a few new things and a video too!

Here I am. It's so late again, 2:15am on April 22, 2016.

I finally did it - I have a new website name: http://livingcreativelee.net/

My old one still works, but I'm going to use the new one from now on as it's much easier to remember (for me anyway - and that's important when I'm telling it to others). 

I also updated the splash page to my site. I'm rotating three photographs of my drawings, three photographs related to my paintings, three related to my ceramics work and three relating to my photography. 

I added a link to my collections database that I am able to share with the world, it's under the new writing menu option... that's taken up a lot of my time this year - organizing my DVD collection. It's large. I used to have a complete list that I maintained on my old website but that hasn't been updated in years. I started using the Collectorz program years ago but it had issues that resulted in my limited use of it. Firstly, I could only download a copy onto one computer at a time and maintain one list on that computer. Now, I'm able to sync my lists with their cloud service, which also allows me to again easily share the list of DVDs, books and CDs that I own with the world. I can also use the program on my iPhone and my iPad, or on my laptop or desktop computer - and I can pull up the same list on any of the platforms - making it very easy for me to update it regularly. The lists aren't perfect - some films and books I own aren't in the database. I've kept a separate list of those and I'll have to manually add them later on. The DVD list is also not complete as I still have to add some TV shows, my foreign films and a good chunk of my fine art documentaries. 

I also updated my CV to include a new section at the bottom, related to the various associations, societies and clubs I'm a member of. 

Finally, I recently uploaded a video to YouTube, it's one that I created for one of my spring classes. You can find it here: 

I'm also working on a write-up about the Vancouver Art Gallery's MASHUP exhibition which I hope to post shortly.

Until next time,

- Steven

late summer update

I found this in my drafts from last August, 2015. I'm posting it now in April 2016!

From August, With Love...

Haven't done anything about my website name. Not sure I like how the search engine appears either. Ideally it should be up top in the right hand corner. 

It's now 3am. I downloaded some stuff from my summer courses that I didn't during the last few weeks as I was sick and I archived the files for those classes. I then made new folders for my fall classes so it's ready to go on day one in two weeks.

I also started remaking in Photoshop the large joiner I had done of people in line last summer for a show curated by Katie Huisman, titled "being" at the Photohaus Gallery in Vancouver. It was so hot in the gallery during the few weeks that it was up that when show ended it actually fell apart during the night - I'm guessing the glue on the tape gave way due to the overall weight of over 600 photos pulling on each other over time. As it fell it broke into pieces and some photos ripped. Not wanting to deal with it as I knew it wouldn't be possible to remove the tape easily I let the gallery chuck it out.

But I never got good documentation of it installed - I had planned to photograph it at the end of the show before the takedown of the show hut because it was destroyed I was out of luck. I primarily shot the project with my iPhone as well as with my Sony RX100iii. As I shot them I would send to print at London Drugs. Then I spent a few days taping them to the wall. So I still have all the photos that it was made up of (and want to shoot more) but to have a copy I can print and put online I need to start from scratch essentially... so that's what I did... I started.  My plan is not to rush it and to do a bit everyday, until it's done. The new file I making is 14ft wide by 5ft high so it will be very long. I'll post photos of the original installation I shot with my iPhone at a later 

second thoughts

I had chosen http://www.artandlifeofsteve.net as my new site name but to be honest even I'm having a hard time remembering it. I should have used www.livingcreativelee.net which I think is easier to remember - I know I haven't forgotten it. Another friend said I'd have to explain how to spell it but that's part of the fun - and once you know it you don't forget it.

 In in terms of other aspects of my site I need to redirect my old site URL to this one. I don't want to delete my old site yet as it still has Kwantlen scandal stuff on it that people can still find. So that should be my next BIG task, putting that info on a separate website so it's still there. I added my video marketing certificate that I completed this summer to my CV. I also integrated Google search into the footer of every page, as well as setting the site up integration with Google Analytics. Kinda dry but important.

 In terms of my art, I still need to add more drawing and painting to the site. 

where to go from here?

I'm at a crossroads of sorts. Well, not really. I've been trying to figure out what domain to get for my website. Since 1999, I've used steveleenow.net as stevelee.com / stevenlee.com and other variations of just using my name have seemingly always been taken.

Here's a short list of possibilities for a new name:

• stevelee.life

• thesteveleelife.net

• thesteveleeidea.net

• thesteveleeimagination.net

• thesteveleemind.net

• andnowsomestuff.net

• andnowstevelee.net

• steveleeonpurpose.net

• hereswhatourclientssay.net

• openingupthestudio.net

• openingthestudio.net

• artfulsteve.net

A friend of mine, Elina, came up with these possibilities:

• quartertosteve.net

• thenameislee.net

• wittysteve.net

• steveleeishere.net

• livinglifecreativelee.net

• livingcreativelee.net

• speakingoflee.net

• allaboutstevelee.net

I don't want to limit my domain name to just steveleeart or steveleefineart because as art is a huge part of my life, I write a lot and I am into movies as well. So it would be nice to center the name around an image of myself as a creative person.

Typing on my iPhone

So here I am writing on my iPhone while waiting for my Mom who is seeing her diabetic specialist at Fraser River Endocronology. I'm trying out the SquareSpace Blog publishing application for the first time as I look up from I phone from time to time to observe my surroundings. The waiting room is central with offices surrounding it. The  waiting area is also warm, lit by sunlight coming in through a large skylight.

A mother holds her small child by his two hands, and she lets him lead her on a small walk around the waiting room. Another older man, dressed in black, sits silently staring off into space. Another older woman sits looking at her mobile device (not an iPhone), while an older oriental man reads a woman's magazine that he found in a pile of waiting room magazines. The mother and child is called and they disappear into the office.

I feel a whoosh of fresh air as a motorized wheelchair whizzes by, it's engine whiring smoothly as an older woman approaches the diabetic  specialists' receptionist. The receptionist knows the lady and I hear them talk briefly about using the chair in inclement weather, "I'd never take this down that hill in the winter," I hear her say before she whizzes away from the desk to the middle of the waiting room where she stops. She's wearing a green mask - one of those medical masks that Asians seem fond of wearing whenever there's a flu scare. One of those masks hospital ERs or walkin clinics make you wear if you have a cough or cold. She takes out a paperback novel, it's black, titled "Prayer for the Dead." Her hand covers the authors name. She too is dressed in black and has bruising on her arm, no doubt from the diabetic insulin needles she likely uses. My mom has similar bruises on her arms and stomach.

"Leo?" The man in black rises and disappears into the office. A younger woman follows him in and approaches the receptionist for her two o'clock and permission to borrow the washroom key.  Minutes later she returns the key and sits, bathed in sunlight as she rubs disinfectant on her hands. She then goes into her purse, opens a small jar of lip balm and with a single finger applies some to her lips. Having finished that her iPhone comes out, and she's browsing it now as my Mom comes out and books her next appointment with the receptionist. It's time to go.

Waiting Room Observa

Now I'm downstairs.

We're now waiting outside the BC Biomedical as the diabetic specialist wants Mom to get her blood work done. She's fighting back tears, saying she had a go round with the specialist who was upset because somehow she was out of the loop over the insulin pump my Mom just acquired. At first she accused Mum of getting it in the States - as many do that - but my Mum would never do that. Then she said she wanted to try Mum on a new drug. But in the end even I clearly remember the specialist giving Mum a number of brochures on pumps last fall. I remember because I sat down and read them with Mum, and I remember looking information up online. I remember getting a call from the hospital from an expert on the pumps who talked my Mum through making appointments with the pump salespeople. The expert only calls when they are sent a letter from the specialist. So even I don't know how the specialist could have forgotten. Maybe she wanted to sign off on it before a decision on which pump was going to be used was made. Who knows. I told my Mum not to worry about it. Thankfully the pump is returnable during its first three months of ownership.

The area I am now has a row of chairs facing an outside area, pictured above. The biomedical office is to the left. To my right is a wall advertising an ultrasound office. The advertisements are kind of disturbing.

A man shouts at the ladies in the biomedical - he's upset he had to wait when he thought he could quickly dropped off a sample. "I've never had to wait before! I'm illegally parked and in probably getting towed!" He storms out, taking his keys from his pocket, his urine visible in the plastic container in the plastic bag he holds as he walks away.  My Mom's done now. So it's time to go.