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Archive for the ‘Spontaneous Constructs’ Category

I finished my visual journal a week after Roxanne Evans Stout’s beautiful workshop, but left right away to Oaxaca, Mexico ( photos forthcoming 😊). Here are some photos taken outside of Jana Freeman’s fabulous Way Art Yonder workshops (above) , Day 2 of the workshop ( details from Roxanne’s teaching table and my work area with “preparatory piles”) and, finally, my completed journal.

At home, I had to co-opt my kitchen ( I need my studio back 🤪)… but thought this would make a nice tableau, so I’m sharing it here. This is how things looked deep in the night, two Sundays ago..

And finally…c’est fini! My first art journal – and first video posted here on SketchBloom.

All of the lovely journals from the workshop:

A closing plen air celebration at the end of the weekend. Can’t wait for my next (February) art workshop…

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Last night, between November 10 and November 11, and all day today we celebrate Diwali, the Indian Festival of Lights. I had fun arranging light
‘sculptures’ and enjoyed the presence of so many candles and lit lamps in every room, till the wee hours of the night.
Magical, powerful fire and all manners of colored skins, screens and effects to spread, diffuse, and scatter light…I loved this night.

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What is Diwali ? – you might ask.

Diwali is the Festival of Lights in India, a day to celebrate good triumphing over evil and light over darkness.
It is in, fact, the end of darkness.
Diwali is a day to honor your inner light and bless your home. It is a day for  new beginnings, as it celebrates the start of the Indian New Year.

H  A  P  P  Y     D  I  W  A  L  I 

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Light up all the candles! Hang your lanterns and luminaires…string all the lights.
….
Diwali is called the Festival of Lights and is celebrated to honor Rama-chandra, the seventh avatar (incarnation of the god Vishnu). It is believed that on this day Rama returned to his people after 14 years of exile during which he fought and won a battle against the demons and the demon king, Ravana. People lit their houses to celebrate his victory over evil (light over darkness).

The goddess of happiness and good fortune, Lakshmi, also figures into the celebration. It is believed that she roams the earth on this day and enters the house that is pure, clean, and bright. Diwali celebrations may vary in different communities but its significance and spiritual meaning is generally “the awareness of the inner light”.
Source: http://www.timeanddate.com/holidays/us/diwali

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The sacrificial lamb- an old leather jacket already repaired twice.

The sacrificial lamb- an old leather jacket already repaired twice.

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With my pattern and leather in the Materials Lab, to trace images in Illustrator and experiment with the laser cutting process. “The object feels good if the process feels good.”

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The laser etched leather swatches. Fire drawings…scars…tattoos and cattle branding.

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Preparing for night surgical cutting, tailoring and riveting. And documenting. The whole project came about in three days (Friday to Sunday), but was months in the making (and in the thinking, and in the promising).

 

 

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The prototypes are done!

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Laying out this graphic board illustrating the process took longer than I would like to admit. In the end, it was a process of elimination…which is the secret to design, really.

 

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Exhibit time. Board layout #2 with Illustrator patterns :).

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Project fini. Ready-to-wear, custom-made temporary leather tattoos....by yours truly.

Project fini. Ready-to-wear, custom-made temporary leather tattoos….by yours truly.

 

 

Idea #13: Temporary Leather Tattoos

Experiments with recycled leather, tattoo patterns and the laser cutter in our Materials Lab for the Action/Reaction Faculty show, where students react to faculty work.

I chose to explore these tribal tattoo patterns I drew long ago and finally turn them into ‘temporary’ leather tattoos – since an actual tribal armband tattoo is out of the question (#italianmother).

In the process, I learned how to make leather-on-leather tattoos, used the laser cutter for the first time, hand-cut till my hands were sore, learned how to put rivets, and was taught about vector lines and patterns in lllustrator by my wonderful, patient students.
Thanks to student feedback/critique (which was extremely positive about the artifacts :)) the board could use one more ‘pass’ as far as fonts and background, but I wanted to post this now, as the show is coming to a close.

While researching case studies, I was astonished by the amount of cool accessories, arm bands and earrings made with recycled bike tires and inner tubes.

Etsy, here I come.

 

Here are some photos from the Action|Reaction opening, by Donn Angel Perez, the curator of the show (and author of the beautiful paintings shown), along with student Chuck Wilson

For the opening- in keeping with the recycled/sustainable theme, and to save time 😉 – I projected my board.

 

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littlescreenshot <<<and this, this little guy on my desktop just makes me happy.

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The process…

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The story behind the collage base :

When starting a new collage, I find I always need a catalyst, an incipit.
In order to tell the visual narratives of my collage I always like to continue an imaginary dialogue started by another artist, graphic designer etc.
The base of this latest collage is the very sparse cover of current San Diego Museum of Art Magazine. I knew the wooden carving was of a monk of sorts and I was immediately drawn to the work’s piety and devotion. I only found out the identity and the story behind the sculpture once I was ready to post the collage…it held unexpected surprises and even reinforced in my mind some of the creative choices I made while composing the collage ( the heart held in the sculpture’s hands).

Excerpts from the San Diego Museum of Art Membership magazine:

The sculpture depicts San Diego de Alcala’, otherwise known as Saint Didacus, who was born around 1400 near Seville.
He became a lay brother in the Franciscan order and worked at monasteries in the Canary Islands, Spain, and Rome, before finally.settling at the Convento de Santa Maria de Jesus in Alcala’, where he lived until 1463. He worked in the infirmaries of these monasteries and is said to have brought about miraculous cures to those in his care. Accordingly, the earliest depictions of San Diego following his canonization in 1588 show his healing miracles.

The San Diego Museum of Art has acquired this remarkable sculpture by Pedro De Mena (1628-1688). Mena worked in his native Granada and in Malaga, and from there produced works that were sent to.patrons around Spain, including the Royal family in Madrid.
Although relatively little known today outside of spain, Mena was the most prominent sculptor of his day. It has been said that he is unsurpassed both in the beauty of his woodcarving and in his ability to capture the expressions of religious emotions.

Mena’ sculpture depicts a miracle that came to be the standard form of the saint’s iconography. Diego was devoted to the poor and often took them bread from the monastery table. During a shortage of food at the monastery, Diego was forbidden to do so, but continued to take bread to the poor, hiding it in the folds of his monastic habit.

On one occasion, the superior of the monastery caught Diego in the act of taking bread and challenged him to show what he was carrying in the bundled robes. When Diego looked down, the bread was transformed into roses, a miraculous confirmation of his charitable works. As was often the case for sculptures depicting this miracle, the roses are not carved, for the faithful would place real or silk flowers in the lap of the sculpture.

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Collage, Buffalo, NY. April 2013.

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Collage, Buffalo, NY. April 2013.

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You have to keep breaking your heart
until it opens.
Rumi

Without the use of a camera Portland-based artist Jim Kazanjian sifts through a library of some 25,000 images from which he carefully selects the perfect elements to digitally assemble mysterious buildings born from the mind of an architect gone mad. While the architectural and organic pieces seem wildly random and out of place, Kazanjian brings just enough cohesion to each structure to suggest a fictional purpose or story that begs to be told.
Reblogged from here.

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Crocheting Cathedrals. Il Duomo with parasitic architecture (stage for New Year's festivities). Ink and watercolor on hand.book paper. December 31, 2011.

Aperol and Spritz. Most of the older ladies in my neighborhood are incredibly fashionable, decked in the latest trend winter coat. Here's two enjoying a mildly alcoholic aperitivo at 11 AM. Ink on hand.book paper. December 31, 2011.

Santa Maria Presso San Satiro. The obligatory pilgrimage to the second Bramante's church. Last year I drew Santa Maria Delle Grazie, which is near to my place. I am always amazed by the playfulness and modernity of the oculi (round windows) on the Northern Romanesque facade. I found out that the space in front of the church is called 'Largo Jorge Luis Borges'. Can it get better than this?
Ink on hand.book paper. December 31, 2011.

Window of the Pio Albergo Trivulzio. In an act of Flanerie, I got lost trying to reach the Roseto, and found these whimsical, almost Gaudi-like windows on a palazzo I had not seen since my childhood, painted in the typical warm 'Milanese Yellow' (think saffron rice and add a patina of melancholy, smog and time). Ink on hand.book paper. January 1, 2012.

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“…and then, I have nature and art and poetry, and if that is not enough, what is enough?” 

Vincent van Gogh




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San Diego, November 25, 2011. Third Avenue Pedestrian Bridge.

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San Diego, November 25, 2011. Third Avenue bridge and context (canyon).

Bridge, De-constructed.

” In recent years , the modern understanding of social responsibility as functional program has been superseded by a concern for context. But contextualism has been used as an excuse for mediocrity, for a dumb servility within the familiar. Since deconstructivist architecture seeks the unfamiliar within the familiar, it displaces the context rather than acquiesce to it. What makes it disturbing is the way deconstructivist architecture finds the unfamiliar already hidden within the familiar context. By its intervention, elements of the context become defamiliarized. In one project, towers are turned over on their sides, while in others, bridges are tilted up to become towers.”

Mark Wigley

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Ink on Miquelrius paper. September 20,2011.

Ink on Miquelrius paper. September 20,2011.

You can write anytime you like,

But you can never reach.

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Entry for ONE LIFE | An International Photography Competition.

I decided to participate ( characteristically last-minute) to ONE LIFE, an international photography competition, in the ‘City Imagery’ category.

Click here (or on the image above) to see the entry at a higher resolution and, if you like what you see, vote and share my photograph.

The prize is $10,000 or a trip around the world. Guess what I would pick.

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C'est fini! Here is the Fabric City on a backpack. The writing was done with 3D Fabric paint. June 25, 2011.

Back of The City. Fabric and thread. June 2011.

The reverse side of “The City” reminds me of a Situationist psychogeographic map. I toyed with the idea of letting go of all the work on the map and apply this abstract work on the backback. This would have been the gutsy thing to do but, in the end , i couldn’t let go of the work.

Guy Debord, c. 1955. Psychogeographic guide of Paris.

 

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The Fabric City is finally finished! Yay! Back to collages and sketches now.

From this…

…to a process of cutting and puzzle-making…

to this:

The Invisible City|La Gitane. Fabric and colored yarn, sewn by hand. June 24, 2011.

Tomorrow the ‘city’  will be cut and applied to a presently plain backpack and signed.

I also want to share this impromptu jewelry design, my second, kindly modeled!

Earth and Water. Ceramic beads and yarn. June 24, 2011

Finally, work inspired by New York in form of a guest post:

Winter Kisses. Ink and Watercolor on translucent Yupo watercolor paper. By Amina Alkandari. June 2011

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Almost finished with my city of felt.
ArtWalk in Little Italy provided the inspiration and urgency to come back today. Good people and my new San Diego coffee love, Caffe’ Vergnano, provided the energy. Happy May.

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Photography and Digital Manipulation. March 6, 2011.

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Photograph, December 19, 2010

This is my piazza, do you want to join me? We can walk inside the Battistero and talk about Islamic influences in the architecture of the Rinascimento in Firenze…or maybe just stroll about like tourists. Let’s take that via,the one on the left, do you want to come with me?

Every time I consider  imaginary spaces, my mind wanders to The Forgetting Room, that magnificent book.

Should we build a forgetting room for this year (to let bitter memories flow onto Oblivion)? Or a remembering one (to extract poetry and melancholy …even, ah, wisdom…out of hardship? – the feeling of seeing a familiar river in winter). God knows I built enough altars, and burned enough. I haven’t yet learned if sadness is better than anger.
2010, what a stubborn, bittersweet, impenetrable year you were….I release you, since I could never reach you, no matter how hard I tried, or how much I mentally applied myself to understand you.
Perhaps you were never meant to be comprehended. Perhaps you were not worthy.

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"How fine you look when dressed in rage. Your enemies are fortunate your condition is not permanent. You're lucky, too. Red eyes suit so few. " Cheshire Cat 2.1. Ink on tracing paper. June 30, 2010

From Disney’s Alice in Wonderland (1951).

Cheshire Cat: Oh, by the way, if you’d really like to know, he went that way. 

Alice: Who did? 

Cheshire Cat: The White  Rabbit. 

Alice: He did?

Cheshire Cat: He did what? 

Alice: Went that way. 

 Cheshire Cat: Who did? 

 Alice: The White Rabbit. 

 Cheshire Cat: What rabbit? 

 Alice: But didn’t you just say – I mean – Oh, dear. 

Cheshire Cat: Can you stand on your head? 

 Alice: Oh! 

 

  

It must be Halloween in July (seriously, wasn’t it Christmas?).   

I have material for three new posts and some serious  retroactive editing to do; have been drawing, reading short fiction, poetry, and fascinating stories about forensic art curating- all of which I will share with related art.  But let me start with saying that at times intense reading  (input) for the ambitious –or obsession-prone– designer/visual artist can be considered a passive-aggressive behavior, when so much needs to be in output mode, expressed, exorcised. Indeed, Julia Cameron in her Artist’s Way asks us to refrain from reading for one week, as we need to temporarily pause others’ voices and opinions to recognize  and strengthen our own.   

Lately my work, alas,  has been hindered: I had to hunt (and was haunted[1] by) a ghost with sixty-four  teeth. The wheels of karma turned and I , who once called someone-undeservedly- a ghost, have had to suffer one.     

Hello,  setbacks.    

So for today’s art, folks, this page is my canvas and my collage. This is where the work is done.  

Let me tell you about the Cheshire cat. He appears to di-sappear only to re-appear!    

All this to say (and yes, Art is process, it is a filter, it exorcises…it is a strainer, a sieve.  She is a savior):   

Ink on Paper and digital collage. June 29, 2010

I have been walking under a black cloud for three months   

Holding my breath   

Only it was not a cloud   

-though it hung like a pale, hungry moon-   

It was the Cheshire smile of a ghost   

Useless, hideous ghost that would not go away   

Spoke maddening riddles, multiplied hydra-like,   

Says I…. I….I….   

    

That single grin is fading again   

Waning   

And I, tethered, am starting to exhale.   

    


Thank you. How about how good it feels to finally forget forgive you.

   

 [1] Definitions from  The Free Dictionary:  

haunt // (hônt, hnt)   

v. haunt·ed, haunt·ing, haunts   

v.tr. 1. To inhabit, visit, or appear to in the form of a ghost or other supernatural being.   

2. To visit often; frequent: haunted the movie theaters.3. To come to the mind of continually; obsess: a riddle that haunted me all morning.4. To be continually present in; pervade: the melancholy that haunts the composer’s music.   

v.intr. To recur or visit often, especially as a ghost.   

haunt   

vb 1. (Myth & Legend / European Myth & Legend) to visit (a person or place) in the form of a ghost   

2. (tr) to intrude upon or recur to (the memory, thoughts, etc.) he was haunted by the fear of insanity3. to visit (a place) frequently4. to associate with (someone) frequently   

n 1. (often plural) a place visited frequently an old haunt of hers.   

 

 

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Mango. Watercolor. June 6, 2010.

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Apart. Photograph, Lumix Panasonic Camera. June 4, 2010

Soundtrack of  ‘Apart’

The center cannot hold. Photograph, Panasonic Lumix camera. June 4, 2010.

Soundtrack of  ‘The Center cannot hold’

Spooning (one. is broken). Photograph, Panasonic Lumix camera. June 4, 2010

Soundtrack of ‘Spooning (one. is broken)’

Gordon Matta Clark (son of an artist, trained as an architect in Cornell) Splitting 32, 1975 Five gelatin silver prints, cut and collaged 40 3/4 x 30 3/4 (103.5 x 78.1) framed Collection of Jane Crawford and Bob Fiore Courtesy the Estate of Gordon Matta-Clark and David Zwirner, New York

Gordon Matta-Clark Conical Intersect (detail) 1975 27-29, rue Beaubourg, Paris courtesy of David Zwirner, NY and the Estate of Gordon Matta-Clark

More on Gordon Matta-Clark

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Watercolor on paper. June 3, 2010

The original family.


NaBloPoMo writing prompt of today:

Define ‘freedom’.

Traveling.

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Words are Swords. May 9 2010. Ink on paper.



It is said that the tragedy of Hamlet is consumed between
‘words’ and ‘swords’. Words, words, words murmur the duelling characters…

Some may say words are swords, of the most insidious kind, and that that which is uttered – or written- has a potential for far more damage than a weapon meant to plunge in an enemy’s body. In Italian there is a saying, its origins in the Gospel, ‘ Chi di spada ferisce, di spada perisce’ [Qui gladio ferit gladio perit] . In English it is translated as ‘He who lives by the sword, perishes by the sword’.  As for those who live by the words, we also (must) suffer by words.

As a writer, a wordsmith, a poet – and more importantly, as a sentient human being – I have pondered today the reach of words, their lasting impact as means of communication in the analog and digital age.

Wounds are healed yet words remain. It is a theme that I will continue to explore, as more images are conjured up on the topic as I am posting this.

Thoughts in the alley:
Can you stop a bud from blossoming?
No.
You can only marvel at its perseverance.
You can choose to admire its beauty,
while contemplating the poignancy of its helplessness.



Word Machine. May 9,2010. Ink on paper.

WordBombs. May 9, 2010. Ink on paper.

The scene of the crime. May 9, 2010. Ink on paper.

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The Art wall I assembled last night, right in front of Adam's Futo Coffee Cart. Sit, sip a chilled coffee and enjoy.

I spent the better part of last night ‘curating’ and putting up a small show of my students’ work.

Last quarter I promised my Neoclassic to Modern Art students I  would organize an exhibit of their art in the main foyer of our school and I am happy to announce that that’s one promise kept:)

My students had the choice to either write an essay or pick a painting of their choice, research its symbolical meaning and attempt to blow up a detail reproducing  it in the same media of the original.  It was a way I thought students of an art lecture course could get closer to the art.

You can see the results of their efforts here.  My objective was not to have a typical gallery show, but combine all the work as in a collage, interspersing the canvases with the prints of the full scale work the students provided. It was a challenge to combine different shapes, colors (art curating and gallery display being an artform of their own) and be true to some sort of grid. The wall is bursting with energy. This was an Art intervention/injection for our architecture school!

I especially loved the documentation of the process. One student wrote what looked like a blog entry, taking photos of his painting at different stages:

‘It is so strange, I found, once I started painting,

I could not put the brush down.’

Well, my work here is done.

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What you see here is a prime spot, the little urban ‘piazzetta’ we have for drinking coffee @Futo’s, hearing Adam playing guitar (or his always interesting music selection), talking, scheming etc…..

As my professor Francisco Sanin would say, this is a place for moments of urbanity.

It’s a  bit of a clandestine show, art that just shows up during the night….as I did not clear all the red tape forehand, but I am hoping we are going to be able to enjoy these for one or two weeks.

So here, to all the students that asked me in the hallway, or staircases, or doorfront : When is our show?

Here you go:)

Oh, I will be at the San Diego ArtWalk in Little Italy (where else) this weekend, with artists, musician, street performers. My kind of people.
Want to come along?

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I started a new sketchbook exchange with Mike Riggin, a Teaching Assistant at my school.

My initial contribution: illustrating two of my friend Sarah‘s poems, and an origami heart– due to my recent infatuation with Between the Folds).


Also I must, must, must tell you about an art show that could have possibly changed my outlook on life, art, etc.

Tara Donovan, Untitled (Styrofoam Cups), 2008, Styrofoam cups, hot glue, dimensions variable. Artwork © Tara Donovan, Courtesy of the Artist and PaceWildenstein. Photo by Dennis Cowley.

One of the most mesmerizing collection of works  I have ever seen, Tara Donovan’s opus has left San Diego this past weekend, but I for one will find her wherever she will show next.  And don’t buy the book, or even look at my link, which is here for reference only.  No reproduction could ever even attempt to duplicate the sense of wonder experienced in front of one of her works. This is phenomenological art at its best, an art that cannot be reproduced, but must be experienced and uncovered tactically, body-in-the-room, primordially.

You can find a podcast that will guide you through her works here on Itunes. And, while you are there, you can check out Artists on Art.

The shock of understanding will rock you. You will see why Tara was awarded the 2008 MacArthur ‘genius’ award.

No virtuality , no screens.  How refreshing. Hers is one of the faces of Art, and I will refer to her, over and over, when I am asked :”What is Art”?

Art transcends the medium to achieve the sublime.


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The exterior of Glashaus in the Barrio Logan neighborhood of San Diego, home of a growing number of art+design hubs.

Some of you, as I write this, are partaking of the festivities (and revelries) at Glashaus in Barrio Logan , San Diego for the Moustache Masquerade – Anniversary Party . Last week, Jamie Huffman of Surface Furniture was so kind to let me roam around the studio with my camera, arrange his tools and wooden cars and play with rusty, coppery dust.

I have in mind to try rust watercolors in a future session, and to film the vents turning intermittently with the haphazard breeze, a’ la American Beauty.  There was so much to see at Glashaus, the Beauty of things made, the poetry of craft.

I am reading Gaston Bachelard’s Poetics of Space, of which John Stilgoe writes in his foreword:

The Poetics of Space is a prism through which all worlds from literary creation to housework to aesthetics to carpentry take on enhanced–and enchanted– significances.Every reader of it will never again see ordinary spaces in ordinary ways. Instead the reader will see with the soul or the eye, the glint of Gaston Bachelard.

Indeed, whatever spirituality we can imbue dwellings with starts with the choosing, crafting, and careful shaping of materials.

The resin vapors and the tools reminded me of my father’s and my uncle’s boat and motor repair/workshop in Calabria, Southern Italy, a place that I can only now appreciate in memory–as a kid I saw it as a bit random, a bit dangerous, a bit of a world foreign to me, perhaps unknowable as a little girl, a place of working men, wood shavings, tools and grease. I was drawn to the dogs that were kept there, the boats, big and small, that were stored under the sheds. My favorite parts was the orchard of fig trees in the back, the grape vines, the fields beyond the property wall.

Visiting Jamie’s studio reminded me of  ‘the work of honest men’ and the Wabi Sabi principles of the aesthetics of rugged things. Running my hands on rough surfaces brought me closer to the material aspect of architecture, delighting in details, something that was definitely a learned trait for me.

Thank you so much for having me over, and Happy Anniversary to everyone at Glashaus.

The working space of Surface Furniture Studio and Make in the Glashaus.

Wooden cars designed and crafted by Jamie Huffman, a statement on mass production and commonplace of outsourced manufacturing products.

Surface Furniture Teardrop Travel Trailer

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Turning into pattern/abstract thoughts. Digital collage. Original mixed media on glass. 2008/2010

Art is a wound turned into light.

Georges Braque

(Thank You Lamees)

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Ink on tracing paper. Kuwait, January 2010. The scene at the bottom is what I saw-or decided to see- at The Avenues, the most popular mall in Kuwait City. There is nothing like seeing photography and drawings from a trip abroad to let it sink in that all reality is subjective, and we choose to see what we want to. We just don't realize it in our own backyard.



This was my small parting gift to my art-sister
Ghadah. I went to Kuwait without a proper gift for her, so I thought I would leave her with a low-tech collage, on tracing paper, of my trip. In keeping with the theme of censorship, which fascinated me- and was the basis for a project of a good friend of Ghada’s-I smudged the personal writing. Censorship frustrates me, and in some cases, puzzles me (especially the haphazard application of it); in other it surprises me- when the censor shows some obvious artistic abilities and inclinations- and I wanted to explore this in something I made. Seeing blurred information makes me feel denied.

(Mis)Using the name of a british band, Does It Offend You, Yeah?

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SketchUP Model. December 19, 2009

I have been observing and pondering the gossamer pieces, and more and more forms appear to be floating, swaying as if under water. A benign medusa of sort.

I would like to try my hand at creating a video with this images, and simulate motion. The only videos I’ve done are 3D animations, so working with stills should be interesting, the variety created by different scales, colors, and degrees of transparency/layering.

I also thought about these pieces being installed at such an overwhelming scale so that the image would encompass/engulf the viewer, and the illusion of being underwater or floating -or lost in a good way -could be more complete.

I had in the back of my mind to try out at some point a digital mock-up using SketchUP (since last time I used it I am simply astounded by the variety of resources available and realistic human figures- no more carton man). Then I thought, why not just do it now, and eliminate one item from the long list of ideas for my art and this blog. So here it is. How would it look in a club? It could substitute a whole wall and perhaps be lit from behind to preserve the luminous qualities seen on a computer screen. Perhaps these lights could change color and intensity with the mood, the time, the music.

You may say I’m a dreamer. But I am not the only one.

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Quick sketch of ray fish, or razza in Italian. Concept for a student model. Ink on back of NewSchool Attendance sheet. October 2009




You can see straight thru

an X-ray fish to its heart.

We are just as transparent

so be true, gentle, honest, just. . . .


From :

AN AQUARIUM

Poems

By Jeffrey Yang

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Suburban Landscape II- Digital Manipulation. 2005

Suburban Landscape I- Digital Manipulation. 2005

D-Evolution of Suburban 'Dream Home'- San Diego. Digital Manipulation. 2005

D-Evolution of Suburban 'Dream Home' III- San Diego. Digital Manipulation. 2005




I hope everyone was able to enjoy domesticity during the just past holiday. I indulged my inner  domestic goddess by cooking a pretty good ‘Pasta al Forno’, which actually gets better two days after baking, keeps well in the fridge and will feed you for half a week!

I have also been surfing the web and handpicking the best architecture and design sites the world over, thanks to the World Architecture Community– do check out the new blogroll .:Global Architecture:.

Must-See:
1. Architecture Lab, a fresh, young, visually captivating and insightful international online architecture and urban design magazine edited by Aline Chahine, an architect living and working in Beirut, Lebanon.
The Architecture bites offered here are just the right size, as a prelude to your favorite periodical or taken on their own.
Can Architecture be delicious? Well, check out Architecture Lab and let me know. Made me fall in love with A. all over again.
I love Aline’s chosen quote:
” A great architect is not made by way of a brain nearly so much as he is made by way of a cultivated, enriched heart.”- Frank Lloyd Wright

2. NotCot. They believe in ideas, aesthetics, and amusement. And they do it with stunning graphics and provocative by-lines. I’m a believer, too.

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Digital manipulation of photograph. November 2009



“Out beyond ideas of wrong doing and right doing, there is a field. I’ll meet you there.

When the soul lies down in that grass, the world is too full to talk about.

Ideas, language, even the phrase ‘each other’ doesn’t make any sense.

Rumi

 

 

This is what may happen if you move an image while scanning, tweak the result in Photoshop, and pixelize : an Impressionist painting.

Try it. Let me know how it works for you.


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Pencil and watercolor on paper. November 2009

 


Persimmon Pattern

Original pencil and watercolor, Photoshop manipulation.

I have been involved in few art and architecture related events lately , among them a wonderful sunday visit to the Getty Museum in Los Angeles- of which more next.  Meanwhile, Halloween and Dia De Los Muertos came and went, and the persimmon tree in the yard has been heavy with wonderful, golden fruit.

It took me three days (one for each persimmon) to complete the first work, as I wanted to paint during daylight, and only had about a forty minutes each day to dedicate to my craft. So here they are, my small persimmons.  I wanted to do a study in pastel, but that will have to come some other day…as I actually ate the model:)

The pattern. I guess I have been inspired by the pumpkin colors all around, the fall, and , perhaps, domestic life?

This I feel could make a sketchbook cover, or a great tea towel. Now if only Crate and Barrel or Williams Sonoma would call…




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So , I have been busy doing some art here

This the bounty I received by mail this week!

1.  A wonderful watercolor postcard from my blog/artsister Ghadah, especially made for me!

Mara by Ghadah Alkandari

Mara by Ghadah Alkandari

2.  A new sketchbook (and drawing project) from Jennifer at  habitofdesign.blogspot.com.

Jennifer has started a wonderful project called ‘ A Study In…’ This is a sketchbook exchange where two artist pick a topic for each other -to fill few pages of the sketchbook, and send the work back and forth.  Jennifer started with ‘Trees” and below you see what she chose for me (so excited!)

Jennifer's Package for Yours Truly.

A new SKetchbook. Tabula Rasa!

A new Sketchbook. Tabula Rasa!

The Instructions.

The Instructions.

Jennifer chose this topic for me : Typewriters. Guess I am going to research that next...and I DO love them!

Jennifer chose this topic for me : Typewriters. Guess I am going to research that next...and I DO love them!

The beginning of "A Study In..' Project Designed by Jennifer Reece

The beginning of "A Study In..' Project Designed by Jennifer Reece



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Concept for jewelry piece 'twomoons'
Concept for jewelry piece ‘twomoons’
I designed this piece in the summer of 2008.
Here is the concept on a Post-It (where else?).
I then took it to a friend of mine in Calabria who has a jewelry shop and, from this design,her and the metalsmith first made a wax model then used  brushed silver to obtain the finished piece.
It was presented to me with typical Italian flair and attention to details.
I was ecstatic when I saw the result. The first thing that I designed in its entirety and that got ‘built’ 🙂
Twomoons Wax Proof-modeled after concept sketch

Twomoons Wax Proof- modeled after concept sketch

Final Twomoons Piece, Summer 2008

Final Twomoons Piece, Summer 2008

Here is how the jeweler presented me my 'project'. Italian taste!

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Original Munny -image courtesy of forbiddenplanet.com

Original Munny -image courtesy of forbiddenplanet.com

This was a fun art ‘project’ I did in the Fall.
It reminded me that art should be, above all, fun.
It should never feel like a chore or like “work”. Making a Munny is pure fun, and could be a warm-up for more serious endeavors.

Sometimes, as adults and as artists, it is a great thing to re-learn how to play, to create while being completely unattached to the outcome,
to forget ‘good’ and ‘bad’, and remember that ‘good’ is when we enjoy ourselves.

The results of creating without judgement may please you or amuse you, maybe even delight you.

I bought my Munny at Urban Outfitters, for about ten dollars, and used pencils, pastels and markers.

Munny- Before and After


Munkin (Munny project), Digital Background. 2009

Munkin (Munny project), Digital Background. 2009

 








Munkin at home
Munkin at home

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Photograph Feb. 09

Photograph Feb. 09

This is an example of extemporaneous art.

Art happens all the time, on the edge of our consciousness.

The difference between the artist and the art-aware, is that the artist captures the object of wander and preserves it for future use.  We do not/ cannot let go of  a moment in which Art manifests herself.  We need to posess it, not only experience it.  We are collectors, time keepers.  We are greedy.

This play of light happened as I hung my father’s japanese robe on a window.
I appropriated this robe few years ago, as it was stored inside my parents’ armoire and had never been used since my father received it as a gift, sometimes in the 70′ s or 80’s.
The light streaming through the silk yarns made it alive. Red light bathed the room.  What was captured with the camera is, at best, an approximation, as are all emotions “collected in tranquillity” (Wordsworth).
The robe- and the air in the room- was on fire.

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