Thursday, February 26, 2009

Misery loves company

That's right -- there's a new ethnic supermarket in town! Couldn't take many pix because The Boy was melting down, but here are a few more I like.If I could just land a job doing nothing but correcting ad copy like this, I'd come home every night giggling into my handfuls of money.

Blister

Our house is neat enough to see carpet -- whoo-hoo! -- but there's still the random shoe or unidentified crap in my path as I walk through our dimly lit house. Might as well be stones, so I painted/created some. They're all bumpy because I deliberately blistered the paint with a heat gun.What do you call those plastic things that clamp bread or produce bags closed? Whatever they are, they're free, and they're everywhere. I started collecting these thingamabobs this past summer, figuring I could use them in something. And they just kept piling up as we bought bread for The Boy's sandwiches. I guess 21st century childrearing brings a lot of plastic into my life. On behalf of my art, I thank The Boy and TwoBoo for their contributions. The stones will go on the bottom of this page. I think I'll add a few more elements before everything gets pasted down.

Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Whistling in the dark

I'm working on a page about shadows and darkness. It was triggered by one of my weird habits: I like to walk through the house in the dark. Which is handy when checking on a baby you don't want to wake up at 3am.
I stamped a transparency with iridescent black ink, then backed it with a translucent, patterned paper that feels kinda like plastic film. Circles overlap each other like a Spanish/Moorish-style window.

The background is iridescent black script on Golden paints: Phthalo Green (Blue Shade) topped with Dioxazine Purple and then muddied to bring down the brightness. It was originally a mistake I made on an ATC; I was shooting for a verdigris color but missed. The result grew on me, though.
The darkness and shadows notion partly arose from when I was a kid reading the Helen Keller Story, junior version. I was fascinated by the idea of knowing a place well enough to navigate in the dark or very dim light. I still have a tendency to use the fewest lights possible. Which irritates my mother-in-law, who says we keep the house too dark. (I'm never going to open another window blind!) But then again, she lives in L.A. so she gets more sunlight in the morning than we do all day.
The stamping next to the face is from this plastic thingy that holds a baby formula scoop in an unopened can. I popped the scoop out and thought, "hey, that has possibilities." Going to bring down the color on those too, but it'll have to wait for another free moment.

Sunday, February 22, 2009

Gahhh!

The Boy's immunization record had this dandy cover to protect it from spills and wear, and I got it at the hospital after he was born, I think.
But TwoBoo's didn't, and I assumed the state department of health was too broke to add that little perk. So I searched high and low for a substitute.
(Okay, does anyone know how to get Blogger to post pictures in the orientation you intended? Gah.) Here I was, thinking I'd cleverly found a clear slipcover (is that the word?) for TwoBoo's immunization record at the pharmacy. It used to cover a calendar/planner. Then, about a month later... what came in the mail?
That's right. The nice little cover, and a brand new immunization record to boot. From the agency in the health department that sends you handy tips and reminders about child development. Gah!!
So now I have two covers. Well, at least I spent less than $2 on the one I bought.

I've missed blogging to y'all, and I have done a little bit of art since we last communicated. So I'll try to post like maybe one in-progress picture and a pithy few words to go with it. I'm back at work, so my schedule's a bit more regularized and might allow for this strategy.

Monday, February 2, 2009

A whole assemblage movie!

From Focus Films via AceShowbiz.com
I admire Tim Burton's inventiveness, but I've never seen any of his animated films. Somehow the creations creep me out more than say, Johnny Depp made up all ghoulish to play Sweeney Todd. So I was going to pass on "Coraline." Yes, even though the original book was written by Neil Gaiman, whom I love for having written Good Omens with Terry Pratchett.

But I stumbled upon the tail end of a 15-minute "inside-look" on HBO, and this is what hooked me: One of the guys was making a dandelion-type flower out of a nubbly dog toy. HBO didn't have any stills that I could find, but lookee here:

From Focus Films via AceShowbiz.com
The first page of the official website actually says, "You are about to enter a world where everything has been made by hand."

Dude! Someone call Jane Wynn and Michael de Meng! Oh, wait. I'm sure they already have the opening of "Coraline" on their calendars.