What's Cookin'

Look what came in the mail yesterday!! A couple of weeks ago I entered into a give away on Alisa Burke's blog and I won this beautiful clutch from her. She let me choose my favorite colors and my word for 2009 (moderation - I know, laugh now). Oh, it's so much prettier in person than I could have imagined!

This is what it looks like when it is snapped shut.

And then it opens up into this deep pouch that I can imagine even puttin long papers into.

I love Alisa's work so much because she has that free loosey-goosey style going on that speaks to confidence and joy. She is teaching this August in Arizona at Art Unraveled where yours truly anticipates meeting her for the first time. You just might want to sign up for a class with her and learn her secrets. (yes, I'll be teaching there too and registration is open now.)

So what else has been going on in the studio is a giant gelatin printing fit. My list of things to do in the off season included a go at this. Printing without a press. Making stuff for my collage paper stash. Because I'm low on stuff. (more maniacal laughter)

I pulled off dozens of prints in a few hours, filling the studio floor with wet prints.

Tried out paints, inks, dyes, alcohol, and everything I could think of to try.

Masks, stencils, stamps, vegetation, direct painting on the gelatin.

I'll be offering a class this fall with my compadre on printing without a press. She is a whiz at this and I love hanging with her so this will be pure delight.

In an earlier lifetime I was a maker of etchings and that was incredibly challenging and fun.

We want this class to be fun without being that challenging.

The hardest thing about making these kinds of monoprints is stopping once you've started.

Because your imagination is saying, "what happens if I try that (piece of texture)? " and soon you're running all over the studio upending everything in your haste to throw stranger and stranger objects on the gelatin.

It's very cool.

I may do some more today if I can find my brayers under all the clutter.

Okay, that's the end of the show and tell. You were a very good audience.

We'll finish up with the latest journal page. Bits and pieces. Memories and dreams from the daily mill. And this parting thought; that our waking life is only half the story. In dreams, actual deep sleep, lives another life more strange and wonderful than what we sense during our "waking" hours. That's what I've been chewing on this week.

Addendum: Squam registration is now open too.