Cay Denise

In one of the online art groups I participate in, there is a monthly theme.  Since the group launched, I've done a zine for each of the month's themes through February.  That means there are 8 to do--to catch up! This week, I've been working on just that...and completed 4 of them.  The themes I've done are Reconnection, Creating with Words, The 5 Senses, and Recycling,  It has been time intensive, but I love the results especially the Recycling one.  The materials for that zine included a painted canvas remnant (see cover below), a hardware store paint swatch, painted watercolor paper, Christmas ornament parts, a used stamp, some remnant yarn and magazine word cut-outs.  All were recycled/repurposed for this zine, and it is probably the most attractive of the bunch. Here are a couple photos of zines completed this week. Recycling Zine 5 Senses Zine  

Being in a 'Comfort Work' phase (a term coined by Austin Kleon--written about in an earlier post), I did a pizza mandala -- with faces.   Both faces are based on reference photos.  They were sketched with mechanical pencil.  The black, grey and silver jacket was done with Sharpies.  The rest was done with Golden fluid acrylics with some additional decoration using a gold Sakura Pen Touch marker. I like the jacket and pearls on the one figure.  Having had no intention of what I was going to do, except for selecting one photo I liked -- to start with, this was an interesting result. The two photos are so you can see each face easier.  

In his October 18th (2022) article, Austin Kleon introduces the idea of 'Comfort Work.  It occurs during the in-between times when our creative spurts and productivity take a back seat or are distressingly missing.  He calls the creative activity/efforts made during this in-between time -- Comfort Work.  It's during these periods, however long they may be, that Comfort Work provides a sense of solace and soothing -- until the periods of Real Work return.  It's somewhat like eating comfort food to gain a sense of well-being during times of stress, loneliness, rejection, etc. until there is relief through change. This article is so timely because I've been in this Comfort Work space for about a month now. Daily, I enter my studio space and have no sense of direction for what to do art-wise, wondering if this is percolation time for a new project, wondering whether my skills will decline because I'm not using them, and finding things to do that aren't my Real Work.

This week, the Supreme Court will hear a case that could change the provision of  'fair use' in copyright law.  It has to do with a photograph by one artist used by a magazine, and later that magazine, with a license agreement with that photographer, asked another artist to create something based on it.  Unfortunately, the magazine didn't advise the latter artist that there was a license agreement in place.  In fact, that latter artist went on to make millions ($$s) on the works that he created as a result. By the way, the subject of the photograph was Prince.  The artists involved were Lynn Goldsmith, the original photographer, and Andy Warhol, the latter artist. This is a case to definitely one to watch because of the implications for all types of creatives and how copyright law's fair-use doctrine could change based on the decision.  NPR Article about the Court Case

Yesterday and today's practice effort is an exploration of using my dot-line-color technique with an abstracted stand of trees.  It is a concept I came up with after seeing some of Dana Irving's tree paintings.  In them,  she anthropomorphizes many of her trees (e.g. a pair of them embracing while ballroom dancing).   It took me a while to come up with my version of an abstracted tree.  But once that was figured out, I sketched them with a mechanical pencil overlaid with a Monoline Studio pen (0.3 mm) line.  Dots and connecting lines were added with the same Monoline pen after the trees were drawn in.  Then all was colored with Sharpie pens. Do you consider this busy or not?  Where is your focus drawn to?  Do you see the trees easily, or are they camoflauged/obscured by the color changes and/or any motion you sense from the image?