Real Estate & Sleep

 A new gadget 

Always looking

How many steps

How much sleep

Heart beat

Obsession! 

"In healthy adults, about 13 to 23 percent of your sleep is deep sleep. So if you sleep for 8 hours a night, that’s roughly 62 to 110 minutesTrusted Source of your sleep is deep sleep. So if you sleep for 8 hours a night, that’s roughly 62 to 110 minutes." Healthline.

What has that got to do with real estate? Nothing! Just been on my mind lately!

Also been thinking about real estate. Not the kind you buy, but the space you create on. Your substrate size. I would call myself a medium size painter. 5"x7" would probably be the smallest I would go. If I want smaller, say for cards, I have my trusty cutter. 

Last fall did an exercise on a full sheet of paper, roughly 27"x39" of a repetitive pattern with various pencils, graphite, charcoal, crayons, etc on newsprint. I chose the circle as my motif, loosely! Had it on my wall, mainly for inspiration, loved various sections. Masking tape isn't a good adhesive, and it kept falling off. Didn't want to chop it off, but I needed smaller real estate.

Then I viewed Helen Wells' video on one page sketchbook! 

Voila! 8 pages of smaller real estate, around 6.5"x10", that I can experiment with, fold in squares up, etc. In the photos you can see extra creases.

Full Sheet

Front

2-3

4-5

6-7

Back

Paper has tape stains, tears, etc, but I love it. Hope to start a new series of circle motifs . Click to enlarge files!

Trusted Source

 

Gift Buddha New Start

What a surprise was waiting for me on my table at workshop. One a big 7 x 11.5" handmade sketchbook from heavy watercolor paper, filled with owls and owls and more owls. The background for this was that last week I made a small one-page sketchbook that I learned from Kiala Givehand as part of the Sketchbook revival that I took part in. Sadly they have taken it down already. She also has a great number of youtube videos, but couldn't find the specific one she had on the revival session. I did find one similar but she doesn't show the hidden pages. Anywho I showed Traudi how to make it and she taught her granddaughter while making me the OWL book. Traudi also gave me another sketchbook like the one she previously gave me, she decided she wasn't going to use it and since mine is almost filled, it should be mine! Thank YOU Traudi, I so wish I could share some of her work but alas she hasn't a blog or Instagram etc. Maybe someday! And now you ask, why OWLS.
Well, we were discussing our project and I mentioned that I took an online quiz and OWL is my soul animal.

Cover

 1-2

3-4

5-6

Hidden Pages

lifting pages 1 -2

Full Spread

Back Cover

We all have some down days where our mind takes over with thoughts and we can't seem to get rid of them. With me, I take a nap which is like an escape sleep. After a shower decided to get it out on paper. In the sketchbook revival, I learned that scribbling and writing on the page has great power.

It really helped and this Buddha was the result! I also remembered the HUGE Buddha at the RISD Museum that I often visited. It was so calming and peaceful!

15 x 13"

Pencil HB on Light Sketchbook Page

 Well, hope you've come this far. This week at Workshop we had our guest mentor Ariel Asseo.

Since his specialty is in realistic figure painting I decided to do two figures. Not happy at all with this WIP. But in the spirit that I show what going on on my easel.  Have to fix the drawing mistakes particularly the left arm and decide on a color palette. It was the end of the session so I used oil sticks instead of getting out my paints. 

WIP

Charcoal  Oil Sticks 

Colored Matte Board

21.5 x 27.5

Brimming With Excitement

Have you heard about Sketchbook Revival? I got the link from artist Chris Lally Thanks so much, Chris! Well, I got hooked even though I am quite overwhelmed. Each day there are 2 artists with loads of tips and gifts, it's very hard to keep up and digest all the material. I signed up rather late so I have finished watching just day 5. Today was with Irish artist Amanda Grace and I instantly connected with her philosophy and technique, in short scribbles and chaos! I worked along with her as she demonstrated 3 journal pages. Never felt so FREE! Didn't care what came out! I just had to share!
They aren't really finished, who cares, I see now as I edited the photos that I can go back and tweak, Its just a sketchbook and only for me and you! No titles here.

Art Journal Page 1

8.75 x 12"

Canson Sketch Book 65lb

Mixed Media

About 3 layers of what Amanda calls "stream of consciousness" writing. Each with different drawing tools of various widths and strength. Veiled with either gesso or white paint, I used paint. Scribbles with watercolor crayons and puddled with water to drip. Added collage papers, figures, and just plain book pages. Scribbles around the figures. When pasting the figure collage it was face down on the wet so the face of the boy got a little paint. Those are what Amanda calls art making itself.

Art Journal Page 2

8.75 x 12"

Canson Sketch Book 65lb

Mixed Media

 This started out with heavy scribbling various colors and crayons. Veiled and then scratched writing!
I AM HERE! More watercolor crayons with water. Started some ballpoint marks which I do not like.
I will probably tweak this because I feel it lacks contrast,

Art Journal Page3

8.75 x 12"

Canson Sketch Book 65lb

Mixed Media

This one is my favorite. Amanda started hers on a page that already had scribbles so I made some light scribbles and then started with transparent collage pieces, cut up a print of one of my works. Book pages traced figure, which you can hardly make out. More watercolor crayon scribbles.  Have to take another photo because I veiled some of that heavy blue. 

Really had a ball today!

Wonderful Gift

Don't you just LOVE sketchbooks? Traudi, an Artist friend from my workshop, surprised me with this gorgeous one!!! Pages are 9.5" x 7" of very good heavy textured paper. Anyone else afraid of a new sketch book? It looks handmade!

Traudi doesn't have a website so I will paste a few images here with some of her fabulous work

Thanks Traudi!