Another Way to Display

Photo by Jaime Davis

I was searching for a better way to display my artwork in an easy portable way when painter Lilian Burwell suggested I display them in an accordion book. What a great solution it was!

Have Art Will Travel...

I did a series of thirteen small collages for the 12th International Art Exchange and Exhibition this past Spring organized by artists in New Zealand. I've just learned that the collection will be housed at the Tsanko Lavrenov National School of Fine Arts in Plovdiv, Bulgaria and will be exhibited in the Trakart Gallery in Plovdiv. I'm thrilled.

District Identites

I submitted nine mixed media collages to the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities Art Bank call for entries. Art work chosen will become a part of DC's growing art collection and hang in federal buildings throughout the city. Several of my works focused on children at play.

Children At Play In Progress

Working hard to finish collages for DC Commission on Arts and Humanities Art Bank deadline. I started a new mixed media collage series called Children At Play depicting children's play life jumping rope, playing in water etc.

BADC In The House

I went to a Black Artist of D.C. (BADC) meeting at Howard University. Several artists brought art to be critiqued including painter and collage artist Jamea Richmond-Edwards. BADC is a very dynamic and vibrant group that consist of  artists working in a diverse range of media including painting, printaking, textiles and sculpure.

Electric Laser Cutter

D.C. artist Gomillion brought a laser cutter machine to my studio and demonstrated how it can be used to cut precisely through multiple sheets of paper with a very light touch. It really saves your hands, he said, epecially when you have a lot to cut. I was excited to experiment with it cutting on a paste paper sheet I painted and layering it on top of another. You can make some really dimensional work fairly easily.

Spillage

I don't know about you, but I like the way the ink spills over the edge when the paper is run through the press. Now I'm thinking, "how can I use this to make something exciting in collage".

The Look and Feel of Ink

Loving the smell of the printmaking studio.

I had to adjust the pressure on the press to avoid the pigment spilling out past the edges, though I kinda liked the effect. My printmaking professor at Howard would not have been pleased.

The prints I made yesterday were a good start for me. Can't wait to get back to my home studio and start collaging on top of these monoprints.

Off To a Good Start

What a great day it was.. my first working day in the printmaking studio this summer. I decided to create some monoprints using plexiglas and Akua inks. I wanted to experiment with different textured effects using brushes and both black and color pigment. I worked with a watercolor Akua ink at first.

A Spot of Own's Own

I'm taking a printmaking studio class at a local college this summer, where I now have access everyday to 4 presses. I can't wait to get to work. Litho, etching, monoprinting, oh my!

Her Black Self

 

I finished up two collages for the "At Her Age" juried show at A.I.R. Gallery in New York. The show explores womens concept of body image at different stages in life. My work incorporates text, paste paper. wire and vellum. Some research shows that Black women and Asian women have a more positive body image than Caucasian women who are more bound to societies rigid and often unattainable standards of beauty that are predominantly European.

Explorations in Collage

 

I continued working in the studio today exploring cut out shapes to use in the artwork for the A.I.R. show. I like how cut out shapes create both positive and negative spaces. The shadows play over the surface creating another dimension.

Paper Clips, Washers and Memories

 

Experimenting with collage. Love the square format after creating those 13 collages for the New Zealand Exchange. Way back in November I did a large collaborative work at a school in Rockville, MD and wanted to use paperclips and washers to assemble the hundreds of 4" x 4" protraits that the children made of their grandparents. The teachers were skepticalabout the weight of it, so we mounted them in a more traditional way. Ever since then I've wanted to create some assmblages using paper clips, washers and other small tools. It reminds me of my father and how he had all these tools in his basement workshop mounted neatly on a huge peg board behind his work tables.

Paint Explorations

 

Loving that thick acrylic paint and having the time to explore in the studio. I'm warming up by painting with acrylic and paste and drawing into the background textures with oil pastels on 7" x 7" squares.

San e psa

What is happening. Things are happening (San e psa) was the title of an exhibit at Pulcri Studios in The Hague featuring Kurt Nahar and Marcel Pinas (both from Suriname) and Patricia Kearsenhout (The Netherlands). The title was conceived by Nahar and referred to his idea that youth in both Suriname and in the Netherlands know little or nothing about critical historical and political events in Suriname and in particular events of the eighties. Nahar and Pina's controversial art installations arouse interest and beg an explanation. Kearsenhout's art incorporates text as the basis for her work and were equally engaging. The exhibit ran from March 13, to April 4, 2010. Luckily I had a chance to meet both Nahar and Pinas while in the Netherlands and talk and share our work.

Rinaldo Klas exhibit in The Hague

I met several artists from Suriname while visiting The Netherlands in late March including painter, Rinaldo Klas who had work exhibiting in The Hague.

On To France

Just heard today that one of my collages that I submitted to the 12th International Collage Exhibition/Exchange in New Zealand, will be going to ArtColle, the museum of collage in France. It used to be situated in Sergines, but now is housed in a stunning building, a 17th Century chapel in Brittany.

At Her Age at A.I.R Gallery

I'm working on some new collages for the "At Her Age" exhibition on Women, Sex and Age curated by Martha Wilson, artist and founder of Franklin Furnace. The exhibit is part of an exhibition series called Currents. “At Her Age” will examine how women at any period in their life, old or young, view their changing bodies.

A.I.R. Gallery, in Brooklyn NY, was founded in 1972 as the first artist-run, not-for-profit gallery for women artists in the United States. 

Art Arrived

I just got word that my 13 collages arrived in New Zealand as part of the 12th International Collage Exhibition and Exchange.  

Countdown to the Netherlands

Only a few days remain before my trip to Holland this coming week. I'm very excited about meeting other artists and writers. I was invited to present a workshop to kids at the Boekids International Children's Literature Festival at the Haag. I finished packing yesterday. I'll be taking many of my illustrated books and fine art images.

New Zealand Exchange

 

In my push to go global in 2010, I submitted thirteen 8" x 8" collages for an international exchange of art from artists around the world to New Zealand. I rushed to the post office to meet the March 20 deadline. I printed out the pigment prints on my Epson printer on bright white watercolor paper and then cut and paste geometric images I painted and collaged other images on top.

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Paper Trail

 

I uncovered some papers I painted at Pyramid Atlantic Art Center in my studio today. I was a resident artist there for 5 months last Spring where I experimented with digital and traditional printmaking processes. These paintings on paper were created using acrylic pigment and paste. After painting, I worked over the surface with different tools with teeth to create line work and texture. Afterwards I screened on top of the surface with white pigment. The words I silkscreened were from a blues tune I wrote. as part of my series I created called ByeKu which explored the concept of loss and abandonment in relationships.  I'll be created new mixed media works on paper from these painted and silkscreened papers this winter.

Going Global in 2010

Although I live in the US, my art has been influenced by my travels abroad. I've studied with artists in several countries in Africa, including a painter and textile artist in Ghana, a preeminent printmaker in Nigeria, a solar engraver in Sudan and have presented my art in the Caribbean. I recognize the universal power of art to connect and bridge cultures and communities by highlighting our shared humanity. Our stories and art paint our hopes and add color and shape to our dreams, which can manifest healing and life transformation. I'm excited about taking my art to the Netherlands this spring, collaborating with other artists and making art that touching lives around the world.

It's a Circus Out There

We've gotten so much snow here on the east coast this winter - which turns out to be a good thing. It has kept me indoors in my studio. Working on a Circus series of monoprints and mixed media that explores women's lives and how we must juggle so much (children, partners, work, art etc.) to stay afloat.

Get Busy

Sat down over the weekend and mapped out plans and goals for 2010. Definitely want to go for more art residencies and shows, especially those in New York and other countries. I started working tonite on two of the 13 collages I need for this New Zealand art exchange and exhibit due in March. I'm jazzed!

Under Concrete

In the studio tonite making small collages about Haiti and the awful devastation. Using paste papers painted with gray. Imagining what it must feel like buried beneath mounds of concrete and steel.

Lacy Veil of Snow

This design was created digitally from photos of trees I took outside my window on the bay, after an earlier snow in December. The trees were cropped and reflected in Photoshop over a horizontal and vertical axis to make this geometric pattern forming a lacy intricate web of snow and branch.

Black Is Blue Is Black

I susbmitted this mixed media collage peice for the Black Exhibit which closes with a reception Sunday, January 10 at the DC Arts Center in the Adams Morgan neighborhood from 5 - 7:00 p.m. This group exhibit features art by BADC (Black Artists of DC). Come and meet the artists.

Back to the Studio in 2010

I can't wait to get back into my studio in 2010 to continue work on my Bye-Ku series that I started last winter while Keyholder Resident at Pyramid Atlantic Art Center in Silver Spring. My Bye-Ku series addresses issues of loss in personal relationships. These narrative artworks include both traditional methods of printmaking (like monoprints) in addition to more experimental prints done digitally on the Epson 9800. I'm jazzed.