Day Three

My alarm clock was not working properly. But I got up at 6:00 a.m anyway. When I couldn't go back to sleep I made breakfast and started to do more work cleaning off the casting residue off the glass sculptures of my glass deep sea creature series. Then Li Gang brought over a power washer because he thought it would do a better job. It was a nice thought that did not work. I tried out the power washer on the large Long and Slender and that was unable to clean off the dirt that had accumulated over time. There are no shortcuts.

After lunch at my studio I went for a short walk. When I came back two of Li Gang's workers were asleep on the couch and my favorite reading/sleeping chair. I felt that this was an invasion of my privacy and their taking advantage of my long-term relationship with Gang and our friendship. So I decided after reading a little to take a bike ride around the compound to cool off. As I was riding two of the artists, Zhu Li and her husband Ye Dongsheng, that I had met on a previous visit invited me to a barbecue party, where they were serving beer, wine, salads, coldcuts, along with a Mongolian barbecue.

The party was a joint effort of three sets artists. I knew Vanessa, an artist who taught at the French School in Beijing. I’d never met the third artist, Haika from Denmark, . There were a number of French speaking teachers from the school at the party, as well as a number of young artists. It was a nice party which was over by 8:00p.m. I was finally able to get through to Leslie, who was taking care of her two twin grandchildren, while her daughter and son-in-law were in Arizona and California on business and for two weddings. My cell phone started blinking that I was out of money on my SIM card.

I went back to the studio and started working on refining a wood cut that I had started in the states. It was my vision of a night dive we did at White Beach in the Solomon Islands. It involved a cast of underwater characters, led by a duhong, a type of sea hare, framed by a section of a military bridge that had been dumped into the ocean at the end of World War II. I tried to go to sleep but the mosquitos were unbelievable. The only fan I could find after trying to sleep for two hours was broken. I then tried to go back to sleep and two hours later I was desperate. I got up again and looked around and found a small portable fan hidden in a corner under some pillows from a former couch used in studio on the first floor. I finally got to sleep at 3:30. My alarm was not working, so I did not get up until 11:00 a.m.

Day Four

It was Sunday and Li Gang was supposed to drop me off at the Lido Bank, so that I could go to the cash machine and then on to Sunday antiques market. But that never happened. So after a quick breakfast, I decided to fix up a racing bike that Li Gang’s brother had given him as a birthday present. Gang did not like to sit hunched over so he previously had offered to let me use this bicycle. I decided to bike to the area of the first compound we had looked at the night I arrived in Beijing. I could not find it initially. The areas surrounding it was an industrial area with no charm . The artists area was also very small and it was set up in such a way that you could not build out either in front or in back. Also, there was a huge mound of garbage in front of it just across the street. It felt remote and small. My instinct was that the much larger Art Village near the Green T. Room would be much more suitable.

I knew that Li Gang had rented one of the units in the Art Village that he was now using as temporary storage and that New York Arts started in one unit as one of the first tenants and now rented 3 units. So I dropped in on Abraham and his new friend, Christina, at their new home. He suggested that although he heard that all of the original units were already sold out, I should nevertheless try to see if any of the units were still available. Then Abraham and I walked around looking at the new units, which were smaller and more expensive because they had central heat. We decided to call the developer, whose office was open. One unit was newly available in the original area. Coincidentally it was right next Li Gang’s studio. It had a footprint of 212 usable square meters and backed onto a new road being built. This was ideal if I wanted to split up the unit so that the workspace portion would be in the rear.

Because sculpture, especially metal sculpture, is quite messy, I wanted to keep my sculpture studio separate from my living quarters. Also, if I decide to rent out the living portion of the studio, the sculpture work shop would remain sacrosanct. I took pictures of the blank space and the frontage.

I decided that it was time for us to get our own space in Beijing, although I would use it more than Leslie. Maybe I could persuade her to use Beijing as a jumping off space to see more of China. She had previously offered to go to language school with me so we could learn Chinese. Hopefully that offer is still good.

I then rode my bicycle to the Chinese flower shop so I could replenish my cell phone SIM card before returning back to studio. After drawing out some rough sketches of the layout for my new studio, a few of us rode off to a local Chinese restaurant for dinner. There was lots of talk about the current Chinese art scene.

On my return to the compound I bumped into one of the persons, Haika, who had hosted last night’s party. She suggested that I try to get more than one bid for building out the space. The problem is that the only person I know who has those contacts is Li Gang and he has the advantage of being there to follow through. Tomorrow I will ask around about reputable contractors so that I can hopefully have at least two or three bids.

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