Quilt, Albondigas Soup, Thesis and Yard Sign: A Quarantine Life from Our Staff
As we know 2020 has not been smooth, and a global pandemic is only making the ride even bumpier. The COVID-19 crisis and the stay-at-home order had a lot of people reevaluating adjusting their relationships with work and life, including us at Blue Sky Gallery. While our team has committed to keeping bringing art experiences to you from home offices, we have also spent extra time at home cooking, reading, listening, and making stuff. We’d like to share with you what we have been doing for the past couple of months.
Zemie Barr - Exhibitions Manager
While I've been home I've been doing a fair amount of sewing and baking, two activities that I've always found comforting because they remind me of my great-grandmother. I was lucky enough to know her until she passed away when I was in middle school. She showed me how to sew on a machine for the first time, and I continue to bake with her pie crust recipe. When the stay-at-home order began, I started sewing masks for family and friends with some fabric I had accumulated over the years. I had a bunch of scraps that weren't quite large enough for more masks, so I decided to use these pieces to make a quilt. I'm still in the process of arranging and sewing together the remaining small triangles and squares, but I hope to incorporate some fabric cyanotypes squares as well.
I've also been listening to quite a few audio books while I sew. I highly recommend the Wolf Hall trilogy by Hilary Mantel, as many of the themes seem eerily familiar. In particular, the dramatic narration by Ben Miles for the third book, The Mirror and the Light, is fantastic.
Amanda Clem - Membership and Gallery Manager
Right before everything closed down to curb the spread of COVID, I was lucky enough to go on a really wonderful vacation. On the second night of my trip I slipped, and broke my arm when I put it out to catch my fall. I ended up needing surgery to screw my radius back into place, and now I have a nice collection of XRAYS and a video of an MRI of my wrist.
Did I mention it was my right/ dominant arm? The last couple of months we’ve been sheltering in place, I have been recovering the use of my main hand! In the beginning I practiced writing with my left hand, and I became pen pals with my friend’s 4 and 5 year old who are also learning to write, which was perfect. Now I’m doing physical therapy to regain mobility of my write hand. One personal project I started (unofficial PT) is crocheting a rag rug made from old sheets and clothing too worn to donate...I’m also just learning how to crochet but I think it’s going pretty well!
Aside from that I’ve been going on long walks around my + nearby neighborhoods (which inspired these Blue Sky artist’s photo yard signs— get yours today!) getting to know our city a little bit better by foot, and taking pictures of every flower.
Molly Newgard - Executive Director
Who am I quarantining with: My son, home from 2nd year of college at Cal and trying to find the value of virtual learning; my 18 year old daughter, who is (finally) coming to terms with the upheaval of her HS senior year but graduating nonetheless; my ER-Doc husband who is staying safe and driven by all things data-related; and our 4 cats who keep us entertained and comforted.
What I am reading, writing, watching and listening to: reading Michelle Obamas Becoming, the Sunday NYT although it looks a bit different these days; creating lots of quarantine-inspired Haikus; writing many grants for Blue Sky; sending hand-written notes to family and friends; watching old reruns of a childhood favorite, Little House on the Prairie, and looking at @homelife_stilllife on Instagram.
What I’m cooking: too many meals on a daily basis--to keep the troops happy, but also re-discovering a few old recipes, like my father’s Albondigas Soup. We also don’t hesitate to get take-out to support our local businesses.
What is keeping me sane: walks around the neighborhood, zoom calls with family and friends, jazzercise, a morning ballet barre, playing guitar, and weekends in the backyard around the firepit.
Cristal Tappan - Exhibitions Intern
I just finished my thesis work, She Wanted to Be Called Mary, which allowed me to see myself in my mother’s likeness and draw parallels between our lives that I have struggled to acknowledge. As a result, my frustration with her has dissipated and I have made space for an elevated connection, empathy, and understanding of her.
Yuyang Zhang - Exhibitions Intern
Like a lot of people, I’ve been spending more time in the kitchen during the quarantine. But on top of cooking regular meals to feed me up, I also made some experimental foods that are mostly out of curiosity and a little bit of food homesick. One of them is gnocchi with tahini dressing, which is inspired by my hometown’s iconic breakfast item Re Gan Mian (sesame paste noodle). I also made a couple loaves of banana bread to qualify for quarantine baking life. I made mine a bit healither by replacing all-purpose flour with protein powder.
On the art side, I rethought one of my old projects, and started making digital collages with my photographs, found propaganda posters and commercials. I found enjoyment and possibilities of injecting new meanings in these collages with the experience of both Chinese and American culture. I also continue to work on my car parts sculptures and just finished one of my favorite pieces.
Since gyms are a no-go, I’ve been walking a lot. Thus podcasts have been an even bigger part of my quarantine life. Talk Art, Stuff You Should Know, Code Switch, and the Vergecast are some of the long-term residents of my subscriptions.
Last but not least, I started learning German. I don’t know how far I will go, but so far it has been a reasonably smooth ride. I always thought speaking multiple languages is cool, even though both my Chinese and English are degrading somehow.
While there has never been a better time to learn more about art while we are at home, it’s important to understand the wellbeing of ourselves and the people we care about. We hope the things we share can inspire you in some way, and we can’t wait to share more with you in person once things return to normal. Before that, we would like you to take care of yourself and the people around you.
Keep loving, supporting and fighting. 🖤
If you are interested in the stuff we shared
Home Improvement:
Art:
Podcast:
Recipe:
Book:
More cool stuff: