, more intelligent, or about the same? What if I took a different IQ test like the Stanford-Binet? What good would it do for me to know this information at 28 years of age? Does it even matter???

I’ve always had some persistent issues knowing that my IQ placed me into the top 2% of the population. As in, if I was in a crowd of 100 randomly selected people, this IQ score would statistically make me the second smartest person in the crowd. But so what? Innate intellect does not automatically get you the job you want or even help you obtain friends or get you a college degree or even lead the crowd of 99 others to safety. It’s just an arbitrary number, right? I don’t have any intention of joining MENSA because I could really care less about belonging to a group of people that theoretically pride themselves enough to join an organization simply based on their score on a standardized test.

The beauty of this blog, which is now over 5 years old, is that I have a digital repository for documenting & sharing what my intellect has helped me accomplish. I take solace knowing that an IQ is not simply an arbitrary number that can differentiate someone from others, but rather, its their actions and creations that set them apart.



My Artomatic 2009 Opening Night Exhibit Dissected on Flickr
|| 6/3/2009 || 7:36 pm || + Render A Comment || ||

For my second official upload to Flickr, I continued last year’s practice, and uploaded a photo I took of my Artomatic 2009 exhibit on opening night. By adding notes over every part of the display photograph on Flickr, you can click on the embedded links and view the respective content on my website. If you are unable to make it to this year’s exhibition, I hope this dissection satiates your curiosity.



My own Coat of Arms, the Origin of the Stars & Stripes, and Hartburn, DC
|| 6/2/2009 || 1:57 pm || 2 Comments Rendered || ||

Original image created in Chicago, 1894.
From the Library of Congress’ An American Time Capsule: Three Centuries of Broadsides and Other Printed Ephemera.

Some time in the future I’d like to read more deeply into heraldry and come up with my own Coat of Arms. Today there is so much talk about name branding that I think it would be an interesting juxtaposition where my Coat of Arms could visually explain some subtle details about me. My motto would either be Socio Ditata Labore or Gloria Immortalis Labore Parta, but how would I go about designing the shield? That is where I am currently stuck at, but I imagine that if I were to dig deeper into the arcane traditions of heraldry, I would come up with something fitting.

About two months ago I was rummaging through the Library of Congress’ An American Time Capsule: Three Centuries of Broadsides and Other Printed Ephemera and came across the image above. I knew that the DC flag was based off of George Washington’s family crest, but I didn’t know that it had been changed over the centuries prior to his family’s arrival in America. Moreover, I didn’t know that the city I currently live in, Washington, DC, might have been called something completely different…

From a New York Times’ Letter to the Editor published on April 8th, 1984:

Eberhartpence, Eberhart, Hartpence, Hart – what’s in a name? Indeed, had it not been for a change of name back in the 12th century, our nation’s capital might be Hartburn, D.C.

You see, when George Washington’s British ancestor William de Hartburn moved from Hartburn to Wessington in 1130, he changed his name to William de Wessington, which later became de Washington. The ”de” was dropped when the family arrived on these colonial shores around 1659.

Had William retained his original name, the father of our country would have been one ”George Hartburn.”

Imagine that– a gastrointestinal themed capital city. The people’s pyrosis!

I bet the George Hartburn University would have an even better medical school too! It makes me wonder if there would even be a Hart Senate office building, lest someone get the wild notion of burning it down. Or what about the lexical ramifications of when the British torched Washington in the War of 1812? Would this alternate history be called The Burning of Hartburn? I can only laugh and, of course, take some antacids.


A very long time ago, a couple weeks after the reelection of George W. Bush in November of 2004, I wrote that my most recent map looked similar to the gas mask I had purchased days prior:

Yet living in DC with 4 more years of Bush, I am expecting some acid reflux in the belly of the beast…

While there was only one case of acid reflux to hit Washington, DC during the subsequent 4 years, and a mild case at that, I can laugh again at this alternative history double entendre. Acid reflux in the belly of the beast? Only if George Washington’s ancestor didn’t change his name.



YouTube video of the early years of Disco in the Washington / Baltimore area from 1976
|| 6/1/2009 || 2:41 pm || + Render A Comment || ||

This video was created by Tom D’Antoni in 1976 for Maryland Public Broadcasting‘s show “The Critic’s Place” on the Disco phenomenon when it was happening. It shows some of the nightclubs that existed in Washington, DC and Baltimore during the early years of Disco. I really enjoyed how Tom highlighted the social differences that existed between DC and Baltimore 30 years ago and how they, in some ways, still exist today. I am really curious about where the clubs that were featured in the video were located. At about 4 minutes in he mentions 20th & L streets and that area is now all office buildings. I gotta wonder if there are any nightclubs in the locations shown in the video that still exist today?


A big thanks goes to Dori Hadar, who posted this on Facebook, and is the person we can collectively thank for helping to discover Mingering Mike. You can purchase his insightful book about Mingering Mike on Amazon.


Note: while the YouTube video’s title says “Disco 1975 (74?),” upon a thorough reading of the comments posted on YouTube, audiophiles were able to accurately place the video at 1976.


UPDATE – 2/28/2011 – The Sagittarius, shown at the opening and again at around the 2 minute mark, was located inside of the Fraser Mansion and is currently the national affairs office of the Church of Scientology. -via DCist.





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