Lesson 67 - A Course In Miracles Card

Front of watercolor paper card-

Inspired by lesson 67 of the workbook in "A Course In Miracles", this quote is an easy one to meditate on.

"Love created me like Itself."

1. "Today's idea is a complete and accurate statement of what you are."

This is the first line of the lesson and really completes the thought, don't you think? In reforming my ideas about myself, I can remember it, ponder it, look at myself anew and more forward more peacefully.

This is the first weekend in a long time where I didn't do one single creative thing - until 9:30 P.M. Sunday night when I made this card.

I did laundry. I watched art making videos and took notes. I walked 40 minutes and had a nice swim afterwards in our deliciously warm pool on Saturday and Sunday.

I did more laundry and thought about all the things I could/should be doing. I napped. I started reading a new historical novel, a five pounder on the life of Cleopatra.

I did more laundry. Napped again and put together really simple dinners for us.


Back of card -

Spray watercolor - turquoise. A heart outlined with water soluble oil pastel and finger smudged.

Some weekends are just meant to be restful and this was one of them.

I used a calligraphy pen to write the quote, its' source and my name.


Inside of card -

I did some sewing around the letters with gold metallic thread and it shows up on the inside. I leave long tails of thread hanging.

I like the messy look. Something alien to a seamstress such as me. My Jr High School sewing teacher would not give me an "A" for this, but she might like the colors!



This is the front of the envelope.


I left some paper bare for the address, but really like the way the watercolor dots and drips all over.



The back of the envelope-

Here is the turquoise in all its sprayed and drippy glory with the stamped letters on a old book page.

I have several copies of Reader's Digest in my garage/studio that I have used for many years to lift up from the table, the silk stretching frames I used when I hand painted silk for the prayer shawls I used to make and sell. The pages are nice and yellow now and make a great background for stamping.

It's been hard for me to switch from my sewing machine and fabric paints to paper and crayons, but I am beginning to like what I am doing. And, now, as I post this, I can go into the coming week not feeling as if I wasted two whole days.

Pink-Orange-Green Heart Card

Front of Card -
A happy combination of colors went into this card; pink, orange and green! 140 lb watercolor paper card set was sprayed with pink watercolor paint. See the drips! Don't you just love the drips?
Next, a swath of orange acrylic paint, followed by stamping a green heart with a hand made stamp. Hearts are easy, peasy to carve and I never get tired of making new sizes and shapes.
On top of the green is a heart I cut out of hand colored, stamped, and journaled paper that I sewed on with black thread. See all the loose thread hanging down? Oh, but my 7 th grade sewing teacher would have a fit to see such a mess!
I balanced the collage with more paper scraps and a deeply purple jewel. Sigh.
The last step was to sew a zigzag stitch using my favorite gold metallic thread. More loose threads all over the place.
Being messy is so SatiSfyinG!
This is the envelope.
I used the negative from cutting out the heart and glued it over another handmade green colored paper so I could write a legible address.

This time I had to be careful about sewing because I wanted the card to be able to go inside, so I just added gold metallic to the upper edge and did a couple of start/stop/pull threads out and cut so I would have lots of thread hanging around.

This will require "hand stamp" by the U.S Post Office, for sure!

This is a scan of the back of the card, signed by the artist, (Me!) and the back of the envelope, too.

Lots of pretty pink and orange and green to go around. And, the inside is just as pretty, too.

I am going to enter this in the color challenge at - http://colourcreatechallenge.blogspot.com/

I sure do hope they like it as much as I do.
Now, I wonder who I will send this beauty to. Hopefully it will brighten up their day as much as it has mine.

Don't you just love it when art makes you smile?

p.s. Does anybody know how to make photos pop up on a separate page to show the art close up? I couldn't find instructions on blogger.

More Handmade Cards

Card front -
I'm using 140 lb. watercolor card sets to practice all kinds of techniques and materials. The front of this card has a layer of gesso that I made marks in before it dried, making the card rather heavy to hold. I then sprayed watercolors and after that blend of yellow, orange and red dried, I used oil pastels to draw the hearts.


This is the front of the envelope. I got carried away with smudging the crayons, but it sure was fun to do.

I used the same techniques for the inside of the card leaving room to do some writing when I send the card to someone, someday.

This is really fun!

A handmade card.

The front of a new handmade card.

Sometimes it's fun to just forget how much you are trying to learn a new skill (drawing portraits) and just play around with color again.

I had some watercolor card sets sitting around in my garage/studio that were so old the paper was getting a yellow tinge.

That happens to me a lot. I buy supplies and then put them up on a shelf because I don't know what to do with them. Yet.

I rediscovered a bunch of liquid watercolor bottles I had gotten from Crayola and decided to put some in spray bottles and play around with them for awhile. What fun it is to spray color all over paper!!!

I had a lot of background papers made just for practice and started to cut them up and use them as stencils to spray over and through. It's really fun to use the negative paper you get from cutting out simple shapes.

After using lime watercolor sprayed and dripped on the card, I added some blue acrylic paint. A quick swath of color was just enough, but I made sure to do the envelope and inside of the card all at the same time. The more drips and splashes, the better. I need to do this kind of stuff to loosen up! I am so new at making paint related art, I tend to over think every decision.


This is the envelope. I used the negative shape for the address box and really looked forward to writing a real address inside it.

I even uncovered the sewing machine that has been sitting on my table in the garage and sewed a metallic gold thread border on the heart papers.

For someone who has sewed on fabric for 50 years or so, this was a happy, happy work.


This is the inside of the card, opened out so you can see the stitches made by the sewing machine. I was amazed at how easily the thread laid on the paper. Not one episode of thread breakage or shredding. Amazing!! This stuff is usually so picky and even using a large eyed needle and all the silicone lubricant I can slid over the spool, there is usually a time or two of threads shredding and such.

This watercolor paper was a dream to work on. I am going to make lots and lot of cards. What a wonderful way to practice collage techniques and come out with something useful, too!

This card is going to Karen. Happy Birthday!!!

SuziBlu - portrait #1and #2

It was late. I was tired. My brain was scrambled from a day in front of my computer doing billing and insurance work.

There was no way I could contemplate making art.

So, what's the best way to spend an evening if the TV is just too, too silly to stare at?

Why, find some "how to make art" videos and plant your tired eyes in front of your PC.
I am taking (silly me) another course in drawing portraits, and this one is from my favorite, fabulous, forty year old fighter-for-all-who-hanker-to-create-art; Miss SuziBlu.

I'm sure you know her, she is all over the web and is truly one of a kind. An enthusiastic cheerleader who unstintingly shares her art making experience and love of all things pigment related. Oh, can she make you laugh out loud! At home. By yourself. At your computer.

I found her on You Tube last year and have been addicted ever since. She is so gracious that when you take one of her courses, she lets you download the videos, and there are a lot of them, so you can watch them anytime, anywhere. No wireless needed. No time limits. No trouble at all.

So, here I was, as I said, tired, red eyed, stiff necked and sore bottomed staring at Miss SuziBlu tell me to pick up a pencil and just draw. I had a dull #2 with no eraser left on the bitten end and my wide ruled tablet of note paper.

And, much to my surprise, instead of taking notes like I always do, I put down my ball point and picked up that ratty pencil and did a drawing while Suzi demonstrated how to make a charming, young, beautiful artful face on the video.

Before I knew it, the video was over and I had a drawing laid on top of those blue lines. How wonderful is that?

Now Suzi is in the second week of The Goddess & The Poet class and has started in on colored pencil.

I watched video #2A and got out the Moleskine purple label she recommended for the class and did another portrait today.

This is another face based on a model advertising eye shadow. It's a shame they all wear false eyelashes. It's hard to see the real shape of the eye, but oh, they are such pretty girls. I forgive Maybelline and Cover Girl and all the rest. It's wonderful to have such a plethora of pretty faces to learn on.

On of these days I am going to graduate to color. I have been stuck in graphite on the Pursue Portrait course because (a) my faces are too realistic in an awful way and (b) the last time I tried color, I got an awful mess to show for it.

This art making stuff takes years and years and I've been told it takes 10,000 hours to get good at anything.

That part's OK, but do I have 10,000 hours of play time left to work it out?

Pursue Portrait # 7 and #8

The Pursue Portrait on-line class with Pam Carriker is a really nice class for me. It is really a challenge to draw a face and put some of your own into it.

I have been looking around at old photos and am not finding many with me in them at all. That's because I am always the one behind the camera.

Even when I was young, my sister, Gloria, always said, "Your turn! Get in the picture!"

Guess I didn't listen to her very often.

I took this photo with my digital camera last week and was trying to find a nice head tilt image. I'm happier with the lips and eyes and even the nose has the somewhat square shape I see in the mirror.




I got tired of looking at my face, so I ripped apart a few magazines. Photographs of women in purple eye shadow are really fun to draw!


One of these days I will get up the courage to add some color to the sketches I am making.

Now who wouldn't love to have a face like this to draw everyday?

Portrait Class continues

The work continues. Looking at one's own face is such a challenge. It's difficult to be involved without being critical. This was done from a photo taken when I had my adult Bat Mitzvah in 1985. Of course, while I worked on the drawing, I was filled with conflicting memories of that day. Glad I had completed another goal, happy to be with family, but concerned about where I would be going goal-wise from here.

I shouldn't have worried. God always makes sure you have lots to learn.

A Portrait Class

(Diffuse Glow)

I am taking a portrait drawing and painting class with Pam Carriker at http://www.creativeworkshops.ning.com/ and after practicing on a "generic face" that Pam created for us, I moved onto the next lesson where she encourages you to draw your own face. sigh.
This is not so much fun.
I do not have a 30 year old face. Or even a 40 year old face. 50 is just a memory and now I'm in the middle of my 60th decade and let me tell you, the invention of digital camera is fun for computer use, but not so much fun when you need a blurry version of yourself.

I remember, fondly, my first Kodak Instamatic. Point, shoot, instant flash if needed and then you send the roll away and you get 24 or 36 softly blurred images as memory keepers. Those were the good old days and I didn't even need it then. I was young. My face was unlined and thin and my skin glowed with youth!

Now, however, I have an amazing digital camera that is brilliant at capturing tons of photos one after the other and not one costs me a penny. I can shoot hundreds and still not fill up my 2 Gigabite SD card. If I want a copy of any photo, I print it out at home or have them uploaded at Snapfish and get prints for .09 cents each - a special deal...

But try, just TRY to get a soft focus shot of an old face. Grrrrr. I finally resorted to using the "diffuse glow" option on my photo editing software and after playing with it for 90 minutes, I got about 12 photos that I wasn't afraid to look at. Sheesh.
This first photo is diffused and glowing, but softly. I had to jiggle it so my face wouldn't disappear altogether.

(Digital image)

After lunch I got out my Polaroid camera and took about 10 photos of my face an arms length away. I was on the porch and it was a sunny day, so the photos were not flashed, but boy oh boy were they blurry! My arms are just not long enough for the 3 foot focus of that camera.
Having lunch settled me.
I decided to try to do a portrait, so I printed out a few of the photos that I had fooled around with and sat down with my pencil and paper.
Guess what. There was just not enough detail to get a fix on my chin.
So, I went back to my computer and took another look at all the photos I had taken earlier in the day. I had shots coming from all kinds of angles. Up close, 3/4, full front, left side, right side, smiling, teeth, no teeth, frowns, surprise!, dreamy and whatever mood I could think of to describe what was happening on my face.
How and when did my nose get so Big!?
What I realized right then was, I had some really good photos of a face. Just a face. OK, so for now it is my face, but so what? It's something to draw and someone I know. I was suddenly glad for all those pictures. I was happy with them. I felt good inside. And, I don't know why. Something inside me had changed from before lunch to after lunch. I was OKAY with these pictures and I was going to use them as is.
I printed out a bunch, thank goodness I had figured out how to set my digital camera to black and white setting, and I sat down again at my drawing pad.

(First Self Portrait)

This is what happened.
It's a near likeness. Maybe only I can see it, but it is my first self portrait. I am going to trust that it is OK. I am going to be happy with it just as it is and I am finding out that "diffuse glow" comes from within.
Who knew?

Backgrounds

I've been taking an on-line class, Layer Love, with Julie Prichard, who can be found at: http://thelandoflostluggage.ning.com/.
She teaches how to make interesting backgrounds for art work, journaling and so on.
This is project number three. The base coat was yellow, next was lots of transparent washes with anything leaning toward brown. There are a few pieces of collaged elements added when the colors were just getting more aged. The final layer is made by making the paint drip down the page.
This was fun to do. It reminded me of all the color washing I did on the walls of my office at home.

This is what my walls look like. Two walls are painted in layers of blue and dioxizine purple. I started with a sky blue base coat, then with a sponge and the mixture of dark blue and purple with lots of glaze, I did lots of spongy circles all over the two walls. Three layers! For the fourth, I sponged paint here and there and sprayed water for drips.

It is dark, beautiful and restful. The other two walls are white. One wall has a bifold door closet. The other is a wall of dark wood book cases.
Funny how I never thought of it as artwork, but it is!

First Finished Mixed Media Project.

This is from the class I took with Willowing. She has a wonderful workshop that shows lots of ways to paint, make backgrounds and also talks a lot about facing fears of making art. She showed how to create this image through her videos and though this painting isn't an original, she is the first I ever completed from start to finish.
Art is taught by copying. This is a copy and it was fun.

A colored pencil face -

Taking a course with SuziBlu, Petite Dolls, got me to playing with colored pencils. This is the first face I colored.

Amazing how scary it is to actually color in a drawing. I had tried watercolor pencils - what a disaster! Everything has to be wet at the same time in order to have smooth transitions of color. NOT an easy thing for a novice. And, using student grade watercolor paint doesn't work well either. There really is too much filler for the color to lay down smoothly. Professional grade is a must!

I wouldn't even try acrylic at this point. The paints dry so fast, you are often chasing color after color and soon end up in a mud hole. I know using an extender is supposed to help, but I haven't yet found the correct proportions for mixing it with the paint. Another task to master.

Colored pencil, however, is a great tool for a beginner. It goes on in layers that just sit where you put them. Once a color or two is laid in, you gently burnish it to blend and soften the waxy application. If you are careful and go gently without crushing the paper, you can get a nice natural shading going. I was pleased and surprised with my first attempt. If not for this first face, I might still be cringing at the thought of applying color to anything I draw.

Art trials-

I am changing my idea about myself.

For the past several months, I have been monitoring/taking mixed media classes online. Being very timid about drawing and totally afraid of what I might create, I have not been fanatically creating stuff. The fear has been getting in the way. A lot.

Slowly, however, with pencil and watersoluble oil pastels in hand, I have been splashing paint on watercolor paper. Most of the time I want to rip the page out and never see it again. Lately, though, I have just been accepting my first efforts as, just that. First efforts. Not really important in the scheme of my daily life. No one sees them. No one can make hurtful, wise-ass comments. No one can ask, "Why bother? What are you doing this for?" Enough of that goes around and around in my own head to keep me cringing at the sight of all my new art supplies. Little is made, but that's where I am, for now.

I haven't even turned on my sewing machine since March! Unheard of in this house! What? No new skirts? No new tees? No multicolored nine patch quilts? Nothing at all for my two granddaughters? sigh.

I have found this about myself. I am solo-focused. Is that even a word? I cannot switch from sewing to drawing easily. For now, if I want to learn how to draw and color, I have to just draw and color. It's bad enough trying to turn off my work brain to switch to play brain without also trying to do sew brain.

Now I know why people say childhood is a fun time. All you are expected to do as a child is learn stuff. Words, numbers, manners, concepts, ideas, new foods, walk, run, rollerskate, ride a bike. No body cares if you misspell, add it up incorrectly, or burp out loud - at first. Imperfect behavior is the natural domain of a child and if you are lucky, the adults around you gradually and patiently show you how to do all of it better. If you do fall off your bike, most likely your mom or dad or auntie will bandage you up and put you right back on the seat of that bike to see that you keep going. How nice is that!

All of that is harder as an adult. Things have become hardwired. Beliefs about limitations have settled in. New activities with body or brain come slower. I have forgotten how to be patient with myself. Now, when I was a kid, my parents often fast forwarded me to act more grown up. I was the firstborn of four and did everything first, fast and perfect. This is not easy to change, but I am trying. I don't want to get older and not have explored my abilities for fear of failure. When I am 90 (G-d willing) I want to be busy. I want to indulge my curiousity without all of this fear hounding me. And, I don't want to apologise for being born anymore.

Lomography - Holga 135

I saw a small paragraph in the Sun Sentinel newspaper last December about the new popularity of plastic cameras. After seeing some of the photos taken by these low tech devices, I HAD to have one! I am SO TIRED OF PERFECT DIGITAL PIX! These photos were taken with a Holga 135. It's a plastic camera with a plastic lens and no flash. This style is cool because you can use ordinary 35 mm film and have it developed at any local store AND you can have your pix put on a CD.
This shot was taken early one sunny morning with a 400 speed film and I just love the dreamy quality of this view. Beautiful, soft, south Florida sky with green, green trees. The sun hitting the plastic lens makes the light scatter all over the place and I would have a hard time creating that effect in any of my photo altering programs.

This is a view of our pool and plastic chairs. Look how lush and dense the folliage presents itself as it pushes through several of the now absent screens of the pool enclosure. Surprisingly, most people in our neighborhood have fixed the hurricane damage that was left in October of 2005, but we kind of like to see Mother Nature pushing her way into previously forbidden spaces.

(And besides, I can swim quite naked without fear of nosy neighbors wondering what all the splashing is all about.)

This is a shot of the gable above the master bath. Look at the incredibly intense color of the sky! This camera is amazing! I just love the soft edges that blur parts of the photo. That vine attracts Zebra wing butterflies and I can't begin to tell you the joy I feel as I see them reeling about those big juicy leaves looking for the flowers to drink sweet nectar and lay dozens of eggs for future generations of little transformers.

I got this photo just while taking my morning walk down our sweetly shaded street. Look at the misty effect created, once again, by the plastic lens.

Plastic. Irregular. Imperfect.

Creating softness, reflecting the mystery that is everpresent in each newly created moment of this most beautiful day.

Skirts

It's been awhile since I've done any sewing, but I caught a cold a few weeks ago and when I don't feel good, the only thing that makes me happy is to sit at my sewing machine and run fabric under the needle.
These two skirts are the first is what has turned into a series of toddler skirts for my two granddaughters.
Happily, they fit! Since they live a 5 hour plane ride away, I have to hope they're gonna be OK.
It's truly fun to sew a size 3T and 5T because a project gets done likity-split!

Been Gone Too Long...

It has been a long, difficult and painful summer and I am glad it's over! In January my right knee minuscus spontaneously tore one day while I stooped down to the lower part of a filing cabinet and I could hardly walk at all.
I figured the body would heal itself, so I waited and hobbled around, living with pain all the time. The worst part of it was not being able to go for my morning walks! My body got depressed. I got depressed. I was teary a lot of the time. I am addicted to my own endorphans!

Well, by May I had had enough and went to see an orthopedic MD. He gave me a cortisone shot and said if that didn't clear up the pain, surgery was the next step.
The shot did not help. At all.

Grrrr.




I waited some more. I worked and limped through the office. And getting up from a chair was not fun at all. Think about how many times a day you get up and down from a chair or the commode. Not Fun!

Since I was stuck in a non-moving-much mode, I started to make these multitiered skirts. And, in doing so I learned how to use my gathering foot. What a neat tool for my sewing machine. I've had it for years but never used it because I figured you could never know exactly how much fabric to cut for a project ( and I honestly didn't think the little foot could posible work, it's so simple looking)

WRONG. It works great!


So I began by cutting lots and lots of 6 in wide strips, sewing them together and letting the foot have at it.



It turned out to be great fun! It was easy sewing and it didn't take me long to cut out the strips, which was the other reason why I got into making these skirts. I just could not stand and bend over my table to cut out anything complicated when I was in so much pain.

The knee crisis came crashing down on me one day in the office when all of a sudden, I just could not walk without support. We got crutches out of storage and I had the surgery two days later.

The surgery wasn't bad at all, but the healing time after it has been HORRIBLE. And, long and drawn out and seemingly neverending.

However, two weeks ago, I realized that I no longer had pain when walking or getting up from a chair. Halleluya! I actually began to feel good everyday. It's been ten long months of limitation and I am so glad it's over. No more tears for me!

And, by the way, I have made a total of 27, YES, COUNT THEM, 27 multitied skirts. Comfy to wear and now my new uniform.

Altered Tee Shirt

Okay, so everybody and their grandmother (me) are now doing Tee Shirt surgery to any piece of knitted tee, old or new, that they can find.

This was my first. A very nice garment dyed blue tee that started life at $4.99 and a size Men's 2XL.

I know, I know. THAT'S SO BIG! However, I like that size because I can wash it, shrink it and then cut it out to fit me using a pattern that is the size I want for the project.

I've talked to a lot of women about their tee shirts and many have the complaint that I have; too big on top, too tight at the hip. grrrrr.

Well, if you have a pattern that you like, you can just lay it out on this big sucker and cut. You then end up with a tee that is more fitted across the top and sleeves, make the side curve in and out and have a perfect fit at the hips.

This is the front. I wanted to use it as an off the shoulder cover up and it is, indeed, off the shoulder. But just right for me. And, cool to wear here in hot, humid south Florida.


This is the back.

I used a commercial stamp and plain old craft paint to stamp the leaves and just love the way they tumble down the front and back, too.

Adding the word, "leaf" adds to the interest, the design balance, and as my hubby says, makes it unmistakably "leafy".

I didn't want the sleeves to hang down to my elbows, even though I cut them to a rather short length, so I added cut strips of fabric to the inside and outside of the sleeve to tie them up and keep them up.

The bottom is just raw edged and it rolls nicely.


A close up of the neckline shows that it, too, is raw edged with some embroidery to stabilize the edge and give it some additional interest.

Doing the embroidery by hand was a lot of fun. I hadn't been doing much hand work lately and getting back into my collection of embroidery floss, needles and thimbles reminded me again of how much I used to embroider my creations when I was a teen.

Some activities are fun forever.

Jackson Pollack Wearable Art Skirt-part 3

Remembering that I started out with all my pieces laid out on a big piece of plastic on the driveway, I am getting itchy to do another project soon. Throwing paint is so much fun!









Here, I am changing the Jackson Pollack design to something else. I've added really big butterfly stamping across the front and back of the skirt. By sewing only one seam together, I can arrange the butterfly design going across the back of the skirt and around the front where it flutters in an upward motion.

Additionally, I've placed the top above the skirt front to stamp butterflies there also. Hopefully, when I wear them together, it will look like a natural movement.

At this point, I really didn't like the skirt too much. Those butterflies are really big and really bright. Oh well, as I said to myself before I started all of this, I can just toss it if I really, really hate it.

Every project has an adolescent stage that is awkward. Sometimes it's hard to push through it to see how it is going to turn out. There are days when I still wonder if I am still in that stage myself, but there isn't anything to do but to keep on trying things out.

So, now the skirt has been sewn together, hemmed and the elastic inserted into the waistband.

Since I've made this pattern so many times, I haven't even tried it on yet. I know it fits and I know the hem is perfect.

How good is that? Do you know how much pleasure it is to get so familiar with a pattern, you don't even have to fool with the fitting anymore?

It's great, that's what it is. No worry, no internal fussing, no changing in and out of clothes during the project at all!

If you look closely, you can see that I added the text to the skirt also. In black fabric ink, using a fuzzy typewriter font, I let the words drift across the front to the back: "Change is to give up what we are to become what we could be."


This is the back of the skirt.

Red paint predominates here as opposed to the front where dark blue is slashed sideways. I could have used either side as front or back since there is only one pattern piece for this bias A line skirt. That's another reason why I like using this McCall's 2172 so much.

And, simplicity in a pattern lets you go wild in every choice you make.

Sure, everyone can use a plain white skirt, or a simple black skirt to wear with a great top or an interesting jacket. But, once you get those out of the way, every skirt you make can be full of new design choices and "what ifs".

This skirt was a fun adventure. And, I did wear it. And, two strangers called to me across the street and said, "Great skirt!"

Now, how good is that?

Jackson Pollack Wearable Art Skirt-part 2

Getting ready to change my "blank canvas" of color splashed linen fabric was a bit of a challenge because I didn't know ahead of time what I wanted to do with it.
I could have left it like it was and finished sewing everything up, but decided that since this was an experiment, I should just go further along.
Lately, I've been liking the color red. Wearing it is fun! So I said to myself, "if I were me, what color would I like to play with?" and there it was, red.
I have several bottles of Setacolor fabric paint that are at least 5 years old and mostly full. Again, figuring, "what have I got to lose?", I committed to the red and decided to actually use some of the many commercial stamps I've been collecting over the years. See this butterfly? It's big. Really big. It's over 6 inches across and really makes a statement. Yes, butterflies are reminders of ongoing transformation, change and beauty, but this thing is kind of blocky. Oh well. Letting it sit in a plastic bag in my garage isn't using it, is it?




I was kind of happy with how well the Setacolor by Pebeo covered the stamp and really did show up like, "WoW!" on the spattered fabric. Once I put one down, I had a hard time stopping. The little kid inside kept saying, "more, more!", but I managed to keep it down to about nine impressions across the front and back of the skirt.






Since the paint dried so fast, I hung it up and went to work on the top while the stamp was still damp. Partial butterflies were fun to do, but I wasn't all that sure about the actual design of the front of the top, so I washed out the stamp and took a break to think.

Going away from a project is sometimes the best thing you can do. While having some tea and finishing up some billing for the office, I remembered a phrase about change that really appealed to me. "Change is to give up what we are to become what we could be." I'm sorry I don't know who said or wrote that, but it stuck in my head and arrived for this project. I found a set of really neat typewriter font stamps in my stamp box and stamped the phrase out on pieces of paper. Then, it was just a matter of laying them out to see how it would look. What fun! No committment, just a chance to see how it might look!



The butterfly was the center and the words, both small and large size, fit nicely on the top.

Of course, as I looked at it, I couldn't imagine wearing the thing, but it was pretty!

I used some black fabric paint for the letters and did one word at a time. Easy!

I got so good at it, I put the phrase on the skirt too, though it doesn't show up as well because the drops and splotches have more of a pattern that pulls on your eyes, but that just doesn't matter.



This is the skirt laid out on my work table with one seam sewn and the butterflies scattered all over.

That's the nice thing about sewing something yourself. You can work with the piece nice and flat and place images over seams very easily.

I let everything dry for a few days, then pressed the painted and stamped fabric to set the paint.

The butterflies are really bright, and this is a little more garish than I am used to, but hey, who really cares? I doubt if the fashion police even have a station here in south Florida, so I will wear this thing with red dangly earrings and forget that I am over 62.

Jackson Pollack Wearable Art Skirt-part 1

It was a warm and windy day here in south Florida and it seemed like a perfect day to do something I've imagined for a long time. How would it be to just throw paint at fabric?
So, here you see my initial setup. A bias cut skirt and top, just four beautiful linen pieces laid out so nicely on a tarp, held down with my usual fabric weights.
It was a sun, sun, sunny day and I was ready to go.
However, as I went back into the garage to mix up some thinned fabric paints, I came out to find my pieces flip-flopped all over and getting ready to fly down the drive way! Yikes! March winds are some serious winds, I tell ya!

Since my studio/garage is full to the brim with stuff, I was able to reach back and pull out lots of half empty paint cans to use to weigh down the linen pieces.



The fun part was the flinging of paint. All you need is a willing arm and a drippy brush to slam color down in drips and spots and slashes of color. What a surprise!
And, since it was about 70 degrees and sunny, the fabric paint dried very fast. My biggest worry was just how sneaky the wind could be. The driveway surface is uneven and little teasers of wind kept finding the smallest places to lift up the skirt and flop it over. grrrr!
I had to keep my eye on it all the time as I was mixing water into the next color or else I'd have smudges of drips and spots. Yes, I know, I know, the whole thing is supposed to be free form, but being new to this, I wanted CONTROL.

hA!




Flinging paint on an angle started to make a pattern that I liked, so I just kept slashing blue, blue and more blue. It's amazing how much paint I used. Walking around the tarp with paint brush in hand is so freeing! No wonder Jackson Pollack made so many pieces of art this way. It is mesmerizing to just fling and go.





Sometimes it's hard to know when to stop. I used about five colors and left a lot of the natural linen background.
The other thing I wasn't sure of was how the paint would feel on the fabric. I didn't want thick, stiff spots on whole areas of the skirt or top.

Considering this whole project a complete trial is the only way for me to stay comfortable and continue to change the fabric with paint. My mind set was, "it's only a few yards of fabric ($16.00 on sale) and a little bit of paint, So What iF I Ruin it! Or hate it. I can always just throw it all away....!" I have to fight my Puritan ethic of economy concerning time and money by telling it to SHUT UP for just a little while so I can have some FUN. Believe me, this voice is a nagging one that gets in the way of a lot of what I do, or a lot of times, don't do.

I tend to get hyper when I start a technique that is new to me (because of that VOICE), so after about an hour of flinging and color changes, I stopped to let the sun dry it very well, indeed.
I sat at my table inside the garage/studio and worked on carving a few rubber stamps to wile away the time and let myself be sure that I really had put as much paint on the pieces that I wanted. It wouldn't be fun to set it all up again, so I just sat for about an hour. And, besides, the weather was great! Spring in Florida means lots and lots of birdsong in the early part of the day, and my messy butterfly garden to the right of the driveway brought beautiful Monarchs careening past my head as I worked. Very cool.

Now, I just can't wait to sew the skirt together and add something to this new "blank canvas" of fabric.




Note to self: wear sneakers and socks next time.