altered art – sunshine factory

A little bit of fun.

My pal Karen saw that I was in need of a little art pick-me-up, so she found this project online and brought it to my attention. We lugged our mixed media stuff to the most recent Always Be Creating Art Play Date and gave our paper scraps the Finnabair treatment! Here are my finished pieces. The tag went onto a page in my sketchbook for the 2018 Sketchbook Project. The other 3 pieces are waiting for their forever homes. Or I might do something more with them before sending them out into the world. Who knows? 😀

new project percolation part 2

Soooo….way back in May, I wrote about a new project that I was percolating. Here’s where the bits of that project stand right now, in a bin on my work table:

See the glitter? and the doodling? Well, that’s all I had for a while, until yesterday, when I learned that two of my little house canvases sold this past weekend at Lola’s Fresh Patina. Now my mind has gone into overdrive with a mixture of inspiration based off my own little chunky canvases, plus the works of Denver artist Paul Cunningham, which I saw at Old Town Art & Framery last week.

This is My Bike

Dream: This is My Bike

I was walking alongside a friend who was riding his bike. We were headed for NYC from NJ and having a nice, leisurely walk/ride. At some point, though, the chain fell off his bike and he couldn’t ride anymore. Luckily, we were right across the street from some notable bike co-op and we hoped they would fix it for him. We went in and while they worked on his bike, I wandered the offices, which were in a really cool old victorian walkup. I visited the gift shop, where they sold brightly colored dog paintings and there was a display with the names of each volunteer and what they had accomplished in the organization, represented by assorted shapes in a divided display box. I thought it was nice that they had taken the time to honor and develop the talents of the people who worked there for no pay. Then I was given a bike to alter and I started painting it. When I left it to dry, someone else took it and undid all of the work that I had begun.

(mixed media piece using rescued bike, spray paint, spray webbing, wood, polymer clay, metal)

Last Fire in the Living Room

The Dream: Last Fire in the Living Room

We are in the process of trying to move my mom out of the house she and my dad moved into over 40 years ago. It’s been difficult and traumatic for all six kids and for mom, but with me being so far away from New Jersey, I’ve been having lots of anxiety about this new phase in our lives. I dreamed that I was in mom’s living room and all of the furniture was gone, no pictures on the walls, which were painted white. I don’t even think that the carpet was there anymore. There was a pile of big brown leaves from the tree out front that had blown into the room and sort of drifted up against the fireplace, which was in a different location and was cold and dark. As I stood there, a little area of the leaves in the middle of the room caught on fire and I tried to stomp it out with my shoe.

(mixed media shrine using cigar boxes, corrugated cardboard, acrylics, wood pieces, shrink plastic, light element, picture frame, brown paper bag, beaded trim)

Hostage Teeth

The Dream: Hostage Teeth

The economy really messed us up and we’re behind in some of our bills, most notably to our dentist, which causes me extreme anxiety. In the dream I was talking and my teeth started falling out of my mouth. I don’t remember it hurting, but it was very upsetting. I went to the dentist and he looked at my mouth and said he wouldn’t fix my teeth until he knew that he was going to get paid. So I’m sitting there, missing teeth and completely baffled as to how this was going to work. Suddenly there were many people in the waiting room and in came a terrorist with a syringe and the focus was off my teeth and how I was going to save all of the people in the dentist’s office.

(mixed media shrine using cigar box, wood pieces, Mardi Gras beads, acrylics, teeth mold rescued from the dentist)

Excited About “Interiors”

Oh HELL no, I did not let another month go by without posting! Criminey!!

It’s Wednesday afternoon, just a couple of days before Christmas, and all is quiet at Poudre Studio Artists & Gallery at Poudre River Arts Center. Only one other artist is working in her studio and the gallery has had a few visitors, giving me plenty of time to work. I’m doing two pieces for our February show, “Interiors.” One is an ode to the Barbie Townhouse I never had and the other is an ode to all of the shorehouses I’ve stayed in during my visits to the Jersey shore.They are coming along really well and I’m getting pretty excited about them. This photo is a part of the shorehouse shrine and I call it “beer on the half shell”.

The show was inspired by the book Mixed Media Dollhouses by Tally Oliveau and Julie Molina.

When I was a child, I always loved making things for my dolls; I had a dollhouse in progress when my friend Eliza showed me the book. We all talked about it here at the center and naturally, we organized a show!

There is still time to enter your work in “Interiors”, if you have a mind to. You do not need to be a Colorado resident in order to join in the fun. You may have already-completed pieces that fit the theme and that are dying for a new audience.

a christmas wish

Ever have a piece that you just hated no matter what you did to it? This chipboard tag (along with another, slightly larger one) was one of those pieces. When I finally got a paint job on the tag that I actually liked, I let it sit in a box on my table for months before I got over my fear to do something with it. When I had an idea, it all came together in a flash and it is now an ornament for our Christmas tree. My favorite part is the delicious Diamond Glaze coating.

Kelly Kilmer got me drunk on art this weekend…

…and today I have a wicked art hangover!

This past weekend, I took 5 mixed media workshops from Kelly Kilmer, who was the visiting artist at The Artists’ Nook this month. There are no words to describe how much I love Kelly’s classes and how much I get out of her workshops. Every time I take a Kelly class, I am able to play, experiment and I always get new ideas, either from her, or from expanding on something she or another student said.

This weekend’s highlights, not in any particular order:

Seeing Kelly and learning from her. She is so creative, free and amazingly supportive.
Getting to know Allyson better, and getting an awesome ego boost from her. *waves and paints Allyson’s hand*
Learning more about layering and color mixing and composition.
Realizing that some of the crazy stuff I do in my journals isn’t as crazy as I thought!
Seeing my old pals, like Susan and Marcy and Karen and Terry, who I haven’t seen in a long time. I really admire the talent of these ladies!
Meeting new people! Yes, I’m talking about you, you Ladies From Parker!
Three full days of making art and playing. Heaven.

Last night, I was so amped up, I made 14 of the little paper journals while we watched tv. I love them.

I think my favorite book was the Reclaimed book. I love the idea of taking old books, gutting them, and making new pages for them.

THANK YOU SO MUCH, KELLY!

Clicking on any of the photos below should take you to my Flickr set of photos from this weekend. I should have taken more of the process, but I was too absorbed to even think of that.


Transcribed	Altered Photos Revisited

Triptych Book	Swatches: Little Paper Books

Reclaimed: An Altered Artist’s Book

funky found object canvas villages

I’m going to be a woman of few words today. I finally finished these canvases I started in Leighanna Light’s class a few weeks ago. I love them! It was fun to take whatever scraps and randomness I had on the table in front of me to create these little rows of houses. I loved “frosting” the canvases with gel medium to create texture. Thanks, Leighanna, for a great workshop!

new on my website: creativity book reviews

I have more creativity, art and art project books than you can shake a stick at. I realized recently that I have lost track of what books I’ve read and more importantly, what books actually move me and do their intended job of inspiring my creativity. This thought came to me as I was reading one of my Christmas presents from mom: Jane Wynn’s Altered Curiosities. It really struck me on a number of levels — as an artist, a writer and as a former editor. As a result, I’ve decided to write reviews of these books, starting with the most recently acquired.

Read my review of Jane Wynn’s Altered Curiosities: Assemblage Techniques and Projects here.

Enjoy!