Heart Made of Art

This week has been all about the art, starting with comics and ending with Art Fair on the Square.

This gorgeous piece by Aaron Hequembourg.

I.

I was excited to find out that DanielleCorsetto, the writer of my favorite webcomic, was coming to Madison. Girls With Slingshots is very funny, a little bawdy, and not for anyone with an aversion to alcohol, commentary on vibrators and sex, or cats that say, “Dooooooom.” Graciously hosted by Westfield Comics, this book signing was a weird but happy conjunction of web-art and real life.

Book signings are a strange beast in general. Sometimes you meet interesting people that are happy to chat about the author, elections, tv shows, and the disappearance of the honey bee. Sometimes you meet nobody, and the time spent in line becomes a trial of bad posture and aching feet. Since Madison is still a new town to me, I didn't have the bravery and gumption to chat up my neighbors in line. Not this time, anyways. What I had was an excellent selection of comics to distract me, and that kept me happy enough.

Then, of course, was the moment I met Danielle. The moment she asked if I was from around here (the same question asked to all of the fans, I think, but it still felt special.) The moment she signed two books for me. The moment she said, “Sure! We can do a picture!” And the moment I walked out of the shop, thrilled to have two signed copies of GWS books—thrilled, too, that after admiring Danielle Corsetto for years, she was just as fantastic in real life as her comics suggested. 

II.

I stepped foot inside the OvertureCenter for the first time, where I saw a collection curated by my new acquaintance Anders in Gallery 3. Titled "The Printed World: Artists as Visual Ecologists," I believe it's a collection of prints by various artists. I don't know enough about art to comment, other than to say that a lot of the pieces seemed to be trying to re-arrange bits of my brain.

III.

Laura Harris, these ones.

Art Fair on the Square is more or less (mostly less) like the Ann Arbor Art Fairs. I am firmly convinced I've seen some of the same artists with booths in Ann Arbor.

As excellent as the art was, the Ann Arbor Art Fairs win this round, hands down. Madison's Art Fair on the Square cannot compete with the sprawl of art, the extensive and strange collections, or the devotion it takes to see even half of the art that takes over Ann Arbor this week.

I think this was Dolan Geiman...

Of all the silly things that could make a girl homesick, I think being homesick for a city that goes into slow motion with closed streets and a record of disgusting weather during Art Fair, is quite a silly thing. Still, here I am. Feeling homesick.

And then I said, "Look! A mustache ride!"

4th Night

I didn't do much on the Fourth of July. It's one of my favorite holidays, but there were no fireworks, no grilling out, no red-white-n-blue cake for me. Instead, I spent the day marathoning episodes of the TV show New Girl, and the evening at a rock show featuring local talent.

This is not to say that I completely missed out on national fervor. Six days before the Fourth of July, way back in June, I heard the boom and crack of fireworks outside my window. These weren't a pop here and a fiery spray from a Roman Candle there, but rather a serious fireworks display that crackled above Lake Monona.  I live a half-dozen blocks from Lake Monona, but when I stepped outside I could still see the sprays of light from my tiny balcony. Or rather—I could see some of the fireworks through the leaves and branches of the trees outside my house.

Despite the somewhat terrible view, I couldn't leave. The loud, celebratory nature of fireworks around the Fourth of July usually drenches me with a glorious feeling of solidarity and pride. I might even go so far as to call it patriotism, which is a word I associate purely with politics and firemen.

This year, though, I started thinking. Having missed the memo that the celebrations were starting, I spent my time watching the fireworks remembering other July 4ths.

One year, watching the fireworks sparkling over Lake Michigan with family in Petoskey.

Another year, at my neighbor's house, happy after an afternoon of sun and blue pool water.

The times I ran the Fourth of July 5k in my Michigan hometown of Whitmore Lake. The reading of the Declaration of Independence at the library. The Kiwanis club frying up chicken dinners until the scent of fried chicken wafted across the town. The small-town parade that I marched in as a high schooler. Watching the fireworks exploding over the lake from a friend's deck. After dark, taking a pontoon boat out for a cruise and watching the occasional firework blooming around the lake.

These memories sifted through my mind as I watched Madison's fireworks through my tree branches. I wasn't homesick, exactly, but certainly nostalgic. It's difficult leaving home for a city of 300,000. For me, this is especially true because am acquainted with very few of that number. It made celebrating Independence Day in the traditional fashion almost impossible.

I ended my day with a rock show, however, and that was great. Very American.