cafe müller

from kanarinka's delicious.

Sonic Fire tshirts in NH

My mother mentioned an article she has seen recently about an "electric" tshirt company that she thought I might be interested in. It turns out the company, SonicFire, is based in Manchester NH and makes tshirts with electroluminescent powder under a flexible plastic face. The shirts light up and are reactive to sound. At Social Fabrics, there were a few projects that were sound reactive including Heidi Kumao's dress and bra. The tshirts' electroluminescent powder allows for detailed designs and is not as clunky as the leds. The tshirts still have a rather large battery pack since they use more accessible AAAs. The shirts can be washed by hand since the battery pack is removable and the powder is under the plastic but they can't be crumpled or twisted or the design would get messed up.

plays about Berlin 2

Crosscut by Rebecca Rule

. . . The storyteller whose specialty is local humor ended up on a project collecting the stories of loggers, mill workers and families affected by paper mill closures.

“It’s a bit of diversion, yeah. There’s not a lot that’s funny about what’s going on in the North Country ... except, people are funny. People can find the humor in almost anything. What doesn’t kill you makes you laugh eventually,” Rule said.

She spent “40 days and 40 nights” in 2007 recording stories of the memories, experiences and lives of about 40 people in Berlin, Milan and Gorham. She also attended events where people told their stories at senior centers, the Northern Forest Heritage Park and elsewhere. The outcome includes a four-character play called Crosscut.

Theatre North produced a staged reading of Crosscut in November 2007. But a play is hard to bring around the state, so Rule has adapted it into one-person piece.

She has been working with the oral histories in other ways. As she interviewed, she wrote profiles that were published in the Berlin Daily Sun. She’s writing an essay for a collection on the North Country. She and photographer Eric Kaminsky want to create a book about the last days of the mills. A Massachusetts teacher heard about the project and adapted Crosscut for kids. It was performed or read in four or five schools, Rule said.

Rule said she still gets calls asking her to come up and interview people.

This wasn’t Rule’s idea. Frumie Selchen, executive director of the Arts Alliance of Northern New Hampshire, was heading an Androscoggin Valley Community Partners committee. The group included local industry, United Way and others who wanted to do something unique to help Berlin. “They came up with the idea of preserving stories as way of healing,” Rule said. They asked Rule, and found funding to commission her.

“I think I’ve been preparing my whole career to do this work and I just didn’t know it,” Rule said.

Presenting a play created from the stories to the community was a way of giving back, she said. She thought compiling them would be easier than it was. Her estimate of a month to write the play stretched to six.

“I wanted to use as much of the actual language that I possibly could ... I wanted to let them tell the story. I didn’t want to tell the story.”

She didn’t use much historical reference, unless the subjects brought it up. Themes emerged such as religion, the work and work ethic, and “connection to community. Berlin has very strong center, a very strong heart,” Rule said.

“It’s as diverse a community as you’re going to get in New Hampshire,” Rule said. French, Norwegian, Greek, Swedish, Italian, Irish — mostly European immigrants came for the work and stayed. “It’s an amazing town,” Rule said.

- Reblogged from HippoPress

plays about Berlin 1

NORTH CONWAY — M&D Productions of North Conway is opening a new play just for the people of Berlin. It is called “The Warmth of the Cold” by N.H. playwright Lowell Williams (Winner of 2006 N.H. Theatre Award for Best Original Play). It is a family drama set in Berlin in the middle of winter on the day of the year’s worst snowstorm. It is a deeply felt and poignant story about a family dealing with hardship and loss who are caught, to use Tennessee William’s expression, “in the thundercloud of a common crisis.” The story centers on Carol and her two teenage children Samantha and
Robbie, who are struggling to carry n after the death of Hal, their father, who was killed in an accident after being forced to take a job as a truck driver when the mill in their small New Hampshire town closes. Carol, unable to accept Hal’s death, escapes into a fantasy world where she converses with him every day through the music on the radio. Robbie and Samantha are forced to grow up too fast and become the adults in this dysfunctional and sometimes crazy household. Robbie steps into his father’s shoes to become the “man of the house” and struggles to keep the family together while Samantha does everything she can to find a way out. “This story is sadly typical of today’s economic climate.” states Mark DeLancey, executive director. “The playwright is a good friend of mine and I approached him to bring this to the north country.” Lowell Williams is a struggling playwright who has taken this story from a personal connection he has with a family in the area. Lowell agrees that this play couldn’t be more poignant in conveying how these people live from paycheck to paycheck and are suddenly thrust into a downward spiral after life throws them a curve ball. “The play isn’t without hope” says director Neil Pankhurst. “Yes this family is down and out but the end of the show instills hope that there lives are turning around for the better.” For a limited time M&D is offering a two for one special on opening week of March 26-28. If you are a Berlin or Gorham area resident, you are invited
to attend this show at the discounted ticket price. “The Warmth of the Cold,” starring Dan Tetreault, Rae McCarey, Katie Gustafson, Kyle Mulcahy and Ezra Timberlake Alves, is produced by M&D Productions and directed by Neil Pankhurst of Winni Playhouse. It runs Thursday, Fridays and Saturdays at 7:30 p.m., March. 26, through April 11, at The “YourTheatre” location, 1857 White Mountain Highway in North Conway,. For tickets or information, call 603-662- 7591 or email us at info@yourtheatre. com.
From the Berlin Daily Sun 3/25/09

Original Hamsters

Our friend Matti DJing with a blender and some fruit. The fruit is magical:
"The audio tracks are triggered by inserting different fruits into the blender. The buttons on the front panel control the mixing modes and you also have two different types of transformer switches for cutting the sound in and out."

flushtopia postcards/brochures

twittering machine

mobile blogging device- part 1

Scarlet Electric on Fashioning Tecnhology

Scarlet Electric was featured a while back on Fashioning Technology, Syuzi Pakhchyan's blog and social network site.

piche nut

The other day our niece was piche nutting her brother which is both annoying and funny (this means to flick with the index finger by holding and then releasing the thumb.) It made me think about our old Piche nut table. I need to find it! I am not sure who has it now but it needs to make an appearance at our next event.

OK so I am on a kick of preserving French-Candadian heritage again. I think I will try to start something with the Franco American center in Manch. that is geared toward young people. That's all I have so far. Piche nut cannot die. I don't even really know how to play it beside the flicking part.

Possible names for the group (for the greater effort replace pichenut with French Candadian culture/hertiage)

Society for the Protection of Pichenut
Institute for the Preservation of Pichenut
Pichenut Players Association


wikipedia explanation of the game
slightly different version

40 Under 40

Steve at the 40 Under 40 reception with NH Governor John Lynch and a woman from Citizen's Bank.

pj dolls

Sketches of dolls that I had growing up from pictures I found of them on Internet and memory. Maybe LED paintings later.

GhanaThinkTank in Liverpool!

The Ghana Think Tank guys (Christopher Robbins+John Ewing+Eb Odonkor) are hitting the road.

The Ghana Think Tank will be in Liverpool from March 2009 at FACT, the Foundation for Art and Creative Technology. See what we're up to in Liverpool at the Ghana Think Tank blog

Leonardo+Social Fabrics

Our work, EarBuddies and BFFM with Islay Taylor has been included in Leonardo: The Journal of the International Society for Arts, Sciences and Technology.

The work is featured in Volume 42, Issue 2, April 2009 in the article and gallery "Social Fabrics: Wearable + Media + Interconnectivity" by Susan Elizabeth Ryan, who, along with Patrick Lichty, co-curated the modified runway show of the same name in Dallas, TX at CAA in February 2008. It will also be accessible in an online gallery.

The Abstract for "Social Fabrics: Wearable + Media + Interconnectivity" by Susan Elizabeth Ryan.

Art as a garment, fused with sensing, media and network technology, can become a powerful means for investigating current forms of social interaction and the place of the body and self in digital society. The Leonardo Social Fabrics Gallery presents new works exploring this rich mix of old and new arts and technologies.

creative grooming-pink coyote

Leonardoodle

Peter and Breanne at Scope

via Christopher Robbins. Little sculptures for Rush gallery.
Their site.

craft talk by leslie hall

glue it-cut it-stitch it-felt it-paint it-bead it-dough it-dye it-embroider it-solder it-hotter it-

real eyelash extensions

eyelash extensions