the great divide

so back in february i took a painting eclass with flora bowley called bloom true.  i did not take the class to learn how to paint (i've been painting almost as long as flora has!)  i took the class because i was so drawn to flora's philosophy of painting and life, and because the idea of just letting a painting unfold with no preset idea of what was going to emerge was about as opposite of me as one could possibly get.

i couldn't pass the opportunity up.  and i cannot even express to you how glad i am that i didn't!

so, here is the first of two paintings created through the class.  and just to prove how i truly had no idea where it was going through a good portion of the process, i am adding a quick slide show at the bottom to show you the stages...how this painting revealed itself to me.

here's the evolution of "the great divide"    18" x 18"     acrylic on canvas      2012

and, this week, here's to evolving...and blooming true!

-julia

wear your art on your sleeve

ok...maybe the title should say wrist, but that is catchier!  i've been dying to show you the art cuffs my students made for mother's day this year.  this first stack is from my preschool class.  yes, you heard me right...i said preschool!  haha...prepare to fall in love...

i got this idea from the blog seven thirty three.  she has a great tutorial on how to make the cuffs out of large popsicle sticks here, so i'm not going to reinvent the wheel.  i will tell you that once i made the cuffs and they were completely dry, i painted each one white first.  the older students painted directly on the cuff, and the little ones painted on a piece of white cardstock cut into the stick shape.  all paper was attached and sealed with modge podge gloss.

  some close ups...

wish i would have gotten a picture of all them, but you get the idea.


i'm.  in.  love!

so this week, here's to what you love...and wearing it on your sleeve!

-julia

conflicted

it's that time again...time for the online iphonegraphy project I link to called The Recipe Book Project.  by now i think it's pretty clear how much i love all the photography apps out there.  i use them regularly to document my world and tell my story.  this month, however, i thought i would challenge myself to push it a little further.  first, i wanted to use at least one app that i hadn't tried yet (enter iris photo suite) and second i wanted to try to create an image that was more a piece of art than just a cool photo.  did i succeed?  i'll let you guys be the judge.  either way, i learned a whole lot more about what these apps can do!

first, i snapped a pic of a page in one of my sketchbooks using camera+.  then auto filter/ tailfin filter/ square crop.

then i opened the image in iris and set it as the base layer. then i opened it again, rotated the top layer 90 degrees, and blended it with the base at 50%.  i did that 3 times total, each time rotating the top layer 90 degrees before blending them at 50%.  make sure after you blend the two layers together, you set the new image as the base layer before you open the next layer.

next i opened the new image in snapseed and applied the drama filter.

last but not least, i opened it in phototoaster.  after much trial, i settled on the conflicted filter.

after staring at it for a long time trying to decide if i like it, i decided to roll with it and stick with "conflicted" as the title. so there you have it.  what do you guys think?

and click on over to dave's page where you can see the other participants' photo creations.

here's to being brave in the face of uncertainty,

-julia

the gift

this week is hard for me.  this weekend coming up will mark the one year anniversary of us losing my father.  i don't have a lot to say this week, except that i did finally finish this painting. 

"the gift"         mixed media on 28"x38" canvas       2011-12

this one is for my dad up in heaven, and my sister, sara, who, i swear, talks to angels.

my dad and me in the late 70's

sara and me in the late 90's

-julia

something old, something new

i have a big gap in my portfolio of artworks due to the fact that right out of college i was not good about photographing my work.  maybe it was because it was so much more complicated to get good photos back then.  maybe it was that i was young and didn't take things too seriously.  most likely, it was a combination of both.  well, this week i was really happy to acquire a picture of one of my lost pieces from an old friend who has had it in his collection for the past dozen years or so. 

stitch on cross stitch material - 1998

i started doing fiber pieces towards the end of art school, (a lot of what i would call "manipulated stitch" now) and continued to do so for a couple years after i was out.   looking at this piece, i don't think it will surprise you when i tell you i worked in a retail store back then.  when one of my co-workers saw this piece in a show it was in, he told me it looked so real he wanted to take it back to our store and see if he could scan it.  i still consider that one of the greatest comments on a piece of work i've ever gotten.  so, many thanks to my friend, tim, for sending me this picture, and for keeping the piece in such great shape all these years!  and if anyone else has any of my pieces m.i.a. please send me a good photo- lol.

i also wanted to show you the project i did with my son's preschool class recently.  we used their hand prints to learn color mixing.  i got this idea from the wonderful elementary art blog smart class.  i painted one little hand one color and the other another.  we rubbed the hands together and watched the colors change!  then we printed the new colors on our big chart i made.

i expanded out into tints, shades ,grays, and browns so that every child had a chance to mix a color at least once.  watching their little faces as the colors changed was pretty cool.  and, i think it came out great, if i do say so myself!

i feel like i need to add a disclaimer here...this was a very ambitious project for 4 years olds.  actually, they were fine.  i was sweating a little- haha!  if you decide to try this with little ones, i might suggest sticking with making the secondary colors from the primary colors.  just a suggestion ;)

here's to finding what you thought was lost and to helping others discover something new!

-julia