Artist Residencies at Centrum

Beck Brings "The Artist's Way" to Centrum

Darsie Beck is a bit of a Renaissance man... a professional artist, landscape designer, stone carver, journal keeper, and a teacher. He arrives for his annual Centrum Residency armed with computer and printer, sketch pad and yoga mat, running shoes and infectious smile. Before leaving he will have filled page after page with writings and illustrations of his time here. When he first shared his journal pages with me, I wished I had joined him on his early morning sojourns around the grounds and along the coastline of Fort Worden. In that moment I fully understood the power of these "retreat-like" residencies to breath life and vitality into the creative process.

Darsie is coming back to Centrum this spring. This time he will spend part of his residency presenting a workshop, Discovering Your Essential Nature. He will be joined by Port Townsend Visual Artist Gloria Lamson and by Aletia Alvarez, co-founder of Madrona MindBody here at Fort Worden. There is still time for you to register for the workshop, which will be held May 1st, 2nd, and 3rd 2009.

Karen Rudd Kudos

Congratulations to Centrum Resident and GAP Award Recipient  Karen Rudd . Her  3D Arts entry "Last Stand" placed first in its category at the Collective Visions Art Gallery's annual juried exhibit. If you made it to Karen's open studio here at Centrum in June of 2008, you got to see her work on this series. Here's what Marie Weichman of Olympic College had to say about Karen's work in the CVG Newsletter:

"On February 1st Collective Visions Art Gallery opens its annual juried art exhibit, THE CVG SHOW '09 to the public.  This year the show is stock full of a wide range of artworks representing everything from humor to the dark side of life.  Process dominates several pieces while content is the driving factor for other works.  It is easy to see the world through the artist's eye in this show and those views are vastly different from one another...   

there is one piece that makes getting out of the house worth every bit of effort.  "Last Stand," by Karen Rudd is not only the smartest piece of art in the show, but also, socio-politically speaking, one of the most  currently relevant works in the show.  At a distance this piece looks like nothing more than a tree trunk, but upon closer inspection it is made of, (I pause here to consider not telling you, thereby saving the surprise, but...), scrap pieces of recycled cardboard and glue.  Nothing more."

"Awesome" Cistern Music at Sundance

I was recently talking with Centrum Resident David Mitsuo Nixon of  "Awesome". Described as a "theater - comedy - art collective", "Awesome" is a group of seven guys wearing suits and playing a unique mix of instruments... guitar, bass, drums, trumpet, accordian, mandolin, banjo, theremin, typewriter, kitchen utensils... pretty much anything within reach. While in residency back in March, "Awesome"  recorded in the Cistern, and David tells me that an extended improv session will be part of the soundtrack to a movie "Immaculate Conception of Little Dizzle", which has been accepted into the Sundance Film Festival. Nice going guys, and thanks for sending us the recording and a little view of the space. David will be back at Centrum in February.

Practice This! Marc Fendel on Jamming

Marc Fendel of the Seattle Drum School talks about Jam Sessions, how to prepare for them, and why it's important to participate in them. As a Centrum resident, Marc and his band have done some recording in the Cistern... which he promises to share when ready.

Centrum Residency as "Hurrication"?

We get all kinds of proposals from artists and writers interested in Centrum Residencies. Frederick Mead's recent proposal is as unique as you'd expect from the writer/director of the San Francisco production "The Kung Fu Evangelist". Frederick is a Centrum alumni with a great solution to hurricane season in his hometown of New Orleans... he has arranged his next residency for August and September of 2009. He has even gone so far as to reach out to other writers around the country, and is forming a collaborative residency that promises to be a real treat. Frederick talks about his 2008 residency in his always entertaining blog.

"We Are Golden" Releases Debut EP

Sarah Rudinoff and Gretta Harley are "We Are Golden", fronting a seven member band that's been wowing Seattle audiences since the release of their five song debut album.

Sarah sent us this link to "I'll Meet You There", written during their June 2008 residency at Centrum. You can hear and buy the full EP album on their website. Thanks for the update ladies!

Baroque Meets Grunge - an Interview with Morten Skovgaard Danielsen

Danish composer Morten Skovgaard Danielsen used his month long residency at Centrum to work on his latest project, a commissioned opera. In an interview with "Basically Modern", he talks about the opera, his early work, and the influences on his music.  

Stephen Cohen and the Tree People at Centrum

Stephen Cohen recently completed a Centrum Creative Residency. He sent us an email about his experience.

The Tree People, Stephen, Jeff, and Rich, participated in a Creative Residency at Centrum for a week in September of 2008. These Centrum Creative Artist Residencies, which attract artists from all over the world, are perfect for artists to create in a quiet, inspirational setting. Nothing is required or expected from the artists at these residencies, so artists have the opportunity to concentrate on nothing else but their art.

We stayed in a wonderful 3 bedroom house on the beautiful Olympic Peninsula and did nothing but play music all week. After 4 days of rehearsing, refining, and arranging new pieces, we went into Synergy Studio, a studio on the Centrum grounds, with engineer Neville Pearsall, for two days and recorded a good part (8 pieces) of the music that will be on our our third and new Tree People album. (We will record a few more pieces of music and mix the final results at Dead Aunt Thelma's Studio in Portland later this year, and then send the completed product to Guerssen Records of Spain, who will release it later in 2009). On the last night of our residency we went into Port Townsend and did an evening performance for a nice listening audience at the Upstage, a really nice venue.

We would like to thank Lisa and the rest of the staff at Centrum for helping to make this fantastic residency possible.

The residency provided the 3 of us with time and space to create, think, rehearse and record. We were inspired and energized by this residency and it had lasting value. This residency will always be remembered by our Tree People trio!

You can see my new post, with photos, about the experience on my Tree People blog:

http://treepeoplechronicles.blogspot.com

Dionne Bonner Exhibit

Former creative resident Dionne Bonner will open her exhibit entitled "Exposed: The Unique History of African American Pioneers" at the Evergreen College's Tacoma Campus on August 16. The exhibit features larger-than-life oil paintings of Pacific Northwest African American pioneers.

Marc Fendel's Cistern Residency

Musician and Centrum Creative Resident Marc Fendel just completed a residency using the Dan Harpole Cistern here at Fort Worden (and its 44 second reverberation) as a recording and musical instrument.

Marc sent us a link to a brief video clip of Kevin Nortness playing banjo in the Cistern during the residency. Marc tells us that they also recorded in HD. We can't wait to see that.

[Video of Kevin Nortness playing banjo.]