TOI Blog

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Tools: Matt Miller

On May 8, 2014, the Tools exhibit took place at the Big Car Service Center. This piece is by Matt Miller.   My tool opens people up to the world. It makes learning possible that could never be possible otherwise. It’s inexpensive, but what comes out of it is priceless and invaluable. My tool: a webcam. I’m a […]

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Tools: Bill Foley

On May 8, 2014, the Tools exhibit took place at the Big Car Service Center. This piece is by Bill Foley.   How the photographic image was created and the commonly used tools remained unchanged for nearly 100 years- roll and sheet Film, processed in wet darkrooms and then printed, by hand and machines. With the introduction of […]

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Tools: Sarah Adams

On May 8, 2014, the Tools exhibit took place at the Big Car Service Center. This piece is by Sarah Adams. In the era of do-it-yourselfers, my Corner Vice remains the single most important tool proclaiming my profession. It expects perfection and if received, delivers perfection.  My corner vices strictly allow for 90o angles assembled from 2 sticks […]

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Tools: Nhat Tran

On May 8, 2014, the Tools exhibit took place at the Big Car Service Center. This piece is by Nhat Tran.   Urushi artists use small bamboo tubes like this one to sprinkle metal powder meticulously onto a lacquered surface. Simple though it may look, designing this tube requires careful thinking and patient crafting. The core needs to […]

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Tools: John April

On May 8, 2014, the Tools exhibit took place at the Big Car Service Center. This piece is by John April.   My tool is my job. After university, I spent 6 years looking for a job to support my writing practice. The process of looking for a job all but drove me crazy and nearly destroyed my […]

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An Artist’s Studio By Any Other Name

I’m on a business trip. I’ve come to Chicago to visit an artist who established an art studio inside a school. I’m pursuing a question that interests me: Is an art studio always an art studio? I think of the now seldom-paraquoted: A rose by any other name is still a rose. The actual quote […]

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Tools: Julie Crow

On May 8, 2014, the Tools exhibit took place at the Big Car Service Center. This piece is by Julie Crow.   There is no implement I love more than the broom, and few activities I find more pleasant than sweeping. Everybody, everywhere sweeps. It’s universal. It’s like meditation. It is meditation. It’s simple, direct […]

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Tools Exhibit Tonight

Early on in the Ron Frick film Baraka there is a collage of moving images taken in Kathmandu as the sun is rising outside of a temple. There is a woman sweeping, the dust spreading out around her catching the first light of day. I was reminded of this image when I first saw Julie […]

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Tools

I’m standing in the basement of the Central YMCA in San Francisco staring into a dimly lit closet tucked away behind the boiler room. It is three o’clock in the morning. The year is 1988 and Microsoft released Windows 2.1, NASA scientist James Hansen testified that global warming had begun, Cincinnati Reds pitcher Tom Browning […]

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One and All: An MLK Day 2014 installation at the Indianapolis Museum of Art

One and All: An MLK Day 2014 installation at the Indianapolis Museum of Art, a set on Flickr.