Workshop Report

Spot On
Jo Reimer
10" x 10"
Mixed Media

 It's been a week since I began the workshop with Donna Watson and time to post a report. For two days we worked with Japanese Rice Paper (washi) painting one side with acrylic paints of a consistency that left fibers visible on the reverse side which, in many cases, became the front. Then we cut and tore these papers and made collages. Spot On was my first one and if you look closely you can see the visual texture of the papers which were actually quite smooth to the touch.

The Good Life
Jo Reimer
10" x 10"
Mixed Media

I'm showing each collage in the order in which they were created. This one is a mix of papers, moving away from using lots of black and including more color. The lower left quadrant was painted with ultramarine on the other side. Remember that every piece of paper has two sides. The text in the orange band features painting over writing; the white vertical band features what I call "writing that can't be read"; some of the orange bits papers painted over a laser copy of names of women who've influenced my life, and at the top left is blue and black painted washi over handwriting. Because the washi is so thin it will show the layers below.

Torn
Jo Reimer
10" x 10"
Mixed Media

Torn is a quickie collage using just three papers. Donna tells me that this is more "me" than the others because I'm all about color and organic. I think she's right and perhaps that's why it went together so quickly. The piece on the left is white spray paint through a stencil onto brown. The orange stripe is painted tissue from my painted papers stash. The piece on the right is washi. I worked on palette paper, mixed raw umber with black and white and rolled it onto the palette paper, then combed through it to create the undulating lines.

Falling Leaf
Jo Reimer
10" x 10"
Mixed Media

Falling Leaf is my personal favorite. The top and bottom bands are washi painted in class. The orange band at center left is from my stash of tissue painted with inks. The leaf is from my garden, pressed last year and saved for just such a reason. The leaves are turning again and it's time to gather and press another batch. In our family we're all about trees. We have a family wholesale nursery where we grow ornamental trees which are sold to nurseries across the country. The crops include lots of Japanese maples and we have many growing around our home. I love to draw the winter skeletons of trees so using leaves in my mixed media collages is a given.

Now you wonder if I've followed through since the workshop and the answer is yes and no. I got sick the first day with a chest cold and since the workshop I haven't felt like doing much of anything other than reading over my class notes and summarizing them. My intention for tomorrow is to gather my stock of washi and tubes of acrylic and get busy painting more papers. That usually leads me directly to making and then I'll be off and running.