paint cut paste

you may have heard buzz around the internet of art house coop’s sketchbook project from last fall or “liked” them on facebook, maybe. it’s this deal where the art house coop sends you a sketchbook to fill, you send it back, and then it goes on tour around the country with a group of nearly 29,000 other participants sketchbooks, in its own little art show. when i heard about this project, i liked it, i clicked “like,” and i signed right up to participate in it. that was back in september.

about a week later, a great little moleskin sketchbook arrived, and i vowed to sketch and create and keep this visual journal with me for the next few months. (i had until mid-january to complete it and send it in.)  i encouraged some friends to participate, as well. i was psyched that i would be making my own art in it! finally – art time for momma! it was ripe with potential! i had to choose one of their “themes” for the book. i picked one i figured was the most general: a day in the life.

i took myself out for tea that day and began the book.

ahhh… that was nice. and then like 16 days later i made another page in the book. darn, have two weeks gone by already?” i wondered. 4 days later, another page. a month later, two more pages. i was slow to start. it was interesting to watch my own mind and my own process around taking the time to create my own art. it is logistically and emotionally challenging to invest in this sort of me-time as a mom of a young kid. but it is oh-so-important.

i was really wanting to do this in an altered book sort of style, but the really thin pages of the moleskin were a bit frustrating to work with… i think they must really have meant “sketch in this book.” i did a lot of pasting other papers into the book so i could use more wet media and saturated colors. and collage.

the holidays came and went, and my book was really quite empty. in the new year, i vowed to knock out some art work in that journal – BE CREATIVE NOW! hee hee… i laughed at the pressure of that, and relaxed a bit around it. i spent a couple weeks really just having FUN with different media.

then the me-time became we-time, as it often just does organically. i enjoy making art with my little lady, and she couldn’t resist helping with mommy’s sketchbook. so i enlisted the help of my favorite tiny artist who can crank out the creativity like no one else i know.

little ghost artist

she was honored to participate. we did a dialog drawing in the book together.

she made some pictures of her own on some of the pages. (thank you, N!)

N's mandala

the last few nights before the book was due were like a creative explosion on my dining room table. i loved it.

in the end, i submitted it in time. apparently it is being digitized by art house coop (in a way higher quality way than i’ve done here with the photos the morning before i headed to the post office in january) and will be available on their web site for viewing.

also my little book is now on a U.S. tour. i think it was in austin last weekend, and is now on its way to portland, maine. it has a tour schedule, like a little paper rockstar in a huge jam band of nearly 30K players. that’s kinda fun. i’m excited to see the exhibit when it hits san francisco in june. if the tour arrives in a city near you, i’m sure it’s a fun exhibit to attend — look my book up when you’re there!

tour image from arthousecoop.com

art house coop has some other projects currently going on that are open for participation. check it out. it’s good stuff.

a few days ago, i brought out one of my favorite art mediums to share with N: watersoluable crayons. oh, caran dache, how i love thee! and apparently, my little one does, too!

when i lived in new york city a decade ago, i took a “dry media” art class where i discovered the wonders of the watersoluable world of art materials. i spent five months creating images with only these crayons, by choice.

seashell, summer 2001

i had to share the joy with N. first, i demonstrated (on my own piece of paper) how you can color with these “special artist crayons” first, and then use a wet paintbrush to go over your drawing to magically turn it into a painting! this was met with some “ooooh”s and “aaaah”s and an immediate desire to try it herself.

N created several “paintings” during the time it took me to make broccoli cheddar soup for dinner.

she practiced layering the colors and watching them blend together when she added water.

i showed her the technique of using a wet wipe wrapped around your finger to blend the pigment (instead of a wet paintbrush.) she giggled at the thought of “wiping” her picture. she loved how the colors popped once they got wet.

N made many masterpieces this afternoon… all with watersoluable crayons, using different blending techniques. here are just a few: (click the image to see it larger)

she also made this picture of our cat eating her dinner, which i just love. she didn’t use water on this image, but i had to share.

top o’ the mornin’ to ya, lads & lasses! just a little luck & cheer from my weee bit (1/8th) irish lady one who drew this lovely little leprechaun to celebrate the season:

while she drew the rest of what you see below, she told me this: “that’s me behind her, catching the leprechaun! did you know that if you catch a leprechaun, she has to give you all of her gold?”

happy st. patty’s day to all!

as a child, i was a HUGE muppet fanatic. i listened to “the muppet movie” soundtrack over and over and over in my bedroom every single day for several years. my favorite holiday album was (and still is!) john denver & the muppets: a christmas together. when i was 5, i had a rainbow painted on my bedroom wall and muppet stuffed animals strewn across my bed. my master’s thesis was titled: “the rainbow connection: the chakra system as a framework for transpersonal art psychotherapy.
” (okay, so nevermind the latter part of the title — i was trying to convey that as an adult, i never got over the rainbow connection piece.) i had a major boo hoo session when jim henson passed. i met his daughter when out with some puppeteer friends when i lived in NYC, and asked her to draw kermit on a napkin, which i kept. i’m a muppet weirdo. yep. so you can imagine my muppet-crazed-child-of-the-70s elation when my daughter fell in love with the muppets, too.

while she has never been into sesame street like many of her friends (N complains, “there’s no plot mommy! it just jumps around, and i want a story!”), she loves all of the muppet show/muppet movie characters that jim henson created. she’s a bit lonely in this, as most of her preschool friends don’t know who gonzo is, but she’s happy to teach them by drawing pictures like this at preschool:

animal and kermit

N is particularly into the muppet band, the electric mayhem:

can you picture that?

when N sees my husband in the morning, the verrry first words out of her mouth are, “be floyd!” most of my days are spent swinging my hair back and forth, saying “fer sherrr” while pretending to be janice. and N is, of course, animal. she will see a letter “A” and say, “that’s what my name starts with, because i’m not N, i’m animal!”

family portrait: floyd, janice, and animal

we play a “guess which muppet i am” 20 questions type of game for hours on end many days, and she LOVES finding obscure characters to pretend to be, like beauregard, lew zealand, sweetums, and dr. bunson honeydew. she often tries to take over when we have our computers on so she can type out “our” names.

because the muppet songs, the muppet show, the muppet movies, the muppet stuffed animals, and the muppet personalities have taken over our home and art for the past three months, i figured i should post about it here. that is authentically the subject matter of most of the art and play happening in our home at the moment. do your child’s favorite characters find their way into the art in your house, too?

you, dear readers, may recall the huge frame that N and i painted as a prop for her rainbow-themed fourth birthday party.

well, this lovely rainbow ikea frame was just calling to us for some original artwork to fill it. N was up for the task! we started by painting a lavender (N’s choice) watercolor wash onto a heavy weight piece of drawing paper. N wanted to background of her mixed media picture to be purple like her bedroom.

after the paint was dry, N wanted to draw a picture with pencil onto the page. she had an idea that she wanted to draw a porcupine wedding taking place under a decorated tree, with some animal guests.

after N drafted most of the picture in pencil, she got out our crayons and got to work coloring in this huuuge coloring page.

some of the areas were so large (like the tree trunk and some of the tree top.) that her hand got tired and she asked me to help out coloring “in the lines, mommy!” as it was progressing, the look on her excited face was priceless!

the details are fabulous, and i wanted to share a few…

dancing groom & bride

fox, mice, bunny wedding guests

mama bird, nest with eggs, and squirrel

N was pleased with the finished piece.

but even more psyched when it was framed in her bedroom!

nevermind that it’s not yet thanksgiving… somehow our spirits are already in the christmas-mode around here, much like a prematurely decorated department store. we haven’t busted out the stockings or the tree yet, but N has been singing “rudolph the red-nosed reindeer” constantly since december 2008, pretty much on a daily basis no matter the season. she is always anticipating the holiday. the other day i found her at her art table, drawing and coloring, as she is often doing.

this time she was making a picture of santa claus. i just had to share it with you, as i was quite impressed! (yep, i’m a proud momma.) i just love that this entire project was completely child-invented and child-directed.

N said that she wanted to send the picture to santa claus in the north pole, along with her christmas list for the toys she wants his elves to make for her. (even though we downplay the actual existence of one man named santa around here, in favor of “he’s the spirit of christmas” explanations, the mass consciousness around his myth as permeated our household via friends, books, cartoons, etc.) so be it. she’s enjoying the legend for now, and also holds a broad perspective that includes earth-based spirituality and honors other spiritual paths. she knows that christmas isn’t about materialism, yet she is a three year old who wants new toys.

anyway, she got to work dreaming up the things she wants for christmas. she asked me to help her spell the items, as she got to work writing her christmas letter.

it reads: “dear santa. i wish for: teddy bear, bike, fox, ipod, train, train track. love, N”

N wanted me to help her mail this to the north pole. now i think this is the cutest letter ever, so just couldn’t bring myself to fold it and put it into any old envelope, so we spent the afternoon creating a large envelope that would hold it out of a large roll of drawing paper and clear packaging tape (to seal the sides of the pocket.) N addressed and stamped (with a 1 cent stamp) the envelope.

N decorated the envelope with all sorts of stickers for santa. (we don’t have any holiday or winter stickers yet, so she just used random ones we did have on hand.)

we put it out beside the mailbox. (to promptly be retrieved by me when she is absorbed in play again.)

grandma is in town and brought with her a really cool coloring set for N… metallic markers on black backgrounds with who else? the disney fairies!

nevermind that blank rectangle at the bottom where N already took the markers off.

i’m so not getting paid to endorse a product here, but i’ve always been a sucker for making art on black backgrounds, so that’s the gist of this post.

N said it was magical. something about having colors show up against a dark background is like drawing with light in a nighttime sky. she completed both images that came in this disney fairies shimmer art package.

we went out to lunch later in the day, and i thought to bring along these metallic markers from the set, along with an art journal i have with blank black pages in it. (by the way, you can get the sharpie metallic markers at target and they create the same effect.)

i drew a circle on the page and invited her to create a mandala. she LOVED this directive and really got into it.

mandala artists converse

creating this masterpiece…

for some more on creating mandalas on black paper, check out our blog from last year by clicking here.