National Personal Space Day

I thought I’d share a peek into my personal space for National Personal Space Day. This is where I keep a few of my favorite things. You see the corner where I spend most of my life and my two assistants, who do nothing but fight over who gets to nap in this really sad, ratty chair.  I feel very fortunate to have this space. 

I have several workspaces set up in my studio, but in the last couple of years, most of my time has been spent at my computer “station”. Next to that, I have a place by the window where I like to do my drawing and painting, which has been the second place I spend most of my time, though not very much lately. My paper-cutting and assemblage station is out of commission, but I hope to get back to that soon. 

I tend to rearrange this space when I am trying to avoid work, or when I start a new project. And by project, I mean another class, because let’s face it – that is all I’ve been doing; class after class. At some point, I need to put all this learning into action. Perhaps 2024 will be the year I make it happen. But, first I’ll have to completely rearrange my space, which could take a while.

Inspiration is Everywhere

I’ve been moving along slowly in From Paint to Pattern, while I haven’t been so motivated to work on any patterns, I did find some inspiration from my little friend here. It was nice of her to bring a little present too, so thoughtful! I thought I’d put my new Photoshop skills to work and bring in some vector art from Illustrator. While this isn’t great, I’m pretty happy with what I’ve learned so far. I’m still struggling a bit and not sure why my vector art looks so pixelated. It’s something I’ve been working on figuring out.  Thanks so much to Sara Watts for her guidance and also the fabulous Jane and Whitney for keeping things running smoothly behind the scenes!

Here’s the inspiration for the above photo. It was actually a pretty easy process, but something I wouldn’t have been able to do a few weeks ago on my own.

Monday Mood Board

I’m not one to photograph my food, but the beautiful earthy palette in these clams needed to be captured.

It was hard choosing the colors from this photo. I reluctantly reduced it down to these 14 colors from 23.

Have a great week!

Monday Mood Board

Though I’m taking a Photoshop course right now, I still feel most comfortable in Adobe Illustrator, where I drew this Wolfsbane. It’s the start of a bigger project I’ve had in my mind for a while now but still isn’t anywhere near completion.

Wolfsbane is also known as monkshood, but I couldn’t help thinking about gnomes the whole time I was drawing it.

Reference photo by Hans on Pixabay.

Making the Old New

Some of you may have started following me several years ago when I focused on paper cutting and assemblages. I miss those days. It was so satisfying to enter into my zen flow and create something with my own two hands. Bonus if I then sold it! It’s been a long time since I’ve put my blades to paper and I really miss it.

When I’d work on those pieces, it would always start with the most simple idea, but a story would always unfold as I worked and that is when the real fun started.

Since I’ve been working digitally, I’ve been feeling a little less enthusiastic about creating much of anything. It’s been a little over 2 years and with the exception of the Hounds collection I just finished, there hasn’t been a moment when I felt a story emerge or even felt like I was having fun. It’s a bit of a bummer. But, I keep plugging along. I think part of the problem is I spend so much time learning new things, I forget to make time to revisit the old familiar things. At the end of the day, I’m tired of sitting, tired of looking at a screen, and though I feel excited about everything I am learning and all the possibilities, I feel rather blah about the creation process.

I want to get back to the storytelling. I want to feel that sense of wonder, I want to feel excited about the journey I’m being taken on.

My intention in learning digital art was to translate the assemblages into art prints. But somehow, I got off track. I felt in my heart that an art print just wouldn’t have the same impact as the actual 3-dimensional piece, and I gave up on that idea, which left me feeling just a little lost. But as I revisited a few of these pieces this past week, I realized there are stories in each and every one of them, so why not explore those again and translate those ideas into prints and patterns that can further tell the story?

How many stories would a haunted house have to tell?

The early stages of my haunted house – It evolved quite a bit from this photo and there was a scary, sometimes sad story around every corner.

I’m feeling a little more excited about this journey.