Oct 19th

As usual the season of deadlines never stops. I just finished up and delivered the final edition of 50 CSA prints to the lexington art league. (Image seen below) And now I have the rest of my October deadlines creeping up. I have a some commissioned woodworking gigs to start, some in louisville and one for an old student, I have to finish making and packaging items for a Craft Fair on Oct 19th in Louisville (Darrell beat me to the punch in his last post) I will be making prints and some small woodworking things like the tops (seen below in progress), train whistles, and cutting boards. I also have Nov deadlines to already start thinking about...goodness. We will see how it goes. Anyhow I laugh heartily thinking back to when I was in Grad School and I made the mistake of telling my major professor that I was "So busy". He just laughed and said "It never gets any slower than now". I did and did not believe him. Now... I don't see how I could have doubted his words. I like to think some people have it all figured out. I look at people like Stefan Sagmeister (talk below) who work with time rather than against it.

Time moves so fast and there is so much that we feel "has" to get done. Somethings do have to get done but so much of what we do is choice even when we don't feel like it. Make sure to take the time to choose how you spend your time.

"I once was over the water, now I lay my brother down" 

Tops roughed out

7 of the final tops

Field Trip: Aegean Echoes

Detail of work by Helene Steene

Orientation to the show

Students in art history survey this semester visited the Headley-Whitney Museum in Lexington today to take in "Aegean Echoes." The purpose of our visit was to connect our studies of the ancient Aegean art with contemporary works by Helene Steene (whose work is also on view in our campus' Jacobs Gallery) and Ray Papka.

Homecoming Show—almost there!

Our beloved bench! Thanks to our friends who made it possible *>) 

We did it (sort of!). A good portion of the Homecoming exhibit is now installed. Yet, several finishing touches, including vinyl and photos need to be completed. Stop by the Cochenour Gallery in the LRC to see the exhibit and please join us for the official reception for our exhibition, "90 Years and Counting: Homecoming Through the Ages." That event will be held on Homecoming Friday, October 10 from 2:15-3:15.

On Monday, the Curatorial Studies class moves on to Project #2—the extended captions for the GC Historical Markers. More info to come!

Find humor in what you do.

As artists, historians, teachers, and students we need to view the world around us as what it is. Don't get frustrated with what you can't change. Turn a challenge into a masterpiece, find value in the roadblock, and always remember to laugh.

Peace,
Jeanette

Back to the Darkroom

New prints hanging to dry in the darkroom.

In the middle of October I will be participating in my first art fair of sorts. It will be in Louisville at Sojourn Community Church as part of their Affordable Art Show. Daniel Graham and I will be sharing a booth. With this deadline in mind I'm producing more new work along the lines of what I did for the Lexington Art League CSA project.

A wet print in which the veils were not popped. Too bad it didn't look this interesting once it dried.

I have been back in the darkroom experimenting with more botanical mordançage prints. I've learned a number of things since I made the Silver Dollars print. For starters, my enlarger was totally set up wrong, from the condenser lenses to the lamp height. It's a wonder the print even worked. After some quick adjustments and tests, those issues were worked out.

Some very unusual results in the background, although I'm not too crazy abut the final image.

The other part of the workflow that I've been able to explore more is the mordançage process itself. After making so many prints in a row (and now experimenting with a whole new batch of photograms) I've been able to find ways of controlling the tones and finished image. That said, there are still many results that seem unexplainable and random. But sometimes that bit of surprise is a boost that encourages me to keep exploring and finding something new.

This one turned out a little more predictable/traditional.

For the Affordable Art Show I am planning again to finish my prints with 11"x14" mat boards. In addition I'll be making digital reproductions, probably 5"x7" and/or 8"x10" prints on watercolor paper, to sell at a much lower price.

So far so good. Next thing on my list is to find a 10'x10' white tent.

Senior Thesis: A Weekly Update

And now an update on my fellow art/education major, Shelby Eden!

Shelby has been making tremendous headway with her students inside the classroom. This weekend one of her art students happened to appear at her tennis tournament and asked one of her coaches, “Is Miss Eden here today?” No doubt Shelby is already making an impact on these kids’ lives!

To recap of last week, her students learned about color theory, how to mix colors and create tints and shades, and learning the relationships between primary, secondary, and tertiary colors. She also showed in class examples of well-known artists such as Wassily Kandinsky, Matisse, and Frank Stella.

This week, Shelby taught lessons to her art class on two types of printmaking-the basics of etchings and found object prints. She let them bring in their own objects and coat them in paint and press them on sheets of paper. They also did a sort of print exchange by passing around their papers and making their prints on every student’s paper so that they can all have a print made by each other.

Found Object Print

When art is used to explain history it creates a powerful message

International Day of Peace was this past Saturday. Since then the image below has been circulating the internet.

Two British artist, Jamie Wardley, 33, and Andy Moss, 50, conceived the idea to give visual representation to the lives lost on D-Day on the beach at Normandy, France.  9,000 shadows were drawn in the sand by over 500 volunteers.

Onlookers watched as the 'bodies' were taken to the sea as the tide washed in through the course of the day.

It is one thing to learn about D-Day in your social studies classes and talk about the thousands of soliders's deaths.  It is quite another to see it.

What a powerful experience it must have been to be a volunteer as well as watch the sunset that day.

Peace,
Jeanette

Read more here.

Senior Thesis: A Weekly Update

Hello all! This week for my weekly update I will be sharing some details of what Maddy has been working on over the past week! At this point Maddy and I are working hard to get a good idea of what components are going to be a part of our final show in October and how we want our work to be displayed.  Here is a sneak peek of what Maddy has been up to so far and what she is in the process of creating:

Some sketches to be incorporated in product packaging!

Plaster Experimentation

As the semester has progressed, so has my thought process with my work for my independent painting study. I spent a lot of time with my nose in a book-in particular Aesop's Fables. I stumbled across this book in the basement of my grandmother's house this past summer. There, I felt nostalgic as I flipped through the pages of old children's books that recharged memories. I never realized the deeper meaning or moral in the fables.
One story that really stuck with me was the story of "The Hart & the Vine".

"A Hart, who was being pursued by hunters, hid himself under the broad leaves of a shady, spreading Vine. When the hunters had gone by, he thought himself quite safe and began to eat the leaves of the Vine. The rustling of the branches drew the attention of the hunters, and they shot their arrows toward the sound and killed the Hart. As he lay dying, he admitted that he deserved his fate for ungratefully destroying the friend who had kindly sheltered him in time of danger."

MORAL: Ingratitude often leads to ruin.

I immediately started to sketch and began the process of abstract representation of the fable. The moral of the story really spoke to me.

Here are some process pictures....

1. Foam board cut out of antler- positive and negative