Dry(ing) Spell

I have hit a literary dry spell, it would seem.  Vacationing and getting ready for a new school year has taken the front seat, but only on the written page.  I've been burning the midnight oil about 5-6 days a week in the studio, and I'll be excited to begin posting the results, for better or for worse, right here.

First, I have been playing.  Playing in clay, polymer, paint, metal, and even a little glass.  I haven't made anything monumental, but in the pottery arena I have been practicing pulling more refined mug handles, and throwing mugs that are big enough for an actual grown-up to use.  Clay shrinks three times in the pottery-creation process; once to dry, then again with the bisque firing, and yet again with the glaze firing.  I have to make a mug about 12% larger with wet clay than I want the final product to be (did I ever mention I was not required to take math in college because I had 2 years of advanced spanish?  Who knew I would actually need math in my adult life? ¡Que lastima!).  I am also practicing on making larger bowls (which means centering larger amounts of clay with my wimpy, gummy arms), making pendants, studying new glaze combinations, and -the thing I am most excited about this week- making hand built wall hangings I am calling "Relic Boxes".

(Tangent alert!)

When I lived in Costa Rica there was a huge church that was built on the site where a small girl was said to have found a little Madonna and child image that was carved from black stone.  The small item is said to have been retuned to her by the Virgin Mary herself (as the story was told to me) and the priests in that town believed it to be a sign, building an amazing cathedral around that one small stone object.  That simple totem was elevated to a place of great honor, somehow separating it from its common beginnings, telling anyone who looked upon it that it was no longer ordinary.

Stone Madonna and child encrusted in gold and jems.

 The four inch stone in the massive shrine at the front of the cathedral (way up between the two angles near the dome, utterly invisible from the chapel).

(Tangent explination....) 

As most of us do, I have several small, random, and utterly non-monetary-value items that mean the world to me; a little trinket Adam gave me when he was little, a tiny vase that belonged to my grandma, a tiny card that Stephanie gave me long before she got sick, before I ever imagined she wouldn't be here anymore.  These items seem rather unimportant on the little shelf where they sit in the studio, unrelated and undefined, but to me, they are truly valuable.

I began to think about how sometimes a space can define what it contains, the way a book jacket hints to the mysteries contained in a book. I created my first Relic Box with the idea that a simple object could be placed inside, communicating it's secret, though not necessarily universal, value.

 I'm looking forward to creating more of them and seeing if they call to anyone else the way they call to me.

First unglazed Relic Box, still drying.

El Fin!

Oh.  My.  Goodness.

You know how it feels to walk around all day in snug shoes, like all day at Disneyland or on a hike for hours in the mountains?  and when you get home and pop those shoes off your feet and your feet go  "aaaaaahhhhhh" ...?  Yah, that's where I'm at.  My spirit just kicked off it's shoes.

Aaaahhhhhhh.

I did it.  I finished the book. It's done.  I reviewed the pages over and over, making little adjustments and corrections, and at a certain point I had to agree with the little voice in my head that said the book wasn't going to get much better than it was.  Not that it's perfect.  It's not, but it had reached a sort of plateau (also, to be clear; the voices in my head never tell me I to create my own militia or to set animals free from zoos or anything).  It was time to send it on to it's next life.

I wrapped it in bright colored tissue like an amazing present for Ellen, the book's author.  A box with twenty paintings.  The last couple of years of my life, off and on, all in one cardboard box.  As I walked into the empty post office lobby on a Saturday afternoon, it seemed strangely poetic that there was no one there to witness this momentous occasion.  I paid extra for insurance.  I popped on the label.  Then I just stood there in front of the big swinging package drop door.  I hugged the box protectively to my chest, suddenly nervous to let it go out to a faceless system, to trust it would be handled carefully.  I said a prayer and slipped the package into the drop box.  Immediately, I wished I had put it into a bigger, more well padded box.   Or double boxed it!  Why didn't I double box it?  I started picturing that scene in Cast Away where he fishes an artist's FedEx package out of the ocean, dripping wet.  This was a box full of watercolors, for gosh sakes!  The paint will run! Were there any oceans or big lakes between here and Tennessee?  Or one bad move on a conveyor belt and my paintings could be massacred!  Whimper.

It took till Thursday (even though the postage label said Monday!) for Ellen to get the package.  She called me for the grand opening.  She wrestled with tape, and gushed a little at the fun wrapping.  Then one by one the paintings came out.  She read the captions I had put on Post-Its to go with each picture.  She wept a little here and there, and commented, and sometimes was very quiet.

"I'm just speechless... speechless..." she said a few times.  She expressed her gratitude with love.  The phone connection got weird because of my very old, dropped-once-in-water cell phone.  She had to get to a meeting.  Our little moment was finished.

Now new work will begin.  I won't be involved in a lot of it.  Tennessee is far away.  But I trust Ellen implicitly.  Well, what's not to trust?  I was just sending her baby, her book, back to her.

I can't wait to see what she does with it.

Beginning Rituals - Earrings

Here are the most recent additions to the jewelry to be sold on Etsy and at my Annual Sale, which I'll tell you more about later (except to say that my annual Open Studio Sale was the real inspiration for the Etsy site, as many friends from out of state were sad not to be able to come to the sale and wanted a way to participate online.  So really, it's all thanks to them!  Thank you, Them!)

In the book I have been reading called, "Making Art a Practice: Thirty Ways to Paint a Pipe", the author encourages aspiring artists on all levels to begin each art making session with a ritual.  It can be a cup of herbal tea, a certain song or CD, a particular art warm up, the recitation of a goal, quote or motivational mission statement -  any action that will take them to that creative place.  It acts as a portal, immediately extracting one from the day-to-day rigmarole, and transporting them back into the creative flow they stepped away from at the end of their last creating session.

I have found mine.

I make a single pair of earrings before I begin any project currently in progress.  It's a great creative warm up (and it will serve to rescue me from the November crunch when I usually try to pound out items to have enough for my Open Studio Sale.  Freak-out mode is not a yummy-fun way to make art).  

For the moment I am relying on the stock pile of beads I have on hand, but as soon as Ellen's book is done (this week! YAY!), I will begin making ceramic pieces that are one of a kind.  That's when my heart is really happy.  Anyone could make the exact same jewelry I make out of beads from the store, but my ceramic pieces are unique to me.  

In the mean time I will still try to find that playfulness that is part of why I enjoy making things with my hands so much, even if the beads did come from a store.

The light at the end of the painting

The problem with not starting to work until 10 o'clock at night is 1. Quitting time is usually between the hours of one and two, and 2. Yoga. 

See, yoga happens at 9am. I sure wish the days were longer.  I would flourish with a 30 hour day, and 9 hours of sleep. 

I'm nearing the end of Ellen's book, and am excited to send it on its way to it's next life in Tessasee, where it will become something wonderful in her capable hands. Just a few things to touch up here and there, and then a double page spread to grapple with (third try's the charm, right?). 

I Spy (Making Order out of Chaos)

Can you find...?

2 hearts

a nest

an oak leaf

4 blue flowers

a bird

2 pairs of earrings

a measuring tape

3 spirals

a paint brush

a teapot

a cork

2 white pearls

When I was in college working on my final show, I stayed in my campus art studio so late one night that the early morning janitorial crew came through.  I was humored to learn that they never entered my studio space because, as the crew chief said, "We can't tell what's important and what's not."

That's okay.  

Sometimes I don't know what is important either, 

until it shows itself to me.

"Out of clutter, find simplicity.  From discord, find harmony.  In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity." 

~ Albert Einstein

It is in the midst of materials and art books in my studio that I find ideas that might pair themselves together simply because my eyes drifted from one object to another in sequence.  My brain then allows them to mingle in a quiet space together, drawing unusual conclusions and connections.  There is an energy that comes at times as I drift from one collection of materials to another in my work space, that is the steam to drive my next creative effort.  Until recently I viewed the many partially completed pieces, the remnants of failed experiments and the small collections of strange objects around my studio like the debris after a flood; useless, unimportant.  But I am drawing connections now between them.  The tiny stacks of pebbles, the repetition of book stacks, the repeated lines in one of Jonah's drawings on my table, all dance together in my mind and begin to influence a new painting.  The trimmings of scrapbook paper beneath a bowl of stones asks me to borrow color from one to lend to the other.

Failed attempts are learning moments.

Incomplete projects are gestating solutions.

They are not debris.  They are relics.  

It's not a mess. 

 It's not chaos. 

 It's a seedbed, 

a cosmos,

 a beginning.

Getting All Businesslike

I'm working at getting my packaging perfected for my Etsy shop.

I got my business cards in the mail this week.

I used a painting I did last year and I'm pretty pleased with them.  

They will be pretty versatile given the many mediums I dabble in.

Also, they are made of nice sturdy cardstock, so they will double nicely for picking your teeth with.  

Shadow Box

Our Tuesday Project is complete.  We made them in triplicate to give away the other two for Mother's Day to two dear friends who mother our children so sweetly.  The first copy took about 18 hours to produce, the second and third, of course, an hour.  Once all of the photo editing, sizing and such were completed, the assembly was a cake walk.

The real art is their sweet faces. 

 God, the first and greatest Artist.

Tuesdays With Kathy

Every Tuesday, Kathy and I dedicate 3 totally interrupted hours to a project.  We stop fifty times to break up fights, wipe noses, distribute crackers and be vaguely parental.  In the past we have carved clay eggs, created garden art and made holiday decorations.  This month our very slow going project has been this shadow box that took about 10 times longer to do than previously expected.  We should absolutely get government jobs!  

 (this is not the finished product, but I want to get a little braver about showing my incomplete work).

For this project we are making a scene of the children playing hide and seek in the paper forest.  We created the landscape silhouettes and then cut them on her Cricut Super-Fancy-Schmancy machine (I'm pretty sure that is the model name for it if you are looking to buy one.  Make sure you go to the craft store and ask for it by that name).  I photographed all of the kids, spent hours editing and programming the precision cut outs to be done on her machine, while Kathy worked on the sizing details for the layered elements.  Guy made fun of us for how much effort went in to selecting the perfect colors of paper, and being that Kathy and I are both ridiculously picky, it took two trips to  craft stores miles away to get, what Guy calls, "beige, beige and beige" paper.

That's okay, the finished project will be beautiful.

Baring illness or earthquake

 (ooo, I shouldn't have said that.  I hate earthquakes), 

we should finish this week, 

 I'll post the finished image.

Learning Curve

We interrupt our regularly scheduled painting for this, well, major interruption.  Art doesn't sell itself.

There is quite the learning curve to all this online sales biz.  I am working on photographing items and trying to make sure the lighting gives an accurate representation of the colors, particularly metals and reflective surfaces.  I am watching YouTube tutorials, and practicing new techniques.  Lots to learn there.  

Then there is the mailing, which for me is just plain weird.  First of all, no one in my family is surprised to get their birthday card a week or so late.  As far as packages go, Christmas in March is normal, isn't it?  But I have managed to get all of my orders out on time, and my last order was almost instant.  Well, a day, but still, that is pretty good.  

I am also learning about great packaging.  Years ago I ordered an old book off of Ebay, and it arrived with a teeny, tiny alligator in the package as a thank you for my order,  If you know our family, you'll know that that little gator has lived in our Christmas village for years now.  Whoever finds him re-hides him again, and the search goes on for weeks.  I wish I knew the sellers name so that I could tell her about what her tiny gift has become in our home.

I just received an order of some supplies from another Etsy seller that also arrived with a little thank you gift, a tiny teapot charm.  I love the way that little gift made me smile, and she couldn't have known that my mom loved teapots, but it sure was sweet to get something so accidentally personal.  I want to make sure that my buyers get to enjoy that same cheery experience.  I would love your suggestions!  Please leave them in the comments section below (it will also let me test drive the comments feature here.  Traditionally it hasn't worked well for me on my family blog).

Guy is taking over the bookkeeping.  Yay!  And I am teaching him how to post listings of new items.  Double yay!  Less computer time for me, more art time.

We now return to our regularly scheduled painting.  

These cuties are available on Etsy right now.

And if you would like to order from Loretta's Beads, visit her at Lorettasbeads.etsy.com.  She was awesome, and she uses a time machine for shipping.  I swear my package came 5 minutes before I even finished my order.

(Then let me know what your little gift was!)

Ellen's Book

My paper arrived and I am excited to get back to work on Ellen's book.

Let me tell you a little about this amazing project.

Ellen is my guru, gal-pal and kindred soul.  Our spirits were cut from the same celestial cloth.  One day some time ago she asked me to illustrate a special book she had written, or that had, as she recounted it, come through her.  It just wrote itself as she put pen to paper, as so many inspired words do.

I have told many folks a big hairy no to illustrating a book for them.  If I commit to that, I want to get one of my many stories done first.  But when I read the text of Ellen's story, I HAD to be a part of it.  I was so moved and touched by her text, and it spoke to my heart, as it has to anyone I have shown it to.

Back then I had an 18 day time limit to illustrate the book back then before Ellen would be off on a plane to take the book to her friend, a gift to honor an amazing emotional and spiritual healing journey.  I delivered the 16 paintings to her at the last possible minute, having spent 14-18 hour stretches painting in those last few days.

Flash forward several years, and Ellen has had the opportunity to show our little book (if I may be so bold to call it that, it's really Ellen's)  therapist friends, all of whom have shown an interest in buying many, many copies as soon as she had it published.

There was only one thing standing in her way!!!

Me.

I was unhappy with how some of the paintings had turned out and wanted a chance to spend more time getting them up to snuff.  But with 5 (uh, oops, add one) SIX kids and life and all, I put it off.  It wasn't just my busy life.  There was some clogged spiritual pipes that I needed to work on before I could get the art work to flow out of me.  I can't explain it, but every time I thought about working on it, I felt stifled and foggy.

I had to first polish off two other huge commissions that had been in my way.  My shame over how long I had put them off put them in line ahead of Ellen's book.

With those done, and a little soul scrubbing that followed (you know, to get unclogged), I have returned to her book.  Here are a few previews:

First Sale!

I had my first sale on Etsy!  

It was a cool ceramic pendant necklace.

(Okay, technically it was my second, but my first was from my dearest friend who was helping me work out the kinks in the system.  That's like having your mom ask you for your autograph).

I got the package all ready and fussed and putted over how to make it perfect.  It was like the first day of school; you wake up early, tummy in knots, excited, hoping for a perfect hair day.  Then six weeks later (or days, if you are gifted or something) you are totally over it.  May I reach the day when packaging and mailing my art and handmade items becomes a dull part of the process!

Look for more items to be posted next week!!!  

***

Above: Balance, made from tiny pebbles.  I am going crazy making these tiny towers out of rocks that I find in the road or at the horse stables where the girls take lessons.  I love finding a balance in them, and then fusing them that way.  It reminds me to look for balance in my life, and once found, not to lose it.

***

Thanks to those who have signed up to FOLLOW this blog.  When we get to #25, I will host my first giveaway.  Message me or comment if you get someone to Follow and I will add your name to the GIVEAWAY twice!  I'm generous like that.

While I wait...

I had to take a break from Ellen's Book (which you will be seeing more of shortly) in order to wait for... well, an order.  Paper, to be exact.  Ultra fancy-schmancy cold-press watercolor paper from France.

My local all-things-artsy store wanted 80 bucks for a pad of 20 sheets of paper.

For a 5 day wait, I got it for $30, free shipping.

I love saving money.

In the off time I tinkered with a few things.

This is a very tribal looking piece.  I dyed the satin cord some time ago, and then just the other day found my stash of junk-yard metal.  I used ammonia to get the green patina on the metal, and then it sort of made itself after that.

Making jewelry is like meditating or doing yoga.  There is a pleasant and calming rhythm to it, and once you decide on your pattern, you sort of go on autopilot to finish the assembly process.

Some days autopilot is a very good thing.

*****

Follow my blog and you will be entered in my first jewelry GIVEAWAY.  I will pull from the first 25 followers!  The winner will get to choose from 3 jewelry items to be posted soon.  

Share my blog on Facebook and I'll enter you TWICE.  Woo woo.  

Them is some pretty great odds, baby!

New Ground

I have discovered a new ground (surface) to work on.  It's called clayboard and I am in heaven.  It's got the sensitivity of paper, absorbs water and yet remains wet enough to push paint around on it a bit.

This little piece is about 5x7, and was inspired by a little post it note I found that Jonah had drawn on.

There was something special in the way he created the little black boxes and they reminded me of windows in the early native cave dwellings in Colorado.

I don't know why, but tiny windows in vast walls are comforting to me.  I feel protected and sheltered when I look at these little structures tucked away in the safe and sturdy stone (that's a lot of S's).

I am embarking on a new art journey as I am trying to let go of the expectations others have for me and my art.  Because I am able to paint "pretty pictures", there has always been a pressure for me to do so, to paint things that are easy to understand to the people around me. But so much of what I have created over the years holds no real worth to me because I was not creating from my heart.  

Out of nowhere this month, three books have come to me (I say come to me, because they have been around me for ages, but this is the first time I have picked any of them up), and it happens they are all on the theme of painting from your soul, or as one book puts it, "Source".  I am embarking on totally new territory... New Ground.   It had never really occurred to me that I should want to paint for myself.  It has been something that I have always given away, either physically, by giving the work away to others, or metaphorically, by giving away control by allowing other's opinions of the work dictate how I would paint and what images I chose.

My reading has encouraged me to simply paint and not worry about outside influences.  That is what I did with the little piece above. I just went for it, going only on what felt good. 

It's a whole new way to work for me. I'm excited to see what's next. 

Four little stories

My first big commission was to illustrate a book of poetry.

Back then I didn't think a church going person would ever cheat me, and I didn't think twice before I handed over 15 pencil drawings to the fellow who hired me.  He said he'd mail me the check.  Two years went by and I tracked him down and asked for payment, or to have the art returned.  He accused me of trying to take the food right from his children's mouths.  He said he'd fallen on hard times.  I said I'd just take the drawings back and forget about the payment.  "But I love them!" he lamented. I never got the art, but I got the hard earned lesson of the need of having a contract.  Also, a backbone is helpful.

*****

The next commission I remember was a portrait of a woman's grandparents.  They were Native American, and dressed in elaborate tribal tunics.  I drew the 2 x 3 foot portrait in pencil, and soon learned that $65 had been far too little to compensate me for the dozens of hours spent drawing tiny shells and tassels, and achieving a crisp reproduction of their faces.

When I brought the drawing to her she took one careless glance, and without a word about the image (or of thanks, for that matter), she took the drawing, gave me the money, then shut the door.

*****
There was a third, really involved commission.  It involved a contract (now that I had learned my lesson), and adequate payment.  I felt like I had done everything right.  It was a huge painting (for me) of a mountain lake with a man standing near the edge.  The painting had been commissioned by the man's employees, and with the covert help of his wife they had delivered several reference photos to me to use.  I even painted small "thumbnail" paintings to show what the final painting would roughly look like, getting signed approval on the contract, and set out.  With two little boys and one very pregnant belly, I did my best.  It took me a while, but once it was done, I was very pleased with the final painting.

I walked to the office to deliver the painting to the woman who had hired me.  Upon seeing it, she paused, raised an eyebrow, and said "Oh,  that's, uh... nice."

"You hate it." I pointed out with a questioning tone.

"Oh, I don't hate it." she replied as though to clarify that what she felt was slightly less strong than actual hate.

"Oh my gosh!"  I said with eyebrows raised, "You HATE it!"

"Well, I mean, I just thought it would be brighter, is all.  And that maybe there would be some flowers in the grass, and maybe, like, a critter, or some bird footprints..."

The words "bird footprints" echoed over and over in my head.  I felt dizzy.  And small.  And bad... bad at art.  I took the painting back home.  I spent hours making it brighter, adding little flowers, and yes, birdy footprints.

I learned later that the dentist didn't like the painting.  It was lovely and all, but apparently in the reference photo I had been given he was wearing his fishing hat, not his hiking hat.  It looked off to him.  No matter.  By that time I didn't like it either.

*****

Several years ago I was at a midwives' convention with my friend Francine.  We had a booth and were selling our birth, pregnancy and breastfeeding themed artwork.  A young father came up to our booth near the end of the day.  Born a generation too late, he was the perfect hippie.  As he looked over my paintings, he stopped on one.  He stood staring, and then gently picked it up.  He asked how much.  I told him $20.  "Are you kidding?  That's not enough!"

 He just stared at it, and in a moment he looked up and I saw that he had tears in his eyes.  "It's just like the day our son was born.  I love it."

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a crumpled $20 bill, and said, "I don't know where we're sleeping tonight, but I know I have to have this."

Now, I'm not saying that one should ever opt for artwork over shelter.  But that day, I learned that I could make art that people loved.  Not everyone, but one person could.  I also learned that they could love it at first sight, without even telling me what to paint.  No plan, no commission, no contract, no thumbnail.  Just my intuition.

I have been on the receiving end of that process; I've seen a piece of art that calls me, sings to me, asks to come home with me.  Vincent price once said, "I have never regretted any of the art that I have ever bought; only the art I haven't."

First Post!

Today I am launching both this blog and my etsy shop! I have been asked for years now to get this up and running by friends who live far away.  I am excited to begin posting my wares there for all to see, and for one lucky little pair of earrings to go live on some cute ears miles away from here!

But this blog is also going to be a place where I post my other projects of which there are toooooo MANY!!!

It came to me not long ago that I am not good at fullfilling commissions.  I have therefore spent the past year finishing off many old commissions and have learned a new word.

No.

No, I am sorry, I would love to paint your dog/ grandchild/ boat.  I would love to sculpt or create that thing you are envisioning.  I really would.  But I can't.  I can't because I need to create what is waiting in my heart to get out, and it's a LOG JAM in there, baby.

So, with great respect, and with deepest gratitude for your request to have me make something just for you, I must decline.  Commisssions drain me, they cool my creative fire, they steal my mojo, my juju, my umph.  I need my umph.

Instead, I am going to begin creating things you and I have never even imagined (you, because, well, you don't live in my head.  Lucky you.  It's chaos in here) and (me, because I have yet to see what I could possibly make!  Won't that be exciting for us both?)

So, to kick things off, I'd like to show you my studio.

Okay, that's the rather romanticized view.  Here is what it is looking like without the soft focus.

And here are a few of my current projects:

I'm also finishing my last commission-ish (but very heart felt) work.  My friend Ellen wrote an amazing book and invited me to illustrate it.  It's going very well and I am excited to see where this sweet little book will go once it is complete.  I have a few more paintings to go, but here is my favorite:

Then there is painting that I am doing "just for me", because, the more I think of it, it seems a real shame that I have almost grown to hate painting because of "needing" to finish paintings for other people.  If I can't enjoy it, what is the point?

Here is a painting I started a few nights ago with the sole purpose of putting it in this cool frame that I have had for YEARS!  And while I am working on the painting I am also modifying the frame (it was all light brown).

Also, I've been playing around with blending collage with images of my children.  This piece isn't done, but that will be the fun of this blog... pieces in progress!  For this piece I incorporated papers, paint, and a photo transfer.  That was a really cool process.  First, I painted Mod Podge on white cardstock.  When that was dry I printed a photo of Tessa on it, and then coated the image with Mod Podge.  Then, with that still wet, I placed it face down on the painting surface and smoothed it down and then let it dry.  Finally I wiped away the paper by soaking it in water with a sponge and then rubbing it with my fingers.   The image was left on the canvas!  I'll be trying more with this.

Last for today, a painting that I did using my friend's wedding announcement photo.  I cut her sweetie out (sorry!) and made her an angel.  I have been adding cloth and wooden elements. 

Can't wait to share more with you. Fun stuff, baby.