Amherst News-Times, 1998-12-30

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Local artist turns
cardboard into art
by OLEN MILLER
News-Times raporter
Diane Yalc-Peabody has an unique ability to turn pieces of scrap
cardboard into art by dreaming.
The 48-year-old Amherst woman
carefully cms, pastes and paints corrugated cardboard to make Acadia
Dreamscapes, three-dimensional art
reminiscent of New England villages and towns she has visited over
the years.
"There's something about small
towns that fascinate me and captures
my imagination,'' she explained.
"They're quaint and colorful."
She calls them dreamscapes because the ideas come from her imagination based on her recollection
of the towns. Rather than landscapes, she often calls them "towns-
capes,*' although some also feature
the majestic lighthouses that dot the
New England coastline.
Yale-Peabody spends weeks,
sometimes months, painstakingly
cutting, shaping and painting her
artwork, most of which she has sold.
Her first work came about in
1991 after she and her family vacationed in New England's small
coastal towns. It was there she visited the Acadia National Park, from
which she derived the name of her
art
"I just wanted to remember my
vacation in some way, so I made
one and got an idea for another one
and so on and so on," she explained
"I just decided I wanted to do something with dimension, not just
paint"
... The results of her first work surprised her and others, given the fact
she had no formal art training and
didn't think she could paint
landscapes.
Some of her artistic abilities may
have developed while working on
the scenery for the Sandstone Summer Theater over the years.
She constructs buildings using
layers of corrugated cardboard. She
then paints them and the surrounding landscape, such as grass, water
ind skies, before adding details and
painting them.
Even her husband, Gerry, gets involved in her projects. He makes the
frames in which they are mounted
prior to painting.
A librarian at St Joseph Catholic
School, Yale-Peabody often gets her
corrugated card from boxes the
school custodian saves for her.
The more dreamscapes she has
made, the better and more detailed
they've become. She soon realized
she could add more dimension by
adding extra layers of cardboard, the
top layer of which she carefully
strips away to reach the corrugation.
It enable her to add roofs, signs,
light posts, animals, tail boats and
other tiny glued on details that bring
her dreamscapes to life.
One was a townscape with a sail
boat with rigging made of suing and
dowel rods. Others have been people's houses and a factory, although
they are not her favorite kind of
work.
"They're boring. They are just
houses and a lot of times they're just
brick, so you can't be real creative
with them," she explained. "It's really tiring painting brick."
She prefers scenes with lots of
details in which different colors can
be used
Her favorite work is a lighthouse
overlooking the ocean.
"The more things you put in
them, the more alive they become,"
she added. "There are always ideas
running around in my head for ones
I'd like to make. I like things that
stimulate my creativity. They make
it fun for me."
So far, Yale-Peabody has made
30 dreamscapes, half of which have
been commissioned by people who
have seen her work. Most have seen
them at St Joseph's school, where
she often displays them.
Finding a tiny cat in her towns-
capes is one of the favorite things
St Joseph's school children like to
do when they see her art She's a cat
lover, although she will substitute a
dog at the request of some one who
commissions her to do a work.
To her knowledge, no one else
makes dreamscapes.
She prices her works based on the
number of buildings in them, the details she includes and the overall
size of the art work. Most sell for
$130 or more and usually take 30 or
40 hours to complete, although she
works on them over several weeks
or even months.
"I don't like to overlook things or
rush," she explained. "It takes time
to cut things out with a razor blade
or craft scissors."
Yale-Peabody has more time to
do them now that her children,
Aaron and Megan, are away at college. Still, she usually prefers to
take her time.
She's currently working on three
and has about two dozen finished
ones on display in the community
room of the Amherst Public Library.
Tire fire
Fire fighters from Amherst and South Amherst battle a stubborn
tire fire in the rear of A&C Tire on Rt. 58. The smoky blaze sent
clouds of smoke billowing skyward for nearly two hours Monday
morning.
City wUl spend $150,000 for computers
by QLEN MLLER
News-Times reporter
The city will spend an estimated
$150,000 to $200,000 to upgrade
and network its computer system
over the coming year.
Part of it will be a shot against the
infamous Y2K (Year 2000) bug,
which threatens to create havoc on
computers after midnight 2000.
Many of the processors, the heart
of computers, were not made to recognize 2000, a shortcoming that
could cause all kinds of errors and
problems.
An electronic data processing
committee formed by city council
has found the city also needs to replace its hodge podge system of different computers with ones that can
be networked.
The upgrade will be phased in department by department as funding
permits. The first priority will be
those in the auditor's and treasurer's
offices so the city is financially
ready for the second millennium.
The majority of the city's fiscal
needs have become computerized,
most of which need to be upgraded
to accept new applications.
This phase of the upgrade was introduced to city council at its Nov.
30 finance committee meeting so it
can begin setting aside money for
the project Part of the process involves replacing older computers
and'applications with newer ones.
Much of the existing hardware and
software is out of date, according to
mayor John Higgins.
He and other city officials want to
make sure the equipment that is retained is Y2K compliant In other
words, they want to make sure it
does not shut down after the clock
strikes midnight 2000, a concern
shared by the private and public
sectors.
Most computers built within the
last five or six years are not expected to stop functioning, although
older ones may if they are equipped
with microchips that were not made
to last into the 21st Century.
Even though he is not a computer
user, Higgins said he has been trying to educate himself about them
so he can better understand the
city's needs. A small task force of
computer experts, most of them volunteers, was formed several months
ago to help analyze the city's needs.
The mayor doesn't want to delay
the upgrade too long because he
foresees an increased demand in the
hardware and software computer
market as businesses and govern
ment agencies rush to complete upgrades and avoid Y2K problems.
"We might be able to reduce the
cost a little. A lot depends on each
department's needs and ultimately
what council decides, but computer
hardware and software doesn't
come cheap," the mayor said. "The
good news is we'll have an updated
system when we're done with all
this and we would not need anything for a while."
The city expects its costs will be
divided between software and hardware, although some will be allocated for. creating a network among
city departments in various buildings, including the recently purchased San Springs Building on
Park Avenue. Both it and city hall
will have to be specially wired and
outlets installed so computers are
Internet accessible.
By networking computers, city
officials will be able to send messages and computer generated documents to each other.
"We're a small city and everybody is on the go a lot so its hard to
communicate some times without
playing telephone tag," he explained "Leaving e-mail would help
a lot but first we've got to get
networked."
There will be other advantages.
Residents and city officials eventually may be able to access city information, including codes and ordinances, in addition to state and federal data available to the city. In
effect someday there could be a
computerized library of city documents, he added.
Quarry Road bridge
set for demolition
by OLEN MLLER
Police Dept. also needs
new computer system
by QLEN MLLER
Newa-TimM raporter
The city will have to spend
$75,000 to prevent the police department's three-year-old computer
system from being batten by the
Y2K computer bug tad wreaking
havoc on its record keeping and dispatching systems.
The process involves upgrading
software and hardware that was not
made to itcogniae the veer 2000.
thus causing a host of unknown
problems that might include error
messages, wrong dates or system
failures.
That's the worst pan of iris, not
public safety agency, we can't af-
ford to wait and see what happens
because it may have dire consequences. We can't afford to have any
disroption in service."
The department dispatches police
as well as fire vehicles snd ambulances to emergency calk. Its computer system also stores vital iafor-
mation on criminals, motorists snd
ssry to Law
The
Itol
Newt-Times reporter
The city will spend more than
$134,000 to demolish a seriously
deteriorated bridge on N. Quarry
Road spanning the Conrail tracks on
the city's northwest side.
City council met in special session Dec. 21 to approve $11,200 to
pay for a Conrail flagman to overaee
train traffic safety during the
bridge's demolition next year.
The Fort Defiance Constniction
and Supply Co. in Defiance was the
low bidder on the project during
Dec. 22. bid openings.
City consulting engineer Milt
Pomeranz said he expecu work to
begin in Match and conclude ia
May.
The project involves replacing the
bridge with a steal support truss to
choice in this because, if it collapses
more, it could reduce the clearance
to trains on the tracks below,"
mayor John Higgins said.
The $11,000 must be set aside to
reimburse Conrail for a flagman
who will maintain radio contact
with Conrad trains white the work is
being done.
The railroad insisted that a flagman be brought in for safety
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weat oat of
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M997.
system was pur-
firm that
shortly before
into service m
which a U-maftv line win he
nected. The water Una is now stitched to the oM'hridge and pro-
r to Crones Road tad
i oa the city's nortlwest
The mayor said the bridge had
been in a state of disrepair when he
took office in 1996. Rather than replace it the city agreed to a five-
year option that gave it the right to'
connect W. Martin street with the
section of N. Quarry Road north of
the railroad tracks.
The agreement was worked out ia
April 1997 with • resident Florence
Leslie, who owes land near the end
of W. Mortal Street N. Quarry
Road ends ie a ceVde-eac jest soam
of Rt2.
Pomeranz ttrid the dty had considered replacing rite bridge with a
wakway. Tie idea was
mid-1
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