Art du Jour 92

Food. Drink. Sleep. Books. They are all drugs. (Fay Weldon)

It has been over six months since my last art du jour post. I’ve missed that drug.  See, I would add Netflix and Making Stuff to that list.  I admit my addiction to all of the above.

These are the coffee pictures for my daughter.  Her colours are grey and turquoise.  There is a lot of black and white in her kitchen and I know she likes purple, so fingers crossed she will be happy with these.  I am trying to be less chaotic with my creations but maybe it’s just not in me to make something calm and normal.

It’s a lazy Sunday here, perfectly gorgeous fall weather.  We went for a stroll down to the mall and back in search of rimmer spices for Caesars.  Do we have our priorities straight or what?

When we started this ‘update the look of your ’70’s house’ project I professed to not like grey.  Then I said I didn’t like turquoise and I was really done with purple.  Then I chose pelican grey for the master bedroom and both bathrooms and NOW I’m thinking turquoise and purple are really nice and maybe those should be my colour splashes in the bedroom and forget royal blue or red.

So I guess my point here is you can believe what I say today but don’t assume it will be equally true tomorrow.  I’ve made up my mind to never make up my mind.  Or some such nonsense.  Posting this now before I rethink the whole thing.

Happy autumn Sunday.

Art du Jour 91

It’s the Fish Picture!  Or the Fishing Collage!  Or Angling in Hell!  I haven’t made a final decision on the title.

Normally I do ink spritzes to finish but W was so happy identifying fish species I decided not to obliterate them with colour.  There are no purple pickerel in the real world.

But there could be rainbow cats.

I got a how-to art book from Amazon and the first exercise is to draw a bunch of cats.  HAHA!  I am obviously SO ready to move on.

Hope your weekend was happy and fun!

Art du Jour 90

What do you think? Too wild? Would you want to live in this chaotic little city?

I don’t know whether or not this is finished yet. It’s one of the biggest canvases I’ve ever worked on so all that work makes me feel like I should be done.

And then I frown at it for a while trying to decide what’s missing.  But whatever is missing, there’s no room for it!  So I’m finished, right?

Anyway, letting it hang for a bit.  I used up a LOT of paper scraps creating my little village on crack.

Art du Jour 89

Even though this is not my art, it is the product of my art class, so it qualifies for the art du jour category.  My two amazing students (granddaughters O and M) when given free rein in the art corner always come up with some creative, artistic and interesting results.

They have done a lot of stickers and stamps and drawing and painting on paper, but this weekend graduated to mixed media on canvas.  I think I’ve got them hooked.

They had some help with the ink splashes (it’s pretty messy) and the addition of texture, but the rest – collage and colour choices – it’s all theirs.  I got to hang them on my wall for a day, but now the art and the artists are headed home.

I hope whenever they look at them they remember what fun we had putting them together.

Art du Jour 82

My November Day Twenty Eight

There was a vision in my head before I started out on my little artistic adventure involving a grinning cat, but the result is not what I expected.

It never is.

I’m happy with the concept and I like the colours, but this had to sit on my easel for several days before it grew on me enough to share.

I suppose you can’t be madly in love with everything you do.
“I meant,” said Ipslore bitterly, “what is there in this world that truly makes living worthwhile?”
Death thought about it.
CATS, he said eventually. CATS ARE NICE.”
― Terry Pratchett, Sourcery

 

Art du Jour 72

Previously I mentioned somewhere that it was too hot to breathe. I like breathing and don’t want to stop anytime soon, so I’m thinking a fierce and crazy thunderstorm might help to disperse some of this heat which appears to be happily settled in for the duration.

“For the duration” is an expression my mom used a lot about many things. It’s a good one and I like it. It means for the whole time that something continues; for the entire period of time required for something to be completed; for as long as something takes.

This 16 x 20 inch (40.6 x 50.8 cm.) work of art on canvas took me about three days to complete. Here is a breakdown of actual time spent on it.
1. Ripping up paper and map pieces – 20 minutes.
2. Pasting stuff everywhere, including on canvas, desk and fingertips – 30 minutes.
3. Spritzing on ink and colour and water and letting it meander – 10 minutes
4. Staring at unfinished piece during drying time while thoughtfully contemplating next step – 2.5 days.
5. Adding final touches and sealer – most of this morning in fits and starts while doing many other things.

I don’t know how to speed up the staring time. There is a lovely ghost-like dementor shape floating across the canvas and I didn’t want to obliterate it. But it did fade into the background. Perhaps I’m the only one who will ever notice that. Excessive staring has its perks.

My plan for the duration of this heat wave is to keep the ice-cube trays full and the fans on high. And listen for the distant rumble of thunder bringing cooling summer rain.

Art du Jour 63

Surprise! It’s another collage. This time the background is bees and magazine people.  Although most of the bees are lost in the ink.  But I know they’re there.

I believe this piece has depth and balance with an over all burst of chaos.  Feel free to use that at your next art show or wine tasting event.

Other things that made me happy this weekend:

1.  Daughter, granddaughter, shopping.

2.  Free hemp hearts.

3.  Finding the book(s) they’ve been looking for.

4.  Potato salad.

5.  Sunshine.  Rain.  Thunder.

6.  Seeing my daughters two beautiful collages made up of ticket stubs and mementos and memorabilia from various adventures in her life.  What a brilliant idea.

7.  Stocking up on breakfast blend extra large Tassimo coffee so there is none left on the shelf for the next person, who will then have to make do with bold midnight eclipse instead.  I know how this all goes down.

8.  Watching a tuxedo cat on the neighbours fence being mercilessly harassed by two cheeky magpies.  He could have jumped down and gone home at any point but he puffed up his tail and stuck in the game; one magpie squawking in his face while the other snuck up in the rear, both alternately flying off if he got too close and swooping back down to claim their place on the fence when he’d turned around to face the other.  It was a dramatic dance, a battle of wills, a territorial spat of epic proportions.  Or something to do on a fence for fun on a sunny afternoon.  A nature show with no voice-over commentary, so I just don’t know.

9.  Saying goodbye to another May.

10.  Finding a seasonal allergy med that works very well, so that all that green stuff floating around in the air and drifting through my window screens is merely an annoyance to dust, and not turning me in to a sneezing weeping mess. Because no one likes a sneezing weeping mess.

Okay, no animal documentaries going on in my backyard at the moment so I will turn my attention to catching up on blog reading.

Happy first day of June, and have a memorable Monday.

Art du Jour 59

This one is made up of random google images I randomly printed and even more randomly pasted to a canvas over a background of orange and yellow tissue paper.

I’m not sold on all that orange, but I thought too much sepia and brown would just be dull. And I went a little nuts with the stamping, but this time I used archival waterproof ink. What a difference, not having to worry about drying time and messy smearing by totally impatient me.

I love this idea, and now feel a little more confident about photocopying old photos of people I can actually identify and immortalizing their images in a less random fashion.

After I finish one of these there is always soft gel dried on my hands and fingertips and removing it is like pealing off layers of dead skin. Very freaky. And all my clothes are turning in to paint clothes with various splotches here and there of things that can’t be washed out.

So have I figured out that I should have a special few things to wear strictly for art? Nope. But I’ve thought about it, so that’s a start.

It’s another beautiful hot and sunny day here! If this keeps up we will be in for one hell of a thunderstorm soon. Enjoy your Monday.

Art du Jour 54

On the weekend my daughter came over to learn some of my mixed media collage making techniques.  She made a lovely picture,  of which I neglected to take a photo,  using predominantly greens, yellows and blues.  At one point during the process I asked her if she wanted to use a picture I had of some oranges which I had cut out of a magazine and with no hesitation at all she said no.  Imagine!

So I used it myself.  I’m still in show and tell mode,  so I’m sharing my latest artistic journey with you. Yes, apparently it is your lucky day.

It all started with a piece of an old road map glued to a flat 11 x 14 canvas.  When it comes to measuring paper and canvas sizes I still prefer inches.  I am THAT old.  Metric hasn’t taken over my life entirely.  And I didn’t really use glue, it was soft gel medium, brushed on front and back.

I have a lot of orange and yellow tissue paper to use up.  This project barely made a dent in it.  The paper is ripped and placed haphazardly and overlapped and stuck on there until I feel like doing something else.

Here is a sideways view.  Please don’t ask me why.  I added some black and white scrap tissue paper pieces over some bald patches.

Isn’t this a lovely picture of oranges?  It went on all wrinkly with the gel medium, just like the tissue paper did. Wrinkles add depth. To canvases. And sophistication to faces.  I should have cut all the black off around it, but I didn’t and it’s too late now.

I finger painted some gesso over the glossy cut out, then let everything dry before adding colour and shading with oil pastels.  My easel has a big lip on it at the bottom, so I balance my canvas on this ruler when I take a picture of it.  Otherwise you can’t see to the very bottom.  Not that there’s a whole lot to see there.

Oil pastels blended with finger tips make a really nice subtle border.  I used orange, crimson, dark green and black in random order around the edge blending them in to each other.  Then I think I did some shading on the oranges and stopped when one of them started to look like a pumpkin.

Finally I went crazy with my stamps using brown and black ink and  green and white paint. This is a close up so you can see how the map shows through all the crap I’ve put on top of it.

And that’s it.  Sign it, spray it with clear acrylic sealer, and call it done.

I am so far behind reading all the blogs I follow that I don’t think I’ll ever catch up.  Please know that my LIKES are very sincere and I am commenting in my head.

Okay, that was pathetic.  I will try harder.

Have a super day!  Colour something orange!

Art du Jour 53

This is what I did yesterday while my house was being cleaned.
Yep, you read that right. I do not go to work outside my home, or inside it either.
For whatever reason, when someone other than me cleans up in here, I appreciate it immensely. It’s magical.

So, to the sound of my vacuum cleaner, I sat down at my desk and started ripping and pasting. I love red.  And all the colours that go with it, which is ALL the colours.   Seriously, I challenge you to think of a colour that can make red look bad.

In other news, there is no other news.  I am lazy and spoiled and well fed.  Like a pampered cat.  I think in a previous life I may have actually been a cat, and decided to come back to live this one still acting like one.  Except for adding coffee.  And being slightly less hairy.

W just asked me who I’m going to vote for next week and I said I couldn’t tell him because it’s private.  And he said you don’t have a clue yet,  do you?  He knows me too well.  But I have been reading up on the candidates so that I can make an informed decision.  Based on something other than who is wearing the most red in her campaign photo.  There are three women running here!  Isn’t that great?

I have many more red things to incorporate into collages so enough non news for now.

Have a beautiful April Tuesday!  Don’t work too hard.