Nature Morph

things finished and unfinished

Finished (for the most part):

Quail Magnolia

Birch with Birdshrooms

Unfinished (and racing against the clock to be completed):

Goose and Rabbit Magnolia (diptych)

She-Wolf with Birch

Framed and wrapped and ready to go:

In 48 hours, I will be in a plane on my way to Seattle, and it stands to reason that my work will be done by then.  Yikes!  I don't know why this particular round of show prep has been so tortured.  But I am so looking forward to visiting Seattle for the first time, meeting my co-exhibitor Justin Gibbens, seeing a dear old high school friend, meeting fellow blogger Christopher Reiger (who happens to be out there at the same time as I am), going gallery hopping, etc., etc.  Maybe the rain will even hold off!

Once I'm back, it's time to start tackling my paper quilt project in earnest, and also to start prepping for my show at Rare Device in San Francisco that opens in early June.  (And, might I add, the Red Sox season gets underway, but I digress.)

print preview

My work for Seattle is just about finished (thank god, since the show opens a week from tonight), and I will post all the pieces hopefully by tomorrow night.  In the meantime, I'm happy to announce that my Bird Heart print with Keep Calm is finally in the tail end of production and should be available on their site in a few weeks.  I've been emailing jpegs back and forth to London, and the printer is in Paris, so it is an international affair!  Here's a sneak peek:

And, as a reminder, there are still a few medium and large size prints of my Manshroom collage available through Jen Bekman's 20x200, at this link right here.

duck, duck, goose

Almost done with this here goose magnolia:

Made from these two things, each magnificent in its own right:

I had been painting bare birch trees, and they were killing me, and I realized that I have been so desperate for Spring that I had to go back to my magnolia pictures from last year, and paint them.  Now I feel better, and the painting was easy, and the goose adds some levity to the fact that I've got my back to the wall with the deadline for the Seattle show.  Something tells me I'm not going to make it down to NYC this weekend for the art fairs, which I'm really upset about.  Why can't I be more disciplined about getting my work done on time?  (And, the flu is not all gone yet, boo hoo!) 

And, if we're going to be bemoaning things here, if you are one of my art dealers, and you are reading this, I cannot handle another one of you deciding to close your doors.  I know it's a sign of the times, but I am starting to think that it's really ME, that you all are closing shop because I am the common variable!  No, seriously, I know "it's the economy, stupid," but it suffices to say that I won't be having a repeat of the banner year I had in 2007.  And on that uplifting note (ha!), I will be back tomorrow with the finished goose product.

bunnies from the vault

Happy Easter to those who celebrate it!

collages for Seattle!

These are each 10x8 inches, and they will hang in a grid like this mock-up I did on Photoshop.  I'm really happy with them, and I'm even happier that they are done and on their way to the framer's.  Some close-ups:

 

 

the intersection of art and [family] life

I swear, once I have kicked the flu and fully tackled my Seattle show, I will return to the world of regular blogging.

So this is my new book:

My daughter was flipping through it and found this owl drawing by Brendan Donnelly.

And so we made some owl drawings together.

What can I say?  How much happier could I be to do a project like this??

And: the Tokion book is amazing.  It has so many of my favorite artists in it, including Clare Rojas and Simone Shubuck.

I'm finishing up a bunch of animal-themed collages for my Seattle show.  Hopefully I'll have some pictures tomorrow...

coming up for air

Yikes, another week has gone by.  I've been sick, sick, sick, and now, to top it off, I've lost my voice.  I did manage to drag my fluish self to the studio today to finally finish this birdshroom drawing.

It's headed to Seattle for my Animal Spell show at PUNCH Gallery with Justin Gibbens.  Check out how cool the postcard is!  The designer, Justin Beckman, made a composite image of my birdshroom and Justin's unicorn mole, and I am so excited about how it looks.

looking back

Yesterday in the studio I decided to dig out some big old drawings I had made as preparatory sketches for the first wall mural I ever did, way back in early 2004. 

 

 

They are probably the clunkiest, most garish things I've ever done.  I collaged bits of fabric and paper onto them, and I deliberately used materials with which I have absolutely no finesse, like acrylic paint and cray pas.  It was a good way to get the ideas down without worrying about the finished product.  I have no idea if I ever blogged about that first mural, and I'm too lazy to go back and check, so here it is, possibly again.

It's hard to believe that such a muted palette came from these crazy colorful drawings! 

I also dug up this unfinished graphite drawing, which also found its way into a mural project.

I guess I would call it a foxglove-robin.  It became part of this mural, which I mentioned before, here:

All of this is to say that I am looking back in an attempt to move forward with my work.  The common thread running through all these images seems to be scale.  Clearly, I need to work large... and yet, I keep making very small collages!  Maybe, through some sort of miracle (or hard work, though I'm hoping for lightning to strike in the studio), they will meet in the middle.

March madness

Why is it suddenly so busy around here??  I can't keep up with this blog!

My Seattle show is right around the corner, and I think that the postcard image is due tomorrow, so I am heading into the studio for the day to finish up the piece that I want to use for that.

I've been making some stream-of-consciousness collages.

I've been thinking about eyes.

And I've been reading poetry.

Stewardess, by Yehuda Amichai

A stewardess told us to extinguish all smoking materials

And did not detail, cigarette, cigar, or pipe.

I answered her in my heart: You have beautiful love material,

And I did not detail either.

And she told me to buckle up, bind myself

To the chair, and I answered her:

I want all the buckles in my life to have the shape of your mouth.

And she said: You want coffee now or later,

Or never.  And she passed by me

Tall to the sky.

The small scar at the top of her arm

Testified that she will never be touched by smallpox

And her eyes testified that she’ll never fall in love again:

She belongs to the conservative party

Of lovers of one great love in their life.

postcards from Tuesday

My girl's morning piano practice:

The remains of Frosty, who melted overnight:

Antique store loot from yesterday:

Maps from an old book that will be turned into a paper quilt (log cabin style) for an upcoming show:

Birch trees from my morning walk along the river with the dog:

And some new collages.

 

See you tomorrow!