It's a Wrap

For reasons that are not important I'm not the biggest fan of magnolia trees.  But I'll have to admit I was quite smitten with the whimsy of these big floppy blooms that were just starting to go by.  The swoops, curls and shades of pink were just a delight.....they looked like they were dancing.

  And I do like the concept of small thumbnails.......and if I could pull it off I would sketch or paint close ups of these curvy blooms.  But I'm better at photo grids....so here are the thumbnails that were in my head as I stood there taking photos....while Paul patiently walked in circles.

The Mixed Media Thumbnail Sketching lessons wrapped up on Friday....but like most classes the real fun with a viewfinder is just beginning.  Tansy has given us a challenge project that she would like us to do....but I'm going to mull it over for a bit before I tackle it. In the meantime I'm sure I'll play around with a few other thumbnail type things.

I came away with lots of information and insights.  Tansy has a unique way of teaching and uses unusual exercises to make her points....and the last two were unexpected.  The first one was on abstraction. The initial round sketches were made while watching something moving like a babbling brook. I actually had a video that I took while I went through a car wash that I used.....yes....you heard that right....and it worked well for the exercise. 

While watching the video I used a round viewfinder to try and capture the lines and movement.  Then I used a smaller viewfinder on the first sketch to abstract out another part...then repeated that a couple times. My end product is a little iffy....but the point was received and I appreciated the exercise. 

Here's a still photo from the video....that's the best I can do. 

The final exercise was quite fascinating....and I want to repeat it when I have more time.  We were to walk a block we've never walked before looking for and doing quick sketches of shapes we decided on ahead of time.  I walked around a commercial block with lots of office buildings looking for window and door shapes...and round things.  I ended up looking at all the lines and grids on the faces of the buildings.....and round things led me to hubcaps. The next step was to take pieces and parts from those sketches and make little color swatches inspired by the shapes.  I hope to make more of just the different hubcap designs....there were so many interesting ones.

Lines, dots, and color...inspired by an office building....who would have thought!   Mixed Media Thumbnail Sketching...it's a wrap. Thanks Tansy!

"Soft Fascination"

I was in town for a bit today and wandered through Deering Oaks Park....a beautiful sanctuary in the city.

I learned about "soft fascination" today....when your attention is focused on things that are effortless and not overly stimulating often allowing you to reflect and ponder.  Soft fascination is most often associated with enjoying nature....and Paul and I do this all the time on the back patio.  

Just recently we have been watching 4 or 5 baby squirrels forge out of a few holes in a hollow tree. They dart in and out...chase each other up and down the tree then scurry back in to safety. We can sit there for a long time....just watching.

So you won't be surprised that the title of today's class assignment was "soft fascination" and we focused on trees. We worked in just black and white on brown paper taking all the pressure away about which colors to use.....it was just about the trees.

We were to find a good view of the trees and Tansy suggested an upstairs window.  But I didn't have to go farther than my backyard....I have a lovely view of trees right from the living room. 

I made a one inch grid on viewfinder using washi tape on a piece of plexiglass and taped it to my sliding glass door. I placed it at just the right height to see through it while sitting on a stool so I could complete the assignment. Our goal was to focus on the spaces between the branches and notice the layers of our view. 

In each vertical row of my grid I tried to focus on a different layer....the strong larger trunks, the skinny smaller trees and branches, the distant scruff and the pine branches that cut across horizontally. The translation from what I see to what I draw is generally a bit lacking....but I really enjoyed this "soft fascination" activity.

A Cookie

Do you know the children's story If You Give A Mouse A Cookie by Laura Numeroff?  

If you don't....you can listen to it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCDPkGjMBro

This is my version:  If you Give MaryAnn A Clean-Up Project.....a story about one thing leading to another.

I desperately needed to clean up my work table...there were tools and paints and tiny snippets of color swatches everywhere. One might think that I could just swish it all in the trash and be done with it....but if you know me you know I can't part with precious little scraps. 

So I put down a long piece of double sided tape on a long skinny scrap and started assembling a little swatch lineup.  

Then I wondered how it would look sewn. (The "and now" on the paper is at the bottom of one of my sister's writing pages....and it's serendipitous that I chose it for the background of the photo....."and now" seems pretty appropriate.")

That was pretty cool....lots of uses for that....so I thought I would make another.

Of course then I started playing around with bigger pieces of paper laying there on the table and this swirl I made a few days ago. I'm thinking little landscape....or city skyline? Hmmmmmm.  

There were still more little salvageable strips but I really needed to get my table cleaned up so I sorted the good ones out and put them in a little box.  

But I was intrigued with the little chunky scraps....so what do you do with those?  You cut out little round shapes....because you never know when you need a little round shape.

Finally I was able to swoosh the teeny tiny slivers of scraps that were left into the trash. 

Our goal for class today was to add color and turn our sketches into a cohesive series responding to the "character" of the place we sketched.  I had some trouble....this doesn't come easy....but I mostly completed the task.  I'm not quite ready to show the whole thing straight on....the angle is more forgiving....and I don't like the top row.  I mostly used pen and watercolor pencils and a few markers....and some gray text to collage the gazebo parts.  

But you know what my favorite part of my series is....this little pile of rocks. Do you remember what I said? You never know when you're going to need a little round shape." 

If you give MaryAnn a cleaning project....magic can happen.

Time for a cookie.  😉

Tiny is Good

I told Paul I was quite pleased with the size of our most recently found objects. It's going to be hard to stop this habit of picking up things we find on our walks....so tiny is good.  And just in case you were wondering I do know I don't have to save everything....and I do edit some things out.  

I did notice that the most newest items match the rescued garage hosta....that continues to green up up nicely, by the way.

Paul's neon shirt matches too...and another round yellow object on this morning's walk.

And for the sake of the new readers.....here is some of my collection.

https://joyfulputtering.blogspot.com/2020/11/abundance.html

Someone new has stumbled onto the blog and has asked about the class I'm taking. I don't know her name....but I'm so glad she's interested.  So here's the scoop in case anyone else missed my intro.

The class is called "Mixed Media Thumbnail Sketching"  by Tansy Hargan....known as palimpsestparade on Instagram.  Tansy is a landscape architect turned artist from the UK. Tansy is helping us use all our senses to get connected to a space....then...using a viewfinder we are isolating areas are looking for lines and shapes for our thumbnail sketches.  We are using all kinds of media and mark making tools....I didn't buy a thing for the course.

The class goes for 2 weeks with a new video lesson posted every morning.  We can work at our own pace and the lessons will be available until the end of September. The wonder of the internet allows us all to take classes from artists all over the world.....reminding me how connected we all really are. 

https://tansyhargan.com/mixed-media-thumbnail-sketching/

https://www.instagram.com/palimpsestparade/

Today I took my sketchbook and viewfinders I made from some old postcards and sat at our gazebo on the pond in our neighborhood.  I'm not really very good at this....but it was a delightful experience. Tomorrow we are going to add color...so I'll share more at that point.

Two other readers reached out earlier this month...Marilyn and "Goldencomet".....thank you to the two of you too!  I so love hearing from people. Collecting, creating, and connecting....that's what this is all about!

Theme

What a fabulously beautiful Mother's Day it was today!  I did a little gardening, a little puzzling, and a little puttering.  It was a very good day.

These are blooms from  Sandy's fuchsia plant across the street. It's hard to believe that all that splashy color comes out of those red round buds. 

To be honest....I thought almost the same thing when my two sons came out of my round belly. They're kind of splashy in their own unique ways and I'm proud to be their mom.

The weekend project for the Thumbnail Sketching class was to choose a theme for some mini collages based on sketches we made using our homemade viewfinders.  I chose the theme of "foreground and background"  and focused on the simple shapes of the rocks along the top of my fence.  I love the rocks themselves....but sometimes it's what's behind that is the star of the show....the beautiful sky with the fluffy clouds and spectacular sunsets.

On the left half the page I focused on the foreground...and the right half I focused on the background. 

Here I used color in the foreground....and neutrals in the background....which, by the way, included some of Angie's handwriting.  And....I turned a few of the thumbnails collages on their side just for interest.

And the reverse for the others....the color was in the background and the neutrals were in front. It was a very interesting and enjoyable theme exercise.

Phew!

Sunlight and water.....the magic ingredients for photosynthesis.

I'm quite relieved to see hints of green appearing on my neglected hosta.  I think it's going go be OK....so I've gone from oops....to phew!

It already looks so much better than the pasty yellow it was when I rescued it from the garage.

I'm becoming familiar with my homemade viewfinder sketchbook....I'm going to be looking at the world one square inch at a time for a little while. I have several small lessons that will lead into a weekend project....and as my practice I'm going to focus on the rocks along my fence.  You gotta start somewhere.  

I've taken dozens of photos of these rocks...and the sky, clouds, and sunsets behind them and all of that history will feed into the project.

I have five at one end and three at the other.....and I love their silhouette.  

Tiny Landscapes

I had an enjoyable few hours this morning making tiny little landscape collages from my painted paper swatches for the "Mixed Media Thumbnail Sketching" course.  My goal was to connect the marks I made in my swatches to lines and shapes I found in reference images. Although I needed more variety in the light to dark values of my papers....it was a very interesting exercise. I think there is more swatch making in my future! 

Swatches

I've started another 2 week class with Tansy Hargan....this time it's Mixed Media Thumbnail Sketching.  I wished I would have taken this class before I took her textile class....but I know I'll revisit that again in due time. Yesterday we got familiar with our tools.....and I'm only using things I already have....pens, pencils, and various paints and other art media.  

Today our assignment was to paint 30 tiny little swatches using layers of color and mark making....and we'll use these in the next lessons. I started with scraps of book pages, Angie's writing, maps, and other recycled papers.

I have given up trying to predict what Tansy has in store for the next lesson....but I'll see tomorrow.  Today it was playing with bright happy colors.....what's not to love about that. You can watch a little time lapse video of all my swatches here on my Instagram page: https://www.instagram.com/p/COd7QSQnc10/

And...what's not to love about a wabi-sabi tulip....it kind of looks like my swatches.