How MANY days ’til Christmas?

39?! It is serious list-making time!

One of the first traditions in our family is making our Christmas cards. The year when my daughter was born I wanted to somehow include our new addition in the card. I painted four cardinals in a wreath (two parents, a growing boy and a new baby daughter). This painting has since been framed and comes out of storage at Christmas to be hung in the front hall of our house. At this point I have only visions of this years’ card. Hopefully, this weekend will be the time to get those visions tested on paper!

This weekend the four of us will also be taking our annual trip “downtown”. This trip is, in our kids' eyes, primarily to get a new piece for our growing Christmas village. For my husband and I it officially starts the season. We will begin at the Eaton Centre, a large shopping mall in downtown Toronto. The glass-ceilinged mall is not what draws us there. We could get the Christmas village addition at any department store. But, it has now become a tradition to look at the decorations, watch the children sit with Santa, and take some photos of us at the fountain.

We make a stop next door at The Bay, an old, Canadian department store in a historic, red brick building. Every year they have windows along Queen Street decorated with Christmas scenes. From there we decide whether to go east or west to shop at some wonderful, independent shops that can only be found “downtown”. And, of course, we stop for tea/coffee and a sweet indulgence.

Once home, with our son's exuberance, we start to pull the Christmas decorations out of storage. By the end of the night he will have set up this year's Christmas village. Hopefully, by the end of the weekend, I will have Christmas card production well under way.

POD Project - Food, contained

The subject for this POD project was food. I took the image of flying food (that Laurel of CranberryCloud supplied to me) and placed the food (pieces) into colourful, rectangular segments. Order has been brought!

I can't stop looking at the orange leaves!

Without a doubt fall is my favourite season. Here are ten reasons why:

1. Gorgeous orange, red, and yellow trees.

2. Crisp blue skies against the orange, red and yellow trees.

3. Walking through the leaves along an unraked path.

4. Apples.

5. Wearing orange scarves.

6. Picking out some pumpkins for the front porch.

7. Baked acorn squash.

8. A first fall fire in the fireplace.

9. Cool mornings that justify a warm cup of tea or coffee.

10. Chocolate and peanut butter candy bars I need to buy for Trick-or-Treaters!

POD Project - Resplendent, indeed!

I am playing catch up with my POD (Point of Departure) creations. For the subject of animals, Laurel gave me a beautiful photo of a bird called a quetzal. Not knowing too much about this colourful bird I went to the web to get more info.

Resplendent quetzals live in the forests of Central America. Both the male and female have brilliant blue, green and red colouring. However, only the male has the long train formed by twin tail feathers which can grow up to three feet long. This site has more information. But, the last fact I will share here is that the currency units traded in Guatemala are called "quetzals". I found that fact to be interesting enough to include a reproduction of a paper quetzal in my piece.

I do not feel this POD to be my strongest. Yet, as discussed briefly with Laurel yesterday, our POD project is meant for us to try anything we want. Any medium, any process... to let loose with no audience or outcome in mind.

Now, I am going to practice that again with the next POD subject: food

Illustration Friday - Old-Fashioned

Typewriters are old-fashioned symbols of production, correspondence and technology. I would love to have an old, black, manual typewriter as a giant paper weight in my office.

This is my contribution to this week's Illustration Friday.

What's in a name?

I consider myself to have a fairly creative mind. However, when it came to titling my recent mixed media art pieces I really drew a blank!

My most recent pieces are now posted in my Etsy shop. And, you will notice, they are generically named No.1, No.2, No.3, etc. Yawn. Maybe during my morning walks next week I will brainstorm for some dynamic, humorous names for them. Stay tuned.

September Morning Walks

Almost every morning of the last few weeks I have been walking around the paths not too far from our home. Yesterday, I finally remembered to bring my camera to record the glorious long shadows and bright morning sun.

Altered Books on Display at Varley Art Gallery

I am thrilled that my altered book is among the twelve on display at the Varley Art Gallery in Unionville. Yesterday, I viewed the exhibition and was amazed with the quality of ideas and artistry. To protect these beautiful creations they are displayed behind glass which I completely appreciate. However, you can not help but wish you had the opportunity to journey through all the pages of every book.

Thank you to artist Judith Livingston for co-ordinating the exhibit.

Here is a peek at my altered book.

POD Project - Old tech

Technology was the subject for June's POD project. The original image Laurel gave me looks like a page from a machinery textbook.

Here is my creation. I included three little rocks I recently found.

It's been a year already?

Last August I posted my first blog entry. It was of a page spread from my mini sketchbook. Here is another peek into my mini sketchbook. I sketched this scene earlier in the summer when my husband and I spent a weekend away at an inn. Looking back over the summer, I think this moment was the longest time I could sit still and daydream.

POD Project - Far away fashion

Fashion was the subject for the "Point of Departure" project from May. Laurel (from Cranberry Cloud blog) gave me a page from an auction guide. The image was of a Chinese Emperor's robe from the 19th century.

I've Stalled

Today, this quiet summer day, is the day to clean and organize my studio. I have been going great guns for the last four hours. The floors have been swept, the computer dusted and everything that was on the floor in the studio is now on the floor outside the studio. Now I find myself checking out my favourite blogs and browsing iTunes for some new music. Oh yes, and searching book prices on alibris.com.

I guess if I have stalled here at the computer I should at least be productive and write a long overdue post.

Where have the last two months gone? They have been busy: year-end fundraising at my children's school, three family birthdays including a milestone celebration for my husband, two pro-bono design projects, two trips to Prince Edward County and planning and packing for a family trip to England.

I haven't even posted about the Artist's Alley in May. Well, it was a sunny day and I made one sale. Which was one more than I expected. For me, this first participation in Artists' Alley was all about experience. Planning. Setting up. Trying not to feel shy. And, staying cool in the heat. I will be participating again on Sunday, September 12.

I am also three (?) months overdue with the POD Project I participate in with fellow art blogger Laurel at Cranberry Cloud. (Sorry, Laurel. Better late than never, eh?) Look for POD updates soon!

Now, back to some studio organization in order to have space to create some artwork. The following are photos from the past few months.

I will be back soon!

Lisa

My booth at the Artists' Alley in May.

A piece created in May.

Another piece created this year.

A mini (10cm high) stonehenge on a beach near Picton, Ontario.

Beautiful, ancient steps in Wells, Somerset, England.

Comings and Goings

Where has the month of May gone?

It has been a very busy month for me. Early in May my piece, Excessarama, was in a group show at the McKay Art Centre in Unionville. Now I am prepping for next Sunday when I will have a booth at Artists' Alley. You can find us on Robinson Street just west of Main Street.

Here is the McKay Art Centre on the night of our show reception. This was shot at a rare moment when you did not see many visitors out front. Over 120 people visited us that night!

POD Project - Flowers reformed

The April subject for POD was botany. Laurel supplied me with an ancient, but not valuable, printed scene of wildflowers. If I remember correctly, she took it out of a frame she bought at a yard sale. I cut pieces from it and made my own botanical creation.

Original image.

My new image.

Jump over to Laurel's Cranberry Cloud blog and see the beautiful world she created with a giant leaf I gave her.

Excessarama is now complete!

Today I am decompressing and cleaning an "excessive" amount of mess.

Over the last three days, I spent most of my time finishing a large mixed media piece called Excessarama. It has been entered in the annual juried exhibition at the Latcham Gallery in Stouffville, Ontario. I will know by tonight if it has been accepted.

The piece is a commentary on one's experience when they shop at dollar stores. When we go into a dollar (or discount) store we feel like millionaires. We can afford anything. We can buy as much as we want. Looking at an organized shelf or wall in a dollar store with all the colours and textures of the shiny, unused items, they look like economical jewels. We think to ourselves, "That looks nice. I need one of those. How many should I get? I wonder if I can find...?" We are enticed to buy stuff. I am most enticed by cheap wax paper, low-grade eyeglasses and mittens that go missing through the winter season.

Aside from the obvious questions of: Is it recyclable? Is it of good quality? Do I really need another one of these? What person in a far away country put these tiny toy pieces together for very little pay? I would like to pose the question: What if ALL we had were dollar stores (and discount stores) to buy the products we want in our lives: clothes, food, toys, furniture, computers, cars, etc?

Illustration Friday - Linked

I am always attracted to the idea that everything is connected (linked).

"There is a path between any two neurons in our brain, between any two companies in the world, between any two chemicals in our body. Nothing is excluded from this highly interconnected web of life."

— Albert-Laszlo Barabasi, Physics Professor

In my piece I used watercolour, ink with a lino stamp I made, and paper. The paper was a gift from my printer on a day when it decided to spew a sheet at me with my image underneath thousands of stripes of colours. Nice effect, but how much ink was used?

Core Series all on Etsy...

All twelve of my Core Series mixed media pieces are posted in my Etsy shop. Phew. Done. Yay. Now on to the next series.

My Etsy shop is now open!

I have posted the first four of my original mixed media art on Etsy. The following eight will be posted over the week so be sure to come back to see them all.

POD Project - Do you dot your i's?

This month's POD subject was typography. Laurel, the blogger with whom I share this project, gave me three little pages of text about typewriter keyboards. On the back of one of these pages I saw my "point of departure". It was a couple of paragraphs about why we place a dot on the i.

“It has to do with something called ‘minim confusion’. In handwriting, a minim is the small downward stroke used in m, n, i, u, and so on. In early writing there was no dot on the i, and the minims were written almost identically. This could lead to confusion in words containing a lot of minim next to each other.” An example was given: minimum. I loved how it looked without the dotted i's. Can you see the word repeated throughout my piece?

Artist Trading Card's Event No.3 -- part 2

As usual the Artist Trading Card event at the Latcham Gallery was busy and exciting as 16 "traders" buzzed around the room asking "Wanna trade with me?"

Here are the cards I traded that night. You can see my favourite three cards on my flickr site.

For my friend Laurel, of Cranberry Cloud, it was a family event. Her husband John participated again and her daughter Eleanor took part in her first ATC event. I traded with each of them and they have allowed me to post their creative cards here.

Laurel's card. Be sure to view all of Laurel's cards on her site!

Eleanor's card. She did cool linear portraits with a single colour added to each. This one is called "Lime".

John's cards require installation. They come flat and you assemble the three cards on the enclosed wire to create a three dimensional piece. His series is called "Caulderizations: 2010". (John, let me know if you have a site I can link to!) Update: if you have a facebook account you can view John's cards here.

Artist Trading Card's Event No.3

My first batch of ATC's. I made these in November 2008.

These are from March 2009.

This coming Wednesday I will be attending my third Artist Trading Card event. It takes place at The Latcham Gallery, a lovely public gallery in Stouffville, Ontario.

I had known about ATC's for a few years and searched online for trading events in my area, to no avail. Needless to say, when my art teacher, artist Judith Livingston informed me about the event at The Latcham I knew immediately I would be there!

For this Wednesday I have 13 cards ready to trade. I'll post photos of them later in the week.