A year of observation and reflection. Of snapshots, soundbites, and tiny stories. Of kōans, riddles, and magic tricks. Of meditations and revelations. A year of haiku. Artist, writer, designer, and musician Jeff Mellin shares his year-long project to chronicle, in both words and images, the micro-moments of day-to-day life raising his three boys. Illustrated with 60 black & white photographs.
"Jeff Mellin found me on Instagram. When I followed him back, I discovered how talented he was in painting, photography, graphic design, and even music. He was a true artist through and through." — Hazel Sun, Project: Do What You Love.
Read the full interview here: https://hazelsunphotography.com/index.php/2020/03/04/jeffmellin/
Poet/artist Jeff Mellin will be signing copies of his new book, Player Piano (Dream 19), at Book Warehouse at the Tanger Outlets in Tilton, Tuesday, August 2, from 11 am to 1 pm. Described as “a mysterious vision,” the book features Mellin’s “hopeful dream-ballad” illustrated with images he adapted and collaged from a painting by Pre-Raphaelite artist Edward Coley Burne-Jones and a 16th century Book of Flower Studies, courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Anyone who writes knows that some days you're arranging driftwood and desert island beach stones, trying to signal an airplane, trying to jury-rig a radio telescope from the stuff in your pockets,” he writes in the foreword. “And then, other days, you're soaked catching high tide tsunami water in cups, scrambling to translate an alien transmission. This was the latter.” He’ll also be signing his previous books: Skin & Bones (Kolourmeim Press, 2008), a collection of lyrics, and Driveway Chalk Stars of Pajama Astronomers (Pennyring Press, 2020), Mellin’s year-long haiku project. "In a sense, writing the year of haiku was like taking photographs without a camera,” he says. “I learned to see these haiku moments around me, wherever I was, because I told myself I had to. It wasn't so much finding beauty or meaning in everyday things, but knowing I could find beautiful or meaningful things every day.” Mellin is also an award-winning art director, multi-media artist, and songwriter who’s released multiple albums and EPs. He’s designed for art, community, and literary publishers (including Art New England and City Lights Publishers), collaborated and recorded with rock bands, poets, and avant-garde performers, and helped to build, promote, and elevate an array of cultural non-profits, start-ups, and upstarts. Originally from New England, the now Philly-based author has deep ties to the area, and still has family in the Lakes Region. “We’ve been up here every summer for decades,” he says. “It feels great to have an opportunity to be back again and to share what I do.”
