ArtFest: Story Painting With Punch

My first class while I was at ArtFest was with Gina Rossi Armfield and the class was Story Painting With Punch. I don't love my finished piece, but I did love the process and have some ideas for using a different type of image in future pieces.

Here's sweet Gina demonstrating the technique of marrying a black and white image with paint:


And I got to sit next to a fellow Portland Art Collective friend, Paula!


Okay, here's a little photo gallery of my work in progress.








My finished piece, taken in my fancy studio (the bed in Dorm 225, Room 29)! The question is this: Is the woman holding red posies, or bloodied rags?

Outlandish Tales: What's Inside

I participated in a swap at ArtFest that was coordinated by the talented Portland artist, Nikki Blackwood. This was a swap between members of Camp Runamuckus, a group of women who share housing in Dorm 225 at Fort Worden. Nikki random matched up the interested women into pairs, who then exchanged information about each other to help figure out what to make for the swap. Nikki drew my name so we were officially swap partners.

I've known about this swap for several months and had played around with a couple of ideas of what I wanted to make for Nikki. At an early point, I was going to make her a set of blocks that represented our theme of Outlandish Tales, but I jettisoned that idea long ago. For a while I thought I might do an altered tin since Nikki loves rusty, vintage, edgy pieces. Again, this didn't quite feel right. I finally settled on creating a set of images on Formica tile samples, something I could embellish and place into a rusty tin. I started in on this and really made some progress. But a few days before I was leaving for ArtFest, it just wasn't working, the Formica didn't have the right sound or feel. I decided I would take something I had started at Art and Soul a couple of years ago, rework and revamp it, and make it Nikki's. I cried (really, I did) as I realized I was going to do this. So, with reluctance and excitement, I took my Vintage Metal Deck from the wall and began transforming it into a story of outlandish proportions. And all of this was done the day before I was leaving! I worked on the metal deck for all of last Tuesday and managed to get it completed.

A bit of the process (Destree popped over late in the day and breathed new life into a few of the pages).




The completed deck:




All wrapped up and ready to gift:


Nikki opening her gift from me:


Nikki made me the coolest altered book cover, incorporating lots of vintage lace and metal and numbers and paper and even a big 'ol brass D!


And just in case you are curious or want to see more of the pages I created, here are some close up shots of what's inside.

The Artist's Way: Discovering a Sense of Power

Last Tuesday night was the second session of my newest Artist’s Way group. We were discussing Chapter Three: Discovering a Sense of Power. I had asked the ladies to bring items that represented power for them and they brought such varied items as a gavel, money, driver’s license, knitting, and the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous. It is an interesting exercise to choose a physical item that represents a concept.

For our creative activity, we did a favorite of mine. I had each of the women write in their journals about their critic, or their internal censor. They could either write about how it works in their life or what it looks like. After they had written for about five minutes, I had them close their eyes and draw a squiggle over the top of their writing (with no peeking and no lifting of their oil pastel crayon). After they had squiggled away, I had them use any color oil pastel they wanted and asked them to embellish or change their squiggle into something beautiful OR to embellish their drawing so it represented their censor. They were all happily drawing away, listening to the music, when I chimed the bell and asked them to pass their journal to the person on their right. That person then continued with the embellishing, using any color they wanted and doing whatever they wanted to the page. A few minutes later, another bell chime and again they were asked to pass the journals to their right. This continued until all of the journals had circulated and the ladies had their own journal returned to them. Everyone shared what they had done to each of the journals.

Think Outside the Tin And See What Happens!

I came up with a new class idea last month and called it Think Outside the Tin. Last night was the first time I taught the class (other than with my Walking in This World women, who were my guinea pigs!). Come see what eight creative women did with a prepared tin.

The class was held at Stampin' Cat Studio in Lisa's fabulous studio space at the back of the store.


The initial prep of the tins:






Caveat . . . I got a new camera over the weekend, a Nikon S70 Coolpix, but I have not yet learned how to use it (it's a touch screen, so completely different from my old Nikon Coolpix), so the following following are less than acceptable. However, I wanted to post about the class so I am including them here with my apologies. Guess what manual I'll be studying before I take another round of photos?

Preparing the patina in advance of class:


Getting started:





"Most" of the finished tins:

Aren't they just beautiful?