STORY BUS PROJECTS
PARKING LOT
In an increasingly speedy and mobile world, PARKINGLOT slows down to document the place of Malibu, California, and its varied histories and stories.
In an increasingly speedy and mobile world, PARKINGLOT slows down to document the place of Malibu, California, and its varied histories and stories.
Malibu, California, a place marked as “27 miles of scenic beauty”, sits precariously sequestered between prickly oaked mountain ranges and jagged coastal points. Malibu is a connecting artery between the cement sprawl of Los Angeles and the hand-picked produce fields of Oxnard. This city has come embody the idyllic California dreamscape for both its visitors, and those commuting daily along its serpentined Pacific Coast Highway.
While Malibu holds this idyllic notion for many, it also holds a history of disasters, such as mudslides and destructive storms. On November 9th, 2018, Malibu endured one of the most devastating fires on record, which destroyed nearly 700 homes, and left numerous of its residents displaced. Now more than ever, the documenting of Malibu’s varied histories and stories is an invaluable step in honoring the many voices that make up this community.
PARKINGLOT is on a road trip documenting these voices and their stories. We park, we hang out, we probably loiter. Primarily through the use of The Laughing Dog Story Bus and its activities,
PARKINGLOT will invite folks to slow down, listen, collaborate, and share the stories, histories, and voices that are nestled in this place called, Malibu. Conversations and activities will hold space for healing conversations, will foster engagement with stewardship, belonging, and our sense of place and community, and will assist us in collectively creating new perspectives, and new and healing histories, of Malibu--envisioning and enacting positive impacts for its future.
PARKINGLOT is creating a published anthology, a vessel to hold these oral histories, to catalogue and preserve them. Because stories matter. Because everyone has a story. Because every story is art. And because everyone’s art matters.
STORY WEAVE PROJECT
Our goal: A permanent installation of the fully woven, handmade collaborative weave in a publicly accessible location
Participants write messages on to provided rags/old clothing and weave them through a handmade loom. To date, many people have participated. Some spent some time writing their message, and cried as they wove the message into the loom. Others wrote messages to special people or pets they love, or have loved. Some wrote messages to themselves.
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STORY LETTERS PROJECT
Our goal: To send the letters to their recipients (postage provided for letter writers), and to resuscitate/appreciate the undervalued art form of letter writing in the age of technology.
Participants write personal letters to friends or family on stationary with pens, markers, paper, and postage paid for and mailed by The Story Bus.
I WAS HERE
The story bus is a place that Connects people and stories and art.
MAKE CONNECTIONS! MAKE STORIES! MAKE ART! STORY BUSES FOR EVERYONE!
Participants write messages, names, haikus, pictures, thoughts onto an old picnic table, claiming the space as their own, and letting the world know they were there!
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LAUGHING DOG ART STUDIO
Creative Director, Cindy Short's, Laughing Dog Art Studios was the founding project that began the story telling.
The creatures we share our daily lives and homes with connect us to life through bonds nurtured by the energies we share. Our pets teach us how to love with more honesty. Through their creatureness, we become more exquisitely human.
This way of thinking deeply informs my work. More than a simple commissioned pet portrait, I try to “listen” and “see” the relationship between a person and their pet by considering a collage of stories, memories, and photos you, my client, provide.