Your Eyes Give Me Something to Dream is an ongoing series of multiples made out of recycled newspaper and words. The words are taken from tags I frequently use in the blog, art & life.  Everyone is invited to take pencils by making a small donation. The money collected is donated to an organization related to the environment and protection of trees.

On the Run, a blog about the New York City Marathon. The Marathon this year is on November 7 and will have about 43,000 runners. So looking forward to it!

A Running Start, a free online coaching resource developed by New York Road Runners in response to rising obesity levels in children.

Enjoy and wishing all a happy healthy weekend!

“Rather than entering any situation wondering how it will serve you, let your entire motivation be to serve the greater good. Ask yourself constantly, how do I serve here, rather than how does this serve me and you put yourself in the great flow, which paradoxically causes life to serve you far better.”

Enjoy!

Finding of the week:

“We always need to remember that behind almost every great moment in history, there are heroic people doing really boring and frustrating things for a prolonged period of time.”

From New York Times, My Favorite August by Gail Collins.

The taste of summer is…

fresh
I’ve been giving life to those whispery notes/sketches I often add to my Eco Ciak. I love that little recycled paper sketchbook. It’s always a fun process to go back to the notes/sketches and try to understand the where/what/how/why.

warm
To me there is nothing like a simple and open conversation about interests, ideas and life as artists. I had the opportunity to moderate the virtual panel Resource: Where Abstract Art is (From) with a great group of artists: Glen Cunningham, Mark Dagley, Laura Fayer, Molly Herman, Lori Kirkbride, Ben LaRocco and Rachael Wren. All artists were part of Source, an exhibition curated by Susan Ross and Melissa Staiger. Both, exhibition and virtual panel, were presented and sponsored by PowerHouse Projects. Source was on view at The Halls at Bowling Green from April 22nd through May 28th. Check out the virtual panel and take a look at their websites. It’s all good!

sweet
I finally signed up my family to a CSA. The fruit begins to arrive next week. I’m excited and so looking forward to it…

The upcoming weeks and months look exciting and enriching as well. This fall, I’ll be taking a course on advocacy for children at Citizens Committee for Children of New York. This is such a great organization and resource in the city.

More soon and I wish you all a great rest of the summer.

Swimming in the Caribbean. Surrounded by family and nature. I’m counting the days…

Where is yours?

Where is My Mind
By The Pixies

Oh
With your feet in the air and your head on the ground
Try this trick and spin it, yeah
Your head will collapse
But there’s nothing in it
And you’ll ask yourself

Where is my mind

Way out in the water
See it swimmin’

I was swimmin’ in the Caribbean
Animals were hiding behind the rocks
Except the little fish
But they told me, he swears
Tryin’ to talk to me, coy koi.

Where is my mind

Way out in the water
See it swimmin’ ?

With your feet in the air and your head on the ground
Try this trick and spin it, yeah
Your head will collapse
If there’s nothing in it
And you’ll ask yourself

Where is my mind

Oh
With your feet in the air and your head on the ground
Oh
Try this trick and spin it, yeah
Oh
Oh

“The critic has to educate the public; the artist has to educate the critic.”

-Oscar Wilde

“Yoga is about the union and integration of breath, movement and body, both on and off the mat. Our practice on the mat should hopefully guide us towards actions in the outside world: if we observe our actions on the mat, perhaps we can all try to apply them to the outside world, and together, in a united way, we can make a difference.”

Green Goa: Green Yoga, Karma Yoga and the Art of Transforming Practice to Life by Inna Costantini. UK Yoga Magazine, July 2010.

Happy summer!

Photo contest submission by Jennifer Day
From We Love Birds, a site for bird-lovers from the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.

Dorothea Tanning
Costume Design for Bayou, 1951
Graphite and gouache on green paper
12 1/2 x 9 1/2 inches
Collection of the artist

On view Dorothea Tanning: Early Designs for the Stage at the Drawing Center, April 23 – July 23, 2010.

We’ve been having glorious days filled with beautiful colors and sun. The weather always inspires me to choose what to experiment with in the kitchen. I have two new favorites: quinoa and kale. Cooking them is simple, their benefits are plenty and they taste great.

I was about to write about the benefits of kale when I found all I wanted to say (and more) in the great Brooklyn blog — Butter Beans Kitchen. This is a must read blog if you love real food. I agree with what they write about their blog:

“…If we want quality lives full of goodness, we have got to learn to make good choices about the food we plant and the food we eat. We have got to spend some more time in the kitchen and appreciating the food we have.

We have to teach our children, in a way that makes them want to celebrate. What could be more magical than the colors and tastes and sights that the Earth produces with sunshine, rain and a few pairs of dedicated hands…”

And here is the information about kale:

Kale — in April’s glow by Butter Beans Kitchen. They will add kale recipes this month.

Enjoy!

Welcome to my new website/blog. There are so many positive things happening this year, I hope to find more time to write. As you probably know, 2009 was an amazing year for me because I had an incredible baby boy. But as many artists who are also parents know, it is extremely challenging to balance a family, a job, to stay healthy and making art. I’m breathless!

I am grateful to have the opportunity to live and enjoy this whole experience. There are not words to really describe it…but my heart has grown so much since I became a mama. And I am thankful to have such wonderful community: my family, friends, neighbors and readers.

As I mentioned on my last post, this web project is a work in progress…My goal is to create a place where we connect, share and have a dialogue. I want it to have the quality of a studio visit, a great run or a yoga class.

Lastly, I want to thank and highly recommend Brad Stephenson who helped me with the new website. Brad is an actor, amazing father, technology developer, and huge Steelers fan — Go Steelers! — maybe next year. Brad was fantastic to work with and so patient with my slow pace. His website is www.bradpstephenson.com. Muchas gracias Brad!

I was sleepy too and left my sleepiness guide me through the streets of Brooklyn. I set my iPod to shuffle songs. The cool air woke me up when I found myself in DUMBO right in front of the water. I stopped for a couple of minutes to look at the view. It felt as if I was right in the center between the Brooklyn Bridge and Manhattan Bridge. I’m petite, but at that moment I felt so small. What an amazing place, I thought.

Bruce Springsteen’s song, Working on a Dream started playing. The song’s lyrics are beautiful and I love his voice when he sings: “I’m working on a dream, though trouble can feel like it’s here to stay…” The song reminded me of yesterday’s yoga class when the instructor asked us to find intention before we began the class. The purpose of my practice was to have strength and patience when life seems tough.

So here I am today, ready to do all I can to help a friend. I invite you to join Art Movement on Sunday, September 13, for the 19th annual 5K run/walk — Komen New York City Race for the Cure.

To join us or to make a gift, please visit Art Movement’s Race for the Cure. If you can’t be with us on that morning, please consider making a donation.

Every dollar counts! The money will help local organizations provide breast health education, screening and treatment.

Let’s be active, be part of the change, and help make the dream of a world without breast cancer true.

THANK YOU!

While browsing the Food Issue of the latest Prattfolio, I read an interview with graphic designer Margaret Noon. Noon is the owner of a green event planning business called Sustenance. She is also the leader of Slow Food USA in northern New Jersey. She describes the reason she became a chef after a career in advertisement as:

“Creativity has many outlets… Sometimes you reach a point at which your passions change and it’s time to be inspired again…”

I totally agree! And to be inspired by the beautiful spring, nature and real food, herbs are in season. Here is a nice resource on how to plant a window box herb garden.

Enjoy!

I want to dedicate my art practice as well and wonder if there are other artists interested in dedicating their creativity to something larger than having exhibitions or selling work?

As artist Lygia Clark wrote to Mondrian: “If I exhibit it [sic] is to transmit to someone else this “moment” stopped within cosmological dynamics which the artist captures…Don’t you think that the work of art is the product of two polarities which are the dynamics of human life?”

Photo:

Rossana Martinez

Magical Movement, 2009

Colored pencil on journal

Image:

Reclining Hero Pose

From Yoga Anatomy by Leslie Kaminoff

It’s a beautiful day!

A day to give us the chance to create and live with a new perspective, to find fulfillment in the real and meaningful, and to always give our best…

Here are my highlights from Barack Obama’s inaugural address:

“We remain a young nation, but in the words of Scripture, the time has come to set aside childish things. The time has come to reaffirm our enduring spirit; to choose our better history; to carry forward that precious gift, that noble idea, passed on from generation to generation: the God-given promise that all are equal, all are free, and all deserve a chance to pursue their full measure of happiness.

In reaffirming the greatness of our nation, we understand that greatness is never a given. It must be earned. Our journey has never been one of short-cuts or settling for less. It has not been the path for the faint-hearted – for those who prefer leisure over work, or seek only the pleasures of riches and fame. Rather, it has been the risk-takers, the doers, the makers of things – some celebrated but more often men and women obscure in their labor, who have carried us up the long, rugged path towards prosperity and freedom…

To the people of poor nations, we pledge to work alongside you to make your farms flourish and let clean waters flow; to nourish starved bodies and feed hungry minds. And to those nations like ours that enjoy relative plenty, we say we can no longer afford indifference to suffering outside our borders; nor can we consume the world’s resources without regard to effect. For the world has changed, and we must change with it”.

Image:
Visual representation of the most used words in Obama’s inauguration speech from Wordle.net

This year, Art Movement is participating in a Virtual Food Drive for the Food Bank’s annual campaign. I understand it’s hard to give when we don’t have much, but any amount — small or large — will help Food Bank provide free meals to New Yorkers in need. $1 provides 5 meals, a $20 donation can feed 100 people. Food Bank’s mission is “to end food poverty and increase access to affordable, nutritious food for low-income New Yorkers throughout the five boroughs”.

I didn’t want to set a specific goal amount. Art Movement’s goal is simply to give and help others.

If you would like to make a donation, please visit Art Movement’s Virtual Food Drive.

THANK YOU and Happy Holidays to all!

A while ago, my friend Margie, an awesome athlete, cook, and nutrition expert, recommended me to read the book Real Food by Nina Planck. One of my favorite things to do is to cook simple and fresh food, and I find so many similarities between cooking and working out an idea in the studio.

I’m currently hooked on the book, The Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan. I think these books are great tools to open our eyes and remind us that we have the power to change things — even if it’s a small change. Since I’m not into junk food (had enough in art school!) or diets, eating healthier feels natural to me.

As Michael Pollan says in his introduction to The Omnivore’s Dilemma:

“Eating is an agricultural act, as Wendell Berry famously said. It is also an ecological act, and a political act, too. Though much has been done to obscure this simple fact, how and what we eat determines to a great extent the use we make of the world—and what is to become of it. To eat with a fuller consciousness of all that is at stake might sound like a burden, but in practice few things in life afford quite as much satisfaction. By comparison, the pleasures of eating industrially, which is to say eating in ignorance, are fleeting. Many people today seem perfectly content eating at the end of an industrial food chain, without a thought in the world: this book is probably not for them; there are things in it that will ruin their appetite. But in the end this is a book about the pleasures of eating, the kind of pleasures that are only deepened by knowing”.

So thanks Margie! And here is my list of recommended books for those interested in food, nutrition, wellness, and social responsibility:

The Art of Simple Food: Notes, Lessons, and Recipes from a Delicious Revolution by Alice Waters.

Food Matters: A Guide to Conscious Eating by Mark Bittman.

In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto by Michael Pollan.

The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals by Michael Pollan.

Real Food: What to Eat and Why by Nina Planck.

After spending a wonderful holiday with family, I’m grateful for everything, but especially for all the small moments of 2008. And every time I feel my baby boy kicking in my belly…I’m simply grateful for life!

I hope you all had a great and happy holiday!

I’m currently writing about how important it was for me to create and stick to a wellness plan. I must say, it was a challenge as an artist because we tend to think about our work more than our health. While doing a bit of research, I came across this article in the New York Times Fitness and Nutrition section: Learning How to Walk (Chewing Gum Not Included).

In yoga class, my instructor mentions body awareness very often especially when we are in Tree and Mountain pose. This sounded kind of silly when I began practicing. But now, after years of running and practicing yoga, I totally agree that being aware of our bodies can prevent us from having problems later. I think prevention is the best health plan we can have. Especially for those of us that spend most of our days in front of a computer or working at a studio table.

A wellness plan is a commitment. And as with any commitment, it’s a lot easier to get to where we want to be at our own pace rather than to rush and get burned out in a second.

As artists, I hope that these difficult financial times make us approach our work differently. That our studio time becomes full of fresh ideas and endless experimentation without feeling the pressure of sales.

But most importantly, I hope that we as people understand the need around us and dedicate some time to help others in need, volunteer, invest in our community and environment. There is so much we can give.

To find volunteer opportunities in New York City, check the Mayor’s Volunteer Center. For those interested in healthy living and a healthy environment, check Time Out New York’s wonderful lists of what is in season by Daniel Gritzer.

April-June

July-September

October-December

I keep these posted on the fridge and check them every time I go to the Greenmarket. To find farmers’ markets near you, visit Local Harvest.

Enjoy!

This morning, it was 70 degrees with a beautiful clear and blue sky. I ran towards DUMBO and decided to stop next to the Brooklyn Bridge to absorb it all — the sky, the water, birds, and the view of the Bridge and Lower Manhattan. I thought of the excitement that is about to begin, the 2008 Olympics.

I’m excited to see all the athletes, but I’m also excited about the new architecture especially the National Aquatics Center or “Water Cube”. It’s an amazing piece of public art and I can’t wait to see grand athletes performing in grand architecture.

The “Water Cube” is a collaboration between PTW, ARUP, and the China State Construction and Engineering Corporation (CSCEC). Inspired by soap bubbles, the architects designed a simple structure using a plastic transparent material called ETFE. The building works like a green house and the material allows more sunlight in than glass. The sunlight heats the pools and the interiors, making the building energy efficient. And that for me is the perfect match — a balance between creativity and sustainability.

For architecture and green lovers, there is more information about the building at the New York Times, Inhabitat and TreeHugger.

Enjoy the games!

As I turned and walked on the street to get to a meeting, I could sense I was a stranger. I knew the only way to make a connection was by using a universal language ⎯ an unconditional smile. So I smiled at the people around me and they smiled back at me…and there was a connection.

After the meeting, I thought of the nice experience I had while commuting that morning. What I enjoy about experiences like this is how they go beyond any differences in race, language, or culture, and become a union of people ⎯ a human connection.

The idea of making a human connection has been part of my work for a while. I appreciate when other artists or people in the arts understand my work. But while making the work, I think of a different type of viewer: a stranger, someone that doesn’t have an art background, someone that doesn’t know me or where I come from. My goal is to be as transparent as possible and make a person to person connection with the viewer.

With that idea in mind, I’m currently working on a series of works related to movement. What I’m trying to visually show is a certain energy I feel while being active. The movements I make are extremely simple and I want to keep that simplicity in the work as well. I constantly use the word simple (I know!), but to me a simple gesture (like an honest smile) has a stronger meaning than a complicated installation that doesn’t show who the artist really is.

A couple of weeks ago, I had a chance, or a better word to describe it, the privilege to attend the New York Women’s Foundation annual breakfast. The highlight of the event for me was when the Acholi women from Meeting Point International in Uganda received a Vision Award. These women work breaking stone into gravel. They received an award for raising $1,000 from their salaries for the displaced families in Houston and Baton Rouge after Hurricane Katrina. As one of the women said: “I give you the love which was given to me the first time by people who did not know me. So the greatest thing in the world, even greater than any suffering or illness, is the love we have for one another.”

In June, I will be participating in various 5K and 10K races as part of Art Movement, an initiative I’m starting to fundraise for beach cleanup in northwest Puerto Rico. The beaches in that area are absolutely beautiful, but there is also garbage. And there is little information about how to recycle. These are the beaches where I grew up and I want to make sure they are pristine and preserved for generations to come.

Art Movement began last year when I learned a good friend’s computer, video camera, and equipment were stolen from her studio. Seeing my friend upset made me think of ways I could help her even if I couldn’t provide financial assistance. We are both artists, runners, and came to New York from other places of the world (she is from Canada, I am from Puerto Rico) to be artists. The least I could do was to show her I cared and wanted to do something to help her.

I invite everyone to join Art Movement. The goal is to connect artists, runners, and anyone interested in the environment to participate in one way or another. Please email me if you are interested in participating. More event details to come.

Video: Smile Like You Mean It

By The Killers

Like Oiticica, I think the world is the best museum. I find so many extraordinary things to be inspired by — artists, people, places. I recently learned about the films Pray the Devil Back to Hell and Run for Your Life. I haven’t seen them yet, but I’ve only heard fantastic things about them.

Pray the Devil Back to Hell directed by Virginia Reticker, is a documentary about the story of women that changed the course of the war in Liberia. Run for Your Life directed by Judd Ehrlich, is a documentary about the story of Fred Lebow and the founding of the New York City Marathon.

Stories like these give me the opportunity to keep the warm feeling of inspiration and admiration flowing continuously in my mind and heart.

Photo: Brazilian singer Caetano Veloso wearing Parangolé by Hélio Oiticica.

Top video: Pray the Devil Back to Hell directed by Virginia Reticker.

Bottom video: Run for Your Life directed by Judd Ehrlich.

In honor of Earth Day and the Boston Marathon, I decided to go for a run in one of the most beautiful places in Brooklyn, Prospect Park. The park is full of energy and simply a piece of art. It was designed by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux who also designed Central Park. While enjoying the awesome energy of all the runners, I noticed a family walking in the park. The father and daughter were holding hands. The daughter was so adorable in her pink dress and with tons of curls. I melted, but continued running when it just hit me…

This month, some amazing experiences have kept me busy working out. It hasn’t been the usual gym workout, but a tougher kind of workout. I thank all my good old and new friends for giving me these opportunities. I really feel humbled and honored.

I’m still digesting the idea of receiving a Mujeres Destacadas Award from New York’s daily El Diario/La Prensa. There was a moment during the luncheon when I just couldn’t believe I was part of it. It felt surreal. What incredible company — an amazing group of intelligent, hard working, honorable and successful women. Wow!

I consider myself very lucky to be able to do what I love. But the reason I’m here today goes directly to my core, my family. When growing up, I saw two loving and hard working parents who showed me how patience, education and hard work are essential tools to make dreams real. And I’m still the girl (like the girl in the park) who always dreamt about beautiful and creative things. I can’t deny it, I still love pink dresses and will always have tons of untamable curls — like a lion!

As memorable experiences like this continue to cross my path, I deeply understand the power of art. It’s great to make art and exhibit it. But it’s so much more to be aware of how creativity can be used to give, help, contribute and stimulate positive change…

Image: Leonardo da Vinci, Vitruvian Man, drawing, circa 1487.