I just returned from spending three days at an art retreat at Menucha with my Portland Art Collective sisters. Menucha is nestled on a hill overlooking the Columbia River Gorge just east of Portland. We arrived on Friday afternoon and claimed a spot in the Greenhouse, the large meeting room where we gathered to work on individual art projects. I chose to work on some little art elements (yardsticks cut into various sizes) in preparation for making vignettes. I didn't get any of the large pieces assembled, but I sure made progress in getting all of the wood chips painted, covered with vintage papers, and aged to look even older than the papers already are. I then began attaching embellishments in preparation for putting it all together like assembling a puzzle. Here's how I spent my long weekend:
Board prep for my project.
Steph had fun playing with my little wood bits and embellishments, laying out a possible finished project.
Projects around the room ranged from sewing to painting to knitting. I love the look of hands creating, so here's a variety of shots of what was being made at the retreat.
A couple of completed projects: Tory's little village of clay houses and Tammy's sewn flower mural (made from stealing scraps from the sewers in the group)!
Saturday afternoon was our big Art Garage Sale. We all clean out our studios and bring what we want to get rid of. Everything goes into the living room of one of the houses we rent and then it's off to the races. The entire room was filled with arty goodness: paints, brushes, vintage ephemera, handmade papers, rubber stamps, books, embellishments -- I was so busy shopping, that my photos don't really capture the frenzied excitement because I waited until I was finished to grab my camera. We all then pay for what we took by putting money into a fund to pay for the U-Haul rental to transport the doors for our Open Doors show in December. (The art supplies no one wanted will be donated to SCRAP).
On Saturday night, we had a TV theme sing along. We all brought songs to sing, songs like the themes from Mr. Ed, Flipper, The Flintsones. We were horrible. Really. Usually in a group of 20 women there are one or two voices that stand out. Not with this group. We have vowed not to do this again, but I did hear a mention of dancing . . .
The beautiful grounds at Menucha. I managed to break away on Sunday morning to walk the Labyrinth.
