Just a Few New Pieces I Whipped Up

"On The Air"

The latest stuff. The RAW stuff.

Now that RAW is over, I've started fitting the pieces I'd created into the rest of my regular show at the Art Bank. I figured I'd do a big debut post here, though.

First off, we have "On The Air," a piece I'd started on during our November Second Friday event at the Art Bank as an artist demonstration. It was a picture I'd taken at work, near the studio, and just kind of came together after that. I made it hard for myself, though: Usually, I start with the stencil, and THEN paint the rest, but this time I reversed it. I'm not sure why, but an animation technique sure did come in handy when trying to transfer the painting to the stencil to get them to (somewhat) line up.

"EJ3"

The other blatantly teevee image would be "EJ3."  EJ is actually short for ENG, which is short for Electronic News Gathering. It's how we designate our receive sites (big dishes that take in our signals) at work. I was working a lot. It kind of seeped in. One of my coworkers really liked it in a WPA/1940's kind of style. Heh. Receive site propaganda.

"Bars and Robot"

"Bars and Robot" is just that: Test Pattern Bars and a robot. But I like them both! They work so well apart, why NOT put them together?

"Robo-Plight"

"Robo-Plight" kind of came up as an image in my head of a robot reaching out. I don't know, maybe he has some issues. Maybe he needs some oil. Can someone please lend a robot a hand?

"Ba-Bomb"

"Ba-Bomb" was a suggestion by the Boyfriend to "paint a bomb." I had an 18 in. x 24 in. canvas left and wanted to make one more piece before the show. He came up with a grand narrative of a bomb that said different things and could symbolize... strife, struggle, apathy, destruction......you get the idea. He told me this while I was driving home from visiting my family and I had about 4 hours to think about a bomb. So it became a cartoon bomb, acme-style, and I left any of that symbolism off of it, so, you know, you could add your own. Or just like it for thinking it looks cool. BOOM!
 

 

I Got This: The RAW Wrap-up!

On December 6th, I got to participate in my first RAW: Natural Born Artists event!

Photo by Michelle Craig (Spitz) 

I was very excited to get this chance, and glad it came along when it did.  I'd been looking into what to do next, in regards to my art. I'm happily showing at the Art Bank, Urban Kitsch, and Butterfly Consignment, and am doing pretty well, internet-wise, but you never want to get complacent. So here I offer up basically an overview, a rundown of my RAW experience.

I'd gone to their site and filled out the application and was accepted. I had to do an over-the-phone interview and, to tell you the truth, I was nervous! In my art, I just do my thing. But there's always the lingering doubt about whether or not I'm "cool enough." I don't paint the broody stuff with creepy dolls and bloody faces, or whatever it is that I'm seeing so much of lately. I like happy stuff, and if I'm not happy, I honestly can't paint! So: Robots make me happy. Interesting things I see make me happy. Cartoon-y things make me happy.  Eh, be yourself, I guess.

Photo by Michelle Craig (Spitz)

On RAW Day, I had to show up at 2pm with my entire set-up in tow. We were being hosted by Bartini's, a bar in downtown Indy, converted from a former train station. That means old bricks, a train rattling overhead, and high ceilings with many pipes. We had taken a walkthrough and selected our spaces. I'd taken photos for reference, and brought the elements they said I'd need for set-up: rubbing alcohol to clean the bricks, 3M sticky wall-hanger things, and those aluminum lights that you hang in garages while you work on your car. And a TON of extension cords and black duct tape.

Photo by Michelle Craig (Spitz)

I was glad I came in with a plan. It took me three hours to complete my set-up! I just kept working diligently and making sure everything looked nice, and, at the end of the night, I was lucky as none of my pieces fell off the wall and I had no infrastructure problems at all! I even had enough time to clean up and consume nourishment!

The event began with a little pow-wow at 6pm, kind of a "Okay, team, we can do this!" moment. We were also taken aside for a photo shoot and a video shoot, that we could use down the road for our promotional materials. This was definitely something I was interested in: Promotion. Something I knew only a little about. I feel like I have a better handle on it now, and what I need to do down the road.

Photo by Michelle Craig (Spitz)

We had a DJ with a giant Lego head bopping away, we had a fashion show, we had performance art, and a several bands, including one called Robot Love Song, and they were very pleased with my art! (Heh, robots, who'd have guessed!) I had several friends show up and support me and made some new friends and new contacts for opportunities down the road. It was an incredibly long night, and by the time 10:30 came around and we began to tear down, I was already exhausted! But once again, since I'd planned pretty well, everything went right back into the bins I'd brought, tear-down was a snap, and the Yaris was filled back up. I'd sold quite a few of my smaller pieces and made some good profit on the event.



The crowd was interesting to watch. There were the folks and friends that had come to support their artist friends, there were the 'scene-sters' that just wanted to show up to something cool, and there were the art crowd folks that were genuinely there to check out the latest art that Indy had to offer. A different mix than a normal First Friday.

Photo by Michelle Craig (Spitz)

I'd started out trying to do art related to television, and was wondering if I should go back into more of a realism style instead of the aerosol stencil + acrylics that I'd been doing all summer. But that aerosol is just too addicting (metaphorically!). I ended up doing a combo of the TV stuff, with the On The Air sign, some of our microwave receive sites (how we take signals in) and the bars and tone test pattern, but then I just kind of got into the robots. Robots are fun!  The final piece, a cartoon bomb, was suggested to my by the boyfriend as a last minute addition. The kind of painting you visualize on a long drive back, and as soon as you get home, you can just execute it, because it's been completely planned out in your head.

Now that I've done one RAW event, I can do several more throughout the next calendar year. I'll definitely be doing more of them, especially now that the nerves are overcome and I've got set-up down pretty well.

I got this.

RAW: Natural Born Artists

RAWrrrr!

I'm a RAW artist! Woo hoo!

Back in June, I got an email inviting me to apply to RAW--Natural Born Artists. But, on the other hand, I had my epic sinus surgery coming up, so I procrastinated filling out the rest of the sign-up page, which completely worked out, since I had to deal with a bout of partial facial paralysis after that! But now...

Look for "Autopilot" as my logo image.

Now everything is better! In the course of cleaning stacked up stuff off my plate, I finished my application to RAW, underwent a phone interview, and am now slated to be one of the artists for the December 6th show: Holiday RAWk!

From what I gather, it's a national organization, that started out in San Diego a few years ago and has spread across the country, city by city. They put on monthly shows at a cool establishment in town and feature not only 'traditional' art forms, such as painting or photography (what you commonly think of when you think of an art show in Indianapolis) but also will have fashion designers, make-up and hair artists, performing artists and musicians all showcased. It's basically a monthly art party! Yeah, I'm psyched.

As an artist, I'm really happy about the opportunity, not just to show in another venue besides my home at the Art Bank, but I also get to learn about promotional elements. We get to do a promo photo shoot and video, and get to see how they make flyers and such to market ourselves with a national-style polish. So far, believe it or not, I've been making up a lot of this as I go. I'd been wondering what to do to keep advancing, keep moving on to the next level, so I'm glad I didn't look twice at the opportunity.

On top of that, I get to have this big night with a friend! Miranda Gabbard, also an Art Bank artist, will be showcased as a photographer at RAW for December as well! It's always a good thing to be able to venture into the unknown with a friend by your side!

You know, like this.

I'm also planning on pulling together a whole bunch of new pieces for this show, blending the stuff I see from some of my work in teevee with that aerosol outline style I've been exploring. So, if you liked my Masterpiece In A Day entry, there will be more of that...but I promise to take more time with it than the allotted MIAD four hours. 

Here's the catch: I need to sell tickets. (I don't get to do this for free...Life lesson). I need to sell 20 tickets for $10 a piece! What I don't sell, I have to make up the difference, so c'mon, help an artist out!  All you have to do is click here, and look for the yellow text link that says "Buy a ticket for this artist," near the "I AM RAW" text in the middle. Then follow the simple steps (it operates via PayPal). So far, I'm 2 down, 18 to go. C'mon, join the Joy Posse! (Yup, that's what I'm calling you all...unless you come up with something better...I'm up to listening...)

RAWWWWRRRRRRRRRR (Dinosaur yell).

How To Make a Can of Soup

Our victim.

At the Art Bank, the gallery I show at, we've normally had a First Friday gallery walk to participate in.  This is great! Really! First Fridays have become quite the event. The problem is, a lot of establishments are now doing something on First Friday, so we are finding that people that go to one event, may not necessarily make it to ours in that same time frame. This is a bummer. And we are going to solve this bummer problem with a hearty can of soup. Here's how:

First, you randomly ask a friend, in the middle of a text conversation on a different topic, if she has a barrel she needs to get rid of. And, amazingly, she says yes. (Thanks, Shirley!) She will even bring the barrel to you. Once you have acquired the barrel, you check it over, making sure the bottom is sound, and that it will fit in your car.

It's green inside!

Once you get it into your car, and into your home, you drag it back outside and coat the entire insides of it with a nice dark spray paint, to hide any icky marks or anything. In my case, I used dark green because I had a can sitting around and I don't often use dark green, so if it wasn't used for this, it was just going to continue sitting there. While you're at it, you can spray the rims of the barrel silver, to freshen them up. Make sure you do this step outside and wear a mask, because apparently spraying the insides of a barrel results in you getting particles all over you, your arm hairs even feel sticky and weird, and the cloud of aerosol just comes right back at your face. So try to lean away when spraying.

Those lines were really hard!

Then you drag the thing up to the Art Bank to be completed while you're the Attending artist for the day. You also take a roll of brown packaging paper and some paint and an Andy Warhol Campbell's soup can. Start by measuring out and painting the background.

Let that dry and add some lettering. Ok, so this doesn't say Campbell's and there are circles instead of yellow fluer d'lis, (excuse my French), but you know what? I'm calling this artistic liberty. And I don't want to get sued by the Warhol estate.

Our label.

Now for the fun part. We get to get a little high (because it was cold and icky outside and I didn't want to ventilate properly. You may do as you please). I used spray adhesive to stick the new label to the barrel. It seemed to work best if I sprayed both the paper AND the barrel and waited a second to stick them together and smooth out the wrinkles. I added a nice clear coat for some shine and Boo-yah! One big can of soup.

That's one big can o' soup! Mmm Yummy!

Now for the why. Why? Because we decided to host a Second Friday as well as our normal First Friday. It even operates under the same, user-friendly hours! 6-9pm! But for Second Friday, we will be more interactive. We will have artist demonstrations, more time to chat one-on-one with our patrons, and will partner up with a charity each month, as a way of connecting with the community. November's Second Friday will have a canned food drive for HVAF, the Hoosier Veterans Assistance Foundation, which helps homeless vets in Indianapolis. Being that Second Friday is two days before Veterans Day, this is fitting. And that big giant can of soup just became a giant receptacle for food donations. Doing it the art way. Boo-yah!

ART Soup. With Special Ingredients

Birthdays, Masterpieces and a Space Dog

"60 Years of Peppers"

"Oceans Tridents Submarines"

First of all, I'd like to wish Jim Kirk, of Captain Jim's Sauces, a local hot sauce maker, a happy 60th birthday!  I was amazed, about a year ago, when "Captain Jim Kirk" signed my guest book at the Art Bank.  His wife, Kate, secretly bought "Oceans Tridents Submarines" from me for Jim's Christmas present, last year.  He was thrilled, declared my style to be reminiscent of 70's underground pop art, which caused me to go on a massive Google search to figure out what that was. This year, Kate commissioned me to paint a logo for Captain Jim, using their chili pepper pirate character. This was in the middle of my recovery from Ramsay-Hunt, so I used it as a welcome therapy opportunity. I'm pretty proud of the result.

"Postcard Masterpiece"

I was also dead-set on completing this painting, because I wanted/needed the art work-out so that I could be in 'shape' for the Masterpiece In A Day competition at this year's Art Squared, the Fountain Square Art Festival. This year, for me, has been nuts. ...Well, the last 2 years have been pretty nuts, but this summer has been exceptionally trying. I was crazy looking forward to MIAD, really really excited. I think I just needed the release. It was a great day, I created something I'm really proud of. It was really windy, and my aerosol finishing bit, the black lines in the painting, started to seem like not such a good idea, but I pulled it off. It's called "Postcard Masterpiece" and it's of the fountain that puts the "fountain" in Fountain Square. (It was also so windy that I was across the street and 4 doors down and I could still feel some of the spray from the fountain!).  I got to see a lot of good art friends, a posse of folks from my hometown (Kewanee, represent!), and meet some new artists, or at least new to me, folks that I hope I get to work with in the future.

After MIAD, I collected Remy and we marched in the Art Parade. She was an astronaut, a costume that got her the judges award at the Hog Days Pet Show, and I wore my Sonic the Hedgehog spiky hat and declared myself an alien. We were lined up in the parade behind a group of little kids dressed as cute little robots, with an adult playing They Might Be Giant's "Robot Parade" on an infinite loop (it was stuck in my head for 2 days) and we were in front of Family Video's float and a giant Chinese food box. Good times.

Astro-Remy

When I was a kid, my Grampa Weber would march in the Hog Days parade, dressed as a clown, repping the company he sold hog feed for, Agri-King. He would walk an invisible dog, ride my scooter, ride an adult tri-cycle, and eventually, as he got older, a riding lawnmower with a little cart on the back. Now I know why he would do something so silly: It's just fun. Why NOT do it? Remy and I weren't representing anything but neighborhood folk having fun. The weather held out, and I got to play.

In other updates, I got the final puzzle piece for my Ramsay-Hunt recovery: an eye check-up. I was really worried my eye took some damage from my inability to blink properly. It can seriously dry out your eye and change its shape. In my case, it did for the better! For now, anyway (the doc said it could revert back in a few weeks) my contact prescription has actually gone BACK as step! My eyes were hurting when I tried to return to my contacts, but that was because my current contacts were too strong! He gave me a sample on a weaker prescription, and instructed me to come back in 6 weeks, but for now, I'm glasses free! Yay!

New Stuff!

Which leads me to First Friday. It's October everybody! Besides my Masterpiece being on display at the Art Bank, all of my 16 in. x 20 in. paintings (of which there are many--I gotta stop painting in that size) are marked down from $150 to $100! Yup, a third off. You get some nifty Christmas gifts, and I get more space in my house! Also, I have fully restocked my Wee Paintings rack, and updated all of the postcards and Christmas cards (for those of you looking for some of the Star Trek themed pieces, now's your chance!)

So, despite the grey weather, come and see me tonight. Things are looking up and I'm in a great mood!

New Things!

"Curious-er and Curious-er"

Progress!

As part of my...face physical therapy, besides smiling, I've been trying to force myself, bit by bit into doing the activities that make me tired, to force those muscles in my face to work. I'm getting there!

I've only managed to finish one piece so far, but it's a start. And it's strange. It is "Curious-er and Curious-er," an acrylic and aerosol piece kind of inspired by the Mars rover Curiosity. Because what else would a giant space robot-car see on Mars but a green rabbit looking back at it!

"Untitled" Help me name it!

I also have, to present, this little piece. I'm not entirely settled on a name yet, but it's basically an image I saw while I was knocked out during my sinus surgery. A lady was hanging up strange things, like play-dough, silverware and jacks, from little white strings, while a bright glow came from behind. ...Aaaand it manifested like this. The BF immediately declared that I'm never allowed to do drugs. This one I actually managed to finish before the Ramsay-Hunt ordeal began.

And one last little goodie: The Five Year Mission posted their latest music video today! It's from their second album, "Year 2" and is of the song "Arena."  In the original episode, Captain Kirk is pitted against an alien called a Gorn (that basically looks like a big dinosaur-man) and a fight ensues. That explains the lyrics of the song. In the video, the Gorn is getting beat up by life, instead of a member of Starfleet, and is just having a generally crummy day, until he stumbles upon the Five Year Mission practicing.

I'm proud to say, I shot the video (edited by band member Mike Rittenhouse), and the Gorn's house is actually my house, and the dog is my wonderful 'painting assistant' Remy Hernandez. We think it's awesome and hope you do too.

Astro-Remy!

So now we prep for First Friday; come down and see my newest paintings (for sale but not labeled yet--in fact, help me name the dream painting!) and then we gather our energies (and by we, I mean Remy and I) for Art Squared: The Fountain Square Art Fair! Remy and I will be at our usual location outside the Hero House comic shop and then Remy will be marching in the Art Parade at 5pm! She test drove her parade costume at the Kewanee Hog Days WJRE Pet Show, and got the Judge's Award! (kind of a best-of-show). Rock on, Remy!


Oh yeah, and for OCTOBER'S First Friday, I'll have all my most recent work in greeting card and post card form--all up-to-date and ready for the holidays! (I know, I know, too early, but hey, when you're making them by hand, you have to get a head start!)

Broad Strokes!

Prime Time!

Due to my art sidelining, I've decided to catch up on a bunch of my DIY projects. Seriously, some of these have been in the works for like a year. Time to clean the plate.

I'm calling them my Broad Stroke projects, because they don't require me to concentrate on fine detail. All I have to do is cover the surface with color, no staying in the lines required!

Remy and the bench.

This morning, I finished my tree-log porch bench. I painted three logs, cut from trees felled at a friend's family farm by a tornado (yeah, what?!) a nice indigo color. I picked a semi-gloss because I wanted them to look kind of plastic-like and fake, but that would make the bark look all the more interesting. I inherited a circular saw from my grandfather's garage last year, and have been slowly mastering it.

Close-up of the logs.

This time I was able to cut the 2 x 4's to the right length (trust me, a year ago, I couldn't do this) and painted them a nice, glossy yellow. The green and blue circle in the photo--that was from a paint spill last year, while painting a cabinet for my Art Bank space. I made the spill into a circle, added a spiral and made it look like a rug! And my landlord wasn't mad that the 'oops' had happened! He said he could just power-spray it off, if I ever got tired of it. I had better plans in mind!

Cup-inspired murals.

I had a section of wall on the back of my house that was just screaming for something to be done. I didn't want to mess around with the structure of the wall, so I opted for some plywood murals. My mom got me a cool plastic glass with a cute design on it at Hobby Lobby this spring, so I basically stole the design from that (except I changed the flower middles from pink to blue on the one mural--matched my scheme better). I'll be straight up about it.

The entire back corner.

Much like the fence/barn-board murals I did last year, I kept these loose and brush-strokey, and, as they are on plywood, I made sure to seal them with lacquer so they would weather better. I haven't messed around with outdoor applications of plywood much, but I've been told the plys become unglued over time. I don't want to find out the hard way. Lacquer it is! Next summer, I'm going to plant black-eyed susans all around the front of the murals, so I think that will make a nice little space. There's also a small boulder in the foreground that crashed through my basement wall a few years ago (non-structural, just surprising!) so it's part of the nice little space too!

Toad-stool seats--COMFY!

The toad stool tree-log seats were a swipe from a Pinterest photo, except the photo used red with white circles. I went with orange and blue with gold swirls (you can see them better in person). The logs came from the same tree as the bench, but I got most of the bark off for a smoother look. I also lacquered them to seal them and it made their color very rich and warm! A few screws, some cut plywood circles, and some staples and there you go!

Pallet Fort, sans doors.

All summer I've been working on my "pallet fort." The city gave us these ugly grey trash cans that we have to use for trash pick up. (I spray painted my house numbers on ours so our less-than-scrupulous neighbors don't steal them).  They just sat in this muddy spot in the back yard. So I've built the pallet fort to shield them. I poured concrete and set fence posts, attached pallets to the sides and painted the entire thing bright blue. Now I just have to build doors for the sucker. I was going to use straight pallets for the doors, but they're too heavy and the swinging would destroy the rest of the structure.

Key wind-chime.

So I've been trying to disassemble a pallet, make a frame for each door, and use the pallet boards as panels to fill it in. Problem is, I'm not strong enough to get the boards off, or if I get them off, they usually get destroyed in the process! So, I'm still working on that one. Painting all that blue was truly an exercise in monotony, so it took me a while. The doors will be many colors and awesome.

Hanging off the side of the pallet fort is my key wind chime. It's another Pinterest steal, sort of, but I just used the things I had around: A slice of the logs from the bench and toad stools, and a bunch of retired live truck keys. I want to add more strands of keys, so I'm collecting them as I go...so, you know, if you have any old metal keys around that don't go to anything any more...I'll take them!

My sweet lime-green coffee table.

Now for the indoors: This sweet green-topped table was a back porch find at my grandparents. My grandpa used to go to the Sale Barn in Kewanee, a place where you can buy all kinds of things, and buy, well an entire lot of stuff just to get one thing. I'm going to assume that's where this table came from. The rest of the stuff that he didn't want, but now owned due to what he really wanted to buy, was usually just left around the house or garage. The top of this table was all weathered from rain, but the legs were really nice. So I sanded down the top, painted it glossy lime, cleaned off the legs, painted the caps with some Rustoleum and there you go! It cleans up pretty nice!

My First Stain!

This table was hand-sanded by my great-grandfather last summer. He sat in his garage and just sanded that sucker down. I don't know here he got it, I think at some kind of sale. It had leaves at one point, but now it's just a square. He offered it to my cousin, it just needed a stain and seal, but she didn't want it. So I took it. I'd never stained anything before, so I was intimidated, and I'll admit, procrastinated once the weather got nice enough to stain outdoors. I was worried I'd mess it up! I figured I only got one real shot at it. Finally I just went for it. I picked out a stain that matched the wood trim in my house pretty well and just knocked it out. Then I sealed it with the same lacquer I've been using so far (that can went pretty far!).

This table is HOT.

I'm seriously crazy-pleased with this. That table looks SHARP. I am so thrilled with how it turned out and I can't wait to show Grampa Woody a picture of it! And staining was deceptively easy too! (just don't get it on your hands, they call it stain for a reason). Yeah. I'm proud.

So now my project list is cleared off, so I've been the bullet, signed up on Pinterest (I'd just browse anonymously before, but a recent upgrade made that more difficult). I don't know how much of a 'pinner' I'll be, but I'm on the look out for more projects. I have one more nearly complete, but I need to find two more components to complete it, then I'll post a pic. I also have this little step ladder I want to do an orange wash on. I guess that will be for the next post!