This Week's Zero Sum Auctions

If it's a Thursday, Friday, Saturday or Sunday night, you should stop in and check out the latest Zero Sum Art Project auctions. Here's the most recent crop:

The Zero Sum #22 auction, ending Thursday night, 11/29, at 10 pm Eastern time.

The Zero Sum #26 auction, ending Friday night, 11/30, at 10 pm Eastern time.

The Zero Sum #27 auction, ending Saturday night, 12/01, at 10 pm Eastern time.

The Zero Sum #28 auction, ending Sunday night, 12/01, at 10 pm Eastern time.

The 4 Zero Sum Art Auctions currently running. . .

Zero Sum #20

The four Zero Sum auctions that are currently up and running are Zero Sum #15, ending on Thanksgiving (bad planning on my part there), Zero Sum #17, ending Friday, 11/23, Zero Sum #20, the etching you see here, finishing Saturday, 11/24, and Zero Sum #21, another etching, ending Sunday, 11/25.

Look for an auction ending every Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday night at 10 p.m. from now until mid-January, with the exception of a week off for Christmas, as part of The Blogger Show at Digging Pitt Gallery, here in Pittsburgh PA.

One year of the Zero Sum Art Project

Today is the one year anniversary of the Zero Sum Art Project. On November 19 of last year, the first Zero Sum Art auction started with this piece:


Zero Sum #1
The project started with whatever free materials I could find to make and package the first piece. This little drawing was made on Anti-Defamation League notepad paper with a Heart of Georgia Technical Institute pencil and a Radisson Hotel pen. The opening bid was $1.77, which was the initial amount that the project went in the hole for the eBay fees and postage. It ended at $22.72, which gave me my first opportunity to spend the profits and add to the studio.

When I first started the project I was imagining that it would be more an exercise of trying to make something out of nothing - I didn't expect that spending the money back to zero would be a large part of the process. Adding still life objects and more exotic materials, a growing exploration of photographic processes, and now an exhibition in a commercial gallery space have all grown from the challenge of juggling the cycle of surplus and deficit.

As of today, after 22 sales, the balance is $51.49. I've got two weeks to spend that back to as close to zero as I can get. I'm looking at adding a new kind of litho plate to the mix. . . That balance comes from an income total of $1912.65, with costs of $1861.16. If you want to see how it all breaks down, you can see the day to day account here.

The first three auctions of ZSAP in the Blogger Show

For the duration of The Blogger Show, from now until mid-January, a new Zero Sum auction will start and end every day that the Digging Pitt Gallery is open. If it's a Thursday, Friday, Saturday or Sunday night, at 10 pm Eastern time, and you're near your computer, tune in and see how it's going. Here are the first three:

Zero Sum #9 auction, ending tomorrow night, 11/17, at 10 pm Eastern time.

Zero Sum #14 auction, ending Sunday night, 11/18, at 10 pm Eastern time.

Zero Sum #15 auction, ending next Thursday, 11/22, at 10 pm Eastern time.

Zero Sum #9 in the Blogger Show

Zero Sum #9

A couple of hours ago the doors opened for The Blogger Show's Pittsburgh venues, at Digging Pitt gallery, Digging Pitt Too, and the Panza Gallery. These three shows will be up until January 12. The opening receptions for the Digging Pitt and Digging Pitt Too shows will be on Saturday, December 8, from 6-9 pm, and the opening reception for the Panza Gallery will be on Saturday, December 15, from 6-9 pm.


My contribution to the show will be a frenzied rotation of works from the Zero Sum Art Project. The first six pieces are up on the walls now. Each day that the gallery is open during the exhibition, a new auction will begin from the Zero Sum Art Project. These auctions will run for a week. So, every Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday night from here until January 12, you will find a new piece from the Zero Sum Art Project being auctioned off on eBay. Every week I will take out the sold pieces from the exhibition, and replace them with the next artworks on the auction block. It will be a different show every week. Visitors to the gallery will see a small slice of the project, but they will see it in "the flesh". Online viewers will see the work through the pixellated haze of the computer monitor, but they will be able to see all of the work in the project in one place. So it's an odd blend of "virtual" and "real" worlds.

The first piece, that will start its auction at 10 pm tonight, will be Zero Sum #9. You can find the Zero Sum auctions, once they start tonight, here.

Zero Sum #26

Zero Sum #26
cyanotype and acrylic

Here's Zero Sum #26, essentially a painting on top of a cyanotype base. I love the ghostly blue of the dangling plane - it reminds me of the odd blue glow one sees from the street when people inside are watching television. . .


the "raw" cyanotype for Zero Sum #26

This is the first image in the Zero Sum portfolio that was pulled from a bunch of cyanotypes that I made with the help of Justin Kasulka. I worked up a bunch of transparencies of images that were either photographed from the Zero Sum box and odd object collection or collaged on the scanner, and then shipped them down to Texas, where Justin worked his magic with chemicals and exposures and made the cyanotypes, printing them on my favorite heavy printmaking paper. In terms of the project, it was a nice challenge to buy the chemicals and paper and pay for his time over the course of several Zero Sum sales earlier in the year.

This piece will be sold during the Blogger Show. It will be on display at the Digging Pitt Gallery here in Pittsburgh during the week that it is up for auction on eBay. Once it is sold, it will be replaced in the show by the next piece for sale. Every day of the exhibition that the gallery is open will have a corresponding auction ending. It will be a nutty rotation of artwork over the 2 month run of the exhibition. We'll see if I'm conscious when it's all over.

Tomorrow night is the opening of the New York City component of the Blogger Show. My contribution to that part of the exhibition is Zero Sum #24, which will be sold after the NYC show comes down.

Zero Sum #25 is the last piece that will be auctioned on eBay prior to the Blogger Show. Once the Blogger Show gets going, you'll notice a new expense in the pricing of the work - the 30% gallery commission!

Things will get fast and furious towards the end of next week - stay tuned!