Her face was like an open book

The joy was written all over her face

A Portrait of the artist as a young Frida

Photoshop work

Here are some of my photoshop exercises from school. It is so much fun learning this stuff!
The top example is a movie poster using my own images (Paul's family that came through Ellis Island) The bottom image is a tiger lily photo where I added painting techniques I am learning.

Autumn means Candy Corn!

I love October because not only is it the month of my favorite holiday...Halloween, it is also the month of one of my favorite candies, candy corn. I know you can get candy corn anytime of year, but you know it is fresh in Autumn. My friend Susan loves Halloween and candy corn, too, so I made her this bracelet. I made the candy corn lampwork glass beads, they were so fun, and I used commercially made black and white beads to go with them. Good enough to eat!

More tiles for Joyce

These tiles are numbered 1-7, the top tile being number one. The yellow T with fish is Number 1, the pink dress is # 7. The tiles in the next post will start with the top tile being numbered 8 (the shorts or swim trunks with fish) scrolling down to the last tiles being.....#23, itsy bitsy teeney weeny green orange polka dot bikini!

Joyce's tiles

In your eyes

Blanton Museum of Art

This week I have been going to the new Blanton Museum on the campus of the University of Texas in Austin. My daughter is taking a writing workshop at UT this week and next, so I have been enjoying the museum. It has an incredible collection of art, you should check out the website
http://blantonmuseum.org.

A-HA

I have A-Ha moments on a regular basis. I don't always have a specific, preconcieved idea when I start making something. Working with ceramics, it is an A-HA moment everytime you open a kiln after a glaze firing. Sometimes it's an A-Hell moment! But when that happens, I just smash 'em up and use them for a mosaic peice! A-HA! hee hee!

Tile installation

I just got these pictures of my tiles that were installed as a backsplash. I love seeing how my tiles are used by others!

Gotta love those art supplies!

I love all art supplies! The seductive promise of a new piece of art work! The possibilities, the potential, the perfection! Right now my favorite art supply is my "concepts" glaze. They are easy, versatile, and beautiful! You can use these under a glaze, over a glaze and even as a glaze!
I got them to use in my own work and also for a class I taught this past spring. They give solid coverage or painterly, brush stroke coverage for ceramic glaze work. Gee...I almost feel like I am doing a commercial for these little gems!
I must admit, I have never met an art supply that I did not love! It is all good!

Space? The final frontier?

I am fortunate to have a studio in our garage. I have the back of it and there are windows and a door to the backyard. I am my biggest challenge! I took this Studio Friday opportunity to clean the desk but it is always challenging for me to keep neat and organized as I work. My studio is messy, crammed with my stuff and hot in the summer (Texas), but I love it all the same!

Studio Friday

This is my first Studio Friday post. In my studio I make many things. One of the things I make are glass beads. My contrast is a before and after thing. The glass starts out as long straight colorful rods. After I heat the rods with the torch and wrap them around a mandrel, they turn into round, square , or triangular beads with dots, stripes and even flowers.

Laura

This is a painting I started a year or more ago. It hangs over my computer and I look at it to try and figure out how to fix it. The hands need work and the perspective got a little messed up.
This is from a photo I took back when Laura was visiting us in New York. It was before she moved to Florida, so she must have been in the first grade? She had a great time playing with Stumpy on that visit!

Buz

This a portrait of my dad done at around the same time I did Ian's portrait. This was from an old photo of him taken in the 50's. The face and background were done with pieces of stain glass and the border tiles are my handpainted tiles.

Family Portraits

I have a bunch of portraits of family members in various stages of unfinished.
Ian's tile portrait got me thinking about posting some of those works here.

It is hard for me to finish paintings, much easier for me to finish tile work because once you make the tile, then glue it down and grout it, I'd say it is finished. But when you do a painting you can always go back and add more paint, touch up the face, paint over a portion and re-do it. It can be unfinshed, forever a work in pprogress.

Ian

Here is Ian

New blog!

While I wait for Ian to work on my website, I thought I would go ahead and make a blog pertaining to my tiles! Here is a stepping stone to honor our sweet dog Stumpy.