Art and Soul - wow!

Just back from my Art and Soul retreat at Asilomar. Still getting myself back to normal.
I plan to upload all my pics and show off the cool art i made. But i need some time to get organized.
I met so many wonderful people, took three workshops and swapped and traded art. I also hooked up with old friend Aileen from outsidethemargins.com, who i met way back when we participated on the altered dictionary round robin and ended up taking an altered book cruise. She is WAY more organized than me and already has all her pics uploaded on her blog. Please check them out while i get my stuff unpacked:
http://aileensmusings.blogspot.com/

Yes - i too was housed at the Stuck Up Inn!

We're Off to Asilomar...

Yes - this is my art retreat eve. Tomorrow morning we depart for the Art and Soul retreat at Asilomar on the Pacific coast between Monterey and Carmel. Just up the road from the famous Pebble Beach. I'll be staying for 4 nights surrounded by rustic beauty.

I'll have many exciting things to report when i get back. Remember the ceramic fish we were asked to alter?

Here is what i did with it! Yes - a mermaid. Turned the fish on its tail so to speak. Since i figure there will be many mermaids - i wanted mine to be extra special, a mermaid artist! She painted a mini painting of the windswept trees that grace the northern California coastline, used one of those adorable mini canvases and easels they sell at Benjamin Franklin. I drew her in pencil then coloured in with oil pastels. Then glued on all those mini beads ONE AT A TIME. No seriously. Not my thing. I covered her tail with glue and poured on the beads. A nice mixture of blues and greens and a touch of glitter made a nice scale-y effect. Then did the same with her hair - using gold and orange beads. A shell bikini top, a few more shells here and there and done!

Today has been spent packing for the trip. Well not packing really - cus that would mean that things actually got PUT into a suitcase or something. All i have done today is shop for necessities like cookies and chocolate and trashy magazines. Things to amuse me in my cabin after a long day of creative pursuits. Then i bought all new toiletries - you know - smaller size shampoo and lotion to fit in the new makeup bag. Then i spent literally two or three hours playing with art supplies - coordinating ribbon, selecting embellishments, picking out pens and arranging them in neat piles on my dining room table. I am taking three workshops and there is a long supply list for each one. In addition to all the usual tools required, i need to bring fabric, wire, beads, ephemera, paper, boxes, clay, paint, etc.,etc..

I also finished up making some ATC's to trade - versions of they 4x4 fat book page - with the windswept trees photographed above and discussed on an earlier post. Now i just have to make a major decision to be DONE and start actually packing. You know how, Diane, just start putting stuff INSIDE the suitcase, stop fussing and get on with it. This is supposed to be a major stress reducer - and i sure to need it. Does it really matter in the scheme of things if i am missing a button or bauble? of course not.

Oh - and while i am talking to myself, hey Diane, all the clothes on the bed? They have to go INSIDE a suitcase as well.

Make it Mondays - Hands

Here is a hand themed page i made last year for the calendar round robin i was in. It was spiral bound journal with Rothko illustrations. I happened to be in a funky import store in Bolinas, a cool beach town near home when i spotted a basket full of hands made out of a plastic-y sort of surface. I learned later that they were patterns for henna painted hands, the kind Indian brides get the day before their wedding. I just thought they were cool and had no real plans where to use them. But hey, I am ready to purchase just about anything i think i might one day glue into a book!
They also had many kinds of milagros - the mexican tin ornaments. I thought - i bet i could make some of those with metal duct tape (not to be confused with duck tape). I took a piece of cardboard and made a hand shape. Then I shaped some thick armature wire in the same shape but a bit smaller. Then I covered the whole thing with the duct tape. This is from a hardware store - look around - you want the real metal kind, with the super sticky blue gooey backing. I used a bone folder to gently smooth the metal around the wire without tearing it. I etched the edges with the edge of my scissors and then added a mass of fibers to the loop the wire left on the "wrist" of the hand. I liked how the hands off set the bold graphics of the Rothko painting on the right, which i echoed with mulberry paper on the left.

I also had a round robin altered book swap, where one of the books had been cut shaped like a hand - so i knew i could use this same technique when it was my turn to work in that book. I shared this technique with my altered book group. Here are some other examples - these both used mini mirrors to add some dimension to the piece, and adirondak ink to add colour.
Check out other examples of Make it Mondays - this week's theme is HANDS.

Here is the link to the GO MAKE SOMETHING website : http://www.gomakesomething.com/component/option,com_frontpage/Itemid,1/.

See link on the left to Ten Two Studios for great art projects and products..

Asilomar Challenge

As part of the welcome packet for Asilomar, the artist retreat i will be taking next week with Art and Soul,(i can't believe it is already April...!!), we were given a ceramic fish. Just a plain white fish with the instructions to "alter" it. I came inside this clear pillow box filled with blue cellophane dunnage and a sprinkling of shells. How cute is that? Also inside the box were cards shaped like fish, each listing the classes and instructors we had signed up for. I just love the extra attention paid to something that could have otherwise been so plain and boring. These little touches really help get you in the mood to be creative!

Well, what can one do with a plain white fish? Paint it, sure but too obvious; do a tile or maybe a marble mosaic? Hmmm, that could be cool. But no - i decided to go outside the box and do something fish related, but not a fish exactly. I'll wait until next weekend to post a picture - just before i go. This is the backside. I should have scanned it before i started, but it just isn't like me to think one step at a time. I just jumped in last night and before you know it i had a concept and was half done.

As part of these art retreats there is a mad swapping ritual. I only know about it from the Arts de Mer cruise i took a few years back. They asked us to make 30 or so ATC's, which i had never done, to swap at the meet and greet coktail party on board the ship. I made "life's a beach" cards with a picture of a beach, some sandpaper for sand, and some beach glass-like beads wired on. Not bad for my first ATC venture?! It was so interesting to see how some people put so much effort into these things, while others take the shortest possible path. Well, that's really life in a nutshell, isn't it? Everything grades on the bell curve. Some people outdo themselves, some shouldn't even bother, and most fit right in the middle.

For Asilomar i decided to use these little mini book-laces i had left over from a project. Each one has a letter sticker on every second page - A thru Z. It is like a mini dictionary. The idea is that you need to finish the book by stamping or collaging or just adding a sticker to each page facing the letters to create your own visual dictionary. They would also make great storage for inchies.

I filled in "W" with a mini version of my 4x4 swap page for the fat book swap for this same retreat. The theme was "windswept" and i used the lyrics to the "westward wind" so it fits right into the alphabet beside W!! I added some colour to the book covers with Portfolio oil pastels and finished off with some coordinating beads. So 25 nice artsy people will get one of these in exchange for whatever they might be swapping.

I have heard these swaps can get elaborate and snotty - so i hope i don't encounter that at Asilomar. But just incase someone is swapping more labour intensive projects, i might bring a dozen or so beeswax collages to exchange. And maybe some ATC's - mini versions of the 4x4 fat book page i did.

The hostess of that project posted pictures of the books on line - they turned out really really cool. I can't wait to meet her and all the other artists who participated. It will be one way to meet and mingle next Sunday. Oh man, is it really only one week away? I have been collecting all the supplies for my classes - but they are scattered all over the house. I need to get myself organized and figure out what to pack and what to pack it in. Then there are the tools and materials, and clothes, and whatever else one needs for an artist retreat....!

Canvas Collage with Niche

I have to give credit 100% to Carine who teaches at Scrapbook Territory in Berkeley for this workshop i shared with my altered book round robin group on Sunday. I took her collage class last year and created a magnificent art piece that graces my living room wall.
When i showed it to my group - they all wanted to know how to do it. It was tricky turning a 6 hour workshop into a two hour class, well less than that if you factor in our altered book swap "show and tell".

I found the 1 1/2 inch gallery style canvases cheap on Dick Blik, if you order in bulk - it's the way to go. Or use your Michael's coupon or around here there is a place called Aaron Brothers that has a annual buy-one-get-one for a cent canvas sale.
The best part of this workshop was using Italian renaissance style images - from a very expensive art book bought oh man so cheap (like $3.79) from a clearance table at big box book store. At that price why make colour copies? Or scan the images? Just use the originals cut right out of the book!
The niche is made of foam core and covered with thin paper and inserted into the canvas. I won't reveal the secrets as to how - you can take Carine's class!
With a simple background of subtle scrapbook paper and a bold image, cropped to advantage, the effect is striking. Keep in mind none of us actually finished our collages or added any objets to our niche. In some of these pics the glue wasn't even dry!
It will be interesting to see how they end up. Do you like the simplicity as they are now? Or should they be "junked up" a bit more? I especially love how Shanna's has the blue sky from her image as the paper inside the niche. I used the same original vintage pen and ink letter i used in my first collage to tie the two together.

Cigar Box Assemblage

Cigar box assemblage workshop was one of the most wonderful classes i have ever hosted. I can't really say i "taught" the class - i just gave guidance and direction a big workspace and a great atmosphere and 4 1/2 hours to play. Oh yeah, and STUFF. Lots and lots of stuff. I suggested a parallel between playing with my copious craft supplies, to playing with your neighbour's Barbies when you were 7. Hers were always better. Or maybe not better but different. My next door neighbour Sharon Wilson never ONCE lost a Barbie shoe.

If you read my blog or have taken my classes you know i am big on "kits". A carefully selected assortment of background papers, focal point images, and embellishments, each packaged lovingly for the students. Not so for this class! "Kits? We don't need no stickin' kits..." I felt this class really needed more creative rummaging. Each student had to select the elements that spoke to them. Who was i to determine that? But since my moto is to supply EVERYTHING you need in class - i had to bring well, just about everything. My husband will tell you that it was quite the undertaking transporting my stuff to the nova studio for the class. He almost couldn't help me because we didn't both fit in the car!

But we did and he was there to carry in all the treasures and help set up the training room. Oh - but to have the space to teach classes at home so that my supplies don't need to be packed up and organized and transported to another town.... So perhaps you already have three totes of rusty metal things from places like Urban Ore, and a huge glass jar of porcelain doll parts from eBay, and rolls and rolls Cavallini papers, and boxes of estate sale ephemera - but I bet it was really cool that you got to dig into MINE for a day!

I started off by having the students select a box - small, med or large - really just varying depths. The deeper the box, the more stuff you can fit inside. Pretty much most of the students were returning altered book enthusiastes, so they welcomed the opportunity to take their collage to a 3-D level. Certainly that's why i wanted to try it.

The class followed the following structure: P-S-C-A (just try saying that outloud to yourself!)

P - Preparation
S - Selection
C - Composition
A - Assemblage

For Prep, we lightly sanded the boxes, applied a thin coat of gesso and then covered the boxes with old dictionary paper using matte gel medium.

Before the selection or "shopping" part of the class, i gave a brief demo on turning a copy of a cabinet card into a realistic looking reproduction. Then the students were let loose on the two tables holding supplies. Really would have been better to spread it all out, but the full class used up all the other tables in the studio.

I presented two potential themes - which interestingly ended up blended by the students. One was Cabinet of Natural Curiosities - or you know - the whole bird-nest-egg-butterfly organic thing so popular today. The other theme was Historical Journey, using vintage photographs, old letters, postcards and bits of old toys to tell a story about days gone by.

This was when the teaching more or less stopped and the glue expert took over. One of the complex parts of assemblage is knowing which adhesive to use for each element. Glue dots for small things, pop dots for creating space between papers, E6000 for heavy metal, and a hot glue gun came to rescue for really stubborn situations. The class spent about 2 hours on composition and assembly - most choosing to finish off their pieces at home. In the end we had a lovely opportunity for show and tell. Sorry i don't know which boxes belong to which students - but if you write to me in the comments section - i'd be proud to give you credit!

This is my box - i went with the vintage theme - choosing a cabinet card image of a young girl i decided to name Annabelle. I picked out the block with an A because i liked the colour - her name came later! Then imagine my surprise and delight when rummaging through an old bag of jewellry i found gold pin "A", which i added to the cover. Well that's your serendipity right there, b'y. One student found a Bakelite button she told me to put aside and sell on ebay. She was amazed that i told her to keep it. (god please don't let rare bakelite buttons be worth $10,000....)

Here are some of the students fine work:

Stitchery Altered Book Pages

Here are the pages i did in Dorothy's book, entitled, A Stitch in Time. She requested that our work be anything related to "stitchery". I have a stack of old Spanish ladies magazines from the 50's. I just knew i would find some inspiration in those. They are filled with recipes and illustrations of dress patterns, embroidered napkins, crocheted pot holders, and some great old advertising.
The first spread uses one of the ladies dress patterns - then i "cut out" the same dress in two other "fabrics" - striped scrapbook paper and a floral napkin. I knew i always wanted to try to use a zipper in an altered book. I folded the paper and glued the zipper underneath. The flap just folds back enough to see the pin up gal in her slip lamenting that, even with her talent as a dress maker, she has nothing to wear. The back ground is Aileen's Color Mists in pink and green. Check our her products at OutsidetheMargins.com
The next spread was just for fun. I cut out a full page needlepoint/ cross stitch pattern of a house by a pond. It was the perfect backdrop for these ridiculous hard boiled egg cozy's that YES, you too can make out of felt, to dress up your morning breakfast tray. Is that supposed to be "the wife" all dressed up like a maid to serve the rooster eggs?
I have TONS of old lady sewing basket stuff i have collected over the years. So this book was a perfect chance to use some of it.
First i made the cover for the basket. I padded the page and covered it with fabric. Then used ruffled lace all around. Then covered the inside (next two pages in the book) with another fabric that is reminiscent of a basket weave pattern. I punched some holes in the cover and used vintage seam binding to create a bit of quilted effect. It actually kinda looks like the lid of a sewing basket! Can i just say that the Japanese Screw punch did a magnificent job punching holes through two layers of fabric, padding and several pages in the book.
Inside the basket are all of Nana's sewing paraphernalia. I actually cut a spool in half and wound it back up with thread, so it wouldn't be to thick inside the book.
Oh, what's that? An old girlie magazine clipping underneath the buttons and thread bobbins? Does granny have a secret she isn't telling us?