FRESCOING THE KOLO JOURNAL

Expecting to see frescoed paintings in Florence, I thought I would gesso on paper bags to give the blank Kolo Journal a frescoed look. 

photos: gessoing process & working on the first gessoed page in Lucca.

PREPARING TO COLLAGE IN ITALY

In May I went to Florence, Siena & Lucca, Italy with my friend, Marcia Carole. We both were excited about the possibility of creating on the trip. Before leaving home, I prepared journal pages for collaging, painted papers, and collected glue sticks, children's pair of round tipped scissors, small ruler & fine tip black markers.  

Little Boats Paris: KITTYKEE ON BOARD

from today: pages 2-3 Kittykee enters the story

Still working on pg. 3, but yes, Kittykee gets on a boat, named Marimekko.

Little Boats Paris: TACKING A NEW DIRECTION

We used to sail.  In our boat we'd sail against the wind, tacking our way across the lake. I feel like I have to sail into the wind making these collages and not settle design-wise.

I tore out the second collage! It was just not right. The sails on the little boats are not that shape. It would have been easy to leave it but no! I scraped the collage off the page!  Tacking a new direction, I took one of the photos and extended parts of the image with fabrics and painted paper.

Little Boats Paris: ABANDONING SHIP!

When I'm posting the process you are going to see what does not work. I was pretty unhappy with what was happening here-it went from loose to tight. Not what I had in mind. 

I decided to abandon ship and sail on. 

Be minimal, simplify and play!

So the small quilt went into the closet and moved the fabric scraps to the side.  

Out came the painted paper scraps onto the side table. I have given so many painted papers away, the assortment is way down. They're in France and Turkey and currently on their way to Greece! 

I brought out a Kolo journal and started. First little boat below. It's a process. The design shape will morph and change over the pages.

Little Boats Paris: SCRAPS AND HIGH CONTRAST

What is with the dark back ground you might wonder?  I was asking myself the same thing!  All I  can say is that I had to get the black and purple out of my creative system on this 1st one.  

Working off this pile of scraps, I started pulling out the black and purple fabrics.  What can I say. I like high contrast of black/purple against  hot colors.  

I stitched the dark fabric background down 'as is' - raw edges. Worked on first sail this afternoon. 

I'll probably use sky painted fabric background in the next one.

Little Boats Paris: BEGINNING THE LITTLE BOATS

process

• beginning to play 
• printed photos
• collaging boat

My Studio: READY FOR CREATING

Reorganized and ready for creating.  

My Studio: ART QUILT AND SKETCH BOOKS

Continuing to reorganize the art studio. (5th of 5 posts)
Moving around the perimeter of the studio...I came to the last shelving unit with a collage book on the top shelf AND all my sketchbooks below! 

Groan. How come I never stopped to date them!? I should really go through them all. But that would take a lot of time!  So I paged through some. Hmmm...some good ideas never brought to fruition...maybe I should go through them all! 

Moving down 2 shelves - an Oaxacan animal sculpture and a stack of art quilt books.  I spent 10 years in the quilt world - speaking, teaching and exhibiting.  I was in some pretty prestigious shows those years. My quilts did the traveling and not me - all over the US and Japan!  Art quilts I created are in each of those books on the shelf. (below)

After 10 yrs. in the art quilt world, I moved into missions - my quilts and I off to Russia in 1994.  

I continue to design story-telling quilts to use over seas - having found that the soft quilt is the most engaging - effective medium for me to use with women. 

God used 10 yrs. in the quilt world to prepare me for these last 20 yrs. in missions. 

artist statement on my website