pff - a quilt

Thanks to kristen and eva  for hosting

I thought today I'd share something different I'm doing - a quilt on wood.

Have a great day day! 

PFF - SS - Love Commemoration

Radical Love Revolutionizes Everything

Yeah, I don't blog anymore so sad :( I unfortunately am not one of those people who can have many long-term commitments, or, too many things in my mind at once - mind like a sieve no doubt!

However today I want to commemorate love, not only bc it's so close to V Day, but because the 24th is the anniversary of the date that I met my own husband, exactly 9 years ago. So... my love to him always! We both made the above wood. Actual wedding anniversary would be May, but the day we met was special, clearly! We have had many adventures in the short yet long time we've had together, and I only pray we have many more still.

Speaking of love - every couple of months, though I've quite abandoned the enterprise, I have a hankering to go back to the old haunts, and the 3 that I always took to the best were Sunday Sketches, Creative Tuesdays, and Paint Party Fridays. So I went snooping the other day.

So I find out that not only has "Mr Toast" at Creative Tuesdays closed up shop, but he has joined forces with Alexandra from Sunday Sketches!

Wow.. the things you miss when you're away!!

Their lovely union weirdly means a lot to me because, even through the roughly year and 1/2 that I DID commit to participating, I came to know both of them fairly well - just through their work, their art, and their own committment to their blogs. And though I didn't know them in person, and didn't exactly intuit it, somehow mysteriously, after I found out about it, it seemed PERFECT. Both are very dear people, sensitive, creative, hard working and disciplined - you can just tell. And both are very good looking too, so there you go! Luck all the way around. 

I also just really enjoy the whole meta narrative of it - art blogs, blogging co-ops, together in cyberland, together through art, and then in person.....and all the people who knew and followed them without necesarily knowing that THEY knew each other... and am just madly curious - how did it all come about? When did they meet? Had they always lived in Colorado together and one day ran into each other at Starbucks and said "HEY@! I Know you!!!" Or did wily fate make one move across the country to the proximity of the other? Did they meet because of the blogging, or was that just some bizarre accident, and proof of synchronicity? Enquiring minds would like to know ....

So I commemorate their union as well and congratulate them with this image of a recent art piece of ours "radical love revolutionizes everything". More images can be found at our facebook page, and I invite all who care to to stop by and say HI.

-- linking to Paint Party Friday & Sunday Sketches

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PPF and APR - New Wood Art

For today's installment of Paint Party Friday, I will also be connecting to Artists Play Room at 'just add water'. It is also showing some of the artistic/creative work I am undertaking & seeking to market under the banner of "Marshall Arts". This is work I do in collaboration with Jim, my husband - we have lots of fun with it, attend art fairs, etc, and have even sold! What's infinitely blessed and inspiring are both letting natural shapes speak for themselves, as well as collaborating with loved ones. It inspired me to take art to a whole new level, and to make it a sustainable economic activity from which others may benefit.

We have tons of these! He is the Wood Man & the Word Man - for as long as he's lived, practically, he has gathered these precious wood jewels from the surrounding countryside - and  even when we lived in Atlanta we'd come up here to WNC to pick some up - and randomly last year, we began turning them into art.

He began by burning messages into them - the wood speaks to him - and I followed by drawing random illustrations with the wood burning tool. At times these are elaborate illustrations, or at times only curly cues & random things to give the thing structure. He then goes in & paints in the colours - varnishes them at times, etc. Some of them have turned into earrings, pendants, walking sticks... or random wonderful acts of sculpture such as this one which fits into the hand.

The text begins with "The cosmic pipeline always looms a single misstep away... feathering even a modest nest brings plenty... every portal has own mysterious allure" and to me the cosmic egg shape, the mysterious animals, and the warning message bespeaks great wonder - not to mention the amazing shape of the wood. It is so darling! But it has teeth - just like life & death & nature -- "too big a bite augurs indigestion or worse." I have been so excited working on this collaborative art project - it seems a blessing indeed.

I have been busy promoting it - we have been visiting different art vendor events - all which we detail in this blog. Would like to find a way to integrate the Marshall Arts blogging with what I do here on my personal blog, but that's soon coming.

Have also spent time putting up a Marshall Arts facebook page!! Would appreciate any likes, and will return the favour.

This page shows both work I do on my own artistically, as well as the bulk of mine & Jim's collaborations.

I also have decided to migrate from Etsy to Zibbet. For anyone sick of Etsy fees, this is an excellent solution - only minorly less usability with the free version - but the minute I begin selling, I will upgrade. One of the perks of migration is an initial promotion of $5 for 50 excellent business cards from Moo. I am incredibly excited about these cards - double sided, with text, extra heavy 100% recycled paper --- sounds almost too good to be true - we'll see how they turn out when they arrive around the 11th.

There! Sorry about the novel - hope all have a great weekend!!!

PPF - boats, Turner, and Kickstarter Campaign

Am linking this to Paint Party Friday - though it is a piece I finished a while ago, it is one of a series of 90 I intend to create - if I could receive funding.

To say this fundraising process has ruined my life is probably a little extreme, but it has been one of the more unpleasant experiences of my life. I don't think I will ever try this again.

I utterly despise bugging others to notice what I do, let alone ask for funds. The timing was horrific, coming just weeks after Xmas and a lot of people were going through some bad stuff in the process. And there's a lot of back end I just did not do to ensure a success.

But I have gotten other things, such as belonging in a fun online community of artists ('kickstarted' by my desire to draw traffic to the thing, but in essence its own reward), and the chance to produce some video or other. I also had the chance to craft an A - to - Z artists proposal project.

So saying, since I don't particularly have anything much more remunerative going on, I will continue pushing this thing till the bitter end.


http://kck.st/tC9jLX

I only have ten days to fund it. As you can see, it's a marathon painting process. I intend to paint 90 Turner reproductions in 90 days, starting mid February, if I can receive funding.

Some interesting tidbits:

• already have had 2 local media mentions (Madison County, NC)
• have received an interesting friendly email from the Tate Museum, regarding the project
• have a private investor stating his willingness to front $1,000 if I can manage to raise the rest. So, in the end, all I really need is to raise $2,000 to make my dream come true!

So, please, if you thought supporting the arts in this very tangible way - above all the great things you already do - please consider making a small donation to my campaign. Or, if you know any person or institution who might find my project interesting, please send it along to them.

I have also updated the video, since I got feedback that it was waaaaaaay too long. So everybody please go take a look.

Requiem for Troy Anthony Davis

Ah, today's specimen is a good one.

It shows a man alone in the wilderness, singing a song of utmost urgency, a song that's ignored, over and over and over again, until it is absolutely too late.

We all have that man inside of us, of course - the outraged iconoclast, the to-your-own-drummer proponent, the visionary, the crazy man, etc. We all honour and condemn that part of us in equal measure.

Some of us make it something of a life's vocation, to give voice to what must be said, to the best of our integrity and ability. Come what may, whether we are thanked or damned for the effort.

In theory, people are ENCOURAGED to be thus, but the reality ---- Consensus Reality poo-poohs on all true iconoclasts and prophets.

So, why persist?

What motivates this lonely songster continue his lonely song? When so much is frightening and hopeless, what compells one man to stand against Consensus Reality and really state what needs to be stated?

The man who pens the following posts IS the lonely singer.

The song in this particular case, of course, is that of the murder of an innocent man, Troy Anthony Davis, murdered for the dubious crime of being black in Savannah. Black, and unlucky.

More on the story here: Accessories, Before, During, and After the Fact
When the State Murders the Innocent, When Will We Really Stand Up?

Not just Treesus Jimbo has talked about this, however. Many hundreds and thousands, even, have, at some point or another, voiced loud objection to Troy Davis' death.

It really has not done any good, has it?

But you know, I was also thinking about a conversation I had with my mother last night and how she always said "I never give up, never give up - if there's something I want done, I persist till the very end. You should be more like that - do the same..."

And this morning we get the email, "Troy Davis Clemency Appeal DENIED"

and I write her

"never give up? They're gona kill this poor bastard in spite of what 100,000 of people desired, wanted, worked for - just saying, is all"

and she writes back

"It's not over until the Fat Lady sings."

And I think, 'that's interesting' - if I were someone who didn't give up, who had HOPE that her actions affected the outside world, I might pick up the phone and call a few people, the way one site recommends.

I actually took it a step farther and found a list of random Capitol/GA government employees to heckle. Why not, right? If I'm on payroll to a murdering mafia organization, I deserve to catch a little flak. Just saying. In any event, it was mainly an experiment.

The script was very much the same: "I'd like to complain about the murderous, corrupt, racist organization which is the State of Georgia. You work for the State of Georgia... are you aware that your employer is a corrupt, racist organization? How does that make you feel?"

The answers were telling and varied. The experience in itself was also informative:

1) it's damned difficult to stand for something in any way, even in the most tangential, haphazard, cowardly and uncommitted way (no wonder nobody does anything to REALLY improve this shite world we live in) - damned difficult because it is damned terrifying

2) it feels GOOD to voice something you would otherwise censure. It makes your heart beat in a different, stronger way.

3) you really can't do shit about much of anything, it's true - but sometimes it's just good enough to ruin someone's day

Mountainousness

Glorious gorgeous natural scapes do invite one to let one's hair down. At least that's what I've found to be true in the mountainous climes of Transylvannia County, NC.

There's a moment of being before nature, especially upon hearing the roaring cascading swirls of water, where the rest of the world just falls away, and an attentive person will find herself blending with the landscape. After a while you cease being a person with that constant barrage and baggage of noise - you just be.

This particular swirly wood lent itself to that theme