Red

Here is RED. Okay, there isn't much red, but I'm trying not to try here. That said, I want to work on her a bit more, but time's up and so it goes. It is a glorious day here in Oregon today. Spring is definitely in the air.

April's Theme

For those of you who wish to do a theme in April, it is "ancestor." I could just leave it at that, but my online dictionary inquiry broadens the subject considerably:
1. a person from whom one is descended; forebear; progenitor.
2. Biology. the actual or hypothetical form or stock from which an organism has developed or descended.
3. an object, idea, style, or occurrence serving as a prototype, forerunner, or inspiration to a later one: The balloon is an ancestor of the modern dirigible.
4. a person who serves as an influence or model for another; one from whom mental, artistic, spiritual, etc., descent is claimed: a philosophical ancestor.
5. Law. a person from whom an heir derives an inheritance.

Have fun!

Hado Mandala

Hado: The intrinsic vibrational pattern at the atomic level in all matter. The smallest unit of energy. Its basis is the energy of human consciousness.

Better late than never, right? :) Here is my mandala (variation on a theme, of course). :) In truth, it is the fourth incarnation and my final attempt at bringing into form the idea I'd had in my head for weeks around this theme. I have settled with this in a way, and have surrendered to the idea that I cannot, with my own two hands and paint, create the same natural beauty which inspired it.
The uncharacteristic snow here for days brought the first spark - idea. Snowflakes are certainly mandalas...but I wasn't really in a "aw, sweet. A snowflake" kind a mood. :) I was instantly reminded of a work I had read about years ago (which incidentally was also mentioned in the movie "What the Bleep Do We Know") about the work of Dr. Masuru Emoto. His work gave "proof" to something I had intuitively known on some level for years. We all know it. Prophets, intellects and mystics have known this in some way for eons. But finally...FINALLY, we have scientific proof....as if I needed it. (I admit, I have a little inner child who becomes giddy when science and spirituality intersect and don't seems to contradict each other.) :)
I won't attempt to explain Dr. Emoto's work - the study of prayer on water crystals. Prayer, words of kindness, even a thought of love have incredible power on the structure of the water. Our earth - primarily water. Our bodies - primarily water. The effect a little prayer has...wow.
If you are interested to know more about this and to see heartbreakingly beautiful pictures of prayed over water (yes, they really are amazing) here is a wonderful link about his work and an excerp:

"He undertook extensive research of water around the planet not so much as a scientific researcher but more from the perspective of an original thinker. At length he realized that it was in the frozen crystal form that water showed us its true nature through. He has gained worldwide acclaim through his groundbreaking research and discovery that water is deeply connected to our individual and collective consciousness"

So....I send prayers to all of you....to all the water in you and around you. :)
-Stephanie

Red - I was in the mood to layer

Layer 1 - black gesso
Layer 2 - 4 different acrylic reds in varying thicknesses
Layer 3 - painted collage scrap elements and 2 small ink drawings
Layer 5 - plastic netting
Layer 6 - Shiva paint colors, red, black, white and silver
Layer 7 - small silver balls made of wire threaded through

I've never made anything like it before. I was just playing.

True confessions of a Dufus....

Yes, that would be me. I was feeling pleased myself, not only had i completed January on time but yesterday I completed February's Red piece. Or so I thought. As I looked at two pieces, it occurred to me that I should have been able to fit them in the scanner bed, if they were 8" x 8", but instead I took photos each time because they were a bit too big. Ding. No, the fact didn't register until last night and I literally ran to find a ruler and remeasured the matching pieces. Surprise, surprise....they aren't 8" x 8" at all, but 9" x 9"!! Auuuuukkkk!!! I did measure, each time I measured, but apparently each time my eyes deceived me and I saw what I wanted to see (or else my ruler is wrong, and I don't think that's the case). I was feeling so bummed last night, trying to figure out if I could somehow save them. If I knew how to saw carefully, and had the right kind of saw (which we don't) I could possibly cut 1/2" off each side and refinish the edges. The only other option is to start over, which is probably the best solution. Jeeze....I'm going to go to Dick Blick online now, and order some 8" x 8" canvases and boards, no more winging it for this project. If you want to see what I did for Red, it's on my blog - I won't post it here since I'm going to be redoing it and it won't be anything like again, i'm sure....
katie

February-Red Valentine!

So this is my Mexican folk art inspired "red" piece....of course, I had to put a heart in it! The heart came from an article in the LA Times about the Latin American show at LACMA this past year and I had been hanging onto it for just the right moment and I guess this was it! I may monkey around with it a bit more....
Does everyone know what the March theme is? In case you didn't read the post awhile back...it is a combo theme of "Mad as a March Hare" and "Herald Spring".
This has been such fun seeing all of the beautiful pieces of art appear here. I look so forward to checking to see what has been posted!

Hold-reach

Hi All, Just under the wire here with January's entry. The mandala theme seemed challenging at first but then this funky female just appeared and she HAD to be encircled. Those tiny words on her arms read "hold" and "reach", both of which I seem to be doing a lot of lately-- in my art and otherwise. I am happy and honored to be a part of Project Eight and look forward to the coming months. This is my first "project" and my personal goal is to play, stay out of my own way, and allow whatever wants to emerge.

January Mandala

I'm so pleased to have completed my January piece on time even though I have cut it kinda close. The mandala theme was perfect for me this month; it gave me a chance to settle into myself and settle back into art. I started my piece late yestereday evening and found myself still up working on it as midnight approached, I was totally "in the flow". I finished it this morning and have my February board gessoed and ready for Red.

The base is a thin piece of particle board, a recycled game board. After several coats of gesso, I drew out a mandala design, cut and pasted papers to fill in all the little sections, did multiple coats of gel medium, than begin the painting process. The last stop was painting the piece with encaustic. The colorways are subtle with splashes of brightness, not the pallet I usually choose, but it feels right.

All of the artwork in the project posted to date is so beautiful and diverse, I can't wait to see more, more, more!!!

katie

Here is my entry for the Mandala theme! Ta da!

I had a lot of fun creating this.

I opened a big container of "THE art STORE" gesso from Dick Blick and saw that it was super thick like modeling paste and so I used it to make the petals of my sunflower with my index finger. It is on thick! Then I just added layer over layer of acrylic paint in yellows and light oranges for my petals. I used a little raw umber paint and wiped it off really fast for the shading inside the petals and then outlined them with a black stabilo pencil. I collaged a made up poem from a page of text I ripped out at random from the large print edition of the book "The Girl With the Pearl Earring". It was a very serendipitous choice of page because it mentioned the colors I have here. That was a pretty cool coincidence, I must say.

The center triangle is some aluminum color metal sheet I cut to fit and textured with a tool I got in a repousse class I took from Beckah Krahula. I used dark umber paint on it and wiped it off so the paint stayed in the textured grooves. I used a little orange too. Then on top of all that I used my Neocolor II watersoluble crayons : yellows and white on the petals and bronze on the metal. I am going to make a full size photo stitching this together in photoshop. Then it will be a circle.

Now I am going to go work on "RED". I promise it won't take as long.

Let's Try This Again - RED

Sorry guys. I had to homicide the encaustic I posted yesterday; I wasn't convinced it was going to fly when I did it and when I woke up this morning it had gotten even weirder overnight. This is my replacement. It must be the full moon.

Another Mandala

Here is my mandala. This was a challenge for me as I'm sure it must be to at least some others of you but I like the idea of the themes very much as I think they will help hold a group show together. Now for red. (You guys are killing me. RED!! Ack!)

BTW, this is mixed media encaustic.

January & February

OK, so Laurie inspired me to go out into the FREEZING cold this AM & photograph these!

I finished January & February because Karen from Indie Arts came over the other day to interview me for her DVD magazine. I really wanted to plug our little group & have something to show her. As it turned out, I talked about our group, but not as much as I wanted to & I didn't mention any of your names. I had an incredibly difficult time remembering my OWN name & I was afraid that I would leave someone out, so I said nothing! I'm so sorry about that, I need to ask her if we can have some kind of link to this blog at least, since the issue will be coming out in July & that would be a perfect time to get people excited about our show.
That's if she even uses the footage, it was a terrifying experience for me & I pretty much froze once she got the camera out. She says that she can edit it to make me look "brilliant", I guess I trust her, even though I really can't imagine how anyone could possibly make anything work out of that interview! I was a little bit nervous, but I had no idea that I would freeze up & go completely blank! She was really wonderful to work with though, she has the patience of a saint & once the interview was over, we had the BEST time running around town & trying on hats in the freezing cold! It made it all worth it in the end.
Anyway, this image keeps coming up for me, of a single female figure holding circles or balls, with circles all around her, so I decided to milk it & work with only that image for this project, but incorporating the different themes. I'm going to call my body of work "the 8 faces of joy" since the theme of joy is something that I want to explore more in depth.
I'm also working with this image/figure in my other group, only I'm using clay & carving the figure into it.

January- Mandala (of sorts!)

Hi Project 8'ers,
Well, I thought I would get the ball rolling here and post my "mandala". I use the term loosely as this project totally morphed from the design that I had neatly planned out before the holidays which was rich with symbolism. It looks nothing like that first rendering which really was a mandala. Somehow when I began, I was compelled to glue a map down in the background....maybe because we had just returned from London, who knows! From there it just sort of took on a life of its own and became more of a compass than a mandala! (atleast it is round!) Oh well, the best laid plans.....now it is onto RED! For those of you who are thinking about March, I have a theme....shall I wait until February to post it? Take good care, Laurie

FEBRUARY THEME

Hey everyone, happy new year!
For all of you overachievers, the theme for February is....
RED!
Now, it doesn't actually have to be red, above is some brainstorming that I did about red in my journal....(I hope no one is a therapist...oh dear, I just realized that there IS a therapist among us!) Oh well, maybe she can help me out!!!
Anyway, please have fun with the theme & don't let it limit you.
I'm almost done with January, I just have to put it all together, I'll post a photo when it's finished.
And speaking of Cirque de Soleille... (see, now this is where a therapist would come in handy!) I'm going to see them in Portland on March 5th, would any of you left coasters like to join me? I'm not sure if Dianne will be coming with me or not yet, but it's on my list of things to do before I die & I'm going no matter what!
Happy 2008 everyone!

Project 1 of "Project 8"

Howdy! I’m Catherine Witherell, pmc (precious metal clay) and mixed media artist.


I’m “IT”. I’m going to set the theme of our artwork for the month of January for Project Eight. We are eight artists, 7 of whom I am thrilled to be connected and working collaboratively with, through the wonder of the internet.

A little about me:

I was raised by my Hungarian immigrant parents in a Canadian public elementary school back in the 60’s. I pretty much was taught I had to figure out how to do something “serious” and become a “professional”. I was instilled with a good puritan ethic, translate that to “work before play”. My family moved to the U.S. when I was 13.

It was in the 70’s, when I was in my teens, that I became truly aware of my surroundings but didn’t have the vocabulary or the skills to fully express my experiences verbally or visually, and I fell in love with images, color and art history.

The sixties and the ensuing “fallout” of the next 20 years altered much in my mind and many others. Now, especially in America, we live in a time where many people believe you can be whoever and do whatever you want. With a great idea you can even be rich. In the 80's I got married, lived communally for 4 years and had my children in my 30's. It was after all that I called myself an artist.

So, referring back to a group psychedelic experience I had when I was young, before I thought of myself as an artist, I got an early glimpse inside myself . Swirling circular patterns of flowing color. At the time I thought everyone there that day saw the same thing I saw, but later I realized that was not the case. For me in hindsight it is a clue to what is inside me. I am not encouraging anyone to go out and have that kind of experience. For one thing, now it’s illegal. It is just something that happened to me and is part of who I am today. I live in the San Francisco bay area with my husband of 21 years, our son (12 years old), daughter (14) and 2 dogs. I love it here.

Each of us has a picture in our minds, a thumb print stamped on our brain. It was there when you were born and I’m of the opinion it doesn’t change. But our eyes and skills get better and if we attempt to express it I think it makes us happy. If we ignore it, then that is one of the things that contributes to our unhappiness or sense of “Is that all there is?” Even if we express ourselves just a little we are certainly happier doing what we were meant to do.

You don’t have to do it all the time, maybe 1/2 hour a day or once a week for a few hours a week. But making art, your definition, is a good way to go.

For me, ART is:

1. pretty
2. not always pretty
3. makes me think
4. feels good
5. makes me uncomfortable too
6. it just is
7. is whatever YOU say it is

two of my favorite symbols: the circle


and the flower




The theme I have chosen is “Mandala”

Mandala is Sanskrit for circle - a symbolic diagram used in the performance of sacred rites and as an instrument of meditation. The mandala is basically a representation of the universe, a consecrated area that serves as a receptacle for the gods and as a collection point for universal forces. Man (the microcosm), by mentally "entering" the mandala and "proceeding" toward its centre, is by analogy guided through the cosmic processes of disintegration and reintegration. --from Encyclopaedia Britannica


There are no rules except it has to be 8x8.
I doesn’t strictly have to be a circle.
It can be a section or a slice.
It can be your interpretation.

Here are a few of my favorite links for inspiration:

mandalaZone - check out the lounge and the menagerie

mandala-style flower images by David J. Bookbinder in The Science Creative Quarterly

Serpent Mandalas by Lindy Longhurst
and here


... only gradually did I discover what the mandala really is: 'Formation, Transformation, Eternal Mind's eternal creation' (Faust, II). And that is the self, the wholeness of the personality, which if all goes well is harmonious, but which cannot tolerate self-deceptions.
--from Mandala Symbolism, C. G. Jung

In this group, what brings us together as artists is the time we were born in, a love of color and the lines in between.


And if you feel like playing along, post a link in the comments so we can all see YOUR thumbprint.

Greetings from Southern Oregon

Hello ladies!

So glad to be participating in this project with you all. I have been thinking the past couple of months that it would be good for me to participate in a collaborative project - step outside my rut...er...um....routine and stretch a little. I love stretching! :) So, imagine my surprise when the invitation arrived! Actually, my reaction could more appropriately be described as "But of course. This is what I was needing wasn't it?"
So, here I am. Ready and willing to play and play hard! :)
talk to you all soon.

-Steph

WHY ARE WE HERE?

Each year around this time I seem to cook up some kind of community or collaborative project for the upcoming year.
Last year I started a group called one week at a time, where a group of local women made one piece of art every week for an entire year. We met once a month to share our work, & at the end of the year we had a group show at a local gallery. It was such a wonderful experience in so many ways & I wanted to do something similar this year only a little less intense & expand it to beyond Albuquerque.
I was talking w/ my friend Paula about this one day & she came up with the idea of inviting 8 artists to create one 8x8 piece of artwork every month for 8 months & having a show here on the 8th month. I loved the idea, but the group filled almost instantly & there were a few women that I really wanted to work with. So I decided to do a sister project, same thing, only w/ out of state artists & have a traveling show at the end of eight months.
I sent out an invitation & almost immediately everyone wrote back & committed to the project!
I am so thrilled & honored to be working with 2 groups of such amazing artists, I'll be working with both groups, our local group with Paula & this new group Project eight.
It's going to be an amazing adventure, I can just feel it!
This blog is a place where we can all post our work, so you'll get to see the work as it progresses. Paula is also going to set up a blog for her group... when it's all set up, I'll add it to my links here on my blog & hopefully everyone else will too.
I can't wait to get started & thank you to all of the amazing women who will be joining me on this great adventure!
Leighanna