Friday, December 21, 2018

NYC field trip and holiday-ing

Soda_Jerk at Anthology Film Archives
screening of Terror Nullius
A busy week in Artlandia!  After submitting all the new prints for the Zea Mays Flat File (whoop!) it was time for a well-earned field trip to New York City.  There I spent time with family and friends and saw the screening of Soda_Jerk's awesome film, Terror Nullius at Anthology Film Archives.  

The next day, my person and I went to the Hilma af Klint exhibition, "Paintings for the Future" at the Guggenheim and it was amazing and eerie! Then we stopped by the Frick to see a great  show The Charterhouse of Bruges: Jan van Eyck, Petrus Christus, and Jan Vos  that featured a Van Eyck painting near a companion piece by Petrus Christus - it was very cool to see the pieces together, and the show also included a terrific drawing possibly by Christus of a lost work by Van Eyck.

We also stopped by to see the window displays at Bergdorf Goodman and they were dramatic and stunning.


From the Hilma af Klint exhibition, "Paintings for the Future,"at the Guggenheim Museum
On the left, painting by af Klint, on the right, the Guggenheim ceiling - coincidence??


The Frick looking so festive all decorated for the holidays. 

The windows at Bergdorf Goodman!

At home, the holiday-ing continues with this year's batch of kitties (x2), owls, and stars gingerbread, and creatures happily napping by the tree. 

Though, I also got a funny picture of all 4 of my creatures sharing the bed, which has become standard procedure.

Even though I swore I made my last finished pieces of the year for the flat file, I lied (of course), and I made one more piece and even framed it.

The landscape shots of this week come from the train ride and are a good representation of the gloomy weather we've been having.


Wednesday, December 12, 2018

bunny and swallow collages

A busy week in Artlandia!

First, the big reveal on a series of new collages headed to the Zea Mays flat file:

16 x 20" collage: relief prints, woodcut, polyester lithography
and ink, colored pencil, acrylic on marbled paper

18 x 24" collage: relief prints, woodcut, polyester lithography
and ink, colored pencil, acrylic on marbled paper

16 x 20" collage: relief prints, woodcut, polyester lithography
and ink, colored pencil, acrylic on marbled paper
Details:



Getting to this point involved many steps. First I marbled the paper.  Then I made polyester lithography plates for the background based on my relief prints.  This time, I did something a little different in that I used the silhouette of my relief image and layered it digitally as a clipping mask over a pattern.  I also used vignette edges, fading to white around the edges of each plate so that I could place them in different spots on the paper without leaving a line at the edge of the plate.  Then I printed a variety of backgrounds.  Unlike the last round, because these involved multiple plates, each one is different, and I also used the ghosts of the plates to create a difference in value from black to gray. Very excited with the way these turned out! 


Then, I printed the new bunnies and re-printed an older block of a bunny and the woodcut block of the swallows. I also made a polyester plate of some of my house and vehicle blocks.  



Then I collaged.  Max helped.
In creature news, all the creatures seem to enjoy the new, larger bed (as we can see, there is even a tiny bit of room for the human!)


 

Honey and I also went on an outdoor adventure with our lovely human. 





The Christmas decorating continues...

Mo as King of the Tree

Wednesday, December 5, 2018

bunny and Christmas tree

new bunny block
A busy week in Artlandia!

I made a new bunny block and marbled paper for the final new collages to submit to the Zea Mays flat file.


new bunny block proof
Opening of En Masse 2018 at Thompson Giroux Gallery
In addition to making new work, I had work in exhibitions opening at Thompson Giroux Gallery and LABspace.  The 7 pieces at Thompson Giroux all sold before the end of the opening which was very exciting and a first for me. 








In creature news - the "kitty toy tree" made its appearance.  It's the little guys' first tree and they quickly got the hang of it.  Mini, being experienced, kept watch over the ornaments.  I'm not sure Honey is into the tree itself, but if it makes her human and kitties happy...





Some good landscape photos this week:





Tuesday, November 27, 2018

swallows



A busy week in Artlandia!

With the holiday season upon us, I made and ordered this year's gift edition of 50, 5x5" digital collages.

Maybe because I'd been working with it on the computer, I also used the swallow in the next collage for this year's Zea Mays flat file submission. One funny thing, to me, is that even though I used the same file to create the polyester plates for this and the other 2 kestrel collages (one of which, it turns out, actually features a peregrine falcon), the sizes and positioning of the plate is different in each piece. This one is 20 x 16."



I also got some good nature shots this week.



The atmosphere and trees in this one look like one of my collages to me.
Cute creature shot of the week - Momiji showing off his cute little paw pad dot.


Wednesday, November 21, 2018

other kestrel, family visit, and snow

A busy week in Artlandia! The other kestrel made it into a new 24 x 18" collage.


Also I had a nice visit with family

There was lots of snow this week and my creatures had very different reactions to it (I vote with the feline contingent on this one :) ):

And on that topic, the landscape shot of the week is the back yard covered in snow.