In Cris' Niche

The Holiday Flurry

2011-12-01T10:09:00.000-05:00

Here it is December already! There is a dusting of snow this morning, with more on the way tomorrow. I love the earliest of the snow falls, transforming the landscape.

The Big Holiday Celebration is beginning here in Saranac Lake - art openings, The Nutcracker, school chorus performances, craft fairs, little and big parties. I am involved in three of them this weekend - an opening at NorthWind Fine Arts on Friday evening (from 5 - 7 PM: a collaboration with The Left Bank Cafe, right next door), the opening of the Big Little Show at the Lake Placid Center for the Arts on Saturday afternoon (1 - 3 PM), and the first Saturday (of two) of the Enchanted Christmas on Helen Hill.

This morning, I was delighted to see that one of my "mountain collages" entered in the LPCA show was featured as the Artwork of the Day on North Country Public Radio's website. Here it is - a study in complementary colors, based on a view near the ADK Loj road outside of Lake Placid.


In the Mountaine - mixed media collage

A New Act

2011-11-10T22:09:00.000-05:00

That was WAYYYYYY too long to neglect my little corner of cyberspace out here! Life has shifted considerably since July, when I left my workshop at QBL in Syracuse full of big ideas about which art project to start next. Just days later, I was offered a job teaching the art classes at Paul Smith's College, I had a new car (due to an unfortunate but harmless - to any humans - car accident), and brand new whirlwinds started up. All good. But time in my studio has been too sparse and instead of being covered with piles of my own watercolors and fiber collage scraps, my horizontal surfaces look like this.

Books on painting and drawing, my students' paintings, lesson plans, and art experiments are happily littering my life. The time has come, however, to focus all possible time and energy on my own work.

And part of that needed focus is due to another adventure: membership in the newish cooperative art gallery NorthWind Fine Arts in Saranac Lake. The nine of us agreed to put up new work in November, and I am scurrying to finish several little watercolor and collage pieces. Here are some samples.

The basic concept for these originated after reading the article by Roxanne Stout in the Nov/Dec 2011 issue of Cloth, Paper, Scissors on her mountain collages. As I drive to and from the college, I see the most incredible mountain views of the Adirondack High Peaks (and loads of lower peaks) in wide panoramas. I paint the landscape portions of these pieces from the photos I take when I just have to pull the car over to take it all in. More photos soon, when these pieces and their siblings are completed.

Fun with Paper and Dye

2011-07-20T22:14:00.000-04:00

This week I am at the Quilting By the Lake extravaganza in Syracuse, New York. I'm not quilting and the lake is not too close, but this event is in its 31st year, so the name seems kinda beside the point now. I'm taking a workshop with Hollie Heller and about 15 other people and it's all about collage - of papers, fabrics, threads, you-name-it. I haven't done much surface design work before and I am soaking up a lot of information. The pieces above were done with dyes and wax batik on wasa paper. Others were done with shibori dying of folded paper, batik on waxed paper, discharge of dye, etc. Here is a little gallery - more details later.

Flowers on the Brain

2011-06-23T10:16:00.000-04:00

View near Glacier Point

We just returned from a trip to California and Yosemite National Park. It was all wonderful and interesting. Of course, some of us were looking at birds in great detail and we found some fascinating ones. Our first full day there, we hiked from Glacier Point to Illilouette Falls - a 5 hour trip with a 1200 foot drop to start off (and you know what that means for the "back"), and the start was at about 7000 feet. It wasn't the best idea for two relative flatlanders before much acclimating, but we did survive. And one of the very best things about the hike was the chorus of Fox Sparrows all around us. We could hear at least 5 singing at any moment, along with lots of other birds. But the Fox Sparrows were incredible in their virtuosity and richness. They also looked quite different from their larger and lighter-colored cousins we see here in the northeast during migration (if we are very lucky). Not many watercolor sketches were completed - much hiking with others, birding with other(s), and general busyness. Maybe now that I am home...

CA Poppies and Miniature Lupines

But, I digress. The thing that really grabbed me most was the abundance of wildflowers, many that were completely new to me. Every trail was lined with wonderful little gems.

Indian Pink

Mustang Clover

Violet species

Lily species

There were many I could not identify with the smaller field guides, and I didn't want to carry around the giant ones that would actually have been more useful. Made me think (as I do on every trip I take) that I would love a digital field guide to the plants of a region that I could load onto my laptop for trips such as this one. I may have to figure this out. There is an online guide to flora of California that I will use at home to make some more IDs, but we didn't have internet service up there in the mountains.

As these lovely flower images danced around in my head while we prepared to leave, I happened to see a couple of huge posters in the San Francisco airport about a show of Josef Frank's work. Two huge cases of Frank's fabric and design work was located in the International Terminal. What a fantastic exhibit to have at an airport - the place of Eternal Waiting. Knocked me out!!! He used mostly botanical images and transformed them into gorgeous designs for fabrics and other household goods. Here are some of the images I found online later.

Several of these were on display. Almost worth a trip to the SF Airport just to see it. A Google search on his name turned up all kinds of cool information and images. Once again, my ignorance of amazing things astounds me! Now I am experimenting with using plant images from my travels as well as from my garden. To be revealed after some more playtime.

Another Post Card for Lili

2011-05-18T22:15:00.001-04:00

This post card went away to my grand-daughter Lili today. I have been sending handmade post cards to her since she was an infant, and I needed to find a way to send her my love. She lives four hours away, and the busyness of life for all of us makes it always too long between my visits.

Now she is two, and she knows who the cards are from. She carries them around, and she and Mommy called me last time one arrived, so Lili could tell me, "Gammy, I WIKE it!" What an amazing miracle she is.

We are preparing to sell our home of nearly 14 years, so we can relocate in the mountains where my heart lives (when it is not thinking about Lili). The gardens are glorious and lush. I am drinking all of it in, enjoying my last Spring here. So much work and love and nurturing. So rewarding.

Rhubarb Harvest

Volunteers Growing no-Work Salads

New Iris with Crazy Lavender Beard

And the rain just began pounding on the roof again. Feeling lucky to live high above the creek.

Spring Projects

2011-05-16T15:13:00.000-04:00

THREADS & LETTERS

The Fringe Gallery in Saranac Lake is currently exhibiting its 8" by 10" People's Choice Show. They are celebrating their first anniversary - a welcome addition to the burgeoning gallery scene in the village. This is the little piece I entered - fabric paper with machine stitching over collaged papers and threads and mounted on a painted prepared canvas. Lots of fun small pieces in this show - very affordable.

Now I am watching the birds return and the plants emerge.


CHRISTMAS FERN FIDDLEHEADS

The silvery scales and beautiful spirals of these new ferns fronds are exquisite.

Pleasure of the Process

2011-04-04T23:18:00.001-04:00

There is so much to do to prepare for an art show! In the case of the Out of Season exhibition opening on April 13th at Paul Smith's College, I am putting it together with my friend Lee Ann Sporn. And what a pleasure to work with her! There will be more about this show in an upcoming post.

So, press releases to write and send, e-mails to create, post cards and lists and posters to make, etc. But the BEST part is doing the artwork. I finally got most of a day to continue working on some pieces, including more holographic pieces using some of my photos from Florida. The one above is a detail from a small piece using those beautiful Sea Grape leaves that were golden and red in January. Making the fabric color and pattern choices, deciding on the assembly order, sewing the pieces together - all so satisfying and happy-making.

Back of sheer printed layer with border


Sheer printed layer & opaque backing layer

For more information about this process, see the last section of my March 14th post.

The fabric for the border of this and another piece came from the Foofsique Quilt Emporium in Chatham NY. I was stumped by some project and fabric questions, and Diane really bailed me out. The fabric above was her perfect answer for this border, as well as some other perfect answers I brought home with me. Thanks, Diane!

Learning to Focus

2011-03-26T12:26:00.000-04:00

Lili at her Painting Project

For a child not quite two, my grand-daughter Lili amazes me with her ability to enter into what she is doing with complete concentration and focus. And she is not finished until SHE decides it is so. Would that I could be so clear and sure about what I do. It seems odd to want to emulate a small child so often, but here I am, thinking frequently "How would Lili approach this?".

In the meantime, I am working on several pieces for my upcoming show at Paul Smith's College called Out of Season, with my friend Lee Ann. All of my pieces in this show are new and all are inspired by and related to my recent trip through Florida this past winter. The piece de resistance in this show (in my opinion and for several reasons) is my set of handmade postcards that I mailed to 15 friends from the road toward the end of our trip and which they returned to me when I returned home. I am displaying all the cards in a 3D piece at the opening. I also scanned all the cards when I got them back, and I printed them, so I can use them in some fiber work.

Here is the post card I sent to my mom, shown below first in its original form then made into a deconstructed fiber piece, still in progress.

Avoiding the Doldrums

2011-03-14T12:30:00.000-04:00

This is what I see from my desk this morning in Night Rain Cabin, at an odd moment when the chickadees and red-breasted nuthatches are not at the suet feeder on that birch tree. Most of the giant snow pile is from the deep blanket of snow that slid off the roof in many Whoosh-Thumps over the past few warmish days

I have been away in some lovely warmer places when most of this snow fell, so I don't have the same exhausted outlook on this extreme winter here in the Adirondacks as many of my friends. But it has been a time of a darker outlook in past years because of the sunlight deprivation that gets intense for me by now. This year I am holding up pretty well, partly because of our trips and partly because I have so many wonderful art projects and events that buoy me up. And I am so grateful for all of that.

On Friday, my friend Lynn and I went to the opening of the Cover Art Show over in Lake Placid. This annual show is sponsored by the Arts Council for the Northern Adirondacks, with the main objective of finding a piece of artwork to grace the cover of the arts directory for this region (which is getting heftier every year). As always, it was great party and an opportunity to see other artists and friends.

I entered a piece that I reworked from one of my fiber collages that I made over the summer. It is a little deconstructed digital photo of my cabin Hobbit House, with added fabric fragments and decorative stitching. Here is the original:

Fernville Spring

I like this little piece, but originally it was mounted on a muted turquoise rayon background to coordinate with its ten sister pieces for a show. I decided that background wasn't what this one needed now. So I painted, stamped, and otherwise played on the background fabric to come up with this:

I popped it back into the original frame, renamed it Deconstructed Cabin, and entered it in the Cover Show. I was surprised and pleased to learn it received an Honorable Mention!

Two Saturdays ago, I went to the New England Quilt Museum in Lowell, MA to attend Wen Redmond's workshop on printing with natural materials. Really fun and interesting! There is also a wonderful show up at the museum by members of the Studio Art Quilters Association called No Holds Barred. The range of styles, subject matter, and materials used by these talented artists was mind-boggling! See it if you possibly can! After lunch, Wen talked about and showed her art quilts, starting with early pieces. All wonderful, beautiful, and inspiring.

Using Wen's directions from a 2007 issue of Quilting Arts magazine, I made two pieces that were accepted into the Adirondack Artists' Guild recent juried show. Because these works are constructed with a photo printed on the top sheer layer and an opaque layer of the same photo underneath, separated by the depth of the stretcher bars, they look 3-dimensional (or "holographic" as Wen describes them). I love this technique - lots of potential for future work.

Low Tide Treasure

Winter Ferns

The photo below shows how the Winter Ferns piece was assembled. The lower opaque layer was glued to the back of the sheer layer which was attached to the stretcher bars by the border fabric.

So, on to the next project - finishing work for my April show Out of Season. Lots to do. More about that next time!

The Post Card Project

2011-02-09T19:44:00.001-05:00

Upon leaving Florida (tomorrow morning) I am finally getting back to my blog! My current project is making 14 or so post cards, mailing them to friends, retrieving them later, and making them into a piece for my show coming up in late March at Paul Smiths College. Each one is about some aspect of this wonderful trip my sweetie and I have been engaged in since late December. A recent post to my Inkjet Transfers Yahoo Group spurred me to show a few of the cards for which I used inkjet transfers.

This card was made from a photo I took of a sweet little cottage in Bradenton, Fl. I printed the image on brochure paper and transferred to the watercolor card using Golden soft gel medium, with a spritz of water on the printed image before placing it facedown on the medium. It turned out very well. The painted borders are cut from the map in the Village of the Arts booklet I received when Mom and I went to studio/gallery tour the Village in January, along with a little strip of lovely painted paper on the right edge.

This card is made from an inkjet transfer on plain paper, using Golden matte medium. A little less successful than the image above but the strong photo of the palm leaflet worked well anyway. I used map fragment for this card as well.

This image transfer is of a gorgeous sunset, made as the one above. I enhanced it with watercolor pencil and spread the pigment with matte medium to make it more durable for its postal journey. Painted handmade paper is attached with matte medium along the bottom and right edge.

Hope you enjoy some tropical thoughts when you look at these. I feel so lucky to have had all this sun while you poor dears are digging out from under the winter!

Cris' Collages at LPCA

2010-12-10T15:30:00.000-05:00

These collages (each 8" x 8") were on my November 24th post, with information on how they were put together. Now they are the Lake Placid Center for the Arts in the Big Small Holiday Show, along with lots of small works by area artists. Worth the trip!


Trust the Trail


October Pond Lilies

Hints for the Cook - Girl Scout Series

In Using an Ax or Hachet - Girl Scout Series

Warning for Windy Days - Girl Scout Series

Gail's Map to the Art & Craft Holiday Show

2010-12-10T15:11:00.000-05:00

In the center of the map, find "The Brills" at 44 Fawn Street, Saranac Lake NY.

For more information, call Gail at 518-586-1063 or Cris at 518-524-0533.

Saturday, Dec. 11 from 10 to 2
and
Sunday, Dec. 12 from 1 to 5

ArtWorks at Bluseed

2010-12-10T14:29:00.000-05:00


Winter Solstice I

Begin the Journey

Tonight our Saranac Lake ArtWorks "Art Under $100" holiday show opens at Bluseed Studios. Here are some of of the pieces I entered in this show and sale. Lots of lovely pieces by about 18 artists. Our reception runs from 5 to 7 PM tonight. Come over and see what deals you can find! The show will be up until December 29th.

Dreamscape IV

There They Go

2010-11-24T21:21:00.000-05:00

On my way down through the mountains yesterday, I dropped off my five 8" x 8" collages at the Lake Placid Center for the Arts for the Big Small Holiday Show (a.k.a. Miniatures Show on the website but originally the show had the former title - much more descriptive, as I don't think of my pieces as miniatures at all). It always feels kind of like leaving your small children at school on the first day of classes - you know they are looking and behaving their best, but you can't help worrying a little and you hope people like them, understand them, and help launch them successfully into the larger world. And here they are for you to see:

In Using an Ax or Hachet - Girl Scout series

Warning for Windy Days - Girl Scout series


Hints for the Cook - Girl Scout series

Trust the Trail

It is hard to see on the piece above the metal leaf that I applied to the trail going up the steep mountain among rocks and leading to the glowing disk. Maybe a photo would show the technique better - quite perfect for the effect I had in mind. I could not find locally the sizing that is prescribed for gluing down the delicate metal leaf, so I used double-sided adhesive. The fire tower on the left is a transfer from a newspaper using a Chartpak blender marker. The ravens are stenciled on, and the pressed leaf is a spring Tiarella.

October Pond Lilies

The background on this one is a manipulated photograph printed on air mail paper ("oil paint" effect and faded back); the foreground image is a photo transfer using matte acrylic medium on hot pressed watercolor paper, enhanced with watercolor paint, and cut apart; and the image in the upper right is a scan from an antique print that was inkjet printed, along with the text, on gampi silk tissue and applied with more medium, allowing almost total transparency behind the printed image. I'm still working with the gampi to figure out the best way to print on this delicate paper. In this case, I sprayed the back of the gampi with the temporary bonding spray I use for fabric work and just stuck it firmly to a piece of regular printer paper. It went through my printer perfectly, after several earlier nerve-wracking and unsuccessful tries. (Many thanks to several friends on my inkjet transfer Yahoo group for their suggestions!) The downside to the temporary spray is that it leaves a sticky residue (of course) on the back of the tissue. Not a problem in this case, but not always what I want.

Every piece is an experiment in one way or another.

Calling All (Long Ago) Girl Scouts

2010-11-21T21:59:00.002-05:00


Warning for Windy Days

I was a Girl Scout for a long time - age 8 to 18. Much of the time, I was jealous of my brothers, whose scouting experiences involved camping in the rain in leaky pup tents, learning to use jack knives, and tracking raccoons - great stuff! Meanwhile, I learned to make hospital corners, to dance the Hava Nagila and the Mexican Hat Dance, and to occasionally cook over an open fire, identify wild flowers, and learn to sail in my own little boat. So, taken as a whole, it was very worthwhile, even in high school when it was quite uncool. (That was when I learned to sail. That was also when I melted the toes of my vinyl boots while on a GS camping trip on a very cold rainy weekend by standing too close to the campfire. I think my tent fell down during that trip after becoming completely waterlogged.)

My fondness for so many of those experiences led me to collect a modest number of old Brownie and Girl Scout manuals, including two elderly versions of the Girl Scout Handbook, third (1936) and fourth (1938) editions. For quite awhile, I have thought about using those books in my art pieces to pay some kind of tribute to what I owe Juliette Gordon Low and all my troop leaders. The materials above are being made into a collage with the pages from one of my books, fabrics, embroidery thread, paint, and some of the buttons from my friend Joan's vast collection. Below is one of the pieces that is a bit further along.

Hints for the Cook

Tomorrow I will take three of these Girl Scout collages (with their metaphorical titles) and a couple of other collages to the Lake Placid Center for the Arts for their holiday exhibition of small works. I am looking forward to seeing the response to them. How many other white-haired Girl Scouts would like reminders...?

Friday at the Huyck

2010-10-08T22:09:00.000-04:00

Today was the last day of my week at the Huyck Preserve. I finished my piece of art work, packed up my gear, and finally took my walk from Lincoln Pond to the waterfall below Myosotis Lake. The weather was perfect, and the forest - mostly old Hemlock and Sugar Maple with Christmas, Maidenhair, and Wood ferns in herbaceous layer - was very beautiful. The Witch Hazel is blooming now, as it always does in October. See the little fringe-y growths at the twig tips? Those are the flowers.

And here is my collage that combines scans of two of my aster drawings done with technical pen and colored pencil, a scan of an old topographical map of the Preserve, scans of pages from Gray's Manual of Botany, and papers with acrylic paints. I also left my page of the original drawings.

With the use of some transparency sheets, I also experimented with some photos I took of the light on the Lake. I printed on the transparencies (made for toner-type copiers - not really at all suitable!) with my little inkjet printer using the draft setting to avoid getting too much ink on the sheet. Then I transferred to watercolor paper using Golden matte medium on some and with plain water on others. I also had a small sheet of gold-colored foil (from a chocolate wrapper) and I glued some of it down with the medium before the transfer process. I really learned a lot! So, here are some of the results, showing the finished transfer with its original photo (remember that the transfer is a mirror-image of the photo):

original photo 1

matte medium with gold foil


original photo 2

water on substrate, no burnishing


water on same transparency, burnished

original photo 3

more water on substrate, slight burnishing on blacks

Today was also the day I said good by to the Brits (and 1 Aussie). I enjoyed each of them enormously. Things were awfully quiet once they drove away this morning to get the train in Hudson for NYC. Here they are:

Jenny & Dave

Heather

Carolyn (from Down Under)

Chris & Andy

CSA Interns, Adam, & British Trust Volunteers

Bon Voyage and Safe Travels to All.

Thursday at the Huyck

2010-10-08T08:44:00.000-04:00

The big news today was SUN! Even though I spent most of the day in the studio, it is a huge relief to not have to slough through ever-growing puddles to get everywhere.

And, I did get some work moving along today. I used a scan of a page of draft aster drawings (that includes a few blips) to print on light-weight calligraphy paper.

I carefully wet then tore the paper around two of the drawings and started collaging them onto an 8"x8" canvas, along with a print of an old map of the Preserve, excerpts from Gray's Botany, and paper fragments.

Well, now it's Friday already! I went for dinner at the Palmer House Cafe in Rensselaerville last evening with the Brits (+ 1 Aussie) and the CSA interns here. What a celebration we had!

Wednesday from the Huyck

2010-10-06T21:31:00.000-04:00

This is the same spot as the starting photo from yesterday. The rain didn't stop and the streams are all high again. Here is the waterfall near the Preserve office:

My plan to do some botanical drawings outdoors did not go well because of the deluge, so I am doing a different project for my offering to leave here. The drawing that I have done have been huge pleasures though, and I am grateful for this time and the place to focus on this process.

This evening I had the great pleasure of going to dinner at the home of my friends and former Saranac Lake neighbors Chad and Lisa Jemison and their beautiful daughters. Chad is the director now at the Huyck Preserve. What a lovely coincidence for me that they are just up the road from my little cabin here!

Tuesday from the Huyck

2010-10-05T11:39:00.000-04:00

The little stream outside my kitchen window is racing again after the hard rain all night. And it's still going. The view from my little cabin, The Bird House, is not really out of focus as I looked out at the Huyck Preserve's Lincoln Pond a few minutes ago. The blur is the steady downpour.

And it is fine with me, as I will go to my studio over in the research building soon to work for the day. There is much to inspire and motivate me there. The work of past Com.En.Art artists hangs everywhere in that building - bats, snakes, moths, insects, wildflowers, birds, habitats. All of it meticulously rendered and completely wonderful.

I have barely begun my serious work here, as I try to shake this bug I have that blurs my thoughts and lowers my energy. Sometimes that helps me to focus though. I have started drawings of some of the many aster species I find along the trails here. There are not many plants with open flowers now in early October, and I plan to relearn the asters every fall. This is an opportunity! Here is one little beauty that I quickly drew while sitting in the marshy north end of Lincoln Pond (as a Bald Eagle pair and a Common Raven cavorted overhead).

Last evening, my neighbor Heather (one of the six British Trust Conservation Volunteers staying in the adjacent cabin - more about this lively group later) came over for a drawing lesson. She really understood my teaching method (based on Betty Edwards' right-brained drawing concept) right away, and she left with the most lovely drawing of a lemon wedge. Perhaps she'll let me photograph it for you...

Yesterday I needed groceries and so did 3 of the BTCV folks and Sarah, the other current artist-in-residence, so we all piled into my car and went to Greenville. On the way, we stopped to buy fresh produce at a farm stand. It was something new to the 2 Brits and 1 Australian, especially the Honor Box into which we crammed our small bills to pay for our gorgeous veggies.

My Artist Residency

2010-10-04T12:13:00.000-04:00

I arrived at the Huyck Preserve in Rensselaerville, NY on Friday near the end of an absolute deluge here in the upper Hudson Valley (and elsewhere). We had 5 inches of rain in about 24 hours. That afternoon seemed all about water! In any case, I am finally here in this beautiful place for my week as one of several ComEnArt Artists in Residence over this season. This program allows artists to stay for one or two weeks at the beautiful Preserve to work in a retreat-like setting. In return, the artist donates one or two pieces of artwork completed during the stay. I have contemplated applying for this residency for several years - finally got it together this year and I was pleased to be accepted.

I have been taking lots of photos (these are from my twilight walk to Myosotis Lake on Friday) and started some drawings that are helping me to narrow my focus and decide on a project to complete by Friday this week.

Now I am off to set up my studio in the research building. Rain is expected today, so it will be good time to settle in there.

Abundant September

2010-09-26T21:49:00.000-04:00

Hands Full of Beach Treasure

I LOVE September. The evenings cool off, the colors and light change, the summer memories are still fresh and satisfying. And usually life slows down a tiny bit, so I can take more deep breaths. This year I am in the middle of abundance of all kinds and although deep breaths are a little harder to come by most of the time, I am not complaining.

August finished with a successful show of my art work in Saranac Lake. The opening was a wonderful party - loads of friends (including my mom) and some new friends came, all very supportive and making for a festive event. Several friends even bought my work, so now my collection of 10 little fiber collages is 6 in number and several other pieces went to good homes as well.

This weekend I participated in the Adirondack Artists Studio Tour (Sept. 25 and 26). I met some lovely people, saw some friends, and led a wonderful mixed media collage workshop this afternoon at the theater. It is always so amazing to see people claim they have no creative talents producing amazing little works of art. Thanks to all of you who attended. I loved working with all of you!

Next - a show of my work in Old Chatham, NY at the sweet little Old Chatham Country Store and Cafe (up on Sept. 29th with the reception on Oct. 10th). Lots to prepare and think about.

So, our birding trip to Cape Cod two weeks ago was a welcome break. Nothing like the beach, wind, and sun to restore some equanimity. The bird migration out there seemed to be either slow or mostly past. Or the weather was just too nice. (Experienced birders know that stormy, miserable cold fronts in the Fall bring the birds through.) Well, we settled for nice, without too much complaining. Our last morning there, we were getting ready to walk from the ocean beach across to the salt marsh when at least 500 Tree Swallows arrived and proceeded to make themselves at home for the day. It was quite a spectacle, with swallows sitting in groups on all the vegetation with any substance in the dunes. Imagine a goldenrod clump with 3 or 4 birds sitting on each stem. They all rose into the sky again every 15 minutes or so, then settled back down. We assumed they had just landed after a night of flying from somewhere to the north and were resting and feeding until evening arrived to make another leg of their long journey.


Tree Swallows at Sea Gull Beach

EXPLORATIONS Exhibit

2010-08-27T11:10:00.000-04:00

Layers of beach

My artwork is hung now at the Pendragon Theater in Saranac Lake. It is an interesting venue - the lobby of the little community theater here. It is just the right size for the number of pieces I wanted to show, and apparently people really do look at the art. I already sold two large-ish pieces. I am gratified at the nice response I am getting in this community.

My little fiber collages are nicely mounted and framed, and the series looks complete in the simple maple frames my sweet Ron made for them. The last of the ten was based on an mental image I had while riding in Gail's tiny boat with my Silver Fox girlfriends one Sunday afternoon, after swimming and picnicking on Lower Saranac Lake. It was such a clear blue and green day, and I imagined - almost believed - I was soaring above the river, floating in that blueness.

Raven over Second Pond

The next two weeks will be full of family and friends visiting here at our little cabins. It will be a pleasure to slow down and enjoy the last beautiful days of summer with all of them.

2010-07-06T22:48:00.000-04:00

Ghost Orchid

Remember the Pink Lady's Slipper photo from my last entry? The pale image incorporated into this piece is the water transfer made from that photo. The early spring wildflowers are also called spring emphemerals - those that bloom and set seed before the deciduous leaves are fully out and then disappear until next spring. I am aware when I walk in the summer woods that many of those plants that were blooming so gloriously in May are now invisible.

The indoor activities become less engaging once summer arrives in the mountains. So, the daily practice becomes weekly or even less frequent when family joins me here. A beautiful day nudges us out onto the Outlet in the canoe.

More Fiber Collage Adventures

2010-06-14T10:30:00.000-04:00

The Fabric Embellishment experiments continue! These projects all are in quite an extensive book, which I should tell you about. The name is Fabric Embellishing: The Basics and Beyond. (Thanks so much, JoAnn!!!) I'll say! It goes way beyond, in my humble opinion. The authors are Ruth Chandler, Liz Kettle, Heather Thomas, and Lauren Vlcek - all apparently incredibly creative souls. I'm working my way through the book, more or less from page one. I am skipping some of the projects that use materials I don't have or can't get easily, but I'll probably go back and do each of them at some point. Some techniques I have tried in the past but even some of those inspire me to try something new. Today I am transferring some inkjet images printed on transparency sheets onto fabric, actually using neither technique recommended quite as described by my "textbook" and instead using some transfer techniques I use often on paper but not on fabric - water on one piece and acrylic matte medium on another. The photo you see above (Pink Lady's Slipper orchids on the Hays Brook Trail) was transferred to muslin after being printed on a transparency (3M brand - not ideal but okay for this) with water as the transfer medium (sprayed onto the transparency image). It is drying at this moment and will be made into another 7 inch square later with some other materials (maybe some paper) for a collage.

The piece at the right was discharge dyed using a Clorox gel pen. It is a somewhat crude method (which is sometimes exactly what I want) but I like the way it works. I used an old kitchen spatula for my design - just traced around it with the gel pen tip, then added a few embellishments. It is free-motion stitched with batting and a backing, and it's not quite finished - stay tuned for the rest. (And don't look too closely!)

This little piece (my favorite, so far) was made for my "printing on ribbon" lesson. Well, I didn't have any ribbon of an appropriate size on hand, so I made ribbons by cutting apart some fabric, although in this case I left most of the square of fabric in one piece until it was printed. Then I cut it apart and placed it on my background. The basic idea is that you print out the text on a piece of paper and then attach the fabric or ribbon over the text with double-sided tape. (Pretty cool, I think.) Send the whole thing through the printer again (keep the original file and don't change anything!!!) and remove your printed pieces. I used some fabric scraps (donated by Amy D. at our play date in December!), a bird I drew and then printed on fabric ages ago, and a National Geographic photo of a crashed plane on its original paper. Free-motion stitching holds it together. By the way, the text is by Brian Andreas from one of his several books. This book is titled Strange Dreams, and I just love his funky little drawings combined with his poems (?). Each page really is like a strange dream - a little odd, leaving you wondering where it came from but knowing there is some truth from your waking life that you can't quite remember. If you want to see more about Brian's wonderful art and books, this site will be a treat. And be sure to buy something! Brian, if you see this I would be greatly honored to hear from you.

A Lovely Mix

2010-06-06T21:56:00.001-04:00

A lovely mix this week of birding, paddling, work, and art-making in the Adirondacks. In spite of the apparent health of the Star Flowers and Canada Mayflowers, it has been very dry (until this weekend). While paddling down the Saranac River with Myra and Tony, we frequently ran aground on the sand bars - usually not even a glimpse of them, especially this early in the season. The water level was at least a foot lower than normal. Lots of birds and other wildlife out there though - A Hooded Merganser mother with 10 scuttling little ones, a Wilson's Snipe at a nest site, several warbler species, a muskrat, huge Snapping Turtle, among others. Wonderful!

In addition to all this outdoor fun, I continued my daily art practice with my fabric embellishment experiments. This piece with the moth was made by printing a digitally-altered moth photo onto an Extravorganza printing sheet, then sewing it onto an altered fern image on rayon, along with other stitches and fabric scraps. The letters were stamped onto twill tape to spell the moth's scientific name - Grammia virgo.

I learned how to make a fabric window in this little bird piece - the sheer embroidered fabric was sewn into a 4-piece square and faced with turquoise cotton. Inside the window is a bird and piece of a scientific article on a background made with a CitriSolv-altered page from a National Geographic magazine. (Really fun and interesting to make!)

The waterlily was my "printing on fabric" lesson. I used some stamps I made awhile ago (to print waterlilies in my bathroom) on batik-printed cotton. I like the way it looks but I really prefer the collage pieces. In any case, I plan to make some kind of wall quilt once my experiments are finished. (Well, they'll probably never really be finished... So much to learn.)

A Renewed Daily Art Practice, at Last

2010-06-01T20:36:00.001-04:00

Hard to believe it has been over two weeks since the Art & Garden Party! The weather was perfect that day, the flowers were gorgeous, and a couple of close friends tried the morning drawing lessons. They both claimed they haven't done any drawing since childhood, but they took to it quickly and made a couple of lovely watercolor sketches each - beautiful! Many thanks to the many friends who came and enjoyed the day together. I am grateful to each of you. Perhaps it will be an annual event.

Now I am in Fernville, our Adirondack property, and enjoying all this place has to offer, even though Spring is late to unfold here, and in mid-May the Beech leaves are still softly opening, downy and rosy. In addition to the things I love so much here - the rivers and lakes, wonderful birds (Mourning Warblers, among others, the other day), a lively arts community, and fascinating people - I have found a life coach who is helping me enormously by getting me on track with my art making and art business. With her encouragement, I am again making time for a daily art practice. For now I am working with a book about fabric embellishments that I received as a gift several months ago. Below is the piece I made with "Tucks" - inserting various bits and pieces in each tuck. I included fabric scraps, photos cut from old natural history encyclopedias, and embroideries cut from sheer fabric. It makes me think of a beach scene.

The next day, my project was "Deconstructed Quilts." Taking small scraps of fabric, the pieces are assembled on a square of fusible web and then ironed to bond them together. For this one, I used some of the off-white embroidered fabric I used for the beachy piece, as well as an old fabric piece made by printing a photo of one of our cabins onto muslin. It has faded somewhat, and I cut it apart to reassemble the pieces with other fabric scraps. Here you see the piece before I did any of the machine embroidery. Four pieces are in progress now, and I am so glad to be learning some new things! Thank you, Jane!!!

Art & Garden Party Preview

2010-05-14T15:00:00.001-04:00

I've been busy preparing for the Party here at our Frogmoor home to be held on Sunday, May 16th. My sweet husband Ron has been helping me in enormous ways in the garden and in the house, and this is good way to get set up for the summer. The porch is clean, the patio table painted, and some gardens mulched. Never really done, of course, but on its way to easier.

Here are a few of the art pieces I'll be showing and selling at the party.

Some of these are originals; some are available as prints. I also have a nice selection of my Reminder Pins, made from mostly recycled materials.

Lots of great cards too, made from my paintings and collages.

Some other fun things to look at - visual journals, little books, and dolls.

Here is the schedule for Sunday:

10 AM - Noon

Drawing Workshop in the Gardens

Bring your own art supplies and a folding stool or chair. I will help you get going and supply loads of encouragement! The workshop will be limited to 10 people, so be sure to let me know as soon as you can to reserve your place.

Noon - 1 PM

Potluck Brunch

Just bring along some small yummy dish to share and we'll enjoy some food and conversation.

No need to reserve for this.

Noon - 3 PM

Art Show & Sale

My original art work, along with prints, cards, and canvas bags will be on display in the Foyer Gallery. Some of the work will be displayed for fun and your enjoyment - visual journals, handmade books, collage, and more. The other art will be for sale, so think weddings, birthdays, Father's Day, etc. No reservation required to view the gallery.

The Party will be held at my home at:

112 Crestview Drive

Valatie NY 12184

To get here from Valatie:

Drive north about 3 miles on Rt. 203. Turn right on Crestview Drive, go up the hill about .5 mile until you see the red mailbox with the number 112 on it. Park along the left side of the driveway. (Try not to block or park in the turn-around spot - Thanks)

To get here from North Chatham:
Drive south about 1.5 miles and look for the first left turn past the Chathams Animal Hospital.
Turn left on Crestview Drive, go up the hill about .5 mile until you see the red mailbox with the number 112 on it. Park along the left side of the driveway. (Try not to block or park in the turn-around spot - Thanks)

Please bring a friend and come over to say Hello!

To Contact Me:
518.524.0533

crisniche@gmail.com

Gardens in Bloom

2010-05-10T07:56:00.001-04:00

The gardens are gorgeous right now, and I am hoping the weather will stay cool this week so the flowers will not go by too quickly. Above is a view down the wildflower garden I planed along the steps leading into our woods. Those of you who come to the Art and Garden Party on Sunday (May 16th) will enjoy translating some of the beauty into a small work of your own. Here are some photos of the wildflower Bloodroot (Sanguinaria canadensis) that blooms in April in my gardens.

And here is a little watercolor sketch I did while sitting in the woods watching them.

What you will see next weekend includes Dwarf Crested Iris, Foamflower, Solomon's Seal, Creeping Phlox, Jacob's Ladder, and the mostly-unfurled ferns - Maidenhair, Broad Beech, Lady, Christmas, Ostrich, and Interrupted, among others. Lots more - come and see!

A Little Wild Green Thing Every Day

2010-04-21T23:45:00.002-04:00

In early Spring, I like to find some wild green thing each day to provide nourishment and extra flavor to our meals. I brought Wild Leeks (or Ramps) back down with me from a gorgeous stand in the Adirondacks on Sunday and made a big pot of Wild Leek and Potato Soup. Then I found some Wild Leeks here along our favorite walking route and threw the chopped lilies (did you know leeks and all onion-related plants are in the Lily Family?) into an Indian lamb dish with peas. Yesterday I picked some fiddleheads from the abundant Ostrich Ferns in my wild flower garden and braised them in olive oil for lunch, served with a squeeze of lemon juice and a shaving of Parmesan cheese. Today, it was stray garlic plants and sorrel from the vegetable garden (not exactly wild, but weeds, more or less) with garlic mustard and dandelion leaves in the quiche.

There is something about going out and picking something usually neglected (and even sometimes despised) as culinary subject-matter that makes me feel connected to all the abundance at my careless feet.

The asparagus just made its way through the mulch yesterday and the salad greens are starting to make something of themselves (sown by some goddess from seed pods I allowed to mature late last summer). Soon, the garden will generously provide more than we can possibly keep up with (and we are REALLY lazy), but even then the wild berries will drip from the brambles at the edge of the field. We strain to plant and weed and mulch and fertilize, and sometime I wonder what for. In this very green part of the planet, we literally trip over and chop down the bounty provided by Nature. Did I mention that someone told me fiddleheads go for over $6 per pound at the fancy produce stores? Please pardon my amusement....

Spring Wonders on a Small Scale

2010-04-15T10:01:00.001-04:00

Spring is arriving in the Adirondacks too. It is slower, colder, perhaps more reserved for now. This morning I heard a poem on the radio about a sweep of hundreds, maybe thousands, of daffodils by water. What a gorgeous spectacle that must be! But here, I’ll take my spring wonders in smaller scales. The beautiful reds of over-wintered pitcher plants and sphagnum moss. The surprising purple on the scales of a balsam fir cone, recently disassembled by a red squirrel for the rich seeds hidden there. And (above) the unfolding leaves of Hobblebush, a wild and native viburnum that has surely one of the most wonderful flowers to be seen in the May woods up here.

Yoka Wallets

2010-04-10T12:59:00.002-04:00

Yoka Wallet Assortment

So, what in the world is a "Yoka Wallet"? First I'll introduce you to Yoka Hart. I met this sunny, friendly, lovely woman at the internet shop in El Valle, Panama as we both struggled with the technology of getting our photos onto our travel blogs. (Click here for Yoka's blog.) A few days later, I stopped on my bicycle at the sweet little apartment she and her equally-lovely husband Matthew were renting for the month on the outskirts of El Valle.

During our Tea Break, Yoka told me she was an artist and showed me a beautiful bag made from one of her weavings. Then she gave me a wallet she had made from one of the wine boxes they bought while in Panama. (Look for the bunch of green grapes with yellow tape trim above.) She said she made the wallet because she needed a wallet to keep her currencies separate while in Costa Rica. She also gave me a milk carton on which I could practice making my own, along with verbal instructions. I had some trouble finding the electrical tape she used to make hers, so the boxes and bags accumulated during the trip. I even collected a couple of wine boxes from fellow birders, including a nice one from Sue that is on its way to her now as a Red Wine Yoka Wallet. She is going to give it a test run. I hope it holds up and is fun to use! The graphics and text make this a great ReUse Project.

I ended up making several wallets from boxes I brought back (they are SO common down there), including a couple from the Duran coffee bags we bought on our first day in El Valle and one from an apple juice box, the text mostly in Spanish. My favorite, though, is one I made from a box I bought here in our local supermarket. I love mango juice, so it didn't take long to come up with this:

To make a Yoka wallet:

Try to find a box that has a rectangular circumference, to avoid making the "pleats" too thick. If the box is fairly lightweight, it doesn't matter so much.
Wash the beverage box thoroughly (of course).
With an Exacto knife or box cutter, cut off the bottom of the box. I like to use a plastic square on a cutting mat to get it even and - well - square.
Cut off the half of the top that holds the spout, leaving the other half for your top flap.
Fold the sides of the box inward so that a symmetrical pleat is formed.
Fold the length of the box in half, using a bone folder or some some other tool to flatten the fold. (Pliers may be needed to squash the fold enough to make it fold properly.)
You may want to use electrical tape on all the cut edges, but you must at least use a length of tape to join the innermost edges together so you end up with two compartments.
The extra flap you left when you cut the top of the box will be folded over now to cover the compartments.
Glue little pieces of Velcro on the edge of the flap and on the front of the wallet so they meet up. (You might need to put tape on the flap if the glue doesn't adhere to the plastic of the box interior. Seems to stick better to the tape.) I used the very serious E6000 glue.
Put a little money inside and let it steep for a day before taking your Yoka Wallet out into the world.

Please try this out and send me any comments about how to improve my directions. Enjoy!

What Happened in Panama?!

2010-04-10T12:03:00.002-04:00

Besides filling a journal with bird lists, brief descriptions of daily activities, and a few drawings, I brought home a wealth of ideas for future art work and loads of photos to remind me of what inspired me.

I found a nice landscape-format sketch book with medium weight watercolor paper and covered it with some beautiful paper, including a label with hand-stamped lettering. I finished the inside cover with more of the green paper. Then I covered the outside with about three coats of glossy gell medium to protect it.

On the inside of the back cover, I made a large envelope out of an old calendar page and more paper. (I have to have a safe place to stash brochures, receipts, and other papers to use for the final compilation of the trip in the journal!) Of course, there were a few too many things in there and the next-to-last day of the trip, the end of the envelope blew out. Not bad for a month's worth of collecting though.

Here are a few of the pages, including one of the pages on which I glued the week's dates with spaces for a day's summary. I kept the "date strips" (also cut from an old calendar for a month when the dates and days matched those for March 2010) in the envelope and inserted them at the right place in the journal, not knowing ahead of time how many pages I would use. It turned out to be a great system for us, especially when we joined our bird tour group and we were busy all day and tired when we could finally rest.

I left lots of space for photos, collaged sections of brochures, interesting receipts, and little doodles. Now I am in the process of printing out the photos on brochure paper (so they are not too thick), using my Microsoft Publisher software so I can adjust each photo to the size I want and to print out full sheets of many photos at once. I then cut them apart and place them in the journal with archival sticky strips or tape.

Eventually, we will have a completed journal that can give us not only lots of little facts we will want later but - more importantly - a way to remember and immerse ourselves in this wonderful, rich, full trip.

To Lili from Panama

2010-03-25T08:46:00.000-04:00

During our month in Panama, I sent only one postcard and it was to Lili.

I am counting on everyone else to read our Panama Field Notes blog.

It has been challenging to do all the painting and drawing I want to do. My trip journal has some of that incorporated in it, but especially now that we are with a birding group there is little time to be in a spot long enough to even doodle. And most of our van and bus rides are bumpy. Partly for all those reasons, I am at the lodge in Gamboa this morning while the rest of the group is out in the woods chasing Ant Pittas and Manakins (some very cool groups of birds). I am going to play with my pencils and paints a bit. Here are a few images from the cloud forest that I want to use in future work. What a gorgeous place this is - over the top much of the time!

Collage of the Day

2010-02-27T21:27:00.000-05:00

I made this post card for Lili using some shipping tape transfers (from the recent class I taught), an old border from some postage stamps (subject: dinosaurs, I think), part of a white pine branch printed from an old book, and some paper scraps. On the back of the card, I wrote her a note telling her how wonderful it is that she can get around now on all fours now like her brothers Milo and Charlie. (I don't think the fact that those two are cats matters to the three of them...)

Because of the continuing snow, the drawing class I planned to teach this morning was canceled. I used that time to get my Panama journal into shape for the trip. I don't exactly how I'm going to use it yet. It may get taken apart once we return home and reassembled in another format. For now, I like making a special cover for it, and it is filled with a nice light-weight watercolor paper that will be perfect for sketching, making bird lists, and collaging artifacts.

Slow in the Snow

2010-02-24T23:01:00.002-05:00

This was the view from the bedroom yesterday afternoon. By this morning, the snow-laden branch hung low over the bird feeder, covered by a thick blanket of white. Then the power went off. Luckily, the coffee had just finished brewing and was still hot, so we admired the 10 inch snowfall with eyes wide open. It really was spectaculor. After the Great Ice Storm of December 2008 when we were without power for four days, we knew what to do. So we did slow things doable without electricity, a furnace, and running water - reading, shoveling snow, sitting by the fire, napping, and packaging art work for mailing to Saranac Lake for submission to the 12th Annual Juried Show sponsored by the Adirondack Artists' Guild.

I always find photographing my work before sending it away very challenging, and today was no exception. A bit if serendipity interfered when I tried hanging the work on the front porch though, making the photos of the two little spring flower watercolor sketches into multi-layered images of winter giving forth to sweet growth and color.

The main piece I sent off was the collage of four little collage pieces that started with the botany illustrations. Working with plant images and terminology reminds me so much of my childhood experiences in the woods and fields where I grew up. One Spring while exploring the fields and woods around my grandmother's farm near Bath, NY I found a whole hillside covered with white trilliums. I was completely enthralled. Another Spring a few years later, I discovered intriguing sprouts pushing up through the leaf litter and dug some up so I could watch every bit of the progress made by the emerging plant. I planted the shoots (and their roots) in pots in my bedroom. Then I found branches with swelling buds and stuck them in jars of water on my shelves and desk. Then I watched. Again, I was enthralled and awestruck as the shoots sent up leaves and then jacks in their pulpits. The buds swelled to bursting, and maple catkins and oak leaves and black cherry flowers unfurled, shedding pollen and tiny larvae and little winged creatures across my homework pages and text books. I was in love with it all. And still am.

Some Elements of Botany

2010-02-20T11:32:00.000-05:00

A few months ago I printed some scans from an old botany book (Elements of Botany) on butterscotchy-beige rayon. After some refreshing play sessions when I remembered how much I love free-motion sewing, I turned the four little fabric pieces into a set of four fabric, paint, and stitch collages. If you aren't familiar with free-motion sewing, it is simple - think about drawing with a sewing machine needle instead of a pencil. I used some scraps of upholstery fabric to enhance the illustrations, and I love the way it frayed like crazy - made me think of root hairs, so I left a lot of them. I am in the process of mounting all four on a piece of wood so I can enter the piece in an upcoming juried show.

The other project going on now is preparing for our trip to Panama - coming up soon. It started as one of our intensive group birding trips with a professional tour company and has turned into a an intensive birding trip with a pre-trip adventure on our own up in the mountains west of Panama City. We'll be there for awhile, and I am mulling over which art supplies to take. I nearly always take more than I can use - both the actual phyical materials and the ideas I have for journaling, painting, and drawing. I am building a blog that I hope to use for postings every few days. It will include bird sightings, my journals and drawings, our progress with Spanish (we are not really complete novices), and lots of photos. This plan depends, of course, on the accessibility of the servicio de internet in El Valle near our cottage and our lodges during the birding trip. That link coming soon...

Snowy January 2010

2010-01-12T17:17:00.003-05:00

I was honored to be invited to show my new piece in the current show "Seeing in One" at the Adirondack Artists' Guild Gallery in Saranac Lake. I am experimenting with Lesley Riley's Transfer Artist Paper and used it with a watercolor underpainting for this work. The TAP was perfect for this because I ironed it right on the painted watercolor paper, and it didn't move the paint around at all. There is definitely a learning curve with this material though. For the media I used here, it was too easy to have the ink on the transfer squish out from under the edges of the cut-out image when I pressed too hard with the iron. I'm imagining lots of promising mixed media projects with it though.

Last week I closed NICHE Gallery with feelings of both sadness and excitement. I enjoyed being there so much, but a gallery-keeper I am not. I plan to teach art classes in Valatie (and other places, including Saranac Lake). I also want to develop my own art work and be able to travel (to Panama for month this Spring - look for a link later on to a blog from that trip).

Now I am up in the Frozen North at my little outpost near Saranac Lake for several days - seeing friends, snowshoeing, drawing, working, and pondering. The chickadees, red-breasted nuthatches, and blue jays (previously uncommon in Fernville) have found the suet and seeds I put out on Friday afternoon and zoom around the cabin all day long. Last winter a Northern Shrike sat on a branch just 5 feet from my face at the bedroom window for a look at potential meals. Wondering if it will return. I filled up one of my blue water jugs today when I went to a friend's house for a delicious hot shower. There is something about being completely covered with warm water that is such an unappreciated luxury most of the time... I really manage very well without running water but I won't mind when I have it here - maybe next winter after a new well and an addition. Some lovely frost on the porch window when I arrived:This photo will make a wonderful background for a transfer. Feel free to borrow it.

The Lili Doll

2009-11-03T21:26:00.003-05:00

Here she is!!! I realize in looking at the photo that she looks like she is wearing a crown. It's really some simple hair, make from cotton embroidery thread. Honestly - I haven't done enough serious sewing in so long that I made a bunch of silly mistakes. Luck I didn't sew my fingers together... Anyway, I like her - she makes me smile - and can't wait to give her to Lili next week. Maybe next I'll make her Mommy and Daddy dolls, a Grammy doll, a PopPop doll - this could get serious.

2009-11-02T09:49:00.008-05:00

The sassafras grove out in the hedgerow was beautiful last week - shades of rose, lime, and lemon. The leaves seemed to fall off ALL the trees on one day recently, so along with the shorter days and watery sunlight it looks like the very beginning of deep autumn or early winter.

I signed up with the wonderful Leah's Art Every day Month project, and I 'll be posting my results here. There is alot of experimenting going on in NICHE Studio these days, and that is what alot of my work this month will be about.

For the first day of this challenge, I used my cool new Beast of a fabulous Printer to print a photo of my grand daughter on cotton so I can make a small doll for her. The last time I was with her, she was focusing so much on faces that i wondered how she might react over time to seeing her own face on a doll. At first, of course, she will just see it as Face. The color is a bit extreme but that might be good for this project.

I also took a basic collage class recently. The instructor, Jeanne, was great and got me going on some fun Rip and Glue collage projects. Here is the one I made using Jeanne's subject "Excitement." While working on the collages, I found plenty of images to use for my Soul Collage cards, which I am starting using Seena Frost's book. I'm looking for a local workshop that fits with my odd schedule! More on that later.

My Art Picnic

2009-09-04T20:55:00.005-04:00

Creativity has been happening in fits and starts (not exactly every day) but my Art Picnic with Leah of Creative Every Day was really fun. We were driving back north from North Carolina that afternoon, and I sat in the back seat of the car surrounded by my limited art supplies. Leah's suggestion (via our conference call set-up) was to grab some materials that felt right and just start working. I had some wonderful hand-marbeled paper (thanks, Gail) that made me think of the amazing beach we had just left behind at my family's reunion. With that to start with and memories of a lovely week with 24 of closely-related women, men, and children I made this collage. It still needs some pelicans, gulls, and shorebirds.

For materials, I had a few pieces of interesting paper, a newspaper my sister brought from Virginia, some New Yorker magazines, some glue, some stamping ink, and a few other things. Later I added some photo transfers of some shells I brought home and some old crochet threads that reminded me of seaweed. The old photo from the newspaper was perfect - lots of funny-looking people who looked kind of jammed together - and they are about to be engulfed by a tidal wave!!!! All kinds of interesting connections to be made....

Trying to be Creative Every Day

2009-08-12T20:32:00.006-04:00

I recently took up a challenge to be Creative Every Day (see http://creativeeveryday.com/creative-every-day-challenge). I like this reminder - a little nudge to do what is truly important to me. Last summer I made a daily visual journal beginning in early July and I continued well into September. What a pleasure it is to look back at that collection of small pieces and to recollect the days! This summer's work has been more scattered but still significant to me.

Today I mailed this post card to my grand-daughter Lili. She is just 3 1/2 months old, but her mom, the lovely Tanya, reads the cards to her and is saving them for a future book or album that I will make for her. This beautiful new child is in my thoughts so often that I have to send her my love in some way. She was christened on Sunday, and this post card is made from, among other things, a photo I took that day.

I sent Lili another card a couple of weeks ago, after seeing a Hermit Thrush nest at our Adirondack camp. When the baby birds hatched, they reminded me of her - amazing, perfect, helpless, and hungry.

Other small projects in progress, including some monoprints I am making while at my cabin on some lovely new handmade paper I bought at the Bluseed Studios Summer Breeze fundraiser. See what this wonderful organization does: http://www.bluseedstudios.org/

We are heading off for many days of birds, beach, and family - preparing to do little pieces of art on the way and while at the cottage. I love doing collage work in the car while my dear husband safely cruises us along. That time feels so free from duties and often very creatively rich.

A sketchbook page from a different beach a few years ago -

I expect similar scenes next week!

Whimsical Watercolors and Babies

2009-07-07T13:51:00.007-04:00

Last week I was at the Arts Center in Old Forge, NY at the "A Whimsical Way with Watercolor" taught by Gordon Bashant. What fun! It was very freeing and happy, and Gordy was a very enjoyable teacher. Lots of water, lots of color, lots of painting! Here are some of my efforts:

I have plans to use this technique to paint some of my favorite places.

We found this lovely little treasure in front of one of our cabins in Fernville:

It is the nest of a Hermit Thrush pair. They are my favorite singers of all the birds - a northern bird - and the nest is nestled in the ferns, mosses, and Tiarella. I am starting a painting today - that blue of the eggs is so gorgeous. Since this photo was taken on June 28th, the eggs have hatched and 3 hungry little bird mouths are all we can see of the nest!

And speaking of babies, I must include a photo of our own Grand-daughter Lili, sent yesterday by her mom, Tanya. I smile just seeing a photo of her little face. She is a bit more than 10 weeks old now. How lovely she is...

Almost Summer

2009-06-08T08:48:00.007-04:00

On Saturday I was at home, and it really felt like we were in mid-summer - hot in the sun, pleasant in the shade. Blue sky filled with huge clouds. Scents of the early roses, cut grass, growing things. The gardens are spectacular this year - every time I look there is a new Beauty somewhere. The Foxgloves especially captured me last week - they have been busy crossing and scatttering and finding their own Perfect Places to Thrive - my definition of NICHE. As we sat in the shade after some soul-satisfying work in gardens and yard, Ron and I agreed that this is our very Favorite Planet. It is incredibly beautiful, amazing, and hospitable most of the time.

Yesterday I woke up in Fernville - the place of our lovely old rustic cabins, in the Adirondack Mountains of New York State. It was cool (53 degrees in mid-afternoon), spitting rain, and at least another three weeks from the fullness of leaf and warmth we had 162.5 miles south of here. (To be honest, it rarely gets as warm up here as it does at home - which is fine with me, although the leaves do come out fully eventually.)

I spent the morning with some wonderful people, co-leading a birding trip by canoe on the Osgood River as part of the Great Adirondack Birding Celebration. My co-leaders Dave and Bernie are always great company and the folks saw many quality birds (meaning: not-all-that-common-to-most-people bird species). We saw a pair of Grey Jays with 2 immature young, some Palm Warblers, Nashville Warblers, and Yellow-bellied Flycatchers, among many others. To top it off, some of us went to another site to see a pair of Black-backed Woodpeckers at their nest cavity tending their young, who we could hear peeping in the nest high in an old spruce.

March 26th Collage Class

2009-03-29T13:12:00.006-04:00

Look at these!

And these!!!

Our Mixed Media Collage went really well this week. We had a nice group of 12 women - all so amazingly creative! I was knocked out by what they did. And I learned alot too. They gave me some good suggestions for making the class better next time - I really appreciate knowing what works - or not! The collages you see here are theirs - more coming soon!

February - April Art Classes

2009-02-25T10:03:00.004-05:00

I am so looking forward to teaching this new series of classes! Here are they are:

Basic Drawing 3 Thursdays - Feb 26, Mar 5 & 12 4 – 6 PM $50
Anyone can draw!!! (REALLY!) Using non-judgmental and easy methods, you will amaze yourself at what you can learn to see and draw.

Intermediate Drawing 3 Saturdays – Feb. 28, Mar 7 & 14 9-11 AM $50

Drawing for those who have taken Basic Drawing or who have some experience with “drawing on the right side…”

Playing with Watercolor Workshop Friday – Apr 3 10 AM - 5 PM $60
Watercolor painting is joyful, expressive, portable, and fun! Spend a day experimenting with the delightful properties of color pigments in water, so you can take these techniques to your own art projects. Specific materials are required and will be available for sale.

Mixed Media Collage Workshop Thursday – Mar 26 5:30 – 8:30 PM $35
Papers, stamps, paint, photo transfers, used text, old books, pressed flowers - whatever you want to use to express your idea can be included in an artful way to make a beautiful piece. Most materials included.

Botanical Drawing 4 Saturdays - March 28, April 4, 11, & 18 9 – 12 AM $75
How is a plant constructed? How does it grow? How do flowers differ from one another? Short botany lessons combined with drawing instruction will provide you with an enjoyable learning experience.

December Candle Photo - How To

2009-02-04T09:49:00.003-05:00

My friend Colleen asked how I made the pretty candle holders in the Decmber photo. Here you are:

I froze a little water in the bottom of a short drinking glass. Then I arranged some small sprigs of cedar and chopped cranberries between the glass and smaller plastic cups filled with water (to weigh them down) and placed inside the larger glass. I carefully poured water over the sprigs and cranberries. After it all froze, I removed the inside cups - this where the candles went. I kept them in the freezer until dinner time. They were frozen and reused them a couple of times. Easy and lovely.

Today is another sunny perfect Winter day. The birds are starting to sing their Spring songs. Hormones are powerful things!

The Sun in February

2009-02-03T21:21:00.002-05:00

February 1st was a spectacular day - one of those days when you know for certain that the sun is getting higher and the light stronger the instant you get out into an open field on snowshoes. I love the geometry of the corn stalks and their blue shadows on the snow and the tracks of the crows that show their toenails dragging through the snow in the soft places. Several Eastern Bluebirds were communing with some robins in a sheltering swale, feasting on wild grapes and bittersweet berries. Some small grey bird is roosting at night in the hollow tree - see the tiny feathers clinging to the wood at the edge of the very round hole.

Some watercolor painting is in order - the blues are too beautiful ....

Late December 2008

2008-12-30T23:01:00.004-05:00

The holiday season is winding down, but not before we go to our cabin to be with some family and friends. The weather has been frightful many times already this winter, and although I love snow, it has hampered my need to celebrate with those I love. So, a few more gatherings in the next week, then many more little ones to help us all through the Cold Dark Time.

I have been busy in my studio. Here are some of my new Reminder Pins - helping me remember what is important sometimes.

Sea Shells

2008-11-29T21:19:00.006-05:00

Lucky to be in Florida this week, visiting Mom. We spent this afternoon at the beach. As usual (and ever since we lived down here when I was a kid), I was enchanted with every shell, every piece of sand dollar, every strand of algae. I should know by now to bring a bushel basket with me (a slight exageration) to collect all the beautful bits that I want to look at and make into lovely reminders of that salty, mysterious world.

2008-11-12T21:04:00.003-05:00

Studio Grand Opening

The event on Saturday was wonderful - lots of friends and well-wishers stopped by, and my friends Susan and Bill came all the way from Ithaca for my Grand Opening! Also received some beautiful flowers - Thanks, Mom and Colleen!!!! Here a few photos. The next project is to arrange to give some art classes - drawing, card making, and mixed media collage this winter.

The New Studio

2008-11-06T20:59:00.004-05:00

Although I have officially been in my new studio since October 18th, I haven't been there much. BUT, I am participating in the Grand Opening of the store in which my studio is located, Great Finds in Valatie, NY, on Saturday, November 8th. I expect it will be a busy day, as all the weekend days have been since Maggie moved her store from a smaller space up Main Street to this grogeous renovated house across from the beautiful falls as the Kinderhook Creek tumbles through the village.

Here a few views of my sweet humble space:

MidOctober

2008-10-15T22:01:00.004-04:00

The Adirondack studio tour went very well - lots of friendly visitors, some of whom bought some small works (Many Thanks to ALL!!!). Next project is setting up my new studio in a small village near home, Valatie. Much to do there before Saturday's village-wide Harvest Festival.

Meanwhile, the Fall colors and the Hunter's Moon are spectacular this week. Working indoors is HARD! Before I left the mountains yesterday, I paddled with my friend Gail. The tamaracks were golden, and the dropping needles rained down as we sat in our boats to talk and look.

Last night, our Full Moon Circle met outside with a campfire under the clouds and occasional moon sightings. We all agreed that it clearly feels like the turning point of the season now. A month from now these colors and mild tempertures will be a fond memory.

More for the Studio Tour

2008-09-25T21:10:00.005-04:00

If you love being in little boats as much as I do, you might like the papier mache boats I made. There are two made from my handmade paper with pressed plants inside - one small (9.25") and one larger (13.5"). These are photos of the treasures inside. (Photos of the outsides were posted a couple of weeks ago.)

Two more boats (same sizes as above) are made from royal blue paper with gold fish printed on it; the insides are painted gold. Like the first boat I made for myself, I can add words of your choice to the interior of the boat. I'm thinking of love poems, anniversary sentiments, etc.

I'll be working on some collage pieces during the studio tour, and there will be some other small paintings, pastels, and photographs to browse through.

You will be most welcome at my little cabin! There will be hot cider on the stove and a cozy wood fire to warm you.

Adirondack Artists at Work Studio Tour

2008-09-24T11:44:00.010-04:00

I've been so focused on getting some new pieces ready for this weekend's studio tour that I have not been attending to much else. In fact, three bowls of beautiful raspberries are calling me to make them into jam. (... just talk amongst yourselves ...)

Okay, now there are nine beautiful jars of jam on the counter, I made a fabulous dinner, and I'm back at the studio and computer.

First of all, get directions to my studio on the Adirondack Artists Guild website: http://www.adirondackartistsguild.com/studiotourwinters.htm Directions to the studios of all participating artists are available on that website as well. I will be in my studio on Saturday and Sunday - Friday is my day to visit the studios of some other artists.

Here a couple of new pieces in my "Habitats" series. They are made from photo transfers and torn papers, applied to small canvases that have been painted with acrylic paints.

I'll also have my Small Works and Dreamscapes on exhibit. These will be for sale, at prices named by the interested buyer. How much is one of them worth to you?!

Here are some examples. Each was made from free-form watercolor paint tossed onto small pieces of watercolorpaper. Then I drew into the shapes formed by the color. Most of them are completely informed by the viewer's interpretation. Look for the tiny details. Here is "Eichybush Autumn."

And here is "Dreamscape IV."

And "North Country I."

Tomorrow I'll add a few more pieces to this page before I load my car for the beautiful drive north.

On The Island

2008-09-21T11:59:00.003-04:00

A week ago - last Sunday - I was sitting with friends on Halfway Island in Lower Saranac Lake for a morning meditation. It rained earlier, and the water dripped from the overhanging pines while we sat quietly, looking out over a grey and blue waterscape and the other islands that are scattered across the lake. The croaks of Common Ravens and the chips of chickadees floated across to us. During our Saturday meditation, a raven sat nearby and joined our chanting.

Shorebird Migration

2008-09-12T09:37:00.004-04:00

Last night I made this journal page. It has nothing to do with what I did yesterday, but I saw the nearly-full moon and it reminded me of the shorebirds we saw on Cape Cod last weekend. Many birds migrate at night and can actually be seen flying past the moon. We know alot but it is all still a beautiful Mystery.

Later today I will paddle out to the island where Zen in the Woods is taking place. I'll set up my tent (probably in the rain - all fine) and settle in for a couple of days.

A Journal Page & Some Watercolors

2008-09-11T09:32:00.006-04:00

I am working on a concept I have for a "Habitats" series. This little piece - yesterday's journal page - includes a leaflet of a Cinnamon Fern frond (Latin name Osmunda cinnamomea), part of a topographic map, the symbol from the map showing the decliation from true north, and a painted print of a mushroom. Being something of a botanist, I love the often-descriptive quality of the Genus and species names. In this case, this fern belongs to the larger genus Osmunda, which includes the amusing Interrupted Fern (Osmunda claytonia) and the magnificent Royal Fern (Osmunda regalis). The Cinnamon Fern is named for the fertile fronds that emerge in the center of an individual plant and are covered with cinnamon-colored spores. To make the support/background for this piece, I tried the method described by Pam Carricker in Cloth, Paper, Scissors [http://clothpaperscissors.com/] (July/August 2008) - 140 lb. watercolor paper coated front and back with gesso, then painted with several layers of liquid acrylics. (Thanks, Pam!)

Before I head to the mountains later today, here are a few of my watercolors that are framed and will be available for sale at my cabin studio tour later this month (also available by contacting me through my blog).

Drawing Class & Studio Tour

2008-09-09T21:46:00.006-04:00

Last week, my friend Stephanie and I finally got together for her drawing class. As usual, I got at least as much out of the class as my student did. Drawing the gills on this mushroom was completely absorbing - and they really were purple!

My post card invitations are now in the mail, inviting friends and acquaintances to my little cabin studio for my part in the second annual Artists at Work Studio Tour, sponsored by the Adirondack Artists' Guild in Saranac Lake from September 26 - 28, 2008. I plan to open my studio on Saturday and Sunday this year, so I can visit other artists on Friday the 26th. For information about all the artists and studios on the tour, visit the Guild's website: adirondackartistsguild.com Here is my cabin, with which I am completely in love:

Glorious Morning

2008-09-02T09:17:00.001-04:00

Another glorious late summer morning here in the Berkshire foothills of New York State. Behind our house is a corn field from which we can see the Berkshires to the east and the Catskills to the west. This time of year when the mornings are cool, we can see the mist rising from the Hudson River, although the river itself is not visible from here. The blue jays are forming their roving bands of raucous marauders, making lots of racket and zooming around among the forest fragments.

On my drive to Rochester this past weekend with my friend Brin, we passed a huge sunfower field - most beautiful. It reminded me of a road trip in Wisconsin with my longtime friend Susan when we had to stop the car to admire the sunflower fields (that or drive off the road in distraction). I did this pastel painting later for her.

The Morning Glories are in their prime out on the garden fence. I find their colors and habits enchanting - it is a challenge to recreate that exact shade of blue in watercolor paint.

In Cris' Niche

2008-08-29T07:51:00.000-04:00

This week I made more paper boats. My first (pictured above with the little double-bladed paddle) was made during my Oiseaux Sisters workshop. I have not worked much with 3 dimensional objects - we worked with low acid paper mache - and this was fun. (Early this summer, I bought a little lightweight solo canoe and I am a bit obsessed with being on the Adirondack waters.) A couple of years ago, I saw a lovely poem by Mark Nepo about paddling a boat as a metaphor for making one's way through life - I collaged some excerpts from that poem into my boat. I love the idea of a boat being both a vessel and conveyance.

The two different-sized boats are made with paper mache bases covered in paper I made that incorporated flowers from my gardens.

This weekend, I hope to be on Lake Ontario with my son Chad in his little boat.

In Cris' Niche

2008-08-27T21:41:00.000-04:00

Lots of changes coming up - good for the Fall, I think. Maybe I'll buy new pencils...

The workshop I took this summer with the Oiseaux Sisters in Moravia, NY was a wonderful experience - many lessons on new techniques, as well as lessons in how to live and think as an artist. One of the best lessons was the importance of having a daily art practice of some kind, and - as recommended by Susan Dollmaker Andrews - I began a visual journal. The process of coming up with a new idea for each day is challenging, always a good way to keep creativity flowing. In addition to the visual piece, I write the day's activities on the back of my little art piece. Here are photos of my July journal, a week of August, and a couple of this week's images. I'm a little behind, after the canoeing and other Adirondack activities of the past couple of weeks.

Meanwhile, ideas keep percolating.