the art of not keeping a diary...and other things too

MPCG Clay Gathering in Morrisburg

Thu, 7 May 2009 09:16:35 -0400

We have just completed our seventh annual gathering here in Morrisburg. Thirty four of us from, Ottawa, Toronto, Montreal and Chicoutimi and areas in between, played, clayed, shared, taught, and experimented with Polymer Clay for four days. (some were wishing for more) Some found it exhausting, I think everyone enjoyed themselves, and the Inn is still standing.
For the second year in a row, we started off doing a “surprise mosaic” Of course it was more of a surprise last year when we did Picassos, “The Dream” and no one knew what we were up to, but Marilyn was fun too. Hmmmmm, what can we do next year??
Basically our four days consisted of five full workshops and a few demos, a lot of socializing, a little wine (ok, a lot of wine) but no whining.
We ate, we drank , we clayed,.....we didn’t sleep enough.

the masterpiece project

Fri, 10 Apr 2009 14:07:29 -0400

I posted a link to this a while back but since they hadn’t yet received my submissions, I was hesitant to post pics. They have had them for a while now , (they liked them) so I thought I would put them up.It was a fun FUN project!! And now I want to paint water droplets on the side of my garage. Think I won’t do it don’t you? Stay tuned and check back mid summer!!
http://www.masterpiece.on.ca/Artists.htm

Moleskine Madness

Sat, 21 Mar 2009 11:56:05 -0400

In November of 2005 , while on a weeklong retreat at Mt. Tremblant with some friends, four of us decided to start a monthly post card exchange. The rules:
Size was to be 5” x 7”...no exceptions
To be mailed on the 15th of each month....no exceptions
No other rules, except we often break the first two.
Make 4 each month, so each participant has a full set. And believe me, between the 4 of us we aren’t playing with a full set....if you know what I mean. (go to the Monthly Mail Art page to see some random cards from over the past few years.)
Scan ahead to 2008 and we have decided to shake things up a bit. Jumping on the Moleskine bandwagon, we are now starting a new exchange.....our version of the “Traveling Moleskine” The new rules:
We each have 1 Japanese accordion folded Moleskine .
We come up with a theme, to be interpreted ‘loosely’
We start in our own book and depict our theme any way we like with any medium we like on 2.5 pages....don’t even ask.
We mail it to the next person ....like in a round robin.
We scan a detail of the card and use that in place of our monthly post cards. (we do only a detail so we don’t spoil the surprise of seeing the whole image before seeing our book for the first time.

So yesterday, I received my own Moleskine back from its first round and man is it AWESOME!!!! Pretty exciting to open it for the first time and see the entries in full. And really interesting to see some connection, not only in my own book from one page to the next, but a connection throughout all the books. I will try to explain:
First, Leslie’s book came and her theme “Moodling” was the theme I had been “moodling” about, so I had my first entry already in my head. Curious...then arrives Krista’s book and her theme is “A Bird and a Fish Can Fall in Love, but where would they live?” So my entry in that book was a take off of Escher’s bird and fish negative/positive space (see below) ...”The fish can live in the space the bird doesn’t use” Then comes Vio’s book and her theme is “what goes around comes around” and Leslie’s entry in that book starts with ”Sometimes it’s the space between the lines that speak volumes”
Do you see where I am going? But we are doing these entries independently, so its all just weird coincidences.......or is it?......

Other Oddities

Krista and I both started off with fish??
I am still wondering about a cryptic post card from Vio involving a spring onion?
Krista’s postcard (3rd one below) arrived as just a close up of the platter and It took me a while but i was pretty sure she used Dr. Seuss’s “10 Apples Up On Top”...surprise surprise!!

Three Things You Should Learn Before You Grow Up....

Sat, 21 Feb 2009 09:12:52 -0500

Drive a Standard.....well, you should be a little grown up before attempting this.
Read Music.......it doesn’t matter if you can play anything, but if you do decide to pick up an instrument at some point in your life, you have a really good head start
Understand Colour Theory .....or at least have the basics. In my mind... Colour the single most important factor in EVERYTHING! Think of all the things that happen in our lives big and small....
“I went shopping today and bought a new sweater” “What COLOUR?”
“I have a new car” “What make?” “What COLOUR?”
“We purchased a new home” “Where?”, “What COLOUR?”
‘I am redecorating the living room” “How?” “What COLOUR?”
“They had the baby!!” “How big”? “What is his name”? “What COLOUR is his hair?”
Whether you are designing a website, planning a dinner party, or planting a garden, COLOUR
is one of THEE most important factors to consider. It sets the tone and invokes a theme.
Odd then, that I only wear black and am sitting in a white kitchen.....
But black and white are the ground colours, it all starts there and branches out.
Colour is my passion and sometimes I feel like I can smell and taste colour. And while colour is not that important to everyone, it can be helpful to have a little understanding of what makes up certain colours.
For example, you are painting your living room and you want a brown that will compliment the golden brown of your furniture. It is helpful to know that brown is made up of the three primary colours, red, yellow and blue. The quantities of each of these three colours within the brown, will determine whether you have a warm or cool tone of brown. A warm brown, which has more yellow, differs greatly from a cool brown, that contains more blue. Knowing this, and knowing how to recognize it , will make your trip to the paint store an lot more successful.
Your eye mixes colours all on its own. Look at the work of Seurat for a good example of this. The fad of sponging walls in the eighties can give you really bad examples of this. Take a bathroom. The fixtures, and floor and accessories are navy and pink. (Ok, I said it was the eighties.) The enthusiastic, but not so knowledgeable home decorator decides she is going to sponge navy and pink on her white walls. The result, of course, is a mauve bathroom with navy and pink accents. She would have been much better of to pick two shades of blue, or two shades of pink. Or better yet....forget the sponge.

My current project (not related to work) is helping (note I said HELPING) my son and future daughter-in-law plan their wedding. Yes, I am aware that I am the Mother-of-the-Groom and therefore a lesser being, but, all I can say in my defense is , they asked!
So, where do you start when you are picking out a theme? Well, usually you have something to start with. Ie, if you are redoing a room in your home, you need to take into account the things you cannot change. For example, floor colour. That could be your starting point. You have two choices, if it is neutral, let it be invisible, if it is bold, build on it. But what to do if, as in the case of this event, you have carte blanche?
Well, first stop is the hardware store.
Yes, thats right. The paint department to be exact.
And pick up a whole bunch of paint chips.
And cut out the ones you like and start to group them.
And think about the feeling of the event.
And at some point I suppose, you should probably consult the Bride.
To be continued............

This blogging thing........

Tue, 10 Feb 2009 19:42:16 -0500

.......is tricky. Well, organizing the whole website/blog thing is tricky. Being new to this, I am learning as I go along...and I am a pretty slow learner!! My first thought, to base the blog around each days picture, has presented problems. First of all, the blog, at least for me, needs to be more spontaneous, sometimes the picture I have drawn/sketched/painted that day is not relevant to anything, making it difficult to blog about....not to mention pretty darn boring....”here is a picture of a cheerio floating in milk” followed by “cat sleeping” (better though, than “cat floating in milk”)
Second problem, this plan also meant that I had to write an entry every day. Yeah, like that’s every going to happen. Even if I could think of that many things to say, I’m pretty sure nobody would be that interested that often. Sooooooo, If you ARE interested in seeing every drawing from every day in 2009, please go to the page titled, wait for it......”Pic a Day for a Year 2009”.
So now this space can remain random, because really, how much can you say about the “View of my Neighbours House From my Studio Window in the Dead of Winter?” or “The Little Glass Leprechaun from the Liptons Tea Box”?

Drops of Water....

Fri, 6 Feb 2009 11:54:58 -0500

I have said it before, and I’ll say it again....”too many projects, too little time.
This little number, known has “The Masterpiece Project, better described here
http://www.masterpiece.on.ca/Artists.htm
is something I have been working on for the past couple of weeks. The above is just a rough ROUGH sketch of the idea that I had for the Wonkies. I was going to photograph them, but I think I had better wait until they are published on “The Masterpiece Project” website. (so many secrets....I want to update my moleskine page as well, but don’t want to ruin the surprise for the others...argggg.)
The Wonkies are now ready to be sent off to be clear coated, and then, well, I am not sure what happens next, but it’s been fun!!
Enjoy looking around the Wonky page

“These are a Few of My FavouriteThings....”

Fri, 30 Jan 2009 08:31:29 -0500

When I find an artist or illustrator or sketcher or ‘journal keeper’ whose style I like, I am always interested to know what supplies are their favourites.....the ones they pick up every day. So, now, you get to hear about mine even if you don’t care.
First lets visit the.....
PENCILS....My two favourite pencils are Rotring mechanical pencils, 0.7 and 0.5. I tend to use the 0.5 a bit more cause its less smudgy. There is nothing special about them really, except one has an orange casing and the other is lime green, (my two favourite colours) oh and they came from a little shop on the island of Naxos in Greece. (you can get them anywhere of course but if you feel you need to travel to Greece to get them I will send you the name of the shop)
PENS....I have four that I use regularly. On the top of the list is my KOH-I-NOOR Rapidograph 3.0 over .25. At around $30 ,it might seem a little high for one pen, but you can wait for the 40% off sales a Michaels, unless you have a daughter that works there. Next is my Rotring Fine Art Pen, same price range, a lot heavier, and I like the water soluble ink. I use it a LOT for edging. Number three is my fountain pen from Rome, again, special because it came from Rome, but it also has a really nice weight to it and feels very solid in your hand. Most good quality fountain pens ‘feel’ this way and if you ever start writing with a fountain pen, you won’t want to go back. And number four is my $1.99 black fine Micron from the GIANT TIGER. I LOVE this pen and won’t go anywhere without it. Sometimes I buy 3 and 4 at a time fearing the day they stop carrying them. (GT is known for discontinuing products on a whim!
MARKERS...I don’t use them alot, but the ones I like are Staedtlar triplus fineliner...24 colours in a vinyl roll pack.
BRUSHES....the one I always pick up is my brush with the water reservoir in the handle. There are lots of brands, (KOI is one) and it doesn’t really matter which brand, except that the inexpensive ones (3 in a pack for $10) don’t hold a nice pointy tip, with the more expensive ($10 each) have good bristles. I love this brush because it travels anywhere and I don’t need to have a water container with me.
WATERCOLOURS... I have a small Windsor Newton Cotman Compact Box. You can find it here http://www.winsornewton.com/ under watercolor sets. It holds 12 1/2 pans of watercolour (which you can purchase separately) at two price points depending on the quality you like. It comes with a brush (that I never use) and has a mixing palette and water reservoir in the kit. I also just purchased a small set of six tubes of Cotman watercolours, but I am not sold on them yet. I mentioned them because they are in the drawing above....they are not yet favourites!
And my very favourite thing to draw in is my MOLESKINE watercolour book. Just because they are cool. http://www.moleskines.com/ But I use lots of others as well. Most are journals that I have made myself, and as long as it is watercolour paper, I don’t have any favourite brands YET!

Every now and then I do something called “OUT OF THE COMFORT ZONE” I do it when working with polymer clay also.
For a specified period of time ( a day, or a week perhaps) I will remove all of my “favourite things” and force myself to use different tools/art supplies etc. It can get you out of a rut and introduce you to new techniques.

Maggie the Monster....

Sat, 24 Jan 2009 08:59:04 -0500

Let me introduce you to Maggie.I purchased Maggie from the Monster Factory at the One of a Kind show in December. I do not do a lot of shopping for my house at the shows, mostly because I am trying to de-clutter the place since the kids have left. But there is always one or two special things that come home with me. This year at the OOAK Maggie spoke to me. She has a vivid imagination and never lets the facts get in the way of a good story. At least that is what it says on her tag.
And, “Never let the truth get in the way of a good story” is something my father in law said repeatedly during his lifetime (he was a newspaper editor) and I have often been caught uttering these same words.... usually while re-telling an event involving one of the kids at which time they are violently rolling their eyes swearing said event never happened. (what do they know, they were only little)
Maggie’s portraits were my ‘pic a day’ entries for Jan. 17, 18 and 19. I broke out the new watercolours for the ‘Maggie period’ but I am not so sure I am in love with them.....yet . I tend to keep going back to the old standbys. (More on this in a future blog) I used a heavier marker in places and that may have been an error in judgment, however, for every error in judgment something positive is learned. When/if I do use a marker or pen to make a heavier line, I like to use a water soluble one and then go over one edge of the line with a sharp brush and clean water. It bleeds a little and leaves a nice soft edge or shadow...Maggie IS soft and some of these lines are definitely too static.
I do like her colours though, and I love the way she is frowning from the front, but smiling from the side!!
Thought for today...don’t judge your drawings at all in the beginning, just draw for the enjoyment of drawing. But when you have built up some confidence , acknowledge the areas you feel could use some improvement......recognizing a fault (or what you believe to be a fault) is the biggest step on the road to improving it.
Maggie, you’re so cute.........

One World-One Heart

Wed, 21 Jan 2009 20:44:11 -0500

This is a great project started by Lisa Swifka , aimed at getting bloggers from all over the world to network, support one another and promote their blogs. To read more about the project, click on the link above. The best part is that some 350 plus bloggers are participating and each one is giving something away!
The worst part is that it is going to take hours to go through the list to see all the neat draw giveaways and great blogs.
I am giving away one of my journals (shown below) made from a discarded library book. Its a very sweet book called Honey Bunch and Norman, and is actually going to be featured in the April edition of Canadian Living. Plus, as an added bonus..:), I have left in some great illustrations and text and I am going to sketch a surprise on the inside! (get an idea by visiting my ‘picture a day for a year’ page)
All you have to do to enter is:
Post a comment to this message before Feb. 12 and make sure you leave some contact information so I can let you know if you win.
You can only post one entry here, but you can go to as many blogs as you like....that is what I am going to do now....bye!!

Retro Inspiration.....

Sat, 17 Jan 2009 09:19:21 -0500

The other day while putting together some journals, I came across an old book about power tools. It was written in the early sixties and had some really amazing technical drawings within it’s unassuming covers. I will scan and post a couple of them below. Even though I had just purchased some new watercolours, I couldn’t wait to try out this style.
The drawings were very controlled, almost like woodcuts. They looked so simple I began thinking about what I would draw and where every line would go. I could easily imagine how to make the handle look rounded and what type of line would create the shading. I scanned the kitchen and found my first subject....an old MEAT GRINDER from some era even before mine.
Very quickly did I realize that I had underestimated the skill of this anonymous illustrator! The best part about the meat grinder (see below) turned out to be the Sienna drawing ink my good friend Krista gave me and I can’t wait to get my hands on more colours to play with in the near future. The meat grinder went from the ‘wood cut’ look to ‘not so neat cross hatching’ in a nanosecond. I think the pen I was using was too fine.
My next unsuspecting subject was my second favourite corkscrew. ( I say second because my wall mounted one and the ”Lazy Fish” are tied in first place so technically it could be my third favourite... I’ll let you figure that out. )
This attempt (above) turned out better, (I think the pen was too thick) and except for some obvious ‘line placement malfunctions’, I was pleased with it’s overall appearance, but clearly there is more to this technique than meets the eye!!!
I plan to revisit this idea soon, but today I am going to meet my new paints!!