Brushes down!

After a few minor changes and additions, I placed Mona in her frame today.  She makes her way to her new home tomorrow night! 

Art is a Luxury? *WTF?

I was meeting with my AA group yesterday.  That's Art Accountability group to you!  And a certain someone brought up how her family was taught that art is a luxury. And the 3rd person in our group agreed!!! I was SHOCKED to say the least.  Art is NOT a luxury, especially for an artist.  Art is a *M.F'en necessity!

A little Rococo for ya!

I'm still in shock.  Image, if you will, there is no art. Look around you.  Bare walls, no color, every piece of furniture ceases to have style.  Every house would look a-like, all our clothes would only be utilitarian.  Art is embedded into every nook and cranny of our cultures.  You might not think of yourself as an artist, but every time you arrange your furniture, pick a particular combo of clothes, paint a room, arrange a flower vase, you are expressing yourself.  You are creating a composition.  You are, in fact, living art.  

Horse
c. 15,000-10,000 BC
Lascaux, Franc

Now, if you don't consider
yourself and artist, and apparently even if you are an artist,  you may disagree with me. But you'd be wrong.  :) Art has been an integral part of society.  I'll spare the art history lesson today.

Function without form?  Sounds horrible.  For me, art is a necessity! A staple in life's my diet.  My hope is that it becomes that for you too!  A life without expression hardly seems worth living.  

Disagree?  I'd love to hear why!  Agree?  Do tell!!


*M.F'en is my abbreviation for a shocking offensive pairing of swear words, same for WTF! :) Just in case you didn't know.

To Blog or not to Blog...

Another weirdo face.

Bad photo! Expression and all! haha

That is the question!  The last couple of weeks have been a black hole of time sucking activities that have nothing to do with art and very little to do with unemployment.  I'm the VP of Fundraising and Sponsorship for IIDA's Oregon Chapter.  Last Thursday night was the annual fundraiser!  Phew! Am I glad that is over!  It's our only fundraiser and it always involves a theme and awesome raffle prizes!  This years theme was High School "Clicks".  I went as myself, in circa 1987.  Died black hair and all.  My ears still hurt from all those earrings and my feet still hate those dyed to match pumps. I'm also pretty sure this black hair is making me look old.  Oh 1987.  I won the below light in the raffle!  It's going to look great over my table! Yay!

Louis Poulsen PH 5

Sunday I looked at a studio space share potential with a letter press gal!  The space is perfectly located for me with a small store front and workshop space.  The trouble is money of course.  There is a potential to make some there, but you know the old saying "you have to spend money to make money" . Sad but mostly true.

Recently I also visited Atelier Meridian!  Now, they have some presses!  Their Friday Ink and Drink seems to be well attended and a good time!  I'd like to visit again! 

Last Monday was Valentines day. Previously I had made a linocut of a box of chocolates for the occasion but also wanted to finish a drypoint I sketched. I got as far as getting it on the plate!  Better than still being on paper I suppose.  I'm planning to print it Sunday at the workshop I'm running.

I'm hoping to get back on track creating! I have a couple of projects up my sleeve, but more about them later. 

Thanks for taking the time to spend with me here in my virtual world! :)

Sunday Crafternoon at Powells

Christine Answers Questions

If you live anywhere near Portland you know what Powells is.  If you don't know, it's city block of books.  New books, used books, signed books, collectors books and more!  They also offer pick up of orders, shipping, ebooks, and you can sell your books there or online too.  They feature book signings and readings and sometimes just a good time! 

Yesterday, at Powells, Christine with Yellow Owl Workshop was there.  She did have her books and wares for sale, and she was signing them. But the fun part was she did a short demo on how to make your own rubber stamps and turned the crowd loose to use her creations!  Yellow Owl Workshop creates rubber stamps for the average person to use.  They are thoughtful, creatively fun and surprisingly made in the USA!  Try to find craft items or anything else not made in China sometime.  But that's another ranty blog post all together.  I feel confident in using her supplies that no one was harmed in the making of and no one will be harmed using them.

Making Fun! 

Everyone had a really great time making cards and valentines with the supplies Yellow Owl Provided!  The event was co sponsored by I Heart Art: Portland, if you don't know who they are check them out!

My Valentine!

I made this!  I must say her stamps are much more thoughtful and pertinent to me than a lot of the ones I've seen in craft stores.

Yellow Owl Workshop offers other items beside the stamps, please take a look! There is stationary, pendants and cards. One of my favorite things are these LCD Write Your Own Message embossed cards. 

Thanks Powells, Yellow Owl, Christine and I Heart PDX!