December is here already!

 I missed a post in November- Busy times. The first news is that I have several pieces in a show that opens tonight  at Ricochet Gallery here in Albuquerque. It is The Big Queer Show featuring works by artists from the LGBT community here. The show will be up the month of December. Albuquerque Peeps I hope you can see the show- the diversity of work is wonderful.

I have been working on prepping for that show and I will share a picture of some of my work- here are 19 hand collages that are framed- I love how they hung these at Ricochet.

 

Here are a few things from The Gents art retreat.  We often make gifts for each other when we get together.  I had made several winged angels and decided Brian and John needed to have wings.

 

Brian with wings

John with wings

One of the things I made on the retreat was this book- a variation on Henrik Dresher's seeded notebook project.  I took a large sheet of paper and collaged on it and cut it up and folded the pieces to make a book. The collaged parts appeared randomly- then I finished each spread with more collage. I usually monoprint or paint the background but I liked this one with the stark white.  I saw this very old children's book John had brought-and Terry was the main character. He gave it to me to cut up. That will do it for this post.  Thanks for taking time to look and read.

What a month October has been!

 I can hardly believe that October ends Sunday. It has been very busy- I returned home Sunday the 24th from being gone a week with my art brothers John Arbuckle and Brian Kasstle.  I have known these wonderful men for 10 years or more. Thomas LaBadia was unable to come this time. One the way to our rental on the Oregon Coast we stopped at Seaside. Our dear friend Orly Aviner was in Seaside so we got to visit with her.  The week was spent creating together- the weather was windy cold and rainy but we did have one glorious day of sun for a forest hike. So here are some pictures from this special time. Next post I will share some art I made on the trip.

 

John, Brian, Orly and me

Haystack Rock

Oregon Coast

Magical forest

Photo magic from Brian

John prepping for eco-dyeing

More eco-dyeing prep

Autumn Has Arrived!

 Greeting All,

I am very glad to have fall arrive. We experienced the hottest summer here in Albuquerque since the depression. We have pretty much been in the 90s since early May or before until just a week ago. Now we have temps in the 70s- that is so pleasant. Autumn usually lasts a long time in New Mexico and I so hope that is the case. The International Balloon Fiesta Begins this weekend. I do not like huge crowds so stay clear but we see a lot of them from our house and in fact too close a couple of days ago- 2 balloons went down in the street behind us-  one was caught in our ornamental pear tree for a time.

I have been working on things- lately it has been making house boxes. I first made these a least 20 years ago.  They have changed over the years.  Some I do analog collage on- that is a term collage artists frequently use to describe a collage that is actually done my cutting the parts out and gluing them down. Some I do the collages for the houses digitally.  Once the digital work is done then I can print the parts out and glue them to the template-  way faster than the analog (one of a kind) collage.  Those can take hours.  

 Here are some in the currently in the Ricochet Gallery 

I can't seem to find any of the analog ones- I have given those as gifts and thought I had photographed them.  Oh well. Well I just found one- not a good photo- it is part of a hanging house thing I made for myself for my birthday- 3 houses of different sizes.

 

 The last part of this post is showing a project that I had a lot of fun with.  I created these winged beings. These are made out of cardboard.  The wings move. Hope you enjoy. I have always enjoyed making things and these houses and winged beings were pure fun for me.

Later August Already!

 I have been meaning to post for some time.  I have to say I end up posting on Instagram more these days.  It is faster.  I know some of you do not see instagram. 

I have worked on several things over the last week weeks- collage work- journal work and I got into making more of the small house boxes.

I finished up a journal I made and started in June of 2020. I have several journals going  but it is always nice to finish one. Here are a few of the final spreads from that journal.

This is the final fold out from that journal.  It is 21 inches long and 7 inches tall.

The Rhetoric of No

Knowing

This spread includes parts of a letter written by a man to another man in 1930

Family Tangle

 

 Did You Hear?

Final Spread

Wrapping up June With Work From a Week Long Class

 June is almost done- will be after tomorrow.   The 30th Ron and I celebrate 45 years together- that is mind blowing to me. Looking forward to a nice dinner out with friends.

All last week I was in a workshop with Ron Prokasso. Ron is an amazing mixed media printmaker and a terrific teacher-  This was way out of my comfort zone.  I was a prints major in undergrad a million years ago. This class was a monotype class with many different techniques. There were 6 students in the class and we were the first class in Remarque Print Workshop's new classroom space- it was terrific- plenty of room the spread out.  I enjoyed everyone in the class and the diversity of work made was amazing. The first couple of days were hard for me as there was so much information and technique demos- so I needed to pick just a couple of techniques to focus on. Printmaking is all about process and this class was all about layers.  I printed on 9" x 12" plates. These photos of the work are not the best- I don't have time right now to fix these up- some friends were asking to see what I made so I quickly shot these photos.

This is the first print. I think this went through the press 3 times. I love that they use nontoxic Akua inks. Clean up is with water and dish soap and sometimes alcohol. 

This is the ghost print from the first print- meaning there was ink left on the plate after printing so you can run it through the press on another piece of paper.

This print has collaged elements and those were printed over with transparent ink.

 

 

This print has several layers and I used chine colle- a printmaking technique for adding elements to a print.

Another print where I used Chine Colle.

This print has some layers of ink and chine colle and regular collage.

More chine colle and layering.

Layered print with regular collage.

Layered printing with collage.

Of course I had to have one with a chair. This is layered printing,

chine colle and collage.

This print has a layer of ink and then I chine colled a piece of handmade paper to it.