Category: Art

Posted in Art, Writing

Public Poetry

Posted on by textisle

We’re used to art in public places, like this mosaic in the Lonsdale Quay Market in North Vancouver, which was made by young people in an arts apprenticeship program.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Poetry in public places is less familiar.  So I wanted to share this by Victoria’s Poet Laureate Linda Rogers.

They are a custom made cover for the free-flloating stainless steel globe sculpture at Government and Fisgard Streets, coincidentally next to Satin Moon.  In past winters, the globe was removed because of the damage of freezing; this is a much more elegant and eloquent solution!

Posted in Art, creativity, journaling

The signs are out there …

Posted on by textisle

This is to remind folks when to empty the dishwasher.   I’ve tried with the magnets that say “Clean” on one side and “Dirty” upside down so you are supposed to twist them around, but it’s easier to slap this on whenever we run the dishwasher.  It’s recyclable because it’s just on heavy sketchbook paper with a loop of masking tape to hold it on.  When not on active duty it lives on the whiteboard nearby.  And when we need a change of appearance, it’s quickly replaced.

 

 

Are you ever gobsmacked by synchronicity?  The other day I was browsing through an old copy of Mark Lipinski’s Quilter’s Home (the only magazine for quilters that’s fun to read) when I found an article entitled A GPS for Quilting Creativity.  This is the March 2009 issue.  The wild thing is that I already did this exercise, although I have totally no recollection of having read this article.

Digging through older sketchbooks, I located the pages I’d created, and have now cut them into another sketchbook and personalized the cover.   That way this tool won’t disappear again and will be handy as I want to add to the pages.  For now I’m going to share K. & this is Y: (sorry, couldn’t resist the pun!)

Last week I watched a documentary “Real Men Knit” which of course had interviews with Kaffe Fassett and Brandon Mably.  I’m deep in the throes of domino knitting, and the other K is I’ve signed up to take Elizabeth Barton’s Quilt University design class and the artist to whom I look for inspiration is Paul Klee.  (Note to self:  do the prep work before the book is due back to the library and the class starts!)

 

 

 

 

 

Posted in Art

Mixed bag

Posted on by textisle

A family member found Iri5 on flickr and I have been oohing and aahing over her work …

 

meanwhile my own resolution to draw something in ink every day has been a challenge I have not lived up to.

 

Domino knitting is intriguing and I have a design in mind which I think is original — but it is definitely Kaffe Fasset inspired and I’ve read all his books, both knitting and quilting, so it’s quite possibly in one of his books already.  Will post scans of my work so far but am not quite ready yet.

 

 

Posted in Art

Mehndi

Posted on by textisle

I’m not particularly enamoured of yesterday’s effort but in the spirit of keeping going with the challenge and not missing any more days I am posting it regardless.  Long story short, found myself downtown without ink (since I was going to a knitting class) and also without a pigma, so I was down to green ballpoint (crashing sound as art teachers everywhere faint!).  So I just drew round my hand and put in a pattern of dots like mehndi.

 

Hopefully I’ll do better today.

Posted in Art

Nature study

Posted on by textisle

One theme emerging from my drawings is a preference for manufactured objects with natural things such as plants or landscapes.  Today I was at the cafe and decided on a planter about ten feet away, the only hiccup was as people came to the door they would obscure the view!  I struggled to draw front to back and not have the back of the planter showing through the plants.

Posted in Art, quilting

Kiosk

Posted on by textisle

Another drawing at the cafe, done in the early afternoon so light changing was less of an issue.  Let’s just say it’s a good thing they have cultured marble table tops and not white tablecloths.  I’m frustrated because I still don’t have enough control of the lines the pen is making to convey shading and highlighting or textures of surfaces.  This thing was a bugger to draw, in fact it has panels attached to its legs so that on each side you are looking at two panels that meet at an angle.  To show them you would have to work front to back, and for me to draw a structure like this, I have to build it as a structure.  It took 15 minutes to draw this, so although I could have gone on drawing the cobblestone pattern around the poured concrete circle, I decided to call it a day.  Actually the cobblestone pattern (which I suspect is also made of tinted concrete in a mould of some sort) would make a nice quilt pattern, either pieced fabrics in similar shades or actually quilting the lines into the finished top.

Posted in Art, creativity

Lutradur bowl

Posted on by textisle

This is a Lutradur bowl made as an inspirational prototype for Laine Canivet’s workshop at next summer’s Quilting in the Trees retreat.   I fused two layers together with Steam A Seam 2, stitched extra layers to form the base, then used Wonderfil Accent rayon in coral to embellish, along with other neutral variegated threads.  I enjoy the translucency of Lutradur, and that it doesn’t fray!  For other ideas involving heat and paint, see here.

This afternoon I resumed the cafe life.  This time I sat in the glassed in porch looking north and selected some elements of the landscape to convey gloomy clouds hanging over a misty landscape with modern street lights in front.  Reading that description, it sounds like an oil painting perhaps by Thomas Kincade or those paintings of Paris in the rain (are they all painted by the same person or is there a whole atelier full of artists pouting when the sun comes out????  “encore du soleil, quelle misere!”)

I did better with the ink and ruling pen, using a piece of scratch paper to start the ink flowing, so no nasty blobs, and it dried much faster.  This is a very edited landscape and I could probably sit in the same spot, pick out different elements, and make a completely different looking scene.

Posted in Art, journaling

The Sniffles

Posted on by textisle

Since it was not practical to go to a cafe today I stuck with Pigma pen on paper and tried to draw a tissue popping out of a box.  At some time I will try again in pencil, which is outside of the scope of this challenge, but I want to improve my shading.  This turned out to be much more of a challenge to draw from life than I anticipated, and I deliberately ignored the artwork on the box, largely because with pen I would have no way to draw the artwork and show the long side of the box as being in shade.

Posted in Art

Seascape

Posted on by textisle

Went to the Ogden Point Cafe this morning.  It’s remarkable how fast the light changes early in the day.  Still frustrated by the smudging and by the way the pen won’t always start writing when I want it to, even fully loaded.  By the time I left the ship in the sketch had disappeared.  My hometown Brighton is on the English Channel and if you see a ship in the morning you’ll still be able to see it in the afternoon, just farther east or west.  Tried to convey the texture of the water which varies because of the shoals beneath the surface. At least I was able to sip on my coffee as I worked!

Posted in Art

The Cafe Life

Posted on by textisle

My first foray into drawing at a cafe, using ink and a pen and drawing deliberately as opposed to doodling while waiting for a friend to arrive.

Lessons learned:

If you draw a coffee mug, you can’t drink from it until the drawing is completed

bring a wet wipe to clean off the pen

allow drying time before you can leave

 

Find I’m noticing reflections a lot more than before.  At the top of the gleaming white mug I could clearly see a reflection of my notebook.