2018 in Review - It was a very good year!

This past year has been much different in tone and scope than the last. Artistically, I've been productive in different ways...with fewer paintings but many more crafts completed.

That said, there is so much to be thankful for including the fact that I've maintained a reasonable work-life balance especially compared with 2017. For me now, its all about that work-life balance plus exploring new artistic horizons and continuing to do the work!

My arts-related accomplishments for 2018 include having:

*Completed 5 Let's Face It! projects in this 2018 course
*Made 36 Blog Posts
*Done a video log (VLOG) for every day in February!
*Started keeping VLOGs more regularly starting in July
*Created 5 iMovies
*Started a spontaneous art journal and completed 38 pages
*Watched and totally enjoyed these movies: Loving Vincent, Christopher Robin, and A Star is Born; other great movies though harder to watch included Green Book and Dark Money
*Created 50 shimmering ornaments
*Completed implementing a photo filing system and naming conventions for RAW, JPG, PNG, and other image types
*Enjoyed a weekend meet-up and art-making session in Cambria with Creative Club compadres
*Joined a photography club
*Started a wheel-throwing pottery class
*Attended a wonderful Jake Shimabukuro ukulele concert at the Mountain Winery
*Visited the 'Truth and Beauty' exhibit of Pre-Raphaelite art works in San Francisco
*Participated in the 2018 Woman Unleashed Online Retreat (Winter)
*Kept an Awesome Jar and have reviewed the 9 entries (reminders of the positive)
*Written a poem (inspired by owl hoots on a impressively quiet night)
*Learned to make Shambala bracelets

(and these are in addition to having walked more than 350 miles since July!)

Comments

Introducing 'Kaleidoclown'

For fun, I've drawn one of my own photos (yes, I was dressed in a clown outfit) and added a wild and crazy background to accompany it for today's practice effort. As part of sketching the piece, it was split into four sections with two opposing diagonal lines. In terms of color choices, I've worked with color gradations for some shape sections. Can you believe, there are five major shapes in this effort? There really are -- circles, squares, trapezoids, triangles and spirals. I think the substrate is Biengfang Watercolor Paper (140 lb.). The materials used were Ohuhu markers, Micron 01 pigment ink pen, some red Stickles glitter glue for the nose, and a white Posca pen (for white dots on the face and to highlight eyes) and a yellow one (for yellow dots in the center of the flowers on the hat). There was no intention in working on this piece other than to have fun...and based on how it looks, I'd say well done!. One thing I learned is that blending with the Ohuhus i

New Project in Progress

I'm working on a new project with multiple layers and shapes of different colored organzas. It is an interpretation of lighting on an ice rink...from a show I recently saw. There is a lot more stitching to do, but I like how its coming along. I'm learning organzas are not easy to work with especially when you layer them and have overlaid edges. The fabric also tends to ravel easily. This post also linked to http://ninamariesayre.blogspot.com .

A New Sharpie Drawing/Painting

This effort was done starting with a 5-minute sketch while process photos were taken along the way. My intention was to work on color selections and to complete the jewelry/dangles to stand out without overtaking the female image (and maybe even getting a sense of dimension with their use). This is the second project in which a straight line across the page has been added to interrupt the wavy/curved lines -- and to show that using subtle color adjustments on each side of the line. (The first project that incorporates a line can be seen in the August 23rd post,) I'm pleased with how this came out. There are a few areas where the decoration looks sparse, but I notice it seems restful to my eye, since the balance of the Sharpie-painted areas are much busier. What is your experience looking at it? What draws your attention first?

Cay Denise

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