By the Creative Power Vested in Me....

I hereby declare you FINISHED!

Your pages are filled.

Your story is told.

The angels have sung your glory.

The final reflection has been recorded.

It's time for us to close the book on our nearly 18-month journey together and go our separate ways. You will find a safe place to rest among my greatest treasures, and I will find other (much, much, much smaller) books with which to play and alter.

Happy trails, my friend. Thanks for the memories.

Still Plugging Along on Pilgrim

I didn't achieve my goal of finishing Pilgrim, the book I've been altering, in 2011 as planned. That's OK because it's a big book. It's a really big book.

Did I mention that it's a big-ass book? So far I've altered 135 pages that are 12 x 13 inches each. When I think about it that way, it's no wonder I'm still plugging away at it. If I had completed 135 of anything else in 2011, it would feel like an enormous accomplishment.

Pilgrim has been a wonderful place for me to play and experiment. Some pages are just about pattern and color because I like pattern and color.

Some pages are just about mark making and seeing what can evolve.

Some pages were inspired by The Sketchbook Challenge. Others by song lyrics, favorite artists, books, movies, or experiences. This page was inspired by a book about vintage board games to which I added a quote that seemed appropriate.

I couldn't resist one more hand image. I think this is the third one in the book.

I re-discovered my plastic alphabet stencils and added favorite quotes wherever they would fit.

I've had a lot of opportunity to practice my lettering on these pages.

This page was done on Easter last year. I can't believe an entire year has passed since then. I guess Pilgrim is proof for me that even a big-ass undertaking can be accomplished line by line, stroke by stroke, mark by mark, and word by word.

Pilgrim is really close to finished now. Filling the last few pages and adding a bit more here and there is both exhilarating and bittersweet. A celebration will be in order when this big book is finally declared DONE.

Merry Christmas to All

To all my friends around the globe, I wish you peace and happiness during this Christmas season and for the new year. May 2012 be filled with inspiration, adventure, and creativity galore! I'm grateful for all those who stop by to visit, leave kind words, and generously share their artistic lives. Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!

What's Thanksgiving without a Pilgrim?

Well, hello Pilgrim! It's been a while since we've seen you here. What would Thanksgiving be without at least one pilgrim at the dinner table? Right? I know, I know. Thanksgiving is over and I'm behind as usual.

In fact, it was time to pause and reflect in Pilgrim about two months ago but I'm just getting to it now. Why? Because, as you can read above, I'm afflicted with 75% syndrome. As soon as any project reaches this point, I run out of steam, inspiration, and interest. I'm ready to move on. I like starting projects so much more than finishing them.

The dilemma I'm reflecting upon is whether I should try to catch up and finish Pilgrim in 2011 as I had originally planned....or if I should forget about my self-imposed deadline and just finish it whenever. Of course, that leads me to wonder if I will ever finish it at all, or if it will end up amongst all the other unfinished projects in my studio. What should I do? Advice? Anyone? Anyone?

This page was the first I did in Pilgrim with my brand new Lamy Safari fountain pen. It arrived in the mail from Germany on Wednesday and I haven't stopped using it since! I bought it for sketching since it's the pen of choice for so many urban sketchers, but it works well for lettering too. It glides across the paper much better than a marker and I'm still getting used to the feel of it. I can refill it with waterproof ink, so no more dried out markers. So far I have to say I LOVE IT!!!

Let’s Go to the Movies

I watched a lot of movies this summer. You might even say I went on a bit of a binge. It started innocently enough—as most adventures do—when I bought some old art books at a local used book sale. That purchase made me realize that there are huge gaping holes in my knowledge of art and artists. I took a few art history classes in college but all I remember is a darkened room, poor quality slides, an instructor who spoke in a monotone, and the ridiculous memorization of names, titles, dates and periods.

I got the brilliant idea to create my own learning experience and decided to start at my go-to place for learning—the public library. I checked out a few books on some of my favorite artists and started reading. However, I find reading about art to be a difficult task so next I went to my second go-to place for learning—google. I searched for movies about art and came up with a large list that I then requested from the library.

I thought I would share with you the movies I watched over the summer in case you are looking for some art-related education and/or entertainment. A lot of these are documentaries and I discovered that I absolutely LOVE documentaries.  I created this spread in Pilgrim where I recorded all the movies (and a few books too). Here they are in no particular order:

Exit Through the Gift Shop – Documentary or mockumentary? Watch and decide for yourself. I thoroughly enjoyed this entertaining and thought provoking look at street art as seen through the lens of the eccentric Thierry Guetta, a French immigrant in Los Angeles. 

Pollack -  Ed Harris stars as abstract expressionist Jackson Pollock. A great movie!

Basquiat - Jean-Michel Basquiat started as a street artist in NYC and had a meteoric rise to fame as a painter in the 80s. Friend to Andy Warhol, he died tragically of an overdose in 1988.

My Left Foot: The Story of Christy Brown - A drama starring Daniel Day Lewis as the title character, an Irishman born with cerebral palsy who could only control his left foot. He uses his foot to paint and write and becomes an accomplished artist and author. I liked this movie although I thought it was more about family and perseverance than about art. I wanted to see more art.

Lust for Life - A classic 1956 film starring Kirk Douglas as the Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh.

Crumb - I never really liked the art of illustrator and comic artist Robert Crumb and now I know why. If you think your family is messed up then you need to watch this film. Holy crap.

 

Rivers and Tides - Watch as British artist Andy Goldsworthy creates fantastic outdoor sculptures from rocks, twigs, flowers, and icicles. This man has more patience than a saint.

The Cool School - A documentary about the Ferus Gallery in Los Angeles which opened in 1957 and launched modern art on the west coast.

Beautiful Losers - This film focuses on the work of a group of artists with a DIY style of street art.

American Splendor – The story of local home boy and quirky comic book creator Harvey Pekar. I think Harvey can only be described as a curmudgeon.

My Kid Could Paint That – Is four-year-old Marla Olmsted a child prodigy of modern art or is it just an elaborate scam? Watch this documentary and decide for yourself. Like Exit Through the Gift Shop, this film will make you question the validity and value of the art market.

How to Draw a Bunny – A documentary about the life and art of Ray Johnson, often considered the father of mail art. It appears that his life was as much a riddle as his art.

Vincent and Theo - Another movie about Van Gogh, but this one looks at the relationship with his brother Theo whose financial support enabled him to focus on painting.

Brush with Genius - Apparently Van Gogh is a popular subject for movie makers. Personally, I would watch every movie ever made about the man.

The Yellow House - An interesting book about the nine weeks that Van Gogh and Gauguin spent living and working together in Arles, France.

Andy Warhol: A Documentary Film - Four solid hours of video that examines the life and work of legendary pop artist Andy Warhol. The first disc focuses on his early life and everything that came before the soup cans that launched him into super stardom. The second disc focuses on life after instantaneous fame. This film inspired a visit to the Andy Warhol museum in Pittsburgh recently.

Herb and Dorothy - The story of the Vogels, a likeable and legendary couple who amassed an enormous collection of contemporary art on a very modest budget and then donated it all to the National Gallery of Art. Philanthropic and adorable at the same time.

The Horse's Mouth - One of the strangest movies I've ever seen in my life. There's nothing else I can say about it.

As you can see from these pages, I also watched a few movies completely unrelated to art and read the "dragon tattoo" trilogy of books. Whew! I told you I went on a binge.

Are there any other good art movies I missed? Let me know if you have any to recommend.

_______________________

Speaking of movies, quite a few have been filmed here locally lately including one where my friend Laura’s house was chosen as a location. Laura completely restored a fabulous arts and crafts bungalow a few years back. At the time, I was doing a lot of mosaic work and she asked if I would like to collaborate with her to mosaic the fireplace in her living room. We worked on it on and off for months and now there is a chance that it might end up in a movie!! The movie won’t be released until next fall but I’m crossing my fingers that the fireplace gets at least a few seconds of glory.

Most of the clutter you see in the room is part of the movie “set” and not Laura’s decorating. The room was made to look retro 70s. I can't believe I have to wait another whole year until the movie is released to see if our fireplace gets its "15 minutes (or seconds) of fame."

So Many Things to Love

I've been a little MIA lately and I don't really know why. Maybe I've been distracted by a messy house, an upcoming craft show, or too many rainy days in a row. Or maybe I've been distracted by making this list of things you gotta love.

Yeah, let's just go with that.

Influence

I think this quote by Sean Reichle perfectly illustrates the meaning of influence. Think about it and choose your friends carefully.

Chicken Soup for the Pilgrim's Soul

Pilgrim has been a little neglected lately since I've been sketching a lot in my watercolor Moleskine.  I looked around the house for an everyday object to sketch in Pilgrim and came up with the reliable old soup can. It worked for Andy Warhol, right?

I debated between chicken noodle and tomato, and the noodle won out. This sketch was done over a background sprayed with pigment inks in pink and red. The can was painted with gouache, watercolor, and twinkling H2Os. This time I decided to skip the black ink and use only paint to sketch the soup can. I tried to make the can recognizable while using as little detail as possible. I was going more for personality than realism. (Honest, I was.)  I kind of like the pinkness of it--so NOT Andy Warhol.

The Halfway Point

I'm a little late in posting my halfway reflection in Pilgrim. It's hard to believe that 2011 is already half over. It's even harder to believe that I've managed to stick with this project for six months!

Once again, I dedicated a page to my reflections on participating in The Sketchbook Challenge. This time I thought about what has changed since my last reflection at the quarter mark. I think the biggest change has been in accepting that this book is a place for experimentation and I care less than I did before about whether or not I like every page. I also am not as bothered by drips, smudges, and overspray. I'm not as protective as I was in the beginning and now those imperfections just feel like part of the process.

Here is a page that went "unfinished" for quite a while. I've recently been very inspired by street art and graffiti and used that inspiration to add more to this page.

This page started out with inspiration from another one of my book sale finds--a book about Paul Klee--but then it took on a life of its own.

It's done with pencil and gouache over a sprayed background.

I think I would classify this as geometric doodling with gouache.

Thanks for stopping by! I hope you're having an inspiring, art-filled summer.

More Pathways

I've been pretty inspired by this month's theme of PATHWAYS for The Sketchbook Challenge. I think it's partly because anything with lines reminds me of pathways and I guess I like to use lines a lot. The page above doesn't use lines, but was instead inspired by a quote. (Another thing I like to use a lot.) I had so much fun with my experiments to paint with gouache that I wanted to try more of that. I also wanted to try lettering with gouache instead of a marker.

That's the nice thing about a sketchbook...having a place to experiment.

It's also a place to just let loose and have a little fun.

In the last post, I mentioned some little art books that I picked up at a local book sale. One was a book about Ernst Nay, a German abstract painter who I was not familiar with. You can read a little bit about him here. I can't read the book since it's written in German but I can admire the pictures. I really like his abstract paintings that use intersecting black lines and round shapes between the lines. (If you scroll down to the photos of the books in the last post you can see an example on the cover of the book about him.) Since lines remind me of pathways, I thought I would attempt my own abstract painting inspired by Nay in my sketchbook.

Of course he probably used oil paint on canvas and I'm using gouache in my sketchbook. I couldn't resist adding my favorite stripes and dots here and there. I especially enjoyed making the gray stripes.

What I really about abstracts is that you can crop in and create a new composition using a smaller piece of the whole.

I'd like to point out that before creating the pages above, I had never even opened the tube of black gouache that came in my starter set of five colors. Everything black in the sketchbook was done with markers and everything painted with gouache was done by mixing three primary colors and white.

See the lonely unused tube of black there? I took a painting class once and the instructor told us we should NEVER use black paint. He said it was better to mix your own black and gray by combining other colors. (Then why the heck do they make black paint???) I don't think that's the reason why I didn't use the black gouache. I think it's more about liking bright colors and not being very sophisticated at color mixing. I don't really consider what I do with paint as "painting" most of the time anyway. I think of it as just adding color to something. I don't believe there are any rules in art and I don't like when people say you should NEVER do something this way or you should ALWAYS do something that way.

Boy did it feel good to use that black gouache straight out of the tube! Another first in Pilgrim and another first for me on my little artistic pilgrimage.

Pilgrim - Pathways

The Sketchbook Challenge theme for June is Pathways and this is my first interpretation of the theme. I've been working on mounting my map series (still!) so I had maps on my mind when I started this page--specifically road maps.

As you can see, I'm still not tired of making marks with gouache. I find it so relaxing and enjoyable. Now I'm even venturing into (ack!) painting with gouache.

A few weeks ago, one of the local universities held their annual used book sale. I've always wanted to attend but it usually falls on a weekend when I have other plans or I happen to hear about it after the fact. This was the year I finally went. Imagine an entire gymnasium filled with table after table of used books all neatly organized by subject matter.

I was torn between buying books for reference and buying books to cut up for collage. I guess I comprised because I bought some of both. The books above were from the art section and most are older than me and written in German. They are compact and lovely, filled with beautiful watercolor paintings. They were around $1 each. Except for the one in the top right corner which was 50 cents and contains the religious frescoes of an artist named Giotto. I thought I would cut this one since it was cheap and I have no idea who Giotto is, but then was inspired by the picture below.

The image on the right is a close up of the image on the left. I thought it would be fun to try to paint it with gouache. (Don't you just love the age on the paper? So pretty!)

I didn't get the angle of the face quite right, and it probably needs more work...but I don't HATE it so that's something, right? The best part is that I really liked painting with the gouache. It definitely behaves differently that either watercolor or acrylic and warrants more exploration.

The art books will go into my growing art library, and I was lucky enough to fine four huge atlases for 50 cents each that I can cut up for collage. All in all, it was a fun and productive outing that I'll make sure I don't miss next year!