art mimics life mimic art

facinating...
http://www.yeondoojung.com/artworks_view_wonderland.php?no=88

something...

i've done "something" with myself...this piece is done on a scrap piece of wood brought home from mr. pop pirate's job site, combined with tissue paper, acrylic paint, stencil, rusty nail, yard stick, silver spoon, alcohol inks cloth ribbon and (as kieth lobue always lists) soil...

here is "something"...





mr. and i were going to see a concert at red rocks tonight for our anniversary but, just as the rain clouds were parting, they canceled it! we've been looking forward to seeing rush for months...arrrr!

and the winner is.... (a little late on my part)

do i know how to pick a winner...david cook was my choice since day one...american idol is inspiring in that people think they might have talent, they try and try again and some even become artists...







here is my mess on my studio table...some art has actually come from this mess...

Evenflow

every morning in my art studio...art ideas flowing, spring has sprung...here's a brand new piece i'm working on...it's for the art challenge the artist's nook is sponsoring in june...take an everyday item and go...i've got a dustpan, light bulb and a pair of scissors....i'll work on the background using linoleum self-made stamps...layering along the way...


as promised, here are pix of my artfest finished projects i did in my three classes...linoleum prints on deli paper...
copper necklace in susan kasmer's class....i absolutely am pleased with the results....



i stamped a couple of my "word salad" phrases on both the tube shape and the open box...

here's my drawing done with a large feather dipped in water then ground charcoal... others raved in class about it but i was less pleased...

work for two days coming up...i know i sound like i whine a bit about work...i only work three days a week...nice...but twelve hour shifts are tough for me...age? attitude? a certain difficult workmate? i don't know but NEED. ATTITUDE. CHANGE.
arrrr....

seattle redux--three days of art bliss

a.m. on the beach at fort worden...






first day class: drawing with tiphoni, daughter of the fest organizers...


second day with ann bagby, (see this post) ...she never, ever stops moving...thus the blurry pix...


here's christine, owner of the fab artist's nook here in town....(she does internet sales too...)...we had fun sharing tools and laughing at ourselves...



third day...jewelry making, metalsmithing, cold joining...all with susan kazmer ... what fun! my fave class...
here's my table mates hard at work, making treasures...


the fun didn't stop at night...here is a gang we joined...

tomorrow, pix of the finished products....

seattle--day one of artfest

I was thrilled to be on the jet plane on my way to seattle for artfest...you see, i registered for this event waaay back in september of last year...talk about lack of instant gratification...not to complain (but i will just a little) i haven't been on a vacation in waaaay too long...

my flight was, thank fsm, uneventful...all have to say is i'm also grateful for ipods...keeps me from going postal on public transportation situation....

i met up with lisabeth who flew in from Anchorage AK to meet up with me...sun was shining and we had the top down on the convertible sebring....here are some pix from the bremerton ferry...

lb in all her beauty with hair flying in the cold breeze on the sundeck...

we arrived for check-in at fort worden and the first thing i saw was this automobile assemblage...i knew i was in the right place...

the car belongs to a woman of a certain age (in her 70s?) who wore a different crazy beany hat every day...it has happy meal toys, mosaics...even (my favorite toy) devil duckies (see left side of the pix)

we checked in, received a bag of cool artfest swag and i took some time to look at the gallery of art...the theme was woodland creatures...here's a look...





what talented people...all woodsy and delightful...

some didn't quite stick to the topic...

great nontheless...

as fate would have it, lb had friends from Anchorage sailing on the puget sound at the very time we arrived...they invited us to see their water craft... at the marina...



here's the cutest darn houseboat ever...complete with container garden and scrolled porch decoration...
we all ended dining in town at a great local restaurant instead of artfesting it that night....great choice...

more to come on thursday as i must (gulp) go back to work for a couple of days ...arrrr...

new books on day #14

i shouldn't even go to barnes and noble...it's like crack for me--irresitable, i shake and crave when i pull into the parking lot, pocket book in hand...i came out with not one but two new art books...

"art making:collections & obsessions" another book by artist and author lynne perrella...it is strictly an eye-candy coffee table book full of lovely pictures of artists' collections and their confessions regarding their inability to walk past rusty metal googas, gorgeous printed fabric, old plaster doll heads, turn of the (last) century cabinet card photos and not snatch them up to use in their art...or maybe just to look at, satisfied in their findings...

featured is fort collins' own photographer, memory jug maker and massive, ginormous altar creator laurie zuckerman...


also featured is ann bagby, one of the presenters at artfest this year and i'll be in her class making the very thing shown in the book, lino cut pattern making...her collection of hand-cut stamps are shown here...


the second book is "mixed media collage" by holly harrison, a book of interviews and how-to's not found in other books...here is teesha moore's spread...and she is the facilitator extraordinaire of artfest!
my advice to you is: either slave away alone in your studio without these inspiring books or share my jones and go directly to your local, independently-owned bookseller (fort collins, alas, has no such endangered species) and order these books pronto...

day #13--the hissing of summer lawns

if you are ever stuck, out of the flow, missing your juju, and having artist's block, just put on joni mitchel...it has to be her 1977 release, "the hissing of summer lawns" on mint-condition vinyl, analog recording, on a new, old-fashioned turntable...once again joni has moved me, this time through the problem in my "no wonder" rusted piece...




i finally worked through this problem, a term i got from the (little bit of ) rock climbing i've done in my youthful past...when you get to a part of the climb where it's not obvious how to navigate the next few moves, it's called figuring out the problem....i've successfully navigated...joni was my compass...

day #10--exploring

i've been inspired lately by this artist, andrea fuhrman...her composition and juxtaposition of simple scraps creates what i think is eye-appealing art...

so , thus inspired, i spent time making this piece, "gives up the goods"... mr. pop pirate, my in-house art critic, really likes it...

here's a closer look:


this one, "stereo," is a work in progress...


still working on "no wonder" (see this post)...i know what this is needing, and that is paint...now, i have a blockage when it comes to painting...i took a watercolor class way back around 1985 when i first went to college...i liked the medium and felt proficient in still life rendering but...that was back then and now i'm using (or in this case, not really using) acrylics...some would not agree that water colors are more forgiving but that was my experience...acrylics are there--permanent, bold and not easily (for me) manipulated...i worry that i will "ruin" my hard work and vision with painting it...not quite getting the results i see in my head...

i went out friday night to our village's art walk with my best friendy, emily...we sauntered about, looking at tradition (read: boring, been there, seen that) and modern assemblage, photography...in the fort collins museum of contemporary art you can tour working artists' studios upstairs...i had a chat with a gal named lyse whose oils and acrylics have traditional landscapes but with luminescent qualities... she asked me if i am an artist, of course i said yes (and so are you, dear reader) but confided that i hesitate when it comes to adding painted elements to my art...she encouraged me to study other painters and to enjoy the process of learning about the qualities that paint has to offer....

i see on many art blogs that artists have art journals they play around in...trying techniques, exploring visions and feelings...i have a couple of them that i woefully ignore...no more...time to reintroduce myself to them....it's time to explore, to encounter my blockages and bust through them...we'll see how it goes...arrr

day#9--Freeze!

this clip reminds me art can be for just 5 minutes...no framing it , no signing it, not for keeps...just a brief moment to make people respond...things that make you go "huh"....

day #8--no wonder

my current piece is under way...i love how the rusting solution made my plastic mass-produced thrifted canvas turn this great mottled shade of , well, rust! i brushed the antiquing solution on and did not like the first attempt so i repainted the entire thing with the iron paint and rusted it again and boy howdy it looks like i've set out this metal rectangle out in the winter weather all season...grant thinks it almost looks like wood...



i've been having fun taking elements off and on, trying on this or that...i am going for a certain mood or feeling...don't ask me to elucidate this as i can only look at it and know when it's right...i took away the polkadot and bird "scrapbooking" paper...i also removed the word salad i had chosen and replaced it with these words: "layering, and" "no wonder" in case you don't know." as i've said before in another post, i like the play of punctuation, fragmented sentences and fonts to offer up a found poem of sorts...

i secured the bird's nest with blue wire and added a rusted smashed tin can i found where??? as a cornice or finale on the wooden boxo.k. the can looks better in person...

next: another local artist review