Women of Note

Well, Howdy!
I'm hoping you all had a nice Thanksgiving feast or whatever you might celebrate at this time!

The art show and the craft fair I participate in are over now. I made a modest amount selling my art pieces and greeting cards and my "WOMEN of NOTEbooks."  Women of Note--I chose Eleanor Roosevelt, Annette Kellerman, Sojourner Truth, Madame Sherri, and a couple of Queens of the World.

Annette Kellerman,
Pioneered one piece swim suits.
Arrested for indecency

It started with those cute little versions of the composition books sold at Staples.  They have covers that beg to be decorated.  A little rubber cement or the blue glue (Martha S), trim it neatly, rounding the corners and repeat on the back. I put the portraits on the front and a little blurb about each on on the back, along with my business name.  I didn't take any pictures of the notebooks, but am enclosing some of the women here.

Become Queen of your own World.

Annette and Queens were the first ones I collected and I loved their spunkiness, prompting me to find a few more strong and interesting women:

"No one can make you feel inferior without your consent"

Eleanor was one of the most pro-active First Ladies in history. I have always admired her.

"The spirit calls me and I must go."

Sojourner Truth traveled the country speaking against slavery, for women's rights, suffrage,
religious freedom and pacifism.

And then there's Madame Sherri. With a background in Paris and NY theater, Madame Sherri built a castle in Chesterfield, VT in 1931. She and her friends lived a life of parties and scandal. Her castle burned to the ground in 1962 leaving the ruins, including an arched stone staircase in Madame Sherri’s Forest. It appears to be haunted with the remnants of music and party sounds.

Look up their stories in the links above. Seek your own heroes!

Have a great week!
Hugs,
Sherry

More Paintings.

Happy Friday~

Today I taught myself how to do watermarks on Photoshop elements. Why that program is so difficult for me, I'll never know! How do you do watermarks? Is there an easier way?

Year after year, I question the wisdom of doing art shows/craft fairs.  The last few years, it has been SO unprofitable, that I only do it for fun.  I did much better last weekend than I have for a long time. Not a lot of money, but maybe 3x as much as past shows.  I sold two of my old collage prints, many cards and altered notebooks. Of course, what carries me is my note cards.

I enjoy making my own cards, though it can be tedious. Printing, scoring, folding, trimming, stuffing the envelope inside and bagging. I keep thinking of having them printed, but they would look totally different with a white border. I enjoy controlling the colors and sizes and the whole look of them myself.

My next show is next Saturday, after Thanksgiving. It is more craft fair, so I am working on some crafty things that will sell cheaper than art.  BUT I hope I sell some of my art!

My current passion is 10 x 10" canvases. They are recycled from cheap department store art. I spend so much on art supplies, that I'm thrilled to find this great source. Many of them are marked down to just a couple dollars apiece.

I'm still working on this piece. I think it needs more background complexity. The photo color is way off, it is soft green and turquoise, with teal birds.  My computer photo editing program seems to have some trouble with greens. Even in my landscape photography the greens don't process the way I expect them to.

Still enjoying warm, lovely weather here in Massachusetts. Hope you have a great Thanksgiving with family and/or friends!

Hugs!
Sherry

Trusting your heart is where the magic happens... and where destiny starts to unfold.

A New Look!

Well hello, again!  I hope to be a blogger when I grow up! With winter months approaching, I am once again thinking of life inside and connecting with friends on my blog.  I hope you will join me as I expose myself -- that is, revealing my ever-evolving art to you and the world at large!  P.S. I'm no photographer. These are pretty distorted, but a sampling!

One of my first painterly ones

I have been on a quest to grow from a cut and paste collager to an artist who paints on canvas. In 2014, I took a wonderful on-line class by Kelly Rae Roberts. It was such a benefit to see how she lays papers, paints and words onto a canvas and comes up with awesome complex backgrounds, sweet, fun and touching themes and beautiful mantras. One of the best things that came from that class was the community that we created as all 200ish of us shared our evolution. From blatant beginners like me to accomplished artists, each dared to try new things, and bravely posted our pictures on our facebook page. We continue to share and encourage each other as friends do. Sometimes we even meet each other and we already have so much in common that it is just like seeing your bestie after a long time away!

Still stuck on collage, but starting to play with paints. Sold it!

My aim is not to become a landscape or a portrait artist, but to use my intuition and put my feelings out there in a way that others can relate to. I LOVE it when people come to my art show booth and laugh and show my cards, collages and paintings to each other. I LOVE it when people get me.

A bit anal with the rubber stamps!

Well enough about me, already...How about my studio?  Older posts tell about moving into Dad's very dusty old carpentry shop. He's been gone for 11 years already and the 3 brothers had ravaged the shop and filled the corners with their own stuff, spare pianos (the piano tuner brother), big carpentry machinery and lots of sawdust (the carpenter brother) and old lawnmowers and icky old gadgets and gazillions of recycled screws, nails, and broken old stuff that my old Yankee Dad didn't throw away. Ever.

Playing with drippies and stencils. 12" square. Sold this one!

After all those years of sawdust, grease, spiders, mouse residue, old nasty chemicals and scary old liquids in cans and bottles...well you can imagine how daunting that room was. The good things were:   the size, a large L shape with some oddly angled walls, plumbing for a sink, lots of electrical outlets and high ceilings.

I love how this came out. It is a big one, too.

I hired Jim (the welder brother looking for work). His first project was to build an addition to the garage to house the stuff that no one could get rid of. Then after lots of cleaning and insulating, the room was boarded in with bead board paneling, the fluorescent lights taken down and replaced by overhead LED directional lights, I painted and painted it all white and Jim installed a kitchenette (donated cabinets with sink along a short wall). I put down a vinyl stick-down tile floor over the concrete and moved in.  The wall over the sink and one stretch in the middle of the longest wall became soft turquoise. In came lots of storage-wall shelves and Ikea cubicle shelving units. I dragged Dad's old metal workshop bench in, which he had painted turquoise years ago (industrial chic!) and filled up with my art supplies. The room is now kitchenette, studio, office and sitting area with a back door overlooking a small yard and acres of woods. I love it!

My favorite so far. The layering effect I learned from Kelly Rae Roberts.

Mom and I live in harmony, each with our own living room, kitchen, bedroom and bathroom.  We use separate entrances and driveways, but our spaces are open to each other.  I work one mile down the road at the Senior Center 15 hours a week and do freelance desktop publishing. I am starting to really feel balance in my life!

Art Show this weekend, Old and new things

I hope you will visit me here soon and often. I can't wait to hear "what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?" (Mary Oliver)

Hugs,
Sherry

Ummm, revised!

Hello from Lalaland!

I have been a bad blogger. I don't know how I've managed to get so busy that blogging is nearly impossible, but I am and it seems to be!

Floating in a birch forest

One of the engineers of the submerged forest-beaver!

I am the epitome of the person of a certain age who lost her job a few years ago and now has a portfolio of part time options:  two office jobs totaling 25 hours a week; LOTS of pet-sitting jobs, in which I am away from home from overnight to 3 weeks at a time; free-lance work in desktop publishing; volunteer work with the senior center; a home to establish in Mom's house, which consists of converting an old workshop into a studio/kitchenette--yes, I'm actually finally getting started on that project.

Playing with Magic setting on new camera

I have been in limbo with that project, as getting brothers motivated is almost impossible without the moola to pay them, and thanks to a recent financial benefit, we are moving forward. I went on a scouting mission to Home Depot this weekend, looking at flooring, paneling, paint colors. I should be in there by Thanksgiving....HOPEFULLY!

Breaking up housekeeping...

One of the coolest things I've done this spring/summer is take an e-class by Kelly Rae Roberts! She is one of my favorite mixed media artists, and this class was just a blast. The best part was meeting so many like-minded artists and learning to be fearless and express myself with paint. When I get my studio back together, I hope to plunge back in and do lots of artistic stuff. I miss it. I had a great start early this year when I set up a temporary studio space, but that is gone now and everything is moving into the garage for the remodel.

So I hope to reconnect this fall and reestablish myself as a blogger once again!

Meanwhile, enjoy this lovely time of year!

Hugs,

Sherry

P.S. Thanks, Tammy, for noticing me here!