Creations and discoveries

Hello all! My apologies for the extended absence. I have finished my time at Interlochen and am now back in Indianapolis, working on wedding stuff with my wonderful fiance and starting a new job search. I have to admit, it's been great having this week off to just hang out, but I do need to get back to earning a living...

Anyways, here's a project that I started back in June, and wasn't able to resume until our last week at ICA - the granite etching for my dad's headstone. Here's the completed drawing that I worked from--

Unfortunately, it's now covered in red ink - to transfer the lines onto the stone,  something like carbon paper is placed between the drawing and the granite, then the drawing is traced over to leave the same marks on the stone. That becomes the guide for creating the etching. Make sense? I hope so...

And here is the finished product!

I will say I was rather intimidated to not only learn this completely new medium involving a very sharp power tool, but also having to create something of this magnitude for my very first project! I think that's part of why I had put it off for so long, and in order for me to even start on it, I had to make Devin leave our cabin :-p I suppose I needed to "bond" with the etching tool...

I find that many times, when I'm learning or experimenting ("playing," as I prefer to call it), I want to be completely alone. Call it performance anxiety, but I need to be able to do whatever I feel like doing without someone watching me...in my mind, they're thinking things like, "Wow, what a weirdo," and "what on EARTH is that freak doing?" Just one of my artistic idiosyncrasies. Moving on...

Latest project: new (to me) HUGE canvas!

This is a painting I acquired from Devin's grandparents, who are in the moving process and left many of their possessions up for grabs to the grandkids. Score! They originally bought it from a department store, which means it was mass-produced and therefore worth next to nothing. My brain said FREE CANVAS, and we grabbed it. It will be the largest canvas I've ever used - pretty sure it's 3 ft x 4 ft - and tonight I took step 1 towards a masterpiece: GESSO-ING THE CRAP OUT OF IT.

See also: PLAYGROUND. :)

For those who don't know, gesso is used as a primer for canvases (and just about anything else that needs it). It comes in white AND black (ooh!) and is therefore perfect for redoing a canvas. SHAZAM, a world of potential is born! I'm already cooking up ideas...and in need of a new supply of gesso.

And that's not all, loyal readers! After being gone for a few weeks, I have to give you more treats than that. So here's two artists that were introduced to me this week, one from my mother, and the other from my future mother-in-law. Brilliant ladies they are ;-) Bonus: Both artists are women, too!

First, we have Helen Dennis. Just today she closed an installation in NYC of projected drawings...check out the link to see what I mean! It's so many of my favorite things...drawing, mixed media, projection, site-specific, oh my! She also has some gorgeous pictures of Iceland, which is near the top of my list of places to visit.

Next is Debbie Smyth with some incredible large-scale installations of string art. Seriously, this stuff makes me jealous...but in the art world, jealousy can be nearly synonymous with inspiration. Am I wrong, fellow artists?? :)

I love looking at work from wonderful artists like these. It reminds me that really, anything is possible, that I'm not limited to the page/canvas/computer (unless I want to be), and that it IS possible to do great things with art in the present moment, as opposed to 100+ years after you die (poor Van Gogh...).

And now, allergies are overtaking me, and I must bid you goodnight and adieu...as always, thanks for reading!