Aoife's Little Book

I absolutely love, love, love when my grandchildren gift me their tiny creations. (See Atlas’s origami box, Anwyn’s miniscule origami birds, Rhys’s pottery bird all in dark green and black.)

So when Aoife slipped this onto the dinner table for me, I was overjoyed! A tiny book of her rhyming words.

I did not want to lose it so I put it in my coat and zipped the pocket closed. My phone was in there too. On the way home I pulled out my phone, then slipped it back in the pocket and zipped it up.

Sitting in bed, I remembered the tiny book and went to check the pocket; the tiny book was gone! I asked Andrew to please go out in the foot deep snow and look in the car to see if the tiny book had fallen onto my seat when I pulled out my phone.

He came back in, set the book down on his bedside table and I was thrilled. It was lost but now it was found!

Illuminated Letter

A little history about illuminated letters and then on to the project.

For this project the students were asked to pick a letter and then pick out things that begin with that letter to embellish it. For example, “F” for fox and forest. “O” for ocean. I stressed that the pieces are generally chock full of detail.

We used colored pencil and marker for the color and then used a gold acrylic paint for the illuminated part.

I sampled a bunch of gold paints and in the end I wasn’t thrilled with any of them. They tend to go on thin and need extra coats. But the up side of that is that we discovered the paint can be applied over the colored pencil or marker for a colorful shimmery finish.

One little girl did an homage to the recently deceased Eddie Van Halen.

Virginia McCracken

I’ve followed/stalked/loved these little creations by Virginia McCracken for years. This Christmas my ship came in when Erin gifted me a bespoke box. I had loved McCracken’s “The Artist in His Study.” She created for me, “Terri in Her Study.” The books are superb, the trinkets are a perfect touch and the critters expression is wonderful.

Origami Box

Atlas was taught to make these origami boxes at Christmas time for an advent calendar. He whipped up one for me out of paper of my choosing.

Women in the Arts

National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington D.C. Sometimes I wonder why we have to reduce artists to certain categories; can’t an artist be amazing without the reduction? I mean, can’t some of these pieces hold up to anyone else’s art? Or do we have to reduce the comparison to other women in art? We hit the last day before a Covid shutdown. The city was in eerie lockdown. Andrew and I with our grandson, were able to see the whole museum in under 2 hours. Some art is uninspired but there were some clever pieces and some well executed pieces.

There was also an extremely vigilant guard who felt it his bounden duty to make sure Andrew’s bandana never slipped beneath his nose. Very tiresome.

This happy art patron accompanied me through the gallery.

I was intrigued by the detail of the paper sculpture

A kid with a little patience could do this to great effect.

the close up of applied paint is fascinating in the way it conveys reality when you step back.

Remember those little paper lanterns from grade school? Up a notch.

Baby feet would make this a poignant piece to reflect on the Right to Life.

Origami en masse

I thought the pink wall was clever for a gallery

Good old Frida Kahlo and her iconic unibrow.

Ceramic Tupperware

Kinda makes me want to give a large canvas a go

Has his bandana slipped? the art guard could tell you.

Umm, my 3 year old granddaughter could kick butt on this.

My kids used to do clever magazine collages like this. Maybe better.

Jerome, AZ

We went to see what we could see and stumbled upon Jerome, AZ. It looks like an old town created for a movie. The windy road up the hill has houses whose front doors hug the road; the back door sits high above the cliff it’s settled on, precariously perched on stilts.

We pulled into the Jerome HighSchool parking lot to discover that long ago, over 40 years ago, it became art studios. Robin John Anderson was having a one man show in this town with a population of 474.

“Proclaimed the “Wickedest Town in the West” in 1905, Jerome earned its notorious reputation because of bordellos, saloons, gambling and gunfights.“ It is a ghost town now with tons of character.

Robin Anderson and his wife have owned the high school for 41 years. Just six weeks prior to our visit, his wife had died. He was 21; she was 34 when they married. When she died, he’d discovered she was older than she’d ever let on. The age difference was more than the 13 years he’d been told.

As we walked through his exhibit, he explained his mathematical way of dividing the canvas. Once upon a time he painted en plain air, but now with his formula, all his paintings come from his imagination.

I liked the ease of them and the brightness.

Nana/Granddaughter Class

This was the sweetest painting class. The grandma arranged for her and her granddaughter to share a painting lesson.

I also had an art class paint the lemons.

Here is the church, here is the steeple...

I was honored to be able to teach a few fundamentals of acrylic painting to this group of women. We are in a “pandemic” and sometimes it’s just a relief to do something normal, something creative. Everyone chose their own sky color; did they want evergreen swags in the window or no?, snow on the peak of the steeple or no?

I was focused on teaching, refilling paint requests, offering perspective, when suddenly I discovered that the hostess of the evening had provided artichoke dip with bagel chips. I am such a sucker for a creamy dip with chips. Excuse me just a minute while I stuff my face.

Anyway, yes, the painting. Acrylic on an 11” X 14” canvas. The only “cheat” I offered was a template of the church.

Sort of in the middle of the project here with lots of detail to go.

Okay, sometimes you are just so intent on it turning out like the picture you have in your head.

The student surpasses the teacher…

Let it Snowman

The last hurrah before we break for Christmas. Snowman in acrylic on canvas. Oh my gosh, I always love seeing the personality of each artist.

Pears

I am in love with the rendition of each pear.

I did a step-by-step demo and the unique personality of each artist shines.

Pushing the Abilities of Colored Pencils

I wanted my students to realize some of the possibilities with colored pencils. If you are patient, it is possible to get deeper darker color. Patience also allows you to layer the colors for a more vibrant color. Leaves this time of year are too beautiful not to use.

Colored pencil leaf drawing

Botanical Art

I wanted my art students to know that good art can be used for science. I gathered plant specimens from the Columbia River area to copy in detail.

I introduced them to vellum. Vellum comes from calves, goats or deer. Today vellum is still used by both miniaturists and botanical artists who are painting in a very precise way - typically working with 'dry' watercolour using a stippling technique or very small strokes. We used man-made vellum and I opted for colored pencils not wanting to deal with the crinkling, wrinkling of the paper when watercolor goes on too wet.

Honey and The Bees

Is gathering honey an art? I don’t know but those bees create a masterpiece of honey comb perfectly shaped, perfectly filled.

The fact that bees all have a ready personal weapon makes you want to be sure you’re well covered and know what the heck you’re doing.

We didn’t so we proceeded with caution and amazement. In the end we had 20 pints.

Beekeepers

Suited up

Exposed!

Cleary there’s been a lot of gathering honey

When you look at those perfect little building blocks for storing honey it’s a marvel

Without a spinner, we scrape and filter by hand

Every helper got their own jar of honey

ArtSquared

Who even knows in “These Trying Times” if ArtSquared will even happen come the end of September. ArtSquared is an annual event in Walla Walla, Washington. It is so popular with artists that even though signup is available for a week, the available slots are full the first part of the first day. Months before the event each artist is given (8) 6”X6” wooden panels; what the artist creates on this small panel is up to them. Every panel bought costs a mere $36. I decided to do a little bit of everything.

A pair of all my styles

These are done on watercolor paper then adhered to the wood board

A little bit abstract

After Joseph Cornell

I was thrilled to discover Joseph Cornell’s clever boxes in the Chicago Art Institute. I’d poured over pages in books with his clever work and suddenly there it really was!

With a cue from him, my art students created their own whimsical boxes.

Diner

Gerbera Daisies in acrylic

I bought a big pot of Gerbera daisies for my art class to paint on canvas in acrylic. I actually think the class never even looked at the flowers. A class of girls, they had already perfected their own floral style long before this class and cavalierly set about penciling in their design. No glance at the leaf shape, no interest in the leaf veining, the tiny hairlike flower filaments in the center, just full speed ahead.

I insisted that the whole canvas needed to be filled.

I’ve started painting in watercolor again so I did a quick one.

Art for the soul during Covid

It was just good to have an art class with some creative people. The assignment was hills painted in strips and shapes and not realistically. They could use bold colors or mimic the colors of a real mountain.

Pysanky Eggs for Easter

My sister is the real artist here. And she has the patience to really create gorgeous pieces.

There are sites where you can buy the amazing dyes that are so intense and vibrant; just search for “Pysanky egg supplies.” Really the supplies are reasonable and can last for a very long time.

You’ll need kistkas; the tool used for drawing your design with beeswax on the egg. They come in various tip sizes. Also, bees wax is the only kind of wax to use. And of course the beautiful dyes. Also , eggs are needed. You can buy hollowed out ready to use eggs from all manner of fowl: chicken, duck, ostrich. And a candle. We used little tea lights; they are squat and personal size.

You need to use beeswax for this and the kitstkas come in various sizes

Beeswax

You can make up your own design or copy a traditional one

Design

A tiny hole is ideal to get the egg out or its shell

Eggs

First attempt ever at this craft

newbie

My class was so quiet as they became absorbed in the process

art therapy

Even the paper towels become their own work of art

Ink blots

Josephy Center for Arts and Culture

I was happy to get into this juried show at the Josephy Center in Joseph, OR. In part because it was a show entitled:

Determined to Rise:  The Valiant Women of the Vote – 100 years

And my art didn’t exactly reflect that at face value. But I am glad to be a woman and glad that I get to vote. I just feel like I don’t need to rise from anything.

It was a fun night starting with drinks and a delicious dessert at the Gold Room. And then to the show where I got to meet my grandsons’ pottery teacher and other local artists and patrons.

Rhys's Pottery Bird

I laid eyes on this perfect little bird my grandson, Rhys, made in his pottery class. I loved the subtle color choice he made; I loved the earnestness of the bird, I loved the heft of it and the shiny feel of it.

He told me he had originally painted the bottom too but his teacher told him he had to scrape it off- it would explode if it were completely covered in glaze.

I told him I was obsessed with it and thought I probably needed to take it home with me. He said, “I was thinking of giving it to you.”

So it’s mine now.