Hello Friends,

This feels like a weird time to be breaking my hiatus from sending newsletter updates. I and many of my friends in the US are still mentally processing the events of the election and how they will continue to play out in the coming years. But of course, we need to continue with the work that we have cut out for us, and supporting the pockets of creativity, community, and empowerment that will continue to keep us going through whatever else is going on in the world.

It’s been even longer than usual between updates from me for a few reasons. Firstly, I was working hard on rebuilding my artist website using a tool called Eleventy. My site is still coded from scratch, but using this tool allows me to update and edit everything much more easily compared working directly with HTML files. While this was in progress, I didn’t make any new blog posts for a long time, since they would have just added to the things I had to migrate… But now, after a few months of chugging away on it in my spare time, I’m happy to say that the new version is now live! Some things are similar to the old site, but there are a lot of subtle improvements. I invite you to come visit my new site and poke around: https://palomakop.tv/

In particular, consider checking out the new version of the blog — I’ve just added some belated posts about shows and things that I did in late summer. https://palomakop.tv/blog/

Another reason I have been a bit quieter than usual is that I was last-minute hired for the semester as an adjunct professor of animation at Hamilton College, which is a few hours north of me, near Utica. I have been driving back and forth each week and teaching two sections of Intro to Animation. This is my first time teaching at a college, and I have been enjoying it a lot. I often think about the professors I had in college who introduced me to so many interesting new things and expanded my world, and it makes me want to help pass that forward to my students.

Meanwhile, as of September, Andrei and I have taken up temporary residence in a yurt near Saugerties, NY. We will be here until the end of the year, when we plan to look for a more permanent space of some kind. After being quite mobile for a year and a half, we are ready to settle in somewhere and set up proper studio/work spaces. But in the meantime, yurt existence is quite cozy.

I’ve continued to send out bimonthly mystery objects and quarterly e-zines for Zine Club, which has slowly been accruing new members; there are now 25. The latest mystery object that I can share (since it was sent out long enough ago that it’s no longer a mystery) was a handmade set of mysterious cards based on the life cycle of a fictional plant.

At the end of the newsletter, I usually write a bit about events and things I have coming up, but to be honest, I don’t have anything like that going on right now. I will quietly continue teaching my classes, making zines and objects, doing miscellaneous freelance projects, and figuring out how and where I want to live. I guess the only thing I ask is, let’s keep in touch. Let me know what you’re up to. Let’s keep making art and being there for each other.

Until next time, take good care however you can.