Community Art

One of the great things about living in a small community is the ease in getting involved. This will be the second year our local Juvenile Justice Center has used art to make the community aware of their mission and raise funds for the program. They help kids going through tough times, negotiate through the justice system. They provide education, support, counseling and shelter for kids in need. This year they are providing 8x8" canvases to anyone who wants to "art them up." The theme is "Hearts for Heros." Her is my piece this year. It was really fun to do.

New Journal Pages

I have been a bit overwhelmed lately. Getting ready to teach a journaling class and working on my samples. Too many supplies is one of my issues, so I am limiting myself to pencils, watercolors and only a few paint colors. It is a lot more fun to just make art and not spend time hunting for supplies. Here are a few of my new journal pages. I am pleased that they are a lot looser. I am doing my best to stop early. Keep them more gestural, less detail.

Art and Soul and Journalfest

I just found out I will have a busy Fall. I will be teaching my Block Party class at Art and Soul. The classes are available for viewing now. Registration starts February 1, 2011....

And Pencil Dreams at Journalfest...registration is not up yet, I will let you know...

New Year, New Directions

I was honored to be chosen to show some work at the local theater. I have been to plays there and thought it would be fun to do large panel "people" to hang on the walls, as if they are watching the play also.
I cut some canvas into panels and made pockets for dowels on the top and bottom to hang the pieces with. Then I went to town with gesso, texture and collage. I used anaglypta wallpaper also. I did a random free hand ink drawing and picked up the panel so the ink would run in odd ways. Here are the initial panels....

and a close-up of the face.

Here are the finished panels.....

I am hooked on these, love to work large!

Happy New Year!

I have been super productive during the holidays and wanted to share some of my sketches to start out the new year. I enrolled in the "Sketchbook Project," and have been working in my book. The goal is to fill it and get it in the mail by 1/15/2011. I am not sure I will make it, but at least it has me working in it!

I am enjoying the sketching, but am not in love with the book. The pages are thin and you can see the images through the pages. I am limited to pencil, conte crayon and ink. I do like the monochromatic look though....

Home From the Holiday

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday with family in San Diego but we hit a bit of a snag on our way back home. We experienced our first snow event of the season....

Here we are...waiting to chain up.

Max looks a bit worried. What is all that white stuff?

But oh, so beautiful!

I See Faces

There is a certain comfort to me to make order out of chaos. I am thinking that is why I am so drawn to collage.We just got our shipment of fire wood for the winter. A big pile of chaos that would surely take hours to sort out. It would have been faster if I did not keep removing pieces from the pile because I saw "faces" in the wood....

Once the photos were taken for future drawing projects, we were able to finish our creation..

A thing of beauty!