Hotlanta: Days 4 & 5

8/12/14

Indigo leaves from the Garden at Appalachia Center for Craft

So we'll start off saying that the trip to the river failed. We were packed and ready to go walk the trails and enjoy the morning but the spiders and their webs forced us to turn around… Spiders: 1 SoapSkeptics: 0. Instead of doing that we visited Kelsey and Jeanne in the Fiber arts studios. Kelsey showed us some of her amazing work! All of it was so beautiful and delicate you couldn't help but feel relaxed around it. Very inspiring. Our time at the Appalachian Center for Craft was amazing. We got to experience some great nature and explore wonderful studios, met with Jeanne Brady who has been supporting us since the beginning, and also Kelsey who inspired us in so many ways. Thank you ACC for accepting and welcoming us into your community. Hopefully we'll be back sometime soon!

Our TN weaving

Next stop, HOTlanta! Avondale Estates to be exact, where we met with Lynn Sisler. Lynn creates some great paintings/collages involving animals. Her reasons for incorporating animals into her work are pretty eye opening and definitely force the mind to think a bit. You can check out her interview in the next couple of days to find out what exactly she has to say.

One of Andrea's friends from school, Hannah, is from Atlanta so we just met up with her and her friend  Mel. Although it's only been a few hours, we must say that it is so lively, fun, warm, and eclectic! Definitely feeling some good vibes over here. Got to relax for a bit then hopped over to MOTHER, a cool little bar and taco joint near the heart of Atlanta. Mel offered us a place to stay and we couldn't be more thankful! The road has been good to us.

Although Andrea did all of the driving today, I think its safe to say that with all the running around and altitude/climate change we both are beat. Tomorrow we plan to explore the city and see more of this glorious place.




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8/13/14


So last night, Andrea has an accident and spilt half a bottle of sumi ink on her laptop, right on the key board, after a night of draining it out and cleaning it, and putting it in rice, it still doesn't work. It's unfortunate, but we are going to be unable to edit and post videos, Rosie's computer is too old to update the iMovie software. It's an obstacle we'll manage to overcome for sure. Aside from that…


WE ARE IN LOVE WITH ATLANTA!
Today was a good day! We started off at Highland Bakery for brunch with Hannah and then went back to her place in Buckhead. You guys… the SoapSkeptics gals were stunned! Hannah's mom welcomed us into her gorgeous home with open arms and was genuinely interested in our mission on this road trip. It doesn't cease to amazes us how supportive so many people are of our mission.










We spent the afternoon adventuring through the Glass Objects Studio, Gallery, and Smoke Shop space. Mel works there and gave us the grand tour, she then demonstrated blowing glass into marbles. It was awesome. Then Hannah and Mel showed us around Atlanta's street art murals. There is an event happening on Saturday called Living Walls so a bunch of muralists are hanging around Atlanta painting on the walls. We decided for dinner we needed fried chicken from the south. So

Mel took us to a spot she'd been wanting to go to called Harrold's Chicken and Ice- but it also has the name Harold's Chicken Shack. Luck for us, it was comedy night at Harold's so we also got a live comedy show to accompany our friend chicken, mac and cheese bites, and fried okra. After dinner we went to a local with signs that say: "CHURCH it's a bar". We met some really amazing folks here in ATL. Hannah and all of her friends were so sweet to us, so open, friendly, caring and helpful! The south sure knows about hospitality.

Something about the liveliness and influx of art and culture in this city really made us feel comfortable and inspired. Would love to come back and explore this city to even greater depths. Thank you to everyone who has helped us thus far, this experience has already been life changing and it's only been 5 days.

Now we are going to head to Mobile, Alabama for an interview then end the day in New Orleans where we plan to stay for the weekend. Until then, goodnight and be well.

Andrea + Rosie
SoapSkeptics
@soapskeptics

Artist Perspective: Tegan James

Artist Perspective: Tegan James

This week's featured artist is Tegan James, an artist based out of Metuchen NJ. Tegan James takes inspiration from the rainbow after the storm, listen as the journey of transgender and LGBT issues influence they ways in which Tegan James creates lively abstract paintings and how spirituality and acceptance has brought the artists to all of the right places at the right times. Creator of GALA Magazine, featuring LGBT artists online, and exhibiting in the local book store which we also filmed the interview in, To Be Continued... Tegan James has a very open mind about what art is and CAN be.

Keep up with what Tegan James is up to:
Teganjamesart.com
facebook.com/jerseytaurus143
twitter.com/teganjamesart
twitter.com/gala_magazine
instagram: tegan.james77

SoapSkeptics is made up of Andrea Garcia and Rosie McNeill, we are embarking on a road trip August 8- Sept 15 to continue to create interviews and documentaries such as this one with other local artists across America. Stay tuned with what we are doing and have done in the past:

www.soapskeptics.blogspot.com
www.facebook.com/soapskeptics.1
www.vimeo.com/soapskeptics
instagram: soapskeptics
soapskeptocs@gmail.com

Peace~

ONE WEEK EXACTLY!!

WE HAVE ONE MORE WEEK TO REACH OUR KICKSTARTER GOAL!

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1793708100/soapskeptics-traveling-across-usa-to-film-art-and

Help us make a documentary about art and culture across America. The money goes towards our travel costs, equipment, and post production on our book and full length documentary film!

We have great rewards and incentives for those who help us out in some way. Any little bit helps!

Peace,
Andrea & Rosie
SoapSkeptics

www.vimeo.com/soapskeptics
www.facebook.com/soapskeptics.1

THIS WEEK'S ARTIST PERSPECTIVE WITH ARLENE THAYER

Artist Perspective: Arlene Thayer

Arlene Thayer is a fiber artist, yarn spinner, and writer from Glenville, PA. In this week's SoapSkeptics interview, Arlene talks to us about how the world of fiber art is growing in today's culture, her views on the business side of being an artist, and how she came to become so involved in the blogosphere for her knowledge and practice in fiber art. Thank you Arlene for inviting us to your studio and being so hospitable and kind!

To see more of her works and writing and keep up with her whereabouts visit:

www.spinartiste.com

www.fiberygoodness.com

SoapSkeptics is an art group made up of Rosie McNeill and Andrea Garcia. We are traveling across the country in August 2014 to meet with more local artists [of all mediums] and discuss how culture and society shape the ways in which they make/view art. 

Keep up with what SoapSkeptics is doing:

Blog: soapskeptics.blogspot.com

Instagram: @soapskeptics

Facebook: facebook.com/soapskeptics.1

Youtube: youtube.com/soapskeptics

Vimeo: vime.com/soapskeptics

Email: soapskeptics@gmail.com

Help us make this project possible- visit our Kickstarter Campaign to help us reach our goal of $5,000

kickstarter.com/projects/1793708100/soapskeptics-traveling-across-usa-to-film-art-and

Peace.

 

Special THANK YOU to everyone who has been supporting our project!
We have 28 days to go and $3,459 left to reach our goal. 
Please share this with fellow art supporters and appreciators:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1793708100/soapskeptics-traveling-across-usa-to-film-art-and

For those of you who are new to follow SoapSkeptics, we are two artists from New Jersey. We recently began filming short interviews with local artists about how today's culture influences their art practice and the way they view art.

We are doing this because in the present moment, SO MUCH is happening-- not just in the art scene, but in our society as well. Culture and art go hand in hand. We want to capture a little chunk of today's history and society so that one day we can look back on this time of information overload and maybe try to make some sense of it... or just a little part of it. 

Traveling across America to interviews local artists of all mediums will help us collect a wide variety of perspectives and influences. These interviews and our experiences will be filmed by us, produced by us, edited by us, and exhibited by us as a full length documentary film.

We will also be making our own art while on the road. We plan to make a weaving to represent every state we stop in; each weaving will be soley made our of raw natural materials found in that location. Along with our weavings, we will have our own personal sketch book which we will draw/write in throughout our journey and we hope to even collaborate with some of the artists we meet with. All of these art works will be published into a book that will serve as OUR OWN visual interpretations of our trip. 

So please, check out our kickstarter and help us reach our goal of $5,000 by the end of June.

Thank You & Peace,

Andrea & Rosie 

SoapSkeptics

!!! Kickstarter Update !!!

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1793708100/soapskeptics-traveling-across-usa-to-film-art-and

This whole experience has been mind blowing for us, we appreciate all of the support we have been getting so far! We are forever grateful to these lovely folks who have been pledging to make this project possible:

Also, a SPECIAL THANKS to Jeff Edwards from the Visual and Critical Studies Department at the School of Visual Arts for publishing about our Kickstarter Campaign on the Visual and Critical Studies Blog!!

To read more about the Visual and Critical Studies Department at the School of Visual Arts, which is also where Andrea of SoapSkeptics just graduated from, go to:

http://www.visualandcriticalstudies.com/