PATTERNS Of SNOW

I made patterns of the snowy sky & wintry landscape today, following the flowing line across the pages.

Later in the day I cut and pasted a couple skies on to the paper squares. Keeping the pages separate for now.

They say we have another snow storm coming tomorrow. We'll be snowed in - so hoping to make good progress in the morning.

click on photo to enlarge

THE 1000 JOURNALS PROJECT

In SoCal last week. 2nd visit to the
Skirball Cultural Center in LA, a beautiful museum/gallery space. Wanted to see The 1000 Journals Project.

Found it to be very different from the Sketchbook Project 2011 which I recently participated in.

My personal observations? Great exhibit design & lots of creative hands-on for kids and adults.

After taking the photos I spent some time reading the journal pages. From across the room they were colorful and interesting.

Up close I found many of the journal pages to be dark, angry, hopeless & disturbing. The docent in the room volunteered a similar observation.

Makes me wonder what the Sketchbook Project 2011 - sketchbooks will look like.

We'll see in a few weeks when it opens in Brooklyn.

MY FRIEND JO

That's my new friend, Jo Reimer, in her studio out in Portland, OR. We spent a day together last week. Actually it was like we knew each other for a long time, having been introduced by a friend of a friend and been on each other's blogs & emailing for a couple months now!

I have to admit I have been hedging on doing this blog post because where do I begin!!!??? I was so overwhelmed with the caliber of her artwork & her WOW studio filled with art books, collages, paintings, quilts, encaustics, materials, supplies, equipment, great work surfaces & how about that NEON !

Creativity and art collection flowed throughout her northwest style contemporary home. I was so engrossed in the total experience that I neglected to take all but a couple photos!

We had lunch at the Hands on Cafe at the Oregon College of Art & Craft. Click here to take a look at this fabulous school. What a great website!!! On Home page don't miss clicking on Craft is...and then make art.

Click here to see Jo's wonderful blog. Jo also participated in the Sketchbook Project 2011 and you can see her sketchbook on her blog. Look for it in the right side column - a trip across Oregon east to west-in photo & collage. Just super creative! Click here to see her Sketchbook Project profile page about her + her portfolio.

To complete the perfect day Nelson and I returned in the evening for a wonderful dinner & conversation with Jo & Gerald Reimer, Bob & Anne West & perhaps you know this person, Luis & Pat Palau. Did I get a photo. No! Once again overwhelmed !

BACK IN SNOW COUNTRY

LAX to JFK

We are back.

Missed 3 snow storms!

More tomorrow.

Snow? News? Both!

SNOW COUNTRY

Machine stitched-quilted these winter scenes 7 years ago, trying techniques out for the snow book. (click on picture to enlarge)

Interesting as I pick up the project now, 7 years later, I'm approaching it quite differently. Stitching yes but no more quilted layers. Collaging on paper.

Tomorrow we head back to snow country. Next week back in the studio for me, returning to work on the snow book.

LEANING SNOW

I bought a poster of Breugel's Hunters in the Snow at the museum in Vienna. Here it is framed & set on one of the flexible leaning shelves in the great room.

Above the Breugel are 4 pages of the 'snow' accordion book featured in previous post. (do click on lower photo to enlarge)

• That's me in front of the famous painting.

• The gray & white trapezoid is a holiday card from the Museum of Mondern Art, NYC. Digital art well before digital art was 'out there'.

• 2 postcards from a Helsinki gallery in the land of the midnight sun. I always regreted not buying a small piece of this artist's work, but at least I have these inspiring postcards.

ARRANGING WINTER

Snow on the roof means snow on the skylights. It was like that the day I took this photo. Needed the flash which gives a yellow cast. (click on photo to enlarge)

I started this accordion design book about winter when we still had our house in Vermont. The pages have empty spaces here & there but I'll continue to add pictures as I find them.

Inspiring artist postcards, calendar pages, gallery announcements, stamps, museum postcards & catalog cover flow across the pages.

Return to work on the snow book next week.

SNOWING IN KUNMING

Came across this photo in a local gallery in Kunming, China.* (click on photo to enlarge)

An almost impossible scene to capture. Why?

•Kunming is the 'city of eternal springtime' where it rarely snows.

•It was late March when a particular species of birds only migrate through.

•Families gathered to feed the birds around Green Lake.

Great composition! Enjoying it on my kitchen counter this winter.

*Taught/exhibited at Yunnan Institute of Art - Kunming International Festival of Arts '99.

Return to snow book in another week.

SNOW ON THE SKYLIGHTS

Had 4 skylights put in when we were building. Planned for good natural light in my studio.

The snow is inspiring but it's also blocking the light!

Puffy like cotton, it started sliding off the roof the other day!

DESIGNING WITH BLUEPRINTING

Pulled out an early snow scene experiment (1996). At that time trying out techniques and materials for another project.

Focusing here on the close-up of blueprinted fabric. This was a leftover fragment/scrap from another project - a tree branch sunprinted on chemically treated fabric.

Thinking about designing some blueprinting into the snow book. Maybe. Might order some.

A PAGE OF SNOW

3 favorite children's picture books.

Design, story & illustrations: minimal

The way I would do it. Let me rephrase. The way I am doing it!

Did something just for fun a couple years ago when I first started the snow book. I designed a ‘snow’ page from my story & paper clipped it over a page of One Christmas, just to see how it looked.

Possibilities but not the right time to work on it. BUT someday the time would be right.

'Someday' came a couple weeks ago. Click here to see.

One Christmas, One Evening & One Morning by Yohji Izawa & Canna Funakoshi

WINTER ON MY WALLS

We had a ski house in Vermont. I loved looking at the snow especially from the warm vantage point of our sofa by the woodburning fireplace !

At VT art galleries we bought original woodblocks by Vermont artists, Boiling by Sabra Field (top) & Spring Patterns by Margaret Torrey. (click on photo to enlarge)

Looking at these pieces now, brings back fond memories of roadside VT in March, when maple sap was flowing & trees were being tapped. It would be collected into covered tin buckets strapped to the sugar maples & boiled down in sugar shacks.

I reorganized art in our great room the other day. Enjoying winter on our walls now too.

FALL ON THE EARTH

Trees On A Snowy Night

One of the first non-traditional quilts I designed, shortly after getting into quiltmaking. A patch on the back reads:

For to the snow He says,

"Fall on the earth."

Job 37:6

Winter 1986

I love this verse & plan on using it at the beginning of the snow book.

Snow - inspiring me 25 years ago !

HEAVEN BOUND SNOW

An ongoing sharing of past art experiences. These eventually led to inspiring my current project - the Snow Book. No time to work on it now. Back to collaging snow at end of month.

Heaven Bound * is a quilted fabric accordion book, designed for classes I taught in Zelenogorsk, Russia in 1996.

2 pages of 'snow' created with some of the same fabric & techniques I plan on using in the Snow Book. 11 pgs, each pg 7"x7"

*Actual title is Heaven Bound. Russian translation on cover is Pathway to Heaven. Translating into other languages is never as straight forward as one might think. This was the closest a Russian friend could get to the original. The Russian front page is actually a separate piece velcroed over the actual front page which reads Heaven Bound.

HUNTERS IN THE SNOW

Out & about for next 2 wks. Snow book on hold. Instead will share art leading to wintery collage book.

Pieter Bruegel's Hunters in the Snow, painted 1565, definitely early influence. I dearly loved this painting from childhood, though I only saw it in art books.

Many years passed before seeing it at the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. What an emotional moment... standing in front of this massive & meticulously painted work after studying it over & over again on the pages of art books. I cried.

Because this painting was so popular, it led many artists of the next century to specialize in winter landscapes. From What Makes a Bruegel a Bruegel? published for Metropolitan Museum of Art

And it is still inspiring artists today. ME !!!

WORD PICTURES

Realized I better write the word picture story before I draw the hills flowing across the pages. If the snow is 'drifting,' I'll need space for snow drifts!

Came up with words & phrases we use around our house to describe wintery weather. The story will be minimal like the collages.

Photo • fabric in sequence • text set on fabric • drawing the blue line.

DRAWING HILLS

I put 4 sections of graph paper together today to line draw undulating hills. Still working on it.

The snowy scene pictured is a small section of Good News * created in 1996. Using some of the same fabric in the snow book & maybe the tree stamp & snow flake sequins. Maybe.

Here's some embellishment possiblities to enhance the snow pictures. Too early to figure out but fun to look at.

Snowy square are waiting to be made into pictures. I work slow. It will be a while.

* GOOD NEWS by GOD

pictured is fragment of small quilt

by Marge Malwitz

@ Billy Graham Museum

Wheaton, IL

OUT MY KITCHEN WINDOW

An inspiring day for working on the snow book. 18" overnight.

Paired words & phrases with fabric. Arranged-rearranged day into night & flurries into storm.

Tomorrow I'll design the flow of land & hills across the snowy squares.

flakes

flurries

snowing

blowing

swirling

drifting

LET IT SNOW

Did some thinking on graph paper this morning, planning the next steps of the Snow book.

This is a photo of the accordion book I took the other day in my kitchen. It's a winter wonderland outside.

Today other projects took priority like mailing the RAIN, Sketchbook Project 2011 down to Brooklyn, NY.

Tonight more snow is coming. That will make for an inspiring day to work on the Snow book

tomorrow morning.

DAY INTO NIGHT

spreading out

14 blank pages.

14 snowy sky fabrics

day into night

descriptive words

how to begin?

trusting the process

14 PAGES OF WINTER

Cut squares. Ready to collage 14 pgs of winter.

Couldn't resist a quick snow scene. No glue. Just for fun.

Staying open for 'book' possibility. Creating each scene individually.

Can assemble into accordion book after scanning.

I can almost taste the creative fun ahead!

A FEW FLAKES

today

paper squares

words

sky fabric

gessoed canvas

painted paper

3 buttons

nothing glued. passing by. possiblities. playing...day off.