Color Inspiration

Hi All,

As I had told you recently, I have not been communicating well with the paint lately and had to turn to a different way of expressing my creativity. I am actually waking up in the night with exciting ideas but they are only partially formed and nothing has really gelled yet. I am playing with assemblage and other types of collage. Here I am playing with supplies grouped by color. I like doing this because it can inspire me and it's PRETTY!!!

This is a grouping of different colors but similar items. I will let you know what transpires with this. If I am lucky perhaps one night while I am asleep, the Art Leprechauns will come and put it all together for me into something really spectacular. (I would even pay money for that.)

Peace and Love to all, and to all a Good Night.

Kelli

Busy, busy, busy

What a weekend it was. I got to spend all day Saturday with my daughter. She just moved so we had fun arranging paintings on the wall. Of course she has to have a collection of momma's stuff. Looking back at some of the pieces I did years ago was fun, except when I saw some that I really wanted to rework. Sometimes you look back at your work and think - cool, I did that! Others you look back and think - geez, can I take that frame apart and do that over?

Sunday I finished a commission piece. This was fun to do since I haven't done a landscape like this for quite a while. This is watercolor and colored pencil. Some of you might recognize the area, it's in Evinston. A few of my plein air painting sisters were just there for a paint-out, more power to them! I'm a studio painter. I don't know how they deal with the weather, hauling the supplies, bugs etc........ I guess I'm a wimp :) I like the comforts of home when I paint.

Off and running on the next project,

Peace,

Carlynne

A Walk in The Forest

I have been staring at canvases and dabbing paint on them and then not being happy, painting over whatever I did. I am just not feeling the paint right now. Sometimes that makes me a little panicked, but always disappointed and unhappy. However, there are many ways to be creative and when the well is dry, it's time to fill it with an artists date. So, my husband Greg and I went for a drive into the National Forest and took photos.

We really liked the color in the thistle flowers. (Yes, I know it's a weed, but Nature makes no distinction, all plants and animals welcome.) The bright purples are the ones in full bloom and then they lose color and become paler as the bloom fades and dies. I like both. I will share more of these photos when I have a chance to look at all of them. Perhaps this will inspire me or you to do something creative.

Peace and Creativity,

Kelli

Still stringin' along

I think I spent more time in the studio this past weekend than I did anyplace else. If I wasn't painting I was prepping surfaces or sorting and putting away supplies. I even love doing that! I did take a trip to the book store though, looking through the magazines and art section just made me want to go home and paint some more, so I did.

These are a few of the many projects going right now. I'm continuing to play with string gel and since I have that fish tank in the house now I thought I'd take a little inspiration from it's occupants. I want to make a few different fish shaped stamps and have some fun. These 2 pieces are little 5x5's that will go in the Etsy shop.

Enjoy your week.

Peace,

Carlynne

I love seeing what other people do

The fact that I love texture is not exactly breaking news so of course when I find an artist that loves it like I do I get excited about it. When I got my newsletter from Artsy Shark this morning I just had to share. Bobbi Mastrangelo does some of the most intriguing work with handmade paper and metal. I just want to run my hands over all of these pieces. Poke around on her site and look at what she's doing.

Happy Sunday to you and Happy Birthday to my daughter Liz!
Peace,
Carlynne

Football and art go together?

When I was in high school my world revolved around my friends and art. Outside my circle of friends the school revolved around football. It swirled around me non-stop in a blur of shoulder pads and cheerleaders and pep rallies. At that time, at that school, if you weren't involved in football you were a nobody, you didn't count. That was the attitude at all levels. Us artsy types were just background noise - not even that really, we just existed. We didn't show up on any one's radar unless, of course, someone needed a poster or banner painted for a sporting event. There was "us" and there was "them". I still see some of that separation between the art world and the sports world even 30+ years later. Some of that separation comes from me and my own attitudes, a self imposed distance coming from lack of interest in sports but also, maybe there's a residue of resentment left behind from the old days. Everyone has their own interests and there's nothing wrong with that, that's a great thing. Sometimes we need to get out of our own areas though and explore what other people find interesting. We might find some really interesting people. And yes, I have watched a game or two and enjoyed it - who'd a thought!

So.... what brought all these thoughts back to the foreground for me was this article that I came across on Artcyclopedia

The new Dallas Cowboys stadium is not just a stadium, it's an art gallery featuring the work of 14 living artists. These are site-specific commissioned pieces of abstract art! Hurray!

"And why shouldn't a stadium have art? Sporting venues in the ancient world had it, impressive and brilliantly colored. Besides, football and Texas go together; Texas and money go together; money and art go together. Voilà: Football and art go together." -Willard Spiegelman

"Football and art go together"..... I like that. Now can we substitute "Texas" with "Florida"?

Have a good weekend ya'll and peace,
Carlynne

Heading North

Lea is hitting the road today and we're going to miss her very, very much! She is one of those students that is such a joy to have around. She's always got a smile on her face and caring in her heart. Take care friend, have a safe trip and we'll see you next November.

Peace,
Carlynne

Movies, guppy babies and string gel

It's been a great Saturday! It started off with Amazing Hubby not having to go to work this morning so we watched a movie and had breakfast in bed - fabulous omelets made by Amazing Hubby. We watched The Time Travelers Wife - good flick.

Then..... we watched fish. We just got this tank set up so we've been having a good time with it, it's very meditative. There was a momma guppy about to pop so she got put in the birthing tank and there she went dropping the babies. I do have to say it's a little creepy to see a creature give birth and immediately turn around and gobble the baby up. ewwww. I think she ate 6 or 7 of them and we might have 20 survivors. Maybe when they're bigger I can get a photo of them.

Then..... it was off to the studio. I just get so excited by textures! This is what I was playing with today - string gel, acrylic and foam squares for stamping. I'm definitely going to have to experiment a little more with this technique. Oh, made some progress on a painting commission and walked a couple of miles too. Yay for productivity!

Now..... it's time for another movie, Blind Side. I've heard it's very good. I hope ya'll are having a nice peaceful evening.

Carlynne

Bored?

Can you tell it was a little slow at work today? I thought I'd walk around the store and see what I could see. It was interesting using my viewfinder to find abstract compositions on the shelves I look at every day.

What do you see every day?

What was in your Easter basket?

Happy Easter, whatever that means to you, and I mean that in the nicest possible way! I'm not a religious person so it doesn't have the same meaning for me that it may for many of you. Right now my thoughts simply go to my children and family. April is a special month for me and as you saw in Kelli's post yesterday I decided to celebrate in a slightly unusual way - by getting a tattoo. It was kind of hard to see the actual design in the other photos so I thought I'd give you a close up - I know, don't do you any favors right?

Years ago this would've been the farthest thing from my mind but things change. Big events in your life have a tendency to make that happen and I wouldn't do something this permanent unless it had big meaning for me. Like Kelli said, going through the whole cancer thing was certainly a big event and makes you think about a lot of things. There was also another big event - it happened 8 years ago - I found my daughter. I'm a birth mom, a member of the adoption triad. She was born in April and she was 22 years old when I found her so basically I spent 22 March's dreading the April's. It meant remembering a lot of painful stuff and was very difficult to deal with. Well now of course I get to celebrate her birthday and let me tell you, seeing my 3 children together for the very first time was one of those life altering moments that's impossible to describe! Now my daughter has 2 moms (thankfully she sees that as a good thing) and I have all 3 kids in my life. So, in honor of the power of "3" there's the triquetra for mind/body/spirit and my 3 children's initials winding through it. I had Amazing Hubby help me with the design - he's a genius with Photoshop.

Getting a tattoo on Easter weekend (or any time for that matter) may seem like a really nutty thing to do, but for me, having a design that Amazing Hubby and I did together to commemorate life and reunions was the perfect thing to do.

Have a beautiful day,
Peace,
Carlynne

PS: have you ever microwaved a peep?

Tattoo Day!!!

Hey All,

If you thought yesterday was just Good Friday, you would be wrong. So many momentous things happened, I barely know where to start. Of course there was the First Friday Art Walk in downtown Ocala, and yes, we both sold one piece. But, even more importantly, my creative partner on this blog, Carlynne got her first tattoo and her sister-in-law, Leigh Hershberger got her 4th!! Leigh is the sister of Amazing Husband whom Carlynne has blogged about in the past.

I am honored to have been invited to my very first tattoo party at Fat Kats on the square, and I tried my best to document the event. You can see Carlynne in the chair above as hers is just being finished. I was very impressed with the artwork in the shop, the collection of art books and tattoo designs, the cleanliness, the friendliness and the professionalism of the guys there. (Well gee whiz, what did you expect my reaction to be? I've never been in a tattoo parlor before. Do they still call them parlors? Maybe it's salon.)

You are probably asking yourself why did Lynne want a tattoo? Based on what she has said and what I am assuming myself, it has something to do with being a woman past the age of 50, surviving cancer, and recognizing that family is really all any of us have. Even though at this point, I am not inclined to have this done on me, I understand it perfectly. After all I never colored my hair until I was 50 and it had nothing to with grey. Now I am thinking about going a really funky color. But, enough about me.




Here is a shot of what Leigh's design looks like just as it 's getting started, and before she passed out. OK, not quite, but awfully close. (Note to self: if I should ever decide to get a tattoo, make sure I eat first. Even my acupuncturist tells me to do that.) But don't worry, Leigh is alright now. I hand fed her chocolate as she laid in a stupor on the reclining chair and she drank some wine afterwards. Below you see Leigh in the process.

Carlynne's finished tattoo, an original design created by her and Amazing Husband with the initials of her children intertwined. Personally I am not too keen on elective surgery, especially when I am awake, but she said it was not nearly as painful as she had anticipated. I thought she should just wear a vial of their blood around her neck, but that would involve hurting her children to get the blood and she just refused to do that. I saw the tattoo several hours later and it was barely even a little red and not swollen.

Watch here for a complete unveiling in future posts.

Peace and Love to all,

Kelli

Mindfulness

Hi All,

Recently I realized that whenever I am doing something, I am not really there. You know, I'll be washing my hair and thinking about what I need to take with me to class, (is my hair washed and rinsed or did I just wet it?) Eating breakfast I am thinking about the new student we will have and what she might be wanting to do today, (where is my egg? did I already eat all that? I've only been sitting here for 5 minutes. Sorry I missed it. Maybe I should have another one.) In bed at night I am thinking about whether I will get my taxes done on time this year, (I wonder if I remembered to list that receipt, I wonder where I put it. No wonder I am so tired during the day.)

So, I have recently been trying to bring myself back to the present moment and be mindful of what I am doing in any given moment. Now that spring is here, I am noticing the flowers as I drive around town. (I know what you are thinking, shouldn't she be mindful of DRIVING while she's driving?) But these are right at my front door, so no humans were injured in the writing of this post.

Enjoy and don't forget to stop and smell the azaleas. (I am really glad spell check has azaleas because I didn't feel like looking it up and yet I know that I could possibly be an example to a young person out there and should not spell it wrong.) And if you have time, join us in downtown Ocala, FL on the square for First Friday Art Walk.

Peace and love,

Kelli

It's April

It's April, it's a new month. This is a month of meaning for me. This month my oldest child turns 30! This month will be the 9th anniversary of my quitting smoking - that's a biggie too. This month I get my first tattoo - that's tomorrow! Kelli said she wants to document it with photos so maybe you'll see it here. And yes, for a short time I fell for the Google/Topeka name change thing. LOL! The lengths people will go to for April fool's day.

Anyway..... above is one of the pieces I finished today. I just couldn't get the violet color to show up the way it really is which is warmer in tone and more vibrant. Oh well.

I know I've been absent from here recently but I've been focused on painting. This is a good thing! I've been working on a hopefully promising project. If it pans out I'll share more info so keep all of your fingers and toes crossed for me. In the meantime I'll be breathing through the tattoo process and then setting up for the First Friday Art Walk in downtown Ocala. Come say hi to me and Kelli. We'll be on the square from 6-8 tomorrow night at the Sushi Bistro of Ocala.

Peace,
Carlynne