Schoolmarms - Red Barn # 8

Schoolmarms - Red Barn # 8

I am mailing my first signature of the Red Barn series to Sweden today.  I can't wait for Ingrid's signature to arrive here and to see what she does with my signature.  Every other page will be hers.  Yesterday afternoon I spent time with my friend Michele talking about art journaling.  We chatted away about how we start a piece and how it is completed with all the issues that come up and how we come to  solutions.  So much fun!  Fiber paste helped me solve several problems with this piece.

Sophie and Buffy - Red Barn # 7

Sophie and Buffy

Sophie and Buffy is the third spread in the first signature that will be mailed to Ingrid in Sweden for our collaboration.  I actually have completed all four spreads and will post the last one for this signature soon.  I discovered a Golden product that I just love and which I used on this spread.  It is fiber paste.  It gives wonderful texture to the page and is so easy to apply through stencils. It has a great unifying effect.  I have not tried adding pigment to it yet, but coloring over it works great using Faber-Castell pens.

Flight to Paris

Flight to Paris

This week I spent the most amazing time in two Seth Apter workshops on Whidbey Island, Washington.  Over four days we created two different types of journals.  The first was an altered book and this is one of the pages in my new altered journal. I met tremendous artists during the week sharing stories and tips, laughing way too hard, and eating way too much tremendous food.  If you get a chance to take a Seth class or attend the Pacific NW Art School you are in for two great treats.

Shades of Red or Whatever Your Favorite Color

On Saturday five art journalers spent five hours creating journal pages using a predominant favorite color.  We examined color right out of the bottle versus mixing colors to color shades from magazine sources.  In this study the journalers collaged found magazine items with a pre-chosen predominant color.  They then used their "right out of the bottle" predominant colored page to connect to a magazine collage on the opposite side of the spread.

 

In a second journal spread, the students created various homemade papers in their predominant color shades to create a collage.  We also learned how to use packing tape for image transfers which they used in their collages.  It was a terrific day which left us tired but satisfied.

 

Please enjoy the photos taken yesterday during our art journaling session.  Click on the link.

https://plus.google.com/photos/106404291205708776350/albums/5877087423123096945?gpsrc=gplp0&partnerid=gplp0#106404291205708776350/posts

Barn # 6

Barn # 6

I am almost finished with three spreads in the first signature of the barn series that I am doing with my friend Ingrid.  The two barns seen here were taken on my journey to photograph barns and to see the tulips in the Skagit Valley last month.  I found some insect stamps in a box recently and decided that they would work well with the background color.  The postage stamps were discovered in my father's desk as I was cleaning up some of his paperwork.  My friend Marlyn gave me some receipts that date back to the mid-nineteenth century and the photos of people were found at the Long Beach, California fleamarket in October.  I used packing tape to transfer the images for some.  I really like how the background color comes through the image.  To finish it off I used Portfolio Pastels.

Red Barn #7

Red Barn #7

Quite frequently it takes many days before I complete a composition in my journal.  This one came together in an afternoon with the exception of the orange and purple background which I did in just a few minutes several days ago.  The purple and orange comes from a napkin with the same colors.  The barn is a photo I took three weeks ago when I was on a day trip photographing barns in the Skagit Valley near Mount Vernon, Washington.  All the other papers used were created by me over the last two years.  I found the birds in a AAA magazine.  The men are recycled from a piece I did called Italian Gothic.  This piece will be mailed to Sweden by the end of May to join my friend Ingrid.  Ingrid will create four pieces in this signature as well.  My three other pieces in this signature will appear here soon.

Post 100

What a year this has been and it is not over!  Being my first year of retirement I had a plan, I had been warned.  I did, art!  Everyday with the exception of an October vacation I have done something that had to do with art.  This blog has been a way to showcase and now I am posting my 100th post for the year which began June 27.  Right now I am averaging a post every three to four days.  Who would have thought?

This post is honoring a group of students who I visited at an Everett, Washington school.  We did an art project and they wrote me letters thanking me for coming to their classroom.  I love those letters!  So I decided that I would write back to each student personally.   I embarked on creating 26 original postcards which I will send them this week.  I am almost done with them.  All I have remaining to do is write the messages.  Here is an example of one of the postcards.

The background idea came from an article by Jenny Cochran Lee in the magazine Cloth Paper Scissors.  When I first saw the article I thought what a wonderful way of using up scraps from papers that I had made over the last few years.  The painted deli papers are stitched together; cut into postcard size;  and embellished (in this case with the salmon, map circles, and torn napkin).   It is a totally fun project that I recommend.