Street Art...

Whether a mural or graffiti, isn't it all art?

Linking with Photo Art Friday and Ready to Waltz.

One of Those Days...

Do you ever have one of those days where you just can't seem to machine quilt...the fabric seems weighed down or something and you're struggling to move it around through the machine with your regular ease?  Well, that's the sort of morning I'm having!

Let's take a closer look at why...

Yes, it would appear as though Arbour has again found the newest 'cat bed' that has obviously been put in the studio for her personal pleasure and comfort!

But, being the horrible person I am, I will have to move my little assistant because my wishes to work on this piece trump her need for yet another comfortable place to sleep!

Liebster Award for Cool Blogs

Joanna Grant from http://joannabananadesignoriginals.blogspot.ca/  kindly gave me a blog award that's about discovering new blogs.

Joanna, I can't thank you enough for this award.  I feel very privileged that you have included me in your five choices and it is an honor that I hope to pass on to five other very deserving artists.

ABOUT THE AWARD 

This award was designed to be a blog award in the pay it forward fashion. Once you've been nominated, you award it to five blogs that you like that have fewer than 200 followers, to encourage new visitors to visit these blogs. 

RULES FOR ACCEPTANCE 

Thank the person who gave you the award and link back to their blog. Post the award onto your blog. Give the award to five bloggers who you appreciate that have fewer than 200 followers. Leave a comment on their blog letting them know that you have given them this awesome award! 

PAY IT FORWARD

It's hard to choose only five bloggers who I find inspiring but here are my choices of art blogs that have less than 200 followers and that I know you will enjoy:  

Kit Lang  http://kitlangfiberart.blogspot.ca/

Anne Marie Desauniniers  http://artfuldreamer.blogspot.ca/

Sandra Spagnuolo  http://creatingartnow.blogspot.ca/

Kathie Gadd http://lavenderchalet.com/

Currie Silver http://becurrie.blogspot.ca

(I may have included a blog with over 200 followers as the number of followers was not always listed but I still felt that these individuals were very deserving.)

Recipients, you may copy and paste to your blog and change the introduction and the list of blog awards.  I hope that you decide to participate and award some other very deserving artists.  Make their day!!!

Cheers!

Linda

Crocus are Blooming!

A few days ago I took this shot of some of my crocus, while just a few steps away my dog, Casey lay in the snow.  She's in a bit of a panic because she loves the snow and knows it's going fast so any chance she gets she lays on it or walks through it.

Kim's challenge this week for Texture Tuesday is 'flower power' so these little guys came up just in time.  I used a bit of a comic sketch filter on the image, added a layer of Kim's kk-2203 texture at a soft light blend mode of 60% opacity and then I added the text on an eliptical shape as Kim demonstrated this week in Beyond Beyond.

Spring Is In the Air!

 Last night, while listening to TV I was doodling in one of my art journals, and clearly Spring was on my mind.  I'll probably add some watercolour to this to give it some colour, but today's goal is to keep working on the quilting of my rust dyed piece.  I started working on it briefly last night, as you can see in this photo.

My goal is to finish it this week, but we'll see what other distractions pull me away from it.  Some days I feel like the crow, attracted and/or distracted by anything shiny, but in my case it's anything at all...shiny or not.  Look, there's a distraction now...

Exploring New Materials...

On Friday, I was reminded of some Magic Stamp moldable foam stamps that I bought a very long time ago but had never yet tried.  I also managed to get my hands on some deli paper thanks to Sandra, a friend in Cambridge, so yesterday I was in the studio playing with some new techniques.  I especially liked the result I got when using buttons and some round/spiral paper clips with the moldable stamps.  I painted the deli paper with a thin layer of white gesso and then stamped onto it using various stencils and my newly molded stamps.

This image shows the deli paper stamped with sequin waste, the mesh from a grapefruit sack and the molded stamp.







On this other photo, you can see the button stamp.  I tore up the deli paper and used it as the background for a journal spread.

Although it doesn't show well in this photo, the black and white images show through the acrylic paint nicely to create some good texture to the page.

I used a white pen and wrote a bunch of journalling on the page, as I was thinking about something I'm currently reading and reflecting on the connections I'm making to some things in my past.  Thus the "Try to make sense of it" that I wrote in the circles.

Not my favourite art journal page, but it is probably one of my more productive ones in terms of actually doing some meaningful journalling.

Rusty WIP

Here's a look at the basic layout of the rust piece I'm working on.  I love the rust dyed fabric, but it is really hard on machine needles!  I've got some plans for the larger black areas, although this photo doesn't show the rust in them.  The close up below gives you a better indication of the wonderful colour and texture that is showing on the black.  It almost looks like old leather.  Really cool!

Photo Art Meets Journalling

Bonnie's challenge this week for Photo Art Friday is 'self portrait' so I decided to combine some digital photo work with some hands on art journalling to create this spread. I started with a very low res. image that included me in a group shot that someone had posted on Facebook.  I printed it at the size I wanted to work in, and used it to trace the key shapes (head, eyes, nose, mouth, glasses).  I then used various media including Inktense pencils, Neocolor II watersoluable wax pastels, pan pastels, acrylic paint, black Pitt pen, and white Signo pen to recreate my face as well as the background and journalling on the facing page of the spread.

I took a photograph of the finished journal spread back into Photoshop Elements where I did a minor level adjustment and then place it onto Bonnie's 'inspiration' texture.

A Touch of Tradition

It has been a very long time since I have made a 'traditional' quilt.  In fact, this sofa quilt, made with a large variety of batiks, was started over two years ago and has been waiting patiently to be finished.  I finally finished the last bit of work on it and got the binding sewn on last night.  It's a gift, and I'm hoping they won't mind that it's 'slightly used'...the extra warmth provided by the cat hair is a bonus!  Arbour decided she should help me with the binding, but as you can imagine it didn't make the hand sewing any easier!

You might notice in the close up that the two shorter edges of the flying geese (triangles for you non-quilters) are loose, creating little pockets of sorts.  This adds some interesting extra texture to the quilt.

I'm Honoured...

I've been featured in an interview over on Artful Adventures.  Thanks Kristie!