Christina once belonged to an artist trading card group. The group has continued to meet long after they lost interest in trading the cards. They meet at Cafe Leila in Berkeley once a month, supposedly to make art, but over the years it's degenerated into more of a social thing.
"Degenerated" is the wrong word. I'll substitute "evolved" because the stimulating conversation that I experienced at that table was not a debasement, but an enhancement of my day. It's fun to talk with bright lively people about everything under the sun: dogs' breeding patterns, domesticated foxes, cats' food preferences, Israel and Germany's fight over Kafka's literary estate, the class system and economics, health insurance and collective bargaining issues, and the origins of Yiddish and Hebrew. It's lovely to see old friends enjoying each other's company and it's wonderful to be welcomed wholeheartedly into their circle.
Of course, they still do create artist trading cards as well as art journals, hand-made jewelry, collages, paintings, drawings and small 3D sculptures. They turn everyday things into art, which leads to the question "What is Art?" I'll leave you to decide that with your friends, preferably as you sit in a sunlit cafe on an almost spring day.
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