The A Project

I saw an interesting article in the Walker Magazine in January. In each magazine, the Art Center introduces a member. That month, it was Peter Haakon Thompson. The introduction explained the Art Shanty Projects and the A Project. Curious. I checked out the Art Shanty Projects website but there wasn't a link for the A Project. So I tore the page out for future reference.

I tear out interesting articles/pics/tidbits and file them away for later. Seriously. I have magazine pages from high school in folders in tupperwares while I try to get Rabi to throw out something he acquired yesterday!

Well, what is the Art Shanty Projects? Well, it's a bunch of uncommon ice shanties on Medicine Lake. This is the 4th annual. We checked it out this weekend. Pretty neat. Not artsy fartsy. Thank goodness we went on Sunday and not last week! Jello was melting in one of the shacks. It was pretty warm. My fav probably was the OurBrr shanty. It smelled like Christmas. And since we didn't have snow or the cold this year for Christmas, it really reminded me of Christmas. Inside were animal sounds. Folks could pick an animal and record their interpretation of the sound, which was then played. I didn't try...hadn't yet had my coffee. Which was quickly fixed by a snappy young gal. Someone was providing free and hot coffee, cider, cocoa and mochas out of a minivan covered in astroturf.

We also met the founder Peter Haakon Thompson; thus the article in the Walker mag. Peter is a photographer who also started The A Project. The A Project is a way for art enthusiasts to quickly identify each other. (Am I giving away the secret handshake?!) I haven't really noticed the A in our neighborhood. But I did have a realization today. I did see a big A parked outside the Grain Belt Brewery Bldg (artist studio building) a number of months ago. Like Peter said, maybe I'll be more in tune to it now and will start noticing it around town. We have our sticker now in our car window and at the front door. So we'll see if this helps bring our neighbors together. Community is important and it's kind of hard to have in a city behind closed doors. That's probably the hardest part of living in the States for Rabi. People being indoors all the time; in the winter it's too cold, in the summer it's too hot.

C'est la vie.