Arts Thaddeus Experience the Power of Participation

What will your Students Create?

2011-01-10T19:21:00.000-08:00

Batiks

Self Portraits

Mask-making

Reed Sculpture

Giant Puppets

Rocketry

2010 August Arts Camp

2010-09-07T23:03:00.000-07:00

This was a great year for reed sculpture at August Arts, the arts camp sponsored by the Shoreline LFP Arts Council. The kids created several challenging sculptures. Some of my favorites were the red panda, octopus, palm tree and Frankenstein. Some nice batiks were created as well! I saw a great mural of the Fremont Troll near Archie McPhee's in Wallingford. The whole week was capped off nicely on Friday evening with an incredible sunset viewed from the Edmonds-Kingston ferry.

Loyal Heights Ensemble at the Syttende Mai Parade

2010-06-11T16:44:00.000-07:00

The parade was a huge success! For much of this school year, I've been working with teachers, students and parent volunteers to create troll masks and giant puppets based on characters from Norse mythology. The school made a great turnout, over 100 people. We had two serpent puppets, the Fenrir Wolf, Hel, Garn (the hellhound), Odin, a Frost Giant, two Iduns, two Ratatosks (quarrellsome squirrels), goat and wolf heads, and a dwarf troll! Thanks to Kitty for sharing her pix with me.

Loyal Heights parade video on Youtube

Here's a link to the school newsletter for the month of May. There's more info about the residency and a good column about the benefits of providing art experiences in school.

Loyal Heights newsletter, May 2010

Loyal Heights, Rehearsals

2010-06-09T20:05:00.000-07:00

I went to the school for a couple of days this week so that I could finish some construction details on the puppets and so that the kids could rehearse. The kids and puppets both did great, only a few minor issues that were easily fixed.

I've really been enjoying my experience at this school. There is such a sense of community here. When school is over, if the weather's nice, parents picking up their kids just hang out at the playground for an hour or so, conversing while their kids play.

Loyal Heights Art Walk

2010-04-25T00:46:00.000-07:00

Here are pix of several of the puppets from the recent artwalk at Loyal Heights Elementary!

Loyal Heights, part 3

2010-04-20T20:31:00.000-07:00

In April I helped create more troll masks with the remaining first and second grade classes and we added some after-school sessions to put finishing touches on the giant puppets.

Loyal Heights, part 2

2010-03-10T19:06:00.000-08:00

The 3rd grade class I worked with last month made great progress on the puppets. Large pieces were skinned, hands, paws and arms finished off. We have another session coming up in April, when we will be doing troll masks during the day, and finishing off the puppets afterschool. We also hope to be doing some parade practice during recess!

Loyal Heights Elementary, Part 1

2010-01-31T21:53:00.000-08:00

This year I have been doing an artist-in-residency at Loyal Heights Elementary in Ballard. We're creating troll masks and giant puppets for the Syttende Mai (or Norwegian Heritage) parade in May. The theme is Norse Mythology and I've been doing the masks with K - 2nd and giant puppets with the 3rd - 5th graders. Some of the characters the students are making are Jorgamund the Midgard Serpent, the Fenris Wolf, Odin, Idun, Hel, and several others. It's been quite the mix of art, engineering, group problem solving, and most importantly, working together. Parent and teacher support has been great, and the students have been producing some phenomenal work. These photos give some examples of the progress that the kids have been making over the past several weeks. The school also benefits from a well organized Artist-in-Residence program. Our project was recently featured in an article in the Ballard News Tribune. Additional pictures can be seen at my Photobucket site.

3D Shadow Dancing in Bellevue

2009-05-24T12:14:00.000-07:00

Another recent gig was an assembly program at Tyee Middle School. A couple of months ago I was asked to present a 90 minute assembly program for nearly 300 6th graders. I was contacted because of programs I had done for the King County Library System, and the teachers were looking for some sort of science content. I was a bit stumped for a bit, as I don't generally do assembly programs, but then I decided that a 3D shadow dance performance followed by hands-on activities would be the way to go. A couple of the 6th graders even volunteered to do the dancing!

The dance performance was a bit hit, I'm having trouble posting it here, but you can see it on youtube, http://www.youtube.com/my_videos?pi=0&ps=20&sf=added&sa=0&sq=&dm=1

After the dance portion, I did some activities with the whole group on blind spots and stereovision, using handouts I had prepared. One of these is a version of a RDS (random dot stereogram) that I made using the letters on a computer keyboard. After that, the students split up into smaller groups, and we did some cooperative activities for the rest of the time.

Here's my stereogram. To try it out, click on the image to enlarge, and cross your eyes just enough so that the repeating characters line up. If you can do this successfully, you should get the depth effect.

How this works is that the image is made up of mostly repeating characters. Along certain points, some characters have been removed; and in other places, added. When you cross your eyes and look at the image, in most places your eyes are seeing the same things in the same place. But here and there, different images line up. This confuses your brain temporarily. But your brain doesn't like confusion, it likes order; so it creates an explanation, that there is a difference in depth to explain the difference in what is seen. Whether the perceived depth of the image seems to come in or go out depends on whether the characters have been added or deleted. The easiest place to see this is in the row of numbers, where I have removed the "0", then replaced it with an "X". This is where the line of depth occurs. If you are able to diverge your eyes, you can get the depth effect in the opposite direction.

Bubble Magic at Childrens Festival of Art

2009-05-12T20:07:00.000-07:00

Last month I presented Bubble Magic at this year's annual Childrens' Festival of Art in Port Townsend. I showed kids how to make the caterpillar, bubbles inside bubbles, the bubble cube, and the ballerina. My bubble work is inspired by Tom Noddy, who I met several years ago, and who's bubble artistry you can see at http://www.tomnoddy.com/, as well as a few videos on youtube. He is also one of the few people I know who can make the "Bubble Jewel", a dodecahehron. Here are a couple of pix of kids doing the caterpillar and one making the ballerina! The Ballerina bubble is a double bubble with a ring of smaller bubble around the two. Then the space inbetween the bubbles is inflated, and air is blown through the straw to rotate the bubbles.

Mask-Making with Children's Center in Shoreline

2009-04-21T10:15:00.000-07:00

From February through March, I did a mask-making residency with three schools in the Shoreline School District. The residency was funded through Shoreline/LFP Arts Council and Shoreline Schools Foundation and involved about 120 kids. I have a few pictures here, but you can see more at my photobucket site. I really enjoyed working with all of the administrators and staff and seeing the kids' creativity shine through.

Rockets Away

2009-01-17T20:55:00.000-08:00

On Thursday, January 15th, I did a couple of rocket workshops at Machias Elementary in Snohomish as part of their annual Day of Science. I've been presenting here at Machias for about a decade now! There were 50-60 kids in each of my groups and they worked in cooperative teams of 5 to design, build and launch the rockets. The rocketry workshop is a mix of science, math and teamwork. The rockets are built from scratch using 2-liter bottles, foam core boards, clay, paper and tape. I use an air compressor to pressurize the rockets and a well built rocket can go 400 feet or more. We did nearly 50 launches during the workshops. Each team launches twice, so that they can apply the lesson form the first launch. In one of the pictures below you can see a water plume following a rocket. Although this is too quick to see with the eye, the camera is able to capture the moment. Thanks to the teachers and parent volunteers for all your help!

First Night 2009

2009-01-07T19:46:00.000-08:00

On December 31st, Port Townsend held its 2nd annual First Night event, a community celebration. Last year I was commissioned by the Jefferson County Historical Society to build a glowing anchor that would be raised up at midnight (NY time), then followed by a shower of fireworks. This year I also recruited several friends to do a Mummer's Play, "St. George and the Frightful Dragon", that we performed in front of City Hall before the anchor went up. The characters include the Fool (me), St. George (Zach Nesmith), his Squire (Mason Stan) , the Frightful Dragon (Karen Starling), and the Doctor (Dr. Gary Forbes). We were also joined by local musicians Otto and Kristin Smith who contributed their musical expertise to the mix.

Snow

2009-01-07T17:29:00.000-08:00

I love snow. I grew up in Northeastern Ohio where it snows for much of the winter and sledding was one of my favorite activities. We also got snowflakes, those tiny crystaline, hexagonal formations that unfortunately, are so rare here in the pacific Northwest. We tend to get a mix of rime (slush) and graupel (mini-snowballs), which doesn't last too long. However, this December, not only did it snow, but it stayed around for over a week! I didn't see any real snowflakes, mind you, but I did get to go sledding and snow sculpting. I built a snowbear, snowhenge, and just for the heck of it, used xmas lights to create a giant xmas eel in our front yard that made one of the local papers! One of the nights I was working, several deer ambled by; and one of them let me get pretty close for a picture.

Carnival of the Twilight

2008-10-28T09:20:00.000-07:00

For the past few weeks, I've been working on HaunTownsend's "Carnival of the Twilight" at the Jefferson County Fairgrounds. It's an "old school" haunted house, the concept is a 1930's style carnival lost in time. The large skeletal puppet is Beatrice, and the smaller one I created just for this show!

The Shakespeare Bench

2008-10-09T07:53:00.000-07:00

Earlier this summer, I accepted a commission to do a bench for the Performing Arts Center Eastside in Bellevue. The theme was performing arts. I chose a quote from Shakespeare to woodburn into the bench. My partner and I attended the artist's reception in September. All of the benches were on display at the Bellevue Art Museum, then moved to Bellevue Square. They will be auctioned off as a fundraiser for PACE in November. You can view all of the benches by clicking on "PACE Benches" in the "My Links" column on the left.

August Arts 2008

2008-10-07T11:40:00.000-07:00

I returned to Shoreline in August for my 4th consecutive year as a teaching artist at August Arts Camp, funded by the Shoreline - Lake Forest Park Arts Council. I offered reed sculpture and batik self-portraits during the week-long camp. Here are pictures of some of their work.

Site Specific Art with 4Culture

2008-10-07T11:08:00.000-07:00

This past spring I wrote two proposals for 4Culture's Site Specific Art program. Art On the Spot allows participants to create their own self-portraits. The portable Camera Obscura is a large tentlike structure built with lightproof fabric. A small hole on one side allows enough light to come in to create an upside-down, inverted image of the scene on the other side of the hole. Both proposals received funding, and I presented one or both at arts events in Duvall, Fall City, Shoreline, Des Moines and Enumclaw. The photo of me inside the Camera Obscura is from Chris Goodenow of The Enterprise newspaper. The Camera Obscura would not have been possible without the assistance of the Widow Corder, who provided the sewing engineering and expertise.

Batik Self Portraits at Port Townsend High School

2008-09-02T22:12:00.001-07:00

I had been talking with Kathleen Burgett, the art teacher at the Port Townsend High School about trying batik self portraits and we decided that this spring would be a good time. I took photos in all three of her classes and the students traced their images onto acetates, which we enlarged to fit onto 11" x 17" paper. The students waxed over those lines, then used acrylic paint on cloth to paint their portraits.

Einstein Middle School

2008-09-02T21:23:00.000-07:00

In the early part of 2008, I did an artist in residency at Einstein Middle School, generously funded by the Shoreline Arts Council. I was invited in by Wendy Francis, one of the art teachers. These are pictures of a few of my favorites. I taught batik and reed sculpture. The batik work was really good, but some of the students really excelled with the reed sculpture. A few of the pieces were even displayed at the Shoreline Arts Festival in June.

Raising the Anchor!

2008-06-09T23:51:00.000-07:00

The new year started with a commission from the Jefferson County Historical Society. They were doing a First Night celebration here in town and wanted someone to create a glowing anchor to hoist up at midnight, (New York Time). I built it with reed and bamboo and lit it with 70 feet of auqa EL wire. First Night was a great event with lots of activities. We started hoisting the anchor up to the top of a large crane about 20 seconds before 9pm as people began a countdown. When it got to the top, fireworks went off and everyone cheered!

Sun, Pigs & Puppets

2007-10-30T00:07:00.000-07:00

August was great, I had three full day camps in a row!

Here’s one of my favorite batiks from the August Arts camp.

I’ve posted more pictures at the PhotoBucket site.

Just after things died down in August, I was asked to design a giant puppet for the Backbone Campaign, to become part of their Procession for the Future - http://backbonecampaign.org/page.cfm?id=129

They wanted a Sustainability Puppet, a giant sun that opens to reveal a vision of a sustainable future. It had to be able to be disassembled and packed up and reassembled without too much difficulty. Realizing that this project was somewhat beyond the scope of my talents, I enlisted the aid of two fellow artists in town. The Widow Corder, who took my simple design concepts and spun them then into an engineering and artistic marvel. Virginia Ashby created the collective vision of a sustainable future. Linda Atkins contributed her sewing and pinning skills to the project, and Peter Gritt offered some sage advice on scope and materials. We finished it just in time for it’s debut at the Sustainable Ballard Festival in Seattle on Saturday, September 29th.

$On October 12th, my partner and I attended the Pig Auction at the Westin Hotel in Seattle. 39 pigs were sold at live auction and another 25 were sold at a “Buy It Now” price, raising257,000 for Pike Place social service agencies.
The range at the live auction was $800 to $8,000. Marina the PigLit started off at $2,000 and went to $5,500 at the live auction, and Sophie the Merpig sold afterwards at a “Buy It Now” price of $3,000.

A week later, I did a 3D shadow demo with a 4-ft tall skeleton marionette at the Port Townsend City Library. I managed to get a bit of it recorded which can be seen at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PLDUlJVwGk

On the evening of October 24th, Rob d’Arc and I returned to the Federal Way Regional Library to present our shadow puppet version of “The Reluctant Dragon” and a workshop. 90 people braved terrible weather to attend and everyone seemed to stay for the workshop!

Busy August!

2007-08-12T08:13:00.000-07:00

The month started for me with the Self Portraits workshop at the Jefferson County Library on Thursday, August 2nd. On Monday, August 5th, I began a four day Math Wizard Camp at Chimacum Elementary for the Title 1 program. The weekend of the 11th & 12th I'm doing Bubble Magic at the third annual Northgate Family Festival. On Monday the 13th, I begin a 5-day artist in residency at the August Arts Camp sponsored by the Shoreline Arts Council. This will be my third year offering reed sculpture and batik. Then it's off to Camp Kirby on Samish Island to manage the art barn and offer workshops for Power of Hope, providing youth empowerment through the arts. August 27th & 28th I'm doing shadow puppet workshops at the YMCA in Port Angeles as part of their Puppet Camp. Whew!

Jefferson County Summer Reading Program

2007-07-03T07:21:00.000-07:00

This summer I’m offering some great science and art programs at the Jefferson County Library as part of their Summer Reading Program.

Bubble Tricks with Thaddeus!

Thursday, July 5, 2007 - 2:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m.

Learn great bubble tricks and techniques, including how to create a bubble cube using only a spoon and a straw! Watch bubbles freeze. Kids of all ages are welcome.

Crazy Chemistry with Thaddeus!Thursday, July 19, 2007 - 2:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m.
Make bouncy and stretchy slime to create your own magic slime egg. Make it smooth or grainy. Ages 5 and older.

Self Portraits with Thaddeus!Thursday, August 2, 2007 - 2:00 p.m.
Discover your inner artist by creating a self portrait on the spot using photography, drawing and doodling. Ages 5 and older.

ZSI: Zoo Science Investigations Puppet Show

2007-06-25T17:06:00.000-07:00

ZSI: Get a Clue
Zoo Science Investigations with Dr. Thaddeus & Lenny the Lab Rat at King County Library’s Summer Reading Program

When Lenny's country cousin Myron the fieldmouse disappears, Lenny and Dr. Thaddeus use the ZSI lab to investigate the mystery and solve the case! The show lasts 30 minutes and combines humor, puppetry and interesting facts about local forest animals. Rob D'Arc and I had our premiere show at the Woodinville Public Library on June 23rd, and here are the dates for the remaining shows.

Thursday, July 12th 3pm Shoreline Public Library
Monday, July 16th 1&2pm Issaquah Public Library
Tuesday, July 17th 2pm North Bend Public Library
Wednesday, July 25th 2pm Federal Way Public Library
Wednesday, July 25th 7pm White Center Public Library
Saturday, July 28th 2pm Redmond Public Library

Pigs on Parade Reception

2007-06-08T12:12:00.000-07:00

By Jennifer Jackson, Peninsula Daily News

SEATTLE - Port Townsend's Sophie the Merpig was the center of attention, but was outshone by her litter mate, Piglit.

Last Friday, 100 Pigs on Parade - fiberglass pigs transformed by artists as a fundraiser for the Pike Place Market Foundation - were officially unveiled at a reception in Seattle.

Among them were two porcine creations by Port Townsend sculptor Thaddeus Jurczynski.

"Sophie was elevated on a table, with other pigs radiating out from her," Jurczynski said.

Jurczynski transformed the two pigs from fiberglass blanks modeled after Rachel, the Seattle Pike Place Market piggy bank.

Jurczynski took the sitting version and turned it into a merpig, complete with tail and flowing blond locks.

Read More

Local Sculptor Chosen for Pigs

2007-06-07T11:59:00.000-07:00

By Jennifer Jackson

Peninsula Daily News

PORT TOWNSEND - An artist known for his giant articulated puppets and bright-colored paper lanterns is branching out into a new field - pigs.

This year, Seattle's "Pigs on Parade" will feature two porcine creations by Thaddeus Jurczynski.

A fundraiser for the Pike Place Market Foundation, 100 artistic versions of Rachel, the famous Pike Place Market piggy bank, will be on display in Seattle this summer to celebrate the market's centennial, then auctioned off.

"I'm really excited to be a part of this project," Jurcynski said.

"This is what celebration artists do in the off season."

Read More

Port Townsend Lanterns

2007-06-06T13:44:00.000-07:00

JENNIFER JACKSON

PORT TOWNSEND -- Stars wheeled overhead in the cold night sky, candles glowed in a spiral of light and lanterns shone like the planets.

Once again, Port Townsend marked another cycle of the sun with an ancient Asian tradition, the Lantern Festival.

"We're saying goodbye to the Year of the Rooster, and are welcoming in the Year of the Dog," said Thaddeus Jurczynski.

Modeled after New Year celebrations in China, this is the third Lantern Festival that Jurczynski has organized in Port Townsend.

Read More

Bubbles

2007-06-06T12:47:00.001-07:00

These pictures show youth that I worked with when I visited Taiwan as part of a delegation for the arts.

Lantern Slideshow

2007-06-06T12:33:00.001-07:00

2006-07-05T13:10:00.000-07:00

Taiwan

2006-07-05T12:55:00.000-07:00

Thaddeus

Bubble Tricks with Thaddeus!

2006-07-05T12:33:00.000-07:00

This summer I’m offering some great science and art programs at the Jefferson County Library as part of their Summer Reading Program. Bubble Tricks with Thaddeus!

Thursday, July 5, 2007 - 2:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m.

Learn great bubble tricks and techniques, including how to create a bubble cube using only a spoon and a straw! Watch bubbles freeze. Kids of all ages are welcome.

Crazy Chemistry with Thaddeus!

2006-07-05T12:32:00.000-07:00

Crazy Chemistry with Thaddeus!

Thursday, July 19, 2007 - 2:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m.

Make bouncy and stretchy slime to create your own magic slime egg. Make it smooth or grainy. Ages 5 and older.

Self Portraits with Thaddeus!

2006-07-05T12:31:00.000-07:00

Self Portraits with Thaddeus!

Thursday, August 2, 2007 - 2:00 p.m.

Discover your inner artist by creating a self portrait on the spot using photography, drawing and doodling. Ages 5 and older.

Self Portraits

2004-06-06T13:03:00.002-07:00

Self Portraits

Sculpture

2004-06-06T13:03:00.001-07:00

Sculpture

Kirigami

2004-06-06T13:03:00.000-07:00

Kirigami

Puppets

2004-06-06T13:02:00.001-07:00

Welcome

Rocketry

2004-06-06T13:02:00.000-07:00

Rocketry

Batik

2004-06-05T14:07:00.000-07:00

Batik