October 2020

FIG Meetings First Fridays 5:30-6:30

We will be meeting monthly through Zoom for the time being to support each other during this strange and difficult time. If you have any topics you’d like us to talk about, please contact Linda and Kathleen, and we will will try to put it on the agenda for the next meeting we have. The meeting will be a monthly happening, so every first Friday of each month, we hope you will all join us. Email either or both of us - links below are live!

Linda Litteral and Kathleen Mitchell, FIG Co-chairs

FIGs In the Public Eye

Helen Redman

“The Guerrilla Girls quip: “Knowing your career might pick up after eighty!" is currently happening for me!!” Many opportunities are opening up for Helen. More to come!

Amanda St. Claire

Amanda is working with Katie Flores, a young artist on the Autism spectrum, who will be showing work in a few locations soon. Check out http://www.katieflores.com.

Minnie Valero

Being a very social person and prolific painter, Minnie initiated a lovely art-correspondence project, offering her small paintings, posted on Instagram, to anyone interested. She’s mailed work through USPS to many very grateful recipients from the US to Europe.

Linda Frueh

Immediately following Amanda’s show at the Fresh Paint Gallery in La Jolla, Linda has a solo show of her encaustic work, called Seductive Surfaces, running now through November 29.

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Uplifting

Judith Parenio sent us a link to an amazing exhibition: Magical Van Gogh Exhibit and and an article about a group of female skateboarders in Bolivia combining sports with the South American country's tradition.

@MPaolaFlores meets the women of the ImillaSkate collective. To read more: https://t.co/v7FbBe3Cii and https://t.co/0dwsJUDwgq

Opportunity

The UCSD Crafts Center, as Kathi McCord reports, is planning to open in November. Equipment is being purchased now, so if

there is equipment needed for your craft, and you’d like to teach, get in touch with Annika!.

Annika Nelson, the director and a friend of Kathi’s, is looking for instructors in all kinds of crafts. Her contact email is anelson@ucsd.edu.

Desert Dairy Labyrinth Project

November 6-9, 2020, Desert Dairy, 29 Palms, California

Linda Litteral and Anna Stump have collaborated to develop an exciting and rejuvenating retreat / installation in mid-November, 2020. Contributions for supplies have been gratefully received. If you are interested in finding out more about participating in this project, feel free to contact Linda Litteral or Anna Stump.

A description from Linda: “The design of the Labyrinth is a triple spiral or triskele, taken from ancient Greek design. It represents protection, action, cycles, progress, and revolution. I was thinking about all the triple goddesses throughout history, The three fates of Moirai, Three phases of the moon of Hecate, Three seasons of Horae, and the three graces of Charites. Maiden, Mother, Crone, the Hindu Tridevi, and others.”

FIGs will install our ceramic pieces in the landscape during the November Desert Dairy gathering:

Jennifer Spencer, Cindy Zimmerman, Jeanne Dunn, Terri Hughes-Oelrich, Anna Stump, Kathleen Mitchell, Kathy Nida, Stacie Birky Greene, Kirsten Aaboe, Alise Sheehan, Stacy Nixon, Linda Litteral, Janice Grinsell, Minnie Valero, Amanda St. Claire,

Work submitted by:

Judith Parenio, Amanda St. Claire, Cindy Zimmerman, Kathy Nida, Kit Aaboe, Kathleen Mitchell, Janice Grinsell, Minnie Valero, Judith Christenson, Anne Olsen, Moya Devine, Stacie Birky Greene

FIG Critique Groups, in development

A group of FIG ‘Crit Group Guinea pigs’ is developing a flexible, media-friendly, supportive and informative process of providing constructive critique to each other through a weekly Zoom meeting. So far, the group has met for three weeks, and has used a process developed primarily by Jeanne Dunn and Doris Bittar with input from the other Guinea pigs. At the end of the 6-week trial period, the Guinea pigs will have smoothed out and refined a good process that can be used by any FIGs who are interested in being part of a FIG Crit Group.

An overview at this point: The group consists of 6 FIG members; the Zoom meeting is approximately an hour long; the artist whose work is shown puts together a slide show of work to be critiqued in advance; the artist’s screen is shared and she remains silent after showing the slides and directing the group to one or two pieces of work for closer viewing and discussing; a stepped discussion process that moves from the objective to the poetic provides the artist with substantial and very helpful feedback. The artist then engages with the other members to finalize the critique.

Anyone interested in being part of a FIG Critique Group is welcome to let Linda and Kathleen know. At the next FIG Monthly meeting, the Guinea Pigs will have completed the rounds of critiques of each others’ work and will gladly answer any questions.

A FIG newsletter, to help us stay connected!

FIG News in .pdf format, will be emailed once a month to the feministimagegroup@groups.io email group, soon after the monthly FIG meeting.

The intention is to include some of the information we send out through email to the .io group email that’s not time-sensitive and that’s discussed at our meeting. We’ll all then be able to find information we’ve shared in our Newsletter editions instead of searching

through the emails.

If you’d like anything FIG-related included in the Newsletter, feel free to email the newsletter email at OurFigNews@gmail.com and the info will be included in the next edition. Send any questions about FIG News to that email too. Kit Aaboe will respond.