How should I dress?

I had salvaged a collection of encyclopedias from large pick-up a year ago hoping to use them for altered books in my classroom. After making an altered book myself, an encyclopedia is too big and overwhelming. They have been sitting in our office ever since.

Temp started going thru them picking out rad images. That idea was genius, cause now I am thinking of making a library of images for my students to reference for their art. The kids are so dependent on google images, this will be more efficient and the images are dependable. Thru my search, I found this randomly awesome page on "dress".

love at valet

i valet'd my car. when he returned it to me, this heart was drawn in dust for me

New Adventures

So things have gotten a little exciting in the past couple of days. I started school (teacher meetings this week, kids next). I am teaching photography and trying to get that all worked out. It's so crazy how you need to be an expert when you teach. The thought of teaching photography is so exciting, I find it to be the medium I am most passionate about in the visual arts. But when it comes to teaching, especially at the introductory level, my responsibility is to teach them the technical aspects of the camera, picture taking, darkroom etc. It's a lot easier to have advanced levels where they are self-managed. But the cool thing is, the art form I am most passionate about, I get to explore, learn, and master! It's empowering.

Then last night, but formally today, I was asked to be the faculty advisor for our student government. People may think I am crazy, but I am really passionate about school pride. Anyone that has ever gone to school with me knows I was President of the Art League, Editor of school newspapers, athletic associations, heritage clubs, key clubs, shag club (yes, shag club), soccer, track, basketball, band, jazz band. I was THAT kid. I loved going to school-college and middle and high schools because I was involved. Anyone I know that didn't enjoy school was not involved. So I want to encourage the students of my school to be involved and hopefully it will make going to school an awesome experience for them.

Obviously these are new stresses in my life, but they are good ones.
Life is good.

Funny Family Guy Moment

Bocce fun-Virginia Beach

Rachel, Rob, Tom, Drew and Templeton
Go Templeton Go!
Fun angle
Want some watermelon? Thanks Sarah for a fun afternoon!

close one

on st. paul's blvd. when u actually get close-only the front grill of the truck hit the car. crazy huh?
-mo-blog

Found Art

So today I purged...my artwork. I have saved portfolioS worth of artwork that really means nothing to me. I am really embarrassed of a lot of it. I saved a couple of items to serve as inspiration for lessons in my classes, but basically it was garbage. It turns out I learned more in my training in California for my art studio in 6 weeks than I even came close to learning in college. College was about creating and I really didn't learn much of anything.
Anyway, this self-portrait I found made me laugh because of my "over-itness" of not learning that I literally stuck my tongue out and stared in a mirror for hours to create this piece. It's now in the garbage can. Cattina, were you in this class? I am pretty sure Leslie was.
For those of you that didn't know me, I have naturally curly hair and straighten it now, so that's why it may look more NOT like me than really. It's still pretty bad though! I loved me some turtlenecks then though!

Office/Art Studio Changes

Temp and I painted, added new furniture and got rid of the plastic drawers and random wood bookshelves. (All being used for other purposes). We spent time building the IKEA shelves and individual drawers and cabinet doors. It was a lot of work!

We also go this flat drawer unit for my artwork, but turns out we used most of the drawers for other forms of storage. I need to get more organizational things. More building.

Our next search is a cool chair and ottoman for under our window so we can relax! Here is what Temp wants:
I think it could be cool, the average price for a Barcelona chair is about $6000, we are looking for a knock-off....they are very comfortable.

****Addition: The wall above Templeton is a shelving unit full of Happy Meal Toys over 20 years in the making. I even have some that my grandfather collected pre-20 years. I don't eat Fast Food anymore so I don't accumulate new ones, but also happy to accept donations!

Art Nouveau

So in Richmond this weekend, we went to a used book store and I found this great print book. (Beth, it made me think of you!!) Anyway, here are some of my favorite prints from the book that I scanned. I am brainstorming on how to make some art nouveau stuff myself...I am thinking art nouveau meets photoshop, any suggestions?
I am kind of inspired by the printmaking and thinking this kind of imagery would work well in a woodcut print. I am going to patiently wait until I get to school to use the tools there, but I may start carving beforehand.

Steamrolling Art

I discovered this new site called Make Magazine.
It's all about being creative with technology. I have an affinity towards printmaking, and I thought this was super cool. They are making prints with an actual steamroller. It makes me want to make a print with my car tires or something! Below is what a final print looks like. You can also see the steamrolling process by clicking here

Congratulations Dave and Kristin!

The boys, Templeton, Brendan and Daniel pre-wedding.

The girls, Rachel, Kellie, Amy, Carm and Allie

Dad walking Kristin down the aisle

A beautiful ceremony

The first married kissCake

Surprised?

Andrew and Rachel....good times!

The luckiest girl in the world

No Art Day 17: Blah

So art month got to a point where it was stressing me too much. I liked creating the art, but dedicating that time was tough. I am the type of person that likes to take it easy in the evening (after working with kids), and I felt like 2 hours a night was too much of my down time taken away. I tried working for shorter periods, but it was impossible.
SOOO, no more art each day. I will continue to make art, and in the next couple of weeks I need to study up on darkroom photography since I will be teaching it this year. Templeton and I will be making pinhole cameras, so that should be fun. Just a lot of school stuff is creeping on me and I am feeling a bit overwhelmed.
Back to regular blogging in the meantime.
Sorry to disappoint.

Art Day 16: Thiebaud

Wayne Thiebaud is another favorite of mine. I am going to paint acrylic paint tubes in oil paint. I haven't used oil paint in awhile so this should be fun. He's all about texture, repeated objects, and color. This one may take some time. Here is the drawing and some of Thiebaud's work:

Art Day 15: Finished Grumpy Gorilla

Blogger was not letting me upload pictures tonite, so I had to use photobucket. Anyway, this is the final product. I am pleased with it. Hello to any NPS employees looking at my page! Off to new things tomorrow...

Art Day 14: Mean Gorilla, or Lonely Gorilla

So I have been working on this today for about 2.5 hours...I am still going to do the shadows and gradients, but Templeton suggested I break today and work on it tomorrow!
I like the way he's turning out so far, and it's kind of a funny story as well.

Art Day 13: Grumpy Gorilla

Here is the first stage of Grumpy Gorilla. Obviously it's a rough sketch, I will clean it up tomorrow, add color, and venture for background. I have a busy day, so limited on amount of work to do.

Art Day 12: Another raccoon

Ok, so I think I like raccoons! After an an exhausting day of work, hanging out with friends, I still had to do art night. I am pretty stoked on this guy. Computer generated...never played with shadowing on cartoons before, so it was an adventure and I am stoked!