Museum Fiber Show, Mixed Media, and Sunday Meditation

Experimenting, playing with fiber, paper, beads, who knows what I'll create on any given day...

"Heron Whispers to the Moon" Mixed Media 8.25"x10.5"

Museum Fiber Show
This piece will be included in the upcoming show below. Be sure to add it to your calendar as it promises to be full of fibery goodness and wonderful creations from our guild members.

2011 Pacific Northwest Needlearts Guild Show
October 12 - December 31

Edmonds Historical Museum
118 5th Avenue North, Edmonds, WA

(425) 774-0900

Hours
Wed - Fri: 1 - 4 p.m.
Sat: 10 am - 2 pm
Sun: 1 - 4 pm

Sunday Meditation
It is a quiet day as I tend to tasks needing to be done, the cat is napping, my spouse is away for the day. The wind has been rushing and howling all day despite a partly sunny, partly cloudy threatening storm kind of day. Fall is definitely here, the leaves are beginning to turn and dance in the wind doing a ballet in the air. Nature makes my heart sing on a day like today...

"Let us be silent, that we may hear the whispers of the gods."

Shapes, Crows and Bird Books

Focusing on shapes and silhouettes and birds...

Crow Series
This group of paintings was started in February. It began with the small painting at the top right. It actually was a crane and I disliked it a lot, proportions were off, colors were too much, it was sitting on my table in the studio, waiting. So, one day, I picked it up and started carving out a new shape with gesso and so on. I really liked the results, so I painted two more small similar paintings. Then came the bottom two which are about 12x12. I have since painted several more crows (inbetween doing some abstracts/collage), so I am continuing on in this series, exploring different ways to depict my subjects. I'm finding working on a series helps me really know the subject better.

This whole direction is probably a result of participating in my women's painting critique group monthly. One of my friends there always focuses on shapes in her wonderful oil paintings, and I guess the idea of focusing on the shapes themselves appealed, and made me look at subjects differently. Belonging to a small friendly and supportive group of fellow artists is something I highly recommend. The diversity of outlooks and styles (loose or realistic), and even media, as among us, we work in watercolor, acrylic, oil, pastels, collage and 3d paintings, is truly inspiring. I'm always looking forward to see what we will each bring to the next meeting - it keeps me painting.

Bird Books
To complement my continuing bird interest, I'm in the midst of reading "Crow Planet: Essential Wisdom from the Urban Wilderness" by Lyanda Lynn Haupt, a local Seattle author. This is a wonderful read about our urban crow friends with some lovely woodcut illustrations by the author.

And I've added to my Audubon identifying book on birds with two more great selections listed below. They are great inspiration for a fiber book on Texas birds that I am finally completing. It was a project started last year in April when I visited family there.

The National Wildlife Federation "Field Guide to Birds of North America" by Edward S. Brinkley - a terrific guide with lots of stunning photographs to help identify birds in our country.

"BIRDS of the Puget Sound Region" by Bob Morse, Tom Aversa, and Hal Opperman - I like this one as it's specific to my area. I've already used it to determine we've got "spotted towhees" hanging around our yard - gorgeous 8" birds with a dark black hood and tail, sprinkled with white spots on the black wing, and robin red sides and a white belly, red eyes.

Photoshop Art, Flight Museum and Collage

Sifting through photo's, mixing colors, shapes... mixing it up...
PhotoShop Art
Above is a Photoshop composite of 3 photo's taken at a recent visit to the Seattle Flight Museum. I used layers, inversion, several other adjustments and filters to combine the 3 photo's: looking into a jet engine, the bottom of a hot air balloon, and butterflies.

The Museum of Flight
The Museum of Flight is a fascinating place. I'm not so much into technology and machines, however, the concept of flight, the history, the airiness of the high glass ceiling lead me into the land of imagination. A fun afternoon spent with visiting family, including the open eyes of a six year old, cannot fail to inspire. I especially liked the room devoted to lunar exploration and pictures of nebula's. Isn't this spiral shape stunning?
More Photoshop Art
Another altered photo follows, I used inversion and color adjustments. It is a rhododendrun blossom at Snowqualmie Falls. I'm drawn to the shocking green. It's fun to color outside the norm, play with my choices...
Collage
A friend and I had a great afternoon about a month ago making 5x7 "soul collage" cards. I've made many collages, however this is my first soul collage card. There is a book prescribing the techniques in using them for those who want to follow a system. I believe any art we make is a picture of who we are at the time, an expression of inner goings-on that we may or may not be aware of. It's good to pay attention to what shows up in our artwork, to ask ourselves about it, to notice and listen, this is what I learned when I trained to become an expressive art therapist a few years back. Noticing, listening lead us up the path of self-awareness.

Museum Day, More Plein Air and Watercolors

Taking a break, playing with color and pen...
SAM and BAM
That's Seattle Art Museum and Bellevue Art Museum, for non-locals reading this... my spouse and I have a museum date once a month. Last month it was SAM where we viewed the Nick Cave, "Meet Me at the Center of Earth" exhibit of "soundsuits". There were rooms full of stunning life-size manikins artfully and completely covered with a colorful array of everything that could be found in a thrift store. Some of them could and have been actually worn and that is the sketch above.

The BAM has an exhibit of ceramic sculptures by Wanxin Zhang which we saw this week. This is a fabulous exhibit of larger than life size figures inspired by the tradition of the buried terracotta warriors that were uncovered in China. However, they are somewhat modernized, mysterious and seem so lifelike. So if you want a treat, do go see this exhibit. BAM also has two other interesting exhibits showing which are worth a visit: unique South American jewelry which weaves in some cultural stories, and an exhibit on "Softness" featuring various fiber and stitching pieces.
Plein Air
I plan to get outdoors more often this summer as nature is so inspiring. Above is a quick sketch from our deck. Below is another watercolor painting from the recent day over by Lake Washington on a plein air date. Both were gorgeous sunny days and it felt good seeing the sun again after it's absence so many months here in our rainy cloud covered heaven.
Note to myself: Definitely get outdoors more often this summer, alone or with art buddies! Feel the sun, the cool breezes, smell the flowers, soak in the colors and the music of this season of the year.

Painting Preview, Art Show and Plein Air Painting

Still painting those undulating shapes...

"The Sun Held Court Over the Whispering Seas" 16x20 mixed media
Copyright 2011 by Delorse Lovelady

Seattle CoArts Art Show
The above picture is a small peek at one of my two paintings that were juried into the Seattle CoArts Show "The Joy of Art!". This is one small portion of a larger abstracted seascape painting.

"The Joy of Art!" is a beautiful show with a variety of artists and styles. The show runs from May 16 - Jun 24 at the Mercer View Gallery, next to the Luther Burbank park. The Gallery is in the Community Center at Mercer View, 8236 SE 24th St, Mercer Island, WA (206-275-7609). Gallery hours are Mon-Fri from 6:30am-9:00pm; Sat from 8am-10pm; and Sun 11am-6pm. Here are more examples of what can be seen there:
Plein Air Painting
We've had some glorious weather here lately in the Northwest, partly sunny, partly cloudy, cool - my favorite. I heard a couple of days ago, that so far this year, Seattle has only gotten about 6 days of 60 degree weather. We are having a remarkably cool rainy year so far (wish I could send some to my Texas relatives who are in severe drought). Anyway, on a particularly sunny day, my friend Beth & I settled in a secret spot by Lake Washington and spent the day painting and sketching, such fun... Here's one of my pieces.

Death Valley Desert, Wildfires & Gratitude, Sunday Meditation

“Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans”.... John Lennon
Time has moved by at warp speed and I'm realizing I haven't posted for over six weeks. So I suppose I've been taking a breath, or two, away from the little screen that captures my words and images and sends them to who knows where or to whom....

The Desert, Death Valley
I finally got my taste of "Southwest" kind of terrain. We set off on a two and a half week road trip (love them) which included the desert. Death Valley, always wanted to go, finally made it. And added this to my list of National Parks visited, I want to experience them all. How to describe something so vast and so diverse... let me see, did you know Death Valley has very high undulating sand dunes? And a 150 mile long valley floor, called Badwater Basin that has white salt flats on it? Yellow canyons colored like mustard. A canyon named "Artist's Palette" because of the colors - red, ochre, sienna, brown, black, turquoise, all mixed up, just like a palette against the cliffs. Volcanic craters. Mountains, with very high points to look down at the valley on several sides. Flowers. Lots of raucous ravens. An actual Spanish castle in the cliffs of a canyon. Slickrock, narrow canyon passages. And more.
It was very warm (for me) in March, mid-80's, I wouldn't dare wait any later to go. I have to say it was stunningly beautiful in it's starkness and harsh terrain. I love the wide open space, seeing forever, big skies, and all the other cliche sayings about that kind of landscape...... nature undressed, getting down to the bare bones of what's essential, and letting my artist's eye relish the colors, shapes, lines and dancing mirages..... I had fun with my sketchbook and paints. And I left reluctantly, but filled with inspiration.

Sunday Meditations - Wildfires and Gratitude
One day you are peacefully going about your life immersed into your world, your routines. And the next, nature throws some sparks your way, maybe sets a blaze into your world. And it wakes you up (again) to the enormity of our universe, of what a small piece of it you are, of the greater forces always present.

This past week nature stirred some massive storms in the Texas panhandle. Hot dry dusty wind, severe drought conditions with no rain in months, so conditions were ripe for the huge fires that raged across the plains, pushed by 60 mile an hour winds, no mountains or anything to stop them from advancing. There were many homes burned down and lives turned upside down.
Among the lucky, were my two brothers. They both live in the rural areas surrounded by pastureland and both had huge walls of fire raging nearby - one up to the back of the house (see photo's, courtesy of Jonathan Clubb) after it had eaten nearby houses, and the other, across the road from his house. Evacuations, road blocks. Lots of firemen. Very scary.
Foremost, I am so thankful none of my family was hurt. Or suffered the loss of their houses. It's a bit calmer today, but it will be a long hot nervous summer, if the drought doesn't get relieved. I imagine sending them some of our Seattle rain to ease the pain. Water is such a life giving fluid. So today, Sunday, it's a good day to be grateful for family, for rain and water, and the abundance of life and home sweet home.
Namaste

Crows, A Painting, and Flyways

Such smart interesting birds, I love to watch them...
Crows and a Painting
Here is one of my latest acrylic paintings... playing with shapes, colors, movement. I have a series of these going on now.

Crows are such a delight to watch, and I have that opportunity every day, as our house is in their daily flyway. Every evening about an hour or so before dusk, they are winging their way in our direction. They gather in the hundreds in the nearby park, the greenbelts, the lumber yard, the library, and their raucous chatter fills the air.

This is the view from our back deck, we happily have a small greenbelt adjacent to our backyard and the trees are often filled with the crows in the evening.
Sometimes when there are no clouds, we can even see the Cascades.....
An Artist's Life is Never Dull
In between the snow, and painting canvases in my studio, it's been a very busy time. I entered the Gallery North miniature show with 3 paintings, and submitted 2 digital entries for the Seattle Co-Arts juried show. Managed to meet with friends for painting critique, so fun and inspiring to see other's work, and helpful too. Played at sketching at a brewery with sketching buddies, stitched button pins with sewing friends... And now I'm volunteering as the Workshop Chair for Seattle Co-Arts so, have just set up two workshops and demo's with terrific artists for our membership.

Meanwhile, soon, we are off on another adventure, to visit a favorite town, Ashland, and perhaps venture farther afield into Nevada territory. So much to explore.

Abstract Floral, Do Over, and Experimenting

Sometimes changing direction is just the best thing to do...
Do Over
Once in a great while I might wonder if a "do over" of a life situation might have been better. But not very often, as, I generally am content and consider myself blessed in many ways. Why am I talking about this? Well, I recently discovered what "do over" means on painting. Having used watercolors for so many years, I didn't see many opportunities for those. But, with acrylics, "do over" is a definite reality.

I was painting in my studio recently and I kept glancing at an annoying painting. It was a crane of some sort, and I really did NOT like it. The shape was wrong, too much of a certain color, wrong feel, you get the idea. I can't remember painting completely over a painting, but I decided to work with it. And I tried out a different style of painting for me. It came out great. So my lesson was, yes, "do over's" do exist, especially in the art world. And sometimes I need a little annoyance, like an unresolved painting, staring me in the face waiting for the fix and a fresh coat of paint.

Abstract Floral
I will show that painting in another post, as I have more to say about a different subject with that painting. But meanwhile, I remembered the painting below, an abstract floral, that also languished for a while in my studio. Until one day I took my pen out and doodled all over it, the finished (for now) version posted at the top, a very different look.
Experimenting
This week I continued my pantry experiments with fabric dyeing. Last week it was avocado skin. This week I have an earl grey tea muslin and a stunning tumeric yellow (canary color) fabric. I tore off a scrap and put it in a glass bowl with each, set it in the sun in a window overnight and voila! What's next? Maybe chili powder? Such a lot of fun. Pictures to come soon. I am getting ready to take a Jude Hill (Spirit Cloth in my sidebar) class on hand stitching soon. She uses natural fibers, many hand-dyed.

Today I painted the edges of 2 large bird canvases. And gessoed 3 small ones to add to the 3 mini bird canvases I already finished. These will be entered into a miniature show this weekend.

And looking about I found another "finished" canvas and started repainting it too. Now I've got my eyes looking for "do over" possibilities... let's see, what do I have sitting in a drawer, a back room somewhere with a sad look, that only needs a new look and fresh coat of paint...?

Sunday Meditation
This photo was shot out of the windshield at a stop light, I couldn't resist that luminous sky, always at the ready with the camera for possibilities.

May the direction you are going, be the one you consciously choose.

Sunday Meditation, Shibori Dyed Fabric, and Patterns

A deep bucket of creativity filled the circle within...
Shibori Dying
Our machine embroidery group got together this week (Thank you yet again, to our talented June), and this is what we brewed up in a big bucket of dye. To start, we folded, scrunched, twisted, and more to the plain white fabrics. Some were tied onto a pvc pipe, other stuffed in those net bags that oranges come in, and others just folded and tied up and dropped in.
Patterns
This process has quite a chaotic feel to it, but in the end, there is vast amount of creativity in that process and that bucket. It is another adventure into randomness, because, you can never predict with certainty what will emerge into the cloth, but the patterns are always organically beautiful and unique. Kind of like people. Sometimes I'm sure we ourselves feel scrunched, twisted and folded, stuffed into the midst of our ever changing lives, and dropped into the bucket of chaos. But like the strength of the cloth, we withstand the treatment and hold the markings of life. And like the cloth, if opened, unwrapped, we relax. And then, we emerge yet again into another pattern that has been imparted to us - like another unique and beautiful cloth.
Look here if you want to see more examples (in bright colors) of my shibori dying.

More Dyeing and Experimenting
I had read a while back about dyeing with natural items, which would be more environmentally friendly, and have wanted to try it. In particular I read that you can get lovely pinks with avocado skins. So I did put a skin and a small portion of the flesh into a pot, boiled it and dropped in a test muslin piece. Here is what I got, the original pure white on the left, and the soft beige on the right. It doesn't look pink to me, perhaps I'll try it again with more than 1 avocado and without the flesh. I have it on my list to try things like beets, tumeric, and onion skins, among others.
Sunday Meditation
Here's a little nod to all the beating heart's in the world... may they all be full of love, good intentions and open to life's blessings, such as, unexpected freedom. What a wonderful condition, freedom, having choice, access, a voice, many voices being heard, making changes, weaving a new cloth, a new pattern.

Here's a little Valentine I created a few years back with fibery things.... enjoy your day.

Fiber Art, Snow Geese, and Sketches

Enjoying nature, shapes, lines and colors.....Snow Geese
We headed north to LaConner on Friday to the Skagit Valley farming area to see if we could spot some snow geese or eagles. There were thousands of snow geese! And I counted 12 eagles. As always, I carry my sketchbook, and captured a quick sense of the shapes. Lately I am paying more attention to shapes in my paintings and perhaps these will end up more refined in paintings to come.
As far as the eye could see, white covered the farmer's fields. They did look like snow, and up close, lovely swan shapes with black tipped wings, honking madly. We were lucky to see this entire flock raise up as one, flooding the sky with beating wings, turning on a dime altogether, like one massive organism changing directions, here, then there, and turning back around and landing again.Fiber Art
I have been focusing on birds the last year. Two weeks ago I worked on a fiber/paper stitching project. Here is a close-up portion of it. It incorporates fabric, my sketch of a heron transferred to fabric, embroidery stitching, tea bag paper, beading and more. I'm not done with it yet, it's an experiment but I'm liking the mix of textures and the pale muted colors, different for me.We visited the La Conner Quilt Museum again. There's a wonderful exhibit of contemporary hand stitched items which I would post pictures of, but they weren't allowed. However, there were also some outstanding examples of crazy quilts from the 1800's, with their amazing quantity of handstitching on every one.
And a final quick sketch - from the turret window of the museum looking across the street.
Taking time for nature, art, sketching, stitching with good company, what could be more satisfying...