A story about an artist, told by a writer and a photographer, all boyhood friends of mine whom I am so happy to see are using their talents to bring beautiful things into the world. Through Kevin Bouldin’s vivid words and Daniel Collin’s communicative images, I was able to catch up with an old friend from boy scouts, Ethan Swiggart. His is a classic tale of lemons and lemonade. I feel so proud to know these guys. I hope you will head over to Nashville Public Radio’s web site and check it out.

-Adam

Thanks so much to the hosts of Real Life and to Beth who found us and wrote to us in the first place! We appreciate the exposure and are especially glad for all of the information they gave about Sweet Sleep.

If you are interested in learning more about Sweet Sleep, visit their site and blog. You can donate directly to Sweet Sleep here.

-Jessica

We’re grateful for the exposure and are really looking forward to seeing the show. I’ll let you know when it’s up on their online player, and we can watch it together.

If you are a CTS viewer and this is your first time visiting us at Laughing Tree, welcome. I’m glad you stopped by.

-Jessica

I have been so grateful to see the way so many people and organizations with the necessary skills and means have mobilized to do what they can. Our good friends at Sweet Sleep already have relationships with some orphanages in Haiti and had been working there, providing beds since the earthquake Haiti experienced a little over a year ago. This week, Sweet Sleep organized a bedding drive in the Nashville area and collected over two thousand blankets and sheets that are now on a ship to Haiti. Sweet Sleep maintains relationships with orphanages and humanitarian organizations in Haiti, and they’re worthy of your donations.

I’ve also been glad to see businesses that aren’t normally humanitarian in nature step up and do their part. CD Baby is one of those businesses. CD Baby the largest online distributor of independent music, and they’re the primary distributor of both of our CDs. We got an email from them today (read it here), saying that they will donate $1 of their cut from each sale on CD Baby for the next two weeks. Their donations will go to the American Red Cross and Mercy Corps.

So, support indie musicians and buy their music on CD Baby. According to their site, there are 278,510 different albums to choose from, so you’re sure to find something you like. And if you have not picked up a copy of our Laughing Tree Lullabies, Vol. 1, this is a really good time to do it. Like always, we’re donating 10% of our proceeds to Sweet Sleep, and right now CD Baby is donating a dollar to Haiti relief efforts, too.

-Jessica

This past Thursday we held our first evening of a new Laughing Tree sponsored event, ‘8mm: Owl Bus Vintage Cinema,’ and it was lots of fun. (for more event info and a map, click on that link)

I’ve been into emulating vintage film looks with my digital photography work for a while now, trying to capture the delicious, muted tones and nostalgic feel produced by Holgas, and old 35mm film. Any of you that have kept up with some of the photos I’ve been posting lately are aware of this already. I think this retro fetish first began with my obsession with electronic duo Boards of Canada whose whole aesthetic is dripping with 70’s and 80’s vibes and was then further fostered and fueled by of my creative heroes, Scott Hansen of ISO 50 and Tycho fame.

Anyhow, this vintage fixation has begun to carry over into an interest in retro-styled moving images as well. I began collecting some home movie and other 8mm footage when I was working on ideas for the video for “All the Pretty Little Horses”, and I just got kinda hooked. Something about the gritty jumpiness and washed out colors felt so authentic and really transported me into another emotional space that slick, HD video and CGI just can’t match.

At first my collection was confined to home movies, and then started branching out into other genres like old animations, some experimental film, commercials from the 50’s and 60’s, and even some old ephemeral films produced for education and promotion. Video can fill up a hard drive quick, and soon I was wondering what I was going to do with all of this material. I’ve long had some latent VJ aspirations and considered getting into that, but honestly I still don’t have the time or money to really pursue that hobby just yet so I let that idea go. Then a few weeks ago I was talking to my friends Hyesook and Heejong at one of our favorite spots in Hongdae, Owl Bus, and they told me they were looking for a way to get more people in during the week. I told them I was looking for an opportunity to share my growing film collection with people, and we hatched a plan to do a weekly vintage film night there. Win-Win. Love it.

Well, we managed to pull it together the past Thursday and had a nice crowd of about 15 or 20 folks there throughout the evening. Just about right for an opening night when the kinks are still getting worked out.

I will be there at Owl Bus curating 8mm each Thursday night from 7-11pm from now on until it stops being fun, so I hope that you will come and join us some night soon!

-Adam

Last weekend we got a nice group of art-loving friends together and headed down to Seoul’s Museum of Contemporary Art, which is located in the Seoul Grand Park complex. Another friend had been raving about the Peppermint Candy exhibit she had seen there, and we wanted to be sure to see it before it closes on February 15th.

This was our first visit to the Seoul MOCA, and we were thoroughly impressed. If you haven’t made a trip there yet, do yourself a favor and go. Preferably before February 7th, when Kang Ik-Joong’s year-long exhibition, Multiple/Dialogue ∞, will be coming down. It really should not be missed.

“Multiple/Dialogue ∞” is a stunning, prolific and multi-layered body of work filling the massive space of the MOCA’s spiral-shaped Rampcore Gallery from top to bottom. Comprised of over 60,000 of Kang’s ‘3×3 inch’ works, the barrage of imagery and textures performs several, simultaneous functions, as the title, Multiple/Dialogue ∞, suggests. First, Multiple/Dialogue ∞ is a comprehensive retrospective of Kang’s prodigious output of work dating back to the early 1980’s. Second, it serves as an homage to Kang’s artistic mentor Nam June Paik, with the sensory-overload of Kang’s 60,000 images echoing the same effect created by Paik’s famous video pieces that flash and vibrate with a flood of endless visual content. Lastly, Multiple/Dialogue ∞ is meant to reinvent and give new life to Paik’s towering work, ‘The More the Better,’ that dominates the center of the Rampcore Gallery. Indeed, “The More the Better” seems to have been Kang’s motto, as evidenced in his mind-blowing volume of work.

I was completely in awe of this exhibition, it is nothing short of a multi-sensory delight.

Also very excellent was the Peppermint Candy exhibition. It was originally assembled to serve as the first, full-scale introduction of Korean contemporary art for the South American audience, and was shown in Buenos Aires, Argentina and in Santiago, Chile before coming back home to the MOCA. Evidently, it was very well received there and it is easy to see why. The exhibition, which is broken into three sections, ‘Made in Korea,’ ‘New Ghost Town,’ and ‘Plastic Paradise.’ and traces various threads of development in Korean contemporary art since 1980, such as nationalism, the rise of capitalism, problems of consumption and commoditization of culture, and the challenges of Korea’s incredibly rapid urbanization. The show was really well curated in this regard, with these sub-sections of the exhibit helping to illuminate the overarching issues and motifs that have captured the attention of Korean artists during the last three decades.

In addition to these special exhibitions, there is an excellent permanent collection as well that highlights some of the best 2d, sculpture and photography produced in the last century. Of special note is the gorgeous collection of works on hanji (traditional Korean paper) that is not to be missed.

In short, go to the MOCA and see these excellent shows. We had an absolutely delightful afternoon there, and I can assure you that you will not be disappointed.

-Adam

When I recorded my first album, Tonic, I opened it with a carol, O Come, O Come Emmanuel. Then we moved to Korea, and I started a tradition of recording a carol every year. Since Christmas 2006, I have shared these songs for free as a gift to my friends around the world.

A few weeks ago, my friend Gail shared a gorgeous video of the choir at King’s College, Cambridge singing Jesus Christ the Apple Tree, and I knew that that had to be this year’s song.

Below, you can listen to Jesus Christ the Apple Tree and each of my carols from 2005 to today, and then download them all. They’re a free gift for you to enjoy, so please feel free to share these songs around with your friends and family. I hope you enjoy these songs.

Merry Christmas!

-Jessica

Downloads:
Download Jesus Christ the Apple Tree here.
Download the carols from 2005-2008 here.

Jesus Christ the Apple Tree, Christmas 2009 Jessica Lofbomm
Seoul, South Korea

A Midnight Clear, Christmas 2008 Jessica Lofbomm with Sarah Gautier and Dong-Seon Chang
Seoul, South Korea

Angels We Have Heard, Christmas 2007 Jessica Lofbomm with Zach Bardon
Seoul, South Korea

Peace on Earth, Christmas 2006 Jessica Lofbomm with Nolan Riley and Nathanael Nicol
Paju, South Korea

O Come, O Come Emmanuel, from my album Tonic released in 2006
Jessica Lofbomm with Jonathan Lawson and James Waddell
Nashville, Tennessee, USA

It is such a cool CD - nostaligic, whimsical, fun… I find myself wanting to turn it on whenever we are in [my son's] room and humming along. The songs are a variety of styles and include sounds from many countries.

The global thread is perfect for this album because 10% of all profits from Laughing Tree Lullabies goes to support the work of Sweet Sleep… AMAZING. I love when purchases support others in need.

You can read Jessica’s entire review of Laughing Tree Lullabies, Vol. 1 here.

Our record is a great, calming gift for anyone who feels stressed or disconnected, and of course it’s great for new parents. Visit our music page to hear some of the songs, and then stop by the shop to purchase your Christmas gifts!

-Jessica

With Laughing Tree Lullabies, Vol. 1, we are donating 10% of the proceeds to support the work of Sweet Sleep. Sweet Sleep builds beds for some of the poorest kids in the world in places like Moldova, Uganda and Haiti.

Last week, when we visited Felicia the beautiful young girl that we sponsor in Moldova, we saw firsthand the lasting good work that Sweet Sleep is doing. Four years ago, Felicia and the other kids were living in dormitories, sharing beds that were from the 1960s and earlier (with the original mattresses… imagine.). Now, thanks to Sweet Sleep, all of these kids have their own comfortable, warm bed.

In a very small way, we are trying to extend that comfort to other kids in need. If you’d like to buy Laughing Tree Lullabies for yourself or as a gift (or both!) visit our shop. You can also donate directly to Sweet Sleep.

Thanks. Enjoy the season!

-Jessica

Tomorrow we’ll take a bus back to the capitol Chisinau and take the night train back to Bucharest, arriving there early on Saturday morning. We’ll have a day and a night in Bucharest, again with our host Tony. Then on Sunday, we’ll fly to Italy and have a week there with our friends. In Bucharest or Italy, we’ll try to take some time and write down some thoughts and stories as well as post some pictures and videos from our time here in Moldova.

Thanks for sharing this experience with us and praying for us and Felicia.

Lots of love,
Jessica and Adam