Just the bones

Shawn, Maggie, Emily and I decided that cutting the paper totem into pages for a book that would live in the archives of UNC might be an idea. I'll use the wooden hoop that held the bear to help bind it. I photographed the wooden matrix in several postions where the original Totem Teddy stood. This one, by what is now Gray Hall (Bru-Inn) is close to where the original stood. The well known photo of the students in 1947 shows the real position. I wrestled it around a little trying to find the right spot. The wind blew it over one time!

This is an adventure of the Spirit. The people whom I've met and have been gracious and helpful shall be remembered with much love. Steve Girault, one of my teachers throughout my entire education in Greeley used to sign his letters this way:

Much love..

ms

Ghost Retires

April 25, 2008

Met with Emily Carlton, Maggie Wright and Shawn Brackett today at the UC. Jay Dinges appeared with the lift and made sure that I understood that we had to be out of there soon. The kids decided to make a book of the paper totem, so we cut it into about 32 pieces which I’ll assemble into a book, using the wood from the hoop the bear hung in to bind it.

Chris Casey from the Tribune appeared with Jim, his photographer to do a story. Christina from The Mirror appeared later. Each of the students was charming and articulate and bright. We cut up the paper totem, then hauled the matrix outside. Dinges made it clear that if it was not removed from the UC by the end of the day, his crew would just smash it to bits. He was civil and helpful. But, obviously the art was not welcome in his UC. Ronna Sanchez never appeared. Theresa, one of the staff, was very nice.

I met some terrific kids on the way from the UC with the matrix. A beautiful girl..a quad.. let me guide her hand to sign the matrix. She was a pure spirit.. amazing.. Philip a tech major was effusive and fun to chat with. A girl who just loved God and liked to help other people helped me briefly in front of Snyder Hall. The fountain there is long gone.

All together, with the snardly attitude from Dinges and the fear of them destroying the matrix notwithstanding.. I’ve had a heck of a day.

Here’s to you, old Totem Ted.. Long may you wave.

Sheehan

Almost On The Road

I depart for Greeley in the morning.

The responses from most folks at UNC regarding my arrival have been cool. What mystifies me is why the courtesy that was afforded to me years ago with the several projects that I’ve brought to campus that were designed to illuminate Tradition is missing now.

I’ve been thinking about the notion that “some people know the price of everything, but the value of nothing.” Not that my contributions are all that valuable except in the value that they bring to those who actually get it, but because a place of learning is, to me, supposed to be where those who attend are challenged to grow.

I remember seeing a huge display on the UNC campus when I visited some time ago with giant posters of human fetuses and anti-abortion literature. I loved it because it gave students and others who were on the campus an opportunity to discuss the political views of the organization (I believe it was a religious group) that wanted to discourage women from aborting unwanted pregnancies. The basic issue of Pro Choice / Pro Life was up for discussion. That the university allowed that group access to campus shows that letting people have a say and discuss ideas is a great thing. There was no advocacy on the part of UNC. Just access.

That’s all I’ve been asking for. Of course, I’m just one alumnus with a love of tradition at my alma mater. To be censored .. if I am persona non grata at UNC now, it seems antithetical to the basic goal of education. I don’t expect everyone to think that my artwork is the end all of contemporary art. It’s very simple. It’s just an idea, after all. Anyone can do it and if I’m unable to erect the
Re InCarination of Totem Teddy, I’ll hope that a student or even staff or a faculty member will be willing to take up the idea and use it to keep the memory of Totem Teddy alive while the committee I may or may not get to serve on meets and comes up with an idea for a permanent replacement.

To that issue, should I be no longer welcome to contribute my ideas.. this is what I think should happen.

It's a simple suggestion for the Totem Committee to come up with basic requirements that they think are important for a new totem. Send out a Call for Artists that will require submissions by an arbitrary date.. September 1st, 2008. Take the submissions that must include a budget for the construction of the artwork under advisement and select five finalists that the committee agrees has come up with ideas that they approve of. Give the five finalists a stipend to create a maquette and detailed description of materials and final budget. Depending on how serious the committee is, the amount of $500 for each finalist seems fair. Then, all the committee has to do is to set a deadline for itself and award a contract to the winning artist.

Arts experts and lay folks see art differently. So, hopefully, the committee would include faculty or a professional advisor who might guide it toward a work of art that would be aesthetically pleasing and fulfill the expectations of those who really care.

By sticking to dates and getting an artist who is reputable, the debacle of Mustang, that great big horse outside DIA should be avoided. However, I can still see Charlton Heston as Michelangelo painting the Sistine Chapel and Rex Harrison as the Pope yelling at him, “When will it be finished??” Even the Pope couldn’t rush great art.

When Totem Teddy was returned to the Tlingit in 2003, the previous year I asked anyone who would listen if they would contribute to a replica. Tommy Joseph, a Tlingit carver’s rate then was about $2,000 a foot. That would have been about $30,000 for a carved replica by a native carver. I interviewed a wonderful sculptor in Loveland who estimated that the bronze for a heroic replica which he could have duplicated from photos would cost about $20,000 and he would mitigate his fee to be of help. I interviewed a special effects technician who could have come to make a perfect mold of the totem to use for a modern materials replica.

Neither the Alumni Association nor the UNC Foundation was willing to create a fund or otherwise come up with any monies that could be used for a replica of the totem.

Now, it’s great to hear that there are students on campus who may work to recreate another totem that will honor the tradition of Totem Teddy. Frankly, I think that Totem Teddy’s time is probably past. He was a 20th Century Bear. The 21st Century Bears are a new breed.

But, fair’s fair. So.. just move forward. If there’s now money for this project, get it together and use it. If you really care about tradition and the Bear Totem, please just move ahead.

My idea for a temporary installation to follow the now departing Ghost is just an idea attempting to keep that idea alive. It matters to me. It does.

See you on Friday, I hope.

Forty-six Blocks, One Big Bear

Today I cleaned the car and loaded the 46 blocks that make up the ReinCairnation of Totem Teddy. Thanks to Lynn Karowsky for this term. Now, all we have to do is find a way to get the other almost four hundred blocks cut and over to the campus.

This may prove to be a challenge.

I wrote to Rico Wint, the current president of the SRC asking for his help. It would be fun to include the newly elected students, too. If anyone reading this can help recruit them, I’d appreciate that.

Why do all this work for a simple art project and a memory? I ask myself that question, especially when other folks say that they’d pretty much forget about it. Being stuck, a little, in the past.. remembering the smell of spring in Greeley.. the feedlots! Freshly cut grass.. though more in the summertime.. blue skies.. wide streets. Trees trees trees.. is part of it.

Had a nice talk today with a lovely lady who was working in the Alumni Affairs office in 1990 when I was welcomed to UNC to do my Cranford Project. Supportive and direct, she gave me some insights into the bureaucracy of the university and how various factions really need to start communicating with each other to help UNC grow. I’m not close enough to really be of much help… and from the cool reception I’ve gotten so far, it seems that creativity and imagination are not at the top of anyone’s agenda to make UNC an institution where kids really want to come to get an education.

College is a preparation for life in many ways. The nuts and bolts are important, of course.. And, of course, a little tradition isn’t going to make a major difference, but evoking the imagination couldn’t hurt. This is a time for all kinds of life experiences. Biff Rose said "Man does not live by bread alone. You gotta have a little toast."

I’ll be in the UC this coming Friday, April 25th. Hope a lot of folks will show up and we’ll find a way to inspire some fun, remember Totem Teddy and facilitate his ReInCairnation?

Rein CAIRN ation

This is a Mirror photo taken in 1947 when Totem Teddy stood between Bru-Inn and Gunter Hall. This is where he stood when I first saw him in 1946.

After the weather and other elements wore on the totem, CSC President, Dr. William Ross, placed the totem in storage where he stayed until a petition from students allowed him to be restored to Central Campus in 1963.

The bear himself sat for a while in the Carter Library.

Poor Art?

Got another interesting set back today. A professor in the art department whom I'd hoped would recruit a student to help with the Bear Cairn as a project wrote to say that it won't happen.

I wonder what all this resistance is about? The donation of a piece of conceptual art to my alma mater seemed like an opportunity for me to honor my old school and maybe give students something to discuss. Actually, the impression I've gotten as the Ghost Totem has begun to deteriorate has been that the students were inspired to make a permanent replacement maybe because they didn't understand the impermanence of my installation?

The Cairn will be up for only a short period of time. It's going to look pretty cool.. crude and ephemeral..

Growtowsky inspired a "Poor Theatre" and trained actors to just act from the essence of themselves. Their guts and spirits. It was not about the building or the sets or lights.. it was about the actor expressing himself in a very basic way.. for a primer on this, rent My Dinner With Andre (Andre Gregory and Wallace Shawn.. a brilliant movie directed by Louis Malle). The Bear Cairn is like that.. a simple statement, up for discussion, even if the discussion starts with "What the heck is that?"

I'm a little disappointed that there hasn't been much response here.. but it's essentially a journal of my experience that I'll log until my trip to Greeley is complete. It's a quest.. windmills to tilt.. new folks to meet.. questions to be answered...

One question I'd like to have answered would be why the alumni folks who welcomed me in the past seem to have turned their backs on me?

Anyone?

How in the world could a few wooden blocks make much of a difference to anyone?

Bear Cairn

This image is now ready to place on the wooden blocks for the Bear Cairn.
He's about 36 inches high and 18 inches at the widest point from his right paw to his back.

There's something so simple and even pure about this unpainted image. A nineteenth century critter on a 21st century quest. What a trip.

Big Step

The deal is..

that not knowing whether or not the university will cooperate in this cairn idea is a little frustrating. So I just forge ahead and prepare. Today was a Big Step and pretty wonderful. A good friend, a producer with whom I've worked over the years, Robert Roll, has computer equipment superior to mine. He volunteered to honcho a job that I was going to have to pay big bucks for at Kinko's and I took him up on his offer. We spent a better half of this afternoon tiling the image of the Original Bear onto some really nice paper that I'll adhere to the cairn blocks tomorrow. It's pretty labor intensive, this project.

I have to smile because as a concept artist, I have to realize that the art.. the 'so called art?' is mostly in me.. I have the idea.. I work to make it manifest, but regardless of the outcome physically, the important part is done.. The Idea. Of course, this may be like the bear in the forest.. or is it the tree falling? hmmm anyway. I'll post a photo of the Original Bear that will adorn the Cairn Totem.. or should we call it the Bear Cairn? And, will be happy to see what it looks like ten feet in the air.

Having a tough time with this bear image.. stand by..

Stay in touch.

Emily Inspired Dali?

This image by Salvador Dali may have been partly responsible for my inspiration for the Cairn Totem image. Of course, the Bear is less complicated and I don't pretend to have Dali's skills as a draughtsman. I really hope that with the help of Emily and other students on the UNC campus that we'll be able to erect this cairn temporarily.

I'm open for suggestions as to a location for the cairn and regarding the disposition of the Ghost Memory Totem, though I have a loose plan for it.

What I'd really love is for students to buy or find clean eight foot 2 x 6 boards and have them cut into EXACTLY 9 1/2 inch blocks. An eight foot board will yield ten blocks. Home Depot sells the construction grade lumber for about $3.50 for an eight footer. HD will do the cutting, but you often have to watch them carefully to get precise cuts. I'll reimburse anyone who gets blocks made. Please save the receipt.

If we find an on campus location for the Cairn Totem, construction will happen, I hope, the last week of April.

All ideas are solicited and welcome! Thanks.

Re: VP Jerrold DeWitt

I sent an email to Jerrold DeWitt, UNC Vice President of Alumni and Donor Relations, after not receiving a call from him on March 31st. He's probably a busy guy. If you'd like to give him a call or send him an email supporting the idea of the installation of a temporary Bear Cairn, please do.

Here's his contact information:


Jerry DeWitt
Vice President of Alumni and Donor Relations
UNC Foundation
Judy Farr Alumni Center, Campus Box 20
Greeley, CO 80639
970 351 2557 Office
970 381 1753 Mobile
jerry.dewitt@unco.edu

Facebook Opens the Door

Facebook saves the day?

The suggestion to log on to Facebook was brilliant.

I’m hoping that there may be lots of you UNC students now reading this journal and that I may be able to meet you when I get to Greeley.

I now live in Glendale, California. After graduation from CSC, I landed a teaching job in Orange County and eventually wound up in Hollywood where I’ve made a living working as an actor. My artwork has been more personal. That my alma mater has honored me by allowing me to do art projects there has given me reason to return to Greeley. I've been very grateful. Greeley is also my home town so I'll get to see family and friends.

If I'm on schedule, I’ll leave for Greeley on Earth Day, April 22 and arrive at the UC on Friday, April 25th. Depending on whether or not The Cairn Totem Project will be allowed to be installed temporarily with as many of you UNC folks participating is currently in the balance. Certain things have been said about me and my artwork that leads me to believe that the only way I’ll get to install one last tribute to Totem Teddy will be if the students really want to and a space is provided. I’d like to do it in the UC where the Ghost Memory Totem has been since 2005. Communication with the Alumni Affairs office has stopped, so I’m unsure who needs to give the okay. I've asked the director of the UC, Ronna Sanchez.

If any of you, especially after your elections coming up are concluded, you new leaders on campus.. if you start asking for ideas as to how to allow me this opportunity, it may make a difference. I’ve heard from current student leaders who, I hope, will be supportive. I have not heard from President Norton and don’t know what her response might be. In the past, I worked with a Vice President in charge of Student Affairs who was really a terrific help. I hope that the current administration will see not only the educational value of unusual art on campus, but the effect on raising awareness of UNC tradition. Of course, that’s what it’s all about.. Renewing an interest in the history and tradition of UNC.

Make comments here. Write or call. I really would like to know how you students feel about this project. And, if you have time to join the Totem Teddy page on Facebook, that will be terrific. Please spread the word.

Sheehan

Art for Art for Artists

At last! Thanks to Shawn Brackett for his comments and critique of my Ghost Memory Totem.

First, it’s important to remember something about art. I make art pretty much for myself. The installation in the UNC Center is not papier mache. It’s an embossing of the original Bear Totem. I was unsuccessful when I tried, in 2002, to do what students are apparently trying to do now, raise funds for a permanent substitute for Totem Teddy. In my quest, I asked the UNC Foundation and the Alumni Association for funds to either have a duplicate carved or a bronze created that would be an exact replica, I struck out.

My attitude at the time was that if no one was interested in preserving the heritage of The Bear, then, I’d do it on my own. The only UNC support I could get was the permission to make my own duplicate.

My goal was to have a temporary, ephemeral tribute that I could pretty much do all by myself. I was fortunate to have invaluable help from the School of Theatre Arts (I was in the Theatre Program as an undergrad and did summer theatre at LTR in the sixties), They got the wooden matrix together from my design.

The spring of 2003 I was able to get the cooperation of the UC to have access and make a literal translation of Totem Teddy with one huge sheet of heavy water color paper. The image turning above the column is taken from an early photo of the totem. The essence of this ephemeral piece is deliberately temporary. It was tied onto the wooden column by cotton string with bow knots. I told Jay Dinges, the associate director of the UC , that I expected gravity and time to take its toll and that when the time came, I’d return to reclaim the piece.

My simple sculpture contains direct images of the original totem. As I’ve said, I believe that energy is transferred in some subtle way. The embossing will be preserved in a book of pages that will be available for those who may want to touch it one day. Of course, it isn’t the Shroud of Turin… but energy is energy and .. there you go.

That Shawn, as a current student, and others may feel this installation is ‘poor’ is quite right. It is towards a vision in Poor Art. This is the art that is made on a shoestring: the art that anyone can do if they desire. Costs are minimal and therefore don’t need outside funding. Control is in the hands of the artist. I pay my own way.

The one good thing that this Ghost Memory Totem may have done is to have raised consciousness about the history and tradition of Totem Teddy. I’ve recounted my lifetime association with it and, yes, that spirit is in me! So, if students and others want a perfect totem pole looking totem pole, that’s wonderful. Why wasn’t someone interested in my desire to do just that from the time we learned that the Tlingit would reclaim our totem six years ago?

Of course, the reason is that no one cared. But, now? Will a committee raise $30,000 and either have a totem carved or a bronze made or some other tribute created? A full sized ceramic? I like all of those ideas and frankly, as long as there is something with a bear included, I’ll be happy.

My current idea for another temporary installation of wooden blocks signed by students and others and stacked in a ten foot cairn is A TEMPORARY IDEA.. It may be an opportunity for a tradition, though the University of Northern Colorado is not long on tradition. I feel like a spawning salmon headed up stream. Gosh, we know what happens to those guys when they reach their goal!

The Cairn Totem idea will be totally funded by me. The energy of those interested in tradition who will sign the blocks of the cairn is just an idea. The Concept of having many individuals involved in a group is the Art. If I do it all by myself and leave it up for 24 hours, then it’s just my experience. If others opt to join me in a tradition, then, they will have that as something deep within them that may be never lost.

Why would a guy whose experience on the Greeley campus goes back over sixty years want to do something for alma mater? For Greeley? Why does anyone do anything… because it feels like an important thing to do. Because I love my home town. Because I want so much for the tradition of the Bear to never be forgotten. Yes. It feels good.

There may be a few students left on campus who were there in 2005 who stopped and chatted with me as I wheeled the wooden matrix from Frasier to the UC. It was a beautiful spring day. The UNC Marching Band was assembled by Garden Theatre. I spoke to some of them. I met others. A teacher, I think.. and I asked some of them to sign the matrix. It was as though those few people were now participants, accomplices?, in my work.

What are the important memories of our youth? Each of us can flash back to some of them. For me, many memories turn on Totem Teddy. Shawn’s observations are articulate and welcome. This is the politics of art. Get involved. Invite your fellow bears to come along.

Visit me in the UC as I dismantle the Ghost Memory Totem. Treasure your Bear Heritage.

One Bear Two Bear Brown Bear Black Bear?

I may have been living in a delusion for all of my life! I now see that Totem Teddy has been referred to as a ‘brown’ bear. I always thought that a brown bear was the less robust of the two major species. Now, I learn that ‘brown’ is synonymous with grizzly! The black bear urusus americanus is less aggressive and less muscular than the grizzly, ursus arctos.

I’ve been asking around and have yet to get an answer. No idea if there are grizzlies in Angoon?

Got some correspondence today from a couple of students at UNC. The president of the SRC, Rico Wint and Mason Smith, a student who seems to have a great interest in getting moving on a permanent replacement for Totem Teddy. No idea if I’ll be allowed to do the Cairn Totem. My reasoning is that Andrew Thompson innocently sent the original totem to Greeley as a gesture of his appreciation for his education and his love of alma mater. Though my gifts are, perhaps, not quite so grand, I can assure everyone that I have complete authority to make my gifts.

Mr. Thompson probably didn’t know the significance of the Bear Totem and for what it’s worth, I hope that the Tlingit have forgiven him… and us, for not realizing what it means to them. I’ve forgiven them for taking the totem away.

I’ve started a Facebook page for students to visit. Sure hope that interest gets cooking at the grassroots level. Check for Totem Teddy there, if you are a member.