Monday in the studio......

It was hard, but I finally drug myself away from the computer long enough to mow the lawn, do the dishes and actually go into the studio and WORK! For someone like myself who is an 'image junkie', joining Flickr may not have been one of my best moves! My original intent was to have a place to show more of my work. Mary Ann Wakeley at A Creative Life, and also one of my favorite artists, made many mentions of flickr on her blog, so I thought, hmmmmmm - I'll give it a try. Yikes! Nirvana. I know myself, and the newness will wear off and I will become a sane human again, but until then, it's going to be a fight to turn the computer off and get on with my real life! As for the work I did today, here is a little sample - I've been photographing the insides of some of my practice books and having fun with the angles.

This photo turned out pretty interesting.

then I grabbed two pieces I have been working on and worked some more. This one was in my last post and I made some progress, but still a ways to go.


This last one is starting to form and I'm liking the shapes that are coming. Happy Monday to all and I dare you to check out flickr! Guess where I'm headed :)

art lab....

That's basically what I've got going right now - an art lab - I'm spending time experimenting with different ways of working and working with different materials. These two pieces are both very much in process. They are both 300 lb cold pressed paper (scraps I found from another project) bees wax and oil. I have two other pieces that I am applying collage pieces on (gee what a surprise - one-a-day 10 minute collages). I'm finding these experiments fun, frustrating, interesting and informing.



Have a wonderful weekend everyone!

wax.....

I was back in the studio today after some time off. Last week was full of other parts of my life, so I was really happy to walk into my work space this afternoon. I've been eager to work with wax and so this afternoon was just messing around. I ended up with two pieces that are not so bad. I learned alot and will continue to play with the wax and oils. I have also started a morning discipline of a ten minute collage. I was inspired by Robyn over at Art Propelled. Go check out what she is up to. I posted my first one on my sidebar this morning. I don't have an opinion yet as to what this might inspire, but I'm going to stick to it.

63 days..........

an afternoon at Leslie's studio....

Leslie Avon Miller - funny, down to earth, intelligent and an amazing artist! I had the pleasure of spending a couple of hours this afternoon at Leslie's studio. When I first walked into the space I saw painted tissue paper scattered on the floor, on tables and generally drying in any place there was a space. Then I saw this painting on the wall directly in front of me. Fabulous! In process, but oh, so yummy. Much of the detail is lost with the camera. This is a mark makers dream. Leslie can make marks people!



We talked shop, we talked, we talked shop, we talked, we looked at art, talked shop, drank tea, we laughed, we talked, we talked shop and then it was time to go home. I only had my little digital camera with me, so the videos below are a bit raw, but you get an idea of Leslie's process! The first little video I took was after we had discussed the uses of a brush and how scrubbing can make just the best marks! The second video is pretty self explanatory. If you can get past my uninteresting remarks and goofy camera angles, you can see a wonderful process in action.





This final photo is the piece Leslie is working on in the second video and she had collaged a large piece of the tissue paper over the painted surface and it was starting to really look amazing! Hopefully she will show you the finished piece on her blog! Thanks Leslie, it was so much fun!

color palette and a window display

It is really interesting to me how certain colors claim their place in our worlds. No matter how many times I divert into other color palettes, I always come back to the one below. It satisfies me the most. Why?, I don't know and have stopped trying to figure it out. I loved the whole series of paintings I did about 'blood', the lush reds?, but I was soon scooping into burnt umber, paynes gray, deep blues, mars black mixed with yellow, burnt sienna and titanium white, but always with reds underneath. Turquoise always gets added and I usually love seeing it peek out from under a darker layer. You've all seen the piece below go through its many transformations (big yawn, god, would she just move on, PLEASE!). It's been a good one to practice on and may still get a change up (oh, please don't make us look at it AGAIN!!!!). Right now I'm liking where it's at. This is 300 lb paper, oil, oil pastel and beeswax.



Last Friday, Lisa, Halie and I did the window (mimosa fueled) at Salon Delucca. The day before, Lisa and her mother spent the day painting doll furniture pink(don't have any idea what fueled their afternoon of PINK)! This window is just fun and whimsical! People walking by smiled and waved and gave thumbs ups! It's a good thing to give people something to smile about! It's very hard to get a good picture of the whole window. You have to cross the street and then there are cars blocking the view! Anyway, you can get an idea.







Halie and Lis on the sidewalk outside. Hope you all have a great week!

favs of the week.......

I wanted to share a few of my favorite things from this week. Lisa always amazes me with her creative flair. She found this little retro sofa in a very disgusting condition! One of her clients is an upholsterer, so Lis asked her to refurbish it and here is the final piece sitting in her salon. The back is white tufted leather that is still in pretty good shape. The arms with those lion heads just knock me out!



Here is my new handbag! I LOVE it! It just makes me feel good to grab it and throw it over my shoulder on the way out the door! Buttery yellow - mmmmmmmm.



My first peonies of the season. Well, it's a very short season really. A couple of weeks of these bouquets filling the house with their sweet scent.


And finally, some work in progress in the studio. I'm messing around with wax and oil and finding it good. I don't know where I'm going with it, but I'm sure it will show me the way.


This bottom photo is a detail.

Have a wonderful weekend everyone!

UPDATE: The detail above was from this piece. I finished it today. Lyn, this is in response to your post of a couple of days ago, Embedded, about irritants, or at least that's how I thought about it. It really gave me food for thought, so thank you. This is bees wax & oil over acrylic on paper.

work in progress 6/8/09

I went back into the studio today after two days off, and started reworking the piece on paper. The photo below shows how I left it after I stopped work this afternoon. Still very much in process and I actually enjoyed the challenge. It has started to take form and I am hopeful I will be able to resolve it later this week. I decided to video the work today instead of stopping to take photos at each step. Enjoy.

UPDATE 6/9/09

Here is the painting almost finished. I was able to work for awhile today. This paper gets better to work on the more layers there are. It needs to sit for a week or so and then I'll decide if it's finished or not.

brutal.....

That pretty much describes my week in the studio. Started a couple of pieces at the beginning of the week and have been struggling everyday with both of them. You can see on my sidebar my studio notes - UGH! was the operative word and many other more descriptive words. The piece below is almost resolved. It is on heavy paper and it was a very different experience from working on canvas. Don't know if I like working on paper yet or not. Have to do a couple more and make up my mind. Not only has the studio been brutal, but my personal life has been off kilter. My mom's boyfriend had a heart attack last Friday! He was transported to our local hospital but then they had to move him to a larger facility where they had a cardiologist that could put in a pace maker. Well, normally that would not have been such a big deal, but our life line to the other side of the water, the Hood Canal Bridge, has been closed for the past month for repairs, and he had to be transported in several stages and on a little foot traffic only ferry - a very complicated maneuver to get to the other side, which normally would only take us about 45 minutes to drive. Well that left my mom on this side and we had to drive her over the next day which amounts to driving for almost three hours to bypass the Hood Canal. It's been a logistical nightmare, but HURRAY, the bridge opened EARLY yesterday and so it is easier.



Have a great weekend everyone. Will be posting my studio notes on my sidebar over the weekend if I make any progress with ANYTHING in the studio! :)

the one that just paints itself.....

I know all of you have probably had this experience - that piece of art that just seems to create itself - a painting, a poem, a choreographed dance, the final act of a script, a piece of music, etc. I got mine a couple of weeks ago. I went into the studio, grabbed a canvas I had been cleaning my brushes on and bam! this just came. I really like this piece. I'm a believer that when one is doing the work on a regular basis, this moment comes because we've put in the time. A little reward for those days of UGH!



As opposed to this piece that gave me fits. This is the final. I went in yesterday and did the shading, and cleaned up the uninteresting areas and am pleased with the painting. Probably can't really see any difference from the photo I posted last week, but it is just pulled together more.

Well I know I have said I would post pics of my little show at Lisa's, but I thought, how boring to see paintings, that you have already seen just because they are hanging on a wall somewhere else. But........so okay, here is a pic of Lisa and her partner Brendon hanging one of the paintings with some sort of car wire thingy - When we went to hang the work, Lis and I didn't want to head down to the hardware store to get more wire so we did some creative installing with what she had at the gallery. Brendon happen to come by and dug around in his truck for something to hang this piece with.


These pieces we sort of strung together with some chain and then the last bit of wire. They have to hang from a picture rail because the walls are plaster.



Finally the price tags I put together about 1/2 hour before I had to leave here. They were fun! Have a wonderful creative week everyone!