Catching up in the studio

Feathering My Nest

I took an unintended sabbatical from this blog in 2017 but have good intentions to pick up where I left off.

2017 was not a good year in my house, hence little time or inclination to write to all you lovely people. I’ve enjoyed the best health in many years but no so my husband. He’s suffering from several compression fractures in his back and with chronic back problems there’s not much hope for much improvement. We manage, though, and mostly stay upbeat through it all.

Art-making has taken a bit of a back seat but creativity has not. Our September 2016 move into a smaller home sent me into a long period of being creative about how I feathered my new nest.. I dearly love this smaller studio.

As I was downsizing my studio I made some hard decisions. Goodbye to oil paint and bars, encaustic, pastels, and all but the simplest bookmaking. Supplies for knitting, fancy sewing, quilting, crochet, beading, dyeing, screen printing, embroidery, 2/3 of my library, and much more that I don’t want to remember were donated or sold. I decided that since I have many more years behind me than in front of me I will concentrate on my main loves: collage, sketching with ink and watercolor, acrylic painting, and simple sewing. Those choices have proven to be so good, so right.

As I told you, my studio was once a master bedroom. I store large canvases in the soaking tub.

One small closet holds my clothes and shoes and the other one is for storing supplementary art supplies.

Two cabinets contain collage materials with two of the drawers reserved for thread and interfacing.

My old wire basket unit is my colored paper palette and several 12x12 totes house the collage compost. And yes, I set up a reading corner with the bookcase and recliner positioned in a corner window looking out on the backyard.

My corner desk is bracketed by tables, one for sewing and paperwork and the other for drawing and sit-down collage.

 I have a tall Ikea table for collage and for cutting fabric, with a lower pull-out table underneath.

So you see I’m all set.

 During January I plan to make one collage every day. So far so good and here are a couple of the finished ones, both 7.5" square.

MAX tracks at 10th and Morrison

Running For Home

As for my art practice in general, I’m backing off from art as business. All that marketing is in the rear view mirror. That’s not to say that I will say no to opportunities to show or sell my work… not at all! I’ve submitted two large collages to a local competition, have rejoined a local gallery, and am ruminating about ways to sell online. Making a collage every day means the work will stack up and my small house doesn’t have enough wall space for it all. I’ll let you know when I have work to sell.

I'd sure appreciate any comment or hello or feedback you'd like to leave, even if it's just to let me know you're still out there and you care about reading One A Day.

JO

My new Blogger address is  https://joreimer.blogspot.com.