What did you do this summer?

Great summer fun!

As always, I had a great time teaching in the Newtown Public School’s SMART Program. This summer, I started a new class on Puppet making. We talked about the history of Puppet making and the different types of puppets. Although we didn’t have time to make a marionette we did make paper, stick, glove and sock puppets. It was amazing to see everyone create puppets from the same basic materials and yet come away with their own unique and quirky looking creations! Then the children made up stories and put on plays in a puppet theater I made from a refrigerator box.

Turtles were again very popular in Paper Mache creations, the children also made some great chickens! We also tried a new idea by making a faux stone plaque and creating a faux-cave painting on it. I like showing the children how to make the armature and then watching how each sculpture becomes the artists own interpretation of the subject.

Mosaics is never dull, this year I wanted to give the students a quick easy visual way to create the feeling of a mosaic. So I made sponge stamps and had them create mosaic designs on paper the students had fun and really came away with a good understanding of how to make a mosaic. They had fun exploring some traditional an nontraditional materials to create mosaics like plastic beads and gems, foam squares twine shells pebbles and of course ceramic tiles.

For now; I’m back at my work bench creating some new jewelry. I’m also looking forward to my fall adult continuing education classes, meeting new students teaching them and watching them learn some new skills.

Try something new!

Try a material you haven’t used before or try making something you never thought of making before you may be surprised at what you can do and what you learn in the process.
It’s been a long time since I’ve written anything. In the summer I teach children in an art program and we have a great time exploring Mosaics, Drawing, simulated stained Glass and Celuclay a form of pulped paper for Paper Mache. I’ve been working with Celuclay for three or four years now. I’ll be posting some of my creations on Facebook
The material is very easy to use and quite versatile.

Lately I’ve been exploring how marionettes are made. My husband Steve and I went to see a performance of the Cashore Marionettes called Simple Gifts. What a wonderful and thrilling performance it was! I first saw excerpts of the show on YouTube. I was so inspired I got some books form my local library and made a doll from Celuclay and wood incorporating some of the techniques used to make marionettes. I’m not quite ready to put strings on my new creation. I much prefer to work our some of the design flaws and work toward building the control mechanism for the next one I create.

Artists draw, paint, sculpt and forge their emotions into a visual existence

Poets crate pictures with words they express feelings and emotions through language alone. Artists draw, paint, sculpt and forge their emotions into a visual existence.
But the result is often a byproduct of how we respond to the world around us.
Each time I make a piece of jewelry there are a set of problems I must solve to bring my creation to life. The process is a constant journey for me in that I learn something new from the work each time I execute a design. Failures often teach you more than successes


”Well, I would say the aim of art is a constant, and a continuous job to reveal visually the attitude of our mentality. And the less we disturb the influence of our mentality the more I believe we come close to the truth.”

“The role of art for me is the visualization of attitude, of the human attitude towards life, towards the world. And I think I've said before that there is no difference between science and art when it comes to creativeness, productiveness, to come to conclusions and to formulations. That's the same I think. And scientists can be just as creative as an artist.” Josef Albers Quotes

Creating art is also a process allowing you to improve your skills and techniques

Some artists spend a life time creating art containing the same subject matter.
I believe this to be not perseveration or an obsessive behavior but a valid study of the different approach an artist brings to his or her work.
Unlike the poet who is unwilling, to edit a poem in fear that he or she will bring a different point of view or set of emotions to the work. An artist depends on this difference to grow improving his or her skills and techniques.

Georgia O’Keef said of painting flowers “Nobody sees a flower - really - it is so small it takes time - we haven't time - and to see takes time, like to have a friend takes time”.
” I had to create an equivalent for what I felt about what I was looking at - not copy it”.

Creating Art is a journey into the unknown and unfamiliar

I wander into the unknown so that I may gain an understanding of a material or of a process.

Perhaps I’m seeking an explanation or validation of my reactions to the world around me.

Or perhaps I’m exploring a deepening emotion. What ever the reason it doesn’t really matter.

The journey will find its own beginning and its own ending and what ever I create, will be for me a personal growth experience.

Others will view my work and take a different point of view and have an altogether separate experience because we are after all unique human beings.

I wander into the unknown not because I am brave but because I choose to look at what is possible rather than to dwell on what is or has been.

What use to us are the things we know, if not to challenge us to question these theories and practices? Shouldn’t the things we know push our minds toward a different if not better understanding. How else can we break through the boundaries of science, technology and artistic expression?

Have you thought about the process of creating and how you respond to your materials?

Art is an on going dialogue because the process of creating art is a conversation between the artist and the materials used to create art. This dialogue always, takes the artist one step further in gaining depth and understanding in the work(s) created. Each time we engage in the process of creating art we also learn something about our own response to the world around us. Although the work it self is important, at times the process can become more instrumental to the artist than the completed work(s).

Shapes and the elements used to create a design

Being open to the influences around you means that some times a shape will influence me to create a piece of jewelry. The shape of stone or the shape of a flower petal can become incorporated into the design of a pendant or a pair of earrings.

Pablo Picasso said “The artist is a receptacle for emotions that come from all over the place; from the sky, from the earth, from a scrap of paper, from a passing shape, from a spider’s web”.