I collect postcards. I am an artist. This blog showcases both hobbies.

Thursday, October 24, 2013

Pink

I saw a challenge at inspiration avenue to do art that is pink, for breast cancer awareness month.



I had some fantastic ideas,none quite came to fruition...I don't really know any survivors or anyone with breast cancer, but maybe that made the art easier from an emotional standpoint. I made a little craft to speak to all women who either have breast cancer, have had it, or know someone who does.

It says, beautiful you.

i made a dryer sheet flower and used cut out words, ribbon, and little bell things I found on an old skirt.

Sorry it is against my wood table, I think a different background would have been better.

Monday, October 7, 2013

Faces

The weekly challenge at Inspiration Avenue is.....FACES

I have a love/hate with portraiture....I love the challenge and just portraits themselves, but they are such a pain for a perfectionist as I never get them right. It is a lesson in letting it "be". Last week I did oil pastel portraits of my children..... it just so happens they are both sleeping; I used photos as a model and my best photos were of them napping.

But wait there's more....
my oldest son, napping on me

my youngest son napping



This is a portrait of model Tyra Banks . This is my first portrait
attempt and it took weeks to work on . I did this 15 years
ago in high school.

A lithograph. I respect but do not enjoy lithography.
I thought "1980s" here. Circa 1998

oil pastel of a ballet folklorio woman 

Friday, October 4, 2013

dia de los muertos

I went to Los Angeles once during the dias de los muertos celebrations. I had a champurrado drink (sorry world....I did not like it), churro, and I browsed the stalls selling clay skulls and the like. It was fun.


 But to do that style of art as was the Inspiration Avenue theme this week? Totally not my "thing". But I winged it and used a stamped image of a Chinese woman and did a multicultural collage....blending Chinese papers into a Hispanic holiday theme. I used sparkly foam stickers to add color to the black and white lady. It was one of those ten minute projects where you do the art not for perfe
ction but just for a quick creative outburst. I am indifferent about the product of my labor but here it is.

Wednesday, October 2, 2013

Book Arts

My obsession for art is book arts. I took a class geez.....12 or so years ago? It was my favorite art class because...

work/disaster in progress, waiting for the glue to dry
hence the plastic bags so things that should not
stick, do not. See the "lovely" sewn binding?
a) it unites books and art. Sure I have an e-reader (makes reading in bed while feeding my newborn so much easier) but I love a good old fashioned book, the almost zen ritual of turning paper pages. I love book arts as in pretty books like those with illuminated letters and golden pages and illustrations, leather bindings and the like. Let's just say the rare book store in Las Vegas is a must-visit destination for me to ooh and awe at. And well duh...I love art

b) Most art classes were things like "painting landscapes" "lithography, animal prints" or whatever...too specific.  I tire of just one media and enjoy mixed media or at least "hmm I just painted two portraits but I really feel like making a sculpture" - my mentality- can be brought about in book arts

c) When I took the class it was all 100% new to me. And I only cut my finger with the box cutter...well...every time until I invested in a thimble.

tape binding, I used ribbon
d) no boundaries!

So anyways the one part I hate? Structure and procedure. Sure the art part is total freedom- yes! But the construction part is wrought with potential for error.

I should have remembered that. It's like a golden rule of book arts. plan, procedure, plan, don't screw up, plan.

Alas, I forgot and one day recently I  found some water color card stock and thought, hmm I can do something with this. I had read a book on sleep training kids (my co-sleeper toddler.....well he still struggles, we both do) and it said to have a bedtime routine, and a bedime book.

Bed time book! (light bulb idea, on!)
dont try and sew a binding without practice,
at  6am, without coffee.

So I got what craft supplies I had- very little- oil pastels, a muddied 99 cent watercolor palette of my son's, and q tips.... and painted a book. I did not want to wait for supplies as I am a "I have inspiration RIGHT NOW! USE IT OR LOSE IT!" kind of gal.

I made a bedtime book of my own, with our bedtime routine right in the pages itself.

a page in the book
Everything went wrong.

1. I had the card stock which were card shaped so think V shaped if the card is open just a little. Logic says you decorate all 4 sides of the V. You put all the Vs together to make a chunky signature of Vs so its like....well iv you could look at a V with quadruple vison, the Vs all stacked and nestled together. Sure. What did I do? Layed out the Vs  V V V V and painted just the insides. Oops.

2. I used crappy supplies. oops.

3. I sewed it together and screwed up the kettle stitc each time.

4. I used the wrong thread

5


a page in the book
. I did not sew tight enough

6. I did not...gosh what's the word when you bang a stack of paper so they all line up? I did not do that

7. I sewed it and then glues the outside V V V together to make a regular looking book. Really. this book is so doomed that I don't know if I should have glued then sewn, or done what I did, or skipped wither gluin or sewing all together because I did it ALL WRONG

8. I still have a cover to make so I must use a box cutter and ruler, measure twice, cut once, bleed once, to cup the chip board. Hopefully successfully. I then don't have book cloth so I get to experiment with smoothing on nori paste onto non wrinkled fabric (ha ha non wrinkled??!!??!!) and pressing on tissue paper, non wrnkled, then wrapping and gliung without wrinkles onto the board

9. I still don't know if I am leaving the paper and swen ugly spine showing or if I am figuring out somehow...how to make a spine that covers the paper.


wish me luck.


portraits

my oldest son taking a nap on me.
I hate portraits. Ok. I like to look at them and kind of like the challenge of doing them, but my perfectionist side wins and I end up re-crafting my art a zillion times and still not being pleased with the results.

my youngest son napping as well.
 So.....with yoga breathing in mind....its ok....they turned out pretty darn good....especially at a distance (but who looks at art from 6 inches away anyways?)   These are oil pastels on watercolor paper (I know... not the right paper...I was using what was on hand)  the images are my pastel drawings of photos I had taken. It seems they were both napping - I have photos of them awake but these, of all my photos, seemed the best for aet- the most clarity, focus on the face (being a portrait and all) and well...admittedly..using the colors I could find as some oil pastels are missing. What do you think? I'm trying to convince myself to frame them.

altered psotcards

I sent two and received two and will upload the pics if I remember to do so! Thanks Lou Anne and Maggie

Monday, September 23, 2013

Fall

a rare red oak which sadly succumbed to mistletoe last year
Autumn and Spring tie as my favorite seasons, especially because the weather is nice. I love the colors of fall and dream of one day visiting some place like Vermont in autumn.


a rare red oak which sadly succumbed to mistletoe last year
Where I live, the oaks generally turn a yellow-brown, offset by the many coniferous green trees. Rarely do I find a  rare maple or red oak. We do have native Dogwood which turn a lovely pink, but they seem to be inaccessible to my camera, as in, next to a busy highway, in someone's yard, on a cliff.


a sugar-cone pine cone by the fire
An oak glowing in golden light
I haven't done much photography lately, with two kids two and under, so these are pre-children photos of the leaves near my home....I hope to get back to taking photos soon. Photos are using my favorite setting, macro. My camera has since died so I have myself a list item for my Christmas list!


Fall comes later here; I see the first few leaves turning now but it takes them a bit to really "go". I can't wait! But as for winter...I'm not much of a fan of zero visibility fog, un-salted steep cliffside roads, and shoveling.




Thanks IA for this week's theme! (http://inspiration-avenue-team.blogspot.com/2013/09/this-week-challenge-celebrating-fall.html) Celebrating fall colors


incense cedar with morning dew. It doesn't
meet the fall color criteria but don't blame
me, conifers stay green year round


Friday, September 20, 2013

book art

I got a bunch of artsy papers and supplies from my mom because I'm doing it...getting back into art especially book arts!

I have a book I made for my son but I'm awaiting an awl to put it together.

In the meantime, I HAD to make a book of some sort so I made an accordion fold book for my best friend of over 20 years. Here it is.

I didn;t have a way to cut chipboard for the cover, and wasn't industrious enough to make my own book cloth (yet) so I recycled some cardboard from a box and covered it in paper.

art, too

instead of making a millionth blog for myself, this will be my postcards....and my own art blog of my creations.

Here is my inaugural piece, linking up to Inspiration Aveneue at http://inspiration-avenue-team.blogspot.com/ for their theme of the week, woodlands..... perhaps one of my favorite theme as most of my art is nature-themed.

This piece is mixed media. I used paper, cardboard, and "realia", real leaves and pine needles.

It is actually a compilation. I made the trunks, cut the paper leaves, and my toddler son placed the paper leaves and real leaves and needles which he collected. Sadly, it is sideways...no matter what I do it looks "right" until it posts to blogger.