Discovery

I love spending time browsing my fav blogs and looking at all the wonderful whimsical, beautiful and imaginative art by these artists. Sometimes I learn a thing or 2 or 3 art-wise and every now and then I discover something that just blows me over.
Such was the case today when I was visiting and ogling the art here:
mariapacewynters.wordpress.com . Maria paints with such admirable whimsy and wonder! On one of her posts she was talking about her LATEX allergy and how it changes your life to a degree and how as with other things, people just don't understand it. Maria mentioned a few items containing latex that perked my ears up! Last year I discovered quite by accident that among a list of other things I had a allergy to latex. I never really gave it much more thought; just stayed away from regular band-aids and I know not to be around rubber gloves. But, not even giving it a thought I bought 2 different kinds of masking to use in water colours and for altered books/found words. I found out real quick that I can't even hold the bottle of masking without having a major attack....never mind that the label clearly states it may cause a reaction if allergic to latex. I put those bottles to the side and there they sit until I find someone who wants them. They are evil to me! But since then I've been having regular reactions almost daily, some bad and some just minor. I figured it was Winter, the house is closed up and the allergies to dust, mold, scents etc. are just acting up and no, I'm not going to spend every day dusting! I'll just suffer. Now,  after signing up for several on-line art classes I needed to buy some of the right  needful supplies. Some of the items were simply some different erasers! It was time to learn what eraser to use for the right types of  pencil or charcoal etc. And I've enjoyed using those little rascals and seeing how they work and don't tear my papers or leave smears! What I learned today after being with Maria is that they are making me sick! After reading her mention of erasers, I went and finally did some research and then decided to test myself. I know, dumb thing to do but I needed to know. So I got ahold of that neat little kneaded eraser and molded it a bit and then made pencil lines and erased with it. Before I even got to the erasing part, my lips and mouth were tingling, then around my teeth and I took a massive headache. That pretty much ended my day but told me what I needed to know. Tonight I went around gathering erasers and in just picking them up and placing them in a bag, I was back to tingling and the headache came back. GEEZ!
 Now here's another problem and I can see this one is going to cost some $$. I've  been having a 'underwear' problem with rashes and itching. Turns out that 'undies' and bras also have that nasty latex in the elastic and even cloth covered, it gets you! So that explains the rashes and the itching, making me long to just rip the under garments off! I did some research tonight and you can get latex free undies and bras at a nice price. You can also get latex free erasers!! We won't even mention shoes and a whole list of other items! So, I love Maria's art and I owe her a huge thank you for opening my eyes and causing me to discover why I've had these attacks nearly every day.
I've had allergies for a long time but just in the last year or so, new ones, such as the latex and sulfa, are starting up. It's just weird and rather irritating!

So tomorrow is another day and I'll be wiser. I definitely won't be erasing anything and doubt I'll run any tests on myself either. Didn't accomplish any meaningful art over the week end; I just played and fooled around. I do have a project that I had put to the side and tomorrow I hope to find the right size board and get it started!

Too Funny

Nothing major to say again today but I did just find something that I found funny so thought I'd share. I was talking on the phone, sitting right here at the computer and as usual doodling away....making doodles over my notes and doodles on doodles. You know how it goes and I've shown what happens to my desk pad. It never lasts long. So there I was doodling with the ink pen and pencil, can't stop doing any faces now thanks to Sharon; and trust me, she teaches better faces than this. LOL!
But I went to walk away from the computer and this face caught my eye again and I thought, hey, that's not a girly that's a guy and who does he look like? Tell me if I'm wrong.....Stephen Tyler with maybe a hint of Mick Jagger (love of my life) thrown in. Too funny but thought I'd give everyone a chuckle. I have his 'groupies' down below. They were there waiting for him to appear!
I know, I better go find something to do......

Sometimes

Sometimes a piece of art meant to be just practice and learning turns out surprisingly well and you dare to show it! Such was the scrap art on the waxed paper. Today I'll show a page from a little sketch book. I did it while watching the Nascar race and then the Award show last night. This started out a few nights ago just sketching some small faces but then I started to add color and play.....ended up playing a bit too much and I just never could pull the whole page together. But staying with showing the Good, the Bad and the Ugly....I'm showing it.
The faces were done in pencil and started out not too bad, then used derwent watercolour pencils to lay down some color. It wasn't going too bad until I got the paper too wet (remember it's a sketchbook; not meant for wet work) and it started to rip apart layers. Then, too, as I continued to lay on color and blend the facial features kept growing. Sheesh! I finally added some ink lines; only of course I didn't pay attention and grabbed the wrong size pen so the first lines were too thick. Switched pens and gave them some hair. Then I was just going to do another line of faces but decided the page needed some background color even if it wasn't meant to be seen, just drawing faces. I got the Twinkling H20 paint and added color to the page. Thought then it looked like sky and clouds.....forgot I was just going to practice faces and added some strips of script.....didn't like the strips but too late because they were glued in place....still forgetting I was going to do more faces, I grabbed a new bird stamp and put birds above the faces and started to give them some color with derwents and markers, added some leaves and then had this thought.....those pretty little birds are going to be pooping on the little heads below! Too late now! I added the napkin border top and bottom, added dots and then the words because it needed something up there and finished with butterfly. I never did get to practice another line of faces. So it goes......next time!!

Scrap Art

This is getting to be old but again, I still don't have anything good to show you or even talk about. But, I did do a piece of scrap art the other night while watching TV. You know, one of those things where you're watching tv and just reach for whatever scrap is nearest you and start doodling or sketching or something?
In this case, I reached for the Portrait Pastels that were sitting next to me because I thought I'd just play with blending some colors and see how they blended with a wet brush after finger blending. That led me to thinking about something I saw SHARON (All Norah's Art) do on her blog one time. Rather than sketch out a outline for a face, she just laid down some smears of paint where the facial features would be and started painting from there. I grabbed the only thing in front of me, which turned out to be a piece of used waxed paper that I use to protect work from sticking in a book. Anyway, not really giving it any thought I laid down some fleshy color with a pastel for the area of eyes, nose and mouth and from there just played with layers of colors and eventually outlining the face and a neck. I sit next to a heater because my legs and feet get too cold, so for some reason I got the bright idea just to see what would happen if I took that scrap of waxed paper with the colored face on it and put it in front of the heat for a bit? Well, it melts and blends together FAST! Luckily for me, it also cools very fast. Now it had blended away some color so I went back and added more and being just play I started on her hair adding more and more colors and heating now and then to blend. I got to a place where I decided I was rather surprised and thrilled that I actually had a pretty good face. I wanted to scan it because you always see so many more mistakes and good points, even, by scanning and looking at the picture. I was thinking being on waxed paper I probably needed something behind the face so I reached over to my pile and took out a piece of script background paper and now I'm thinking that if it shows through the wax paper it just might be pretty cool.....maybe. While setting a piece of the torn paper to the side, my hand brushed a pkg. of new clear stamps that had just come! So, yup, decided I'd see what the scroll stamp looked like on the top and bottom and at the last minute also tried the bird stamp. I forgot to say that first, I used gel medium to glue the script to the waxed paper and then went over the top with gloss decoupage medium which politely bubbled and buckled! So I let it dry and then turned it over, pressed it down and smoothed it out. It left flattened wrinkles but it could've been worse!
After all the play and what ifs....here is what I ended up with. I sort of wish now that it was done on a good piece of paper or something. Maybe it can be used on a journal page or collage sometime.....maybe not.
I forgot to say that is was all finger blended and until the end and then I got a pen and did some definition.

Nose job completed

I got the courage last night and this morning to go back and give this newest face a nose job and other facial tweaks. I still have a ways to go but at least this time I can say I like her now. One note, however, there's a speck showing right above her nostril....that's not really there! That's a speck from the scanner because I was bad and didn't check and clean the window before scanning. That will teach me!! I find enough bad spots without creating some that aren't even there!
I did change the hair a bit, added some background back in, added flowers to her hair. The bird, flowers and butterfly are cut from napkins and touched up with paint. I didn't show the sides of the canvas....it's a studio canvas with 1 3/8 inch sides so I did a crackle finish and tried to make it look like weathered wood. But then I got white paint on my fingers and managed to get that spotted on the sides. LOL! It'll do. And so I do think I'll go ahead and dare to gift this one. Hopefully the Fairy girl will be happy with it for real and not just looking at a picture. So here's the final piece after surgery:

We have SUN and BLUE skies today! Actually, the sun made an appearance finally, yesterday around noon ! We're going to have almost a week of warmer temps and pretty days before it goes back to snow, cold and gloom. March and April are always roller coaster rides. Our temps are going to hit 40! I can tell you that when we go into town there will be people in shorts walking around with no jackets! That's a virtual heat wave!!

Another Painted face

I finished a 2nd face painting on a 4 x 4 studio canvas. Well, I shouldn't say finished because she has problems and needs repair.....mostly she's going to have a nose job done and hopefully she won't need a whole face lift/reconstruction when she gets it! I'm going to show her tonight anyway and then when and if she's all fixed, then I can show the difference. In my mind she was going to be a gift but she didn't turn out good enough so some poor birthday fairy is going without a gift. If I can do the nose job right, then maybe it'll be a gift again. LOL!
I have to say that Sharon's (All Norah'S art) class is just wonderful and her instruction videos are clear, easy to follow and fun. Doesn't mean that I follow along and make instant perfect faces as there's a learning curve to learning to paint more free and with a bigger brush and lighter paint. But it's fun and I'm starting to get it. I love being able to see what all the other members are doing. Some of the first time painters are just amazing with their faces! When I thought about that, I actually did better painting way back when I knew nothing at all and simply bought a pattern book, some oil paints and decided to paint! I painted on any wood I could my hands on and I didn't do so bad....even sold a lot! But now, I out-do myself, worry too much, want to be perfect and try too many things all at the same time. I want to go back and just be free to do art again.....good or bad....just art....but still learn to be better at it. I do need to go back to the basics.....the basics I never started with, just jumped in and painted!
So here she is for now. I hope I can fix her and show her again! Click for a bigger view.

Beginnings defined

This is a cherished photo I'm sharing. If I had to go way back and choose a point that defined the fine line of happy and content to the beginnings of depression, anxiety and phobias.....this would be it.

That's me on the right, the oldest of 3 of us there but with 4 more in the future. Yes, the straight blonde hair and red red nose which hasn't changed a darn bit! Hear that song playing right now while you look at this?  "Catch a Falling Star", is one of the songs that my dad would teach us to sing sitting on his lap. There were more songs and advertising lingo's from that era....Sugar in the Morning, the Marlboro commercial ditty, the Hamms Beer commercial song (from the Land of Sky Blue waters....), the Alka Seltzer song! Sitting on his lap and singing, hearing stories and rhymes, being teased; those were such happy times.

On his left side is Shelly, a naturally wavy haired, strawberry blonde that I loved beyond measure. In the center, as a 3 month old new comer was my first brother. I know he doesn't appreciate it but I have no memories of him until he's a bit older. I think maybe it's possible I wasn't too thrilled with him sharing time with my Dad and Mom. Shelly and I were as close as sisters could be and still I feel how much I loved her.

Not long after this photo, within a year's time, Shelly died. I still have vivid memories of that time and a big part of me left along with her. Shelly died from Rhys syndrome; she had a cold/flu whatever and was given aspirin as we all were in those years. We know better now days but it was too late for Shelly. Over 50 years and I still miss her, ache for her and I talk to her. My Dad is gone now, too. A part of him is with Shelly here on earth and I know up in Heaven, he's with Shelly and my Nephews, still telling jokes and singing Catch a Falling Star.

Anyway, I think this was the defining time that made a change in my young life. It took away a piece of my heart, trust & comfort. There were other things going on then, too. Things I don't talk about too much to anyone and things my Mom and Dad didn't know then and don't know now. I also had a  "invisible friend" during this time. I don't know why because Shelly definitely consumed my time and thoughts; I was her protector. We had a large fun extended family; we always had plenty of attention and love.  But still, I had 'Seymour', a tiny man dressed all in green. I'll tell the story of Seymour some other time. I wonder where he was during this picture. LOL!

I think when Shelly was taken away so sudden, with no time for good byes or explanation, part of me just shut down. I became shyer and more held back as years went on, I found it harder and harder to trust, I had no confidence in myself. Being alone with music, playing with dolls, finding special quiet places outside and most of all coloring on paper and in books made me happy and content.

You would think that with the passage of many years I would understand this defining point and "get over it" but it doesn't work that way. Other things through the years add on and add on until you can't go back; you try but really it's just all too much.

Well, anyway.....sometimes you can see where maybe depression and anxiety got it's start, you can see where choices made it even worse....what I can't find is the end of it. I can say that the depression sort of comes and goes but the anxieties and the phobia's, now they're tough to handle. You have days where you push them to the side but they never ever leave you alone. It's a battle and I always win in the end. So I don't know the whys; I know others have been through much much worse but I know this was the beginning.

Still, I love this photo. I was so happy.