Now which ones should I use?

So, a few days have passed, and I have been trying to work out what items to take with me to this dinner. I’ve been throwing around ideas. Grandpa’s pictures, definitely a My Sky. The dolls that Grandma made the doll clothing for. And pictures by Gabby. And definitely my other Grandfather’s cherry coffee table. But  how could I not include the stained glass pieces? I have so many great pieces of artwork done by my family members, and so many images I could show. I have to remember though, Monica and Anne both said the 3D Tree and 5-6 other pieces, that was it. No more. So if I wanted more pieces, I’d have to be creative about it. I could bring in my computer or iPad and have a slide show going in addition to items I bring. But about those items, which ones? Which ones speak the loudest? Which ones bring something to the project?

I had to go back to the beginning on this. I was going about it the wrong way.

*From Digital To Hard Copy

With a due date sooner than I expected, I am attempting to do some of the easy stuff quickly to get them out of the way. With the art pieces all created, the focus is here, tying up loose ends, and figuring out the order to things, and then making sure everything is checked for spelling and grammar. I wrote the foreword and introduction, and put in all the page breaks. I also had to go through and check font size, type and color. When I printed out the first section for Anne to go over, I noticed everything copy and pasted from here was in a deep plum purple color, where as everything I wrote in a Pages document was black. It took quite a while to go through, but it was definitely needed.

I sat down to write out the last few blogs, and realized I didn’t have the images to work with, so stepped away again from the computer, and went into our spare room with all the art work waiting for me. I spent well over three hours taking photos of each item. I then came back and uploaded them from my memory card, and then set them to upload here to the site overnight. With nearly 85 images, I knew it would take a couple hours, so I went to bed so I’d have a clear focus in the morning.

Morning:

Great news, all the images uploaded! Today, I will drop them all in. A new page will be started, it will be misc work that I have done from high school to the present. And, the Family Trees page will have images added by each family member under their name. Of I go to get the work done!!

Ready Or Not! First Thesis Presentation~

With just a few weeks left of the semester Jesse, Cathy and I had to do our first thesis presentation. Our instructions were to share something of what we were doing, and to keep it to about 10 minutes. For the few days before I tore through all the art portfolios that stored my own work work and then went through the boxes and portfolios that I  had collected from my family. I needed to figure out which pieces were the most important. I kept changing ideas. I knew for any part of this, keeping it to 10 minutes would be difficult. After a few late nights’ practicing run throughs, I decided to share the internal and external influences that created an environment that lead me to become the photographer and artist that I am. Here are my written notes. I used them to help stay on track.

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Notes: Part 1: Presentation

Notes: Part 2: Presentation

Notes: Part 3: Presentation

2D Tree & Procrastination

When I first got together with Monica to go over my ideas for a thesis, I literally wrote down 25-30 things that I found interesting. As I was listing them off, she took notes on the ones that stood out to her. We then batted around some more ideas, pulled in a bit more information, and then I was off and running to flesh out the project. One of the parts that I wanted to do, I had never done before… I wanted to create a blog! I wanted to do one for a couple different reasons. The first was because I had heard of so many that became  known, and made money. Yep, that’s right, I had this idea that if I could create something on the internet, that I may just may be able to come up with a way of earning money at the same time. The second was because I knew I needed to make myself accountable some place. Sure, we had deadlines with the thesis, but honestly, there were hardly any given. I knew that I’d wait until the last minute for everything, and though that worked for  some projects and papers, I knew I couldn’t do it with this one.

Why do I mention all this? Think 24×36 primed stretched canvas waiting to be painted on… Literally the canvas has been waiting for nearly a month with paints all near it, my ideas thought out… but not worked on. I kept saying that I could do it tomorrow- oh, it’ll just take a few hours- I’ll do it before Wednesday’s group… That is the procrastination that lead to me finally realizing that this first presentation we are giving is less than 48 hours away.

***WHAT?!?! 48 HOURS???***

Yep, that’s right! Just 48 hours! I’m to have a 10 minute presentation ready for Wednesday’s class. We meet at 5:30 as usual, but there will be more people there than just our class. All of our teachers and mentors have been asked to come as well. I am trying to figure out what to focus on. I have so many pieces…

Back to the 2D collage!

Working Space: 2D Tree

Background Sky: 2D Tree

 

2nd Sky Layer: 2D Tree

2nd Sky Layer: 2D Tree

3rd Sky Layer: 2D Tree

 

Trunk & Branches: 2D Tree

 

Collaged Tree Trunk

 

Close-Up Collaged Tree Trunk

I finished up the layering in of the trunk late last night. I immediately took another picture. This afternoon I jumped right in to adding the leaves. I should have stopped now and then to show the progression, but completely forgot until the very end…. So, here is the picture I had taken of the leaves I had cut up from old magazines and specialty papers, card envelopes and scraps of fabric from my grandmother.

Cut Out Leaves

Leaves On Tree

So here it is! I don’t have all the leaves on it- I think I have about 10 or so small ones left. I have a few places I want to fill in a bit with more leaves, so I am in the process of cutting more while I wait for these silly images to upload! Photographs to come will be the additional leaves, family first names, and then the lost children. I will be adding a bit more to the sky, and some sort of grass to the bottom.

 

 

Collecting Artifacts

For part of my learning about myself, and about the artwork of family members, I have spent a good deal of time figuring out what I have that would be representational of their work. Today I spent nearly six hours at my folk’s place digging through my boxed up stuff. I was able to find quite a bit:

~Ginny Dolls with all the doll clothing my maternal grandmother made.

~Pictures taken by my maternal grandpa of her dolls and clothing that were for sale at area doll shows.

~A triptych series I did with my son on a trip to an apple farm.

~Trinkets both my children made for me in elementary school.

~My baby book.

~Pictures of some of the costumes I made for my daughter for halloween.

~A violet afghan my mom knitted for me.

~My old typeset tray.

~A coffee table my paternal grandfather made.

I also went around the house doing some photographic work of things my father built/remodeled; images of stained glass my paternal grandfather created; stained glass my mom created; macramé work my mom has created; crocheted hangers that my paternal grandmother made and my mom made.

My mom also had a few more things from her mom for me! And, my dad had a book with some photographs in it of projects he had done over the years… and which I forgot to grab on the way out the door…

Everything has been loaded into the house. This weekend I will photograph everything I can so that I will have it available if I want to show it on Wednesday’s presentation… it is coming up fast!!

Tissue Paper Flowers and Pipe Cleaners

As with any project I am working on over a period of time, I start dreaming about what the end result might be. Sometimes I dream many different concepts, and other times I get stuck on just one. This project has been no different. Over the past month the tree has evolved as many times in my dreams as it has in reality. And, so often I believe that even when I’m not actually focused on a problem, project, idea or etc, my brain somewhere is still working on it. I’m sure a lot of artists could relate, and perhaps you can too, even if you don’t think of yourself as an artist.

“At the birth of the word “art,” it was a verb that meant “to put things together.” It was not a product but a process(3) that Eric Booth writes about in his book, The Everyday Work of Art: How Artistic Experience Can Transform Your Life.

It is interesting how we change word meanings for a length of time. I firmly believe anyone can work through the art process to create something wonderful. I taught an art class this past fall. My 25 students ran in age from three-6 year old girls, to teens, and adults: male and female, moms and dads, grandparents. Some thought of themselves as artists, some worked in the arts field, while others swore they couldn’t do art for anything. With just a few basic instructions, showing the process, they were able to learn how to create in the simplest of ways. By the end of the session, each and every person had created a piece of work all their own.

This tree has been begging for something. What that something was, I just did not know. Until one night- it was one of those nights where the insomnia was so bad, I thought I’d see the sun rise. At the point of lingering between sleep and not, flowers came to the forefront of my mind with this tree. It needed flowers! The flowers would show the blooming of all the art mediums that this genetic family of mine played in.

After the initial idea, I jumped into pinterest to see what types of paper flowers I could come up with. As I was looking through, I wasn’t thrilled with what I was finding. I didn’t want them to have a “scrapbook” appearance. In fact, I am not much of a scrapbooker anyway. My other thought was that those flowers could become very heavy, very fast. And, my tree’s branches of reeds might not sustain them. That’s when I came across these beautiful tissue paper flowers! I recall making them as a kid in Sunday school class, and in regular school as well. I finally found a few bloggers who had touched on the subject. I found one in particular that I decided to use. Michelle Dupuis the creator of Rust & Sunshine ( http://rustsunshine.blogspot.com ) posted a tutorial on making five real to life paper tissue flowers. Her directions were superb, and very easy to follow. I choose to follow the instructions for Dahlias. I chose them for two reasons, the first is that Gerberas and Dahlias are the two brightest flowers I can think of… next being Glads! And secondly I could make them two tone bursts of vibrant color.

“…until you find better and brighter ones.”

While reading Kay Redfield Jamison’s book “An Unquiet Mind” she describes the point of being in a high manic phase in these words:

“When you’re high it’s tremendous. The ideas and feelings are fast and frequent like shooting stars, and you follow them until you find better and brighter ones.”

Manic Highs Overwhelm

I created a painting in our art therapy group today, on flashing colors, ideas, linear, splotches… those highs can be amazing! And then in an instant, I can be overwhelmed by them…

The Mediums We Work In: Part One

As part of the 3D tree, I am looking at the different mediums my family members (and I) work in. Some of us have varied interests (i.e. My grandmother Peggy, mother, aunt Barbara, and aunt Robin all sew). I am going to hang from this tree an item that represents for each type of medium. Here is the list I have come up with:

Paint Palette = acrylic/oil painter

Polaroid Film Sheet = photographer

Rubber Stamp = For those who created a rubber stamp.

A Beaded Bracelet = For those who make jewelry

Drawing Pad/Pen = For those who draw

A Mini-Handmade book = For those who do altered books/projects

Fabric on a Hoop = For those who quilt, and/or do embroidery

Something wooden = For those into woodworking

Fabrics/Needle = For those who sew

My intent is to have each person represented by the different work they do. So, say I’m putting my mediums on the tree, I would be represented in several ways, with several items. I am an artist, photographer, sewer, altered artist as well as a jewelry maker. I would get all of those hung from the tree. My purpose in doing this is to show that we are all multi-talented artists. I plan to make all of the items be painted in gold. The tree itself is in the tertiary  colors.

Are these things working?

Nope… they (my psych meds) aren’t. I will try my best to explain.

This has been an exceptionally hard couple of weeks for me. The psych meds I have been on for the past year and a half have stopped working. My mental roller coaster of cycling is far more rapid than anyone can keep track of, myself included. Of course, some days are better than others, and I can keep a handle on myself. Other days, those chronic pain ridden days are the ones that I struggle the most with.

I’ll go over the past couple days for you, so if you don’t happen to know anyone who is rapid-cycling bipolar, you might be able to get a glimpse of what it is like, and for all intents and purposes unmedicated…

On Friday Feb 15th I struggled to get my morning meds, and getting out of bed. I didn’t want to get up. The thought of just curling up under my heated electric blanket and going back to sleep was pulling at me so hard I almost gave in. But then, I thought about the art therapy group, and its leader Casey, and how I had made an agreement to all of them that I was committed to the group for the entire semester. As I wasn’t sick, I felt I couldn’t really call in, and I had missed the Friday before due to a nasty snowstorm we had been hit with… So, I dragged myself out of bed, got clothing on, while Robyn made me up a coffee drink to take with me, handing me keys while sending me out the door. I cried a bit on the way, turned on the music to try to cover up my own thoughts, and tried to take in the snow covered trees as I drove by them. As I stopped at the red glow of the traffic lights, I’d look more carefully at how the limbs and branches were formed, and how elegantly they seemed to hold that snow still sitting on the narrow finger-like branches. I needed to formulate how I was going to be making my 3D tree…

Saturday was more of the same. In fact, I spent most of the day in bed…

Some days like that Sunday, I was able to be out all day, spending the first six hours of it with my 95 year old grandmother, and wife Robyn. We stopped at my folk’s on the way home, and were invited to stay for dinner, so of course we stayed 🙂 Mom was making calzones for dinner. They were quite yummy. We were with them until after 10pm.

The day flew by even though I could feel my internal struggle of keeping even for those around me. I knew I had to keep as even as I could manage. Our visit last time had not gone all that well with Grandma, and I didn’t want a repeat there of…

I can only tell you now that on that particular day those weeks ago, that I was cycling- and in the worst way, because I was not able to control it and not being receptive enough to figure it our on my own.

To follow up on those few days, and medications. After being given an RX for meds that were to large for me to swallow (Literally too big, and because they were extended release, wasn’t able to break them down any). Robyn spent that Friday and then the following Monday and Tuesday on and off the phone with my doctor and the pharmacist. They finally pulled through with a new script. This one they call “Depakote Sprinkles.” They are meant for kids, so I have to take 8 of them. I have to open each capsule and put it in a bowl, then add applesauce to eat them. As long as I don’t bite down on any of those nonpareils type sprinkles everything is okay. If I forget…they are very bitter!

No matter how I take those meds, it was Robyn I have to thank for making the pharmacist/doctors work to get me a new RX. On my own I’d not have been able to do it.

An Unquiet Mind + Art Therapy Day

The other day I was aimlessly wandering around the web, I happen upon http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag/bipolar . There are some very interesting quotes about those who are bipolar, and  how they feeling being such.  The one that resonates with me the most is this:

“There is a particular kind of pain, elation, loneliness, and terror involved in this kind of madness. When you’re high it’s tremendous. The ideas and feelings are fast and frequent like shooting stars, and you follow them until you find better and brighter ones. Shyness goes, the right words and gestures are suddenly there, the power to captivate others a felt certainty. There are interests found in uninteresting people. Sensuality is pervasive and the desire to seduce and be seduced irresistible. Feelings of ease, intensity, power, well-being, financial omnipotence, and euphoria pervade one’s marrow. But, somewhere, this changes. The fast ideas are far too fast, and there are far too many; overwhelming confusion replaces clarity. Memory goes. Humor and absorption on friends’ faces are replaced by fear and concern. Everything previously moving with the grain is now against– you are irritable, angry, frightened, uncontrollable, and enmeshed totally in the blackest caves of the mind. You never knew those caves were there. It will never end, for madness carves its own reality.”
― Kay Redfield Jamison, An Unquiet Mind: A Memoir of Moods and Madness

I have put in an order for her book through our school library in hopes of getting my hands on it before the quarter’s end.

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Today was an Art Therapy Studio Day. Our ‘directive’ for lack of a better term was to create something that showed who/what supported us through life. I will upload mine at some point, but for the general idea… A very abstracted  dark blue pastel oval with two eyes, mouth, then a circles of purples, red and then yellow pastels. on the outside I glued on puffy pieces of colored tissue papers- purple, blue, yellow, lime green, pink, magenta. Across the top it says, “Not me without the people around me- a support of people in my darkest days I know won’t ever leave me.” At the bottom I listed people, in no particular order and the date I created it.

My Supporters

Finally got a chance to upload! This hangs in my studio, above myself and Robyn while we are working on our computers. We both have so many great supporters, and though we feel like we left so many of them behind, we have my family who has been our strength over the past couple of years.