We spurned to become slaves

With hands of dust and tools of dust,

Built ladders out of moth and rust

Wherein we placed our crook-ed trust

And earned our rightful graves

O, Father – Gracious, True, and Kind –

Who chose to love us still

We, deaf and blind, and unrefined

Oppressing Thee in heart and mind

Ye sought us first that we might find

Redemption in Thy will

O, Father – Gracious, over all

The saints Ye call Thine own –

By grace Ye heal, by grace Ye call

By grace align our heart’s resolve

By grace Ye hold us not to fall

But reach our heav’nly home

O, Father – Gracious – We art thine

On whom Thy favor rests

O, Father, by whose great design

Made Christ like us to save mankind

Thy Spirit in us intertwined

To praise thee, Ever-Blest

If you missed the launch party and would like a copy, send us an email: inkslinger@biola.edu

See you next semester.

–Inkslingers

We are looking for prose, poetry, and black & white photography. 

Good luck!

We drove down to the intersection of La Mirada and Leffingwell. Traffic on Leffingwell was horrendous. We parked and started walking down Leffingwell. “This is going to rock your world,” she said. She had also worked up other various puns off of the idea of a giant boulder in the car on the way, playing songs such as “We Will Rock You” and “Like a Rolling Stone.”

A giant red truck was parked in the middle of Leffingwell, and traffic was being herded into one lane on either side of it. Advertisements were plastered onto the red edifice. And in the middle of it, suspended a few feet above the pavement, was a giant 5-ton rock wrapped in white plastic.

This was the rock needed for an art installation piece at the LACMA called “Levitated Mass,” wherein a giant rock will be placed over a 15-foot deep passageway. People will walk under the rock, look up, and the rock will appear to be floating. The project has been in the works for years. The logistics involved in transporting the boulder from a quarry in Riverside–involving designing and creating a custom truck–alone had taken over a year.

The rock only traveled at night, at 5-10 miles per hour. It had to take specific paths that could handle its weight, and telephone poles, street signs and traffic lights had to be taken down by work crews from the city in order to usher the massive caravan through. Prior to arriving in each city, the crew had to gain approval to park it somewhere during the day while not traveling. One of those places was in the middle of Leffingwell in La Mirada.

It is the biggest rock that has been transported since the time of the Egyptian pyramids.

I am in a writing class where we focus on the intersection of the visual arts and the written word. What is common to all forms of art is that they create space–setting parameters, defining content, including and omitting things appropriate to the balance of the space at hand, a balance of absence and presence, sound and silence. The visual arts operate under a metaphor of ‘sight’ for how space is created; language arts operate under metaphors of ‘sound’ to create space; and yet the divisions are often blurry.

The product is not the only space created; the very process of creating moves things around, makes space for the materials, and requires sacrifices on the part of the artist and the people within his vicinity. In the case of the “Levitated Mass” project, the space created in the process, although temporary, is perhaps more important. The children, parents and rubber-neckers who gawked at the massive truck may have much more profound memories than those who get to enjoy the finished product at the LACMA. The transportation of the materials created a literal space in the city-scapes of thousands of residents in the Los Angeles area. It was an all-inclusive space, activating all of the senses, something that no artist can presume to do.

As you create your visual and written spaces to be included in the Inkslinger, remember that the true value of art may be not be within the finished product, but may exist more importantly in the process by which you achieved that product.

-Rob Kirkendall, editor

Articles on Michael Heizer’s project, “Levitated Mass”: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/10/lacma-rock-michael-heizer_n_1336518.html

http://www.lacma.org/art/exhibition/levitated-mass

Girl Under Street Sign by Jordan Lopez:

a girl stands,

eating ice cream

beneath a street sign

so sweet she

smiles licking the

last of the brown cream

till all that’s

left is the sharp

sugar cone to chew.

One thing I’ve been learning in poetry class is the importance of an image. This poem requires keen observation of a simple scene (which I love). A good poem does not have to have grand metaphors. It can quietly observe a scene and relay that scene with care and attention.

So, then: go observe some things around you. Write about them. Photograph them. Toil over them (hard work feels good!). And if you love them, send them to us! inkslinger@biola.edu

Once again, this edition is themeless. If you have any questions, please send them to the email above.

We look forward to seeing your work!