Posts Tagged ‘new work’

Recent Sketches

Posted on: December 12th, 2011
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In case you were wondering …

how I’ve been spending my time – other than picking olives, and eating bruschetta drenched in green oil; I do sit down at my table to draw/paint/collage on a daily basis. Some pieces are purely invented, some are of actual places, and then there are those that fall somewhere in-between what exists in my head and what lies out in the streets below.

Italy continues to both inspire and confound me with all it’s chaos and contradictions. For example, though Christmas has become equally as commercial here as in the U.S. they still celebrate the immaculate conception of Mary with a national holiday. Who knew Jesus wasn’t the only one to be immaculately conceived?

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Thoughts of Italy

Posted on: July 25th, 2011
Number 83 - A trip to Perugia

Coming full circle.

I am still cleaning out drawers and boxes (and anything else that appears in my path), which is obviously a never ending task. On the latest pile destined for the recycle bin (or a bonfire) were some small drawings & collages that I made during our first longer adventure in Italy. Although these pieces had been singled out as “not-quite-worth-saving”, they did contain some beautiful moments. Being the waste-not-want-not queen that I am, I started cutting and pasting. Again.

Yesterday I noticed that the piece of train ticket embedded in one of the now-torn-apart collages I was working with was dated 24-07-93. Exactly 18 years ago – to the day. Who says the narrative of a life is linear?

You can see a few more of the recent additions to the “Picking up the pieces” series byclicking here.

Summer Intensive at Wolfe Editions

Posted on: June 24th, 2011
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Letterpress, bookbinding, and woodcuts, oh my!

I just spent an incredible, wonderful, and yes, intense week at David Wolfe’s studio learning all kinds of new skills with David Wolfe and Crystal Cawley. They are both great teachers, as well as fabulous artists; and my fellow students were a complete delight with whom to share the week. I spent most of the week working on a book project: using traditional lead type, hand setting a poem that my friend Janet wrote for me many, many years ago. Once all the type was set, I printed the poem, line by line on some already prepared prints of mine; and finally bound it all together in a book. What an accomplishment!

You can see little snapshots of most of the book by clicking here.

Happy New Year (if a little late)

Posted on: January 9th, 2011

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Here’s hoping that 2011 is full of all kinds of color and joy!

I really did mean to post something sooner than January 9th to wish everyone well. So much for good intentions – like getting holiday cards out on time. Ha! Same goes for New Years resolutions, so I say fuggedaboudit. No, in all honesty, at least in terms of my studio routine, 2011 has gotten off to a good start. In December, I toyed with challenging myself to do a drawing a day for the month of January. Does that count as a resolution? I’m not sure why, but somehow, the idea has gained a certain amount of traction. Nine days down and nine pieces of paper 22 x 30 inches are covered with some kind of marks or other. As the days roll by the drawings are definitely getting a little bit more interesting – though I do still question the wisdom of this plan. At some point, I promise, I’ll post some of those. In the meantime, though, you can see that I’m still picking up pieces and making collages out of them. The pieces above were all completed within the last month. Each one is about 5″ x 5″.

Picking Up the Pieces

Posted on: December 7th, 2010
Picking up the Pieces, Number 62

again.

There must be something about the December darkness that inspires me to clean up. About a year ago I was finally fed up with not being able to find tools on my desk, so I started the “Picking up the Pieces” series – a recent addition, No. 62 is at left. The rule (or game, depending on how you look at it) was that I could use only the scraps on my table – no looking in the scrap drawer, or cutting up work on the walls – just use the already existing plethora of material on my desk. Within a month I’d covered a 4 by 6 foot area on one wall with collages, and the remaining scraps were so tiny as to be virtually dust.

I am again trying to make room in my flat files for new work and in the process am discovering all kinds of old work that is begging to be destroyed, cut up, thrown in a fire, or somehow reconfigured. Not only is my table completely covered with scraps, but so is just about the entire floor in my studio. My table, however, is once again piled too deep, so I guess it’s time to institute the table-only scrap rule until I can find it’s surface. Then I’ll attack the floor!