Salon 24 // Malavika Mandal Andrew and Lee Schnaiberg

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome everyone to the 24th Expressionism Virtual Salon. I am your moderator and fellow artist Davonte Bradley. With me is Colin Goldberg, who coined the term Expressionism. And we have two wonderful presenters today with Lee Schnaiberg, saying that correctly, yes?

It's close, Schnee.

Schneeberg, okay, Schneeberg. And Malavika Andrew. Yeah, hi. And today it's going to be the typical format where we have our two presenters give their presentations that are going to be around 30 minutes apiece, and then after each presentation there will be a 15 minute or so Q&A session with the presenters. And then after that we'll have kind of just a free open discussion as per usual.

Davonte Bradley

We usually kind of wrap back around to the presentations, but you know, we've been known to deviate away from that and talk about all sorts of things. That being said, I am very tired, so I apologize if I might actually like nod off for a second, but it'll be all right, just yell at me, it'll be okay. Yes.

Davonte Bradley

And just want to say thank you all for being here. Thank you for your participation, and thank you for making these meetings great. And I will say, as just a common courtesy during the presentations, please keep your mics muted, but feel free to leave questions in the chat if questions come up during the presentation.

Davonte Bradley

And then I will make sure that they get to the appropriate person to be answered. By the time the presentation is over. So if a thought does come to you, put it down in the chat, and I will see it. I'm always looking at the chat. So that being said, let's get started, shall we? If that's okay with everyone here.

Davonte Bradley

Malavika, you ready to go? Maybe, partly, possibly.

Malavika, are you ready to go? I'm ready to go.

Still setting up? It's all good. No rush. And here comes the yawns. The problem is it's not because you all are boring, it's because my body's being tired, and I have no control over this. I thought I did. Apparently thought wrong.

That's okay. Is this visible?

It is. Yep. We have visual confirmation. So you have the floor.

Yeah? Okay. Hello, everyone. My name is Malavika. Already Dabo has introduced few people. Thank you for giving me the platform for showing my work. Malavika Kaur, My name is Malavika already. Davo has introduced few people. Earlier also but it was a very short and I managed to present in a very short way but now it's quite lengthy so if any explanation you feel requires please ask me again and again so that I mean I want you people to satisfy with my answers so basically I am a textile designer and my back I am with that I'm an artist but I'm a tapestry artist so just first slide what I have showed is my previous work just to give you a background about what I was doing earlier till 2003.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

So different mediums like weaving printing but only traditional weaving and printing I was doing we were not at all into computer design so I was not at all having any grip on coral Photoshop or any kind of design development on a computer so the thing happened that while working in the academic colleges and in different textile industry I slowly developed this skill and in 2007-8 when I was planning for family but because of certain things couldn't manage to

Achieve the goal so it happened like they told me that you have a stress problem so what I did I left my job and I was at home so that particular time it happened that I was not getting how to kill my time how to I mean how to solve though I was do started again doing this small work but it was not happening that way how I used to work till 2003. Because 2003 till 2008 it was a time when I was very much busy with me my office work so I was not getting much time to do so now the thing happened like the I'll just proceed further so that I can explain okay see these are from the exhibition of tapestry now the thing happened that when I started weaving I was not getting you know how to how to finish the work so suddenly I just started working on the computer and that worked out much better and that's how my development of the digital part started so I just wanted to give little background so that because I am not a very professional way of doing it I enjoy and I do it I don't follow a particular system for getting my result I'm just I want my results so by who can prove what I want I'm doing it so there is no if anybody wants to provide information please share my feedback please send my emails ok bye bye will ask me how you reach to this particular effect, maybe I'm not able to explain in a very clear way.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

So basically, my work involves photography, then a little bit of drawing what I do. So I scan, I use that, and different textures of weaving, or sometime I'm doing the work, and again, I'm scanning and reusing it. So whether it is a tapestry, or my current work, everywhere, five elements of our life is there that is either water, fire, wind.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

And so the time when it is started going, there is an addition of different experience of my life, but the elements are already always there. So I'm just sharing some photographs, like I keep on clicking, which I have in my galleries, like this. So this is related with different skies. Earlier one was related with the water. So these are like, in and around, we have water tank, huge water tank. So I have taken a lot of photographs of that.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

Then Mumbai is nearby sea area. So quite a big time I have visited. So wherever I go, I keep on clicking photographs. So now here the thing what I was talking about in 2008, when I sat for 2007, I should say. So earlier, what tapestry you saw, it was a six, seven feet high. From there, this work is just, you know, not even five inch. So I reached to this size, I mean, still, it was like non manageable. But along with that, I started a little bit of adding of prints. So those prints were more of design elements.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

And this is a little bit of a! I mean, I can see the sea. I can see the waves. But when I reached Bombay, it was full of only skyscraper buildings. So I mean, if you see this image, the top two lines are of my previous place and the bottom two lines are of my current place where I am deciding. So it's like literally I have to go at least six, seven kilometers to see this. Whereas earlier it was just, I mean, I just have to turn and I can see everywhere greenery. So this and along with my all around the nature, which is not available, these made a lot of changes in my work.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

This is the, you can say the first digital collage I developed. During that time, tsunami has affected in our in an area not nearby us. But it's little far away. But this is like the edge of another side of India. So those along with maybe the stress I was going through it, I started working these kinds of images. The image itself is containing two three like Ladakh. It's a hilly place and the waves are from seaside. So I started building up layer by layer. So always like I mean, in human being also different layers by layers we are putting together in our experience. Similarly in my work also layer is what I mean, I understand the Photoshop or work itself is a layer, but I have used it as a requirement of my work.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

I hope I'm audible and it is visible. Okay, so next was like I was finding that time lot of these kind of waste material that was popping up. So all these things were in and around me. I started using that, but that time it was just a starting. This is maybe second or third. I have just selected few. So I'm just showing and one more thing what I was finding interesting.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

Yeah, I can do. Okay. So I was finding that I was having two color and black and white, which when I was doing painting, I was not having all these options. Even tapestry, I cannot get those option of having two different section of time together. So slowly when I was getting used to with the computer concept, I really started enjoying it. And this went for my first exhibition in 2008, where I tried to show like I traveled from a small city, a small town to a city. So for my fulfilling my goals. So the title itself is unlimited progress.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

For my progress, I am moving from one city to another city thinking that this will be my place where I can settle wherever I want. And I'll be satisfied. But when I reached to Bombay, I found everything is like, you know, more is there more is there. And I don't know where to go. So that was the thing I tried to show through this collage, digital collage.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

The benefit of again digital or I say expressionism is that I can play around with that. So I can see the forms. So the same staircase I have used, but the drawing I made in one time, but I started using prolonging in a different way. I started merging with these. I cannot think of doing with my hands. So this is the thing which again started attracting me towards this digital part.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

This is like I'm aware of everything still. I'm aware of everything. I'm covering my face and don't want to don't want to see what is going to come. Now I'm going to the next stage where I started developing my different layered landscapes. And this now my work is not only limited to the digital. I'm using the digital in my mixed medium work. So now I will show certain works where I have used this landscape in a digital path. I also along with the mixed media part.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

I take that as a part of my digital area. So images, as I said, I click photograph also. And I take some time from the net also, but I'm not using exactly how it is. So the thing is, I thought of it. I'm a textile designer. So I thought of making a small storyboard, which will relate to you like how I am using. I have tried my best to put all the images which I've used. But I don't know if it's okay or not. So these are certain images of my buildings which I have clicked in and around my city.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

Now this is a mixed media work. Background is full digital collage, which I have removed the print. But the front staircase what I'm using is actually a fabric cut and pasted on that. And these you can make or maybe these are like on stitchings. So I am mixing the digital and my textile part. This is my digital.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

And I'm also using I will also make the text in the cut. And I'm also using the text in the cut. And I'm also using the text in the cut. And I'm also using the text in the cut. And I'm also using the text in the cut. And I'm also using the text in the cut. And I'm also using the text in the cut. And I'm also using the text in the cut. And I'm also using the text in the cut. And I'm also using the text in the cut. And I'm also using the text in the cut. And I'm also using the text in the cut. And I'm also using the text in the cut. And I'm also using the text in the cut. Feeling I have developed these again and I'm just showing for the medium here the there is nothing there of digital collage but the concept is flowing again that same stator I have used in the digital collage this is totally done on computer I remember that there was a time for me the mountain was the highest thing but when I reached here I used to feel like you know this skyscraper buildings are like a staircase I have to climb like that kind of feel I used to get and that feeling is like you know reaching to the sky so maybe you'll find some of the images it is cut I mean the building is not ending you will not see the top the same water tank I used to get the feel of like a globe so I have used that form like reaching you know and like dashing to the globe dashing to the earth and against the distance like because it is like sea then mountains and then the ice mountain so I'm traveling again these images I have developed but I have not used in my work and this is I have not displayed anywhere but this is the process I have learned from the Techspressionist artist how process is important and because of today's presentation believe me I have gone back to again what I was doing and I tried to reconnect the work that was going on in the business with the data that was been given to me and so this is the video that was being played that this is the video that was being played that this is the video that was being played that this is the video that was being played that this is the video that was being played that this is the video that was being played that this is the video that was being played that this is the video that was being played that this is the video that was being played that this is the video that was being played that this is the video that was being played that this is the video that was being played that this is the video that was being played that this is the video that was being played that this is the video that was being played that this is the video that was being played that this is the video that was being played that this is the video that was being played that this is the video fighting about the religion but the important is our nature which we are not taking care which we are not thinking of so in the these lines whatever designing elements you see actually it is a religion symbols I have converted into a design form you can see the cross is also like a sort of I mean everything is like ohm or what I should say a muslim logo also everything I have created into a design form so that it should not be very eye-sticking again a similar concept related to that only that I have created the coconut like a like an earth so I'm cutting that and everything is bursting out I'm encroaching everywhere but not thinking about I need us the earth also need the water also need a space where it will go so it will bounce us back again going back to the mixed medium work reason of showing is if you see I have used a print which is if I don't know whether you can recollect in the starting when I was showing black and white and I said that I like the best part is the same image I can get black and white and colored so those images I have printed and used here again it is a mixed medium work concept is always involving skyscrapers and the land yeah this is again digital collage on that I have used these small small colors these are seven colors actually that I have removed all the colors of the nature and I have kept inside my house so if you see it's almost like a small small rectangular house concepts and I have woven this the reason is I tried to show that I am weaving the nature as per my requirement

So I'm weaving the nature as per my requirement

So this is and this how I try to work on the digital then I remove prints on canvas or paper and later on again I am combining together so this is one part of the work this is second part of that same work and this I got it converted it is on the acrylic sheet I printed and there is a felt there is stitching so I mean here I again mixing the digital so I cannot say that my work is only collages digital even in the mix. Work a lot of digital involvement is there again I will not get this opportunity when if I do only canvas to use that same space in a different way again so if you see the behind one the same image of the bottom I have used again showing that we are we in india there are a lot of political parties are there so everybody is concerned about them but for reaching the goal you need a unity so we have a festival called gai handi where we meet the pyramid to reach the goal to break the pot so I have been used that form to create this collage again this I want to show because this is my one of the finished work in mixed media this is again another work of mixed media which I am using in my digital collage now the reason of showing the mixed media is like I am dependent on not only on the photograph on my wall is that this is the hard work of this world that we are doing is that we are using work also for creating the digital collage this is like again similar concept only like I am bombarding on my earth for different getting my satisfactions to be fulfilled and I use different coins like indian and dollar different sense and all and the background if you see is all different spiral way different way my desires spiral letters are going ahead which is again unlimited on the digital collage after printing I have used stitches and gateway tracing paper to create this effect on the digital collage I have used acrylic engraving and stitches and cords for getting the final work digital collage again printed on canvas woven and stitched this is again one of the most important digital collage series from inspiration and realization in the sense we get inspired from the nature but we go more beyond that to realize to fulfill our desire now this has helped me to develop the next this is my mixed medium work without doing this previous work I couldn't thought of achieving this next work where I have printed this and I have cut in slot half the way and I have created a 3d effect this section this is the front section if I see the painting from the front without moving left and right I will see I am not able to see this red area so that was the my I mean there are a lot of hidden things are there which is happening but we will come to know about those dangers effect or the returns later on same inspiration realization digital collage this I again want to express that this is again I'm very interested in this work because I want to create a small storyboard the faces which you see is a leather batik and just now you have seen already one of the work this is again another mixed medium work now all this helps me to create my next developments this was one of the theme for one exhibition called shakti shakti means power so we have one goddess is called durga who

Is having I mean a lot of gods are we are having

Third eyes so the third eye meaning is that person or that character is having a lot of powers not a brain a lot of it is very she is very intelligent he is very intelligent so to show that they show the third eye so that character I have used but I have used these images to develop this work so this is one this is the second one and this is the third one so what I want to say that I am dependent on my mixed medium work also this project I did when I got my polo kistner I've given them that a project we always need to put up a project so my project was related with work with a tribal artist now there is a place where they create this art called barley they created on they create basically for their on the walls for decoration or for passing message that there is some functions at their home maybe marriage ceremony maybe daily shower so for that they use but now slowly the concepts gone little more ahead their main characteristic is in one surface they try to show multiple things.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

In one layer only they will show there is a house, outside the house they are playing, there is a field where people are walking or they are walking and there you will find the ladies who are going for maybe getting the water. So in one surface, in one artwork they show all these characters. Now when I met this lady, her name is Kusum Samu.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

I asked her, have you experienced about metropolitan city? She was because she was an artist and sometimes she used to come for selling her artwork in the fair. So I told her that I want you to make art related to the city life what you have experienced. So she developed some art only for me for related to the city life. What I did after that, after getting all the images, I start understanding the style of doing it. Understanding that how from, I mean how they are affected with the new religion because they were actually Hindu, but they are converted to now Catholic because over there they are getting lot of facilities from the Christian community. So if you see they made this last supper. So I mean these things after studying, I started to understand that, I developed small, small works.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

Now this is a small work. I'll show in the next image where I use her artwork. But what I have done that this is, this is the actual look of the artwork which you saw. But I have created two layers. The bottom layer, this brown side on the right is the bottom layer what she had made. I have taken again digital help me. For this. So I have created the top layer which is on the gateway tracing paper. So when you fold this, when this come on the left of, come on top of the right side, you see the figures very properly merges with the bottom layer. And it is like the, they created a simple theme like removing water from the well.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

But in city, it is like a really, really sometimes when we don't have water, it is like so much tension, so much problems we have. And in the skyscraper building, you just imagine if you're staying in a 20th floor. So how you get the water? So I have tried to merge that concept with this. So I mean, here the inside the well, I have tried to show the skyscraper concept.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

And it is, this is a road which is, I'm trying to show that it is reaching so far. And the water is very far away. Similar again, I did the two layer. If you see the figures are in one box. So it is like a flat system. Over there, kids are playing outside in the open field. But in our, we are in a one flat. So the game is like, if you see the brown area, they are playing, this game is called Lagori, where the dice they keep one top of each other. And then they are hitting that. And everybody is playing and making again the dice one another layer. And that's the game. But here it is like from one window, they are throwing to the other window. They are occupied with the computer. So I have layered again. We are all, we are encroached inside the four walls.

Malavika.

Yeah.

Roz is asking if you could go slightly slower with your speaking, if you can, is that okay?

Yeah, very much. I thank you for telling me. Oh, no, that's fine.

All right. Sorry to interrupt. Go on.

Even you want me to move the screens also slowly? Or only I should talk slowly? Screen is fine, right? Yeah. Moving up the images. Okay. Yeah. So here I have, this is a banyan tree, which we pray for this tree. Now in the villages, we find quite a bit, but in the city, literally we have to search for this. And so I have tried to show that behind also buildings and the front also, these are actually threads. So in between that, like a cage, the tree is there. And here I have used a radium. So when at night, if I switch off the light, only the tree is visible.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

This is like, again, Jay generally dance outside the house in open field. But here, if I see all the buildings, so we are occupied with our dish TVs and all, and it, I just, this is a 3d. I have made a spiral, which is going out of the frame. A dancing form going out of the plate, but this is from the building. So it is like, I'm trying to show that everywhere inside the building, the functions are happening,

But

In the villages, they have so much space that they can play. They can dance. They can celebrate. They have a feelings. They can meet.

So,

I have used this. The last supper, which figure I showed, I have used here, like, we are, we are dividing the whole nature for our convenience. Again, depending on one tree, the whole birds, I'm trying to show there's no shelter for them. All the features, all the boards, all animals are depending on one tree. And behind, I have used all the buildings, which is in a very shaded effect. So again, my digital helped me a lot in developing all these aspects.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

Now I'm going to the next, just one second. Sorry. So, I'm going to show you something. Okay. This is actually, by mistake, it had come early. I'll show later. Now in, I am into teaching. So I started in 2015, I started doing some workshop. I organized in a bank, on a teacher's day, art, art teaching day. So I told everyone whoever was coming to do something. So what I did, I created some color space for doing their signatures or drawings. And I layered with a different layer of tracing paper so that if anybody is not coming, they can do it behind underneath the tracing papers. And this later on what I did, I developed it in a design form. First, I did some kind of drawings and connected them. And then I developed for them each individual person whoever did for them. I developed this art and designs.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

Now, the reason of showing this, because from this, my next step started connecting. So I got connection in the bank with so many people connected to them through my artwork and developed this and got connected back to them. I sent individually everyone these artworks that see you can do it. You can draw it. I see your signature itself is looking nice. So if you see down on the bottom, the individually what they have written that only I have used in the design.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

It is just to make them feel that they can also draw. And there is no bar, no age bar or even the winner not the girl started at the age of 68. So I'm from I studied at that place. I always try to push that thing everywhere. You can do it. Art is no language. So now when I did this, I was having time shortage problem. Now the problems I will be telling you because that is the thing which helped me in developing my next concept.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

Problems, time squeezing, then planning not happening on time. These things made me do my next steps. The thing was, I was moving with my kids to all different places for the classes. So I started carrying a small notebook in which I was drawing this again gift. I said gift always helpful. I just saw one on zoom meeting also related to how gifts are important. Offerings are important. So this gift also I got it from someone. It's a very small notebook. So each page is connected like how our day to day. Activity is connected in my this book. Also each page is connected.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

And if I fold and I turn the page and connect to the next one, you will find it is getting connected. I just run little bit because I know you all of you are getting short of time. I think I'm.

Okay. Okay.

Thank you. Next storyboard is related with one of my page and this whole photographs I have taken in a church where I got married and where my son got first communion also. Now everybody is concerned about the making the church building work. Very nice but floor is in this condition which is talking lot about historically how old I am how important I am on that story so I used that and I played only with the form and the space for the next one now when I started doing on the coral I found that when I was doing this drawing I scanned it I found lot of lot of gridded effect on my drawing the pencil grading effect which I enjoyed whereas when I am developing on coral it is making it smooth so I thought of keeping the same drawing and developing these work this is again mixed media work and these are all again digital so

So

As I said the layers always making me flow I am once I have some plans that's always get subdued with my other responsibility so

So

This glitch effect I liked it because that making me the up one means the priorities and my plans how to it get diffused that is the thing I have tried to show this is again a drawing I did for sending a gift and then later on I have used for the collage and this I just run it because I think quite a bit of you have seen on my insta because this is the development happen after meeting all of you expressionism especially developed for I mean keeping that in mind no I have to because if you see before that I was not playing much with the forms so in this you will find I am playing now with the forms I am trying to create on the my art right now and you can see that I just put in the on the on the Photoshop actually the previous work whatever I showed is not there in my insta because we have a here is a problem that what we put it on social media can't display on the exhibitions and all so I put very less images on the Instagram passing through the time all this colored work is developed during lockdown generally in my work so very less colors are visible but when I got logged maybe I remembered more the colors those were digital collage but here I it is totally digital art I will say because I have not used any ready photograph what was there I was playing with that and this more on listening music so!

Malavika Mandal Andrew

I like hauser music so I listen I was listening that and I developed this now coming to certain photographs during my lockdown I've taken inside on my mobile phone and I have used that in developing a few of the last few images I call this as a break the chain this I'm calling as hope because in my house it was like it really is a mess continuously I was not getting when day is getting over when night is happening so I'm hoping that this you know step by step these days will pass away I used to watch from my window the greenery outside so missing you're welcome everything was squares and rectangles expressionism itself was under I still I can see you people in squares so a phone square tv square everything was square bed square so all square squares I have mentioned this someone close something far oh I forgot about this one I got good time with my family definitely I don't think we could have thought of spending one month together inside the flat I tried to play with the this everything what I have done I have clicked on the mobile and same screenshots again I have taken so I got this grids which I was enjoying this I have given pixelating relations because slowly slowly after some time it became like now what to do everything was too much And this is like the hope that sometime it will be back.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

Day, night, night, day. Really, I was not getting when the day used to get over when night and sometime I was sleeping sleeping at 6 o'clock morning, getting up at 2 p.m. Change the perspective. And the last one is eyes. After watching everything, I feel now our eye shape is now square. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you very much.

Yay!

That was quite the journey.

Yeah, very long, I think.

All right. Well, I was definitely impressed. I'm sure most of everyone else was also impressed with what they saw and what they've heard from your presentation so far. So again, thank you very much for your presentation and for your art and for being a part of the movement. I think there was a round of applause already, but let's do another one for good measure.

Yay! Bravo! Fabulous. Thank you. Bravo.

All right. Now, with your presentation, it was a bit longer than what we normally have been doing. And I want to make sure that Lee gets enough time so we're not going to spend too, too much time on the Q&A session. If that's okay with everyone. I know we did have three questions early on. So we'll get those in the chat. The first one came from Cynthia. So we'll go ahead and get those out of the way. And hopefully we'll have a little bit more time to come back to it after Lee's presentation. So just keeping that in mind. But Cynthia asked, let me get back to it. Should have copied and pasted this.

Davonte Bradley

Ta-da! Where'd it go? Okay. She wants to know what kind of loom did you use? What did you use to weave your work?

I use vertical loom, which because at Bombay, we have a space problem. So I have a vertical bars, you know, two bars with a bottom one stand is there. When I need, I just put it to get, I mean, just stretch it. And I have bamboos, which I put it.

Okay. And then we have question from Vernada a little bit later. Okay. She wants to know if you could say a little bit more about the piece that had the woven piece that was like blue and gold. And if you could speak a little bit more about your inspiration and, you know, thoughts on that particular piece.

Okay.

That's earlier on in the presentation.

Yes. That particular golden with the blue one is a form I have developed, inspired from the water, sea. And the form is little bit fresh and a boat, a form I have created from that. And I have created the warp lines on top of a transparency. It's a thick transparency. We get it for printing. Even we use it for our computer print also. But I have taken a bigger size. I mean, at least it is maybe two feet by three feet, four feet height. And on that I have done.

Malavika Mandal Andrew

The printed area is a paper print. Archival print. Is it okay? I mean, my answer is satisfying.

Yes. It looked like it was, you know, a loom piece because they are like woven type elements to the construction itself. Yes. No, but I have done directly on the, on a, on a transparent sheet, not on the loom. That is not on the loom. Well, maybe that explains how the gold captures the light. Yes. I'm very interested in how that reflection components. So that would explain that aspect of it.

Yeah. Even the framing is done in such a way that when they display, even the background wall color will be visible. That's the reason of using the transparency.

Yes. Yes. It's wonderful. Beautiful. Thank you.

Thank you. All right. Thank you. And then we have a question from Roz. She actually has two questions, but I am not sure if she would rather like express those questions herself.

But she wants. I'll jump in. Thanks, Davo. That was a beautiful presentation, Malavika. I know we see this months ago, but wow, seeing the larger story is wonderful. It's like you're developing a language, you know, and that's really interesting. My question, my first one was I'm curious how many layers you work with in your digital work.

Difficult for me to say. It's quite a bit. My file size goes to sometime one GB.

So you can understand. Me too. I kept hearing you say everything's too much and it does get to be too much, but I think we are evolving into some kind of new image made of images. To my second question was, you know, all of us are and the square thing was great. We're all in squares, of course, pixels.

Roz Dimon

But I also wanted to ask that. Do you see the photograph as I know I'm certainly starting to feel this way that the photograph is just one element. I load on the brush. It's like the characters of a word or something, you know, you just take all these millions of photos. I don't know. If you have this concept, but I wonder, do you have this concept at all or the photos for you and artwork in themselves, which they can be of course, but can

You ask again? I'm not getting what you are. Speak.

Yeah, I'm not good at asking questions. I go into bed.

I am not good. And I got so I told him the starting if you're not satisfied with my answer, please ask me again and again.

Well, do you see a photograph as an element that goes? Into a larger painting or artwork? We can go. Why don't we take it later? Because you know, I know we are better.

Yeah. Okay. I think that will be better that if we do the question answers later on, what do you say? They will or offline.

It's okay. But thank you. Yeah.

I mean, we all kind of know where we all hang out. So even if we can't answer it here, we can also, you know, have a, I'm doing, I think that is better.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Thank you. It was great. I'll be happy to answer all of them. Thank you. Yeah.

That being said, if you are tuning in to see this, you know, after the recording or after our scheduled time here and you're watching this from YouTube. Yeah, we're just about everyone here is free to, you know, reach out to on social media or in our Facebook group or not. Just leave a comment on YouTube. That's all that works. You can get a hold of anybody. That you see.

They were your, your text. Passion is so good that it is right now. Well, 30 night and every time I attend till end. So you can understand.

Thank you for that. I really appreciate it. Okay. Now, thank you again, Malavika for your presentation and give you one last round of applause before.

Thank you.

All right. Now it's time for Lee. Are you ready presently? You're muted by the way. There we go.

I'm Lee. Nice to meet you all. And I just heard about the Facebook group. So I'm really excited to join after we get off of this and, and look at everybody's work. So, I don't know if I fit in here. I hope I do, but I don't know. And one of the reasons is because I, I really straddle some kind of strange.

Lee Schnaiberg

Conflict between analog world and digital. And that's been going on for. Since around 1993. When I used to be a VJ and I was an analog VJ. And I don't know if you've heard of that. But it was really interesting to me when I was like two years old. When I was surrounded by a whole lot of emerging new digital technologies and a lot of digital VJs.

Lee Schnaiberg

And I ended up feeding in a band that was a 13 piece band, which the new music express said was the last great band of the 20th century. So it's kind of old school and, and the band was like huge. It was like two drummers, three bit three, two bass players, three guitarists. It was a big kickoff and this mess. And I'd VJ to that analog. So if we're doing something that was 150 beats or well, maybe 100 beats, I'd make probably about 50 cuts at that time with my mixing board and sort of sliding just in a subtle zone. So I've always played with the analog. And then on top of that, I also have been doing canvases that I paint and graphite and ink work, which is like started with a pencil and ink and has moved on to pretty much to some digital work, some video. I've mixed around a whole lot.

Lee Schnaiberg

I'm actually looking right now for my folder that I set up for today. OK, I found it. And I don't know, am I still sharing this? I hope I actually.

Yeah, we can see the folder. Hopefully when you pull up the image, it'll.

Yeah, that's now it's

A widescreen. But this is my journey. OK, so this is this one is a mixture of my pencil. And.

And hold on one second. Lee, if you if you shared that specific window, it's only going to be capturing that window. So you should probably share like your entire desktop screen instead so that when you open a new window that it also shows that new window as it pops up, because otherwise it's just going to keep showing the folder that you open first.

OK, so let's look at how we do. Oh, desktop. OK, so.

Yep.

Desktop.

Yep.

And then I go back and I open the folder. That might work. And I apologize for being a bit of a techno.

Oh, no, no, it's this is actually kind of a fairly regular thing that happens. So it's all good.

So I actually planned on. OK, I planned on showing a second folder. This is jumping very far ahead. OK, so the pen and ink. OK, these are the pen and inks that go into that blowout. OK, so now we're back into this is a triptych six foot triptych. But that's not really why I came here today. This is just showing where you sort of come from. And I still do those. Now these this is sort of introduction to what I've been doing for the past two years, two and a half years now.

Lee Schnaiberg

I found. I stumbled upon this neat effect I was getting with panoramas in a. In my sister gave me an iPhone 8 and so I was tweaking it and playing around with it and I found this kind of effect that I could get so this is no Photoshop no after effects nothing this is just straight out of my camera and then we had lockdown so during lockdown I'm fortunate that I live three blocks away from this park that's about 600 acres so it's like just in the center of montreal it's called mount royal there's a mountain it overlooks the city and there's happens to be right a block maybe three three blocks from my house is this is a statue of an angel which I've revisited thousands of times now at different places and I've been to a lot of different places and I've been to a lot of usually at sunrise at dawn golden hour sort of skirting between those so this is a golden hour version of the angel here's another one same day and this is a different day same angel again so I seem to revisit the same imagery regularly I have about I mean made 10 different themes that I've been working on with this with this panorama effect and then about a year and a half into it I found the term intentional camera movement and I thought wow there's other people doing this but of course the icm people are usually people who have like you know thousand dollar cameras and they're like I set this on the b and I'm using this kind of lens and I'm like okay I'm just grabbing my iPhone this isn't the same group and then I found the rogue pano group and so and on facebook facebook and I'm like there's a rogue pano group which actually if you go to rogue pano on facebook you'll see that on the what do they call it the they have a you know a sort of image at the top of the screen and I'm that right now but and then some of those people and some of the rogue pano people in on Instagram were like hey you got to join our flickr so I've been meeting a lot of the older rogue pano people and by older they go all the way back to the old iPhone 4 and there's a filmmaker john lean and there's a couple of photographers everybody's got their own style and I definitely have carved my own little niche in there this one is a new phase I've been going through of street art which is sort of corny but I find the lines that they have on the street and the rogue pano effect like I can get some really neat effects and in montreal leonard cone is sort of the patron saint of the city and there was a construction site the other day where leonard cone was overlooking it I decided so there's only one leonard cone up overlooking the city actually there's two there's one downtown and there's one in my neighborhood but I've literally been in a six block radius so this is in my neighborhood there's one leonard cone but he's pretty looming and this is just straight formalist experimentation with grids that I saw at this same construction site where leonard was I noticed these grids and I don't know if you noticed these this area here had one sort of mesh and I was like okay well let's see what happens with that mesh and with the steel grid so that was kind of exciting I just kind of gathered a whole bunch of these images to show the range of the exploration that I've been going on this is a such a fixation now I'm I wake up I wake up about three in the morning so I can get out the door at four so I could get a magic hour and dawn and the colors every day there's different colors and as you can see here the effect can really sort of abstract the city but you still see the photo aspect like this building right here is a very emblematic kind of building in montreal it's the mcgill medical office and so like when montrealers see these they say they're very much montreal whereas a lot of other people say no it could be any city it's sort of a an expressionist or impressionist depending on which way the camera works but again I don't know if I if I if I fit into expressionism world or not I mean because it seems like you guys all have fantastic printers and are a lot more adept with the technology I wish I was I feel like I sort of battle with it this one I really like is it looks like a plasma explosion I actually sold this and the other thing that's really interesting about these is because they're panoramic they're 50 inches tall why the height is so high and I don't know if you can see it but it's really 50 inches and the length is as long as you can keep it going so I have a lot of these that are 18 feet by four feet and yeah this one I sold the guy told me he wants it straight resolution and exactly the way it is and I was like do you have an 18 foot wall and he realized no so he asked if I can shrink one down and make him a three foot piece and so it's three feet by 18 inch but I print them up on aluminum so that they will they'll last and also because a lot of them that when people buy them I haven't made a ton of sales but when people do buy them sometimes they're over six feet and I figure look I can do it on archival paper for you but you're gonna have to get a nice frame and you're gonna have to get a lot of stuff that if you get it on aluminum I'll sign it right on the back of the aluminum and you can hang it we can make a floating box it'll float off your wall and you don't have to get a frame you're not going to be spending I mean I don't charge enough to the frame would cost it would blow my mind how much the frame would cost this one I find very interesting because not only did I get the city and the colors but this one cloud right in the middle kind of looks like a the eye of sauron from the those ring movies so effect it's only ever happened once this is this is actually my backyard those are some stairs that go up to my landlords and a fence in the snow so but it really creates some kind of they can get a lot of mileage out of this and I've been I mean I love going up at sunrise but I have been I always walk around and I and if I see a grid or a fence or something maybe Right now, summertime, I've been going on a bender with flowers.

Lee Schnaiberg

I hope I have some of them because I did gather. A hundred or so images that I thought were nice, but I certainly, I have a couple that are from today, but I certainly hope I got some flowers in here because the flowers, this one's quite interesting. These are a swamp right in the middle of the mountain where I climb every day. There's this swamp, and I guess because of so much talk over the past couple years about swamps, draining swamp or whatever, I'm like, I like my swamp. I don't really need it drained, but sometimes I get these amazing effects with the water in the swamp.

Lee Schnaiberg

I'm looking for another piece that, I'm looking for some pieces that aren't just the mountain. I mean, I love this mountain. I love the effects, but this one's really interesting because I don't know if you noticed how many of these cross-country skier ended up in the frame. There's one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten. Like, I was just shooting this fence because I thought, okay, I like when you get a grid and you can put it into this panoramic effect, but then I heard this cross-country skier coming by, and I just thought, okay, well, he's not going to know. You know, most people, when they walk by me, they don't know what I'm doing. I don't know what I'm doing. I don't know what I'm doing. They see me with the camera, but they see me, like, going like this, so they figure, like, that's too weird, and they just keep on going.

Lee Schnaiberg

Occasionally, people run up to me, and they're like, did you put me in the camera? You shouldn't put me in the camera. I've often, like, shown them the photo. I'm like, you don't even see your face, and there's, like, eight of you, and, like, you know, so far, I've always gotten, you know, I can sort of bring some peace to it, but, you know, people don't want to be photographed, and I understand that. I appreciate that.

Lee Schnaiberg

Sometimes, I get this sense with these that they're impressionistic when I get the right angle, but this kind right here, I feel is, like, reminds me of, like, an Anselm Kiefer painting from the 80s, like, you're really a neo-expressionist, kind of, these jagged lines, and then, you know, I can't help it sometimes when I see a grid or a pattern. I'm like, well, what can we do with this? And this one, I called Unknown Pleasure, Pleathers, like fake leather, but, you know, a take on the album cover that everybody has turned into a t-shirt, Joy Division. This one was pretty popular with people recently, I guess, because I have so many times stuff that's got trees and sunrise, and then I had a green, and people were like, oh, I love this green. It's great. I had this already, sorry.

Lee Schnaiberg

Why am I repeating? I shouldn't be repeating this, like, over and over again. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't remember what kind of trees there were out there in 1905 or 1900 here. So I, some more. This is, like, my latest edition has been the street lines. I try to see what I can do with them if I can. And here you'll notice there's another, like, I have a couple of moves that I've developed, and one is sliding sideways so that the horizontal becomes a vertical, and that's where I start with the horizontal. So I start with the horizontal, and then I start That's why you get these kind of curves. And so, yeah, I have a number of moves. I'm looking for, I thought I'd have a bunch of these up and down, up and down, which somebody in the Rogue Pano world told me is an infinity move because you make an eight with these.

Lee Schnaiberg

I just kind of actually with these, it sounds a little hokey. But when I walk out in the morning and it's totally empty in the day, like part of me is like just go through the process and making images. And I don't know what to do with them. I have about 20,000 of these now. But the other is like for me, it's part of it is just the process. And in that, it's almost like a meditation. And so when I do these ones in particular, I have a little, it sounds a little hokey, but I have a little mantra that I sort of chant. While I'm doing these pieces. And somehow I feel like by doing it, it kind of makes them stronger. These are some of the, these infinity ones are some of the hardest ones to actually get going. And if you'll notice up here in the top, oh, I think I've already hit the next. Oh, here up in the top, you'll notice there's these big black parts.

Lee Schnaiberg

It's like the algorithm for the panorama in the camera sort of gives up. Or it just says, no, we're not going to fill that in. And I remember when I was first doing these, some people would say to me, oh, that looks great, but you should zoom in or crop the black part. And I thought, okay. But, you know, if somebody asked me, like, I want to buy a piece and I just want this without the black, I'd say fine, but I'm going to let them know. You know, even when somebody asks for one that's like a three foot by two foot or whatever size they want. I sign it as one. I'm going to sign one of one of the prints, like one edition. And I promise I'm never going to do another one of that size. But if I ever get a chance to show in a museum and I get a chance to put an 18 by 20 up there, I'm going to print it and make that as an agreement with them going forward.

Lee Schnaiberg

And so far, I haven't had anybody say no. And I think they realize that if it ever does, I mean, if it ever does get into a museum, then their piece is going to be. Worth a little bit more. So I guess they're like, okay, with the deal of me being able to print a larger edition. Here's another move I've kind of been working on and I developed where I can flip upside down. This is actually sunrise right at the beginning of sunrise.

Lee Schnaiberg

And in the movement, if you do it well enough and you get a flow, you can actually flip. So I flipped over 180 here, which is like I said before, it's kind of I do kind of wrestle with the technology and it's analog. Like it's my how am I moving? Can I get the movement to keep on going? Can I get the movement to include little piece areas?

Lee Schnaiberg

Another another aspect of this that some of the older rugpano people. Talk about is like here where. Oh, in the top. Oh, it's gone. Okay. I'll find another place where it's an example. But they call this move called brushing the teeth, which I think is the funniest name I've heard. But like here, there's one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine suns right over here. And that move you have this. It's kind of like it's kind of like this, but more with the phone. But you're doing it. You're kind of kind of getting that up, down, up, down, up, down. And if it catches, it keeps on building in the panorama.

I don't I don't want to give away all my secrets here, but there's

Me. That's a self portrait. That's another thing that I've got the streets, the angels, the mountain. And then I often do these kinds of self portraits where I could do a rugpano, but then catch myself in the. In the shadow. It was another self portrait. And I have these like, you know, depending on the day and depending on the lights.

Lee Schnaiberg

Usually it's in the same spots as a couple of spots that are primo for self portraits. But depending on, you know, what part of the golden hour, what part of the magic hour, yet different lighting and different. I mean, sometimes he's really remind me. I haven't seen any yet. This one's getting really close. But there's another thing that I've been doing pretty much for the past year and a half in four or five seasons now is this pool. It's an abandoned pool. It's in the mountain, but it's like right on the on the on the base of the mountain. And originally it was for the nursing school for a museum for a hospital. The hospital's closed for a while. The university was using the pool, but then people climb the fence in the middle of the night and somebody drowned in the pool.

Lee Schnaiberg

So it's been abandoned. It's covered in graffiti. And I sure hope I have some of them here because it's been a fixation with me. And I've got four seasons of this pool, which these are, by the way, from this morning. It was a beautiful color this morning. I threw them into the mix because I was like, well, these are really nice colors today.

Lee Schnaiberg

And I mean, my palate is dictated by if it's a cloudy day or if it's 30 percent clouds, which was today, which is a perfect amount for good color or 10 percent clouds. And then you get some color, but you don't get quite as much. And then this is again, I'm in a six block radius because of lockdown. So this is just up the corner of my street. Somebody has some interesting fencing and I'm always looking for something or like once the sun's up and the city is about to start, then my seclusion ends and the bikers come out. And when I when I can capture them, I'll do something. But that's not really a rogue pano. That's sort of that happens if you use a panorama on a moving. You try to get a car. This one I did sell. This one is a little bit different. This one is a six foot by three foot.

Lee Schnaiberg

And I always flattered that somebody wanted it. I'd love to show these in a gallery or, you know, I don't know. I can't even imagine a gallery could fit the right size for the walls because they're I mean, again, this is this is four feet, four feet tall. This is I mean, four, eight. This is over six feet, 16 feet easy.

Lee Schnaiberg

So and I mean, I love the way they look when they're full resolution and full size. So I have to find a way and maybe find some people with bigger houses or something. But. Well, I really appreciate you letting me show these to you. And I love feedback or advice or anything. This is what happens when it's very overcast. And there's gray sky and not too much. I'll start trying to figure out how can I break the plane of the treescapes.

Lee Schnaiberg

And I have a video. I do sometimes do these video slideshows where I'll dissolve between images. And I have Billie Holiday singing pennies from heaven on a whole series of these trees with just blue. No, no, just broken in trees. But yeah, I find that I, you know, depending on the day, depending on how much clouds there are, my palate is constantly changing. And I'm sure at some point I'll move on to something. But right now, I just I feel so inspired by this and this opportunity. And, you know, I got the iPhone and I, you know, I. I took a couple of photos and I was like, OK, I don't I'm a painter more than a photographer or filmmaker. I've never really been a photographer.

Lee Schnaiberg

And then and then I saw the panorama. And so I started saying, well, oh, can I do something with this? And I started pushing it around and it took a good like month and a half to really try to really, really see what I can get. This again is my backyard. This is my neighbor's fence and my fence with just snow. So I got these really nice triangles. And once this started happening, I just thought, wow, OK, here's a new thing that I could new way that I could express myself. I love this one. I don't know if you guys have the me and I haven't like everybody on this side or if you can see this, the photos here. Yeah.

Lee Schnaiberg

With the person up on the top of the stairs. I think that one's it's got this crazy drama, you know, and it's like this is like on the climb up the mountain. And I usually try to stay away from people. But I often when I'm right at this corner, I do. This is the only time I got somebody like right in the corner. But I'm always like, oh, I wonder if I can get somebody here. And, you know, it's and then this is again, that's the brushing of the teeth. And my playing with fences.

Lee Schnaiberg

I think I've gotten I haven't gotten too many of those angels. I have about 500 of those angels and the flowers. So much of the flowers, too. But I don't see them. I see more streets. I apologize. I didn't have a full range. I was sure I would. Well, we might still find some flowers. But. I think I'm going to go back to the.

Lee Schnaiberg

The lines, the lines and the grids and the street lines that being able to play with these things that are usually so rigid. Making them a little wild and chaotic. And I'm taking the this, you know, like the street lines to tell you how to walk. And they're like, you walk this way. You stay in these bars and you, you know, adhere to these rules. And. Here's a really nice sort of expressionistic piece. But I love the idea of like challenging these things.

Lee Schnaiberg

I. When I was VJ. I was also doing these documentaries about how to stop climate change. I did those for about 10 years. And. And I, you know, I used a lot of found footage. I always break rules. I don't mean to, but I just. It's sort of in my nature or something. But. And that's still a fixation of mine. I actually, when I'm not making any videos. I'm making art. I work with this group called the air miners.

Lee Schnaiberg

And at a new group that just asked me to be involved. The open air. Collective. And they're, they're all ways that do this CDR carbon dioxide removal. So it's kind of, I don't know how carbon dioxide removal fits in with this, but it's definitely breaking paradigms and, and, and, and, you know, I'm not. I'm not sure if it's a good thing. And I'd rather find a way that we can get out of this situation. We're in. And. I don't know if these photos. Have anything to do with it aside from like helping me. In the morning. I love this. I love when like these bars. Turn into a, they remind me of, of. That movie, the matrix where Neo.

Lee Schnaiberg

Turns all the Bob, the bullets. He freezes all the bullets just before they fall down. These. Are really helpful because these bars. Help you not fall over the edge of the mountain. But at the same time, I love when they break apart and become these. Floating little things. It's. It's to me. It's really neat to play with matter and, and take something that's so rigid and solid and then make it into. Fanciful.

Lee Schnaiberg

Work. Here's another version of that with that. Flying little pieces. And there's. Another one of mine. I hope I have here. I'm pretty sure I would have included it. Where. Where those bars just become. Like some of the most luscious little shit. Here. I don't know if you can see this. Whole section down here. To me, it's just, it's just like. Something so wild and like it's a. There's a little bit of a little bit of daylight catching onto these bars to make them light up.

Lee Schnaiberg

So there's a little bit of serendipity. In this work. And. And then these moves like to get the bar. To do this thing is that. What that guy calls the brushing the teeth move. They call this brushwork. And I mean, when I look at it, I do see, it looks sort of like an old. Really old oil painting. That's been cracking. Or something.

Lee Schnaiberg

But I don't know if it's really brushwork. It's more like. It's the hand and the wrist. And. It's like a little bit of a. And how you shake the camera. I've been working on these new moves. Recently. I was on the mountain today and I. Had these moves. Which I thought were like pulling taffy. And then pushing it together or like an accordion.

Lee Schnaiberg

Doing that with the two corners of the bottom corners of the phone. And that would create this sort of tension. That creates a. A new repeating of the imagery. This was a. A lovely day. On Mount Royal. The top of Mount Royal. It was very icy. And wet. And the dead, the, the, the lamps were still on, but the. The sun was probably already up. Just not in Montreal. And yeah, I just thought this is a beautiful. This is winter in Montreal.

And.

And it's. I mean, here's, this is a toothbrush. It's a little bit of a. But it's just like brushing again. Getting it to repeat and repeat and repeat. I did get some flowers. Okay. This is. This was. Just the other day, a few days ago. On the top of the mountain. They oddly enough. They planted a whole bunch of. Edible herbs. And. And kale. On the mountain and purple kale. So it's really beautiful, but. They. They. I just love when taking the colors from the tree, the plant life. And being able to. That's an old man on the phone. On a bike. No here. And being able to create these shapes. With the, with the plants. I mean, cause. Cause really if, if I just took a regular picture and showed it to you. Yeah. There's like one carnation. I think there's a little bit of that purple kale here. It's like one purple kale.

Lee Schnaiberg

Some sage. There, but it's, it's like just. Regular flowers. It's not. It's not creating some kind of a wave or. Or something, but. That's what I definitely enjoy doing. This was a guy that fortunately did not notice me. Another one. Yesterday. Strange occurrence with this guy. Totally disappeared. And then this is. Another thing they call. In the, in the road panel world. They call this blue bar. In all kinds of different ways. So I'm just going to say a different way. So I'm just going to say a different way.

Lee Schnaiberg

So I'm just going to say a different way. So I'm just going to say a different way. So I'm just going to say a different way. So I'm just going to say a different way. So I'm just going to say a different way. So I'm just going to say a different way. So I'm just going to say a different way. So I'm just going to say a different way. So I'm just going to say a different way. So I'm just going to say a different way. So I'm just going to say a different way. O'clock in the morning it's dark it's dark I barely have anything in the image but then I pump it up and they call that I mean I do that right on my phone I not no Photoshop but everything I'm doing is straight off the telephone off of the iPhone but the blurred up beyond all recognition has a neat little effect when you blur and you change the was it vibrant vibrancy and you know like there's like about five or six different options on the on the iPhone itself so that's where these kinds of images come from they're usually really too dark because it's way too dark that's you know you got to be 45 minutes or an hour before the sun's up and this is back on my way to the house and again half a block away from my house because if covid and we're all in you know we got locked down and so I don't go too far but I've always loved this guy's staircase the paint of it and I've shot it about a dozen times easy and this is again this morning it's a boobar right as I'm walking out the door on my way to go and shoot these photos I think you can see the pyramid building right there and it's super dark out but I'm just brightening it as much as I can and actually that I did before I even left that before I even climbed up so my house is right about there and this is staying within the six block radius that I've been given which I'm really grateful for and again another blurred street art this is the angel that's right usually I see the angel when I leave when I when I'm finished my trip or the beginning like depending on if I'm not in the middle of the road or I'm not in the middle of the road I'm where I start going one block up or one block down I'm gonna pass the angel either at the beginning or the end of the day so like this is blurred but it's already it's well past golden hour so it's kind of maybe cheating a little bit but I mean I've shot about 500 of those angels so I can't really and that's that was it so I thank you so much for watching these how do I how do I do this now stop share okay stop share stop share thank you so much for thank you so much thank

You no thank you that was a wonderful presentation and just wanted to say because as you were saying I was like yeah no you fit in you're fine like there are actually other artists in here do you actually do something similar to you not quite the same way but there are definitely other artists who are like yourself in this movement tommy actually was commenting quite a few times and he does work that's kind of similar to what you do but he also does a lot of photography work that's mostly digital and it's amazing but you fit in just you're not an outsider here you there you are among peers and friends with this thanks

Well and tommy I look forward to seeing your stuff definitely look forward to seeing and I mean I love collins and I haven't seen yours now and I really want to I heard

Nice things about your stuff so I do a lot I when it comes to my work I say that the single consistent thing about my work is that it is incredibly inconsistent given any time period so like it has similarities but yeah I'm pretty all over the place with my but yeah but anyway you do have some questions that I hopefully want to try and get to before we get to the end of our recording time first one was from sherry she wants to know do you only print on metal that's the first part of the question and then the second part comes from if yes well

So far I've so far I have only printed on metal I have a really nice printer here that I'm working on fixing I don't know we think that the heads are erect so I haven't printed any of the rogue panels on with this printer and I have a really nice printer right down the street from me which has pretty good paper and then the printer I work with who I do the aluminum they'll do they have archival paper and canvas too but I haven't had any opportunity yet but if somebody wanted one on paper I'm sure yeah

But I with the aluminum she wants to know do you use gloss or semi-gloss and then on clear metal or white

White I definitely use the white and I like semi-gloss rather than gloss just because when people have it in their house I don't want it to shine too much yeah

But I really like the white because I like signing them and I like it might be cheesy but I like signing it and not just signing my name and the date and the title but also especially when it's somebody that I know thanking them and having their name there so that if ever they're worth something then they want to sell it there's a story behind it and they might even they're included in it for whatever that's worth that's

Really neat but I'm right there with you because I also print on metal and yeah I've actually got some of those same feelings I hate the actual like regular gloss I always go for like mid or semi yeah

Semi mid mid glass semi glass is definitely the way to get tommy showing off his oh nice oh dude that's awesome yeah oh yeah there you go yeah and I mean I like I was jealous of colin's printer before I mean when I saw this printer I'm like oh wow that's like how I love to have a big printer ironically I live in this house that was this printmaker lived here and she died in the 90s her son got the house and didn't really want to deal with everything so I have this awesome deal my rent is super cheap but there's two rooms in my house that are printing equipment and I have like I have an old printer like with a big metal plates you know that kind of printer and I'd love to and then I have a really nice printer myself I'm not like not I've seen a couple of printers in the back here that I've been like wow a bunch of people have nice printers I love that but right now the pieces are so big size wise that I just feel like anybody I were to sell one to would have to spend a fortune on the printing and then I'm like I'm not only in printing but spend a fortune on the on the framing and I'm like well you know yeah you know we should give that money to the artist right

Right cut

It halfway you know sorry any other oh

We have a couple more there's two actually that are fairly similar and renata I'll get to you there were just questions in the chat that you know came first so I will definitely get to you next question comes from renata who is asking have you ever tried using using flash on like a super cloudy day early cloudy day with your work flash

Hmm I mean I occasionally I take like a few like I have gotten into like taking some still images just to sort of document like this is what it looks like when it's not you know tweaked with my with the cell phone and sometimes I leave the flash on so I'm like oh oh there's a flash good good morning, you know, and, but I haven't figured a way that I can use a flash with the panorama.

Lee Schnaiberg

And sometimes God, I wish because I got to say, like, the panoramas are so much darker than the regular images. It's amazing. Like, for some reason, maybe iPhone 10s, they figured that out. But yeah, I'd really be interested in playing around with that right now. Thanks for that idea. I'm going to try somehow.

That's, that's also Also, thing we're good at, making suggestions or giving ideas. It's like, I've never really thought about that. I think I'll do that or try that anyway.

Yeah.

Right. Michael has a question. Michael Pointer. He wants to know, this ties into a question that Cynthia had as well, I believe. How much post-editing are you doing? Are you doing any dodging or burning or sharpening? Which goes into Cynthia's question too. Are you editing just natively or using other software?

I crop. Sometimes I crop. Because sometimes there's an issue. I have an image that's like, you know, like five feet, four feet wide and 12 feet long, but only five feet of it is really awesome. So I'll crop it into a four by five. And occasionally, and I was thinking that this was cheating, so I wasn't really into doing this. And recently in the Rogue Pano grouping, I showed some and I actually had a little slide show and I was like, if this doesn't fit in, I'll remove it because there was a couple of places where I mirrored the image.

Lee Schnaiberg

And I use Photoshop when somebody buys a piece, when they order a piece so that I keep the DPI proper while I'm doing it. But it may be a stupid point of pride. I really use Microsoft Paint as my, when I do post with these pieces, I do Microsoft Paint. And so I'll do like maybe a mirror image or a quadruple mirror.

Lee Schnaiberg

And sometimes it bugs me when people are like, oh, I love that one. And I'm like, it's not really symmetry. That's just a real, like, I just pulled that out of my sleeve. Like that's such an easy trick, you know?

But if it works and impresses somebody, it works.

Like I

Know it can feel weird sometimes. Like I spent two minutes on this, why are you finding value in this? Stop it.

There's no cheating into expressionism either.

There isn't. No, there's no cheating. Everything that you're doing is valid.

You know, and that's what the guys in the Rogue panel said to me as well. They're like, no, if I see a black spot and I see what you're doing here, I know what you're doing, then double it or triple it or mirror it, go right ahead. It's not cheating because it's already what it is. So I'm okay with that. I still have this like weird, goofy sense of pride of like, yeah, I use Microsoft Paint. You know, it's like, you couldn't be lower. Like, I mean, if you say I use GIMP, it's basically using Photoshop. But if you use Microsoft Paint, it's like, you know, people are like, that's so elementary. That's, yeah. To me, it's like, yeah, it's that simple because the work is actually in the shooting of it, you know? But that's so far. I mean, and I haven't gone into layering, I mean, I'm looking at some of the Techspressionist stuff with the layers and I'm like, hmm,

I can look

At some layering. I can, I can. I did recently take, I had a shot like this gloaming hour, you know, it was like, it was a very dark day, but I managed to get these shots that were all like 18 footers. And I got like 11 of them. And they're all variations on the same, like the same, same color theme. Although there was a little bit more light creeping in each one. And I went back into Photoshop and I made this massive photo. I don't even know how many gigs it is, but I put them like in, in a, in like a whole row and there's like 11 of them straight down. And I was like, whoa, okay. So I would like to keep on exploring what to do, how I can push this. I don't know yet. It's still, I still feel like, like they don't fit. I mean, I mean, I like the fact that you're like, Hey, no, it's part of the thing.

Lee Schnaiberg

And yeah. And I'm glad you like Tommy there. Yeah. I'm probably, maybe I'm not the only person that feels like an outsider sometimes.

Tommy's pointing out his long, his long piece up there. Oh, beautiful.

Oh, nice. Oh, wow. What? There we go. Oh my gosh. That's awesome.

Just about every salon is like show and tell for Tommy. It feels like some.

Yeah. I think that's six foot. That looks like a six footer. Is it six feet? Tell me. It's Tommy. It's a little taller. Tommy's toddler too. Okay. Me, it would be like, I'd be like five. So it's not really. Not that impressive.

This is, this is the Mac. The real one is. I had a 24 inch wide. I had the Epson 7,600 for awhile. This is a test print. I made it. I'm not sure. This is like an eight inch wide. This is like two rolls wide. So it's 48 inches by I think 16 feet. So four, four feet by 16 feet.

But yeah, I have that roll somewhere upstairs. Nice.

Nice. What are you using? What are you have good cameras on bestie?

I'm shooting. Yeah. With that 50 megapixel now. But I mean with this one I was using an Olympus C 50 50 or something like that, which was a each. Each building is actually like 16 feet wide. Frames put together and you could see that like the bottom that you know so I was just walking along taking pictures you know like you do kind of but not toothbrushing so much right which I love by the way that effect that you get and so you can sort of see how there's different frames I've been stitching together and the whole point of this was I was searching for pictures of people in their buildings because I'm such a urban voyeur here but I love imagining what people are doing in their window so this is all found images on flickr or one of those early photo sharing websites Sorry to jump in, Lee, but welcome.

Tommy Mintz

Really. I mean, any kind of use, I think, of these mediums is adding to the sort of booyah base here we have.

There's nobody here that's going to be telling you, you can't do that. No, you're breaking the rules. You can't do that. Stop it. I think most of us have actually been to a point where we've encountered that ourselves. And we were like, that's. So yeah do you my

Previous work that I was doing the college the space in between it's all one line it's a this line that didn't end for almost 20 years and for a while I was doing a series of sculptures that came off of my climate change work which were dealing with investors and business people and I take my notes in a in a muleskin and I kept on telling the investors you know I'm an artist and you know that this is like out of my wheelhouse they're like yeah no but this is good we need that so I stay there but then when it gets dark all over again my colleagues there and when nobody was looking they thought I'd be taking notes and I'd just keep on with my line and I have like and then I moved back to Montreal and a lot of those jobs I just I burnt out and I couldn't deal with business people and then I found that I didn't have the rent money even though my place is like my place is the cheapest place in the entire neighborhood but I still needed money to pay my rent and I had moved back to a city where nobody knew me and so I got a job at a call center sitting in a cubicle and I thought man you know like before I moved back to Montreal I was ghost writing for Al Gore I was like doing all this kind of stuff and then I came back here and I like the only job I can have is in a cubicle asking if you had you know did the teller smile at you at the bank and I was like what the hell am I doing here and then they told me here's how like here's orientation here's how you behave in a cubicle and you can't have a cell phone you can't do this you can't eat food you can't read books and all this stuff which I didn't understand and they explained to me downtime and I never even heard that expression before and they were like most of the time that you're here you're waiting to talk to somebody and they're going to hang up on you and then you got to wait for somebody else but don't miss those calls it was like oh okay downtime and they're like oh but you can doodle and I was like okay because before I was doing these lines and I was like I need a thousand hours or like ten thousand hours with the pencil and paper who's got the time for that and then they gave me that opportunity and like I'm gonna pull some like here's some printer prints that I did before my printer died I don't know if you can see this yeah

But

Like this line line never ends and I either put black on one side or half a rainbow on one side and then the other side is black and has half a rainbow the other pieces are much larger but all this became possible because I had this opportunity of sitting in a cubicle so I stayed there for like three years drawing that I was like so happy every day I got better sketch paper and better pencils and like by the end of it I was like okay now I have like I have like a thick thick body of these and I now I'm gonna be able to blow these up print them properly paint them on canvas and like so I did that for a couple years I'm so excited and every time I'd meet a gallery owner they'd be like well one gallery owner you know in Quebec there's a guy named who just passed away and he used to do these jagged lines not quite like mine but in the in not too dissimilar and he was like this gallery owner was like oh you got to come here you got to come here and but then like I wouldn't show up at the right time or I'm uncouth and I don't know how to play the game and I don't kiss butt properly all the other gallery owners I know we're like oh that's just graphic work and then like you know I'm like oh I'm like you know what I don't really care and then the last thing before I found this camera I got a bunch of like they about 30 paintings got borrowed by a bunch of psychologists who put a 25 people in a room told them all that they just did some psilocybin and they watched them for four hours and but the study was really on placebos and then afterwards all these people in the interview are like oh it's fake well then why was I staring at those paintings for four hours and while why were they shifting and melting I'm like there you go thank you very much so I don't care about the galleries I get I'm you know but at the same time I did a show for Maps the multidisciplinary Association for psychedelic studies they did a fundraiser I had a room full of these paintings and I saw people with like pupils and they were like all like staring at them and they were like these are portals how did you well like okay well that was so that's kind of I've achieved my goals with this and now on to the next thing and the irony is I got this iPhone the week that I had to go to Toronto for a year I made some comments I'm a bit of a smart ass sometimes and I made some comments in social media about the guy who used to be president there in the States and also I worked on an app that somebody was making here called America's second no offense to anybody it was just for like other countries to be able to buy local products and I did this I developed it was fun it was a project then I started getting violent emails and like vitriol and murder and so much hatred and ironically just before that my sister and I you know we had a we had we had a number of years where we weren't really close and then we kind of became friends and she was like don't be a hermit like at least be on Facebook I was like fine okay so I started Facebook and then I'm getting all this hatred for this app that I was developing and then I and then I decided I can't deal with this so I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna one up you all and every day I started posting pictures that I'd find on Reddit from this subreddit called pictures of blurry cats or blurry pictures of cats I just post blurry cats I post blurry cats every day and I said I have to point then I found one that was like five ratio and I was like oh okay I have to print 1 000 post 1 300 or I forget what the number is now but I did that I print I posted that many blurry cats and the irony is there's this really fancy Gallery in Toronto like government sanctioned and like high high end A-list artists and I didn't know any of the artists there but I have a friend who came to the show with me who was a bit bit of a mucky muck and she was like do you know who's in the show that Gallery was like hey we want those blurry cats and I was like they're I don't even they're not mine I just found them on the internet they're like the doesn't matter it's art and I'm like it's not art like I do these paintings that take me like a month and a half to finish and the photos I just have and drop I'm like they're like doesn't matter so I made a bunch of blurry cat collages for them in Toronto and then I come back to Montreal and then all some people like oh you showed it the Johnny Bear John and I'm like you guys are all insane you know but with these photos all of a sudden I'm like I feel like I'm getting somewhere or I'm doing something I mean I don't know I don't know what's gonna happen I mean who knows with climate change who knows if we're gonna have food in another two years and also I got this is too much information but I got some weird disease a couple of years ago it doesn't really affect me too much sometimes it makes me unable to do things the weirdest thing is sometimes it makes my vision look like this so when it was happening to me I was like is it my son is he's I was like, well, this is really interesting.

Lee Schnaiberg

And then I mentioned it to an ophthalmologist and he was like, oh, no, OK, we're getting an MRI. And so I got MRIs. I had to get a deal. I know what's going on now. But what happened was, now I have some medication, which is insane. Thank heavens I live in Montreal because the pills cost $60 a pill. But they stopped me from eating my brain, stopped this thing happening. But what it basically made me realize is life is too short to give a shit. And I just, pardon my language, but I mean, like, really, if I show in a gallery, that's wonderful. If I get a nice show and like, really, right now, I think my pieces are too big size-wise. If I do it four feet by 18, is your gallery big enough? But like, you know, so I don't know what's going to happen. So I'm much more interested in the creative process.

Lee Schnaiberg

And if I can do stuff that... The odd person really likes. And, you know, now, lately, I mean, once every two months, I guess somebody... I mean, once a month, somebody says they want to buy one. But once every two months, somebody says, OK, here's money. I'm sending you money. I'm going to get one. And I'm like, wow, this is really interesting. And I'm really enjoying it. But again, it's like, if it happens, it happens. And if it doesn't, I'm not going to... Like, I want to make sure we have food. I want to make sure that we... I want to have a sea level rising. And that thing, like I was mentioning to Colin at the beginning, this rock dust is amazing. And it takes carbon out of the atmosphere faster than anything. It was finally peer-reviewed by Nature this past year.

Lee Schnaiberg

And then I found a whole bunch of people. I mean, a lot of them have, like, these, like, direct air capture, like big machines and high technology with chemicals. But then there's a whole lot of natural ways. Like growing kelp farms or doing things that can have, like, really quick drawdown of carbon dioxide. So, I mean, like, I love making art. And I love this. I love being able to share with artists. But at the same time, like, gallery owners. Like, I hope there's no gallery owners here. I don't mean to insult anybody.

Lee Schnaiberg

But I just... I don't have time to... Like, life's too short to, you know, care what they... You know, I mean, I wish it would be great if I was suave and not, you know, a bet. But, you know, I feel like, you know, I really like this group because I've always felt like an outsider of outsiders. Like, I've got too much of an art education to be a real outsider artist.

Lee Schnaiberg

And I have sometimes people look at my work and they're like, oh, well, obviously you went to art school. And I'm like, oh, yeah, I guess, you know. And so they don't fit in with the outsiders. And... When I was in this band that I mentioned at the beginning of this talk, it was a whole bunch of people dealing with angst, so much angst and trying to get it out in the music, which is wonderful and kind of cathartic. But I was a bit too happy-go-lucky. And I was, like, really interested in making cool images. And they were like, you just don't get it. You know, we're, like, struggling with our angst and with the bombs and, like, our record label is owned by a munich. It's like a munich company. We're like a munich emissions company. And do you know what it's like? And I'm like, no, I don't.

Lee Schnaiberg

I'm sorry for you. But I'll go off and make another movie about climate change and how... Like, there always been about how we can stop climate change, unfortunately, because they started in the 90s. It would be nice if they were more accessible.

HEY, LEE. I know the story that you've been giving has been great for everyone, but we're like right at the like edge of our typical recording time at four o'clock. And I know there are actually some questions that haven't been asked yet, but we can still ask those. It's just it's going to be after the recording process is done because we like try to keep it right at two hours. That being said, we're formally wrapping things up at this time. So thank you all for attending. Thank you all for your presentations.

Davonte Bradley

And thank you very much, our two presenters for your presentations. They were great. And thank you all for being here. So that being said. I'll see you next time. So thank you very much. You want to give us a countdown to the end? Sure. Let's start with five. So closing out in five. Four, three, two, and one. Thank you.