Cropped table

I realized, Helga, that I was not paying attention to the wonderfully tiny point of light in your table photograph. I wondered if it was because the table took up too much of the space. So, as you can see, I cropped it to see how a long vertical orientation would bring out the light source. I like it and I find my eye more quickly drawn to the upper right corner and back to the table and back. What do you think about this revision?

Here is collage color study that I created this weekend after I cut up a piece of canvas, not stretched on a frame, that I made several months ago. All of the 3" x 3" collaged canvas pieces glued 10" by 10" black-painted Masonite board came from the same acrylic painted canvas. All of the small contrasting or complimentary pieces glued to the squares also came from the same painting. The photo here does not do it justice. It looks much more orange and red in real life. But, I think you get the point of what I was trying to achieve with no intention to make perfect 3x3 squares evenly divided on the 10x10 board. 

It has been hot here; Shelly's sisters and niece have been visiting from out of town; and I haven't done much artwork or art reading. What have you been doing? You've been silent for quite awhile.

Many Directions

Fishes in the sea

An abstract floral arrangement

Eggplant garden
Some patterns here keep repeating in other work
I am making. I must think about it more.

Until yesterday when I took a turn in another direction, I had been creating painting in my sketchbook - the 'best of' noted by me and, somewhat more significantly for the short run, commented on by the art historian who visited. (Yes, Helga, she left me a little terrified to get back to work. She saw these three and liked them very much and suggested I frame them. I hadn't thought of it. They are in my sketchbook where each page is painted on both sides with my somewhat careless and always spontaneous application of paint and marks.)

Lynn Krawczyk in her quilting book titled Intentional Printing describes pattern printing that seemed to me to have value for a painter. However, I had a conversation with a printmaker at a printing co-op yesterday and he was pushing at the edges of his 2-D art and, as I listened, I realized that it is exactly how I am feeling lately. Constrained by the 2 dimensional. The paper cones I created a few weeks ago and posted here are a good indicator of that need to stretch outside of flat plane.

So, I searched on Pinterest for fabric sculpture and got hit with a bolt of lightening that it is not quilting, it is not paper or fabric, per se, but it feels like where I want to be. I want to paint and/or print on canvas so I can USE the 2-D surface to form it into a 3-D abstract form. Likely I am inspired by the Dean Nimmer exercise that got me into the paper folding and molding. You led me to the lighting sculptures that I still cannot get out of my head - sculptural forms hanging from a wood or metal structure. You and the art historian visitor led me to taking a fresh look at my own work.




I like your idea of writing about what we are reading and being inspired by. I referred to the quilting book by Krawczyk. It was a recommended book from Amazon probably because I have looked at quilting books you referred me to and at other quilting books that showed designs that inspired me to make with paper and paint.




I also found a book in a stack of my art books that I hadn't remembered I have. Klee, a 1964 introduction to the artist's life and history of his art development. I tend to look at the pictures in my art books and not read so much about the artist (thus, my dramatic lack of knowledge compared to yours, Helga). The author, Norbert Lynton, quotes Klee as saying this about art, "The work of art is above all a process of creation; it is never experienced as a mere product." Lynton notes that Klee "repeatedly stressed the importance of the creative 'process'" believing that it is "ultimately the process which is communicated." And, says Lynton, Klee believed in simplicity. Helga, your photo of the old table you rescued to your studio and photographed in its spare environment and three old bottles is quite stunning and does exactly as Klee - and many other artists - suggests about simplicity. I like that photo better than the other one with the crushed soda cans.  The second one gives us a glimpse of the modern and, in some ways its gaudy colors. You have other photos of the same subject that I found in your collection URL; some of them are quite wonderful in the way you elevate the trash to something abstract and lovely in its color or shape against grassy or watery backdrops. I think that modern trash seems to me to be more at home somehow in those settings. The old table, spare room and unmarked vessels are probably more classic and, to me, more appealing.

Since your post, I've looked at all of the links and I know I have forgotten to remark about some of them in this post. Yet, I want to get this one posted so I can go back and re-read or re-review your links. This is the part I like a lot about having our discussions captured in one place and saved in an ongoing blog. Thanks for getting us started.

table d'hôte

a week ago i saw this table, leaning to the wall of my friend Jeannette's house. it was a memorable moment. sometimes you just don't know what it is you are desperately looking for until you find it.....

Jeannette was going to throw it away, but when i so obviously wanted it, she took it under her arm and carried it over to our place, where i left it on the front porch for a night, not at all concerned that anybody would want to steal it lol!

next day i unfolded my treasure and sprayed it clean with the garden hose and left it to dry (still in the middle of a heat wave....) the day after i carried it upstairs to my studio, carefully placed it against my brand new wall (with light coming in all day from both sides of the house) and went to work.

for two years i have been bringing back all kinds of trash i found on my daily rounds with the dogs. bottles, tins, plastic bags, empty food wrappers, socks, gloves, etc etc. stuff that caught my eye and somehow felt interesting. i have made a series of photographs of the objects i found, calling them 'accidental still life' and have published 100 of them on flick'r. just take a look and try to imagine all that trash being stored in crates all over our house..... (C wouldn't let me bring back any dead animals though....)

i have been wanting to create my own still life scenes using the trash, inspired by old 17th and 18th century breakfast paintings by Claesz, the bodegones of Zurbaran and Cotán, and by the murals called 'xenias' found in Pompeii. (while looking for a link to explain the whole 'xenia' concept i found this inspiring essay by anthony howell, the bit about xenias is somewhere in the middle of the text) 

anyway, here are my two first attempts at still life iphoneography

i like them very much, they come really close to what i have been imagining while picking up all that trash over the past years. can't wait to create more of these.

have decided not to paint my wall, because the unfinished 'raw' state it is in now makes it a perfect backdrop for my table d'hôte.....

so how have you been doing after the visit of your art historian neighbour? were you able to process her appraisal and encouragement? really let it sink in? or did it terrify you to be associated with the likes of Rothko..... 

looked up George Morrison, didn't know him but like his work a lot, thanks for sharing! fascinating to see the way he broadened his vision over time, developed his own unique style while at the same time channeling and incorporating the art of his predecessors and contemporaries.... 

his wood collages remind me of Kurt Schwitters, especially his Merz-bilder, have always been drawn to those and have seen and inspected a lot of them up close, funny because i now realise that Schwitters is the one that had me started collecting trash.....

want to start a new 'tradition' on this blog: sharing some inspiration

so here's what i am reading at the moment (actually, listening to, i have an audible subscription)

Eye of the Beholder, Johannes Vermeer, Antoni van Leeuwenhoek, and the Reinvention of Seeing, by Laura J. Snyder

inspired by this book i have bought a portable digital microscope that enables me to take photos of 'the invisible world' or what someone once called 'the theatre of nature'. will share some of the pics as soon as my sd card is full...

and here's what i'm listening to:

Currency of Man (artist's cut) by Melody Gardot. we have bought tickets for her show in the Amsterdam Concertgebouw on november 4th.... 

the art of light

well.... of course when you wrote that you couldn't find any other artists using rolled paper in a chandelier, i started a virtual hunt..... hihi, that's one of my ADHD-reflexes, as soon as someone says; i cannot find.... i don't know how.... there doesn't seem to be a.... etc etc i am already stretching my brain in order to dig up a whole range of possible answers.

so here's what i came up with...

the design is called Zettel'z, by Ingo Maurer, left is titled: Viva l'Italia! and right is titled: BangBoom!

you should check this guy out, what he manages to do with light takes by breath away, what an artist!!

if you have the time, watch the video (scroll down to the bottom of his 'about us' page ) where he tells how he went to Venice and fell in love with a lightbulb.....

the idea behind Zettl'z (means something like: notes, tiny papers) is: you get pre-designed sheets as well as blank notes to create your own 'zettl'z'. you could attach anything and everything you create on that chandelier, so why not wrapped art? the construction of the chandelier is very simple and straightforward, you can even download the instructions with clear drawings of how it is all put together. 

i am absolutely crazy about his Tu-Be Lüster ceiling lamp, if i had the money i would immediately go out and buy one.....

apart from chasing down chandeliers i also worked on a new image, combining a self portrait with your beautiful wraps

wrapping my troubles in dreams

the title refers to a song written by Lou Reed and sung by Velvet Underground's Nico. do you know it? the text is rather morbid but the music is entrancing

Chandelliers

i forgot to tell you that I checked out those propeller's dram chandelliers because I never heard of them. They sure do resemble what I am trying to do with those tiny pieces of paper. I researched further to see if anyone has used rolled paper for such things. I saw all kinds of kids' projects and how-to instructions for helping kids make them. Ok. Maybe I should look for some other avenue for my drawerful of painted and waxed papers. Thanks for your comments and praises. I can challenge myself more and those tiny things are a bit tight and constraining, e.g., I can't stand up and move around when I make them.

A clean well lit room

A quick response to your post, Helga. Your new studio looks so clean and spare and I know that isn't how things look after you get it set up. Those beautiful flowers have to be collages into the photo, correct? It is a very surreal image and I didn't think of it as a simple look at your new studio space. It is a minimalist art photo. Is it into the roof of your house? It looks like great light. From what direction? Are your walls suitable for pinning art into? Do you paint on your walls? Maybe not if you haven't had your own studio before. I can't wait to see how this space evolves.

On your comments about channeling artists you love, I have to admit I was not sure about that image even though Edward Hooper kept ringing in my ears. Am I correct? Or was it not so easy for a non-art historian to figure out after all?

Speaking of art historians, a neighbor of ours turns out to be one. She is retired but still gets asked to assess art in the greater city area where I live. My partner asked her at a party if she would take a look at my art and give me some advice (no, I wasn't there when that request was made nor would I feel brave enough to ask for such a thing myself). She visited me and my studio this morning and it was kind of thrilling to hear her appraisal and get encouragement and tips to approach galleries. I sent her away with one of my moon landscape paintings, one that she said she liked and remarked that many of them resemble Rothko's work. As she held it she told me she had a very large print of George Morrison's who was her friend while he was alive. I believe I told you about this Native American artist who was from Minnesota USA. His work was on display at our Minnesota History Museum this spring and I loved it all. Very diverse work. Read about him at George Morrison on Wikipedia At the linked page scroll down a bit until you see on the right side one of his prints. It is similar to the one she has which she said is 7 ft (213.36 cm) wide, which appears to be wider than the one posted on the Wikipedia website. Google his art images because he has some wonderful paintings, too.

After she left and I tried to work in my studio but was too worried about what I was doing. I have to let go of this and just play ... Like I usually do. Also, nothing to show from my online course. Nothing I want to show. I hope you are having great fun in your studio this weekend.

camera lucida

here it is. my new studio. completely empty except for the table i bought a couple of years ago, the future center of my creative workspace......
i have spruced it up with some lovely transparent poppies i found in a neighbour's garden.
and now for the next stage: a new floor, and new containers for all my art stuff.....

i am so impressed with your abstract 3-D project, i absolutely love the different ways you have wrapped your art.... just imagine a couple of your wraps combined in a mobile, hanging in the center of my new 'camera lucida', i can already see it moving around slowly, an ever changing colorfeast created by the soft breeze coming from the new windows! the 3D treatment (even though i can only see the effect in 2D, lol) makes me want to touch the wraps, turn them around, hold them against the light, such incredible colors and shapes...!  i could also visualise them as ceramic forms, like tiny lampshades of very thin porcelain on a chandelier, a bit like propellor's dram chandeliers
ha! maybe you should try your hand at pottery....:-)) i would most certainly buy your stuff!

as it is the end of the month i am preparing my next art-diary for print, have totally forgotten to mention that the one covering may has already been printed, you can browse it here (and while you're at it, look up thursday 21, i'm sure i never showed you that one)

over here we're in the middle of a heat wave, will try not to melt :-)

ps: i feel connected to all the artists that have ever impressed me or touched me or taken my breath away with their work, and i find i am often 'channeling' them, seeing the world in their light.
here is my most recent 'famous-artist-infused' work

the apparition

not hard to figure out who inspired me here eh?