Art Swap 2013: Your Trip to New Orleans

New Orleans: it's all t-shirt shops and restaurants.

Jesse Roessler submitted this week's final Art Swap entry, the story behind his five-page comic and 
 postcard collection, Your Trip to New Orleans:

You resist the urge to reach out and touch the gator.

The inspiration for the postcard project came from a good friend of mine coming to stay. As we were going around town sightseeing (as well as doing touristy things such as a swamp tour), I started thinking about what makes visits to the city unique and what parts of the experience are consistent across visits. It can seem that whatever odd things one comes across are actually quite normal thanks to their consistency.

St. Louis Cemetery #1. "All the graves have to be above ground," the guide explains. "We're essentially standing on water."

The comic is a bit of lagniappe (the term used down here for "a little extra"). I've been making poorly drawn, loosely plotted comics since I was bored studying for an AP Art History exam in high school. The theme is, well, my frustration with having to answer the question "why did you move to New Orleans?" as if there were one solid answer.


Jesse Roessler is currently a graduate student in clinical health at Loyola University in New Orleans. You can read more of his musings and adventures at his blog, crawfishclovis.

That's all the Art Swap projects for this year, and I'd like to extend my thanks to everyone who participated, followed the weekly blog entries, retweeted links, shared Facebook posts, and in general spread the love.  Watch for info about next year's swap in late winter or early spring.  

Interested in joining for 2014?  Post in the comments, e-mail ianmrogers[at]hotmail[dot]com, or hit me up through the usual channels.

Art Swap 2013: Pillow Creatures

Eden Scheans's Art Swap project appears as a normal set of miniature pillows on one side...

...with sharp pointed teeth and asymmetrical button eyes on the other.  Each one has a name and comes with a set of personality traits listed in the pocket of the mouth.  My Tolkien-esque wilderness scene creature (top photo, second from left) has a penchant for folk music and rich food:

Name: Lawrence
Fave Food: Trail Mix
Likes: Bird Watching
Dislikes: Tourists
Fave Beer: Guinness
Fave Band: Mumford & Sons
Vices: Psychedelic Mushrooms

In addition to her talents as a seamstress, Eden also co-founded a her own cotton candy business, Fairy Floss Northwest.

Art Swap 2013: Soldiers of Love

Joe Handschiegel was going to give everyone a set of boobs for the Art Swap, but circumstances, alas, did not work out in his favor.  His backup plan was this set of army soldier paintings in all different colors, though two prints featured hearts only.  How's that for symbolism?

Why read a boring bio of Joe when you can play along to an interactive Easily Distracted game show based on his hobbies and adventures? (Click on Episode 8.)  He also has his own IMDB page.

Art Swap 2013: The Interquest Explorer Treasure Hunt

Hidden among the prints and the photos and the calligraphy, each Art Swap envelope contained a scrap of paper with this image:

Those who followed that link embarked on an online scavenger hunt of epic proportions, a hunt that takes them through the internet's most popular hangouts and darkest corners, with every step testing the explorer's creativity, cunning, and skill with a mouse.  One clue leads to another, and the puzzles are sometimes obscure, usually funny, and always full of animator Jeff Gill's trademark doodles.  Successful explorers will earn themselves a prize, and the final reward (I won't spoil it here!) is well worth the effort. 

What are you waiting for?  Give it a try - Click this link to get started!

Good luck in your quest.

Jeff Gill is a for-serious animator who's worked on South Park and other shows, and whose cartoons, doodles, and musical stylings can be found scattered about the web:
Animations on Youtube (sample below!)
More animations on Vimeo
Goodbye Spacebar, a daily blog of doodles
Songs Jeff made up in his car while stuck in Los Angeles traffic

Art Swap 2013: Cunning Calligraphy

Chicago's own Kaitlin Vogtner presents a set of five matted calligraphy pieces, each bearing a different inspirational message in felt-tipped pen.  Impressed?  You should be: This is only her second calligraphy project.

On that note, sincere kudos to anyone who tackles a new medium, whatever it may be.  There are far too many experiences out there waiting to be had.  Today is that day.

By day, Kaitlin Vogtner works as a pediatric speech-language pathologist at Loyola University Medical Center in Chicago, and by night she develops her calligraphy and typography skills for future lettering projects.  She's also an occasional guest on the Easily Distracted: The Podcast, and plays a mean game of Pirates.

Art Swap 2013: Pirates on the Sea of Board Games

Back in August, I spent a night in Chicago with fellow Art Swappers Jon Trainor, Kaitlin Vogtner, and Brad Stasell playing Pirates, Jon's board game contribution to the swap.  After three rounds, I can safely declare the game a complete success, even though I didn't win.

Pirates was the brainchild of Jon Trainor and Barry Pfingsten after about four margaritas, and the only Art Swap project not designed to fit in a postal mailbox.  The board is an open sea of squares that players navigate by rolling a single dice (which, like Clue, can take a frustratingly long time).  Across the sea are islands with buried treasure, and players roll dice before the game to determine which three specific treasures they must find and retrieve.  The catch is that any player can dig up any treasure to trade for bonus cards that provide all kinds of useful abilities, such as increased attack power, or moving diagonally.  If a player has the treasure you need, you can attack them in a single-dice showdown.  If you have a treasure someone else needs, you can bury it on any square and leave the other player scrambling to dig it up.  The first player to get all three of their treasures wins.

Despite my comparison with slow-moving games of Clue, each game of Pirates moves fast, and takes less than an hour to play.  With four people, the treasures get scooped up after only a few turns, dividing the game into an initial phase of acquiring treasures and items and a second phase of journeying across the board to retrieve a distant treasure or attack a player who's dug up yours.  Because two players might very well need the same treasure to win, hilarity and battles inevitably ensue when the people around the table figure this out.

This showdown for the final treasure is undoubtedly the most challenging and fun part of the game, though because this high-strategy portion only lasts a few turns, Pirates becomes a game best played multiple times in a row to gain full satisfaction.  The attacking feature initially seems unbalanced (Note: I'm not just saying this because I lost every attack), since the defender wins in case of a tie and can take both a life and an item from the attacking player upon victory.  However, the inequality makes acquiring items to boost your attacking power a better strategy, as is foiling another player by stealing treasure rather than risking a hazardous battle.  It's also to players' advantage to shout out guesses for who needs what, and to bargain around the table to prevent another player from winning.  All are allowed, and players are encouraged to make their own cards, decide house rules, and otherwise alter gameplay as they see fit.

Though I neglected to get a picture of us actually playing the game, here's a generic 1980s back-of-the-box board game photo of a family playing Life instead.  Enjoy!

Boy, this family sure loves sweaters.

Jon Trainor is the brainchild behind the Blingasaurus Rex series of internet song mashups introduced in the 2010 Mix CD Swap. You can listen to his mixes via Soundcloud or Tumblr.  He's played in all kinds of bands (including the Chicago-based I Think Everything I Say), co-founded the Easily Distracted podcast, started a financial advice blog for the Nerdist, and is currently programming his own computer game.  This is his first board game, about pirates or otherwise.

Art Swap 2013: Tags and Hemp

Andrea Starr contributed not one, but two Art Swap projects to the mix: a handsome collection of hemp jewelry, and a set of animal illustrations drawn on suitcase luggage tags.  The jewelry includes necklaces, bracelets, and anklets, while the tags feature animals ranging from clownfish to buffalo.  A dolphin pendant  necklace (above, middle) marks a subtle crossover between the two sets. 

Andrea Starr has, at one time or another, produced artwork in most every medium I can think of, and a few that I can't.  In addition to having worked in architecture, jewelrymaking, fruit picking, and landscaping, she's one of the founding members of Fertile Underground, an organic food co-op, grocery store, garden, and cafe in Providence started with Kickstarter backing and still bringing fresh fruits and vegetables to the people of Rhode Island.