En Plein Air

 This week, a bunch of us decided to get together to draw and paint outside.

 Holly had suggested a spot in Cornwall on the St. Lawrence River.

 With a babbling brook and plenty of shade on a hot day, it seemed we were miles away from a busy city.

Half the group, which I never managed to photograph, stayed by the picnic table where we had lunch and watched this flock of ducks.

This fellow decided that we must have a good tidbit to toss to him, but alas, we kept drawing and he waddled away with no prize from us gals.

Sketch Fest

Our artist trading card group met last Saturday and we had 18 folks show up to trade. After the trade and a cup of coffee, Perry (standing), our wonderful 92-year old trader, suggested we get together for a sketching fest. He brought each of us a small sketch pad.


Nine of us decided to participate. We sat in a circle and with an egg timer, we each sketched or doodled for five minutes and then passed the sketch pad to the left and started another drawing until we had gone full circle.


It was a great way to loosen up those sleepy drawing "muscles" and also to get to know each other a bit better.


Guess what my first sketch was? First instict: draw a cat!

Punch Card Art

A few years ago I participated in an art show entitled "Do Not Fold, Bend, Spindle or Mutilate: Computer Punch Card Art." The organizers at the Visual Arts Center at the Washington Pavilion of Arts and Science mailed out punch cards and asked folks to fold, bend or mutilate the cards in any way they chose and return them. This is what I sent in.

Springborne

My friend Nancy from Portland, Oregon is part of a group of poets who needed an invitation to a reading. My friend Peter in Toronto came up with this invite and used my drawing of a lawn chair entitled "Summer Evening." He manipulated it in Photoshop so it looks kind of dreamy. Nice, eh?

Famous Chicken

Mrs. Chicken, an acrylic on wood painting I did last winter, was chosen to illustrate an entry of an intriguing website called Nature Works. At its helm is Doug Subbiondo, a gardener, landscaper and personal vegan chef. To see more click here.

Holly's Birthday Gift

Sixteen friends got together to do a group birthday gift for our friend Holly. We got together late last year to have wine and dessert (natch) and to throw around a few ideas as to what we should do. We decided on each of us completing a 3" x 5" canvas. I decided to paint Oreo, one of my cats with whom Holly has a special bond.


Several months later, the group met again and this time we brought our completed canvases.


We put them together with velcro tabs attached to long ribbons hung from a wooden dowel.


It came together beautifully...


The miniature works of art were wonderful, each recalling a special moment each artist shared with Holly.


...and here is the final piece of work, hanging in Holly's screened-in porch, where she can enjoy it while sipping on her morning tea.

Birthday Card

For my friend Roberta's 50th birthday, I made her a two-sided card that was a sort of trip down memory lane. The card was a z-folded affair with flowers all over it. I gessoed them out to be less of a distraction. I pulled out all my old photo albums, scanned the best photos, reduced and printed them and made an eight sided collage of our friendship. Hallmark couldn't have said it better, eh?

Andy and Me

Andy Warhol loved using the simple red and white graphic of a Campbell's soup can. And I guess so do I. This cartoon appeared in my book Famous People's Cats.


I did a similar thing in my friend Susan's round robin art journal which had the theme "red."


These artist trading cards are from a sheet of soup wrapping paper I bought from the Art Gallery of Ontario in Toronto, after seeing a show on Andy there. I added the cats.


I made only 3 of these ATCs using Andy's own cat drawings. I called the series "Andy's Cats Play Cat's Cradle."


Inspired again by Andy's use of the classic soup label, in this case I used the Canadian version of the label which shows an actual bowl of soup.

Russian Box: Before & After

I love Russian lacquered boxes. My parents had a few of them at one point but the boxes are long gone. So I was excited to see one at a thrift shop the other day. But I kind of knew it was a fake. The originals have lovely, hand painted images on their covers. This one was a poor reproduction of an architectural painting of onion domes.


A friend came to tea just as I was unwrapping my "find." I showed it to her and she suggested I gesso it and create my own version of a Russian box. I painted my signature "flying" cat but this time, in a very ornate fashion to make it feel like it belonged on the box. How did I do?

Google is Famous!

Remember Barney Google? (Google for short!) My blue folk art cat, named by my sister Marcia (because he has "googly" eyes) is in cyberspace today. My friend Julien, who is an incredibly talented artist and graphic designer, authors a blog called "View from the Zoo" and put Google in today's entry. Click here to check it out. Thanks Julien!

Folk Art Workshop

My friend Flip attended "Heart and Soul: Quebec Folk Art" last week at the Canadian Museum of Civilization in Hull, Quebec and decided to hold a folk art workshop of her own. She asked us to bring a few odds and ends, paint, gesso, and anything else we thought might work on a naive sculpture. If we needed some wooden parts for bodies, ears, legs, etc., her husband Robin, a fabulous woodworker would not only supply his extra off-cuts to us, he'd also help us assemble our sculpture.

I found the leftovers of a circle and decided it would be a perfect body for a cat. I also found a large, flat circle and Robin attached it with a 3/4" dowel to the body. He also added a dowel for the tail. We also found 2 triangular pieces of wood for ears. He did a rough sanding, drilled in screws for the eyes (old, china door pulls I had brought along) and inserted the nose piece, which was an electric wall switch I found in my hardware drawer.

Then I needed to seal up the wood with a few coats of gesso.

Meanwhile...Holly sanded and painted a large piece of cedar she rescued from the back woods. It is to become a garden gnome. Barb worked on a pair of horses that sat on four wooden wheels (that actually turned!) and Flip worked on a big orange cat (that she later decided to re-paint black).

I decorated my cat with a coat of blue house paint and black spots. I also added a bit of pink for his ears and mouth.

Robin helped me find the perfect thing for his whiskers -- some wound up wire inserted on either side of his face. Now all he needs is a name. Any suggestions?