Collagraph - W.I.P.

It's been a while since I've created or printed a collagraph. Our printmaking group is getting ready for the annual show and sale in a few weeks and I have voluntered to demo all day at the sale and this is one of the pieces I will be working on.
This print was a quick run just to see how the image was going to look. What I really love about collagraphs is the element of surprise in what your print will look like. You give up some control working with this technique.

Paper Dolls for fun

I came across an article by Pamela Hastings in an old Art Doll Quarterly Magazine about paper dolls, and became inspired. So, my daughters and I worked on paper dolls yesterday. The bodies are made from recycled items such are cardboards from tissue and cereal boxes. My main contribution was helping to get the main part of the body drawn and opening the back end of the brads, which were used to attach the arms and legs.

Kepa - The Apostle

Assemblage represents St. Peter, the fisherman from Galilee. His Aramaic name "Kepa", which means rock, was given to him by Jesus. He was the very first pope and was crucified upside down.

In creating this assemblage I formed a wire spring and attached it on the back of the head. I've had this fascination with bobble heads and decided to somehow incorporate it. It's my weird way of visualizing a bobbing head.

The only thing lacking on this piece is the name Kepa, which I would like to place at the very top.

Hope to have that done soon.

Assemblage - Madonna and Child

Assemblage Mother and Child was created with a metal light switch cover, found objects, rusty hardware pieces, metal, wire, and clay. The angel glass charm was a give away by a friend at our local doll group. Some of our doll club members are very generous in bringing items to give away to fellow members. I love it because it's like free flee market with lots of goodies.

Necklace by Jen Worden

I received this really amazing and interesting necklace from Jen Worden a few weeks back. I love the way she created the whole chain link and all the interesting charms she attached . This piece was created from a project in a book by Stephanie Lee titled "Semiprecious Salvage."

Works in progess

I have about four projects I've been working on for the past two weeks, and this one is about 50% done. Just ran out of E6000 and will continue to glue my way through the rest of this project with Liquid Nails. These mini clamps that I have borrowed from the hubby are great! I also use some small plastic clamps that are just the right size to use with these small projects.

I am taking my very first assemblage class and this is the fruits of my labor. I painted the doll's legs with black spray paint used for plastics. The legs were painted a very beautiful black color and very shiny. As I was moving them around they kept getting nicked, so I just gave up on keeping them prestine looking and took sand paper to them to give them the worn look.

It also helped to have body parts from a very well made doll! I'm now at the point of trying to figure out on how to design the inside of the cigar box. What you see currently are a few torn pieces of ink covered tarlatan(stiff cheese cloth). Tarlatan is used in wipping down plates in printmaking. Some of the ink covered tarlatans have some beautiful colors on them. I guess this is my part in recycling because I think the studio discards them when the are too soiled with ink.

I like indirectly incorporating printmaking into my assemblages.

I was tagged by Robinsunne to tell 6 random things about myself and then tag others in turn.

1) I love to eat pickles and chips.

2) I have a breakfast burrito most mornings.

3) I am originally from the Land of Enchantment.

4) I am a very blessed person to have and know all the wonderful people in my life.

5) Most times I feel that I have an old soul, which is a good thing for me!

6) At another time in my life, I had served 8 years in the military.

As another friend put it so delicately in his blog regarding these tags, I too will have to be a party pooper and decline on tagging other artists friends because they just wouldn't care for this

to show up on their blogs.

Assemblage - Angel of Peace

I had finished this piece some time back and she needed some tweeking, so it was back to the drawing board for a while until I made some time to finish her. After working out problems with this piece, I had the strong desire to rename her as well.
What I really enjoy about creating assemblages is the process of figuring out what structurally works. Just when you think all the gliches have been addressed, something new arises that puts your creativity back to the test.