Christmas in August!

Merry Christmas to me! This is my Christmas gift from my sister! She wanted me to have it now, so I brought it home and put it in my garden window. Baby Cakes looked askance at it, but she has decided that it is OK (the garden window is her territory!) It looks great with the sun shining through, or at night.

Slow Motion Owl landing

Stampington and Company

Tonight when I was checking my email, Stampington and Company had a great page, well it really is 4 pages cram packed with ideas. Some of them are too cutesy for me (lots of birds...) but some of them look really interesting.

The website is here:
http://www.stampington.com/html/theStudio/the_studio.html

I love summer, and the fruit is the best! For the last two days I have had the most luscious white peaches. There is nothing better than a good peach, unless it is a good apricot, but I think that they are no longer grown. I have one more peach for tomorrow, and I am already anticipating eating it!

Flexagons -

One of the art books that I bought from Amazon was "Making Handmade Books" by Alisa Golden. One of the things that caught my eye was the Flexagon, which is a 4 sided construction (kinda hard to call it a book...) This is the first side (I could have been a little more precise on the folds)

You open the middle portion that is horizontal here, and from the way it is folded and glued, another side is displayed. This is side 2 (no particular rhyme or reason about what I glued down and color may have shown better)
Side three, with just a smidge of a gap. You can see the dog in the example above my fold.
Side 4, which is the best fold that I did. I will try again with either colors or a picture.
All in all a very interesting fold, which I think that I could use for some publicity mailings. And the book is great, available for order from Amazon in the right column of my blog!

Message from the Universe

Several months ago I signed up for a "Message from the Universe" daily email.
Todday's message was right on!

The entire world will be a richer place, Shari, once you retire and have your artistic sensibility.

We knew this when we helped you pick your dreams.

So let's get cracking,
The Universe

Some of them are just cute, but some of them are right on!

Have the Courage to be Imperfect

A small wallhanging, reads "have the courage to be imperfect". I have no problem with that! It is not finished yet, I still have to whip stitch the binding. If you look closely, you can see the pins in the binding.
We got a nice rain this afternoon, and it is nice and cool now (I have turned off the air conditioner and have the windows open, which is very rare in NM in August!).

Pinterest

Have you even been wandering the interwebs and seen an article, photo or offer that you wish that you could share with everyone? Well check out pinterest. I am not sure how I found it (wandering the interwebs one night...) but when you come across something interesting, you can click on an icon and set it up on your site.
Most of you know I am a quote junkie, and there are a LOT of quotes out there. If you are lazy, you can repin someone else's pin on your site (that is all that I have been doing lately, as I have been crazy busy with art and work!) Anyway, you might want to check out my site and sign on for Pinterest

Day Thirty-One!

I decided to continue, but it may not always be art... I found a new toy - word cloud tags.
Here is the link to the wordle created when I input my blog address in the cloud tag generator.

The generator takes all the words in the text and displays them. The larger the word, the more times the word appears in the text. I was surprised at the large words. You can go here to create your own wordle. Sorry that you cannot click on the image to make it larger, but you can follow the image to the wordle site.

Day Thirty of Thirty!

I made it....
My last day is "we live here..."
This has been an interesting process, and I am glad that Tracy Bunkers decided to do this!

Day Twenty-Eight and Twenty-Nine of Thirty

Wow, it is amazing that it has already been almost thirty days.
I know I sluffed off Wednesday night while enjoying my new books, but I did something very creative Thursday night (until well after midnight!) and this morning.
I am such a procastinator!
Earlier this summer, Creative Albuquerque put out a call for "Emerging Creatives" that wanted to be considered for inclusion in a program that will support artists, create a show, and expose the art community to your work. I fiddle-farted around and missed out on the first wave, and the deadline for the Fall wave was today. Of course, I have had the details on my desk for months, and just did not or could not submit.
One of the things I have been working on is getting my art out there and decided that this would be a good way to do it. The process was simple: an artist's statement, descriptions of the name, media, size, and price of 6-10 pieces of art with images. "Postcard to a Purple Cabbage" was one of my submissions.
OF COURSE, I waited until the last minute, but did get them submitted early this AM! Wish me luck!

Day Twenty-Seven of Thirty

I had a very arty evening, but did not produce any artwork. I had an unexpected windfall of $80 to be spent at an online retailer (just about the ONLY thing I have ever received from work for free!). But that is another story for another time.
Anyway, I picked Amazon and got two amazing books delivered at work on Thursday. Since I was crazy busy, I did not even get a chance to do more than peek into them, but came home and settled in and went page by page!
One book is Creative Paint Workshop for Mixed Media Artists by Ann Baldwin and the second book is Digital Alchemy Printmaking Techniques for fine art, photograhpy and mixed media by Bonny Pierce Lhotka.
They are both very different but are amazing. So much inspiration, but so little time! I will pursue more this weekend, as I only have a birthday party to go to Saturday night. Of course I have to go and pick up my new HP printer sometime Saturday. My alarm is turned off already!
I ordered three more books on Friday, and am anxiously awaiting their arrival!

Day Twenty-Six of Thirty

This process is taking much longer than I thought that it would. I have now colored in all the lettering, and put in the black separation lines. I have lots of pencil lines, and will probably paint a buff color on the background just to clean these lines up. I think that I can define my lines better with the background paint. But that will take even longer, so I may reconsider. Anyway, here is the third day of my Red Book quote!

Day Twenty-four and Twenty-five of Thirty

This is the inside cover of my dream big journal. The quote is from C.G. Jung, speaking about his Red Book.
It is all hand lettered (which I finished last night) and tonight I started adding color.
The quote reads:
I should advise you to put it all down as beautifully as you can - in some beautifully bound book... think of it as your imagination. And try to paint it. Then when these things are in some prescious book you can go to the book and turn over the pages and for you it will be your church - your cathedral - the silent places of your spirit where you will find renewal. If anyone tells you that it is morbid or neurotic and you listen to them then you will lose your soul - for in that book is your soul. C.G. Jung The Red Book

Day Twentythree of Thirty

These are handprinted business cards, ATC size (3.5 x 2.5") made from the cereal boxes that I posted earlier in the month. I have glued kraft paper on the back, and painted several layers of bubble wrap mono-prints over the sticky remains of some labels that I printed. You can see the hand lettering in the middle right card. Now that I am through with them, I wish that I had started with a wash of paint over the cardboard and labels, as that would have exposed less of the cardboard, but it is OK.

Day Twentytwo of Thirty

Large bubble wrap imprint with the left over paint from the pieces below (I try not to waste paint)
Another view of the bubble wrap prints using the leftover paint
These surfaces are the cardboard cereal boxes that I attached the leftover labels to in a previous post. I will probably use these for atcs or business cards, and this is just the first and second layers
The large front and back portions of the cereal boxes which will probably be cut up into business cards later.
I have really enjoyed coming up with some different things to do in this 30 day experiment, and am amazed at what I have done. I like to say that I do mixed media because you get to do so much stuff with different techniques.

Day Twentyone of Thirty

"Postcard to a Purple Cabbage". This is multiple layers beginning with a gorgeous pic of a purple cabbage from the Rio Grande Community Farm, two texture layers and a french postcard. I got busy last night and did not get it posted.

Day Nineteen and Twenty of Thirty

I worked on this piece for two nights, but did not get a picture taken until tonight. It reads:
Blame
A way to
discharge
discomfort
and pain

Anonymous

This is the second in a series, the other was published earlier this year.

Happy Birthday to my friend Lyncia!

IT IS RAINING-the first measureable rain we have had this year!

Day Eighteen of Thirty

Instead of having our Rainbow Artist's July meeting at our regular venue, we went to the Rio Grande Community Garden in the North Valley of Albuquerque; one of our members has a row there (they have rows, rather than plots; makes it easier to irrigate). It is a charming spot and we had snacks and the director of the Garden spoke to us of it's history and mission. The sketches above are some that I did after we broke up and went into the garden, and the photo below is roughly the area that I sketched. The flies were pretty bad, so I gave up early and walked around and took photos, but was proud of myself for sketching (which is my least favorite art endeavor!) as much as I did. Jackie is planning to make some kind of collage that can be hung at the garden from all of our sketches.

Day Seventeen of Thirty

This was a page that I had started in my Dream Big Journal. The right hand side was Traci Bautisita's art that I printed on labels and pasted to the page (Traci gave permission to use her art). I put the circles on the right and then decorated the left hand side with circles and various colors of felt tip pins. I felt compelled to finish this, which does not usually happen to me, but I did finish the circles early this morning and finished coloring the backgrounds this evening.


Close up view of both pages. I had another artful weekend. Saturday I worked on these pages after meeting with a client. On Sunday I went to Santa Fe and saw the Mining the Unconscious II show. This show was inspired by C. G. Jung's Red Book. It is a very inspiring show and they show a video with artists explaining the symbols and inspiration of some of the pieces. If you are in Santa Fe it really is a must see show, it is at the Santa Fe University of Art and Design, at the Fine Arts Gallery unitl August 7th.

Day Sixteen of Thirty

OK, I had a very busy day, but still managed to do some Fabric Art. There are five batik layers, and each layer is a different color and is snipped very carefully (I almost made a boo-boo on the blue layer which is the last layer and if I had cut through it, it would have all been over. ) Since I have not decided what I will do with this and this is the first time I have tried the technique, I will probably not do anything with it right now.

Day Fifteen of Thirty

OK, I was busy last night editing videos for my friend Juliana's online classes so that will have to be my 30 minutes of Art Making for Friday. On Saturday I plan to do some sewing because I have not done anything fabric wise yet for the project.

Day Fourteen of Thirty

This is collage of two layers of photos I took in Columbus. The facility we were at was being remodeled after years of water damage, etc. This is green peeling paint over a brick layer. I can see some graffiti added to this one!

Day Thirteen of Thirty Part DEUX

Here is the video from last night, it finally uploaded about 11:30 and I was already dead to the world....

Day Thirteen of Thirty

Drat! I shot a video today for my 30 days art project, but it is still uploading and I have to go to bed now, or I will never get up in the morning. I will post tomorrow night!

Day Twelve of Thirty

This is a digital collage I created on the plane back from Dallas Monday night titled white flower. It uses two background pics, one of a marble tombstone and one of rust stains on a wall, and then the white flower in the foreground.

Day Ten of Thirty

After creating the labels for the Rainbow Artist's show at the Albuquerque Little Theatre, I had all these sticky back pieces left over. So I peeled them off and stuck them to some cereal boxes I am going to use for business cards. Should give them some nice subtle texture and then I am not tossing out so much paper or cardboard.

Day Eleven of Thirty

Rough sketches of what I would like to do to my house to make my studio more special (includes buying another unit and knocking out walls, so it will have to wait until I win more than $3 on the lottery). The right page is squiggles for a potential logo... need to have it by July 29th, so I better hurry!

Day Seven of Thirty

Since I am packing, will fudge tonight with pics of the kittehs!
Babycakes is ready to go with me, until we have to leave the house, then she changes her mind! Imagine TSA's surprise when BC came bounding out of my suitcase!





fuzzy Buckets was lazy today...

Day 5 of 30

I FINALLY did it! At QSDS one of my classmates had concentric circles on her photos and I asked how she did it (I have no shame when it comes to asking about a technique that I like) and she told me it was in photoshop and it was easy. WELLLLLLL I have found very little in Photoshop that is easy, and this was no exception, but I finally got it down. She had them on photos of ancient ancestors, and it looked smashing. I just grabbed any old image and put it on it, but I love it.

Day 4 of 30

My inspiration wall, which is just to the left of my computer station. I am influenced by so many things!
I have had such a luxurious, art filled weekend, and I do not want it to end! On Saturday I went to an opening at the ABQ Open Space Gallery for some Silk Painter friends, then went downtown to the Main Library for a printing/bookarts exhibit by Off Center artists. Other than church on Sunday, I have done nothing but art and art related things all weekend! Such a nice way to spend my time. I am also posting my day four entries. These are pages prepared for Traci B's Discovering You e-course, and are all about me and my company, what I offer and what I want to accomplish. If you notice, retire plays a HUGE role in these spreads!

Day Nine of Thirty!

A digital collage, with a journal page from my book of the dead, and several texture layers.

Day Eight of Thirty!

Another digital collage featuring Morning Glories. Do I see a pattern here? Two morning glory photos, french postcard text and two different layers.

Day Six of Thirty

Another digital collage. This is a photo that I took on my balcony of morning glories. I used a text background (the writing) and two texture layers from Kim Klassen.
I decided that I want to spell out the day numbers, just looks nicer.

Day 3 of 30

Journal page for Traci Bautista's Discovering You online course. On the left is what I love and the right hand page is My Big Dream page.

Day Two of Thirty!

Cheetah Bricks, a layered digital collage. I think this symbolizes how civilization (and our attendant "progress") is infringing on the natural world. I used a magazine image of the cheetah (one of my power animals) and a photo of a brick street that I took in Columbus Ohio while attending QSDS in June.

Day One of Thirty!

Day one is a bit of a fudge, but I did not read Traci's post until late. This is Xs and Os #3, the third in a series featuring red, black, Xs and Os. It was started at QSDS from a class with Fran Skiles. I stretched the canvas tonight, so that counts as art for the day, huh?

Joining Traci Bunkers 30 days!

Join Traci for 30 days of art making.
I am going to do this!

Check this out...

If you are into Egypt at all, check this out...
http://www.freehabib.com/work/into-egypt/

Here are the words, but the words and images are stunning!

into egypt

to be ready
you will want beauty
as your face
you will want to greet the day with a heart
you will wish was open
you will want to be brave
and you only fear
want belief in anything
and everything is doubt
when there is light finally you might squint
the sight of it all might make you

steady you will want
a vision ahead
redemptive dissonance
music for the end of
chorus for the coming of
manifest hum into hymn
the noise of it rivers you
you will cry water into flames
vulture your own heart to feed

you will want to love your self
at all enough you will want
to flee and forget the leaving
will have to leap still wanting
you will want to wait for witness
you will want to wait for those already gone
you will want until you are want
you will want until
you are ready

- Suheir Hammad

Clarissa Pinkola Estes Quote

The real miracle of…the Wild Woman is that we all begin the process beforewe are ready, before we are strong enough, before we know enough; we begin a dialogue with thoughts and feelings that both tickle and thunder within us. We respond before we know how to speak the language, before we know all the answers, and before we know exactly to whom we are speaking. -
From Clarissa Pinkola Estes’ Women Who Run with the Wolves

I consider myself a Wyld Womyn Nrrd, a derivative of the Wild Woman!

Who does she think she is????

Watch Who Does She Think She Is Full Free Online... by viekig342655

This is only the trailer, I just watched the full video on PBS. It is available online by following the link on trailer.

Yeah I know - ANOTHER amazing TED video...

Back in the Smokey Southwest!

Xs and Os, one of the pieces that I worked on at QSDS


On Wednesday, we took a bus trip to Athens, Ohio to see the famous Quilt National exhibit at the Dairy Barn. No pics inside, but this is the exterior. It really was an old dairy born.

Untitled large piece from QSDS, also starring Xs and Os.
Xs but no Os
Display of some of the work that I did at QSDS, bottom left is my "wipe piece" that I used to clean brushes and paints. Looks pretty good and may become a selfstanding piece.
Art Sculpture at Columbus College of Art and Design, Columbus. QSDS relocated the workshop here from a hotel. Much nicer atmosphere! The glass building behind the sculpture is the Design Center Studio Apartments, where we stayed.

I am not sure if Columbus air was especially clean or not, but at least it was not smokey! I came back to a yucky, smokey atmosphere that is really bothering my eyes! But it is good to be home.

My "Artological" clock has started again

This is the cover of my new moleskine journal that I am going to use for "My Big Dream Journal". This is for Traci Bautista's Discovering You on line course.

This is the first layer of the background on my title page for the dream journal. Many more layers will follow.

At last, a good sunset picture

Due to the smoke that has been streaming into Albuquerque, sunsets have been muted. But tonight, I looked out and there was a goreous sunset! There is still smoke in the air, but certainly less than the few previous days. The light smoke gives the orange color and you can actually see the horizon line.

Happy Friday

This is a quote from Susannahsays:

...chorus from Anthem by Leonard Cohen

"Ring the bells that still can ring

Forget your perfect offering

There's a crack in everything

That's how the light gets in."

Litany of the Spirituality Book

I am off Sunday AM (a 6 AM Flight-WHAT WAS I THINKING???) to QSDS for a full week of classes! I can't wait!