Sunday

something weird and different


 Dragon eye necklaces!  
I wanted to try doing something
really different so I made these dragon eyes.
They're made of glass and polymer clay.
This one you can barely see the eye.  Before
baking you could see it but after, not so much. 



This one worked a little better as far as seeing the eye.
I tried putting bead eye lashes on it, not so sure?



This one's my favorite.  You can see the eye and
I like the colors and outside design better.



It was a fun, different, experiment.

Monday

Art inspiration

February 5, 2017
We went to the Mt Dora art festival, juried fine art show.  There was some good work there.  There were some artists I haven’t seen before.  I was very inspired.
I was inspired by the mixed media and digital art the most.  I want to try doing some mixed media on canvas.  I also say the lady whose work I would like to collect .  Her work makes me think of things I would like to do.  She works with cement and makes it look like reliquaries and holy art?  I don’t know if that’s what you would call it.  Her art also looks like southwest architecture and I think the mix of that and the religious feel from the old churches we went to is what inspires me.  Her website is: https://www.mysterystonesculpture.com/new-works/
I would buy all of her southwest sculptures.  To me they are gorgeous and what I would like to be doing!

I also liked the lady who did the poster for the festival.  She did animals in different than normal situations and there were small animals within the large animals and small people within the large people.  Her name is Michelle McDowell Smith and
she’s from Florida.  Her website is:  http://www.michellemcdowellsmith.com

This artist did the paintings about technology and some of his work were animated.  He’s only been doing this for five years.  He was a designer and something else before he started doing the fine art.  His name is Ed Meyers and his website is:  http://www.lionoptic.com 

Chuck really liked Jennifer Ivory’s work.  She did paper painted insects that look real and they are 3D.  Her website is:  www.Insectworks.com. 

Another artist we both liked was William Alburger:  http://www.williamalburger.com.
He did really interesting things with wood, very beautiful and artistic.

There was another guy from the country of Georgia who painted on wood and made them 3D.  I really liked the depth and the fact he painted on rustic wood.  His website:  http://eastwestfineart.com/artist/nodar-khokhobashvili/



There was a pen and ink artist Tai Taeoalii: http://www.artbytai.com.  His work was good and interesting and I mention him because in high school I did a pen and ink drawing that won me 2nd place as best artist in school.  I wish I had at least a photograph of it because I worked on it for weeks.  It was a cow skull and some other bones.  It was really good, which is weird for me to say because I’m extremely picky about my work and don’t always like it.  Some things I like - some not so much.
 You would think that by now I would know what my specialty is and I would have some direction but I struggle with it every time I go in my “studio” and try to work.  What do I want to do?  What should I do?  What am I best at?  What should I do to try to get into the first Thursday about a life well lived?  Should I use acrylics?  Watercolors?  Should I do a drawing?  What should I use and what should I do for the subject matter?  
I should have had this figured out years ago!

Sunday

more memories

The last couple of visits to my Mom's house
we've gone through old photos.  This is a photo
of me in 11th grade.  I wish I'd left my hair like this.
It wasn't any work and I think it was pretty.

Then I decided to get it cut and permed and
tried to go with the style back then.

I think I was younger in this photo, probably right after
we moved to Florida, the middle of 10th grade.  Not a fun year.

This is me with my favorite aunt, Aunt Peachie.
She was my dad's sister.  She had a lot of different
cancers too.  I'd forgotten about that.

This is my oldest brother.  He is a year
and 4 days younger than me.  He was quite the cowboy.
We lived in Texas when this was taken.

I've been going through the book The Artist's Way.
Corey told me it would bring up a lot of stuff from my
past.  She wasn't kidding.  I've remembered things I'd 
completely forgotten.  A big thing was how devastated I 
was when we left Alaska.  I loved it there and moving 
back to the lower 48 was not fun to me.  It also made
me remember teachers who were really good and 
teachers who were really awful.  Thankfully, the good
outweighed the bad and I got a lot of encouragement
when it comes to my art.  My Mom told me my third grade
teacher thought I was way beyond my grade level and
there wasn't anything she could teach me.  I don't remember that
at all.  I do remember the pet mouse we had in the class and how
much I liked it.  I liked getting to take it home over the weekend
and taking care of it.  I remember trying out for basketball that year 
and totally stinking at it and not making it.  It was only third grade so
no big life altering issue there.
I did race the fastest girl in school on the ice skating rink.
The problem was she had speed skates and I had figure skates.
You can guess who won.  
Enough memories for now.