So when my friend Sarah introduced me to Jamie and Alex Silver and offered me a place in the NYC Half Marathon, on March 18th, to raise money for their son Jackson and 1000′s of other children all searching for a cure for Epidermolysis Bullosa (EB). I couldn’t think of a reason not to and jumped at the chance…. 

So on March 18th 2012 I’m going to be running the NYC Half Marathon for the Jackson Gabriel Silver Foundation… 

If you can save a few pennies and donate it to my fundraising page (my goal is $1,500), any help will be FANTASTIC!

http://www.crowdrise.com/teamjgsfhalf/fundraiser/helendennis

Here’s a few ideas of how you might like to help out…

- Spreading the word is invaluable and costs nothing, other than a couple of seconds of your time to forward this link; Post it, Tweet it, Facebook it, Tumbler it, Stumble upon it… anything you can think of

- Look in all your pockets for spare change that you forgot about and instead donate it Also check under the cushions  of your sofa, as there may be some change hiding there.

If you come across a piece of plastic in the form of a credit card – even better!

Just a few suggestions:

- Bypass your expensive morning coffee in exchange for office brewed coffee and instead donate that $ that you saved

I understand this is a BIG request, especially as New York is addicted to good/expensive coffee.  So how about…

- Buy an 8oz coffee in the morning – instead of the usual 20oz for a week and instead donate the $$ saved.

- For anyone that is hardcore and can really take up a challenge perhaps skip coffee altogether (yikes!!!) and instead donate the $$ that you saved.

(If you do have a coffee addiction I suggest opting for another choice above, as I don’t want to be held responsible for the blinding headache that you may get as a consequence of caffein deprivation.)

- Skip going out for brunch/lunch/dinner and instead have a picnic in the park and donate the $$ that you saved.

- Forgo your last drink in the bar and instead donate the $10 that you saved.

- Take the subway home instead of that taxi you planned to get and instead donate the $$ that you saved.

- Perhaps convince your friends to skip your round at the bar and instead donate the money for that whole round. This works especially well when you’re at an expensive bar.

- If you fancy a challenge perhaps each time you and your friends order a drink simultaneously put a dollar or two to the side and donate all the $$$ collected at the end of the night. This is good if there is a big group out, perhaps a birthday celebration. Or a long night out. Another suggestion is to ask strangers at the bar to join in too – just think you could meet new people!

- If your company offers matching donations please do take advantage of it. It makes forgoing that tasty/expensive morning coffee in exchange for the bland office brew taste all the better for it.

- Most importantly another way to help is just spread the word and forward this email/link, Tweet it, Facebook it, it’s a great charity supporting amazing work on the cusp of a breakthrough and you’d be apart of helping.

Please feel free to post more ideas… every little helps

THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU!

…and you never know perhaps these ideas will become a habit and you’ll end up saving hundreds throughout the year!

Island: 22 Artists on Iceland

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Images: top left, studio shot : top right, Nicole Pietrantoni : bottom, Helen Dennis

The Manhattan Bridge – Silver pen on black paper, 10ft x 16ft

View of the installation Projected Drawings – by night!

Photo: Taken at The LAB Gallery, Lexington Ave. & 47th Street, NYC

and here’s how it all came together…

and some information about the project as it unfolds and continues to do so…

Front page photo credit: Aminata De Groot

Opening Saturday August 13th 6-9pm

On view 12noon – 6pm:  Sunday August 14th, Thursday 18th, Friday 19th, Saturday 20th, Sunday 21st, 2011

Here’s a little more info about it:

The LAB Gallery

July 8-September 2, 2011

The show Projected Drawings, will unite the notions and essence of photography into a single large scale installation, filling the entire space of The LAB Gallery.

For Projected Drawings the end result will remain the same with a white on black linear distillation of an urban landscape, but the process will be approached from the opposite angle, using light reflective pens on a solid black surface. The lines will no longer be a bi-product as they are in Helen’s typical process, but will become the primary source of the image.

Curated by Jason Patrick Voegele of Republic Worldwide, Samson Contompasis of The Marketplace Gallery, Keith Schweitzer of M.A.N.Y. and Tyler Wriston of The B.A.C.

Hosted by 320 Studios at 320 West 37th Street, 14th Floor
June 28 – June 30, 2011
6 to Midnight with VIP After Party
Concept by Jason Patrick Voegele

Much of what we know and how we learn comes through the study of explicit or subtle comparisons and contrasts. Meaningful opportunities for these comparative studies invite us into a more explicit and intentional approach that can both broaden our understanding of contemporary American art and help us draw connections and distinctions between the studio practices and conceptual intentions of today’s American Artist.

Produced and developed by four of New York State’s premiere curatorial teams, Town & Country presents just such an opportunity.

Much like the rest of the western world, our press, politics, and creative arts thrive on the institutions we have erected to illuminate our differences. We are often reduced to the divisive labels of righteous and heretical, pious and secular, liberal and conservative, formal and conceptual, urban and rural. Dressed up in the costume of duality it appears that we are a bisected people from the fundamentals to our personal tastes. This exhibition challenges those preconceived notions and offers a unique window into the collaborative state of American art. As a people, our founding fathers had faith in the principals of open dialogue, freedom of expression and the multiplicity of our intellectual and creative capacity to bind various philosophies into one singular union. As an exhibition, Town & Country celebrates these great strengths and offers up a chance to draw attention to the ties that bind us as a great creative culture wherever we are from. Through this lens, Town & Country proposes a new vision of American art reinterpreted for a new generation.

On June 28th through June 30th at 320 West 37th Street in New York City, Republic Worldwide, The Marketplace Gallery, Keith Schweitzer (M.A.N.Y.), and The Brooklyn Art Collective invite you to join the discussion and stoke the fires of debate as we present Town & Country: the very best of contemporary American art. Artists include: Scott Michael Ackerman, Doug Auld, Paul Brainard, White Cocoa, Hannah Cole, Annika Conner, Helen Dennis, Eric Diehl, Ira Eduardovna, Tara de la Garza, Charles Koegel, Elizabeth Livingston, Frodo Mikkelsen, OLEK, Sirikul Pattachote, Patrick Porter, Leon Reid IV, Julia Samuels, Tom Sanford, Chris Stain, Veng, Emma Wasielke