What has been going on during this quarantined pandemic

Since I last wrote I have been wearing a mask

 and using disposable gloves whenever venturing forth.

It almost seems normal now to see empty streets and grocery stores.

I get some deliveries and have curb picked-up at a couple 

of restaurants that are closed to all else.

It has been two months since I last wrote. 

Several celebrations, birthdays, anniversaries, and Mother's Day

have past with many greetings On-line,

many Zoom meetings, conversations, and games

have been played.

 For Mother's Day, I received these plants

for the two very empty pots on our front porch

 Also, this lovely indigo and white Shibori tea towel, card, and book,

 found on our front porch.

And in the mail delivery, 

a stand that can connect to a table and then hold my iPad.

 In March there had been a call-out for sewers 

to create hand-made masks to

 then be delivered to several hospitals.

 I made just 20 for Suburban Hospital and 

then a couple for neighbors and our use.

 Then, another Call to Artists by ArtWatch for 

a project to thank hospital workers for everything.

 This project was to create a small (4 by 6 inch) 

piece of art on an index card or cardboard..

 Remembering the note cards I made months ago 

I used the same idea, slide frames, 

painted and filled with fabrics or colored pictures. 

 I had been enjoying pleating the foreign money, so,

 added to one of the index cards. 

These were then sent to a staging address 

where they will be delivered, as our thanks, 

to all the hospital workers in this area.

 Each day that I take a walk, I absorb such beautiful colors..

 I always come home wanting to use colors any way I can, quickly.

So with the machine just waiting for me, 

I add a small bit of color and lay it aside for another time.

I hope to get back to three other embroidery projects, soon.

There has never been enough time for so much 

I want to do despite the fact that we all are staying at home.

Coronavirus Found time?

When everything was closed and all appointments and meetings were canceled

I thought that I had found some time and how could I put it to use.

Of course, I was going to draw and exercise every day, 

clean out cupboards and shelves, organize my studio and read more.

How have I done these past two weeks? 

My plan did not work as I had expected

This is as far as my drawing has gone, just a start.

I wanted to draw some colorful zinnias

 I did finish one piece for the New Image Artists' upcoming exhibit.

This is a detail of an artwork I titled IMPERFECT INTENTION.

Last month I had started to unravel a sweater and 

used some of the yarn to cover part of another large scissor(s).

Having more birthdays approaching there was a need for more cards.

I am always looking for ways to use bits and pieces of unfinished or experimental work.

Years ago I had tucked striped fabrics just to see what would happen when it was ironed.

These two cards with their embroidered butterflies illustrate one result.

 I remembered spending a lot of time working with cardboard slide frames.

AWAKENING THE OBSOLETE is complete with ten 12 by 12-inch panels.

 Painting some of the frames with stripes and filling other with striped fabric, 

 and, filling frames with tiny drawings or paintings 

were more ways I used the obsolete slide frames.

 I had wanted to develop a new format for notecards. 

Starting with some 8 by 11-inch stationery I added slide frames. 

When folded this card just fit in a standard business envelope.

So a new format for notecards that include tiny bits of art in each frame

In between long bouts on the computer, 

I have been walking in our neighborhood. 

 MacArthur Blvd. with lots of white blossoms

 A small white tree at the corner.

And one yard had many colors along their retaining wall.

Now, the big question, will I get back to drawing?

Will I come up with some more use for 

unfinished and experimental work?

Will I clean a closet?

I do not want to waste this 'found' time.

The week of Art and snow

I spent a lovely day Tuesday meeting with several friends 

at SAAM (Smithsonian American Art Museum).

We wanted to see the Obama portraits and found 

more of a crowd in front of Michelle's portrait 

than in front of the President's but I'm sure that changed all day.

Both were even better in person/paint than 

the images you see printed or on TV.

 We were surprised when we discovered that the Do Ho Suh 

exhibit had just opened. 

It is a wonderful unusual and beautiful show. 

He uses sheer Poly fabric in many colors over steel wire 

to create transparent sculptures of common household items, 

he calls Specimens. 

The installation included a long walk-through area 

 hall-like with doors and windows and more specimens.

There were also a couple of huge drawings 

on hand-made paper using thread or paint.

The whole experience is well worth a trip to see and 

walk through that long installation.

 

 Wednesday, the snow fell all day and everything closed. 

I think we saw perhaps 6 inches, nothing compare to NY or Boston

but enough to close the federal government and the schools,

and telling us to stay home......

 So I did and added an over-sized lady bug to this small

(12 by 12) embroidered quilted panel.

Titled ALONE AT LAKE ARROWHEAD 

as the tree is from a drawing I made 100 years ago 

when we had a house at Lake Arrowhead that

we shared with 2 other couples and their families.

 In the meantime  I baked a couple of birthday cakes and 

rather than candles I added a lot of painted wafer paper butterflies.

They are all eatable but no one wanted to eat them. 

So talking about those butterflies.........

..... in my last blog I wondered if I would finish the butterfly piece 

I had been looking at and not working on 

for several months. I cut it in half the day we lost power.

It was finished and photographed this week by Greg Staley

 This pair of butterflies still has no title 

but I will come up with a name soon

 The total size of the Pair is 35 inches high by 47 inches wide.

 So, now what do I do with all the left over embroidered butterflies.

Over the last year I had made hundreds in all sizes and colors.

 Some will go in my notecards.....

And I still have more. I am through with butterflies. 

Of course that is what I said about hands 

but they keep appearing, so who knows what will come next.

Stay tuned....

What do you do on a powerless weekend?

Let's go back in time. 

This butterflies piece has been floating around my studio

 for a long time. I have been unhappy with it and ready to scrap it,

but hated to waste all those hours spent making so many butterflies.

At one point I started to create a colorful and realistic butterfly

 to add as a center of interest.

I did finish and added it but this colorful butterfly was out of place 

and did not make me like the piece any better.

 Here above and below details that I kept coming back to, but still was unhappy.

 So in between other thoughts and art I started drawing dead or falling apart 

dried cone flowers. 

Colored pencil drawing on the left with photos on the right.

Friday morning I looked out my studio window and saw these 

 deer wandering around our yard and the one next door.

We do live in the District of Columbia with a very small yard.

How they got through all the traffic and crossed so many streets is a miracle.

Then Friday at about noon, I finally decided to 

cut my butterfly piece in two and make it a pair or diptych. 

 

 As I cut it in two pieces, our power went out. 

While the NE was having a very bad storm we had the high winds, here.

Now what does a person who would rather shoot myself 

than go without my sewing machine do?

And in the cold........

 Having added a very warm sweater or two,

I sat by a sunny window, as it was still daylight and very bright 

and started to hand stitch a lining.

Continuing on a powerless Saturday and sitting by 

our gas fireplace and a close window

I continued to, ugh! hand stitch a lining on both pieces.

Now must connect all the pieces and add that casing.

About 9 PM on Saturday our power came back. 

We are once again warm and I will happily go back to 

my wonderful sewing machine to finish this pair.

Perhaps in my next episode I will show a completed butterfly pair.

Trying a Different medium , Painted Cookies

I have to start this by sending apologies to Maggie Austin Cake.

After taking one of her  two day workshops on classic sugar roses and

reading her book, (Maggie Austin Cake: Artistry and Technique)

 I thought the easiest thing for me to try alone 

were the painted cookies that she so elegantly designed.

 I decided to stay away from Maggie's lovely Impressionist

painted cookies. So, for my first crude designs

 and not knowing how the few colors and petal dusts I had would work 

I plunged into trying to paint trees and then a simple blossom.

 Feeling the first attempts were messy and bland .........I wanted color. 

Remembering Gene Davis' striped paintings I tried mixing bright colors. 

Using some old paste food color I had I soon discovered that 

they take forever to dry and keep coming off on my hands and clothes.

What a mess. Maggie mentioned using Vodka and paper towels help erase.

I erased a lot over the weeks I worked on these cookies.

 Continuing into thinking of simple styles by past artists I thought, 

"AHA, Jackson Pollack and his drip paintings"

The only trouble was I could not get the paint to drip

 so ended up just scribbling with layers of color.

Then remembering the pointillists....tried dots without a design in mind.

 This group of 4 cookies are designs that I let develop.

You have to let each color dry before continuing although

 I tried to watercolor with vodka and some colors ran together.

 Tried Munch's Scream a couple of times and 

ended up erasing a lot of the dark color I had layered 

that kept running together.

I had invested in two black food pens that were not 

fine tips so used a lot of black by accident.

 Just playing with colors and trying light and dark shades.

Each cookie is approximately 3 inches in diameter.

These are sugar cookies (recipe in Maggie's book)

and covered with white fondant before the painting began.

I had bought some wafer paper and tried steaming it as Maggie mentioned. 

Instead I found that painting it gave some 3D shape. 

I drew on the wafer paper, colored it and then cut it out. 

Using piping gel I glued the small images to the painted cookies.

I have a lot to learn and need a lot more equipment 

and certainly more colors and pens and time.

For now I will go back to textiles and using some thread

 and fabric, work again with a medium I know a bit more about.

But, this has been a fun adventure and who knows what else may happen.