Joy in the Water

The benefits of sharing studio space are numerous:  encouragement, accountability, instruction, inspiration and critique, to name a few. I have the privilege of sharing space with six other artists. We are a diverse group including painters in a variety of mediums, those who collage, recycle artists and even one fiber artist complete with antique 4x4 loom. Our studio schedules do not always coincide, but we all usually come together the first Friday of every month between 6pm-9pm for the monthly Downtown Bellingham Art Walk. Next Friday, August 7, is the August Art Walk.

Many of you know I have been recently working on creating women. Next Friday, many of those pieces will be available for viewing for the first time. The last few ladies in this process have become a series I've entitled the Gaudy Ladies, due to their vibrant primary colors. Most of my ladies have simply been faces, but one of my studio mates challenged me to create a full scale Gaudy Lady on a 5' x 2.5' (really BIG) canvas I had stashed away. After resisting for longer than I care to admit, I began the work I have currently titled "Song of Joy"this week.

It began with collage, using sacred sheet music from my grandmother.

After that I added a sheer coat of yellow as an under painting. I then added my lady.

I particularly like her hair at this point. Everything else is up for grabs...
Next came the flowers I knew she needed.

Yesterday I began the work on the background.

I expect to get her finished this weekend and have her hanging for Friday's Art Walk. Come out and see how she ends up.

This is not something I would have tackled before my association with my studio mates. My fear of failure would have kept me from even trying. In fact, I must regularly tell my Inner Critic (I.C.) that this is simply an experiment... That it doesn't have to be perfect... Or the best... Or sell! I simply must continue doing the work.

So far my I.C. has been held at bay even though he is rarely silent. Perhaps I will surpass his ugly expectations one more time.

Please don't let your nasty, negative, nit-picking Inner Critic keep you from even sticking your toe in the water of your dreams. Thank him (or her!) for his opinion, but you are choosing to risk all those terrible things just this once. That you want to see for yourself what will happen.

And you can even tell him that Jenny thinks he may be over-reacting, the water of your dreams is truly magical and worth ricking a little splash.

I think your dreams are yours for the making. I think that is why they were given to you. Go for it!

Because I love you. Bunches.

Mind Mapping

There is something great about beginning the week with a creative project among friends. This afternoon at Creative Playtime, we did a little mind mapping. Now if you're not familiar with this activity, give it a try after you read through today's blog post. First we prepared the background. Using a partially wet (spritzed with water) sheet of sketch paper. Onto that was layered color with Derwent's Inktense Color blocks. These wonderful sticks of pure color go on like watercolor pencils, but the colors are richer, brighter. And once the ink has been wet and dried, the color becomes permanent. Great for layering more color or glue or any wet media. No running or smearing. These may be my new favorite tool.

Look at these backgrounds. We set them aside to dry while we rummaged through the collage items to fill our pre-cut heads.
  The heads were covered with the collage materials and then attached to the dried backgrounds.

Next week we're planning to do aprons to protect our clothes from paint splashes. Stay tuned!

Replacing Mona Lisa

I went to visit my family this spring and while taking out the trash, I discovered a treasure. In the dumpster. Someone had either redecorated or possibly evicted someone with Pop Art tastes, disposing of his graphic interpretation of Mona Lisa done in oranges and poison greens. The canvas was probably 36x40. SCORE!! I was going to be in town 3 weeks and was beginning to miss studio messes. Unfortunately, no one I knew in town had any painting supplies. However, I did plan a visit to my friend, The Visionary, in a town 3 hours away and I thought she might at least have some house paint I could prept the canvas with. I dragged Mona Lisa along on the visit and returned a week later with a relatively covered canvas ready for my use. But if you look closely, you might be able to see the 4 famed faces I brushed over.

As I had no paints, I determined to work out a shape of a large butterfly using torn newspaper to fill in the negative space. Butterflies are my mother's passion and the final piece would stay behind and hang over the door to the patio.

Once a vague butterfly shape  had been collaged onto the prepared canvas, Mom and I went through her wrapping paper stash, pulling colors she prefers for her house. We also went to the craft store and purchased pack of tissue paper. From this found and purchased paper, a butterfly emerged.

The final touches included some stray tissue and a meandering flight line.