Vessels: The Sky King’s Castle
collage
This is the latest in the tentatively titled Vessels series. The Polaroid of the three terracotta funerary containers is from the same group of photos as the Tainted Love ATCs. The urns were made by the Bura People of Lake Chad, Niger. The phalluses are 3-4′ tall and are covered with scarification patterns.
Spring Flowers
composition book journal
I went shopping yesterday morning and picked up some new cheap, metallic gel markers (RoseArt). They show up nicely against dark colored backgrounds. They also blend well if you work quickly. Inspired by the warm sunny day and by the memory of drawing with similar markers when I was young, I decided to draw a bright, childish landscape.
I had pre-painted the paper the night before with metallic blue and periwinkle paint. The left-hand page stretched slightly, causing minor wrinkling. In person the wrinkles are minimal, but because the page is painted with metallic paint, it is extremely reflective; the scanner accentuated the wrinkles.
Vessels: Blue Moon Gold Halo
collage
This is another piece in the same series as the Identity Theft pieces. Instead of working in a composition book, these pieces were all done on chip board. My plan is to eventually bind them all into a book. The book’s working title is Vessels. That could change, but at this point things are shaping up nicely within that overall theme.
As with most of the glue book pieces I’ve done, this one is nothing new or profound. It’s just a reflection of where my head was at the time. Glue books, for me, are as much stream of consciousness as anything. As you can see, I’ve been thinking a lot about the dichotomy between the Virgin and the Whore. Girls learn at a very young age that they’re either one or the other. However, as any sane woman can tell you, there are no such absolutes.
The sunrise this morning was quiet and lovely. There was a hard frost and the air was fresh and crunchy, like grannysmith apples. There was also a bit of fog, so the light was both magnified and diffused. I took these pictures just after the sun had fully crested the eastern ridge. Because I was facing into the sun, the pictures turned out much darker than the actual conditions were.
The dogs also enjoyed the crisp, sunny morning, entertaining themselves chasing rabbit tracks and digging for moles. You can just make out Elliott silhouetted against the grass in the first picture.
Storm of Words
composition book journal
I didn’t intend for the background to look like camouflage; that was a happy accident. I grabbed the ugliest, dirtiest green and brown paint I had and smeared them all over the page. Then, I washed off as much as I could with a baby wipe. I wrote down all the words that had been stalking me over the past few days, using the paint swirls as a guide. The actual words have been pixilated, since y’all don’t need to know exactly what crazy rantings have been flying around in my head. Besides, it was mostly an exorcism. I’d had more input than I’m used to and needed a place to dump the overflow.
Red Letter Day
composition book journal
Ugh. Sometimes, having a red letter day is not a good thing.
On the bright side, last night I finally got my car back from the shop. I’m $250 poorer, but it was money well spent. Not having a car for three weeks reminded me of how attached I am to my own mobility. It’s frustrating not to be able to hop in the car and run to the grocery store when I want, or go play in the pen aisle at Walmart because I “need” a toy fix, or get Kleenex and cough syrup when I was sick. Yeah, I’ve got wonderful friends next door who were great about making sure I had what I needed, but it’s not the same as being able to go get it myself.
I was gently reminded this evening that I’d neglected to explain what on Urth ATCs are. Oops! ATCs are artist trading cards. They’re small, original artworks that are made to be given away or traded. Based on popular mass produced trading cards, ATCs always measure 3.5 x 2.5 inches. They’re a fun way for artists to swap and collect each other’s artwork.
Although the original intention was that artists would meet in person to trade ATCs, many on-line art communities hold frequent ATC swaps. Often there is a theme, such as the dark Valentine inspired “tainted love” ATC swap I recently participated in.
Sacred Cow
collage
Identity Theft 1 & 2
collage
These are pretty self explanatory. Our break room at work has a table where people leave magazines they’ve finished with. There are usually several women’s magazines Good Housekeeping, Women’s Day, etc. I occasionally flip through them. It never fails to depress me.
1. Baubo Takes Love by the Horns
2. Baubo and Cycladic Head Find Love in a Feather Bed
3. Baubo Cruises the Love Boat
4. Sympathetic Magic 1
5. Sympathetic Magic 2
Technical notes:
One of the art groups I play in decided to do a special Dark Valentine ATC swap. I had some ideas that revolved around Hollywood sex sirens, but they all seemed a bit flat. I was going through a box of photos I’d taken years ago for a project I haven’t really gotten to yet: Baubo’s Safari. I thought some of them would be perfect for this swap, so I pulled out a few of them and set them on my coffee table to contemplate. I figured that if I looked at them long enough, inspiration would hit. And it did.
I sanded and scratched up the surfaces. For the one 35mm photo, I was able to entirely sand away extraneous bits I didn’t want included. Polaroid film isn’t as easily manipulated, but I found that if I sanded off the binding tape around the edges, I could remove the film from the emulsion layer. I really like the way these turned out. (If you try this at home, I’d suggest wearing gloves and a face mask and dispose of the emulsion layer very carefully! It contains some pretty toxic chemicals that you don’t want to breathe or worse, have your pets chew on or eat.)
The photo layer of a Polaroid is a thin piece of plastic, so it presents a challenge when trying to adhere it to something else. I’d decided to use an old deck of Harly Davidson playing cards as my ATC base. The cards are highly plasticized, and even though I’d sanded them thoroughly, I didn’t think I could get a good bond between the card and the film. I decided to use a mechanical fastener–eyelets–instead.
Baubo:
So, who is Baubo and why did I choose her to represent tainted love? Baubo is a goddess of womanly humor and knowledge; of obscene laughter and bawdy jokes; of the belly and the vulva.
Baubo played an important part in the story of Demeter and Persephone. When Demeter–goddess of ripe grain; of fruition and harvest–lost her daughter to Hades, she wandered the earth in deep mourning. Demeter took an oath that the earth would remain barren until Persephone was returned to her. The crops died and the earth turned barren. It was as if ceaseless winter had fallen on the land.
In deep despair, Demeter travels to Eleusis, where she retires from the world. Baubo meets her there and intercedes, telling bawdy jokes and then, the unthinkable: Baubo flashes Demeter. By lifting up her skirts and showing her belly and vulva to Demeter, Baubo shocks Demeter and causes her to laugh. Demeter regains hope and decides to carry on her search for her daughter. In the meantime, she reclaims her duties in making the crops and vegetation grow. Abundance returned to the earth.
Sympathetic Magic:
These two images should be self-explanatory. They are funerary urns from the Bura People of Lake Chad, Niger. They’re shaped like huge penises (3-4′ tall) and are covered with scarification patterns.
Snow
composition book journal
It snowed again today, though it wasn’t very cold. The temperature hovered around freezing this morning then rose over the day. I can hear melted snow dripping on the metal awnings over the living room windows. Tap, tap-tap, tap, tap-tap. The dogs had a blast playing bitey-face and digging for moles. They came inside with snow on their backs, mud caked on their paws and noses, and happy smiles on their faces.
Early in the morning, the heavy, swirling snow turned the trees a ghostly grey. The low contrast between the two was beautiful, so I thought I’d try to capture it. Naturally, I took some pictures, but I decided to try a spread in my composition book journal. I painted the pages bright white. It took several coats and dried to a super high gloss finish. Nothing would stick to it, so I sanded it. Then I got out my grey, brush-tip Pitt pens and doodled a tree. It was a little too flat, so I rubbed the ink around with a Q-tip. That worked pretty well. The rough texture left by the sandpaper works nicely against the soft shading made by the Q-tip.
Because of the glossiness of the paint, I had trouble scanning the image. I ended up scanning it in grey-scale. I increased the contrast. The original is much more subtle, but I just couldn’t duplicate that subtlety on-screen.
On another technical note, I’ve been toying around with applying paint in different ways, trying to minimise the stretching and buckling that frequently happens when working with such thin, cheap paper. Despite what looks like large waves in the paper, especially on the right-hand page, the paper stayed almost completely flat. I’m quite pleased with the way it turned out. Once the journal has been shut and weighted overnight, this spread should be nice and flat. To achieve that, I applied a very thin coat of paint with a credit card, gently squeegeeing the paint across the paper. I was careful not to over-work the paper, though, which made a huge difference in how much it stretched. I also waited for it to dry completely before I put subsequent coats on, which is something I haven’t done in the past. Allowing the first coat to dry and seal the page makes a huge difference. There is almost no stretching along the spine edge, which is something I’ve been struggling with.
Now that I’ve done my arting for the day, I’m off to vegetate in front of some bad television and drink a cup of Breathe Easy tea.
Gold
collage in composition book
I’ve been preoccupied with transcribing letters, so I haven’t been concentrating on arting. Coming down with the plague hasn’t helped matters, either. It’s difficult to feel motivated when you’re tired and grumpy and you can’t breathe properly. hrmph.
I did manage to get some gluing done last night, though. This spread started with the cover of an OCLC publication. I loved the embossed black dot grid superimposed on the satellite image of the Earth. When I finished the piece, it seemed a little blah, so I decided to try to do something with the grid. At first, I thought I’d get a small paint brush and fill in the circles, but that seemed like a lot of work (I mentioned being a-motivated?). However, I found a chopstick in with my paint brushes. The bottom end was nice and flat and the perfect size, so I used it as a stamp. The larger circles were done with the cap of a glue stick.
In other news, it sucks to have an old car. When something breaks, it’s impossible to get replacement parts. About a week and a half ago, my timing belt and cam-shaft went kerplowie. The timing belt was easy to replace, but the mechanic is having having a hell of a time finding the bolt needed for the cam-shaft, plus some sort of pin that also needs replacing. He thinks he can get the bolt from Texas and he may have found the pin in Virginia, but the vendors aren’t sure. Their inventory says they have the parts, but they haven’t been able to physically put their hands on them yet. Poor little MoonPie of Delight. I really miss my silly little toy car.
