Haystack Soothes and Inspires

A weekend in September sparkle, surrounded by beauty and creativity. Push your cares away for the weekend and go back to a time where you could create for hours of intensity only to stop briefly for a delicious meal with colleagues or a walk to the ocean for a breath of pure sea air.

Not much time for sleeping, but when you did it was hunkered way down in the sleeping bag and maybe a hat on your head to keep the chill night air from enveloping you.

So much happened in a short time. Prints were pulled, paintings still freshly applied to canvas, wood carved, glass jewelry fusing in the kiln, wire sculpture and burned hands! I loved walking through the various studios talking to artists and getting ideas from their creations.

I made linoleum prints and fell in love with the process again. It's been many years since I carved into that stuff and it felt good.

Haystack is a retreat for artists and I highly recommend it. It is in Deer Isle, Maine and stunningly beautiful. If you can pull yourself away from the views you might get some art made.

New Work for an October Show "Wrapped in Seaweed" and "Where Do I Go From Here?"

This summer I had big plans of getting a million things accomplished. I know, you do it too. The house would be reorganized, my art studio would be cleaned out and give me lots of new work space, I'd take as much stuff to Goodwill as I could possibly part with, my son and I would do lots of fun activities, I'd plan out lessons for the upcoming school year and of course do a ton of art work and jewelry making. Not to mention spending more time with friends, reading more, back to a better devotional time to learn more about God, cooking less with microwave,visiting family out of state ... what was I thinking?

I did try out some new collage technique I learned from watching youtube artist Gary Reef. I had signed up to enter 3 pieces in the fall art show called 10 x 10 to support Arts are Elementary in the Brunswick schools. The collages are finished and happily hanging on our walls but I wanted to do something different for the show. I found out about zentangles through a web search. They are drawings often created in pen and ink that look like fancy doodling. Very relaxing to do and there aren't any rules. I just completed the second one about half an hour before my deadline to bring them to the drop off location! Deadlines are good, some of us need them.

One is in color and I titled it "Where Do I Go From Here?" The other is a series of nine individual small square drawings attached to a 10 x 10 paper and titled "Wrapped In Seaweed". Years ago I did quite a bit of pen and ink drawing and it was fun to get into it again. If you are in Brunswick on Friday October 9th, 2009 go see the show. I believe there are over 300 artists exhibiting work all in the 10 x 10 format.