To celebrate, 33 1/3 years on-the-air for WORT and Rockin’ John McDonald, WORT is having a benefit party on Saturday, April 18th at the Crystal Corner Bar in conjunction with International Record Store Day. The party will include a live auction and silent auction of record platter art created by local artists and celebrities.

When I heard about the call for artwork, I thought it sounded like fun since the only requirement was to use any size vinyl record in the piece. I forgot it about it until I happened to be at St. Vinnie’s one day and started looking at the records. When I saw this Bossa Nova record, I was so inspired that I couldn’t resist (although I will admit that I didn’t commit to the auction until I saw how it turned out). I hope it does well in the auction since I listen to WORT when I’m in the studio. This piece layers three images with acrylic paint, acrylic medium, oil pastel, and ink. If you are interested in bidding on it but can’t make it to the party, please let me know. I’m sure arrangements can be made for a proxy bidding.

This chapter of “The 12 Secrets of Highly Creative Women” asked us to identify who influenced us early in our life. I immediately knew that my sister, Kathy, had been one of the most influential people when I was young. I think I had a predisposition to all types of arts and crafts but I remember being in awe of her when she left for college, majoring in art. I often wondered if it I interpreted her changing majors to Occupational Therapy as a subliminal message that a career choice should be “practical”. In every book I’ve read about creativity, the question always comes up as to those instances in your life where you were discouraged from following your dream of being an artist. I never felt that anyone said “you can’t make a living being an artist”, but when it came time for me to go to college, my interest in business and computers prevailed. So fast forward twenty years, I’ve experienced the corporate world and am now a stay-at-home mom with two boys (who are growing up much too fast) and I am recreating my life to include my need to be creative. I only wish I could share my experiences and my creative passions with Kathy, but unfortunately she died from cancer over seven years ago.

In the last two years, I have been actively seeking out other creative individuals, some who I consider as guides in the journey and others who are traveling companions (I have found this a bit ironic since it feels like just yesterday I was giving my nephew grief for his “networking” mindset). Having these people in my life has been such a blessing. They have instrumental in identifying my dreams and giving me the confidence to go after them (and if you are reading this, then you are one of those people and I THANK YOU from the bottom of my heart).

And now….on to the Crusade part of my post…

In keeping with Michelle’s play on traditional new year’s resolutions, she titled GPP Crusade #28 as “Portion Control”. I didn’t use my shape from Crusade 27 but I did use the technique in a couple of recent projects. The challenge was to use partial images or shapes to add visual interest. The first canvas, my angel project, uses only a partial image for the focal point and also incorporates part of the angel stamp I carved. I also made a combination mask/stencil of a pair of wings. I used part of it by dry brushing over the mask and also glazing inside the stencil. My original image transfer of the angel head was much more distressed but it was a little “too partial” for my tastes and I ended up doing a second image transfer. My second canvas, with the buddha, includes partial stencilling of the words “purposeful life”. Both of these canvases were made for a challenge that my friend DebMarie and I do every two weeks. We have been meeting for breakfast every two weeks since school started for our kids. Although we always seem to be on a creative high afterwards (don’t you just love talking to people who get you ), we decided that we would also pick a challenge so that we could each see how the other interprets it. Week one was the color red and week two was to incorporate a map (the base of my buddha piece is a japanese map). Don’t forget, if you click on the image, it will bring up a bigger size in a lightbox so you can get a better look at it.

Well, that’s all for now but hopefully I will soon be showing you a piece I’m making for a charity auction AND since it is for a public radio station it had to include some type of vinyl record…have I piqued your interest?

I won’t say that I’m a huge football fan but I do enjoy watching my favorite teams. It has been years since I went to a high school football game but I find myself looking forward to Thursday. That is the day my hometown high school’s football team will play for their sixth consecutive state title. Since they will be playing at Camp Randall in Madison, I can’t resist the urge to go cheer them on. I only hope they can beat our rival, the Edgar Wildcats. They were the one team that beat the Tigers during the regular season. Stay tuned because I will definitely be posting the results of the game.

What I’ve been working on lately is a series of pieces that are on old barn board that my friend, Deb gave me a couple of weeks ago. Because each piece of wood is about one and a half inches thick, they can stand on a shelf or table. I’m still working on them so I’m not going to share them now. Instead, I have my recently completed “Precious Jewels” canvas to share. The main image is a vintage photo of Russian man. When I first saw this photo, I was immediately smitten with it. I think it’s because things like this remind me of my semester in Poland, which was before the Berlin Wall came down. Because it was an old photo, my mind went back in history and I couldn’t stop thinking about the last Russian czar and his family. I decided to combine all my thoughts into one piece. The ghost like images surrounding the Russian man are the four daughters of Czar Nicholas, who where murdered during the revolution. The Russian text translates to “Precious Jewels Forever Lost”.

I’m sure that many of you may be wondering if I’ve fallen off the face of the earth since I haven’t posted anything for so long. Well, yes I did (just kidding) and have now found my way back on and to my computer. The past few months have been ones of transition for me. I realized over the summer that I was having problems again with depression. I have now gotten it back under control and have been more dedicated to my art than ever before. So even though I haven’t been posting. I have been working on various things related to my art. It has been over a year and a half since I decided I wanted to have a website to showcase my artwork. It has only been recently that I’ve made significant strides in making it a reality. With the help of my internet-savvy brother, I have moved my blog to be part of my website and developed an integrated design for all of it. There is still much to do with the website, but at least I’m on my way.
What I have been really excited about is my recent work with image transfers. I have been working on several pieces that incorporate multiple layers of images. One of the first ones I did began as a very different vision than the final result. I love working with vintage images and text but I never thought I would create something with such a strong Victorian feel. I guess you just never know what may be the end result when adding layers upon layers. Stay tuned for more work with layers of images and text.