Amanda Gross is a transplanted Atlantan, living and working in Pittsburgh for the last few years. You might know her if you helped knit the bridge.
knitthebridge.wordpress.com
Her presentation is on the artwork she’s created for her blog, Mistress Syndrome, which is “part of a lifelong journey of personal and collective healing from the multi-layered, generational trauma of what it means to be a white woman.”
Betty Cruz serves as Deputy Chief of Special Initiatives for the Office of Mayor William Peduto. Welcoming Pittsburgh is just one of the programs she’s working on.
And 30 Neighbors, 30 Days is just one facet of that program. Follow @WelcomingPGH on Twitter and search the hashtag IamPGH for more info, and keep an eye out in the coming months for other Welcoming Pittsburgh projects.
Maranie Rae is a photojournalist and has been documenting social issues with her camera for the past few years. Here’s a small selection of photos from her website.
Maranie has several social issues that she is working to raise awareness on including acid attacks on women [graphic image warning] and human trafficking. She is involved with a Pittsburgh-based NGO called “The Project to End Human Trafficking”. Visit their website to find out how you can help.
Annie is doing experiments to create a model of a mouse’s olfactory system, the part of the brain that processes smell. She uses dye to create these beautiful images of the brain:
They also happen to be very important to her research.
You can also follow her on Twitter. She has intelligent things to say, so if you’re on Twitter that might not be your thing.
Gwyn is working on a memoir of her sister’s life, who died at an early age. At PKN, she will be sharing a “chapter” from that memoir about her mother and stepmother.
Clayton Merrell is on the show to talk about, among other things, his ongoing project at the Pittsburgh International Airport.
That project is a piece of public art done in terrazzo and will cover the entire center core when finished.
For reference, the tops of the escalators that bring you into the center core are at the right side of the left-most rectangle.
Intricate patterns are possible with careful workmanship, like the river that runs through the food court.
The terrazzo is laid out like a paint-by-number, with metal transition strips separating each of the 13 colors. Clayton completed the drawings using a Wacom tablet, which were then cut into full-size pieces of corrugated plastic that fit together like a puzzle.
Photo Credit: Bob Grubb
Then they were painted with orange paint so that the transition strips could be laid out after the plastic was removed.
Photo Credit: Bob Grubb
If you have 1.5 extra acres in your backyard and want to replicate Clayton’s design, maybe you can fish through the airport dumpsters for the next few months, looking for the used plastic templates. I’m sure that won’t get you arrested.
Once the transition strips are laid out, the spaces between are labeled with the color they are to receive …
… and then filled in.
Don’t worry, the colors are much more vibrant once the floor is polished:
Photo Credit: Bob Grubb
When finished, you can follow the trails of different flying machines around the airport.
Photo Credit: Bob Grubb
If you visit the airport right now, you’ll see the project in all phases, from the original tile being removed to preparing the concrete underneath to receive the terrazzo and the locating of utilities.
This is Clayton’s biggest public art project and it was partially inspired by his experimentation with covering a sphere with layers of paint, then peeling that paint so that it would lay flat.
And despite an initial avoidance he’s done a lot with landscapes. On the show he talks about using a technique of placing hard-edged “cartoon” objects in otherwise classical scenes.
You can see more of his work on his website, or keep an eye out for exhibitions in the area.
Today we hear from Kahmeela Adams Friedson about her work with the 48 Hour Film Project. We also chat with a participant in the project, Andrew Wolf.
Andrew and I go way back. See his entry for the Pittsburgh 2014 48 Hour Film Project here, called Stiff: A Living Statue’s Tale:
He is participating in the horror film project with Cipher Eye Media. Their entry is called Begin the Sanguine and will be screened on October 25. Details below.
Kahmeela is a busy woman. Keep up with her at her website, Rugged Angel, and follow her on Twitter @The_RuggedAngel.
In case you missed the last episode where I teased this talk with Freddie Croce you can get caught up here.
Freddie lives and works in Garfield at inter*ARCHITECTURE. We each independently had the idea for a logo consisting of 2 letters and a punctuation mark. Great minds, I guess.
I hope to update this page soon with some of the images that Freddie used in his presentation, so check back soon.
