shining egg

last night.

i truly do not know where to begin to tell you about last night. i've been sitting here looking at the blank screen for 15 minutes, because i can't figure out how to capture the excitement.

(photo courtesy of ms. mommycoddle)

so i'll share a few tidbits, and let molly's and jennifer's pictures tell the rest. (note to self - don't even bother bringing your camera to your own opening. and don't worry that you didn't take any pictures, as long as you invited your flickr friends.)

(photo courtesy of ms. mommycoddle)

first of all, i truly felt like all of you were there with me last night. molly and jennifer were there, of course. and i was wearing martha's wrap. (which is stunning and felt amazing and i love it and can't wait to wear it again. maybe tonight to the 3rd grade play. do you think that's too much!?) and erin had seen all of the work before it went for framing and hanging. and when i walked into the gallery last night, there were those pretty orange flowers (the ones you see in the photo up there) waiting for me from alicia, and heather, and rachel. i mean really. it was as if you all were there. and that was so special.

(photos courtesy of ms. mama urchin)

second of all, the gallery looks wonderful. they did a spectacular job with the framing and the hanging - neither of which i had anything to do with, but they really made my paintings look good.

third, there were so many people! family and friends and people i didn't know and other artists (who so kindly introduced themselves to me). and the weather was beautiful. and the doors to the gallery were open to the courtyard outside. and there was wine. and there were brownies (i couldn't help it). and the atmosphere felt so festive.

i really was a bit nervous going into last night - not knowing how i'd feel, standing there among family and friends and strangers with my paintings hanging on the wall. but it turned out to be terrific fun. really, terrific fun.

and then this morning. i got up and took the kids to school and ate breakfast and packed up my car and went out to paint at a very special farm. the weather is perfect again. and it felt so good to have my hands in the mess of painting again. so good.

so there you go, in a nutshell. you can see all of the work that's hanging in the show in my flickrset. and you can contact the gallery directly to inquire about pricing or purchasing.

and one last thing. thank you. all of you. really. for your feedback and encouragement and friendship and support of me and my painting over these last months. really. thank you.

overdue, 1

i'm trying to cross some things off of my list.  the kind of things - you know them, don't you? - that feel heavy in your brain?  

item #1.  

way (way, way) back last summer when sarah announced the second gocco swap, i knew.  i knew that i couldn't not play along.  i also knew that i probably couldn't make the late-august deadline.  i knew i'd be late, but i had NO idea just how late i'd be.  

 

so here i am.  confessing.  publicly.   

i took the packages to the post office this morning.  (you can do the math.)  and now i'm posting pictures and ruining the surprise for my swapmates who read my blog.  (double boo.  so if you don't want to see what's in the package, don't scroll down to the end of this post!) 

in addition to my own delays and life's curve-balls, a piece of my gocco printer was damaged (user error, of course) and had to be replaced (thank you, leslie) - which delayed me even further.

so along with the intended set of note cards, i sent a small token of apology for being so (SO!) late.

and there you go.  gocco swap, check.  next up, pay it forward.

makeshift

here is a peek at the space i set up for myself in the living room.  there wasn't nearly as much painting time this week as i had hoped - a result of the ice storm and school cancellations - but there was some.

(i'm always taken by the little messes that occur when i paint.

the bits of color on the rim of my water jar.

drips on an underpainting.

oil pastels dragged through too much paint.

my fingers.)

i'm hoping for a bit more time in my little corner this weekend, to finish up some things i started.  my fingers are (clean now) and crossed.

i'm painting at home today

there's a new post about process at echoes.  (also, i encourage you to check out rachel's recent posts about process.  her thoughts on the subject are making me think hard about my own processes - creative, and otherwise.)

t-minus 2 days

and i'm getting there.  today was the last day of school before winter vacation.  i spent the day trying to get my ducks in a row - for hanukkah, for gifts, for plans - everything for the next two weeks.  of course it's not all done, but once 230 came, i was able to exhale and begin to ease into the chaos that will be our life from now until january 5.

 

during my mid-day frenzy, i actually bought one hanukkah present, and consulted with my brother on several others.  i lined up a few holiday activities (we'll be making these.  and these.  and going to see this.), made plans with some friends to light our candles together.  and ate a good bit of the dough i had made for baking cookies this weekend.

this afternoon we got started on our hanukkah activities.  my grandmother had asked us to make her some cards she could send to family and friends.  hanukkah isn't like christmas with the cards, not at all.  but she wanted some, so we made some.  and it was so much fun.  

first, i had b. and l. each draw a small hanukkah picture on plain white paper.  i drew boxes on the paper to give them the approximate size i was looking for.  (l.'s was much bigger than the box i drew for her, but we loved it so much that we figured out how to make it work.)  we transferred the drawings onto some of these,and carved them into stamps with one of these.  i've been carving rubber stamps for a while now, and enjoying it immensely - the stamps are such a quick fix, they're perfect for a small design, for a whim.  and they were perfect for this project. 

but then, just because it's winter vacation and i was starting to feel all festive, i broke out martha's glitter and let the kids go to town.  and the cards look fantastic!  we even stamped the envelopes.  and we're going to add my grandmother's return address to the envelopes too, before we deliver them to her tomorrow.  just to make them as user-friendly as possible.  

i'm so pleased with this little project.  fun, quick, a little something for everyone.  and we've done something kind for someone else in the process.  (can you tell this made me happy?)  now, i'm trying to figure out what else i can stamp with these hanukkah stamps that i love so much.  and thinking i might have to make one of my own.

a poem, your advice, and the new word

wow, you guys. i was really touched by your enthusiastic reaction to gossamer. all of your kind comments were so very much appreciated. and megan flattered me beyond imagination. really, thank you.

and did you see what erin and tracy created? all so different - our interpretations, our choice of media, our projects. it's been so much fun, these last few days, anticipating, revealing, reflecting. but before i get to round 2, i have two more gossamer things to mention.

my brother - a poet, an artist whose medium is words - sent me this poem yesterday. it's by emily dickinson, and it's what comes to his mind when he thinks of gossamer. the poem is - well, it's so gossamer. and i was really touched that my brother was thinking about me and my project enough to have connected the word to this poem and sent it along to me. read it, if you haven't already. i don't think you'll be sorry. (i wonder whether my direction would have changed if i had read this poem at the beginning of the process? hmmm.)

the final - i think - gossamer item is this. there is a second gossamer piece. a sister piece, if you will, to the project i shared yesterday. i didn't mention it yesterday because i didn't want to take away from my final project, but there is another. it's gossamer (2), and it's very much like gossamer - 16x20, printed linen and stitching on linen covered board - except that the linen in this one is pink.

i'm considering the possibility of selling gossamer (2). but i have no idea if anyone would have any interest in buying it! this would be my first time offering my work for sale on the blog; it's something new for me, and something that i'm curious about exploring.

would you tell me what you think? of course, if i do put it up for sale, i'll give a full listing with pricing and such. but for today, i'd really love to have your input and opinions as to whether this is something to explore. or whether i ought to hang these sisters together on the wall of my studio room and keep their beauty all to myself! (which is also still a possibility.) so please, tell me the truth.

phew! i think that's it for gossamer for now. which is a good thing, because this next word - from jen - is so full of possibility that i'd better get started right away! (can you see it there? the word, written on the corner of her print, sitting on my desk alongside a few favorite things? it's a good one.)

happy weekend, friends.

wordplay: gossamer

so there you have it. gossamer. my first contribution to wordplay.

and can i confess something? i love it. and i feel awfully proud of myself about it. (though i do wish you could see it in person, because it looses a bit of its impact in the photos.)

it was a journey, this gossamer creation. starting with lots and lots of brainstorming - notes and notes and pages of notes in my moleskine. i imagined a painting. or a series of paintings. and then a collage. and then i got fixated on the definition of gossamer, the one from the dictionary. like, the actual words out of the dictionary. merriam-webster, page 312. and that fixation, with the collage, an idea started to form.

in the meantime, i was also fixated on finding gossamer-weight fabric. i knew it existed. but what i didn't realize was that it's really (according to my research. if you know something more about it, please let me know!) a synthetic gauzy fabric that's used for prom decorations and bridal veils. not what i had in mind; i was hoping for a gossamer weight linen, or something else with natural fibers. in the end, i settled for a very fine handkerchief weight linen. and i'm so glad i did.

so as i was fixating on the collage and buying the linen, i spent some time with my friend pam (who is an amazing textile artist and one of the most lovely human beings you could ever be lucky enough to know. and who really ought to have a blog. or at least a shop. really. are you reading this, pam?), and i shared my ideas with her. and she encouraged me to develop the notion of the collage further, to incorporate the fabric, to expand on my idea of the stitching. all of that, and she let me use her bernina.

really, my conversations with pam were integral to the development of this piece. and i'm so grateful to her for that. it's a gift, to have a creative person in my actual life. it's a new gift for me, and one that i'm so happy about. more on that subject another day.

so there were the notes. and then there were the photocopies; lots and lots of photocopies at staples, enlarging and adjusting and trying for just the right combination of lightness and darkness and grain-i-ness to suggest gossamer. and there was the linen. and then there an earlier version of the project (which you can see here), it's the one i shared a peek at last week. i really liked that one, but i knew there was more to do.

so last weekend i used my big stack of photocopies to burn myself some screens and print with my gocco onto the linen. i incorporated all of the lessons i learned printing on fabric in the gocco swap - about how much ink to use, and about how to burn a screen that will (or won't, which is what i wanted in this case) print crisp images. and i was really pleased with the results.

and then this week, the whole thing came together. these pieces cut and stitched and hanging from threads that remind me, just a bit, of a web. the float-y nature of the whole thing dangling together.

i had always thought that i would mount this project on paper. that's what i had imagined from the beginning (well, from some point after the beginning, really. but i had imagined it for a good while.). but pam (again, pam) pointed out how delicate and floating-in-the-air the whole thing is when it is suspended. and so i built a frame (i'm almost as excited about that as i am about the actual project!) with some canvas stretchers, brass tacks, 2 pieces of foam core, some super adhesive, a large piece of my favorite mid-weight linen, a staple gun, some encouragement, and a bit of courage.

and then i pinned the piece to the board with three red pushpins, suspending the fabric away from the board to create dimension. to let the piece float. to enhance its gossamer-ness. it's an installation, really. and it does lose something in the photographs. but i hope that you can get a sense of how delicate and float-y it is from the photos i've taken.

so there you have it. my interpretation of gossamer. something delicate, tenuous, gauzy, flimsy, floating in the air. gossamer.

(word #2 arrived in the mail yesterday from an amazing artist. i haven't opened the envelope yet, wanting to post this first. i'll open it in a bit, and share the word here tomorrow.)

short

a very short post tonight. because typing with nine fingers is tough.

five stitches and a tetanus shot later, i'm bandaged up and i'll be just fine. (though i can't get the finger wet for seven days - that's going to be a challenge. that, and apparently, typing.)

but rather than leave you with blood and gore, here are four new paintings. they're all 5x7, gouache on paper. they're not technically part of the window series, but i can see the window influence in there.

early to bed tonight. i've had enough excitement for one day!

green week, 4

today has been a flurry of motion. i spend the better part of each thursday in the painting studio, so the hours outside of the studio tend to become a frenzy of dropping off and picking up and finding food and returning calls and emails, building with blocks, dancing to music, braiding hair, finishing homework, and the like. and tonight, the frenzy continues, as d. and i are off to the theater to see this play. but i'm stopping here first, because i couldn't miss the next-to-last day of green week.

today, because it's thursday-painting day, some recent green paintings. i realize that i haven't shared my paintings here for a good while. and today, i'm feeling a bit shy about sharing them. maybe because it's been so long. or maybe it's because i'm nervous (in an eager, curious way) to hear what you think.

incidentally, most of these were painted weeks ago, having nothing at all to do with green week (except that, clearly, green has been on my mind for months).

this first one is on canvas. 18x24. i haven't worked on canvas for a really long time. i just love painting on paper so much. but a few weeks ago i picked up this canvas for some reason i can't really put my finger on. it's part of what has become a series of window paintings - these are all part of that series, in fact.

these two are on paper. 10x10.

and this little pair. they were painted today. tiny little 6x6 pieces on paper.

there are more green paintings, too, if you can imagine. but i didn't want to bore you with so many. so that's it for today.

tomorrow is the last day of green week. i've been trying to visit everyone who is participating - to see all of your lovely and vastly different greens. it's going to take me well into the weekend to see everybody and everything, but i'm enjoying it thoroughly. and tomorrow i'll post one final list of links to those of you who joined late. do send me an email if you want to be included on the list and you haven't let me know already.

now, i'm off to the theater.

(these photos seem to be missing a section at the right edge of each image. i'm not sure why that's happening tonight. but you can click on the photos and see them in their entirety on flickr. really, you're not missing anything important, i just don't love how it looks. but i'm rushing now and i can't stop to figure out the problem. sorry about that.)

gocco swapping and lessons (always lessons)

(charlotte, don't look!)

that sarah is so smart.

i may have mentioned that sarah is the one who directed me to leslie's shop when i let it slip that i might be looking for a gocco (how quickly i went from "looking for" a gocco to owning a gocco!). and sarah is the one who prodded me, gently, encouraging me to open the box and try the thing already, when i was too nervous to unwrap the package. and then sarah devised the gocco swap. just the push i needed to try something new with my little print-gocco.

i had grand visions of multiple screens and a stunning winter print, but the weather was mild here in the weeks leading up to the swap deadline, and i was sorely lacking in the winter inspiration (read: tree branches covered in snow, icicles hanging from the eaves, frost covering anything at all) i had been hoping for, counting on.

but all of my wishing for winter weather (and one miracle snowstorm) led me land on snowflakes as my mid-winter inspiration. i had images of paper-cut snowflakes dancing through my mind, and when it became clear to me that i wouldn't be able to produce the sort of paper-cuts i had imagined, i moved on to doilies. i found some beautiful lace doilies on ebay (one of the items on my birthday list, checked off), knowing that they would make just the snowflakes i had in mind.

the doilies were even more beautiful in my hands than i had imagined when i saw them on the computer, which makes the next part of the story a wee-bit bittersweet.

occasionally, in my exuberance over a particular project, i forget to consider every single detail. and in this case, i hadn't thought about how (of course) the doilies wouldn't photocopy because they're white. yeah. (photocopying is an essential step in the gocco process - the carbonized image is what allows you to burn the screen from which you print.) i did, at one point, photocopy the doilies on a black background, thinking that i'd use the reverse-image, but gave that up because it didn't produce the snowflake effect i was looking for.

and unlike erin (who is brilliant), it didn't occur to me to use photoshop (was it photoshop, erin?) - because i don't use photoshop - to reverse the black and the white in the photocopied image. i can't tell you how hard i smacked myself in the head when i read how she had done that, because it would have solved all of my problems. the gocco problems, and the problems with my husband teasing me incessantly because i - are you ready? - dyed the doilies with grape koolaid in order to give them enough color to photocopy them and burn the screen. yeah. he gave me a hard time that night that i asked him to stop off at the store on the way home from work to pick up some grape koolaid for dyeing doilies. (he wondered why i didn't just spray paint the doilies black. another idea that didn't occur to me.)

so i dyed the doilies purple. (but only two of them, and not my favorite one, because i couldn't bear to ruin it!) which was fun, in itself. when was the last time you opened a jar of koolaid powder!? because that smell, it will take you back (even if your mom never let you drink koolaid like my mom never let me drink koolaid, it will take you back to the neighbor's house where you drank koolaid anyway). and it will give you a sugar rush, too - just the smell of the powder. and it will make you laugh, regardless. especially if you're standing at the kitchen counter at 9pm pouring the grape koolaid into pyrex baking dishes so that you can dye lace doilies in order to photocopy them.

anyhow, after they were dyed, the doilies did appear in the photocopies. but never as well as i would have liked them to. live and learn. the copies were too dark or too light, and the ones that were alright were just that - alright. and the screens that i burned from the alright photocopies were also alright. i would have loved crisp, clean lines like these. and these. but alas, i got a more ethereal effect. which might be just fine for snowflakes. and i learned quite a bit about what to do, and what not-to-do, next time.

there were many lessons along the way. about how much ink gets soaked up by cardboard and linen. about how it is impossible to find the moleskine cahiers with black covers exactly when you want them. about how the white ink and the silver ink do not mix into the lovely pale silver-y color from my imagination. about how much fabric ink it takes to keep a screen well covered.

and then there were these two lessons, my personal favorites: a thing does not have to be perfect in order to be lovely. and, the ideas inside my head are only ideas until i work them out of my head and into reality, at which point they take on a life of their own, and that is an essential part of the process of creating.

of course.

i loved this gocco swap - in the end, and all along the way. i loved the concept, i loved the project, i loved the lessons, and i am loving the bits of joy i am receiving in my mailbox lately. (i'll share those later.) and through it all, the good and the bad and the learning and the making - through it all, i enjoyed the process immensely. thank you, sarah, for all of it.