Pages of my Life - Sept 22-28

1) Gelli plate background (Acrylics)

2) Printed quote and glued it on

3) Added key words from quote and doodled

4) Lived with it for a few days as is

5) Glued on the bag from my Aveda "Comforting" tea

6) Cut out a flower doodle from a gelli printed piece of paper I found laying around. Aimlessly drew around it, on it. And around the tea bag envelope. 7) Hated it. 8) Took my favorite color paint and wiped it all over the non-glued portion using my finger. 9) Liked it better. For a day or two. 10) Outlined the key words from the quote with white ink. 

                         
                                                                                          11) Happily moved on!

#s 22, 23, 24, 25 of 29 And Lessons Learned from 29 Faces

I'm finding it challenging to keep up with this project on a daily basis with everything else I am working on. At this point it is determination that is driving me and little else. BUT this is GOOD because there is a lesson in it! It applies to life as an artist or just life in general, doesn't it? You start out excited about a new project and are sure you can do it. You are committed to it. Truly. And then stuff creeps in and life happens. Parts of it don't turn out the way you wanted them to. You get frustrated. A new project comes along that you would rather be working on. And all the details of the project (in this case taking pix, uploading, posting and blogging) begin to slip from your control and you are tempted to just toss in the towel.

I can see the light at the end of this tunnel though. And I have learned SO MUCH. There are techniques I've picked up that I am excited to keep improving in. I'm learning (still) to be okay with a less than a quality image just for the practice of daily face drawing. I'm learning that I do have a distinct style in my portraits. And that I can evolve in further. I've learned (again!) quality materials have their place. I've learned that out of a larger body of work (my 100 Faces project) there are certain pieces I like more than others and that applies to all works. Not every one is going to be worthy of more than a second glance. But they are all in me and deserve to come out. Some deserve more time than others. Some deserve a second go. Others not so much. I've learned practice, practice, practice makes improvement versus perfect.

And that is good. Very good.

What have you learned from this project?

On My Work Table

Just in case you are wondering...I call it "on my work table" because my easel is over at the gallery. And technically, these were on my small easel but whatever! 

These are 8x10 canvases. Acrylics. Apparently I am feeling dotty or like I'm going in circles?

This one came about after a discussion with one of the other members of the gallery (Geoff) about being centered and staying on true north and how we are both intrigued by compasses, maps, globes, etc. I purposely did not want it to be like a clock or symmetrical which is kind of surprising for me. But as a symbol of where I am at in life; there are so many directions to go and one path might lead to another one in reality. Regardless of the choices though I always come back to what is at the center of my life. 

Available for sale at New Moon Gallery, Waimea, Big Island or contact me directly!

     

On My Work Table (Yeah its a MESS!)

Yes! I have ALL kinds of stuff and projects piled up on my table. Although last week was a fun week with gallery tours, lunch dates and hanging with a new friend it was hectic. I don't do well with hectic. I need time to process things in order to keep a handle on my life. I have piles of notes to be filed, contacts and info for getting prints made of my work (my goal for this week!), projects I'm thinking about, my artist statement I'm composing for the gallery and my 29Faces are way behind. The faces are done I just haven't posted them. So here we go!

When last we visited this project we were with Maori Man # 8/29 and 82/100. I was feeling rushed so grabbed my sketch and wash pencil and made quick faces.

 

Then my mood got weird for a couple days....don;t ask because I don't know either. 

 

 A somewhat normal person's face; still using the sketch and wash pencil

Then I saw a tweet from Tam over at willowing and decided to be inspired by her style without putting much effort in to them because it was pretty late each night before I got around to drawing. 

 

Based on a photo of an online friend who I won't name because it doesn't do her justice. At this point I am totally frustrated with the index cards and wondering why I am torturing myself with using them. I overworked the mouth and the index card DOES NOT allow that. 

Last night's...yes this makes #21. I'm reluctant to tell you this is my child because again it does her NO justice. I am counting it because I want to keep going with the challenge plus I'm using it as a study for another drawing of her today. 

21/29 and 95/100

That's it! I'm caught up in posting my faces!

I am officially working on REAL paper today. Not sure I will finish the index card idea. Tune in again to see. 

Quote of the Week

I love Eddie.
Just saying.

On My Work Table

Do you recall the sneak peeks I gave you of these on facebook back in June?

I was able to finish up this past week but I needed Randy's help to come up with a way to be able to hang the pieces that would allow them to still move! Why? I wanted them to retain some of their original intent. Do you know what they are now?

THAT'S RIGHT! OLD VINYL LPs!! They were beyond use from scratches but they sat still long enough to get paint on them! I have 3 that are with two each and one that has three. Every one still spins! They are able to be hung on the wall in this vertical position. They have a protective matte finish on them as well and as you turn them you get ever changing art! I would recommend limiting the amount of handling if you want them to last YEARS. Oh and yes the grooves are still visible. They also have a decorative bead in finish the center. 

Pages of my Life - Sept 8-12

This is my journal page from last week (yes I'm late in posting it but oh well) I also did not add a quote to this week's page. (again, oh well)

I started out the same way as usual; laying on a background layer. It doesn't matter how you go about this. This was another one of my gelli plate prints though in case you are wondering. Of course, you don't HAVE to put in a background I just prefer to. What I want to point out in this photo is the border. I like to add borders but have been forgetting to lately. So this is just a really simple one. I made it as thick as the paintbrush I grabbed. Once that was dry I made little a little blob and then two swipes off the blob with yellow acrylic. When that dried, I took a sharpie pen (not marker) and drew in little leaf like details. It gives a messy but quick and nice finish to the page even though I added it before I wrote my notes on the page, And for some reason I actually WROTE most of the page instead of doodling.

Occasionally I love to do a senses list. I record what I am HEARING, SEEING, SMELLING, TOUCHING/FEELING, TASTING, and add in THINKING if I feel like it. I do this a lot in my scrapbooking still.

So now to you...do you add borders? If not, try it and see what you think. And do you ever write lists of things n your journal? Let me know if you share your journal pages...would love to see them!

Quote of the Week

This week's post was found on my fellow artist and friend, Paulette's facebook feed. She just read it last week herself. I like it. LOTS!

After adding this to my journal page, I took a few minutes to list what I am passionate about. I agree, these are the things that are my calling. How about you? What are YOU passionate about?

Quote of the Week

Somehow this just suits my mood today!

On My Work Table - 29Faces

I decided to post this one separately because I wanted to share more of the process I went through and am asking for any ideas or suggestions as to what I could do better next time. And for recoord keeping purposes this is 8/29 and 82/100


First, here is the photo I worked from:
 

You can see once I again, I'm working on an index card.

I decided to do his face first without the tattoos.  

Okay so sort of a big jump in the photo process; I forgot to get one before I began adding his tattoos. 

I should tell you that I did use pencil for the tattoos initially but felt it didn't look right so I inked over them. This may be where I went wrong? 

Obviously, my hand was not as steady with the ink pen and when you enlarge it like this is REALLY shows.  

And just for easy comparison....

So if you have ever attempted to do a face that is tattooed, or anything similar, I would LOVE to hear any suggestions you may have for improving this. Perhaps the first thing is don't work on an index card? LOL