Stupid blog won't post my new banner

I think that about covers it.

The Husband says the banner JPEG isn't loading right, because Blogger's server is trying to load it by asking your browser if it wants to download the image separately from the rest of my blog. Or something like that. I hate not having a phone # to call and have someone fix this right now. HATE IT HATE IT HATE IT.

I wish they would answer my email faster!!

UPDATE: The Husband used his powers for good, and apparently got Blogger to pay attention to the problem... 'cause it's fixed! Hurray! Told you I have People Who Will Cut Off the Heads of the Queen's Enemies.

Feelin' a little snitty

I won! I won!

Ooh, I feel extra bloggery. I've been tapped by Jan as being in a creative snit! Here's the definition:

noun
a state of creative chaos, creative frustration, or a state of obsessive creativity: "she was in a creative snit"

Therefore, worthy recipients of this prestigious award should demonstrate one or more of the following criteria:

1) photos of their chaotic creative studio spaces (see my blog for example)
2) reports of staying up till the wee hours of the morning while consuming large amounts of coffee and or chocolate in order to finish a swap or prepare for a show
3) documented frustration over the creative process
4) evidence of a large quantity of art created over a small period of time
5) photos of the recipient at vendor night at any art retreat ( it goes without saying that ALL attendees at such events are either in or will soon be in a creative snit)
AND FINALLY

6) ( created especially for Jan) witnessing the recipient in a SNIT at a CREATIVE EVENT!

You saw my studio/counter the other day... that definitely qualifies under #1. I'll be showing evidence of #2, #3 and #4. Number 5 can be seen here. And I'm even in good company -- my Art & Soul roomie has also been tagged!

Since thanking the little people is so done, I'd like to thank the tall people (that would be you, Jan). Seriously though, today I wasn't feeling so queenly.

There are some days when I wonder why the hell I read as many art blogs as I do. Professional jealousy and all. Especially jealous of the amazing artists who are younger than me. I know, everyone takes their own path and makes their own art. And the people I envy so much have their own issues. But sometimes I'm pretty good at making myself feel small and stupid.

So I figured the best I could do is not look at any blogs for a day or two. But I did check my email -- and Sweetie McSweeterson (again, stand up, Jan) was there for me.

I'm tagging Ricë, Catherine, and Julie... oooh, more bloggy feelings.

Blog candy from the 800-lb. gorilla

One of the ATCs for those lovely peoples who put in suggestions to name the 800-lb. gorilla: Tally, Mija, Cathie and Stacie.
From Tally: "Tar-zhay" for Target;"Las Vegas for kids" for Chuck E. Cheese
From Mija: "No Morals Mart" or "Smallheart" (more love for Wal-Mart); "Suckway" for her local Safeway supermarket; "Greedy Boss" for Reed and Cross (a high-end gift shop in Oregon).
From Cathie: "Ghetto Gap" for Old Navy. (In case y'all didn't know, Gap owns Old Navy and Banana Republic.)
From Stacie: "Group Death" for Group Health Cooperative (it's like Kaiser Permanente); "Boring" for Boeing.I glued images down first, then surrounded them with Golden light molding paste. Then I mixed Quinacridone Red and Oxide Yellow to make orange, and painted the paste.
Next, I painted the image as well as the paste with a drop of Iridescent Bright Gold (Fine) mixed with some gel matte medium. It helped tie the image to the paste color, but the paste was a little too bright.

So I coated it with a wash of Michael deMeng's special secret sauce that he uses to grunge up his creations. (See, I'm using what I've learned, Mom.) Then a hole punch in the corner for some fibers and voilà -- coolness.Fun, fun, fun. I like this game.

A little overwhelmed, but not completely

That's what my studio (er, my countertop) looked like when I came home from Art & Soul Portland. It's worse now. But it's worse because I'm working on the artist book, so I've piled on other stuff that I might use and that I'm definitely going to use.

I'm not the neatest person, but I can only tolerate so much visual chaos. Then I have to clean up the mess, or set it on fire.

I'm a wee bit stressed for many reasons:
-- The Husband's birthday is this weekend. I've bought one present, but I need to get another, surprise present and wrap them.
-- His dad and stepmom are coming up for a fly-by. (They're not judgmental, and they stay in a hotel for the 24 hours they're up here. But no vacuum cleaner has disturbed our carpet in months. And we have a diaper pail near the front door.)
-- I've signed up to do the Holiday Craft Fair at work. That means I'm going to alter ten regular-sized composition notebooks, and ten more small ones. By November 29th.
-- I need to put together clever packaging for three other altered notebooks, so I can impress someone who might be interested in selling them in her shop. (My inside contact says that person's indicated it's all about the packaging.) I have a good idea, but I haven't done it yet.
-- I have a commission (my second!) that needs to be done. The client's very accommodating, but my sense of guilt... not so much.

And that doesn't include other things I should be doing, like:
-- Working out
-- Taking The Boy out more often, and setting up some play dates

OH CRAP. I just remembered my new niece's first birthday is coming up on November third. I need to send something!!!

Okay, now I'm going to do things completely out of a common-sensical, efficient order. Back to the artist book. I'm doing what I expect will be the hardest page -- maybe not technically, but the one that means the most and that I want to turn out the best. It's part of the chorus of "Someday":

We'll take a swim in the deep blue sea
I go to leave, but you reach for me

No pressure.

Name the 800-lb. gorilla!

So my coworker and I were talking the other day, and the topic of nicknames for mega-corporations came up. You know, the kinds of nicknames that ticked-off employees or devotees will come up with. For example, I've heard "Whole Foods" is often called "Whole Paycheck," 'cause that's what you pay to get all that gorgeous, ecologically-correct food. (I've only been in there a few times, and I'm always overwhelmed by the culinary seduction that pervades the joint.) Some other examples:

-- Nike => "Nike-stag" (rhymes with Reichstag), to describe the corporate headquarters
-- Disney's animation division => "Mauschwitz", courtesy of the laid-off animators during the 1990s. (No offense intended to those related to concentration camp survivors and inmates.)
-- Boeing => "Boring." (I didn't say they were all scintillating.)

There must be one for Microsoft, but I don't know it. The closest I've heard are the nicknames for the employees, who've been called "Microsofties" on a good day, and "Microserfs" when the subject of outsourcing comes up.

Do you work for a corporate behemoth, or live in a company town, with a great nickname? Let me know. I could send you some blog candy...

UPDATE: Found some on Wikipedia... there were a lot, but I'm only listing the ones I liked and didn't know before.

-- Bed Bath and Beyond=> Bloodbath and Beyond (now that's what I'm talkin' 'bout!)
-- Starbucks=> Four-bucks, Bucks, Starby's
-- Kodak=> Great Yellow Father
-- Home Depot=> Home Despot (knew this one, but I like it so much)
-- McDonald's (the hatred here is impressive)=>Mickey D's, but also Maccy D, The Golden Nightmare, McDeath, Rotten Ronnie's, McDogchow, McDick's, McConvicts, double-yuck, American Embassy, MacDo (mainly in France), Smack-Donald's
-- Microsoft=> Microsloth, The Borg (I thought only The Husband and I called it the Borg)
-- Walmart (again, impressive levels of hatred)=> Evil-Mart, The Evil Empire, Hell Inc., Evil Inc., Mall-Wart, Wal-Merde ("merde" is the French word for shit), Wally World, Wal-Fart, Small Fart, Sprawl-Mart, Wall-Junk, and my favorite -- Mordor

UPDATE: Mija came up with Suckway for her local Safeway supermarket. I like it... the quality of their stores varies so radically. Keep up the good work, peoples!

UPDATE 2: Tally reminded me of Target=> Tar-zhay (well, of course... what was I not thinking), and added Chuck E. Cheese=> Las Vegas for kids. "Mom, I just need more tokens to get out of this slump. I can feel a winning streak coming on!"

ATCs for everyone!

Art & Soul -- series finale

Yeah, it looks harmless from here, but working on this book is like trying to breathe water sometimes.

The above photo is a close-up in the book I started in "Illuminated Vision: Giving Voice to a Favorite Poem." In the class description, our instructor LK Ludwig said:

"This class hopes to focus on the use of narrative (in this case, a poem) to inspire personal content—we will use a poem as our structure for this project giving you a foundation to then create personally meaningful work around your own musings. The product will be a treasure-filled 5-6 page book, bound into the covers of an old book. "

I haven't really read much poetry since college... the only one I could really remember much of was "If" by Rudyard Kipling, thanks to a fragment quoted in "Harriet the Spy": "If you can keep your head when all about you/ Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;" But it wasn't really doing much for me. So I chose to use the lyrics of "Someday" by Sugar Ray.

This was a double-edged sword for me. That song was playing in heavy rotation the summer that my mother died, and I knew I'd never hear it again without thinking of her. When my father died, I added those memories on as well. Which is fine, when the song comes on the car radio and you can lose yourself for a moment, then move on.

But I found myself delaying printing out the pictures I wanted to use. Then I delayed packing up the class materials. By the time the class rolled around that Monday, I'd accepted that I probably wouldn't make it through the class without at least tearing up.

LK's demo of a technique helped push all that to the back of my mind for a while.
She places something patterned (a fern frond, a stencil) onto brass or copper mesh, then sprays it with patina solution. The exposed part corrodes and darkens, while the part covered by the other item remains shiny. One of the other students realized a stamp coated with Versamark ink (a clear embossing ink) will have the same effect, so I used a gate stamp I bought on Alberta Street the day before.
She also showed us how to do water transfers, using cheap photo paper and a Magic Spoon of Power:Then she displayed some of her finished books for us to page through. And that was about it for instruction, which probably would've been enough for me if I weren't on edge that day.

I've never really used eyelets or much metal before. And my emotional vulnerability was dragging me back to habits that I normally have under (better) control: wanting to be led by the hand, wanting to do it 'right,' and all the other stuff that goes along with it. I kept asking my poor seatmate Deryn what we were supposed to be doing, and if I was doing things right. She must've been really close to stapling my mouth shut. ("There is no right way! Just do whatever the hell you want and leave me alone!") But she didn't; she just said things like, "yes, you could do it that way if you like the way it looks..." Good God. Makes me want to smack myself just thinking about it.

And then I finally started to get it when I picked up a piece of ephemera LK had brought to class, the page of a children's book in the first photo here. It was the words in the first definition of "close":

"The lamb is close to its mother."

Finally, the page plans started to unfold as the song played in my mind.I didn't have most of the stuff I wanted to use, but I knew it was waiting at home. Like the golden hand-dyed ribbon on the top, center and bottom of page two. My mother's favorite color was yellow (so of course she painted my room yellow! It took a long time to get over hating sunshine yellow), so I looped a snippet of ribbon next to our picture. LK urged us to 'use the good stuff' some of us -- okay, I -- tend to hoard and then forget we have in our stash.

Here are some of the pages I've finished so far:I was the last person in class to finish up, since I didn't have to pack or catch a plane. When I was mostly ready to go, I stopped by to thank LK... and that's when it all came to a head. I started blubbering about how I probably chose a narrative that was too meaningful for a learning experience like this, which brought my creative flow to a halt, and I'm not usually this much of a mess, and the first time I saw her work I was so stunned by its beauty and fragility and strength... and, and, and...

She was so kind. She just let me get it out, and hugged me about three times.

I suppose I'm not the first to melt down in or after a class, but it meant a great deal to me that she listened. I was so touched, especially considering that she had so much worrisome stuff going on at home while she had to teach 3,000 miles away. I will never forget that.

Just posting this makes me feel kind of raw. Yet and still, I need to express it more than I worry about how it will look or sound.

And th-th-th-that's art, folks. Remind me to post pictures of the book as I go.

Art & Soul, part four

That's part quatre for all you French-speakers out there. Including all ten of you in the US.
One of the pretty lamppost banners on Alberta Street ("Alberta" is cut into the blue piece at the top). The plan was to drive to the arts district in my own car, so I wouldn't be at the mercy of waiting for the shuttle arranged by some of the arts businesses. Why yes, I do like to do things the hard way. So thoughtful of you to notice.

But the shuttle turned out to be such a blessing, and more convenient than my car. (Hell, if I could use a shuttle like that to get to work, the local transit system could spend their advertising money elsewhere.)

My college roomie Wendy, the one I stayed with before my first A&S class, came over to visit. On her way in, she saw that my car had a serious flat, and the tire pressure of another one seemed questionable. AAA rode to the rescue, but got held up by -- whoops -- the Portland Marathon traffic. But Wendy, the sweetheart that she is, didn't mind 'cause we got plenty of time to hang out together. (We haven't seen each other in person since I got married four years ago. Oy.) So we took the shuttle anyhow, which appeared right when we were ready and was dispatched by phone when we wanted to go back to the hotel.

The shuttle dropped us at Collage first...

I'm sorry, got a little contact high just thinking about the store.

The shuttle dropped us there, and oooh... so many delicious options packed in such a small place. Wendy had to wait outside after a while, because the high concentration of small things to look at, combined with the old-building smell (which I happen to like), was kind of overwhelming. I zeroed in on some Interference Violet from Golden, which I needed after learning how to play with it in Michael deMeng's class Friday. Makes me want to be in two places at the same time, so I can paint and blog simultaneously.

Poppy and Ivy was next door, and while I thought many things were cute or even laugh-out-loud, I didn't really click there. Until I saw the Bacon-Flavored Mints. Any shop that stocks something as nasty-rageous as that gets my vote. No, I didn't get them for myself. I got them to inflict on The Husband, who as you will see appreciates the glories of bacon. (The mens, they like it when you show them you're thinking of them even when wandering about in an art-shopping-induced haze.)

And then we bumped into Ricë and Earl, who took a very cool picture of a little sidewalk graffiti that I had to have for myself too:Now that I think about it, I should incorporate that into the book I'm working on. More about that in the next post.

The rest of the jaunt was pleasant but unremarkable... observing the kids hanging out Being Cool, keeping an eye out for curious and fascinating shops as well as remembering to dodge dog poop, nothing you wouldn't have to do in any other urban area. (To the ladies who were expecting a less-unvarnished Art Experience: come on... it's an art district, not Pottery Barn.) Unremarkable -- until the heavens opened up and released all the water floating above the Pacific Northwest. Damn, we got soaked! And denim feels really good when your legs are the main heat source to dry out your jeans. Oh yeah, baby.

But we really did have a great time together, and then I rejoined Ricë and Earl for a drawing class. I was ready for my bed by the time I tumbled in, so tired I didn't even have time to get cranky about the state of my hair, or worry about the next day's class. Big emotional to-do expected... in the next post. A cliffhanger -- bwah hahaha!!!

Art & Soul -- celebrity edition

I came, I saw... I loitered with the in-crowd!

That's Ricë Freeman-Zachery and her husband, the Ever-Gorgeous Earl (EGE). I'd seen her byline a million times in various Somerset/Stampington publications. And I stopped by her blog a week or two before A&S, not knowing she'd be here. But then there she was, live and mostly pink-and-orange. (She later told me her hairdresser did something completely against the rules to get the hair color right.) I was just going to smile politely and ask to take their picture, 'cause I was celebrity-stalking. But then she cried, "You look just like our niece!" and waved the EGE over so he could note the similarity.

Normally, this doesn't impress me much. I can't tell you how many people say I look just like their fill-in-the-blank, and usually that person is named "Kim" or "Tracy." (I'm not kidding.) I guess it's because I'm about the same color and height of every black woman my age in America.

But Ricë's got this delightfully loony cackle that sounds a lot like mine when I get going, and a spark in her eyes that one usually sees only in people under the age of 13. (Don't tell her that. People under 16 or 17 freak her out.) The EGE, on the other hand, generally maintains a look of mild amusement in preparation for whatever madness is about to ensue.

So we all chitchatted for a while, and I traded an ephemera bag for one of Ricë's felt voodoo doll pins (I think it has a sprout of her hair on it, too). It was a welcome and entertaining break from my hardcore shopping for More Stuff, at the mob scene that was Vendor Night. Ooh, I got so much stuff: Russian Scrabble tiles, printed gaffer tape from 7 Gypsies, pages of foreign-language books (including Arabic. I'm sure I'll be breaking some taboo when I use them), pre-Revolution Russian money... the list goes on.

Then I continued my trek, only this time around to take pictures of My Celebrities:
Thomas and Jane Wynn (note that I shot Jane from the proper angle)...
Keely Barham of "True Colors" fame...Traci Bautista, Karen Michel and Claudine Hellmuth...Sally Jean Alexander...Juliana Coles (don't be scared, she's just challenging in the classroom)...and Karen Michel again, with Nina Bagley in the background wearing the green scarf. (Michael deMeng was vending too, but he got lots of coverage in my last post.)

After that and lots of walking about, I was wiped, so I went to hang out with Ricë and the EGE again. We ended up getting a late late nibble, during which Ricë mocked my meat-eating habits. I'm an omnivore, but she apparently missed the celery sticks next to my buffalo wings. Poor thing, she must've been distracted by the tentacles of the fried calamari she and Earl were eating. Oh... I had such a good time, and I kept them up way past their bedtime. More fun tomorrow.

Art & Soul, part two of... lots

By the time I got out of class Friday night, I was famished for food and other people. But at this point I only knew my roommate Kecia...
... and I'd only met her online up to this point. So I wandered over to the free drinks at happy hour, and there was La Lemoncholy herself with lots of interesting people: Jan (you can see her arm behind K's head), Sammy (who'd just been in my deMeng class), Blaiz, and Mija. Then the connections started clicking. I realized I knew of Mija through our mutual art friend Tally, who's been my dear friend since third grade. And I'd seen Blaiz's work on Artitude's website long before I knew these were real people I might someday meet.

With Jan's prodding, we finally got off our tuchises and found dinner at Sayler's Old Country Kitchen. Whoooo-whee, those folks do MEAT. Huge steaks, chicken breasts -- their idea of a chicken dinner is "oh, two or three chicken breasts" along with the (generous) sides, according to the waitress. Poor Mija... she looked and looked for a side salad with her shrimp cocktail -- and got one when she asked, but it wasn't specified on the menu.

We also discovered we had a few political differences amongst us... Jan (who's from TX) and Sammy are Republicans who were excited to see the celeb pictures of George and Barbara on the wall. And the rest of us... um... aren't. We had a politely animated discussion of Why They Hate Us, and no blood was shed. Aren't you proud?

Then I joined Mija and Christine for chocolate and wine in their room, and Dawn, Kecia and Sammy appeared soon after. Much loud laughter and snorting was heard in the next room over, and we got the "shut the hell up, you loud-ass art women" knock on the wall. I later told Dawn it's a good thing she lives on the opposite end of the country and I live in Increasingly Diverseville, because we agreed we'd soon become insufferable inseparable. Then Kecia, Sammy and I chitchatted as we settled in for the night in our own room, and passed out from exhaustion.

Mija and Christine kindly extended an invitation for me to come hang out with them on Saturday, since none of us had classes. So we went exploring in Portland, to find:We have something similar in my neck of the woods, but hoo-boy -- haven't been to this one before!
I found magnifying lenses that were about the size of thick page pebbles... inexpensive tubes to hold flat papers (really need those)... and the best find: hardback book covers. At first I thought, well, I know people make their own books with these but I'd have to go online and learn it and I'm already crunched for time to finish other projects, so I put them down.

And then hit myself on the head. Helloooo!! Going to take a class on Monday with LK Ludwig that teaches me to do exactly that! One of them even came from the 800 pound gorilla research institution where I work. So I was obviously meant to have all three that I bought, and only for a dollar-fitty. The fourth one was from the "Journal of Hispanic Culture," which Mija happily accepted, it being all about her peoples and all.
We also bounced to a scrapbooking store and Fabric Depot, which is like the Costco of fabric. It's freakin' HUGE. And packed to the gills that day, because there was a big ol' Columbus Day sale. But we still made it out in time to go to Vendor Night. More on that in the next post.

Yay! I have comments on my posts now! Go see all my wonderful peoples now.

Art & Soul, part one of... lots

That's me and Michael deMeng, the instructor for the "Six Million Dollar Man" class. I was too excited to remember to put back on my Extremely Flattering belt. I guess that makes me a fan girl now. Fan woman. Devotee.

After the drive from Increasingly Diverseville on Thursday, I dropped off my "doodad," the papier mache house we were to alter, at the Embassy Suites.
It's not bad... and I did try more layers than I usually do. I'd read something about an artist who says she always does at least 7 or 8 layers on a piece, so I wanted to try that. But my layers weren't always sufficiently transparent, so it mostly just felt a little thicker and solid than it might have otherwise. Still, I did use some of my gorgeous papers [mmm... paper.... drool], the hamsa as the protection charm on the door, and transparencies that would look interesting against the liner of patterned tissue paper. The first one's of a smiling man and his baby girl; the second one's of my mom as a baby.
And I used my Sullen Girl in the doorway...

And I was very good about not worrying too much that it wasn't Cool Enough. I fussed for a little, and then I told myself, that's what you have, and it's Cool Enough. An attitude that withstood, mostly, even seeing these doodads:
(Above: one of the winners)I whimpered a little, and then left.

Then I stayed with my college roomie Wendy, and met her man Brian. They're extremely amusing people, and I completely forgive her for not having gained any weight since college. Over dinner at a local Thai place, Brian regaled us with stories of things that he's seen extracted from people in the emergency room. And I told him things about Wendy that haven't changed a bit, like the fact that she whacks your arm to get your attention. (Her mama never taught her it's not nice to hit.) I paid for dinner as a thank-you, but Brian snuck a twenty into my luggage to pay for their dinner. I'll get him back later.

So! Up at the ass-crack of dawn to fight Portland traffic, but I did get there in plenty of time to settle in and do some trading before class. I exchanged small, stamped bags of ephemera, because Everyone Needs More Stuff. And I wasn't taking it back with me. The class was "Six Million Dollar Man," in which we altered plastic anatomy figurines, the ones you can take the guts out of to see where the heart, liver, etc. fit into the body. In Michael's words:

"We can rebuild him. We have the technology. We have the capability to make the world’s first modified dollar store anatomy man. Better than he was before. Better…stronger…faster… and, well, cooler looking. "

I forgot to bring an apron to wear, but my seatmate Anjali...
... literally gave me the shirt off her back. (She was getting warm in the room, and it was an old long-sleeved shirt over her t-shirt.)

Michael didn't give a lot of step-by-step instruction... it was more "here's how I make this color" and "here's what you want to do to make your piece a little sturdier, and to keep things from breaking/falling off" so now you can go for it. But he was right on top of any question, and he's so friendly and approachable that it didn't really matter.

Michael provided the bases for our pieces: everything from sink stoppers to round plastic whatchamacallits. He also had this really cool epoxy putty he'd brought, which you pinch off and then rub between your hands to get it tacky. Then you put it wherever you need it (within five minutes), and it dries within maybe ten minutes! I liked it because it's "dry," not goopy like regular glue, which distracts me by demanding to be peeled off my fingers. We also used a certain type of caulking for texture on the anatomy men.

At the end of class, we had a critique -- a very gentle one, where we discussed what made the piece work and what it says to the viewer. I didn't finish, but I had great fun, and I think I'll actually complete it at home. So here's what I came up with:
Elements: dental mirror, a bit of ball-chain necklace, fortune cookie fortunes, letters of metal type in a mini jug, brass wings, plastic bits from children's toy packaging, wire, wheeled thingies that I re-purposed as skates, electrical outlet cover as a base, and a beer bottle cap from a road near our house.That's "please" carved into the figure's back. (I'll highlight it later.) I've been interested in the word "please" recently... people use it in so many different ways, just by using different inflections and in different sentence placements. I remember Michael saying that my piece had a great narrative going on that drew in the viewer. It looks like Real Art, don't it? And it's so funny that it looks like metal, but it's such light plastic that your hand completely flies up too fast when you pick it up.

Whew! I'll post stuff about the evening and day two later.

Still groggy from re-entry

Photo courtesy NASA Kennedy Media Gallery

Tons of pix from A&S Portland, but I gotta get ready for work... sigh.

[whimper]

I have too much to do. I have too much to do. I have too much to do.

I'm going to Art & Soul in Portland, OR tomorrow and I'm mostly finished collecting the stuff I'll need. But I still need to do some things:

-- cheap, portable food that won't spoil
-- gift for a friend whose house I'll be staying at tomorrow night
-- checking the car (oh God oh God oh God I should've done this two weeks ago)
-- washing my hair so I can look like I take care of myself
-- printing out two more pictures, for my class with LK Ludwig (Okay, I just looked at her blog. She's worse off than I am right now.)

This is going to be a very busy month... the In-Laws are coming up at the end of the month, the Husband is looking for a new gig right now, I need to find some time to visit with my first-time-pregnant friend, and I want to get my Etsy store up and running (with three items). So what am I doing? Whinging about it instead of acting on what I need to do.

I have to go!!!