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Since I forgot all about this indigo-orange card, and it was supposed to have been mailed out at the end of last month/beginning of this one, I’ll start off with this one instead of finishing up the other two. So… I was thinking “spooky” and found a vintage engraving of a toad pulling a pumpkin carriage. I resketched it, changing the image a bit, and sketched in a huge pumpkin instead of the toad. I imported it into Photoshop and changed the black to indigo… then I’ll print it out and transfer them onto an orange watercolor board base.
Well, here it is… acrylic washes, leaves, squarish “squiggles” and dots masked out with frisket, universal wash over entire piece, frisket removed, leaves and squiggles outlined with leafing glue and gilding added. I’ve finally decided that I’m not going to kill myself making these cards, and that quick and relatively easy doesn’t mean sub-standard.
I had this idea, see… it was actually from an ad in a magazine for furniture. The outline of a sofa was watercolored in these subtle colors, and over the top someone had calligraphied, in the shape of the cushions, what the sofa represented for them. Deciding that I wasn’t going to completely plagiarize the whole concept, I drew my own version of the sofa, cut it into a stencil, and wrote my own poem: Chesterfield Not sure about the colors, though… royal… hmmm… I used my cat’s eye pigment ink pads to tamp on the colors and then wrote the text of the poem onto the sofa with a dip pen and Aladine inks. The background was painted with US ArtQuest’s Stargazers watercolor palette. Then I put little glitter dots all around the edge. Me and glitter… ha! I’m not sure I like the glitter… sooo not me. Still debating on this one… any comments?
SOFA couch
recamé
Holder of coins and crumbs
Place where
my HEART has been won and LOST,
stolen and BROKEN
Witness to Christmas Eves and
sleep overs ~ children rocked,
BABES nursed in its soft confines
NOT merely cushions
AND springs TO support
bone, sinew and SKIN
but a cradle for my SOUL
I worked on my blue postcards this weekend and finished them up. These are all similar (though not exactly the same, since they’re all originals). They took considerably less time than I usually spend on these projects. I don’t know why I feel compelled to create little mini masterpieces each month… well, I do know… I’m neurotic, is all, when it comes to my artwork. I’m trying to finish up old stuff… mail out things that have been sitting here for eons, and have yet to be taken care of. It almost seems like I can’t move ON and take the next steps before I close out some of the old things that have been hanging around and being ignored. I have to share this from Anahata Katkin’s blog (we share the same astrological sign), since it almost exactly sums up how I”ve been feeling lately: For the astrology buffs out there, my official Saturn Return is in about a week. For the rest of you -and for me- that means I feel like a complete dork and I’m having a real time of it. I have the dreaded feeling that suddenly I’m going to get swallowed up by the grumpy old man that is hanging around in my head. I can be intense, yes. My friends and family would all easily enjoy a good jab at my stubbornness and shall we say over enthusiasm. But grumpy has not been one of my Brownie stripes until lately. It’s all comical since there is no apparent reason for discomfort in my life. Sailing along and some how missing ME. You know. The real me. (Do you have a real you that seems like a kid you accidently forgot at the pool and then suddenly remembered when you got to the grocery store!?) I have that sinking feeling that I better find the missing pieces before I begin this next chapter in my life. As I was saying the other day-everything in life feels up for renegotiation. (I know classic Saturn Return BS.) Here is what old Brezny says this week to help me with my vague attitude: Woo-hoo! Time to figure out my three huge, soaring, potent desires rather than 25 puny, scrabbing, half-assed ones! [Hmmm... wonder if dinner with Keanu would count as a former or a latter desire... hmmm...] And finally… I’ve been a grumpy butt lately (though not always unjustifiably)… just having one of those LAST STRAW moments… SO if I’ve offended you in some way, or hurt your feelings, I ask for your forgiveness and request your indulgence… and if it was something you said… I’ll forgive you and seeing that my memory is like a colander, there is a pretty good chance that I’ll forget about it too.
“Once in a Blue Moon”
Watercolor, gouache
“It’s the Season of Burning, Churning Yearning. Here are three of the most important things I’ve ever told you about how to get what you need. (1) If you don’t precisely articulate your conscious desires, your unconscious patterns will come true instead. (2) If you want your conscious desires to trump your unconscious patterns, speak or write your conscious desires every day. (3) It’s better to have three huge, soaring, potent desires than 25 puny, scrabbling, half-assed desires.”
I’ve finally finished my yellow postcards. A month late, but they’re done. Now it’s time to move on to the blues, which I’ve already started on, but haven’t finished.
(Click to see enlarged view in separate window)
My favorite card is the last one; the one that looks like a tattooed nude. It started off as a chair, but it’s shape was asking for some transmorphification. Most of these are a combination of many media: watercolor, collage, pigment inks and embossing power, markers, and transparencies.
I ended up using the hooded raincoat girl more than the other one… and the raincoat ended up looking more cloak-like but it fit into the mandala concept well. I flip them over and then address them randomly, so I hope whoever gets each one will be happy with what they get.
I’ve been working on my (June) yellow postcards… they were supposed to go out around the 1st of July but as usual, I balked and I’m still working on them. I’d collaged and painted a sheet of watercolor paper and cut it up. I’m at the next (and hopefully final) step of adding some final elements to most of them. Some of them seemed to need more than a little touch up, and I thought I’d draw some raincoat clad people and apply them to the tops of the collaged backgrounds (hence the sketch, above, of the raincoat girl). Will post more this weekend, by which time I hope to have completed the cards.
I can’t believe how quickly the weekend has flow by. I’ve not accomplished a whole lot, but I did manage to get one load of laundry in the washer just now, and the dishwasher loaded and started up. I’ve been rather unproductive… mostly sleeping a bunch and feeling tired and out of sorts… not really sick, but not really feeling all that good either. I did manage to almost finish up my Colors of India postcard piece… a bit more to do on the two top right ones and I think I’m ready to cut them up and finish them up individually… may stick some other things onto some of them… we’ll see. Gabriel and I did do some silly, slightly demented things… like watch Monty Python and the Holy Grail this afternoon, and drop in on the comic book store yesterday. I picked up Y The Last Man’s two first books (they’re pretty dang good) and Neil Gaiman’s Midnight Days… absolutely loved the “Hold Me” segment, which featured John Constantine (amongst other characters from Gaiman’s Sandman series) and was drawn by Dave McKean, whose pen work is simply magnificent… I love his squiggles… they do something for me… and the story, well… it really did something for me as well… amazing what wonders simply being held does for the soul.
Well, I’ve come a little bit further with my Colors of India postcards… it’s all moving so slowly. I’ve still been under the weather, though I’m finally on an upswing… must be that Z-pak the doctor prescribed this weekend. Hopefully we’ll all be germ-free shortly and feeling spritely again. The upper left corner has an image of Ganesh, the Hindu elephant god. The following are quotes from Wikipedia: Ganesha is worshipped as the lord of beginnings, the lord of obstacles, patron of arts and sciences, and the god of intellect and wisdom. He is honoured with affection at the start of any ritual or ceremony and invoked as the “Patron of Letters” at the beginning of any writing. He is the Lord of Obstacles both of a material and spiritual order. He can place obstacles in the path of those who need to be checked, and can remove blockages just as easily. The Sanskrit terms vighnakartā (“obstacle-creator”) and vighnahartā (“obstacle-destroyer”) summarize the dual functions. Both functions are vital to his character, as Robert Brown explains: Even after the Purāṇic Gaṇeśa is well-defined, in art Gaṇeśa remained predominantly important for his dual role as creator and remover of obstacles, thus having both a negative and a positive aspect. Paul Courtright says that: I find it interesting that many Hindu gods (in fact, the whole pantheon of gods in general) have this duality in their nature. Is it so surprising that we mere mortals are “afflicted” with the same attribute? So much time and effort is expended into quashing our shadow sides instead of honoring them as an integral part of who we are… the push and pull that moves us forward… toward completion of a cycle. Each has a purpose, and each can be harnessed to move us forward. I believe that transcendence begins with acceptance.
Gaṇeśa is also called Vighneśvara or Vighnarāja, the Lord of Obstacles. His task in the divine scheme of things, his dharma, is to place and remove obstacles. It is his particular territory, the reason for his creation.
All kinds of media on illustration board… (work-in-progress)
I’ve been going through the “birthing” process of this piece… it starts out as an idea, then a search ensues for reference images and “ephemera”, then I begin drawing, coloring, pasting, layering… until it’s done. As you can see, it’s far from done, but it’s on its way… to somewhere… though not yet the post office… and since the next one is due out on Monday or Tuesday, I deserve to be chastised (so spank me, baby). We’ll see how much of the next one I can get done between now and then. *sigh*
(Click to see enlarged view in separate window)
After making breakfast this morning, I finished up my ‘color’ postcards for the year-long swap I’ve organized. This month’s theme was black and white, and while contemplating the different concepts that I’d been thinking about, winter scenes and snow were what finally tied my attention.
It took me all of yesterday afternoon and evening to draw out the postcards on illustration board with pen. This morning, after our pancake breakfast, I resumed working on them and finished them, adding watercolor and watersoluble color pastel. I quite like how they turned out.
