Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Yummy Fabrics...

Whenever I visit my kids in San Diego, I shop. Not for just any old thing, things that are rare in rural Oregon. This trip I had a bee in my bonnet - I bought fabric - yards of it. Silk and velvet in amazing colors.
I have no idea what will become of them, surely some fabric pages for the new book collaborative I am doing with 11 amazing artists called "Signs and Symbols." It is based on the zodiac, but who knows where it will lead. Here is my cover, a recycled 45 record album. I slipcovered it in hand dyed fabric and used some of the vintage optical stuff gather dust in my studio. The images are printed out on fabric and I did a bit of hand quilting and added some doll arms covered in text. It was pretty fun!

Sunday, April 11, 2010

Artfest Pics

I am finally back home. I feel like I have been gone for a year, but it has only been 3 weeks. Artfest was an intense inspirational experience. My students in my class "Cover Girls," were awsome!
Here are some...hard at work. As you can see, paper chaos!

Here is one of the completed album collages by William Bowen. Amazing...
One of the highlights for me was the "Iron Chef Challenge." Teachers volunteered to create a piece of art using some or all of the materials provided in 30 minutes (we actually got 45 minutes.)

The crowd...

Sunny Carvahlo and me, hard at work and surrounded by onlookers.

A close up of me working on my piece.

Putting on the final touches. Believe it or not, I never took a final photo of the piece. Lucky for me, my friend Lynn Leahy won it in the raffle...
I had the luxury and pleasure of taking 2 days of class from Jesse Reno. He was a great instructor and a master of his process. He is living proof that the best way to grow as an artist is to make art prolifically. No excuses- paint, paint, paint. You can only get better.

This is the piece I finished the first day. I did all the things he said I would do. Fell in love with it too quickly, did not take my time and really look from a distance often. I did not really get it....

This is day 2 and what a difference. I took my time with the under layers. Looked and worked on a small portion and looked again. By lunch I still could not see where I was going with this. When I saw it with fresh eyes it clicked and I ran with it. I could continue to work it, but I have decided that I will make 5 more this week and see what happens.