Sunday 27 October 2013

The Elements for Michael's book
I'm having fun with freehand stitching and learning how to create representation with this method. It's hard, can I say. It makes me want a quilting machine that give you serious control over your stitching. I don't have that. Anyway, the square represents fire, earth, air, water. Great theme Michael, thanks!

Saturday 19 October 2013

Window Perspectives


As I sat reading Neil Gaiman’s The Ocean at the End of the Lane this afternoon, the day after completing my sketch, this passage made me smile as I remembered the same tree that I drew just yesterday -- the sway, the creak, and the purple sky made me wonder if he wrote it just for me:

I sat on my bed, and stared out of the window.

My bed was pushed up hard against the wall just below the window. I loved to sleep with the window open. Rainy nights were best of all: I would open the window and put my head on my pillow and close my eyes and feel the wind on my face and listen to the trees sway and creak. There would be raindrops blown onto my face, too, if I was lucky, and I would imagine that I was in my boat on the ocean and that it was swaying with the swell of the sea. I did not imagine that I was a pirate, or that I was going anywhere. I was just on my boat.

But now it was not raining, and it was not night. All I could see through the window were trees, and clouds, and the distant purple of the horizon.



How many times had I fallen asleep with that singular view from my bedroom window? Since moving to Singapore six years ago, we have lived in three homes; before that, Michael and I had bought and sold two houses and lived in four; if I think of every home I’ve lived in, certainly my childhood home gave me that singular view the longest.


My perspective from that window was always of a tree that would dance, scraping its nails in, oddly, the most soothing way, against my window. When it was cold outside, the candle for the Christmas season would warm one side of the glass while frost would creep up the other side. Snuggled in my bed, I had a view of the world that nobody else had.

I’d imagine that my view of the world was so far above that I was looking at the earth in the sky instead of the moon. If could gain that perspective on my life, I could remove myself enough to see the challenges from afar.



I often tell my students to climb their metaphorical tree for that perspective; if they can see their problems from that higher view, they can be outside of them and removed enough to see things more clearly, more objectively. Sometimes the shift in perspective is all we need.


With that new perspective, we see things that sometimes can be more magical than the reality we perceive.



Wednesday 16 October 2013

a positive spin

a positive spin

Sandy's theme, "The Hamster Wheel of Life", got me thinking. I first thought about life in general and where we all end up. Then I remembered some really great photos I took at an old country cemetery. But this thinking was a bit negative, so I started thinking about the literal hamster wheel of life. When do we actually ride wheels? I remembered this photo I took at Santa Monica Pier in California. After showing Sandy my art for her book, she said it's the antithesis of the hamster wheel of life...another way to look at things. I googled hamster wheel and found this:

When life's melancholies and loss get to us, we need a spin on a ferris wheel. Hence the title, "a positive spin".

I turned this photo into a faux painting in Photoshop with the Oil Painting tool.

Tuesday 15 October 2013

An Invitation to Explore


Thanks to Heather's book and her invitation to explore, I finally got around to trying out something I've been meaning to do for a while.  I used the Paper 53 app to create different versions of the letter "e."  Originally, I was going to stop at one, but I couldn't help it.  The further I went, the more surprised I was at what I discovered.  I just wish I took more time to explore in my regular life.  Thanks, Heather!

Heidi's entry in Jonaca's book, "At a Crossroads"



Jonaca's "At a Crossroads" led me to this path intersection. I enjoyed trying to make "rocks" for the path and "wind" in the sky behind the trees.

Monday 14 October 2013

Becky sketches in Linda's book: Thinking on my two backyards

I'm of two minds these days. Linda Blaize's theme of "Art and Inspiration in my own backyard" gave me even more reason to ponder and wrestle and drive everyone in my house crazy.  November break needs to come QUICK.


Sunday 13 October 2013

#learning2 Sketch

I learned a lot this weekend at the #learning2 conference.  I had an amazing opportunity to be in the presence of so many creative educators that good things were bound to rub off on me (and fittingly for Kelly's theme, it was absolutely NOT a waste of time).  I was fortunate to attend a 1 hour session on "visual note-taking" where the unbelievably talented Nicki Hambleton (@itsallaboutart) got us going taking notes on an iPad with Adobe Ideas.  The section on "A Whole New Mind" in my sketch is what I completed during her session, and the rest of the stuff on the page is some doodling I did afterwards, plus some photos taken along the way (thanks, +Jay Atwood +Nicki Hambleton @klbeasley )

I've been inspired.  I'm purchasing a stylus and there'll be no turning back for me!