Art Journal Workshop

I am not a journalist so I have been taking the Strathmore Visual Journal Workshop Series. I have many old sketchbooks with notes and ideas, but they were precursors to paintings. The idea of putting so much work in a journal seemed unrealistic, since I needed to put that energy into my paintings. However, since I quit doing shows the art journal has become more appealing. Unfortunately, I discovered I do not have the casual mindset to dive in and start creating in my new journal. It is like a blank canvas that intimidates me. I need to think and plan what is going in it. The first workshop with Pam Carriker was easier for me because I was not involved with another project and was eager to get started. I loved the idea that she used her computer and scanner a lot. She had a definite motif of faces, which gave me a starting point. The second workshop was with Linda Blinn and she taught ideas for enhancing the journal with extension pages, pockets, stenciling and spraying. The current instructor is Roz Stendahl. Roz is a fantastic graphic designer and artist. Her attention to detail and organization is over the top, which awes even a fussy Virgo like me. As a result, she is a wonderful teacher. Right there to answer any question asked, Roz goes beyond what is expected with suggestions and advice.

I recently went to Whole Foods and sampled the most delicious and expensive pear I have ever tasted. I bought one and when I got it home, I could not bring myself to eat it without trying to paint it. I have been struggling with an idea for a subject for my first journal pages. A painting of this pear seemed like the perfect solution.

I created my background with the watercolor spray and stencil techniques we used in Linda’s workshop then painted the pears with opaque watercolor. Roz’s lesson included using collage. So I created my collage pieces on the computer (ala, Pam) and printed them out on clear labels, (I could have used vellum) and pasted them in my journal. Of course, the writing was also computer generated. It is far too intimidating for me to write on a page that I put so much work in.

One of my favorite followers is Robin Samiljan, who recently asked me if I still paint or do I only use my computer now for my art. Her question really made me aware how long it has been, since I have used a real brush to paint. Creating these journal images were a small reminder how much I love to do that. Thanks Robin.

Confused Anxiety

'Back To Square One Again'   4"x 4"                                   Eva Macie©

The weather is great today! I am so grateful for all the good in my life and having a son here to help me, but as the song goes, “every form of refuge has its price”. I should be outside pulling the weeds and pruning back the shrubs and ivy that has vigorously grown in this glorious weather. However, a word that I use much too often, I am glued to the computer that my son just tuned up and upgraded to Windows7. I am back to square one trying to adjust to this new platform. To top it off the Serif desktop publishing program I have been using has gone wacky and will not save all the work I have done this past month! A nice person from Germany, which I met on the Serif forum, has helped me a lot and suggests I upgrade to the newest program. (The devil in me wonders if in the updates includes a bug comes so you have to upgrade??). My son insists that I should switch and buy an upgrade of InDesign. I have a very old 2002 one that I have never used and I do not want to deal with outdated programs again. I downloaded a trial copy and the learning curve is something else! Needless to say, I am tired, confused and full of anxiety!  I believe the digital collage I created from some of my mix media images reflects my state of mine. I think I will turn off this computer, go pull weeds and meditate on it.

Realistic Abstracts

I just received a book I ordered form Amazon.com titled ‘Realistic Abstracts” by Kees van Aalst. The title is a bit of a contradiction in terms, but it is a lovely little book with a wonderful section on design. As a southern American, I have a little difficulty with Kees wording, but as a reader of images, I manage to understand what he is saying when I compare the illustrations with the words.

I am eager to play with some of Kees suggestions, but they will have to wait for now. I have a writing project that is joyfully consuming all of my time. I have been told (I know “have been” is a passive voice, is there anything wrong with that?) not to mention my project to anyone, as it will take the steam out of my sails. I hope that I have not said too much as it is, but I wanted to offer my excuse for not posting that often.

Yupo Revisited

'Mending'  watercolor on Yupo  15"x 24" Eva Macie ©  

At the risk of becoming a bore about my eye surgery, I will update you about it. In brief, I am mending, but because of some issues I am unhappy with, such as flickering, reflections and a change in the appearance of my eye, I cancelled the surgery on the other one. I have an appointment in July to reevaluate my decision.

I do not have any new art to post so I am showing an older painting I did on Yupo which I recently made some minor revisions. Maybe it is my state of mind, but the colors are not very pleasing to me. I desaturated the color in Photoshop and I think I prefer the grayscale version better. At least the values and the composition work for me. Artists today are so fortunate to be able to use software to do this. In my younger days, the only option we had to view the painting in gray scale was with red and green cellophane (acetate) to see the values or take a picture and wait a week for it to be developed! I cannot imagine where I would be as an artist today if I had all the tools I have now or even the materials such as Yupo.

Beautiful day today and I have errands to do. There is another big storm headed our way, which always upsets me. We have so many big trees next to the house and I have had two fall since I’ve been here. Not sure, what all of the awful recent natural catastrophes are all about, but maybe the Aztecs knew something when their calendar ended in 2012. *0*


                                                                                    

Renewal?

Renewal        4"x5"                    ©Eva Macie

I had cataract surgery on my right eye Thursday and although it’s too soon to really judge, I’m not pleased with the results I have now. The doctor warned me that being an artist I may find the color change a bit unsettling at first. It seems as I aged the eye lens yellowed and became more opaque. When my old lens was replaced with a new clear lens, the cool brightness was unnerving! Not only that, for awhile everything was blurred! I was expecting fantastic vision as soon as the protective shield was removed. Needless to say I was shocked and upset when it wasn't. I’m feeling a little better about it today as the dilatation is returning to normal and my vision is improving. I’m praying that it will continue to improve.  I created a digital image from my Citra-Solv papers, which probably was not the best choice, but I’m still hooked on the stuff. I wanted to show the difference in the temperature change in my eyes. The top is my interpretation of the right eye vision with the new clear lens and the bottom represents my left eye vision.  Depending on the how much my vision continues to improve, I am scheduled to have the left eye done April 22. If it doesn’t, I may opt out for now.

Citra-Solv Tea Ceremony

Tea Ceremony          6.5" x 6.5"                         © Eva Macie

The ongoing disaster in a country that is near and dear to my heart, Japan, and the wonderful Japanese people have been on my mind. Looking through my Citra-Solv papers I discovered what I perceived to be a figure of a Geisha. With few added brush marks I was able to bring the ghostly image forward.
 

Please Help The Victims Of The Quake

                                                     ©  msnbc.com

I captured this haunting image of these precious children from the NBC nightly News. I hope it will inspire you to donate at least $10. to your favorite organization that is helping these people. You can find them at this link HELP.  On behalf of these wonderful people I thank you!

Citra-Solv Collage

                                                   'Wanderer'                                              ©Eva Macie
The comforting sound of pots and pans rattling in the kitchen makes me proud of some of my accomplishments in life. This one is my son, John Allan, who is living with me now. He is a trained chef and is busy making vegetarian lasagna from scratch. I mean pasta and all! The sink is full of freshly wash vegetables that he bought at the farmers market and the counter is heaped with all sorts of goodies and a pasta machine.

The reason for all of this wonderful prep is that my grandson is coming for a visit. Branden has been interning at a Buddhist meditation retreat. We thought he would bring a friend along, but there has been a change of plans. After a few days in Atlanta, Branden will be on his way to work at an organic farm in Tennessee. He really has become a wanderer. I hope he finds the fulfillment that he is looking for. I created the above digital college from one of my Citra-Solv pages and I thought it was a fitting illustration for the current situation.

Steampunk Digital Collage

"Better to see you with, My Dear"                                © Eva Macie

Because of my upcoming cataract surgery I have had eyes on my mind. The digital collage above that I created obviously reflects this. As I blogged earlier I took an online digital collage class to brush up on my skills. It was a Photoshop Elements class and since I use Photoshop CS5 there were some things I wanted to know about this program. Although it was strictly a PDF class and the focus was exclusively on extraction, I learned a lot and enjoyed it.

I decided to use ‘steampunk’ as my subject matter. It is very popular now and I love the idea of recycled parts and vintage elements to create something new. I used a model from a magazine so I guess this is the only place I dare show this. As for the goggles I was given permission to use them by their creator, a super craftsman and artist, Nicolas Chambon. You can see these and his other fantastic goggles and creations at his website atomefabrik.com. Be prepared for a treat if you like steampunk.

Overload, Magic Jack and Citra-Solv

                                              'Overload'                                           © Eva Macie

This has been one of those weeks when everything has happened at once. I’m taking another online workshop to brush up on my Photoshop skills. I’m also trying to get my tax information together and deal with the State of Georgia’s new online filing system that doesn’t work any better than the employees. No one knows what they are doing so they just seem to make up stuff. Then they say they can’t understand why they are flooded with calls. This explains the sixty minute wait and longer on the phone. Thank goodness for Magic Jack! For $20.00 a year I have unlimited calling minutes and it doesn’t tie up my other phone. My son also has one so now we both have a private line. It was a bit tricky to install and if my son wasn’t here I’m not sure I could have done it myself. To add to the overload one of my email accounts has become un-assessable. I have spent hours in online Yahoo tech chats trying to solve it and no one knows what the problem is. (Apparently Georgia isn’t the only place that incompetency rules!) It looks like I may have to abandon it and try to notify those who contact me at that address. Ugggh!

The above Citra-Solv image really illustrates my state of mind. Overload! I was fascinated by the graphic elements and the distressed lettering. I could have digitally cleaned this image up but decided not to for now. The only manipulation I did to add a touch of clarity to the image, was to add the number 15 to an area that looked like a tag. I may have to take a break from my Citra-Solv fun as I have a full schedule ahead of me and looks like I’ll remain in ‘overload’ for awhile. I have discovered so many things that I can and not do with Citra-Solv that I think I could teach a course on the subject. Hummm.... another thing I could add to my overloaded schedule?

The Peekaboo Principle

Robert Genn, painter and author of ‘The Painter Keys’, on February 10, 2011 wrote a great post about "The Peekaboo Principle”. This principle term was coined by V.S. Ramachandran, who is a professor of neuroscience and psychology at the University of California, San Diego. Ramachandran, looking into various brains, including the brains of people who look at art, came to the conclusion that things are better when they are less visible. According to Ramachandran, concealment works because we are hardwired to solve puzzles. People get turned on by problem solving.

A friend of mine and wonderful artist, Susan Faircloth said “I've always loved mystery in a painting. It keeps me coming back to look for more in it. If it's all spelled out from corner to corner, I get bored looking at it really fast”. She also said it was the reason she enjoyed looking at my abstract designs. Thanks Susan, my goal of intrigue has been accomplished. Hopefully my above digital collage ‘Celestial Runner’ meets this standard.

You can read the entire Robert Genn "The Peekaboo Principle” post by clicking here.

Citra-Solv Collage

After all of the excitement of playing with Citra-Solv, I came down with the worst cold I have had in years. I usually use Zicam nose swabs when I feel a cold coming on and it would nip it in the bud. Unfortunately there were a lot of bad reports this past year about people losing their sense of taste and smell from using them. Needless to say I threw away the remainder of the package I had. After three days of a painful sore throat and cough, I surrendered to the Zicam Cold Remedy Tablets. They helped my throat, but the cold had taken over my system so I’ve had to deal with it.

Confined to my room with my box of tissues and herbal tea, I decided to play with the Citra-Solv decorative papers I had previously scanned into my computer. Photoshop is my angel in times like these. I have had a great time creating digital collages with the scans. Inspired by the many circular shape in the transfers, I made a couple of an organic circle brushes to add to my brush collection. I went a little overboard with the new brushes as I put circles in every image! Above is one of the first images I created. There is no meaning behind it, just a collage of textures and shapes. I’m looking forward to the end of this cold and being able to venture back into my cold basement studio to do some actual collages.

Citrasolv Fixation ~ Affixation

I became aware of National Geographic's image manipulation with Citrasolv last year. I had about a half a bottle that I had purchased several years ago. Remembering that it was difficult to find and that it was expensive, I sparingly painted a few of the pages. Nothing happened! After several tries I gave up and forgot about doing it. A friend of mine emailed me that she was hooked into creating Citrasolv pages for her collages. When I saw her wonderful collages I knew I had to try to master this technique. I went to the Citrasolv site and found some technique videos. One of the videos is by mixed media artist, Gary Reef. Gary has a great Ning site, Loving Mixed Media and I've been a member for a few years. Gary made me aware of what I was doing wrong. I wasn't saturating the page with enough Citrasolv. Too bad I didn't heed his warning about doing this outside. I love the orange smell of the product and thought it would be a great way to freshen my studio. It did that and more, it went through my return air ducts and took over my house! I woke up with a sore throat and my son had nightmares all night. My other warning is when you pull the saturated pages apart and see the results you become addicted! It is the most magical thing I have done in a long time.

Gary points out that if you are going to use these as a final piece of art, avoid using any with recognizable images as they are copyrighted. I have no idea how much of any image or type you can use, but I haven't heard of any law suits resulting from the thousands of pages all the artists have used doing this or other collages. I plan to use mine in my journals and as inspiration for paintings so I'm not concerned. Try it (outside) and you'll be hooked too. If you can't find it locally you can purchase it at Amazon.

Artists Journals & Sketchbooks

As you know I have been consumed by a workshop I’m taking for creating visual journals. Everything has been put on hold since I started and continues to be the reason why I have not posted lately or visited anyone’s blogs. I am enjoying this course, but I have not created a page I care to show the world. I have given myself permission to create anything that occurs to me no matter how silly or lack of artistic taste it is. As a result I have created some awful naive images. I even tore two pages out of my journal because they were so trite they embarrassed me! With encouragement from the other students I glued them back in with the idea of returning to them at a later date and reworking them.


My dream journal would be like the ones found in the above book by Lynne Perrella, titled ‘Artist’s Journals & Sketchbooks’. You can explore and purchase it at Amazon.com. This book may not be for absolute beginners, as it is not a recipe or a step by step instruction book, but anyone who is familiar with mixed media techniques will benefit from the mini instructions and suggestions. I like this book not only for the well organized instructions and examples, but also that it covers everything from creating the pages to the cover and bindings. The showcase of other visual journalists creations are absolute eye candy. After I finish the Strathmore series of three workshops that I signed up for, I hope I will not be too burned out to utilize the ideas presented in Lynne’s book.

Anything Is Possible

                                              
There is a wonderful art series on PBS titled ‘Art21’, which focuses exclusively on contemporary visual art and artists throughout the world. The series includes the Peabody Award-winning biennial series "Art in the Twenty-First Century." You will be able to observe the artists at work, and hear their thoughts as they deal with the physical and visual challenges of achieving their goal.... If you are not busy starting off 2011 creating new art, maybe this series will inspire you. Visit the ART:21 website


I am involved in the Strathmore Visual Journal Online Workshop Series which I wrote about in an earlier post. Journaling in this manner is relatively new to me. I have lots of sketch books filled with notes a few sketches, etc, but I would not consider them visual journals. This workshop is going a little slow as the lessons are posted once a week and we are just working on one page or two pages. There is no input from the instructor, except for the video, so we are at a loss as to what to expect or how far to take our pages. I am having trouble with the supplies we are using, i.e. oil pastels (mine are old) and covering my images with a light coat of gesso. I didn’t thin the gesso down enough and it killed my work. Someone said, “start another one, it’s just paper”…. What??? After all the work I put into it? I wonder if they would say that to Picasso? I don’t put myself in his class, but I do know that I worked very hard on this one and a do over would not be the same. The energy is lost. I’m hoping that the next step will salvage my pages, and as William Kentridge said, “Anything is possible”.

After Thought

It occurred to me that my last post may have sounded like I was boasting, about the sales I had before Christmas. That was not my intention. I was meanly trying to illustrate, what I believe is, the importance of consistency if one is trying to build a reputation. I have had some budding artist ask me to look at their site and I am often amazed at the variety of styles. Although they obviously have talent, it appears they are trying to cover every market and taste. This may work for some artists, but I’ve never been that successful with it. Choose something you love to do, do it well, and then market, market, market! Do shows, get an agent, send slides to a gallery that features your style and by all means get a website with your name or business name, and dedicate it to your specialty. Forget about my sales, they are just a drop in the bucket as to what you can do!

Advice from an Old Paint Slinger

                                   'Moving On'    12"x12" acrylic on canvas                              © Eva Macie

The sudden flurry of sales the past couple months of my paintings and prints was a reminder how important it is to stay true to one’s style. I have dabbled in just about everything since I retired from the art circuit and will continue to do so. However, it has been the work that I created and made my living with that continues to sell. If there is any advice that I could give to budding artists it would be to find you niche and grow with it. The above painting, ‘Moving On’ is a small 12”x12” painting that I painted earlier this year and is typical of the work I have created over the years . It has been sitting in my studio waiting to be signed, while I’ve been playing around with other things. I spotted it the other day and said to myself, “you need to get those acrylics out again and return to your easel”…Self said, “Huh?” It remains to be seen if I follow my own advice. Not having show and commission deadlines to pressure me I tend to paint when the mood hits. This is certainly not what an aspiring professional artist should do. I have proof that years of hustle and bustle and sticking to your style, will continue to pay off down the road.

Exhausted

The last greeting card went out today and I am exhausted! I always say next year I will start earlier and I did this year, but I had no idea I would run into so many problems and interruptions. I wrote about some of them in my last post so I won't go into them again. One pleasant interruption was my grandson's graduation from college last Wednesday. I was very proud as they recognized him for being the first to graduate (with honors) from Kennesaw State's new Interdisciplinary Studies. He majored in Environmental Policy. When they asked the students who had a cell phone and was texting and also who was on Facebook, he was one of a few who didn't raise his hand. He is a very quiet, sort of a New Age hippy. No computer, cell phone or any other electronic gadgets. He loves to meditate, paint and garden. He plans to be an organic farmer. Needless to say I'm pretty partial to him. He loves coming here to paint and talk about meditation. He plans to travel a lot. I will miss him when he takes off on his own.

If you are looking for a new project to kick off the New Year, Nancy Standee, a super artist and blogger, wrote about an upcoming free online journal workshop. It is sponsored by Strathmore journals and the first one starts January 1st. I signed up for the one that starts in March as I need to recoup!

Have a Merry Christmas or enjoy your traditional Holiday celebration.
Peace and Love,
Eva

Christmas Cards

Every year I try to do something creative for my Christmas greeting. The past few years I have created a video, posted it on YouTube then emailed the link to friends and family. This year I did not feel up to the challenge and decided to return to the traditional way of sending cards.The image above is not my card. It's a copy of a Dover stain glass coloring book image. In the middle of creating my own cards, I switched gears as usual, and came up with an idea of making some Christmas ornaments using some old shrink plastic from my John Campbell Folk School workshop days. What a challenge that became! I guess the stuff is meant for small charms and jewelry because large pieces warp and fold on themselves when shrinking. Fun, but frustrating to watch my hard work shrink into odd balls of plastic. Then I tried Fimo polymer clay. I do not know why, but I have never been able to get that stuff to a pliable consistency and I have a pasta machine that I purchased solely for that purpose. I bought some soft Fimo and that was difficult to knead also. As a last resort, I am using air-dry clay. It is not waterproof and a bit fragile, but I tell myself that hand painted glass decorations are fragile too. I am still not sure they will fly, as I have not finished them. I am still in the experimenting stage. I may get this done by Christmas! Along with more Christmas shopping, house to clean and decorate, this is a busy, busy time so I may not be blogging for a while. Happy holidays everyone!

Autumn Walk With Me

                          



The last days few days of autumn in Atlanta have been beautiful. I decided to take my camera along  on my walk to record the leaves before they returned to the soil. The video is a little bouncy, but I did not have a rolling movie cart to make the trip a smooth one. Our little neighborhood park is one of the joys of this the area. I told my son to spread my ashes here because it is where I have always found peace. Unfortunately, we live near the county airport and the planes seem to get louder every year. Along with the nearby traffic, peace is becoming harder to find.


The image at the end of the video is another Photoshop CS5 creation. When I am not out walking, I am deep into a stack of books by my recliner and working on the computer. I will be back in my studio next week to create some Christmas cards and gifts. In the meantime, I am wishing everyone a very Happy Thanksgiving!

Reality or Illusion

Sudoku is not my excuse this time for my absence. I have been reading and studying spirituality and quantum physics. I still do not understand much of what I am reading, but I am definitely fascinated. I am not going to defend or try to start a religious discussion, as I think everyone is entitled to believe as they chose, including myself. However, it brought up in my mind the illusion of art. I do not remember which artist, maybe Picasso, when a critic said his portrait did not look anything like a woman, replied, “That is because it is not a woman, it is a painting.” Even if the artist painted a photorealist image of a woman or took a photo of her, it is all an illusion.


Since one of my computers is next to my recliner, I took a break from reading to refocus my mind and for some reason I found myself creating a Photoshop image that was a first for me. I opened a file of a Yupo painting I did earlier in the year to see if it needed any further editing. I will post it in another post. After I played with it awhile, for some reason I added a new layer, filled it with white and began to erase areas with different brushes, some of which I created. Intrigued, I started cloning and painting new shapes. I am excited about the possibilities this opened up. My mind then associated all of this to what I have been reading, reality vs illusion. What I did was manipulate pixels, not paint, which are a tiny dots of light that are the basic unit from which images appear on the computer. For more information click HERE All of which, to my limited knowledge, consist of a binary code made up of 0’s and 1’s. I know someone reading this will say I don’t know what I’m talking about and they would be right. However, this much I do know; it is not acrylic or watercolor paint. Other artists, like Vik Muniz, who is using things like sugar and chocolate syrup to create images, and mosaic artist Ken Knowlton , who create portraits form various materials based on the pixels he generates in his computer, are masters of this art of illusion. A great book, which features these and other great artist, is Masters of Deception: Escher, Dali & the Artists of Optical Illusion.


Back to my books and disappearing into the world of words.
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Sudoku

I have noticed as I age that my memory is slipping. Every time I hear or read about something recommended for memory loss I check it out. In one of the Real Age newsletters that I receive, the game of Sudoku was their latest recommendation. I went to their online game site and let me tell you I was shocked at how something that appears to be so simple was such a brain drain! It is like a Rubik’s cube with numbers! Not to be defeated I have spent days trying to master this thing. I finally was able to beat the beginner’s level and I stopped, since everything has been on hold since I started. I have not picked up a brush, or pasted a piece of paper. I decided to do a digital collage of the game to justify all the left-brain stuff that has held me hostage. If you are interested in escaping for a few hours, or like me, days, you can find the game here. Enjoy!

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Busy Minis

This has turned out to be a busy time for me so I have only created a few mini paintings. The one above is on the back of an old business card. I do these in the evening while I am listening to the TV. For this one I used Caran D’ Ache, which is a watersoluble artist’s crayon. I love the intensity of these crayons and the ability to scratch into the color.

The rest of my time has been filled with going to appointments; getting my house ready for the winter, packing and shipping online art orders and my grandson visiting. The appointments have been for my eyes. A cataract that I have had for years is now at the point that it can be removed. As much as I want better vision, the thought of surgery on my eye, or any surgery, is unnerving. Getting my house ready for winter has involved adding more insulation and my son and I installing a pair of folding doors in the master suite to isolate the sleeping area. It is so warm today it is hard to imagine winter coming.


My grandson’s visit was fun. He is in his last college semester and is a new age hippy! He reminds me so much of myself when I was his age. We went to an organic farmer’s market to buy some veggies. He is writing a paper on fermenting vegetables and is pickling everything in sight! The last time he was here, the art books I am working on inspired him. He brought along several abstract paintings he painted and wanted to make booklets out of them. I showed him how to stitch them together and he took it from there. I cannot tell you how much I enjoyed being with him.


My final duty today was voting. I hope you all have or will do so!

Free Art Class

                                   © Steve Aimone’s ‘Expressive Drawing Class  sponsored by AARP

No, I am not teaching a class now and that lovely woman in the above picture is not me. However, earlier on June 4th -'Marks', I blogged about a book I bought by Steve Aimone, ‘Expressive Drawing’. As much as loved reading the book and looking at the wonderful drawings, at the time I was exploring painting on Yupo and I never got around to doing any of the exercises. I just received an email that Steve is offering a free online class. Here is a link to the class overview video and the info to join the free class. Looks like fun! Maybe I will set aside all of the other things on my schedule and try it. Possibly, you will too?


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More Black Gesso

Eclipsed ©      8"x10"  primed rag paper

This is the second black gesso painting, which I titled Eclipsed. It was not my intention to do a series of black gesso paintings and this painting did not start with it. However, I was not happy with the direction it was going and decided to paint over it with the gesso, saving only the areas that interested me. I scratched back into the gesso to relieve the opaqueness of the paint, and then added a few more marks and numbers. It works for me now.


Eclipsed is a good description of my HP computer lately. I have been having trouble with some of the programs and the email accounts not working properly. I have several email accounts for various purposes and I use a web mail notifier. Unbeknown to me it started dropping the accounts so some of my emails went unread. Then one of my favorite programs, Evernote, stopped working properly. The only thing I could think of that may have caused this was downloading a freeware program, Open Office. It is a huge program, takes up a lot of space, and since I have Microsoft Office, I decided to remove it with YouUninstall. This program is very through; it clears out all the stuff. I hit the start button and went on to something else. When I returned, it noticed the uninstall program was still running like crazy! It was wiping out my computer! I have no idea what the program or I did wrong. Fortunately, I had an old image of my c drive and a recent restore point. However, it did not have all the updated programs. I spent most of the week reinstalling programs and taking new images of my drives, then verifying them. Now everything seems to be back to normal. My son says I have not been a good steward of my computer and it is a mess. He wants me to clean it out and start all over. Uggh! I will put that off as long as I can and save copies my important stuff on my portable drive.

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Black Gesso

'32nd Matrix'    8" x !0" acrylic on primed rag paper

 

Several artists have raved about the quality and many applications for Utrecht's Black Gesso. I recently bought some and decided to use it as a substitute for black acrylic paint. However, it took over my painting. I fell in love with the creamy feel of it and its opaque matte coverage. I do not know what my fascination with black has been of late. For example, my portfolio cover and the black ink of the touch drawings, (see previous posts). To my knowledge, I am not depressed. In this painting, I think it is the mystery of the color that is intrigues me. Possibly the way it ties the elements together. The negative space blends with the positive and flattens the picture plane. In any case, it is a change of pace from the watercolor paintings on Yupo and since I have retired, I am all about change of pace.

Portfolio

I finally took the time to finish my portfolio. As I look at it now I ask myself what took so long. It was the cover. For some reason everything I painted was unsatisfactory, so I would put it aside. This cycle of repainting and quitting continued for weeks until I surrendered. Now it has grown on me and I'm actually happy with it.. I once read a statement by, Liz Lapious, an Atlanta art collector about collecting art, "I think it's important to challenge yourself. I've bought work I wasn't comfortable with, but now I'm in love with it. You need to have a collection you can grow with." I think she may be right. Better to grow than outgrow, which I have many times.


The portfolio is 17" x 24" and the cover is painted with acrylics on acid free mat board. I used acetate presentation envelopes for the inserts to hold my art. I have a supply of 32" x 40" and I cut them down to size with a  Walnut Hollow Versa-Tool hot stencil-cutting tool. I used a metal ruler as my cutting guide and to seal the edges..

© Walnut Hollow

I have an antique double hole punch that belonged to my father. I love this old punch because it works so well, and I think of my father every time I use it. I chose brass brads because I could easily add or remove inserts. They were sprayed black to match the spine. I plan to make at least one more like this for some smaller work after I finish the artist book/portfolio patiently waiting on my mat-cutting table.

Touch Drawing

                     


Here is a You Tube video showing how to do touch drawing. Deborah uses her technique for mediation and art therapy. It appears that Deborah is using a light weight drawing paper instead of tracing paper. She writes about the different recomended papers and paints in her handbook ‘Drawing Out Your Soul’ that you can purchase from her web site.

Below are a three of the many drawings I created. I used acid free tissue paper for the personal awareness drawing, which I will put in a journal. I switched to old newsprint for some abstract designs since archival paper was not important. My digital files are enough for any possible future use. The other limitation of the newsprint was not being able to see what you are doing as well as you can with tissue. I found myself pressing little harder with my nails. As a result, you can see the ridges in my aging, damaged nails. It made for some interesting lines. The paint I used was water-soluble oil paint. Deborah also writes about the pros and cons of the different inks. I really enjoyed this technique and being surprised when I flipped the paper over. I want to do more non-personal insight drawings and use differant tools besides my fingers. My ‘to-do’ list is really growing! The portfolio, that I wrote about earlier, is almost finished. Just a few touch ups left to do after I clear my table of the Touch Drawing materials.

Celebration                     tissue paper

Absract Design 1               newsprint

Absract Design                                   newsprint

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Answered Prayers

This moving image created by Deborah Koff-Chapin came in my email today from The Center for Touch Drawing. The technique is a finger drawing on a piece of tissue placed on an inked surface. The ink transfers to the back of the tissue much like other monoprint making techniques. I played with this technique a few years ago and got many interesting results. It has inspired me to get my inks out and play again.

One of the reasons I was so move by Deborah’s painting is that for the last two weeks I have been dealing with a breast cancer scare. Yesterday, which was my birthday, I had the best present ever, my mammogram and sonogram showed no signs of a lump only a very tiny cyst near the questionable area. I feel very blessed, as it was an answer to many prayers. We celebrated with a lobster, and Red Velvet cake with vanilla Häagen-Dazs Ice cream!

Artist’s Eye

Peggy Stermer-Cox commented on the composition of the steel cabinet photo in my last post. Peggy has a great artist eye as I was not consciously aware of the composition. I guess years of composing art and photography it becomes automatic. Intrigued, I decided to play with the photo in Photoshop. Who knows, I may use the results I achieved as a subject for a painting. The yellow shape in the upper left hand corner is a laminated poster I have had for years. It is a slightly tongue in cheek definition of an artist written by Kenneth Grooms. I am sharing it here. Enjoy :O)

ARTIST (ar'tist) n. 1. a) One who practices an art in which conception and execution are governed by imagination, style, and taste b) a person skilled in one of the fine arts. c) A craftsman that executes his art with individual style 2. Often their work is judged according to the culture and the attitude placed on art at the time. Although they may earn recognition during their lifetime, they are usually not recognized for their accomplishments until after death. 3. Lives a life of unstable economic means. 4. Many theories have been put forth regarding their creativity, the most common one being that it is inherent, although if not developed and tested will remain dormant. They seem to create during moods, often intense, mostly lasting only a short while. 5. They have a feeling of brotherhood with each other that is timeless. 6. Thought to be haphazard, having no sense of order, plan, or direction, yet are known to be perfectionists when it comes to their own work, a) They make decisions on feeling rather than reason, b) Have problems with concentration. 7. They are stereotyped as mentally unbalanced. One artist cut off his ear in a passion of creativity combined with frustration about his art. It has not been determined whether their creativity has anything to do with this. 8. They are sensitive, aware, and alert. 9. They are tolerated by society, which allows them to live in accordance with their own natures.

~Kenneth Grooms

Steel Derailment

      

It seems more often than not something comes up to interrupt what I am doing. I read about an artist who bought a steel cabinet to store his flammable paints. The idea sounded sensible to me, but when I priced them, I decided I would have to find a used one. I started visualizing finding one. Shortly after that, a new thrift shop opened less than two miles from me. Low and behold, they had one and it was on sale for 50% off! I quickly said, “thank you” and plunked down the $15.00! The portfolio I was making for my unframed art became derailed as my son and I rearranged shelves to accommodate the cabinet. I am still sorting, throwing and giving away a lot of stuff as my project waits to be finished and my internet/computer time clipped.

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Artist’s Books & Portfolios

I just checked out this beautiful book from the library. It is not a how-to-do-it book but rather an inspiration book filled with 500 amazing and clever handmade books. A couple of my many favorite artists were Lisa Kokin and Elysa Vishell. Not all of the artists have web sites so I highly recommend that you check your library for the book or you can purchase it online at Amazon.

In my current mood of bookmaking, I thought I would like to store my un-matted paintings in some sort of portfolio. Especially the ones on Yupo as watercolor on this surface is so fragile. I bought an Itoya Original Art Portfolio, which has lightweight recycled polypropylene sleeves in it. I stopped at a store on the way home and I did not consider that the heat in my car would ruin this portfolio! I have left my matted work in my van for hours, but I have always used acetate wraps, sleeves and envelopes. I went back to the store and pleaded my case and they were kind enough to give me a store credit. I would hate to think I would have to carry this with me at all times if I was on the road, no lunch or other stops. While I was in the store I checked the other ones and they looked rather suspect. (I noticed they put up a sign since then that all portfolios were non-returnable.) The clerk admitted that the heat might have damaged them in shipment. He went on to say there are certain products they cannot order in the winter because very cold temperature affects them. This is something to think about when ordering anything. I have some acetate envelopes left over from my show days so I think I will try to make my own portfolio using them.

I Rather Paint

Casting Up Stream

I have not been in my studio for the last week due to other business and illness. I needed to lose some of the lazy pounds I have put on lately. I decided to go the fresh veggie route. My first diet meal really worked. I lost 3 lbs. in three days! I got food poisoning! I could not eat a thing those three days. The pain was not pleasant and something I would not want to go through again, but hopefully I can go from here with a proper healthy diet and keep off what I lost.

Since I have not been able to created anything new, I am posting a painting I blogged about before. The painting "Casting Up Stream" won an Honorable Mention at an Atlanta Artists Center show in 2008 and Best in Show at Kudzu Art Zone earlier that year. I mistakenly believed I painted it on Yupo, because I used some of the same techniques, but actually, it was Aquarius coated with a watered down soft gel. I used watercolors in a simple complimentarily color scheme with the warm earth tones dominate. I lifted some small areas with water using stencils. The calligraphic jesters are often part of my work because of my early schooling with a Japanese calligraphic master. I did not learn calligraphy but the experience has lingered with me since I was a young girl and has greatly influenced my art.