A New Use for Things in the Plumbing Aisle!

So, I've been looking for a way to use colored chalkboard paint that I've been eying for a while. I took an old God-awful dresser from the 70's that used to be in my parent's living room (sorry parents) and repainted it using gray semigloss and some blue chalkboard paint! I think my dad's original intention was to create a rustic antique look with all that yellow, not my fave however. It may have looked better when I was a kid but I seriously doubt it. Since I had taken over my kitchen with art materials I needed another space and place to put all of my supplies. I created a small studio space in my newly renovated living room and turned this dresser into my studio cart. I took off the old handles and replaced them with something unconventional and industrial. I strolled the plumbing aisle at Home Depot (one of my favorite things to do) and found these steel half circles that I think were used to hold piping down or onto a surface. They looked like drawer pulls to me! I really love taking things and using them for something other than what they were intended. It's also fun to weird out the person helping you at the hardware store, however I do get some cool people who really get into it! So, I painted the front of the drawers with the chalkboard paint and added white casters on the bottom. I really love this piece and I hope it will help me keep my supplies more organized! (The white paint on the yellow is me getting antsy and jumping right in before I actually take before pics : )

Out with the old, in with the new...well new-used

I've been busy renovating my house since summer. I've given my kitchen a makeover as well as the bathroom. I'm just now finished with my living room (pic of me below with my renovation face). I will post pics soon! My bedroom was completed this summer which now has a stenciled floor. I love it! I had all of this old furniture from the 70's that I was about to give away but instead decided to give most of the pieces a new life. Here's one. This was an old coffee table my dad used. I've always hated this thing and thought it was ugly but now I love it. I hand painted the flowers and trim on top of the gray. I have a second table that needs the same kind of makeover. I've got some ideas in mind so stay tuned.

Layers

All summer long I've been working on renovating/making over my house. I finished my bedroom, the bathroom and painted my kitchen "borrowing" some great ideas from designspongers along the way. I spent some time traveling as well. Now that I am back into the teaching world and the weather is getting chilly I now have more time to work on making more art. I am in the midst of ordering more canvas, watching for those sales on dickblick! My goal is to start promoting my work around town a little more. I am so antsy that I can't work consistently on something to save my life. I have high production weeks and months as well as very low production times. Just my nature I suppose. Well, these little ditties are fun to make so I can't wait to get back into my art. I am brainstorming new little creatures as well. Until next time : )

Oh Happy Day! Obama Sighting!

Just had to post this! My brother, his girlfriend and I literally just missed Obama and his daughters at The Dairy Godmother today in Del Ray (Alexandria, Virginia)! Apparently, we were at Cheesetique across the street while they were getting some ice cream. We went to get ice cream right after they stopped in. Some people outside were talking about their visit. The girl behind the counter in the back left served me too. We then went into another little art store where the owner confirmed the sighting and was asking if we saw the Pres and his daughters. So close!

Ankeny, Iowa Green Fest

Hi all! I've been super busy working on as many paintings and sculptures to sell at my very first show, the Ankeny, Iowa Green Fest! A little humid and windy at first (as you can tell my my wonky hair) but the sun came out later and it was beautiful. I was more excited than in my picture! That image is the result of my mother taking 3 minutes to take a picture with my cell phone! You just press one button, I don't get the problem haha. Gotta love her. I just completed my show today and had a blast!! I think this will be addicting. It was nice to see people respond well to my new work, I'll be a busy bee in July making more paintings. I nearly sold out, which was very unexpected. I also made my first trade with another couple selling pottery in the booth near me. I think that was one of the highlights. They were just such nice people and they kept telling others to come check out my work! Seriously, could you ask for better neighbors? The customers were equally friendly with nice comments. Overall it was a beautiful and successful day!
Here are a few things I learned during my first show. Be prepared to set up on either grass or cement. I thought we were setting up on cement/parking lot but when I got there everyone was setting up on grass. It was a bit windy at first and I didn't bring any stakes for my canopy! Lesson learned. Always be prepared for either with weights for the tent or stakes for grass. I was lucky, the canopy I bought held up wonderfully without stakes. It was even on sale, score! Second, I brought some items that blew over if they caught just a little wind, so I need to rework those ideas if I bring them to another outdoor show. I can't even count how many times I had to reposition these items. Lastly, I think I would like to make a professional looking sign for my canopy. I saw one a few booths down from me and thought it made the artist seem more professional and legit.
Can't wait for my next show. Time to go order a bunch more canvases and get crackin!

Three by Three

More new work today! Who knew old cereal boxes could look so pretty? The squares actually take less time than the circles because I can measure and cut pretty simply. The circles are a free for all haha. These have that newspaper woven basket look that I see in my bowlflowers and wallflowers. With the bowlflowers I am conscious of color and pattern but with these I am not using color in a specific way. Both are very much about color, pattern, and texture. I'm really just trying to make something aesthetically pleasing in 3 dimensional forms out of a 2 dimensional objects. I would like to make a 3 dimensional sculptural piece without the canvas as a backing. More to come : )

And We're Back

So, as you can tell from my last blog entry that I have been MIA for over a month. Taking winter break to a new level I guess. I have been busy however, developing some new pieces, working on prints for a print exchange, filling up a sketchbook for a gallery tour, and filling out paper work to be a substitute teacher this semester now that I am only teaching in the mornings. Hopefully subbing will lead to a full time job once again since I up and left my old one in Fairfax, VA. C'mon suburbs of Des Moines, show some love! So, I used to teach my elementary students different cut paper techniques and I should mention that they taught me some cool ones as well. I also showed them how to make cut paper butterfly molas that required layering paper that would be cut smaller and smaller each time revealing some of the underlying color. At the time I did a little bit of research and there are a lot of artists that do this in a number of ways, with different colors and patterns. One artist stacked paper and cut away at it to look like a topographical map. Another, one of my faves, Jen Stark uses stacks of paper that she cuts into. I guess this is my homage to what some of these artists do. I would like to take mine even further, making sure to completely make it my own and just using these artists as inspiration. I used rectangles and circles cut from cardboard cereal, cracker and tissue boxes to reveal some of the color and mostly texture. I would also like to keep symmetry and repetition in numbers in these peices. In this piece I used the number 3, three circles, three rectangles. Most people don't know this about me but when I was a kid I had these little ticks, like a lot of kids do. I used to clear my throat and make little sounds in 3's, take 10 steps and count again in 10's. The number 10 is actually my favorite number to this very day, huh : ) This is how my first one came out but I think for my next piece I would like to take a saw to the bigger stacks and cut sections out or cut them in half to reveal the inside. I thought about weaving strips on top of strips too. I believe I will expand on my original wallflower idea through cardboard layers as well. Ok, well it's bye for now and I promise to not go missing for another month : ) Toodles