Wednesday 27 March 2013

Entrepreneurs

Yesterday I went to a Entrepreneurs conference....That doesn't sound like the kind of thing I would do does it? but I did it because:

  •  I was invited by a friend who I assumed would be coming but actually didn't go,
  •  I didn't have much else to do. 
  • There was a speaker who had access to a lazer.
  •  It was free and you got a free drink.
  •  I think I could be an entrepreneur if I wanted to, I just probably don't want to.

There were lots of speakers from different organisations, mainly ones to do with helping people start new businesses. The first thing the first speaker said was that entrepreneurs are a different breed of person, they work harder than the average 9 to 5 worker, and their job is their life.  Well if that's the case I want to be the opposite of an entrepreneur e.g someone who works less hard than a 9 to 5 person, where there's more to life than my job.

I've always wondered about that Dolly Parton song 'working 9 till 5.' What is she trying to say? Is she complaining? because I think they are actually very reasonable working hours. My husband works 8.30 till 5 with a total of 3 hours commuting each day, and only half an hour for lunch, and he hasn't written a moaning song about it.

So anyway this woman talked for half an hour about how they help people become entrepreneurs and in that time she said the word 'entrepreneur' about 5000 times.

She also said 'our website is literally www. entrepreneurcountry.com' I'm so glad she didn't tell us that metaphorically or I might not have been able to work it out.

At the end there was a question time and I asked how they made their money....she didn't enjoy answering that one but the man sitting next to me said 'good question'

The man sitting next to me had a handle bar moustache and when I asked him what he did he said he was working on getting the internet off laptops and phones and into the 'real world.' I asked for an example, and he said he has a bubble machine in his workplace and when you tweet his work twitter account bubbles come out. How very useful. He has also invented a chicken feeder that emails the owner when it's getting empty....Frigging look outside your window you lazy chicken keepers!! I'm a great believer in keeping the internet inside a box that isn't constantly accessible. Theres nothing you can do with an ipad that you can't do better with paper and pencils. Like wouldn't you totally have prefered it if you had received this blog post by hand written postcard? I would have done little doodles of unimpressed chickens and everything.

Anyway the man with the lazer said I could come to a 'making day' in his shared studio space thing and I can see the lazer and the 3D printer and stuff. I thought all printers were 3D or else how could you put paper inside them? but it turns out this printer can print 3D things.

Thursday 14 March 2013

Art, Kids and Comedy

Art, Kids and Comedy are some of my favourite things which is lucky because I teach art to kids and I am a amateur comedian. I've just given myself the amateur comedian title right now on account of the fact I have preformed comedy 6 times and I have 2 more times on the pipeline.

Kids are great, the reason is because they say funny things all the time without knowing it. Which means as a amateur comedian, you can just use the stuff they say as material, and they probably won't try and sue you. I can't wait till I have my own kids who will obviously be hilarious the whole time, and this hilarity will make our whole family rich an famous, as we tour the world in our magnificent sparkly comedy tour bus.

Last week I was teaching kids about colour mixing and I was saying how blue is a primary colour which means you can't make it you have to buy it. A kid said 'the people in the shop must know how to make it though' as if I'd just forgotten how you mix blue. I really wish I knew how they did make blue paint. I guess I could google it, but then there would be no mystery left in the world.

This week in art we have been learning about portraits, I made a PowerPoint of some famous ones from the Mona Lisa in 1503 to a portrait of the Queen by Lucian Freud in 2001. So far I have showed this PowerPoint to 3 classes of 7 to 9 year olds, and they're reactions have been very simular: Frida Kahlo's 1938 self portrait is hilarious...well she does have a mono-brow.


But the majority of the discussion was about Andy Warhols 1962 Marilyn Monroe print.



The comment made by two children in two different classes was 'I've seen this at Pontins'. When I told them that the Marilyn picture wasn't even a painting and he didn't even do it himself they were outraged and chanted 'cheater' 'cheater'. Then a kid asked why Lucian Freud had painted the queen with a crumpled face.



I have been making my own art recently... or rather I have been mocking video art through the medium of video art. Is it art? is it comedy? is it film-making at it's finest? Or is it a mental woman hoovering the face of her husband? Who can tell.  I hope it wins the Tunner prize and a Baffta, and some kind of comedy award.

http://youtu.be/n8tkFcf3VaQ