Finished at last!

Finally, I've finished a journal, only the 3rd I've ever completed I think.  I have at least 4 or 5 others started, I'm very fickle when it comes to journals, so this is quite an accomplishment for me. I was looking through it yesterday, realizing how much my art has changed since I started it, which was probably at least 4 years ago.  

These pages have no continuity in subject or medium, they're kind of crazily random, just whatever I felt like doing, or was in front of me and inspiring me at that moment.  And I'm not sure what I want to work on next, probably not much as I'm out of town for the next 4 weekends. Then, amazingly, the Holidays will be upon us!

I hope you're all getting some Autumn to enjoy, we're just getting teased with it here, but I feel it coming!

Journal pages

I haven't been home much lately, but I have made a little progress in my mission to complete this particular art journal.  We went to the Sausalito Art Festival on Sunday, which provided me with inspiration as it always does, so hopefully that will help me make it to the finish line.  Wonderful artists were there as always, and fun live music in a gorgeous setting.  I've posted pics before so I didn't take any this time, but I gotta say it was much hotter than it should be in Sausalito which is right on the bay near San Francisco - I felt sorry for the artists sitting in those sweltering tents all day.

The following two are my take on a couple of Stefano Bessoni characters - I love his twisted yet whimsical art (although the first one is just cute, but definitely with some trouble brewing in those eyes), and I'm getting in the mood for Halloween as I long for Autumn.

Journal Variety

A variety of journal pages, trying to finish one - 15 pages to go!  I can't explain why I suddenly feel the need to actually COMPLETE something, but then I probably don't need to as you all most likely totally understand.  And this is good practice for me to just work on quick pages, not get too invested in them, and move on.  Always good for me to be working consistently on a (mostly) daily basis.

Jewelry re-purposing and art journal push

I've had an old French light fixture chain for quite a while - I had no idea what I'd do with it when I bought it, but I loved it.  I was looking at it recently and realized that the smaller pieces would make great jewelry components. so yesterday I took it apart and gathered a collection of bits and bobs I could find around the house and made a couple of necklaces.  It was a lot of fun and I can see how jewelry making could be addictive.  (I'm exerting willpower to resist buying any supplies....)

Aside from that, I've been trying to finish an art journal - my goal was to finish by the end of this month, but I can already tell you that's not going to happen.  I've been playing around in it though, no pressure stuff, trying to get art on the page, which is a nice change of pace.  Here are some of the more presentable ones...

This is what I call a couch page, a pen and a few watercolor markers while watching a movie...

A little playing around

I haven't done much on the art front lately, much less homework, just a little playing around (part of the reason though is from being out of town last weekend with a friend playing around in Bodega Bay).  I won't bore you with pictures as I've posted pics from there before, but we had a great time.

This one actually was semi-homework, essentially just playing around with collaging some paper bits on a canvas board then mostly finger painting to keep it really loose - it was a lot of fun.

The next two are small charcoal/pastel faces I did in my little Kraft paper book - I love doing faces on the colored paper, the white stands out so well.

This guy ended up looking meaner than I had planned though.

I'm trying to power through and actually finish one of my many art journals this month - we'll see how that goes, I'm out of town again this weekend, but maybe I'll take it with me and actually do something in it (this usually ends up being wishful thinking).

The Last Empty Wall Space

Available wall space is always a rarity at my house - I tend to live in houses that are longer on charm than space, and I'm a bit of a collector.  So I've had a blank space crying out to me over one of my kitchen windows since we moved last year, but just hadn't been able to commit to anything.  Then a month or so ago I found an old wooden I don't even know what - drawer of some kind?  It's completely crooked in every way though so it's hard to imagine - part of it's mystery I guess!   I'm charmed by misfits and the general size was right so I brought it home and have been eyeing it ever since, trying to decide what to do with it.

I decided over the weekend to stop being so commitment phobic and just DO something with it, so I started playing, in the process pulling out half the contents of my studio. A lot of this can be moved around or taken out, so I didn't completely conquer my commitment issues, but some of it is there to stay, unless I were to do some SERIOUS sanding.

It was a good break from the portrait work I've been  doing, and really fun to get back to one of my great loves, mixed media assemblage.

Homework

I'm trying to be a good student, actually doing some of the homework as assigned in the Kate Thompson online portrait class I'm taking. I'm trying to just relax and let them be learning experiences as I work with different lighting and materials, and not get all invested in the results as my perfectionist self tends to do. 

Partway through the first one I realized that I was supposed to have put a layer of matte medium down before painting, which explained why the Golden Retarder I was using was acting nothing like Kate's was.

As a break from portraits I painted this in my fabric journal to practice with the retarder.

Practicing sketching - she's more worried here than in the photo - I have that effect!

So, this is my first ever self-portrait - in spite of having been assigned many in prior online classes, I never actually did one, definitely not in my comfort zone.  But, trying to be a good student and all I went ahead and tried it, holding a hand mirror while I tried to sketch.  I suppose if you can set aside self judgement and take advantage of having a live model available to draw from it has it's benefits, This isn't quite me, I can't pinpoint exactly where it's off, but it was a good experience.