Happy Thanksgiving

Abstract Painting with Jane Davies

This summer, I took an abstract painting workshop with Jane Davies at the Pacific NW Art School.  First we worked on monochromatic pieces.

We experimented with balancing opposites.  Here's busy and quiet-

Soft and hard edges-

Depth, atmosphere and flat space-

Big Fat Art- this piece measures 18x24 inches and played with line quality, fine and bold.

I like the idea of balancing opposites and plan to explore this more.

Portland's Audubon Wild Arts Festival this weekend

I'm participating in the Portland Audubon Society's Wild Arts Festival this weekend at the Montgomery Park.  You can get a sneak preview of the 6x6 inch artwork with this video.  More information is available on their website.

The theme for 2013 is Urban Birds. I named my piece "City View".  Chickadees are some of my favorite backyard birds. Each 6x6 sells for $40 to raise funds for Portland Audubon Society projects. Hope to see you there.

Remembering Summer - A Travel Journal

I created this little 6x6 inch journal to hold my memories of this summer.  The cover is book board cut down from a novel I finished reading and the pages are painted watercolor paper.

I used the freezer paper that I painted the pages on, scanned it into the computer, and worked with Photo Shop to make the covers.  The book cloth binding is dupioni silk and cloth buttons from Japan.  I use Xyron machine adhesive to attach the covers to the book board, the book binding and end papers. Then, stitched the pages into the book.

Before finishing the covers, I added the words that described my summer.

The title page includes a Swedish proverb, "A life without love is like a year without summer".  As the days get shorter and darker, these memories add light.

In June, I went to the Focus on Book Arts conference in Forest Grove, OR, made a little zine and took a Washington State road trip in July.

The trip started with a long weekend on Lake Chelan with my book group.  We took the three hour ferry to Stehekin- a trip I highly recommend.

Then, I spent two weeks on Whidbey Island in Puget Sound.  In the next post, I'll describe one of the workshops I took with Jane Davies.

Autumn Bouquet

I'm back to blogging again.  The past four months, I've been creative and will share some of my projects in future posts.  I've kept this blog for almost seven years and this is the longest I've gone without posting. Once out of a routine, it's hard to get back to it.  I want to continue and share my artwork with my blog readers.  A friend asked me once why I keep a blog.  The blog follows my creative journey and is a way to put my artwork out there for others to see.  I don't have a Facebook account.  My social media pleasure is Pinterest and I catalog my books read on My Library Thing.  You can follow both on the blog sidebar.  My sketch group continues to meet and here's a sketch from last week. Thanks for stopping by to visit.