Shep Abbott: Art & Space

One of the earliest musical performances my old lady & I had together was in Gloucester

(a lifetime ago)

Open Mic at ARTSPACE 

a lifetime later we ran into Shep and made the connection 

and now we jive whenever we cross paths.

I recently realized the weird street signs on the island were his

and that they were being stolen,

regularly...

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Hi Shep - I've been thinking about your signs and the people that steal them, and a comment that you made that "it's part of the process" and I'm wondering if you want to comment on that further (for my blog)? Thanks - Joe!

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Joe, thanks for your interest. I'm not sure what happens to the signs. It may be malicious destruction. It may be flattering theft. It may be "official" removal by Public Works. Whatever it is, I'm surprised no one contacts me since my email is always on the sign. I'm interested in "public art" because it seems to have a visceral, human impact. I once hung a giant 30' fishing net up high in swamp maples in Dogtown with the phrase "Dream of Love" knitted into it with brightly colored ribbons. It was very beautiful. When the afternoon sun hit it way up in the trees, it was like a giant spider's web with this simple message, Dream of Love which was a real dream I had once. Well, someone went to a great deal of trouble to climb up, rip it down and take it away. A man called me to say he thought it was a "cult". I don't know who it was. I put up a yellow street sign near the Willowrest restaurant not long ago. The sign read "Slow Geezers", kind of a joke on "Slow Children" signs and what with Boomers and all. Just a joke. I even wrote on the back of the sign, "Painted by a Geezer" because, as a matter of fact, I will be 70 on Saturday. Nevertheless, it was torn down, perhaps by an irate Geezer. I really like public art; I think it's great to put stuff in public that is completely unexpected and, hopefully, fun. I'm not interested in making any "political statement" or pissing anyone off. But, let's face it, life can get pretty, well, predictable these days. So, to me, I kind of see the outside, public world as a kind of "museum" where, instead of folks having to decide to come to see your work somewhere, well, it just suddenly shows up! And it's a total mystery as to how the Hell it got there and what the Hell it means and who the Hell would go to the trouble to do that? It just makes life a little less predictable, even if you don't like it and decide to rip it down. A lot of other people get a kick out of it before it disappears. And then, if people like it, it doesn't take a lot of effort to make another sign (although, to be honest, the signs are pretty well done). [You can reprint this if you like.]

for Henry (ARod Answers)

Joe,

Give me your opinion on the A Rod doping scandal please.

Love

Henry

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Henry

Baseball and cheating go together like hot dogs and mustard.

Off the top of my head, here are some of Baseball's easily-googled scandals throughout history:

-Shoeless Joe Jackson and Chicago White Sox (Editor's Note: 1919) (Editor's Note part 2: Field of Dreams) 

-Pete Rose in the 80s

-Cocaine in the 80s

-Speed / Uppers / "Greenies"

-even spitballs and doctoring the ball is a part of the game. some people thought our guy was dousing his hair with extra gel and smearing that on the ball as recently as a couple months back. 

besides the history of rampant cheating I believe that athletes ultimately destroy their bodies to play anyways (the same way we will destroy our hearing as musicians) 

A-Rod has sucked for a while now.  I think some professional athletes take steroids and still suck. 

Realizing baseball players take steroids was like realizing WWF was fake.  I was young at the time.  It bummed me out for a while.  back then.   

How is the purity of cricket?

Joe

Batmanalysis (and Baseball)

you cannot quantify art.

but I believe the Batman franchise to be a Powerful Force in cinematic history

we were trying to hash it out and having a difficult time the last time one of these was on the ole TV

so later a chart was contrived for my own benefit, to look at all the information at once

it was lying there today, a near victim of a hurricane houseclean

this post is a two fold solution, to digitally capture it's glory so the original can be destroyed, and to share it with You.

TITLE - DIRECTOR - BATMAN - LEADING LADY - VILLIAN - BUDGET/BOX - RATIO

Batman - Burton - Keaton - Basinger - Nicholson - 48M / 411M - 8.56
Returns - Burton - Keaton - Phiffer - Devito - 80M / 266M - 3.33
Forever - Schumaker - Kilmer - Kidman - Lee Jones/Carey - 100M / 336M  - 3.36
And Robin - Schumaker - Clooney - Thurman/Silverstone - Arnold - 140M / 238M - 1.7
Begins - Nolan - Bale - Holmes - Neeson/Murphy - 150M / 374M - 2.49
Dark Knight - Nolan - Bale - Gyllenhaal - Ledger/Eckhart - 185M / 1004 M - 5.42
Rises - Nolan - Bale - Hathaway - Hardy - 250M / 1084M - 4.35

The ratio number is Box / Budget aka if I invest one clam how many clams do I get back

I'm not posting any conclusions
only gathered information
the analysis is all your own
because you cannot quantify art

*p.s. this applies to baseball too.  the Statistical Revolution and tendencies and averages are Interesting and So Cool but at the end of the day it's a Human holding a ball trying to hurl it past another Human who is holding a chunk of wood and they're both probably on steroids but that's ok because Tens of Thousands of other Humans are watching which changes Everything and this is pretty much Art too so none of that research matters buddy sorry about those man hours you put into that and Thanks for the pretty numbers