Thursday, May 22, 2008

Where have I been?

Time sometimes passes in such a blur or fog or whatever and one day you realize that a month has passed in the blink of an eye.

I am working in two journals right now, depending on my mood and how much time I have. The skinny little pages, in a journal my daughter made are usually done in a jiff with garden variety markers, pens and a handful of items chosen at random from the overflowing box on my work space. I also work on this when I am on the phone with someone who just needs me to listen. These pages interest me because they seem to represent the entire process of letting someone into your head then taking them into your heart and letting the experience come out of your hands. The square pages, from a journal I made in a class with Kelly Kilmer, can also happen spur of the moment, but usually these are more leisurely put together with paint, specific images and the use of technique.

This page was painted and the images pasted in at Kelly's class. I had no idea what to do with it until I wrote this quote in response to feeling like I needed to spare others my...lets just say emotional release.


The next one is different for me. I just used a black and a red pen. I read about Barron Storey on Kelly's blog and looked at his site. I think I was under his influence with this one. I have given up trying to find "my" style. I'm pretty much all over the place at this point, and having fun trying everything out. My daughter tells me that she can identify me by the colors I tend toward.


First attempt drawing with charcoal pencil. I love the trees that Katie of joyouslybecoming puts in her spell binding paintings and did this under her spell.
Just some quick fun one day after hearing "Do I Ever Cross Your Mind?" sung by Ray Charles and Bonnie Raitt on Genius Loves Company. Made me thing of a long-lost young love.
Waiting for a verse. I made this while clearly still under the romantic spell of that love song.

I am a struggling, fledgling drawer. I feel like this is a bit of a mess and very primitive but I read about this in Eat, Pray, Love and had to express the impact it had on me. Not the best book I've ever read, in fact a bit annoying. But the chapter with the shaman really spoke to me.
And I can post this here because of my wonderful friend Randi who when I told her I couldn't draw held up one of my attempts and said, "Yes you can. You draw like this!" See, Randi, see what you have unleashed on the world?

I love this page. The text comes from a good friend who is kind enough to save me pages from the old books he deals in. Yumm! I love this type. And I have hoarded this image for a couple of years waiting for the right piece to put it in. I think I will type some journaling, cut it out and paste the strips over the text.
This page is an example of being ready to accept the gift of something gone wrong. I was attempting a transparency transfer of an image I really liked. Ink was still too wet and it smeared all out of recognition. My initial disappointment vanished when I really looked at this. I love it, so mysterious and all. Reminds me of a map to a hidden kingdom. Then I found this blue feather in my stash. Serendipity, such a comfort in a rigid world.

Keep reading if you can stand more of me. These are some photos of koi that I took at a shop we visited to try and get snails for our little fish pond. Out back they have several pools of all sizes of koi for sale. You will recall, from earlier posts, I love taking pictures of fish in water. None of these will ever win a prize, but I like the play of water, light and flashing colors of fish. I was happy with them. Then, while cropping etc. one of them got enlarged and holy schmoly! take a closer look. Does anyone else remember, back in the late 70's I think it was, that subliminal advertising was on every one's mind. (So sorry, I just could not resist) There were books and articles urging us to beware the "hidden" images in things like photos of glasses of beer, for example. If you studied them closely, the ice cubes and bubbling brew contained grotesque and sexual images. And they did...well, if you closely and long enough.

While my fish photos have not been deliberately encoded with subliminal anything, just look what chaos brought us. Click on them to make them larger, let your eyes go "soft" and have some fun finding the "hidden" pictures.



The next one has the most obvious magic. Can you see the little sea sprite, who actually looks a bit like Daffy Duck, petting the black and orange fish?



Got to get going now. The husband and I are off to a board meeting for the rehab we are involved with then to an installation dinner for the officers of Key Club, the high school Kiwanis Club that our club sponsors. I love these dinners. Seeing the kids in this environment gives me hope for our world. Peace to all.