Updated! Upcoming Art Events for Summer-Fall 2017

Looking to start or add to your collection of unique, science-inspired art? Here's where you'll find me over the next few months: 

July 12-16

Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts

State College, PA

August 26

17th Street Festival

Washington, DC

September 1 - November 1
Johns Hopkins University, Montgomery County Campus

Rockville, MD 

September 23

Hyattsville Arts & Ales Festival

Hyattsville, MD

October 7

Art on the Avenue

Alexandria, VA

October 16-18
Global Conference on Pharmaceutical Microbiology
Bethesda, MD

November 11-15

Society for Neuroscience 

Washington, DC

November 24-25
Bazaart at AVAM
Baltimore, MD 

December 3-5

ASCB-EMBO 2017

Philadelphia, PA

December 9
GRUMP
Crystal City, VA

And of course you can always find my work on etsy. 

Zone of Resistance

Apart from a few anti-Bush efforts way back at the beginning of my career, I've pretty much avoided making political art. But it was impossible for me, as an artist, an American, and a proud resident of Washington, DC, not to be affected by the political turmoil of the past year. I've been protesting my heart out, and eventually I channeled my anger, despair and hope into Zone of Resistance, a mixed-media piece (watercolor, plastic and resin), inspired by the pattern that forms when antibiotics meet pathogens in a petri dish. (i don't want to over-explain it, but that's pink power overcoming the harmful bacteria) I hope to show it at an exhibition in DC next month.

Update: Zone of Resistance will be on display at the DCCAH Eye Street Gallery from June 16-August 11, in the lobby at 200 I Street, SE in Washington, DC. 

Thank Me for Coming

Let me say this right up front: none of this is a big deal. I know that. And I also know that what I’m about to tell you has happened to many people before me and will happen to many after. But it’s been a few months and I still can’t shake the hurt, so I decided to write about it anyway.

On December 10, 2016, midway between the national body blows of Hillary Clinton’s electoral loss and Donald Trump’s inauguration, I had a small, personal one of my own. That evening, a reception was held for my first solo gallery show in more than 10 years, and nobody came. Not one single person.

None of my hundreds of facebook friends. None of my thousands of twitter followers. Most painfully, though, not a single one of the hundreds of people whose openings I have attended in my 15 plus years of making art in DC. Not one.

I know there were some good reasons. It was a busy weekend. Several other art spaces were having events. Holiday festivities were no doubt underway. But all the same, not one single person decided that mine was the event that they would put first. And that hurts like kneeling on gravel.

I immediately decided never to go to anyone’s opening again. And then I decided to go to everyone’s, so it would never happen to any of my friends. But even with all of the time and the alcohol and the yoga that have passed since that night, I still feel a little bitter every time I show up to a bustling opening and am greeted by all the usual people. The people who didn’t show up for me.

Now I find myself seriously considering whether I should ever try again. I had already applied for a show out in the suburbs in Virginia, but hey! I got rejected, so I no longer had to worry whether anyone would come or not. A show at AU? Chances are a little better that some people might come to a show in DC, but hey! I got rejected, so I’ll never have to find out.

For every exhibition opportunity I have considered since that day, I’m adding an extra layer of dread on top of the usual likelihood of getting rejected. What if I am selected, and I work on a show for months, and once again nobody comes? There is so much effort and expense involved in putting together a solo exhibition, I just don’t know whether I can, or should, even bother.

For now, I’m sticking to festivals, where it’s someone else’s job to draw the crowd, and to the internet, where people seem to like the cartoon version of me. Who knows, maybe in three weeks, or three months, or another ten years, an amazing opportunity for a show will come up, and I’ll do it and it will be great. Or maybe it won’t.

In the meantime, if you should see me at your opening, thank me for coming. 

The Arctic Bride

Michele Banks, The Arctic Bride, Mixed Media, 2017 

With Arctic sea ice at its lowest-ever recorded levels, and the administration poised to roll back environmental protections, spring of 2017 seemed like a good time for a wedding. For my seventh appearance at Artomatic, I decided to show this piece, The Arctic Bride, instead of my usual paintings. This mixed-media piece (yes, that's a real wedding dress that I bought on eBay) considers the marriage of Ice and Carbon. I first had the idea for this piece when I was working with Jessica Beels and Ellyn Weiss on Voyage of Discovery, our climate-inspired show at the AAAS in 2014. Looking at pictures ice and snow in the Arctic, I was reminded of the thick, glossy, pristine white draping of a wedding dress, and all the concepts of purity tied up in that image. 

For that show, we ended up making a larger, much more abstract piece called Waning Albedo.

Waning Albedo, Jessica Beels, Michele Banks and Ellyn Weiss, Mixed Media, 2014

I decided to revisit the idea in this piece. I'll leave it for others to tease out the layers of meaning here, but I think we can all agree that this marriage will be dangerous and damaging for the beautiful bride. 

Artomatic, which features the work of 600+ artists, runs through May 6 at 1800 South Bell Street in Arlington. 

Pay, Pay, Pay to Play

I don’t like to fight on twitter, but when somebody told me that, unlike scientists, artists and writers never publish their work for free, I had no choice.  Ahem. 

YES THEY DO, YOU IDIOT. ALL THE TIME.

I’ve been a professional artist for over 15 years. Here’s how I make money: I put my work in gallery shows and art festivals and I sell it online. The first two, and to some extent all three, are emphatically pay-to-play.

With very rare exceptions, an artist who shows in any type of gallery gets no pay for actually making the work. She buys all the supplies, paints or sculpts, frames and mounts, and delivers ready-to-display work to the gallery. In many cases, the artist also pays for photography of her work, postcards to advertise the show, and even the food and wine for the opening.  In return, the gallery provides display space, hanging, publicity, back-office functions and, ideally, buyers, in exchange for a commission (usually 50%) on sold works. But of course, there is no guarantee that any work will sell, so many artists end up thousands of dollars in the hole for gallery shows.

Artists who show at festivals also pay upfront in hopes of making money. Most shows charge application fees ranging from $25-50, and booth fees ranging from $100-1,000, depending on the size and prestige of the show. Artists generally have to provide a display system, a payment system, and a bunch of finished work (not to mention tools, bags, business cards and usually a tent). If you don’t earn back your booth fee, do you get your money back? Hahahahahahahaha.

Even Etsy, where I make most of my money, requires upfront investment by the artist in terms of making, photographing and listing work for sale. Their fees are pretty low, but again, if your stuff doesn’t sell, you’ll be out some time, money and listing fees.

Now let’s do writers. Hey, maybe you wrote a great short story and you want to publish it. Say you’re already well-known and The New Yorker wants to publish your story. Sure, they’ll pay. But if you’re not an established writer, chances are you’ll be publishing that story in a literary journal for nothing.

I could go on, but I think I’ve made my point.

Just a note on the science side. Most scientists in academia who are publishing in journals are getting paid to do science. They get a salary or at least a grad-school stipend. Most science research is funded by grants. Part of the grant money is usually set aside for the publishing fees. Are the economics of scientific journal publishing profoundly tilted to the benefit of the publishers vis-à-vis the scientists? Probably! Does this mean that scientists who publish are working for free? Not really.