An Ornamental Fiesta

At Create I got to teach one of my favorite classes making Fiesta ornaments. I saw several mother daughter teams at Create, what a fabulous time they always seemed to have together.

You know why this woman has such a huge grin? She had never painted before, aren't her ornaments fantastic?

I love having teachers in my class! they are always the best students ;-)

Here's my teachers pet finishing up her stitching on one of the Bernina 440's we were so lucky to have in our room. What a great machine, I would love to have one in my studio!

Beautiful!

Where have you been?

There is one more trip for us yet to come this weekend in a string of summer travels. I have been away from the blog so long I had to actually sign in!

Let's see how much I can get to before Thursday. I am starting a new painting on a new ground. Canvas has been my ground of choice, but in a new effort to expand the work I will be using Ampersand gessoboard.

On the easel and coming to completion....



In the works:

Create Artist Fair

The Artist Fair at Create was pretty amazing, much bigger than I thought it would be with artists selling there wares and lots of mixed media booths loaded with ephemera and bits and pieces of rusty things, game pieces, little bottles and fibers. It was so crowded in the beginning it was hard to see everything but as the crowds died down I managed to get in a few photos.

Leslie and Jamie with their table of hand dyed scarves and little art quilts.

Natalya and Jane were getting a little punchy after days of teaching and selling at their vendor tables.

Jane LaFazio

Tired and hungry at the end of the night.

Tea & Ephemera

In the evening I taught Tea & Ephemera, this was a new class for me, so there are always so many things I learn the first time through. I had originally proposed it as a 6 hour class but gave the option of a 3 hour class and that is what got picked.

Well, there is no way to cover everything I hoped to cover in 3 hours, when paint needs to dry and there are so many techniques I wanted to demo. One thing we hadn't counted on was blowing fuses from too many blow dryers, seems like 2 blow dryers are the limit. Or how much matte medium a class of 25 will go through, luckily Melly Testa had some in her room that she lent us when my supply ran out.

Normally I spend lots of time going around to visit people individually, but in 3 hours there was barely time for proper demos.

Last night I came home at 11:30 and painted enough fabric with a wash of color for everyone in Sunday's Tea & Ephemera class. That way they can skip the first step of the process and we'll have more time for demos and trying out the various products and techniques.

Create Teacher reception

Pokey and Jenn threw a lovely teacher reception for all the teachers at Create in the late afternoon.

Pokey, Beryl Taylor, Natalya Aikens

Jenn Mason, Leslie Jennisen, Julie Fei-Fan Balzer

Jeannie Moore, Jane Davila, Leighanna Light, Natalya 

Thanks Pokey and Jenn!

Create: Interweave's new retreat is a total success!

The turn out for classes has been great, from what I have heard it exceeded Interweave's expectations. I have heard they are definitely doing it again next year, time and location is yet to be determined. So if you didn't make it this year, get ready for next year, you won't want to miss it!

My first day of the retreat was spent taking a class, something I rarely do, and I am so glad I did. I took Alisa Burke's Living Large class which was painting on raw canvas or muslin in her graffiti mixed media style. I am so envious of people who paint loosely and with a lot of gesture and passion. My painting style tends to be very controlled and illustration like, so this was a great "get out of your box day" for me. Make sure to go to Alisa's blog to see lots of fabulous pictures of student work.

It was really fun seeing my friend Kelli Perkins in class too!

Kelli worked on 4 pieces!

The photo above is my canvas at the half way point, after getting the canvas covered with color and a few paper images added. It is all about adding layers of paint, stamps, stencils, writing, drawing with sharpies and more paint. By the end of class it looked like this.

I will keep adding to this peice, because I don't think it's quite done, it is about 3' x 6'. It was soooo much fun!

Tonight, I am teaching Tea and Ephemera, hopefully I will have more photos for you tomorrow.

Cool collage stuff

When I was in California I went into a Chinese market and found a bunch of cool paper products that would be great for collage. All the paper is very thin and light weight, some are printed with one color designs and some are very colorful. A few have gold and silver foil squares and some papers are silk screened with red and gold inks. The other great thing about this addition to my stash was that it was pretty cheap, I paid $6 for everything here.

The next two weeks are going to be really busy for me, since I will be teaching classes at Create this week and then a few days later I am flying to Cleveland to do a few segments for Quilting Arts TV. It's a hectic schedule so I will post when I can. I know many of you who couldnt make it to the Create retreat this year will be anxious to see photos and here all about it.

Step aside Jamie Lee Curtis,

there's a new probiotic drink in town (that actually tastes good). A friend of mine just did this commercial for Yokult, it's pretty cute, check it out.

Remember this?

Well, now I can tell you that this detail shot is from a tree skirt I designed and made for the new Quilting Arts Gifts magazine.

This tree skirt was made like a whole cloth painted quilt, but it could also be made by applique if that is the way you like to work.

This issue is full of really great projects. One of my favorites are Kelli Perkins' rolling pin recipe book scrolls, I saw these at the IQA Chicago show and they are too die for!!!!!! Pre-order your copy now.

Now showing through August...

If you'd like to make a day trip to Fredericksburg, "Ei" will show at the Fredricksburg Center for the Creative Arts until August 27th.



And "Diamond, Ringleader of the Spring Revolt" and "Overcoming the Seeds of Doubt" are at Liberty Town until August 29th.

If you come to Old Town for a visit to the galleries and see the historic city of Fredericksburg, let me know. Craig and I would love to see you.

Thinking, rethinking

The great summer is winding down and the days of squeezing in a few hours of painting between travel and house guests are coming to an trickle. Limited by physical pain as well, I did find a great local physical therapist to help me get out of the mess I have with my shoulders and neck. Unfortunately, it will take some time to work back up to several hours a day painting and though frustrating, this is just reality for me at this time in my life. It took a few years to get into this much pain and it will take some time to get free.

Having had a lot of time to think in the midst of the crazy summer, I am unsure of how I feel about the direction of my work. A sense of dissatisfaction or, more positively, a desire to push myself to climb to another level has settled upon me. I suppose this is a good place to squirm. The moment we believe we have arrived in some area of life, something in us settles for less. This is especially true and dangerous for artists. A bit of applause, success and a certain level of mastery tempts us to stay where we are in an attempt to hold to what we have, yet so much more awaits if we are brave enough to wrestle with the fear of change and the unknown to obtain something greater. In my life, when the pain of staying the same outweighs the pain of change, I know it is time. I have seen artistic paralysis happen to many. I see it in every gallery I walk into. Before we know it, we have churned out the same reworked painting over and over. So, this fall I start the climb of fear and change....again. God willing and by grace, there will be growth.

Still on the easel:

2 of my favorite people are going to have a conversation and we all get to listen...

My friend Tracie Lyn Huskamp of The Red Door Studio, is going to be on Art And Soul Radio, Monday night at 6 pm, central time.

The lovely and talented mixed media artist Lesley Riley is a new host on blog talk radio, this discussion with Tracie about her work, process and up coming projects will surely get our creative juices flowing and fill us with inspiration. The segment is called:
   
The Upward Flight of Tracie Lyn Huskamp

What happens when you leave the corporate world and follow your heart? Tracie knows. In only 3 short years, Tracie has turned her part-time dreams into a full-time art career. Her list of accomplishments runs long and includes articles in Cloth Paper Scissors, Quilting Arts Gifts, Artful Blogger and the cover of Somerset Studio. In addition to teaching at art retreats both nationally and internationally, Tracie is the author of Nature Inspired: Mixed-Media Techniques for Gathering, Sketching, Painting, Journaling, and Assemblage (Quarry 2009). And wait until you hear what's happening this fall.....tune in to find out!

Bamboo bicycles: the new rage, who knew?

I posted this photo yesterday of a bamboo bike I saw in Davis and then this morning, what synchronicity, when I was reading the latest issue of Hand Eye magazine I see this article on bamboo bicycles! You can even take classes to build your own.

Davis, CA

I spent a week in Davis, California at my mom's last week and loved the warm dry days, the cool mornings and fruit growing in the yard. I am in love with the produce section of the grocery stores there. People in CA, I hope you appreciate it! I get so frustrated by the lack of variety and quality of the fruits and vegetables in the midwest. Sure, there is great corn here and a few other fruits and veggies, but you only see that for a few months in the late summer and fall.

Davis is a total bicyclists heaven, there are bikes and bike trails everywhere. Aren't these bikes irresistible? Look at this bicycle built for two that has been fitted out with bamboo, rattan and leopard seats.

photo by Nina Perez

There are some great artisan shops in Davis. We stopped in several with items from Nepal and Tibet and another shop I loved called Hand Made Creation, had imported handcrafted products, lots of felted slippers, bags, woven shawls and pashminas.

Look at all that felted color!

I bought a beautiful pleated teal scarf that is bright on one side and dark on the other. I'm looking forward to some cooler weather to wear it.