Gluing and Pasting Machine

I feel like I've been a gluing and pasting machine the last several weeks in order to satisfy my sudden need to use up my paper scraps- all of them from my own art. So I went on this kick of filling up large pieces of watercolor paper with layers and layers of my paper scraps and then cutting them into post card 4 x 6 size. Here are some from the second batch of cutting and pasting with the finishing touches of my own stamps and pens and markers. I have so many layers of paper on these cards. Paper from the gelli plate sessions, painted wax paper, wax paper or index cards with markings from stamps and or paint and paper from wiping my paint brushes,and torn paper from stuff I made that I didn't really like but didn't want to throw away. I think I've satisfied this need of making mail art for the moment. Thanks for spending a few minutes here with me................................................jo

Round

I made a round post card. Yes. I did say a round postcard- for a swap I'm doing with Karen only I won't show it to you because it hasn't been mailed yet and I want to keep it a secret until the person gets it. I don't know how Karen does this. She's amazing. She hosts so many cool swaps and I've seen some pretty amazing art pass through her site ,including her own. I went there a few moments ago and she has a picture of what 87 green themed mail art post cards look like spread out on her dining room table, before mailing. I am quiet sure I do not have the patience to do all she does to get these swaps going not to mention all the collecting, organizing and mailing it takes. I bet her mailbox is always overflowing. It's very worth your while to check out that site as well as her own I'll show you the front of the round postcard when my for now anonymous partner receives it. I'm going to go doodle on my egg. Thanks for taking a minute with me. Hope you had /have a good day..............................jo

On Sunday

While it was doing this outside I was inside doing this Back in the Fall, I played around with distressing National Geographic pages with Citrasolv. Have you ever done that? I think you can tell the blotchy, bleedy looking strips on this piece are from that process. I love the way they look and actually, I love the orangy citrus smell of Citrasolv. I also use it for what it is intended for- for cleaning. It's one of the most natural cleaning products I've run across. So, my process was to tear strips from old National Geographics I'd subscribed to when the kids were growing up (I'm so glad I saved them.) and then lay them in a disposable, flat aluminum pan, and let them soak in a layer of Citrasolv. I would often leave them soaking for days at a time but I'd turn them over when I got home from work. AS you turn them you can see the ink bleeding and running and you can make marks on the paper with your finger or a paint brush or the end of a paint brush or whatever you can think of. If pieces were laying on top of each other when you peeled them apart before or after they dried, wonderful things would happen in the peeling process. Anyway, I liked the way these papers looked mixed in with the others sewed down on a file folder. While the snow was very pretty I am certainly ready for Spring. Thanks for spending a few moments with me.

New Faces

I have finished this composition notebook which holds my chicken scratch of Morning Pages(julia Cameron) and of course my ongoing pursuit of drawing faces. I am taking a break from all watercolor to pan pastel, which I am really loving, and sometimes I am trying both on the same face. Here are the results of the last few pages of that notebook. I think it's kind of funny how as I was uploading these that I noted how these women have a tendency to lean to one side.(lol) Go figure. I am enjoying playing and trying to find my style. I'm not shooting for great sketches as in Drawing 101, not yet, anyway.(lol) I would like to figure out how to do a mosaic of all the faces I've done, so I can see them all at once. I think I can do that on Flickr but I have to investigate it further.) I think these are not half bad for 5am 7 days a week. Thanks for visiting, and thanks for all your comments. I appreciate hearing from you. Please come again.......................jo

Something New

I found some plain, manila file folders at the dollar store recently, just perfect for art, I think. In my quest for using up lots of paper scraps I thought about collaging on file folders. But wait! I got side tracked again. My old sewing machine that is just a wee bit temperamental has been calling to me. I found some paper scraps, some of my own strips and some from some pretty paper I had begun to collect years ago and tore them in long strips. I sewed them onto the file folder. I even sewed tissue paper. This took a lot of patience for me and my temperamental machine, but I managed to do it without a bunch of expletives. Here is one side of a folder I did. And here are a couple of close ups. I will have to do some more. I think I'll try strips from the gelli plate prints. I'll let you know how these end up. I'm thinking they would make some very cool mail art as well...................... I have spent the morning housecleaning and cooking. The rest of the day is mine for playing before work tomorrow. Hope you're having a relaxing day. Thanks for stopping in..............................................jo

Sticky Fingers and Mail Art

I've been showing you the mail art I've been making as I've been using up the art scraps of my own art. It's taken me most of this week to finally get them done and ready for mailing. I made the mistake of requesting 6 persons in which to send postcards to PostCrossing. I was wanting to get a country I hadn't yet sent anything to so I just kept requesting and at 6 had to stop, not realizing I had just signed up for 6 more. Silly me. So there is now mail art going to Russia, Singapore, Switzerland and Germany. I'm not big on sending ordinary postcards, (especially not from where I now reside) so I send mail art. Won't they be surprised! The response in the past is that they don't quite know what to make of it. And here is another one that hasn't been finished or cut up into mail art yet. The watercolor paper is warped so the pic is not flat. I apologize for the poor picture. Again, this is all scraps of my own art. I am linking this to Amy over in Artsyville who's having a Glue It Tuesday part. This is ironic that I stumbled upon her post this week given all the tearing and pasting I've been doing. I'm glad there are so many others who enjoy sticky fingers as I do. ...................... Thank you for spending a few minutes with me. I am off from work today so I am going to play..................................jo

Becoming Mail Art Cont"d

On the 16th I showed you the way I was using up paper scraps of which 99.9% were all from my own art. It started with this which became this Which when cut up in to 4 x 6's some of which look like this: I am sorry about some of the poor pictures. I madly ran around looking for black cardstock to use to show off the pictures since I couldn't find much free clean space on my work table. I need to press the paper before mailing as it's a bit warped from all the layers of glue, paper and everything else. You get the idea. Good way to use up scraps and make some new art. I managed to get 10 post cards out of two large sheets of watercolor paper and what was left I can use for a couple of artist trading cards and the rest of the scraps get used again for something else and so on and so on...... I like them, some more than others. I think I'll do more. I might try it on file folders next. I noticed a year ago on this date I was working on altering a book and haven't seemed to move past the front cover. Yes, I did make it past the front cover and a couple of inside pages. Gee, I must have gotten sidetracked somehow, somewhere a long the line. I want to go back and work on that. Thanks for stopping by.I hope you are well........................................................................................jo

Becoming Mail Art

I've been using up paper scraps of my art, and there is a lot. It's not that I think I should save every little darn piece.......... Gluing random pieces of paper down is pretty mindless- watching- Netflix- kind- of-stuff. Since my dog Buddy can no longer climb the stairs, given that he is old and very visually impaired, I have been spending my evening art time downstairs on the lounge with a breakfast tray, so I can keep him company. My intention is that this will all become mail art. I started with this. and it has become this. And here's another one. I used scraps of painted on wax paper, markings from trying out my homemade stamps, merchandise labels, pieces of gold doilies from the dollar store,and cut up pieces from my Gelli Plate prints. I want to finish putting the final touches on with markers and pens etc. Here a couple of close ups. I have made copies of much of my art so I can use them again and again. The people know me pretty well at KINKOS. My intent is to have these chopped up into 4x6s today so I can mail them out. I'll show you what they look like at the mailing stage later. Then I need to work on getting my taxes done. Yuck! I hope you have a good day. Thanks for sharing a moment here............................................. jo

Art or Doodling?

Before I started my blog in 2009 I had been doing what I called doodling. I don't know whether it's because I didn't have the nerve to call myself an artist, didn't consider what I was doing as "art" or a bit of both. I didn't have a lot of art supplies and I thought 5 x 7 Moleskine journals were pretty cool. I wasn't even doing art in the car in the mornings at that time. I was playing and playing through a lot of emotional pain at the time. Art was my friend. I needed to keep showing up to meet up with art. Talk about mindless, doodling. But so much fun. I started to buy some gel pens and markers. Then I started to get strange, like "extra galactic," wierd stuff, or so I thought. Then I went back to black and white where you can see my beginnings of trees and buildings start to appear. Sorry one of them is very blurry. In my thinking about this art and doodling, I see that my doodling or what I saw as doodling then, shows up in my art work now. You know how everyone is always saying to keep a sketchbook or journal? This is the place you doodle your thoughts and ideas. I guess these are mine. Recently I purchased Dawn DeVries Sokol's book Art Doodle Love. I must admit I was drawn to the colorful pages with prompts and or suggestions for playing, doodling, and although I've only worked on one of the pages, I've traded in my morning faces for morning doodles this week in the car. The prompt was to fill in the colored areas with a doodle of anything each day for a week. Here's what I have done. I have a feeling I will enjoy playing in and with this book. Thanks for visiting....................................................................................................jo