The Schmutz Company

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The Schmutz Company is going to be really busy over the next few weeks. First with an adult puppet show at Remedy’s “Sinferno” (March 27th). Come see our foray into puppet video with “The Shoebox of Misfit Sex Toys”! You will squirm!

Then come see us on our best behavior as resident artists at The Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh!

Monday, Mar. 29 – Thurs., Apr. 1

2:00-4:00 Daily
Join The Schmutz Company (artists Dave English and Don Orkoskey)
to create your own animated short film using stop-motion animation techniques and simple torn paper. THEN bring your friends to see your short film’s moment on the silver screen at Saturday’s festival of visitor-created paper-mation!

The Schmutz Company’s Festival of Paper-mation will be Sat. April 3, 3:00 in the Theater. Enjoy popcorn and screenings of visitor-created short films using torn paper and stop-motion animation techniques hosted by The Schmutz Company. For The Schmutz Company, playtime is serious business.

After we take care of business on those two projects we’ll start posting our upcoming calendar of events. We are going to be an exciting and unique part of your summer whether you like it or not!

Get Our Ringtone!!!

No joke, this isn’t spam, we were not hacked and best of all the ringtone costs you NOTHING*

Go here: http://www.locallytoned.org/tone/217

Get the tone, load it on your phone, and take your meds.

You can read about the tone that was done as part of artist T. Foley’s project: Locally Toned

About the Ringtone

Our ringtone is a song by Nicky the Ninny about how he’s not going to take his meds. If you saw A Circus In My Drawers which we performed several times last year then you’ll remember Nicky as the lead puppet who we had to take to the circus. We’ll Nicky is back and we made him to a ringtone. You can *download it from the site for free or have it sent to your phone.

Teresa Foley did an amazing job recording the song and we love the Locally Toned project. To find out more about our tone check out this great blog post that she wrote which also includes some great photos of the Ninny: http://locallytoned.wordpress.com/2010/03/12/ninnytone/

Rent the Lodge

So we’ve recently gotten permission to hold a limited number of special events and classes at the Lodge.

If you’re interested in renting it visit the rental page here or visit the Facebook group to get more information.

We have certain goals in mind for the kinds of programing that we are looking for. We’ve hosted a number of parties at the Lodge and they’ve been fun but have not exactly been what we’ve been looking to host there. We also hosted the Brew House’s Distillery 4 show titled: Unstill’d which helped to show us a direction that we could move in. We’d love to host more art openings, instillations or otherwise. We’ve got a great amount of space and are only a block off of Penn Ave.

We’re  also interested in classes, dance classes, yoga, instructional classes, and the like. If you need a space to host your class please let us know. We have space for small classes on the first floor and larger classes on our second floor.

We are planning to add a larger more powerful projector and screen so that we can screen movies at the Lodge. If you’re a film maker looking to show a digital version of your work to a small audience (up to 45 people) let us know.

Please visit the rental page for more info.

Closing Ceremonies

Just a quick note that March 5th will be the closing of the Distillery Programs Unstill’d show at the Schmutz Lodge. It’s been a fun ride. We’ll miss the activity and buzz of 9 artists and their helpers running around and creating.

We’ve had a great time with the artists and their work is amazing, I’ve heard different parts of the collection described as contemplative, revealing, engaging, and have witnessed the harmony and synergy they’ve created within the environments they are installed in. The Schmutz Lodge has clearly benefited by and is better because of our involvement with the show and the associated artists.

So once again, March 5th from 6pm to 10pm will be the closing event. Stop by and check out the stuff that these folks have done – we expect a HUGE crowd so we encourage everyone to come, check the show out, and then be sure to go see some of the other great stuff that is happening on Penn Ave that night. For more info on that check out the Penn Ave. Arts Initiative’s unBlurred website here.

Unstill’d photos

Don almost never works this fast but with the snowpocalypse he had the time to finish the photos so here are some choice shots as well as a link to the gallery of them all.

- Enjoy!

Here are the rest of the photos: http://wdophoto.zenfolio.com/p211802708

Unstill’d Live Blog

Filling Up

Just a quick note and a few thank yous.

The Schmutz Lodge is so excited to house the Distillery 4 residents for this month and we really just have to take a moment to thank them (the artists), Rose Clancy (their curator for this show and a Distillery alum), and the people who have pledge to come out and support them!

We’ve never seen so many people anxious to come to the Lodge for an event before. It just goes to show what happens when you get so many quality folks together – you can really generate a huge draw. It’s really inspired us to think of future events through the lens of this show.

To see so many artists in this space working together, sharing ideas, collaborating, and learning from each other is something that I will never forget. I’ve never seen anything like this. The camaraderie and kinship that these artists are building is powerful and inspirational.

Who would have though that after they lost the studio space they were awarded that these amazing artists that they’d be able to pull off a show of this magnitude? I just looked at Facebook to see what we are up to as far as attendance and the attendance level is twice as high as anything we’ve done before. Add to that the fact that these artists have been reaching out to their friends and families that are not on Facebook along with handing out flyers at the Cultural District gallery crawl this past Friday and posting them around the city and we’re expecting to be inundated with people. That doesn’t happen just because they got the word out though. That happens because people are excited to see what these 8 artists and their curator have created. I’m just glad that I have been able to witness what they’re doing and feel thankful to have been allowed to be an observer and minor participant.

Who knows – maybe after all this is over we’ll start a residency program at the Lodge. What do you folks think?

Euthermic Arousals

Things are heating up and there ain’t nobody hibernating this winter at the Schmutz Lodge. As the Distillery 4 artists wrap up their installations things are starting to look really cool and a bit messy. Messy is alright though because the show is going to be amazing. Over the next two weeks the mess will give way to a collection of amazing art from some truly talented folks.

Feb 5th – the lodge will be transformed by these 8 amazing artists. You’d never know that at one time their residency was nearly taken from them when the Brew House closed.

They managed to pull together a body of work that should not be missed and with the help of the absolutely amazing Rose Clancy who is curating this show they’ll be exhibiting their work for the entire month with a closing on March 5th.

We are seeing a great deal of excitement build for the show too. As I write this the Facebook event listing says there are nearly 100 “maybe attending” and 55 confirmed as attending. All of that just from Facebook invites – they’ve not even started to pass out flyers yet! There are also a number of blogs that have started to write about the show and more write ups are expected to come soon.

Members of the media and the general public are encouraged to get in touch with the Schmutz Company or Rose Clancy to discuss a private viewing if you are unable to attend the opening.

The Distillery artists have been a dream to work with plus they gifted us some freshly painted walls that have helped to add unique character to the Lodge. They’ve given us some great ideas as well for some different ways to treat some of the spaces that we have at our disposal here at the Lodge.

Once again if you can’t make the show on Feb. 5th be sure to contact us or one of the members of the Distillery program to set up a time to come see the exhibit.

Ridd Up the Lodge

 The Schmutz Lodge is buzzing tonight with the Distillery 4 artists having there first meeting of the new year and discussing their plans for the show they are putting on here for unBlurred in Feb.

It’s going to be a lively January with all the artists here. The show will be unlike anything else that we have done before or will probably do in the future because we’re typically more motivated by low-brow art where as much of what will happen here on Feb. 5th will be much more high-brow and adventurous and will focus less on dick-humor.

To prepare for the show we’ll be ridding up around the Lodge. Walls will be painted, floors will be cleaned, and dust-bunnies will be systematically rounded up and slaughtered.

If you can make the show in Feb. you’ll see a very different Schmutz Lodge. Check back regularly for updates on what is happening during the show and profiles of the artists involved.