Urgent C12 - A New Shabby Chic Series

Urgent C 12

This piece is one of my favorites of the series because I just love the masked man....yellow shirt and hat.  Yellow is not my favorite color normally.  I have very few yellow flowers in my garden but I do like mustard yellow.

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Rembrandt exhibition: Alastair Sooke goes behind the scenes at The Late Works

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iaPZyS0NoBw

Urgent C11 - A New Shabby Chic Series

Urgent C 11

Unfortunately there was a bit of jealousy in this multi-grade classroom.  Mary could sing like a songbird and was on her way to stardom.  Don't you love to narrate a story?  What is your take on the story?

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MODERN MASTERS: Picasso

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QAVi-sjeVwA

Urgent C10 - A New Shabby Chic Series

Urgent C10

Do you think a flamenco dancer has been invited to the committee meeting at the local women's group?  Is the women's responsive facial look one of desire to learn the dance?  Thoughts?

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I love listening to any documentary that Alastair Sooke narrates.  The art of a suit of clothes!

BBC The Perfect Suit. part 1of 4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TdTD0K66f8o

Urgent C 09 - A New Shabby Chic Series

Urgent C 09

I like using cheesecloth as it adds a great textural quality to a piece of art.  I am all about texture.  I have a friend who loves to run her fingers over my art work because she is into texture as well.

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Gauguin at the Tate Modern

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njWwegLURCg

Urgent C 08 - A New Shabby Chic Series

Urgent C 08

Why does it seem so decadent to light a cigarette using a candle?  Just a feeling I have.  I am pleased that the background and the dressing gown compliment each other.  There is a warmth with this piece....color of the background, color of the hair, the candles...warmth!

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Cézanne Portraits: Alastair Sooke goes behind the scenes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-80e-0WVoI

Urgent C 07 - A New Shabby Chic Series

Urgent C 07

I love the richness of red in this piece.  Just what is the story behind the old woman in the photo.  How is she connected to the woman in the life preserver?

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Inside a Damien Hirst exhibition

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NEwyKoZIzOc

Urgent C 06 - A New Shabby Chic Series

Urgent C 06

Can't you just imagine that the singer is a bird watcher who also gets exercise in the boxing ring? :-)

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Alastair Sooke on Brancusi’s La muse endormie

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HZvYcroWl94

Urgent C 05 - A New Shabby Chic Series

Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours!  Today is a two-fer, two art image uploads to celebrate the holiday.  I love Thanksgiving, it is my favorite meal.  Enjoy your day if you also celebrate.

Urgent C 05

I have used paper yarn in each of the Urgent C pieces.  For each I created a different pattern.

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I have included Martin Creed previously but not this particular interview.

Alastair Sooke interviews Martin Creed

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIs7ZdoDGW0

Urgent C 04 - A New Shabby Chic Series

Urgent C 04

My definition of shabby chic came from an experience I had once in Paris.  We were on vacation and I had gone out for a walk alone.  I love to explore alleys and cobbled streets.  I walked up what turned out to be a dead end.  To the left and right were wonderful houses behind walls and vegetation.  When I turned around there was a dog standing in the middle of the street staring at me.  Having been bit by a dog once I am a bit weary until I know the score.

I started speaking to the dog and its tail started wagging.  I was pretty sure I was safe.  If I wasn't I was in for a bad experience because there was no where to go but toward the dog.  Escape was past the dog.  Just then a woman came out into the street to see what had happened to her dog. She heard me speaking and said hello to me.  She was also an American who lived in a wonderful house.

We started chatting away and I mentioned how I loved the dead end street where she lived.  She wanted to know if I would like to come in! I said I could not right then and she invited me back for drinks later on.  I took Tim at the appointed hour.

The inside of her house was lovely, but it had a bit of a worn look and she called it shabby chic.  Wallpaper was peeling off the walls in places.  It needed a new paint job.  The furniture was flea market type.  In all, it was perfect!  I loved it the minute I set foot in her house.  That will be twenty years ago next summer.

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Banksy Culture Show

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXjCjqGMAWg

Urgent C 03 - A New Shabby Chic Series

Urgent C 03

I have talked about the process of how I created my last shabby chic series so I will be repeating myself for Urgent C.  I created my own papers for the background using stencils, old magazines, and spray inks.  One sands a magazine page over a stencil and then sprays ink to get the effect you see that looks sort of paisley.

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How To Paint A Queen: A Culture Show Special

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WvYuac8BVY&index=3&list=PL-0qSEcZTLVJxC0Tlkrng74vcBLBTqVma

Urgent C 02 - A New Shabby Chic Series

Urgent C 02

Now that is the definition of debonair!  What a look!  Perhaps I was born in the wrong era.  His look is just smart!

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Degas exhibition at the Royal Academy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQJRwgzLkLk&list=PL-0qSEcZTLVJxC0Tlkrng74vcBLBTqVma

Urgent C 01 - A New Shabby Chic Series

Urgent C 01

New series beginning today...this one has twenty-four pieces or twelve back-to-back.  I am using some old wallpaper sample book pages, cardboard, and paper bags for the substrates.  There is plenty of texture since I began with modeling paste first.


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The Culture Show, Royal Academy 2012

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3XqAQ1Ks7e0

Menko (Kitty and Crow) 28

Kitty and Crow 28

This is the final piece of this series.  I hope you have enjoyed it.  It was almost a month long. :-)

Animated gif or the series:

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1/2 The Culture Show - Who Are You Calling an African Artist?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srWIeMyQcgk

Menko (Kitty and Crow) Series -27

Kitty and Crow Series 27

This is not my favorite piece in this series.  I like it all with the exception of the white Torri.  You know what a torri is, right?  It is the traditional Japanese gate.  I totally forget why I did a white one.  I do know that the red circle with the yellow circle is suppose to represent the rising sun.  Funny how that is when you create something quite some time ago and write about it much later.  Oh well, I am approaching 70! :-)

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1/2 The Culture Show : A Portrait of Jonathan Yeo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dG0RlZZCdIY

Menko (Kitty and Crow) Series - 26

Kitty and Crow Series 26

Night time!  Dark! I love the cat's eyes.  You can hardly see the crow at first and then all of a sudden it is there.  Maybe it is different for you.

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1/2 The Culture Show at Edinburgh: Leonardo da Vinci - The Anatomist

part 1

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XjoSrOTRytM


part 2
just wait and it will start on its own from the link in part 1

Menko (Kitty and Crow) Series - 25

Kitty and Crow Series 25

As we start to close in on the end of this series (no. 28) I have to reflect on discovering vintage materials that I find are different, that I did not know existed.  There is so much out there that we do not know about and then all of a sudden we run across it and are amazed.  The Menko cards were certainly like that for me.  Recently I discovered stand up sumo wrestler cards.  They are just as amazing.  That is the fun of it, to learn about something that one did not know about previously.

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1/2 ARTiculation - For the Love of Art - The Culture Show

Part 1
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wSdu60-J3wQ

Part 2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GZIALd9z6bs&index=8&list=PLM4S2hGZDSE7GzEU_1dN_ZRShuV5012bB

Menko (Kitty and Crow) Series - 24

Kitty and Crow Series 24

I am captivated by the radiation from the center of this piece out to the boundaries.  The lines lead me through this piece.

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Part II  a continuation from yesterday......

2/2 The Culture Show - Venice - A tale Of two Cities

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYjXCNO2rPg

Menko (Kitty and Crow) Series - 23

Kitty and Crow Series 23

Usually I stamp my chop mark in the bottom right corner of a piece of art.  Focal points were in the way and the upper right has the hole for the Chicago screw.  Black makes a kind of X in this piece, corner to corner.  I like how I broke up the "sun" as it give the piece an Asian feel.

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1/2 The Culture Show - Venice - A tale Of two Cities

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DUWdORG3DTU

Menko (Kitty and Crow) Series -22

Kitty and Crow Series 22

This morning I took the Chicago pin out of the series to unbind it.  I wanted to look at all of the series individually.  I like the fact that the Chicago screw holds them all in place but to look at them individually taking the Chicago screw out is best.  My friend, Jacki Long, took one of my Kitty and Crow Series pieces and manipulated it in Photoshop to see if more texture could be achieved for the pieces shown on this blog. Remember I had commented on that a few days ago.....the pieces look so much better in person.....  There was a difference.  As I add more pieces to the queue, I will experiment in Photoshop.  Right now I have about 60 pieces in the queue so it will be awhile before we can discuss the benefits.  I am being lazy and do not want to have redo the lineup.  Thanks Jacki for the experiment.  Jacki is a master at Photoshop.

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Henri Matisse A Cut Above the Rest(2013 - 2014)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G4NHDpaQW9s

Menko (Kitty and Crow) Series -21

Kitty and Crow Series 21

The black is quite effective with the contrasting yellow.   Love the yellow aura around this cat which I did not think about when I created No. 21.  There is color balance which draws the eye from top left to bottom right.

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What makes art valuable BBC Documentary HD

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XuMAhEOggac&list=PL-09zqzRqDcXgIUJz_fRUwYvW7JDTAkIk

Menko (Kitty and Crow) Series - 20

Kitty and Crow Series 20

What could be better than red and vintage?  Even the cat has a red aura.  Perhaps the narrative on this piece has to do with winning a baseball series as it seems that some sort of fireworks celebration is in the works.

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BBC Modern Masters 1of4 - ANDY WARHOL

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Egsj1n3O6I&list=PLW11btVgRtIPUwtXEV-CTJ9vnIsnBIYCO

Menko (Kitty and Crow) Series -19

Kitty and Crow Series 19

This piece is a good representation of the colors outside my office window for several weeks this fall.  My office even had an orange glow on sunny days.  I am taken with "Hello Kitty."  I saw one today while I was out and about.

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Simon Schama's J.M.W. Turner 1 of 4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pbc_A6Pw2VI&list=PL4EE4F94125F77D30&index=3

Menko (Kitty and Crow) Series -18

Kitty and Crow Series 18

Yesterday I was chatting with my friend, Jeannie, about my art.  We were looking at my new Sumo Series that will appear on this blog later on, probably in the new year.  She said that the images on my blog did not do justice to the actual work.  I have heard this before.  There is something about the texture in my work that does not photograph well.

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Robert Rauschenberg - Pop Art Pioneer Full BBC Documentary 2016

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yELmPbQNx9M

Menko (Kitty and Crow) Series -17

Kitty and Crow Series 17 

I rather like the difference in size of the triangles in the background on this one.  Having not looked at this piece for awhile I am wondering if it seems crowded?  There are a lot of shapes....maybe not too crowded but full.

I was interviewed on a radio show along with Anne LaFever.  We were on ARTbeat Northwest on KKNW 1150 yesterday.  The radio station archived the show and I listened to it this morning.  I think it turned out pretty well.  Here is the link.... https://1150kknw.com/archives/eastside-art-beat/  if you would like to listen.  The show is 30 minutes long.

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Francis Bacon: A Brush with Violence (2017)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MgrO5za0lSY

Menko (Kitty and Crow) Series - 16

Kitty and Crow 16

This one speaks for itself.  It is one of my top ten in the series.


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A Faction Ski Artist.....  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yzgsQyEq1bQ

Menko (Kitty and Crow) Series - 15

Kitty and Crow 15

The background vintage paper especially captures my attention.  This was a fairly difficult collage to adhere de to the thin flag poles and overlapping.

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ARTIST SERIES :: ALEXEY TITARENKO

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=whoZ8SRgi2s

Menko (Kitty and Crow) Series - 14

Kitty and Crow 14

Bold and red!  Two great combinations!   What is that, two cats?  It seems as if the crow is very interested in what they are doing!
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ARTIST SERIES :: LAURA WILSON

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHYtkVsKvrQ

Menko (Kitty and Crow) Series - 13

Kitty and Crow 13

Lucky No. 13......just love the vintage paper used in the background.

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ARTIST SERIES :: WILLIAM WEGMAN

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gTbjGhG_2wU