Something About Nothing

I've drawn realistic faces before but usually from a photograph as the ones I try to draw from my imagination look cartoonish.  I've envied other artists (like my daughter and son) who can draw a face from their imagination.  When I saw Pam Carriker's Mixed Media Portraits book I knew I had to have it.  I read the book as soon as it arrived but it took me a couple of weeks to gather the nerve to put pencil to paper.  Pam's instructions are easy to follow.  My teenage daughter has tried to teach me the proportions of a face before, but somehow the information, though very simple, has gone in one ear and out the other.  I think I am better at learning from reading the instructions than from just hearing them because I can keep going back and making sure I get it all right.   Here is my first attempt using Pam's method - first a sketch, getting all the proportions just right.  Well - sort of just right!  And then comes the fun part - SHADING! I love shading!

Last Saturday was Monoprinting day at my friend, Timmy's studio in Heber.  I rode up with another friend, DeAnna, who needed to make a stop at the hardware store on the way up.  We spent a lot of time looking at all the gadgets and gizmos and figuring out what might make lovely marks in our mono printing. Looking at mark making items is almost as much fun as the making!  Before we got started printing, Polly (far left) showed us a couple of pieces she is working on which she created using monoprinted fabrics and lots of lovely hand stitching. She was hoping to include these pieces at her show that starts today (Friday, April 17th) at the Charley Hafen Jewelers Gallery.  Timmy has many lovely collections at her studio in Heber.  She recently had rods installed so that she could display all of her beautiful handmade purses.  She has made a few but most of them have been purchased from artists around the world.  This beautiful Shibori robe is a new d

Last week was a beautiful spring break at our house.   The weather was fabulous but . . . Two words: stomach flu.   Do I need to say that we didn't get much crossed off the to-do list??? I was able to get some cleaning and a little sewing done.  Mister supervised the cleaning of the studio of course. My daughter decided the Bird Wings needed a home until we find the perfect backpack. They make an interesting bra don't they! Hahaha I started this project when I was at Pie Plates Retreat. I really like where it is going. I need to dye more of the turquoise leaf fabric because I would like this piece to be much bigger.  I created the fabric using a foam stamp with Color Magnet and diluted turquoise procian dye.  The purple is left over from my Printed Fabric Bee Science piece .  I just love these colors together.  When I started the project, my friend, Sylvia , threw a piece of plain peach fabric at me and challenged me to put it in.  I argued

Julie Booth's theme for The Printed Fabric Bee was Mola. Perhaps you have seen the beautiful Mola's   created by masterful Kuna women in Panama?   Beautiful bright colors and striking designs in reverse appliqué. It certainly was a challenging theme to translate into paint and dye.  After studying many variations on Mola's I decided I wanted to use a bee - perhaps for obvious reasons - as the focus.  I created two stencils using my Silhouette portrait.   The first stencil was for the background (green) and the second was the bee (red).  I started with a piece of hand dyed fabric in a very pale yellow.  Next I taped the background stencil to a silk screen and screened several colors at the same time.   The bees were stenciled on last in black with the second stencil. I'm a little disapointed that my bees don't look very friendly. This is the finished piece for Julie: Here is the giveaway piece, which ended up a few inches larger than the norm