Tag Archives for painting

Flower Face… and recent obsessions

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January so far has been half-full of specific commission work (super exciting stuff that I’ll have to wait and share with you later!), and half-full of creating whatever I’d like for some shows coming up. This is the hardest part; coming up with content – ideas that feel good enough to soil a piece of lovely cream Stonehenge paper (so soft and creamy! I love it so). When I’m stuck for ideas I pore through old sketchbooks to remind myself of things I once thought were interesting. This is always kind of weird because it feels like they’re someone else’s drawings, like hearing your voice recorded and played back to you (do I really sounds like that? In my head my voice is much for confident and butch. Hmm). By mid-march I will be creating new work for two separate month-long Artwalk shows -

Saturday, March 9th                5000 20th Ave NW, Seattle

Thursday, March 14th
4210 SW Oregon St., Seattle
6-9pm

So, I’m trying out some new things, like acrylic on Stonehenge paper in conjunction with pencil and ink. It’s weird – I feel like these drawings are showing up and someone else made them. Not that that’s bad or good, just weird. Thinking of: flowers and lace and blood and weeds, black velvet and portraiture and napping.

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Alright! Enough talk about art! Here’s what else is on my mind:

Current obsessions

  • our new bread machine (thanks, Grandma!!)
  • Die Antwoord
  • wearing lipstick and perfume and, a bra once in a while – generally acting like a girl
  • our space heater, and making makeshift kotatsus
  • ID documentaries, specifically Wicked Attractions and Missing

What’s on your mind?

13 Days to Go…

With 30 paintings to finish. Here are today’s updates!

“Suck it! (They’re succulents… get it? Huh? No?)” I think I’m coming down with some sort of cold, or maybe it’s a wicked combination of wine/video game hangover + caffeine withdrawal. Anyways, I feel lousy. :( So today was spent working while watching Dirty Jobs. Hmmm. The following paintings might be getting a bit grosser. Guts and maggots and flies all that good stuff.

Oh! Thank you, thank you so much to all of you guys for voting for me in this year’s RAWards. I am officially a city finalist! On November 17th there will be a finalist group show, where voting will take place live to advance to whatever the next stage of this popularity contest is. I owe you all big time for helping me out here, and getting a ton of exposure for my humble drawings. Let’s see what happens next!

love, me.

 

painting, painting.

Aaaah! What am I doing?? I’ve never been comfortable painting, and here I am, simultaneously working on 30 8×10″ canvas boards, to be finished by the end of October, eventually to wind up in the TK Artist Lofts in Pioneer Square for the 30 Day Art Challenge show on December 6th. Pfhh, why not? 30 days, 30 paintings, no problem – right? Entries are now closed, but I invite you to join me on your own – get yourself 30 little canvases, or 30 pieces of paper, or take a photo every day for a month.

^ Two in-progress pieces.

Originally conceived as an exercise to combat procrastination, the 30 Day Art Challenge (formerly the Forgotten Works 30 Day Art Challenge) has been going on in Seattle for 10 years, and this year I hear 110 artists have signed up. Providing we all finish our pieces, that means the gallery space will house 3300 paintings at once! How cool is that? Sign-up was open to artists of all levels, and pieces will be hung with all information on the back, so while up for sale you technically won’t know who did what. Andrew Buckles, the coordinator, tells me that last year an 8-year old and her professional-artist mother both entered, and the daughter sold more pieces than her mom! Awesome!

I agonized for a few days over what my attack plan for this project was going to be. Blank canvases are so scary! I knew I had to give myself some parameters – a framework – in order to stay focused. I began by covering up that terrible brand-spankin-new-gesso-white, with a range of blue-grey-greens. Today I finished painting in the white “ghosts” which I will begin to fill in, probably jumping back and forth between pieces till the 30th of the month when I’ll have to go drop them off.

So, how about it, artist friends? Join me in fighting proctrastination! Ok, go!!

On an unrelated note, voting is still open for this year’s RAW Awards. You can vote once-per-category-per-day, so you can still vote for me – if you feel like it. Or not. Just throwing it out there. :) Okay, now have a fun, creative day!!

Wow! Artist: Aubrey Learner

Oh my goodness, I am in love. San Franciscan artist Aubrey Learner has an MFA in fine art and a BS in biology, and the combined loves mashup to create something truly stunning:

blush

watercolor on paper 23×38 inches

pheromones

watercolor on paper 17.75×30.25

black chemise

ink, graphite on paper 36″x24″

milk and honey

watercolor on paper 33×41 inches

collector

Acrylic and ink on paper 48.75×45.25 inches

Her intricate drawings include insects, silk, candy, pins, lace and parasites. They arouse both disgust and desire; smaller perhaps disturbing bits making up a beautiful, larger whole. More images in her online portfolio, here. Ugh, she is so good!!