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Wednesday, February 24, 2010

A little art in my life

Way back before the world of pharmacy sucked me in, I was a fine arts major. That's right, prim and proper ol' me wore head scarves and grew bean sprouts in my room and said things during critique like, "I can really feel the emotion in your lines".
I do still love art but you know, it's hard to make time for art when you're working full time and going to school full time. Thank goodness those school days are over and I've had more time to whip up some art projects!
One recent project was a pair of botanical prints for my sister in law. I didn't take any pictures of the finished pieces, but here's one of me working on the night jasmine print.

I have sketched the blossoms, but hadn't painted them yet. The other print was of English lavender.
I'm slowly working on a "swamp" theme for the dining room, and I started with these easy pelican drawings. I use watercolor pencils but I don't add the water: watercolor pencils have a softer line than graphite but are easier to control compared to pastels. I'm planning a long alligator watercolor for our dining room mantel...if I ever get around to it.

Don't you like the effect the Christmas lights have on the artwork? We have lights along our chair rails.

Sometimes I use acrylics, although they bore me. Here's the pear detail from a still life in my kitchen. I can't show you the whole picture because I hate the frame. I need to replace it.

This weekend I made a sculpture for our bedroom that I am OBSESSED with. I admit I copied this one. There is an absurdly talented artist in our area named Steve Martin and I first saw these zany wire sculptures in his gallery. I loved that the wire looks like a 2-D pen doodle but the bends of the wire make it 3-D. I made one of my own and hung it over our dressers and I think I'm in love with the shadow-play it creates on the wall.

For perspective, here's a zoomed out view so you can see it over our dressers.

I have so much leftover wire that I'm thinking about a doing a mermaid next - wouldn't the hair and tail be so fun?!

3 comments:

  1. In the apartment I lived in before the one I live in now, there was a giant topless mermaid painted on my bathroom wall. I named her Lorelei. :)

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  2. What a great artist you are!!! Love the sketches and the wire art, so fun!!!

    I wish I was artistic..... but I'm not.

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  3. Shelly: Maybe I'll name my mermaid, too. Can I steal Lorelei?
    Britt: Thanks :) It keeps me sane!

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