Going Large

I've been having conversations with other art friends about working large. We all agree that we want to, but really haven't. So I took a tiny dip in the working larger pool when I took a 16X20 canvas down to Jan's. I wasn't worried about wrecking a big canvas since I bought it for $1.00 at the thrift store...gotta love that place.

I started by covering the whole thing with collage bits (mostly book pages) and then added a wash of quin gold, quin crimson and thalo green. I bought some latex house paint samples at Lowe's (on clearance of course) to try the bubble effect that I showed in the provious post. After it was home and on display for a couple of days I started adding more paint. This picture was after I added some extra green, yellow and turquoise.

At this point, I didn't glue down the flask. It actually still isn't glued down while I work through deciding what to do. It sat like this for a day before I got brave and added some more paint. Sorry the pictures are crappy. I couldn't get a good shot without the flash back.

Next I added the orange..loved it.

Finally this is pretty much as it sits looking for the next layers. At this point I figure I've overdone and need to dial back. But no, I'm adding more layers of collage before I go in with more paint. This is the hard part...When is it done? When is it overdone?

How to Be Creative

I saw this on Kelly Kilmer's blog and thought it was interesting.

I just had my third weekend of art play-dates and they all left me super-excited!

First there was a night at Karen's house where we made some postcards and chatted about a small girls' art retreat next September.

The next weekend Marissa came over here and we did a little "Mailart 101". Marissa created her very first mailart and we sent it off to MMSA.

Yesterday I went down to Jan's house and played with Carol and Jan. Even though we were all working on completely different projects we all would stop and admire the others and help push through obstacles.

I painted on a big canvas for a change. Here's just a peek... Art on All!!!

Can you say...Obsessed???

I have been playing with both Citra Solv and Nevr Dull a whole bunch lately in preparation for my class at Kept Creations in Whitman, MA on October 11. The pages below are all Citrasolv on National Geographic magazines. Aren't they amazing! You end up with a lot of lunar landscapes, but I'm okay with that.. :)  I'm home on vacation this week and am hoping to actually create some art while I clean the hoard. We'll see what actually gets done. So far it is 10:00 AM on Monday morning and I haven't done either one.

Enjoy the eye-candy. I'll post some finished pieces later.

 Isn't the green fabulous???!!!

 This one below was from an older Nat Geo (1970's) and it took quite a bit to mainpulate the inks, but it's still cool. I actually like my fingerprints all over it.

 The reds are wonderful too. Boiling hot lava...right?

Ransom Note Makers Are True Artists

If you haven't tried to make a ransom note before, be prepared. It takes quite a bit of dedication to cut and paste all of those little letters. These postal ransom notes were sent last month and I just found that at least one didn't make it where it was going. I'm off to cut more little bits....

I wrote this little instruction manual a couple of years ago.

The camel ransom note went to Tricia for a swapbot swap. I really didn't want her camel...send peeps!

Mailart Inspiration in Light Blue and Neutrals

Isn't it amazing how different people can create with the same theme and arrive at very different results? This is Danielle's Round Robin Mailart Zine. She asked the 5 of us to create a zine with the color theme of light blue and neutrals. This is her entry-

She also asked us to add to her cover page. Yes, the fish is mine....

Next in line was Tera who added these hippos. That one in the front is a little un-nerving. He just keeps looking at me....

After leaving Ohio it went on to Massachusetts where Karen added 2 beautiful collages.

All the way back across the country the zine traveled to California where Kerri worked some magic.

Finally, after it came back across the country to me and sat on my table for a month (or more), I finished my page. The note that is hard to read upside-down says *If you have clothes on, don't take them off. They protect you from shark-skin lacerations. Good advice, I thought. It is now off to Tarah in the Netherlands for its last stop before going home to Australia.

A Weekend of Fishy Mailart!

I have fish flying all over the dining room this weekend! In the picture you can see an "add and pass" to go to Rosalie, an altered game postcard and an envelope for the MMSA envelope swap. I have a bunch more fish postcards happening, but I don't want to show them all before they go out. But here's a sneak peek...cracking myself up, just like Karen .

The words are from a Manga comic book from the thrift store...go figure... :)

July is "Put a Fish on It Month"

Soooo...If Cloth, Paper, Scissors can call May "Put a Bird on It" month, we can call July "Put a Fish on It" month, right?

Here's a little inspiration to get you started... Have Fun!

MailArt Inspiration...Big Time!

Wow! I was blown away by the latest Round Robin Zine that just came my way!

This is the third round of mailart round robin zine that I've done based on this previous post.

The first round took 2 and a half years, but all of the zines ended up making it safely home in the end...whew...The next two were done with mailart peeps from swap-bot and are going much quicker.

Check out these amazing pages. I'm not sure what my page will be, but I get to fill in the last page and send it back to Tarah in The Netherlands.

This is Tarah's aka Cheetarah Cheda starting page complete with scads of her local postage. Tarah chose a "going postal" theme.

 Tarah sent it Danielle aka Bedazzle who created her awesome postal page.

Danielle sent it to Tera aka kattera22 who added a super-friendly mailman then sent it to Karen.

Karen aka iamrushmore added a Super Mail Artists logo in stamps and the sent it on to Kerri.

Kerri aka misscorbeau  added more stamps and a happy mailbox and then tried to send it to me....The zine was returned to her because someone coudn't read the difference between to and from...

And now I have the daunting task of coming up with another amazing page to finish it off before it goes home to Tarah. In the end each participant ends up with an amazing mailart zine of their own.

Storing Mail Art

In honor of MMSA's Mailart Monday blog hop I'm dusting off the old blog...woohoo!

People are always asking how we store our mailart. Short of the classic "in a box" or "in a pile" methods, I do have a couple of other suggestions.

I am a thrift store junkie and you never know what will cross your path if you just keep looking. This wire rack was for Christmas cards I think. A quick spray of chartreuse spray paint...voila! It fits perfectly on the side of a bookcase.

I've also punched a hole in one corner of a bunch of cards and threaded them on metal rings. The hubby built this rack on the back of a door with wire shelving and I use shower curtain hooks to hold the rings. This system also works to hold zip-lock bags of collage bits.

My last storage suggestion for today hangs on the wall in our guest room. We bought a full sheet of rigid insulation at our local home improvement store. (I prefer the blue one over the orange one...) I had a full roll of this Waverly decorator fabric that we had bought super-cheap. We wrapped the fabric around the rigid insulation and secured it to the wall with brass screws and grommets. Simple pushpins hold the cards onto the board. I haven't filled this one up, but I should really spend a day and hang up some of my mailart that is currently in boxes....

Monotypes, monoprints, gelli plates and gelatin plates

Just for the record...flavored jello does NOT work for monotypes. I made a mess and it smelled like oranges...




I'm so excited to teach my monotype class at Kept Creations in Whitman. We've postponed it until next month. I'll keep everyone posted!