Trashcan Art WIP - post 2

My daughter is still ill but feeling better, of course now my youngest has the bug. I just got a call from my 2nd graders teacher and it seems it has gone through the classroom pretty hard.

So I didn't get to work at all yesterday as I had a 4 year old on my lap all day watching cartoons... I did this little bit on the trashcan project the day before. I used lots of pencil on some dark grey pastelbord and thenlots of solvent. I'm not sure i like the results yet but I'm going to work a bit more until I decided if I need to start over.

Trashcan Art: Abstract Work In Progress

I went to the dump last week and took loads of photos. The metal pile proved to be the most promising but since they have a policy of not allowing people to pick from the metal pile I had to deal with getting questioned from one of the men working there. I don't think he quite understood why I was taking photos of the trash.

Anyway here's one of the pics I took - I love the bright blue sky above the big pile! I wanted to do a more abstract piece so I looked through a bunch of photos like that looking for recurring shapes and an interesting color scheme. I could have composed it at the dump but I felt funny since I was being watched, so I decided to take loads of photos of everything on my highest resolution and look for an interesting abstract composition afterwards from the much better smelling comfort of my home and computer desk.

OK so there's the reference I'll be using. I like it just as is so it will be tough to improve on it with colored pencil, but we'll see!


So what's in your trashcan?

Maggie's Tea

Hey all. I decided to spring clean this last weekend instead of work on art and then my daughter came down with something... we go to the doctor in an hour.

I did squeeze this little drawing out yesterday while sitting on the couch with her all day. That's the great thing about colored pencils isn't it? I sat on the couch and worked on one of those little tv snack tables with my pencils either in a cup on the table or sitting on the couch in a tub betweeen my daughter and I. She was doing the same thing on her snack table and made some cute little miniatures with my pencils. :-)

This is just 8" x 10" on pastelbord.

Mandala

I haven't done much art this week as I've been getting my stuff ready for a show and just dropped that off today.

I also went with my daughter's class to Keene High School to see the Tibetan Monks who are visiting and creating a sand mandala. They've been working all week on it, dropping little bits of sand from the end of a gold colored rod that has ridges on the outside of it. They rub a wooden mallet on the ridges so just little bits come out at a time from the vibration. The mandala they are working on is the medicine mandala which, when they are finished after a full week of solid work, will be dumped into the nearby stream during the closing ceremony on Saturday March 31st at 4 pm. The meeting will originate at the KHS gym. According to their website, this is to symbolize the impermanence of all that exists and spread the healing power of the mandala.

Here it is on their website with more information about them and the process: http://www.gomang.org/mandala.html

I went with a bunch of second graders and as we walked from their school to the high school they were silly and energetic, so it was really fun to not only watch the amazing artwork that was going on but also the way the kids were reacting to it. Mouths were open, they were still, and their gaze couldn't be broken. :)

I know a group of kids and teachers from Keene High School worked hard to get this to come to Keene, but as their website was down when I wrote this, I don't know the specifics. I did however get a photo of a poster listing the donors that made it possible.

More info on Framing Without Glass

Thanks so much for the nice comments on my miniature Waterhouse's. I have to do one more of my other daughter as the guilt it setting in. :)

Sherry Ellis just sent me a great link to a demo for mounting paper pieces on Ampersand board. http://www.jnibbe.com/pdfs/glassless_framing.pdf Check it out!

Also I wrote to the amazing colored pencil artist Alyona Nickelsen on how she mounts her pieces on stonehenge paper to boar. She graciously replied:

You can mount it on any archival surface. You can purchase gesso boards,
but they are more expensive. I prefer Masonite board. It is not archival, but so
far it is the cheapest. So the best shot is to purchase a large sheet of
Masonite board in a builders supply and prime it yourself. First you have to
lightly sand the board and cover it with a couple of layers of gesso. I use
Golden gesso just because I have it already. To mount the artwork on the board
you can use various adhesives, such as Grafix Double Tack Mounting (expensive),
paste “Yes!”, Golden Heavy Gel Medium, Lineco Neutral PH Adhesive or Polyvinyl
Alcohol Adhesive. The last step and the longest is to cover your artwork with a
few layers of varnish over a few layers of Prismacolor Final fixative. I use
Golden Archival Glossy Varnish in aerosol. You have to let it dry after each
layer.

You can frame it with no glass, but it will not protect the
artwork from scratches.

Alyona has recently had colored pencil demonstrations featured in Artist's
Magazine and American Artist recently and her official webpage is www.brushandpencil.com

I'm
getting ready for a show that I'll tell you all about this week and soon will
get to work on a new piece again.