OK.  I confess.  This is a photo from last year but this is what I'm anticipating soon!

Nature is an amazing tutor for showing us what colors provide us the most satisfying experience.  Purple and green are not exactly complimentary (purple and yellow) or analogous (purple and blue) but obviously, these colors are beautiful when placed next to each other.

I can't wait for Spring to show me other colors that work together that are NOT on the color wheel!

Lately, I'm finding folding paper a very calming and creative way to spend aa couple of hours in my studio.

I've been making books this way for several months and now, I'm exploring the Japanese art of origami.

I love the 3D result as well as the process of folding, unfolding, and being surprised at the end result.  I am finding most "instructions" very mysterious so have been looking at You Tube videos so I can actually SEE what they are doing.  

Everything related to this art form is precise — something I have always had a hard time with since I like to just wing things.  It's teaching me patience.  Is that a good thing?

It takes me and friend Judith Cassel-Mamet 10 months to come up with and test various approaches to the projects we teach at our annual Mixed Media workshops.  Since we both approach everything differently, we can feed off each other's ideas and methods and that is the fun part of developing our curriculum!

Mixed Media can mean many things but one of the components that we always include is some fiber and stitching.  Over the past 4 years, we have also incorporated paint.  But not in the way you might think!  No drawing or fine painting skills are needed!

We had a wonderful group of creative women in our March workshop and they each made amazing books, using a variety of new techniques.  

Judith and I are now contemplating our next workshop which will be held in 2020.  If you subscribe to my newsletter, you'll get the details first.

Meanwhile, I hope you are living in a place with lots of sunshine and are looking forward to Spring!

I just finished teaching a 2 day workshop with my friend and cohort, Judith Cassel-Mamet.  We had 18 students in a lovely sun-lit classroom inside a church near Washington Park.  Everyone created 3 books during the two days and we taught many techniques such as how to print on paper with a gel plate, how to create books using different types of bindings, and most of all, how to layer on paper using a variety of methods to create unique, abstract art.

One of our students gave me a "thank you" card with a pop-up showing the Manhattan Skyline.  (we both called NY our home even though we live in Denver now!)

That got me inspired.

My favorite online book-making teacher is Faith Hale.  She teaches at Creative Bug and yes, I pay $4.95 per month to access all their classes.  I enjoy this learning platform because they have so many classes ranging from 5 minutes to 6 hours so when time is short, I can pop in to see something that might interest me.  So I learned this 3-D folding technique from Faith (she called it a rainbow bridge) and it was super easy and fun to make.  The class is "Altered Book Daily Challenge" if you want to delve into this interesting way to think about using books in a mixed media environment.

Coming from a publishing background, cutting up a book makes me cringe a little but since I have 2,000 books in my personal library, I think eliminating a few this way would save them from the landfill.  So I'm OK with that!

The view from our apartment is totally different from the view from our house and in some ways, even though I live in the same neighborhood, I don't recognize the landmarks around me.

But I've been thinking about how a change in perspective could change how we look at our own art.

One of the things I learned from other artists is that you need to flip your work around in every direction to see things you didn't see before.  I have found this advice invaluable.  It helps me see composition, shapes, and values.  It shows me where I need to add or subtract something.  If frees me from seeing the details of the image I'm working on to seeing the "whole picture".  

I encourage you to try this as one more tool in your art box.

And yes, this is a metal sculpture I used to have in my back yard but now, is placed on my balcony.  I love seeing her every day but on a snowy day like today, the outlines really stand out.  The artist is Arabella http://arabellasmetal.com/ .  She is a Denver-based artist and  I feel lucky to have been able to collect two of her women.

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