The Artist's Way: Discovering a Sense of Integrity

Last night was the third session of my Artist's Way Creative Cluster and our focus was on integrity. For our warm-up exercise, we did movement inspired by Soul Collage cards created by Deborah Koff-Chapin of the Center for Touch Drawing.


For our creative project, we did some touch drawing ourselves. (I had the good fortune to attend one of Deborah's workshops back in February of 2009.) This is such a relaxing and calm activity and the ladies really enjoyed themselves. We moved and swayed to the drum music of Steve Gordon while we let our hands and fingers (and elbows and knuckles) dance across the paper.

ArtFest Mish Mash

On the first night of ArtFest, tons of people gathered in the Commons of Fort Worden to make trades with each other. I had a made a batch of bottle cap magnets and Scrabble word packs, which you can read more about by clicking here. I had made 117 packets to trade and they were all gone within 30 minutes of arriving in the Commons! In return, I received an entire bag of glorious goodies, including packs of ephemera, charms, beads, buttons, ATCs, original artwork, fibers . . . the creativity of what I received was endless and inspiring.






At the opening night festivities, there was live music and dancing in the aisles.


Now I know what I can do with all those plastic toys I collect!





Just horsin' around with one of my fun purchases.


My dorm, Building 225, from the outside (look at that view!) and from the inside of my room looking out.



Show 'n Tell on Saturday night - several large rooms where people share what they made in their classes.


Tory with the lamp she made out of sausage casings - yes, sausage casings (I guess they're kinda stinky). The lamp was so cool!


A parting shot with Tory before we started our five-hour drive home (I'm so glad Tory likes to drive cause I sure don't).


PS

I participated in two swaps this year, an ATC and a Fatbook swap. Here are photos of the Fatbook I received on opening night of ArtFest:





And here's the ATC book:

Make It Yours

On my third day of classes at ArtFest, I had the privilege to sit at the feet of Bee Shay. The class was titled Make It Yours and it was all about making and using your own papers, words, thoughts, and marks when creating a piece of art. The first part of the day was relaxed and slow paced as we spritzed and sprayed and brushed inks and paints onto a pile of Japanese rice paper; we then further embellished the paper with designs and words. The second part of the day we created a canvas with a bold central image using the paper we had made in the morning. Oooolala, it was fun.


Preparing the paper:





The evolution of my piece:







Here's me with Bee: