Community Corner: the Homeling Art Show
By Cynella, HSM staff writer
“The Homeling Art Shows have let members of the Collective share their work in-world, in a pleasant social setting. Guests from other Home groups were invited to view the second Art Show. Now, with the third Art Show, the Homelings invite guests from other Home groups to display their work and participate in the poetry reading.” –Sealwyf
On October 16, 2010, I was astonished to be invited to the third Homeling art show. Having never been invited to such a prestigious event on Home before, I wasn’t quite sure of what to expect.
HomeStation Magazine, Gamer Indepth, Hamsters Freedom and the Homelings all came together on that special night to coexist, in what turned out to feel like one big family. At 9pm EST, we all began to gather at the Homeling Grande Hall, which was decorated with theatrical seating for the night’s poetry readings.
While at the Grande Hall, we each received our invites to one of the galleries; my first invite landed me in Sealwyf’s Chamber Apartment, also known as Gallery 1. Upon entering, I felt like I had walked into the Virginia Museum of Fine Art, and even imagined soft classical music playing in the background.
After being greeted with the utmost respect, our group was escorted into the first viewing room. The first viewing room contained six separate pieces of art from the Hamster artist, Clawfy. As a side note, Clawfy is a well-recognized artist in California, and there are many galleries featuring her work. If you would like to see more of her artwork, feel free to visit her website at: www.jessicawardart.com to see her astonishing imagination at work.
“I use my own personal experiences to flesh out stories in each drawing,” Clawfy explains. “I place symbols that embellish themes of fetishes with the body. The subjects are abject female figures that are grotesque or incomplete. In these figures I include a sense of body dissatisfaction and thus showing body-image coping patterns through sealing or idealizing the body. Hair plays an important role in my work; it is my visual representation of the multidimensional eating disorder. When hair grows it starts from inside our skin, then grows out like ideas and emotion. This is where I give it a life of its own as a metaphor.”
The second viewing room contained work from two Homeling artists. On the right side, we started with three wonderful specimens of Sherminenie’s work.
The above painting was done in 1984, using acrylic, and is one-third of a larger piece. This painting was done while sherminenie was going through a difficult time in her life.
On the left-hand side of the room was TheBrightestGlow’s graffiti artwork. When asked what inspired him to do graffiti, he said, “Art has many forms, and I love the expression graffiti gives me, and the exhilaration.“
Upon looking at my Playstation clock I realized that 10:30pm had already approached, and I needed to make my way to Gallery 2 so that I wouldn’t be late for the Poetry reading. Glancing at my PDA I promptly found my invite and headed over to the 2nd Chamber Apartment.
Upon arriving I was greeted by phatso64. The atmosphere in his Chamber Apartment, also known as Gallery 2, was much the same as the first Gallery, although the decorations were slightly different.
The first viewing room contained the work from two more Homeling artists. On the right side we started with krayziefemale’s artwork, and on the left-hand side we took a look at Razorbax’s artwork.
The picture shown below is the Homeling real-world T-shirt design created by Razorbax, and you can purchase it at : http://www.homecentric-ccp.com/ if you wish. It is available in both female and male sizes, as well as a variety of colors.
The second viewing room was dedicated to Gamer Indepth and features work from both Homeboy79 and Narde15. Homeboy79 chose to display his photography. The title of his collection of photographs was “The Other Side of San Fran Beach”. The first pic was of San Fran Beach and all its beauty; the second picture was of a recycling bin, and last but not least was this dead seagull.
While I’m looking at the art in the second viewing room, the lights dim and I hear Phatso64 over the loudspeaker: the Poetry reading has already started in the Grande Hall. After looking at the last pieces I headed over to the Grande Hall.
Although I was running late, I did get to enjoy a few poems from the Homelings. Although I would love to share all of them with you, I chose one particularly superlative work. This poem is by elhazzared013.
Protectorate
Greetings from the grassy knoll
We have all the sunshine, you know?
I’ve come to ask you where you would go
Given you control your soul
Would you surround yourself with friends
or find old enemies and make amends?
Your friends will only leave you in the end
and your enemies will plot revenge to rend
Maybe love is what you are after
I’ve seen your would be other scoff in laughter
Discover your heaven using a selfless ladder?
I’m telling you it would only end in disaster
I present you with the same offer I gave to the potter
It could not sound more consciously softer
Do not set yourself up for the slaughter
Allow me to be your plotter
I will protect you from your voice of reason
Come with me to the greater season
Let me to clear you of all your treason
Indeed you will allow me to find a spot to throw your needs on
So greetings from the grassy knoll
Did I tell you we had all the sunshine? or did you know?
I’ve come to take you to where you should go
Now that I control your soul
After reading this poem, I promptly contacted elhazzard013 and told him what the poem meant to me. I was hoping for a bit of insight to confirm my comprehension. Alas, he told me that he likes to leave all interpretations to the reader and would not give me any more information. Instead of telling you what my thoughts are on this poem, I urge you to take this poem line by line and develop your own conclusions.
(As midnight drew near, the Homelings asked Hamsters Freedom if they had any poems they would like to share. Wanting to be a part of the festivities, I was happy to read one of my own. The reaction was a lot of “*cries*” text bubbles. I’m not so certain if that was good or bad, although applause and lots of “great job” comments followed.)
Attending the Homeling Art Show was a great experience. I would have loved to include every picture and poem in Community Corner, but there was an overabundance of material and there’s just not enough space. My gratitude, though, to everyone who participated. I would like to thank the Homelings for not only putting on a wonderful event, but for reaching out to other groups and allowing them to participate, even if it was just for a night.
Sealwyf had expressed to me, earlier in the night, that the goal for the art show was to pique interest in a Home space dedicated to the users (beyond just the current Community Theater). She hoped that one day there would be a space that all could go and enjoy the vast Home community’s artwork, poetry, etc. If you haven’t figured it out by now, I have the same desire. That’s why I started Community Corner in this magazine: to showcase you, the Home user.
November 24th, 2010 by cynella | 4 comments
Cynella is a veteran gamer and RPG enthusiast; a member of PS Home Gazette, Home Tabernacle, Imagine!, as well as Hamster Freedom, she runs HSM's ongoing column, Community Corner.
Much appreciation for this glorious article.
This is the first read from HomeStation mag for yours truly, and am quite anxious to take in more!
Of course… stoopid real life work and stuff will be occupying much time, but will sneak in peeks through out the day.
Nos
“Clawfy paintings, meet FilthCrow’s PS3 theme background.” Man, the eating disorder deity series is just amazing.
This art show is a fantastic idea.
Thank you for spotlighting the Homeling Art Show!
There were, indeed, some amazing sights to behold. Personally, I was floored at the depth of the talent both from the Homeling participants as well as the Hammies.
Kudos for the article, as well as to all involved with brining the Art show to life.
Some of the featured artwork is really quite excellent. It’s events like this that really make Home come alive, in my opinion.
As a note: some of the images may not perfectly match up with the text, and not all of the images submitted with the article are used on the website. This first batch of articles are all being uploaded by me, and it’s a painstaking process to place images (particularly since I’m relatively new to this interface). That said, the magazine itself will have all of the images, correctly placed, because it’s being put together by trained layout artists and not caffeinated Norwegian boneheads like me.
Once the writers begin to upload their own articles for me to edit, they’ll be able to upload and place their images into the copy as well. That’ll make things a lot easier and smoother. For now, please bear with the bonehead…
--Norse