Category: Art

Art, Crankypantsing, Doodles

Sunday Crankypantsing

Shelly

Stonehenge Journal: Doodle
gel pen and gel marker on 90lb Stonehenge paper
7 1/2 x 5 5/8 inches

Last night’s wintry mix didn’t end up amounting to anything, because the temperature rose enough for the ice and snow to turn to rain. A good thing, too, because when I got up this morning, the furnace was dead. Again. I had to hunt for my lease, to find the emergency maintenance number. I called, and someone masquerading as a repair person showed up. I say “masquerading as,” because all he was able to do was turn up the thermostat, wait for it to misbehave, and tell me, “Yep, it’s broken.” Pure genius!

I’m going to have to wait until tomorrow, when a real repair person can come fix it. In the meantime, he brought me a dinky little oil heater. Better than nothing, because it should keep one room reasonably warm, but not so very helpful for keeping the large, open-plan living-dining-kitchen area warm. But at least it’s not super cold out, right?

While I was waiting for the Unrepair guy to show up, I watched a show on Alexander the Great (I love the history channel!) and doodled. I have a feeling that the rest of the day is going to be spent on the couch, with a good book, a cup of hot chocolate, and a big, fat comforter.

Art, Doodles

Instant Review: New Pens

Shelly

Stonehenge Journal: Doodle
Doodle
gel pen and gel marker on 90lb Stonehenge paper
7 1/2 x 5 5/8 inches

I used a combination of RoseArt metallic gel pens, RoseArt ColorSharp metallic markers, and Sakura Jelly Roll pens. I really love RoseArt’s metallics. They’re nice and smooth and opaque, and they’re acid free. I’m disappointed in the Jelly Roll pens, though. The ink is glittery with a light colored suspension, like cheap nail polish. The pigment isn’t very dense, and with the glitteriness, that means they don’t scan well at all. I ended up having to blur the image to knock down some of the glitter, so that even a small amount of color would show. I upped the contrast and saturation as much as I could, but anything more than this would blow out the parts of the image that are already bright and clear. It’s a pity, because even with its problems, the original image is nice.

The best part, though? The teal beehive hats! I think those may make a return appearance at a later date.

Art, Doodles, Music

Thought is like a little boat upon the sea

Shelly

Stonehenge Journal: Doodle
Doodle
gel pen on 90lb Stonehenge paper
7 1/2 x 5 5/8 inches

I usually doodle in front of the television. This evening, as I was getting out my pens, that stupid Cheerios commercial with the Donovan song came on. I adore the song in the commercial, but I’m kind of disgusted that it’s being used to pimp a breakfast food. O ick.

Anyway, if you aren’t familiar with the song, give it a listen. It’s very nearly perfect in every way, I think, and you can probably see why it appeals to me. Little boats and circles and all… There really is a method to my madness.

Little pebble upon the sand
Now you’re lying here in my hand
How many years
Have you been here?

Little human upon the sand
From where I’m lying
Here in your hand
You to me are but a passing breeze

The sun will always, shine where you stand
Depending in which land
You may find yourself
Now you have my blessing, go your way

Happiness runs in a circular motion
Thought is like a little boat upon the sea
Everybody is a part of everything anyway
You can have everything if you let yourself be

Art, Crankypantsing, Doodles, Meta

A New Doodle

Shelly

Stonehenge Journal: Doodle
Doodle
gel pen on 90lb Stonehenge paper
5 5/8 x 5 5/8 inches

I tried uploading this file to Flickr, and boy was that ever an adventure! Apparently, though I had to dig to find the information, they had a brain hemorrhage yesterday. Everyone’s photos are all kinds of jumbled up. What fun! I didn’t have any trouble uploading the file, but when I tried to add it to a set, I saw that there were other people’s images intermingled with mine. When I clicked on them, I was either taken to the correct photo or to yet another incorrect photo.

I thought someone had hacked into my account, but I thought I’d check the main page for information, just in case there was something wrong on their end. Bupkis. I checked the Flickr blog. Bupkis. I had to go to their “help via e-mail” page, which directed me to a discussion about the problem. According to Flickr’s official statement, the problem should have been resolved Saturday. Yeah, right. Their advice was to clear your browser cache, and all would magically be restored to its natural order. Uh-huh. Go on, pull the other one. Anyway, the first thing I did was clear my browser cache, ya’ assberets. And then I tried IE, Opera, and Netscape. And then, Flickr implodiated completely.

Oh, and now I see that they’ve finally decided to post about the problem on the Flickr blog. Heckuva job, guys.

Art, Paintings

Little Boat

Shelly

100_3121
Little Boat
acrylic on canvas with collage, buttons, beads, and cotton thread
24 x 24 inches

This is yet another bad photo of the (I think) finished painting. I’ll try to remember to get a better shot of it this weekend, when the light will hopefully be better. I ended up using flash, which does very unkind things to artwork. Well, flash is just unkind in general. It also doesn’t help that I had to take the photo from an angle, to avoid the worst of the flash glare. I unskewed everything in Photoshop, but that’s not a very good solution. Much better to try to take a square(ish) photo from the start!

And, now, I’m going to get off the computer and try to warm up.

Art, Paintings

Untitled Boat

Shelly

100_3111
As yet untitled boat (in progress)
acrylic on canvas with collage, buttons, beads, and cotton thread
24 x 24 inches

This is an awful photo, but it was the best I could do with metallic paint after dark. I’m not anywhere near done yet, and haven’t decided exactly how I’m going to handle the sky. If we get the disgusting wintry mix that’s been threatened, I should have plenty of time tomorrow to finish it. Otherwise, it’s probably going to have to wait until the weekend.

One thing I didn’t account for, when I decided to add beads and buttons, was having to sew along the stretcher bars. NOT EASY! The canvas had adhered to the stretcher bar, which is normal, but pulling the two apart caused the canvas to stretch. It should shrink back into shape quickly, and if it doesn’t, spritzing the back with water will do the trick. Still, NOT EASY to sew between a stretched canvas and the stretcher bars. Just sayin’…

Art

Underpaint

Shelly

Nina B. used to say, “It’s all underpaint.”

This is the canvas I restretched a few days ago. (Please ignore the flash glare.) I primed it with acrylic matte medium instead of gesso, since the base coats are going to be acrylic, and I wanted the color of the canvas to (hopefully!) show through. I don’t know where this is going, for sure, but earlier today I had an idea for prepping the canvas for a sister painting. More on that later this weekend, hopefully.

100_3054
Underpaint Phase 1
24 x 24 inches

And, now, I must go park my ass in front of the television. Survivor started 20 minutes ago, and I’m missing it. Thank the Invisible Pink Unicorn for DVRs!

Art, Crankypantsing, Doodles

Staff Meeting Doodle

Shelly

Staff Meeting Doodle
gel pen in steno notebook

I think that’s about as close to arting as I’m going to get today. I stayed an hour late at work, to make up for leaving early yesterday. When I got home, I did laundry. One of the dryers decided to stop half-way through its cycle, so my jeans and heavy shirts–you know, the stuff you wear when it’s ass cold out!–were wet. Too wet to hang dry before tomorrow, so I had to fork over another $1.25 to finish drying them. Hrmf! So I’m a little cranky about that. And I’ve had a dull, nagging headache all day (which has nothing whatsoever to do with Syndromes of the Head and Neck–Holy Coinky-dinks, Batman!). Between that and The Cranky, I’m not in the mood to do much of anything. Maybe I’ll feel differently after I (finally!) eat something, but I would not recommend holding your breath. That’d be silly.