The Google IPO is all over the news today. The company's founders are each worth a few $Bil. now. Wonder if any of that value trickles down to the Blogger folks, since they got acquired by Google last year... or did they get on the wagon late in the game? I bet lots of folks will Google "Google+IPO" to find out what's been published on the web about this blessed event.

I'm in a group show that runs from August 19 - September 18. The opening reception is tonight. The show already looked great when I dropped off my prints, and the stuff was still just lying against the wall. This part of Brooklyn is brimming with talented folk. My contribution to the show are big, beautiful versions of the two thumbnails you see at the right.

S  O  N  Y  A
s o u t h   o f   t h e   n a v y   y a r d   a r t i s t s
- at -
Robert Lehman Gallery at UrbanGlass
57 Rockwell Place, 3rd floor
between DeKalb Ave. & Fulton St., Fort Greene, Brooklyn, NY
August 19 - September 18, 2004

Pamella Allen, Ellsworth Ausby, C Bangs, Louis Benjamin, Doug Beube, Mark Blackshear, Nan Carey, Mary Chang, Cynthia Edorh, Richard Fett, Tami Kashia Gold, I. Leon Golomb, Eve Havlicek, Kathleen Hayek, Yuka Hirata-Blackshear, Carl Hixson, Jamillah Jennings, Frank Jump, Melanie Kozol, Kris Krohn, D. Lammie-Hanson, M.P. Landis, Marcia Lloyd, Robert Marvin, Matthew Miller, Mascha Oehlmann, Billy Parrott, Jim Porter, Mary Rieiser-Heintjes, Linda Shere, Andrea Spiros, GG Stankiewicz, Kathy Stecko, Sally Mara Sturman, Lawrence Terry, Zawadi and more

Opening Reception
Thursday, August 19, 6 - 8 pm
Refreshments & live music

SONYAspeak
Thursday, September 16, 6 - 8 pm
Meet 12 artists and learn about their work
Call 718-789-2545 or email info@sonyany.com for more information.

www.sonyany.com

Summer Schedule: M - F, 10 - 5pm; Sat, 10 - 4 pm; Closed Sunday.
Regular Schedule (after Sept. 3rd): Daily, 10 - 6 pm. Closed Labor Day.
Directions: Near B, M, Q, R, 2, 3, 4, 5, G trains
or visit www.urbanglass.org

Another Low-Tech Crack-Up
I've heard insanity described as doing the same thing again and again, expecting to get different results. The thing I was doing, was trying to print an image for a group show that I'm in. But there's more to the thing I was doing over and over, I just didn't know it. Some lessons are hard-learned.

Things had been fine for the last couple of days. I've printed nearly a dozen letter-size test prints for my new series. This evening I realized that the two images I planned to include in the SONYA group show, that opens this weekend, both needed to be printed. No problem, thought I... about 20 minutes each, and I'd be done.

I started the first print, and strangely, the orientation was wrong. [One bad print down.] I looked through the Photoshop print dialogs until I realized that the paper size had mysteriously changed to “Other,” probably because I'd changed one of my other settings, and hadn't noticed that the paper size changed along with it. OK, no problem, i figured. I re-checked my settings, loaded the paper, and printed again. Out came a thin, grainy, and greenish print!!!

I checked ink nozzles, restarted my machine, blah, blah, blah. I started a test print on a used piece of paper, and everything looked fine. I loaded another clean sheet, and started over. The page was part way out, and yikes! — that green blight again!

[Repeat several times over the next 2 or so hours]... I had rebooted my machine and trashed queued print jobs, thinking that the problem might have been caused by some obscure low-memory problem. I was ready to install new driver software on a hunch about corruption. Frustrated, I search the Epson support site. I was even more annoyed that the support line at Epson was closed, meaning that I'd have to slog through support documents on my own, but finding the answer actually didn't take long. The self-guided support section actually wasn't bad. After going though several pages of mundane stuff, I was essentially posed the question “Are you printing on the right side of the paper?” D'oh!!! Can't believe I hadn't thought of that.

It's not so obvious under the light in my workspace, but one side of Epson's enhanced matte paper is significantly brighter than the other under my kitchen's fluorescent lighting. A trip to the kitchen with my half-dozen wasted prints confirmed that I'd been loading the paper in backwards! It was user malfunction, sort of like putting photographic paper under the enlarger emulsion-side-down. I remember now that folks have said the back of the Epson matte paper is slightly smoother than the print-side. I quickly tutored myself on reading the sides by feel. I don't plan to make that mistake again.

So in the end, something as low-tech as loading the paper properly trumped all of that technology, and the stress of experiencing the malfunction may not have caused my “insanity,” but it certainly prolonged it. Or maybe it was just my male-ness: after all, we men reputedly never ask for directions when we manage to get lost!

:::

Tonight, I watched a tiny bit of Olympics coverage — badminton and a round of boxing. It was my first peek at the Olympics since they started, and I didn't even see the opening ceremony. That's unlike me. I used to be an Olympics junky, but this year it was all I could do to even be aware of when they'd started. I think part of that is because of a lack of promotion — I'm more aware of the dates of the US Open than I am of the Olympics.

Other than the swimmer who was being touted as the first guy with a serious shot at breaking Mark Spitz's record of collecting 7 medals in a single Olympics, apparently there are few serious American contenders. That means less buzz-worthy material for the telecasters to blab about.

And the lack of buzz may also be affecting ticket sales. On Lou Dobbs tonight, they reported that ticket sales for the Olympics are WAY behind projection — try nearly 50% off — though there might an additional factor beyond low buzz. Many people might have thought twice about getting on a plane to go to Athens, especially after 9/11/01 and the unsolved Atlanta bombing. Or it could simply be a matter of saturation: We see world-class athletes performing amazing feats almost daily and Professional athletes can compete in the Olympics now. All of this makes the Olympics less special.

But, who am I? Just some speculator. I wouldn't be surprised if the “bad box office” at the Olympics becomes a bigger story than most of the other Olympic stories.