CLOWNCRAFT vol. DEUX

Noses and Clotheses for Showses.

Do NOT ask me how long I spent trying to come up with a subtitle for this that was as good as Props for Flops before I decided I needed to move on. I was gathering notes for this post, and I was like oh no, there’s no way the sequel will be as good as the first one. But maybe, just maybe, we’ll end up with a Terminator 2: Judgement Day of a post. On the other hand, if we end up with a Teen Wolf Too, just know that I tried my best. And I’m glad you’re here. Oh—you’ve got an eyelash. I’ll just… there.

DOODLIN’ FOR THE CULTURE

Since writing PART ONE, I’ve done a few more show posters. I offered to do a poster for a Clown Revue at Brooklyn Comedy Collective, and later I was commissioned to create an evergreen version that they could use over and over. So the second version below (with the placeholder names) has tweakable text layers for performers and dates.

Let’s all agree to separate the art from the artist when it comes to Jaxon Blarpington.

I also did a poster for a beautifully titled show, CLOWN IS HAVING A MOMENT. It’s hosted by Tallie Medel and features, I believe, infinity clowns? So my idea was to create a horrifying blob o’clown and have Tallie wranglin’ the mess. It might be my favorite poster I’ve ever drawn, and I’m really looking forward to the show. I actually bought tickets for a BCC show for once because I’m no longer a student (students get into shows for free) because I just finished Clown 3 which is the final class in the program and now I don’t have a weekly class and I haven’t allowed myself to get kinda freaked out about that yet but I know that the feeling is kinda gestating and gathering strength oh no help help help.

LIGHT UP THE NIGHT

Back in September, I took over my living room for a week building light-up Twin Tower stage risers for Ethan & Gigi’s THE MOVEMENT, a show about two well-meaning artists trying to create “America’s First Good 9/11”. It was a perfect project, because it was multi-disciplinary (woodworking, painting, electrical), I learned new skills (I’d never built anything with LED strips or foot switches), and I got to fulfill someone else’s vision (which is a fun challenge). There was concept art, and they knew what dimensions they wanted. After that… we just had to figure it out.

I started by overbuilding the heck out of the risers, because they were going to be hauled around and stomped on. Glue! Screws! Brackets! And I painted them with the blackest black paint I could find.

It took a bit, but I found LED strips that ① put out a solid, diffused beam rather than little points of light and ② were cuttable and ③ could bend super close to 90°. They came with little brackets that were screwed and glued in place. And between the power supply and the wall, I installed footswitches that I mounted to the tops of the platforms. And all of the wires were secured on the undersides of the risers with single cords coming out of the backs.

Then, a problem. There was a 2-4 second delay between hitting the foot switch and the lights coming on. Technically speaking, and forgive me if this goes over your head, the power supply wanted to gobble up some juice before passing it along. And I didn’t have a great solution for it. But OH YEAH. It’s a dang clown show! When I shared my progress, Ethan and Gigi loved the delay and immediately schemed about ways to play with it. So… I meant to do that. Whew.

OOH, this project scratched an itch. Tons of problem solving. A specific deadline. Lots of tools. And I got to send it off and see it put to use. Wanna talk stage prop stuff? Holler at me.

It was a beautiful show. Clowns could save the world if everyone would just be cool.

A SHIRT FOR CATCHING FEELINGS

Hey. I gotta tell ya… writing is a slog today. It was gray and kinda oogy out while writing this, so if it’s okay with you, I’m going to reeeeeeally phone it in on this section. Okay?

SO. I made a shirt for an act that I mentioned last time called Catching Feelings. I wanted some new ‘stume stuff, and The Neutral Mask came to mind for this act. Neutral mask is a training technique developed by Jacques Lecoq to hide character, attitude, emotion, expression, etc. behind an expressionless mask and invite the wearer to engaaaaaaaage their body in honesty and focused movement.

“The neutral mask is a way of understanding performance, not a way of performing.”
– Jacques Lecoq

When I first started getting into clown and reading The Moving Body by Jacques Lecoq, neutral mask reminded me (visually) of the faces I’d put on all of my pottery. I’d try to make them as expressionless as possible so observers would project their own emotions onto them.

So yeah. I done went and put them faces all over a shirt I had but never wore. Uh ohhhhhh, it might make its way into the everyday wear closet.

Here are some pics of me wearing the shirt I was talking about literally seconds ago taken by Deanne Smith, a super funny and good and clever and Canadian comedian. Look back and forth at them for seamless Brainwaav® 400K Imagi-Animation.

THE SILLIEST NOSE IN THE WORLD

One more thing and I’ll let you go. By the way, it’s been so nice spending time with you.

For a recent Idiot’s Hour performance, I made a custom nose. Rather, the nose kinda came first. I… here. Here’s a how-to for a nose that inspired an act. Does Substack let me just embed… YEAH!

It was really fun, and now I’m thinking about all sorts of possibilities. My next nose project will probably be a neutral mask red nose. Whoa. I probably should have made sure you were sitting down before dropping that on you.

Oh! I put the whole performance up on YouTube by smooshing the livestream feed and two iPhone recordings together. If you would like to see it, move your eyeballs down a little bit, then move your finger toward the center of the frame, then lightly press your finger against the middle of the frame, then continue to focus your eyeballs on the video that comes out of the frame.

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I’ve really been loving making things lately. Shout out to clown for inspiring me. Shout out to people. Shout out to autumn. I implore, encourage, demand, and beseech that you take fifteen seconds to do a little doodle on a piece of paper today. Tell me how it goes.

My doorbell just rang. Is it you?