4 x 6 art, July 2016

I’ve not done any of these in months. I’ve been trying to walk at least 30 minutes every morning before going to work, so that eats into my art time. Then realized (remembered?) that I can do pieces of this – do the backgrounds one day, and the images and words another day. That makes it easier. I may add more to this post if I create more this month. There is something to be said for limiting myself to only a few forms of artistic expression, but I’m not there yet. Maybe I never will be. I tend to explore similar themes regardless of the form – collage, art journal, painting, beading, or even writing. It all blends together. But it does lead to having to have a lot of different art supplies and room to store them. While this genre produces small art, it takes up a lot of space to store the supplies for it.

come back new 071416

ability 071416

Buttons

buttons1

Closer
buttons2

angled
buttons3

detail
buttons4

acrylic paint applied with fingers, buttons I bought in May in thrift and antique stores in North Carolina.

Inspired by this sight – a rust patina stained sidewalk, scattered with “helicopter” seeds, at the Monastery Immaculate Conception in Ferdinand, Indiana (April 2016)

button1

And this sign at a craft store in Linville, NC, May 2016.  It was a board, painted green, and the word “OPEN” was nailed on to it using soda-pop caps and nails.  Allowed to rust outside in the rain.

button2

And perhaps most importantly, my English grandmothers’ metal tin full of buttons.

I’m so sad that I’ve misplaced it.  It had such a beautiful smell along with the sights of the buttons, the sound of them clinking together, the different textures (wooden, fabric, plastic, rubber, metal).  I never met her, and I cherished those buttons.  And now I can’t find the box.  I’m sure it is in my craft room.   More uncovering needs to happen. And I need to stop buying craft supplies and use what I have.

Peace of mind

peace of mind 071016.jpg

It is difficult to get a good scan of my art in the spiral-bound art journal I use.  But – it lays flat for working on.  So I’m not sure how to fix this, or if I need to.

 

Created 7-10-16.  Magazine images and words, fortune cookie message.

 

A meditation on how I need to break out of my comfort zone, and how I want to walk the Camino de Santiago de Compostella soon – next year is the goal.  I cannot wait until I retire to start living my life.  I may not have the energy or physical ability – or even be alive.  Life is short and unpredictable.  Better to start doing the “bucket list” things ASAP.

Artwork in process – “Praying for my enemies”

I first worked on this canvas over a year ago while dealing with a very difficult person in my life. This is one of the ways I chose to process my feelings.

This is how it stayed for about a year. This is on a stretched canvas, with acrylic paint I applied with my fingers. I then added silver sharpie light language. It is my prayer for healing for our relationship.

1

Here it is at a different angle so you can see the light language prayer.

2

In part because I’m learning about layering collage, and in part because new canvases are expensive and take up a lot of space, I’m using old artworks to add new material. The focus is the same, but now about a different person and series of issues.

Here I’ve added washi tape.

3

Then I painted a layer of gesso on it in random swirls, obscuring some of the image.

4a

Top left

4b

Top right

4c

Bottom left

4d

Bottom right

4e

More layers are to be added.

Gnossienne

Gnossienne 050516

Gnossienne
n. a moment of awareness that someone you’ve known for years still has a private and mysterious inner life, and somewhere in the hallways of their personality is a door locked from the inside, a stairway leading to a wing of the house that you’ve never fully explored—an unfinished attic that will remain maddeningly unknowable to you, because ultimately neither of you has a map, or a master key, or any way of knowing exactly where you stand.

Art paper from Tim Holtz’ “Distress” line, old Asian map, card stock that was colored with Distress inks and stains and then coated with glazing medium and cut up, old stamps.

Anecdoche

Anecdoche 041516

This speaks to the fakeness of so many people – of those who want to compete in conversations, always talking but never saying anything. Each sentence is like a domino, where they connect their experience next to that of the person who just spoke, and then divert the conversation away from them and to themselves. Nobody is ever heard. It is a game where everyone loses.

Anecdoche
n. a conversation in which everyone is talking but nobody is listening, simply overlaying disconnected words like a game of Scrabble, with each player borrowing bits of other anecdotes as a way to increase their own score, until we all run out of things to say.

(I created the art paper myself using card stock, Distress stains, glazing medium)

Fata Organa

Fata Organa 040916

Fata Organa
n. a flash of real emotion glimpsed in someone sitting across the room, idly locked in the middle of some group conversation, their eyes glinting with vulnerability or quiet anticipation or cosmic boredom—as if you could see backstage through a gap in the curtains, watching stagehands holding their ropes at the ready, actors in costume mouthing their lines, fragments of bizarre sets waiting for some other production.