night 8 - Eight Nights of Lights 2009

Tonight's topic is Penance - thinking reflectively about your life's path--and what changes you might want to enact.

Penance is defined as a feeling of regret for one's wrongdoings. Last year,I talked about making penance art. But it was penance for what happened to the Jewish children killed in the Holocaust. My feelings of regret for what someone else did that was wrong.

Several months ago, I started tonight's project. There's over 80 hours tied up into the making of it. Not something you can do in a day. But I think huge, time-consuming pieces of art are necessary every now and then in order to make us stop and give thought to what we are trying to accomplish.



Notes of Hope - my gift to Amaco because of their generosity in supporting the Holocaust Museum in Houston. If you read my blog, you know that they have sponsored a contest for the second year - making butterflies, 1.5 million of them, one for each child who died in the Holocaust.





Notes of Hope - is a collaborative piece. While the design and majority of it was completed by myself, I have contributions from Linda Peterson, Jana Ewy and Liz Welch. And we all 4 have signed the canvas. It's big. 20" x 16". Considering that strips of Friendly Plastic are only available in 1" widths.....just imagine how much product was used to create this!!! And in the process of making it, I've spent many hours thinking about the art the world has lost in the death of all the children...and the children's children that they might have had.



Notes of Hope - why the music? In Exodus, it indicates that there were about 3 million Israelites who left Egypt. And it tells us that they sang a song unto Jehovah. Now, can you fathom a choir of 3 million people singing in the desert?

And they sang: Jehovah is my strength and song, And he is become my salvation: This is my God, and I will praise him; My father's God, and I will exalt him....Thy right hand, O Jehovah, is glorious in power, Thy right hand, O Jehovah, dasheth in pieces the enemy.

My hope is that Jehovah will destroy the enemies of Israel and that we will be educated and wise enough to prevent children, such as those in the Holocaust, from perishing again.






Notes of hope - I have a lot of them!

Tonight's video will show you how to melt Friendly Plastic pellets, roll them out flat, and then airbrush designs on them. And I'm also showing you a closeup of the canvas.




1,500,000 children died in the Holocaust. 1,500,000 children who never created art. A great loss to the entire world. So I ask you to make a simple butterfly and send it directly to the Holocaust Memorial.

Hanukkah - my Eight Nights of Lights. Jehovah Jesus Messiah - the Light of the World. My art - my way of spreading a little light into the night. I hope you have enjoyed it all. May Jehovah bless you richly in the year to come.

Friendly Plastic Diecut Fusion on Canvas

Last night, I showed you how to do the diecuts from recycled plastic. Tonight....what to do with them?
I love to interloop them....and see what you can get by "hooking" them together or layering them:

I'm working on a big collage (20 x 16") so I just laid these on the canvas.  When you use your heat gun, they will melt into the canvas.  There's enough tooth that they just become part of the fabric.  Careful as you will not be able to remove them...so get them where you want them before you start!

While it's still warm (or you can reheat it to make it warm) simply drop charms, beads, found objects, anything down into the plastic - it will stick!

This next one is still just 2 diecuts. But note the corner that didn't get cut right? (OK, I got the die too close to the edge!)

Heat it into the canvas and add more charms.  Who knew there was a booboo under there?

Once you get started, just continue to add and build up your project.  This is just one tiny corner...but I think I'm happy with it!

Here's the first video that I did for this technique. I think I like the griddle method better, but I still do the iron when I want to get my plastic thinner than a dime. The last part of the video will show you how to heat the plastic diecuts into the canvas and add the charms.



Well, it will be awhile before I'm totally done with the canvas...but I hope to share bits and pieces as I use all the techniques I can think of to create this collage!!! Stay tuned!

Oh! It's so much fun to play!

I have Monday's off while teaching in San Diego, so guess what I did today? I took a class! LOL! Went to Sally's house and she showed me how to paint myself. Here is one of her self-portraits....these are huge....on canvas...and a mixed media collage:



This is the one she is currently working on....so it's a work in progress: (just click on it to see a larger view)



You start with a portrait and blow up each quandrant to 8x11. So this is 16 x 22 overall.



The hardest thing was to match up the center lines. Took me forever!



Then you paint each quadrant separately. Then lay them all on canvas. Paint them on the canvas using gel medium, then blend the paint on the original quadrants into each other. Wow! What complete fun!!!



I decided to be part blonde, part red head, part blue hair, and I'm not sure what the purple and bronze age is....maybe really old! And there's silver metallic flecks throughout all my hair.....yep, reflective of all the grey!



I got this much done today and decided to wait a day or 2 and then start my collage. But the more I look at this, the more I think I might just leave it as it is. You know me, when I start to collage....I just never know when to finish!