Artful Journeys

Sketch of Queen Nefertiti that I plan on using with my Egyptian trinkets for next months Milwaukee Live ATC trade. Now all I need to do is add some color. Inspiration came from Klimt's Eyptian Antiquity from 1890-91. I was able to combine the ATC trade and my online class with Gina Rossi-Armfield, "Under the Influence of Gustav Klimt. I think I will take her with me when I go to Artfest next week and finish her up. I haven't decided what media I will use yet, paint, colored pencils, maybe I'll try my hand with oil pastels, or a little bit of everything. I do love mixed media.

Round Robin painting that I added some shadows, additional paint details here and there, and stamped the tunnel and added a little paint to the flowers. Yvonne Ballaera of Apopka, FL started the painting and collaged the woman. VYB of Geneva Switzerland added additional acrylic paint and collaged the rosehips. Laurie Haley of Rockvale TN collaged wings, hair flowers, butterfly and pearl necklace. Painted with acrylics large flowers,and bird. she also added a golden arch and some glimmer mist. Now she is off to the next artist in Brooklyn NY.
Here is the collaborative painting so far:

Egyptian polymer clay trinkets ruled today. I decided to add the trinket as my focal point to next months Milwaukee Live ATC Group meeting. The theme for our trade is "Jewel of the Nile." Now all I have to do is come up with the background. Maybe I'll draw King Tut or Queen Nefertiti and put the trinket in a headress??? Haven't decided yet. Well enough chatter, here is a photo:

How did I make them you may wonder?

 
First I made some molds out of various Eygptian ephemera I had buried in my studio. It was almost like an archaelogical dig. Pun intended.

I then baked the molds. Per manufacturer's instructions.

Next, after the molds cooled I pushed some more clay into the molds, trimed the edges with a scissors. Helpful hint: lightly dust mold with corn starch or flour for easy removal. Another hint that helps with easy removal is to make sure there is a lot of extra clay on the edges. Something to grab on to to help pull it out with minimal distortion.

Back into the toaster oven they go again.

Adding color:  I painted the pieces with black gesso.  After the gesso dried I added various stamping inks with a brush. When finished, the flesh colored clay had a nice weathered patina. 

Best hint for last, I learned this from Mystele Kirkeeng: the use of Super Sculpy and gessoing over it. The clay is non-toxic and you don't have to spend "forever" conditioning it. It's soft and so easy to use. I may never use the other colored poymer clay again.

Gustav Klimt is the featured artist that Gina Rossi Armfield has selected for her online class, "Under the Influence." The class takes an indepth look at an artist's work and by thorough exploration and practice one would hope to gleen some knowledge from a master artist. Additional featured artists are planned in the future.
For our first assignment we were directed to clip a face and hands from a fashion magazine. Create a mixed media/collage piece after viewing some of Klimt's work. The piece I decided to try and capture was Klimt's piece, "Hygeia." But I didn't include the golden snake, glass bowl, or the man's face hidden in the background. Instead I placed three doll heads balanced on one hand while the other hand is raised to protect the heads from falling. There is also a 4th head nestled on the woman's shoulder. The painting represents today's woman trying to balance her children and keeping them safe.
Here is my practice of trying my hand at Klimt's masterpiece:

The Darkside Round Robin is a yahoo group that I have been participating with for the last six months. Some of the work that I have done I have questioned if I should post here on my blog. So I haven't. This months installment hasn't raised any "hummms."  We receive each other's books once a month. This month I have to send out Wanda Smith's book, "Secrets of the Cresent Moon Manor. A fictional story line written by Wanda. The story is that Reverend Grimmer married a number of times in hopes of bearing a son. Each time he is blessed with daughters and then the current wife mysteriously disappears. But during the time of his marriage to his third wife he was desperately in love with her even though she bore him triplet daughters. She even convinces him to bring home his other daughters from his past marriages.  Now the home was filled with one man and a dozen women.  But as fate would have it, the good Reverend was found hanging by the neck, from the weeping willow tree on the Grimmer estate. Poetic justice???
Here are the two spreads that I did.  The first photo is called "Game Over." Check mate the Queen wins.

 
 
The second is titled: "Destiny" . . . I included a copy of an actual photo of my maternal grandmother.

It has been a couple of weeks since I posted. Sorry about that. I think I have commited to - to many projects. Which leaves me with not enough time to get to the computer. Added to that, living here in Wisconsin lately we have been dumped on with the pretty, cold, windy, white stuff. I've been spending quite a few hours trying not to be buried under it. Excuses, I know. Wish there were "eight days in a week." Anyway, I've been busy. The upside is that I have quite a bit of "arty" projects I can share with you.
I am in my last week of Mystele Kirkeeng "Gut Art" class. I still have this week's field trips to work on. I am thankful that she keeps the forum open for at least one week after class or until the conversations die out. There is a small group with the class that has decided to do a painting round robin. Sounded interesting so of course I was probably the first one to sign up for it. So today, I want to get my painting started because the mailing date is this Tuesday. I am excited to get the painting started, but first I have to go to the post office to drop off my matchbox valentine exchange with www.artfortytwo.com . No really, what I need to do first is clear my studio a bit before I start the painting. I need to put away the materials I pulled out for the last couple projects. I still have time before the post office opens. Yeah! Every minute counts right now. Because you know what I will be doing on Sunday night, watching the Packers win the Super Bowl. Go Pack Go.
Since I can't post without something visual to look at, I guess it is the artist in me. Here is another field trip I took during Mystele's "Gut Art" class . We were guided to www.nationalgeographic.com under the search of "horse ranch photo, Argentina", and the work of the collage artist Benjamin Frey at [email protected] . I did a collage piece I call "Home on the Range" of the photo-of-the day. A combination of paint, fabric, "doodads", and even a piece of and old rattan placemat. :D

 
 

"Freedom to Fly" is another painting that I completed during my class with Mystele's "Gut Art " class. She sent us on a field trip to visit National Geographic's Photo of the day. The photo we looked at was the endangered spotted owl. Mystele also had us look at the work of the artist Jeanne Bessette. Here is the inspired piece I came away with:

Went on my second field trip in Mystele's Gut Art class. I had the opportunity to look at Brendan Mc Carthy's photo, "Dance Practice" and the artwork of Carl Ramsey. I then took the inspiration that got from both and created a drawing that I call "Eskimo Kisses."


Gessoed paper that I scratched the heck out of it. I then rubbed it with oil pastels. I traced an old photo on tissue paper so you could see the pastels thru the tissue after it was glued down with gel medium.  As a final step I machine stitched the edges and stitched a heart shape around the couple. The photo was taken from "The Look Book." It is actually a photo of Eleanor Roosevelt rubbing noses with a South Pacific native, as a sign of good will.

Rescue

This painting I did after going on Mystele's first field trip for the Gut Art :4 Freedom class. The class was directed to go visit two web sites and then make note of the impressions you got from viewing a photo at: www.photography.nationalgeographic.com/photography/photo/photo-of-the-day--tuckerman-ravine-pod/ and visiting a featured artist at: www.jillkrasnergallery.com.

After viewing both the photo, and Jill Krasner's art work, I then created my gut reaction. I thought about how important the sun is especially come March after more than 4 month's of cold, gray days. Living in Wisconsin I need as much sun as possible otherwise when March arrives I suffer some pretty dark days. Early spring you will find me spread out in the grass, or even on the warm concrete wo/ a chair or blanket, just soaking in the glorious sun, melting any coldness away.

The red headed beauty represents the sun as she reaches to kiss the cold little bird.

On Monday I started Mystele Kirkeeng Gut Art class. I love all her videos on uTube and her artistic style. It was only a matter of time before I would sign up for one of her online classes, which I did of course. Two days in and the creative juices are flowing. Nothing like a class to push you to create. I'm like a possessed woman right now all I can do right now is think, dream, and work in my studio. Just came up for air and to blog a quick post. Here is a picture of my new Gut Art journal cover I made to hold all my notes, sketches, and drawings/paintings during the next 5 weeks. I thought the 3 rings will make it easy to add pages as needed. Besides that I am a very messy and clumsy artist. You could say it's damage control.


The cover was made out of xtra thick cardboard that I stenciled with gesso. I altered and combined two photos of myself to add color to the graphic black and white over-all theme.  The typography is a combination of stamped letters, and taped down chipboard, and a number stencil. The final added touch I twist tied some drywall plastic to the cover, to represent myself stepping out of confinement.

More to follow later .  .  .