What to do when the well runs dry, or how to deal with the blank page...

The well runs dry occasionally for each of us.

This week I’ve commenced working again after a fallow period that followed Open Studios. For whatever reason, I felt no passion for art-making for four long weeks. I got out my sewing machine and made half a dozen new tops, did some mending, read a lot, snacked too much, puttered around the house taking time to put my home back in order. A friend suggested that I needed to reclaim my home after giving it over to so many visitors, but that’s not it. Not at all. A couple of my spiritual gifts are hospitality and encouragement and I got to use those gifts freely during the open days. I absolutely loved that part of it, so much so that I’m now offering classes, some in my home.

Then yesterday I awakened to a desire to move on. I took out a bunch of heavyweight papers to use as substrates for new collages. Some were starts, some were old paintings that didn’t work, and some were virgins… pure white and ready to be sullied with whatever comes.

Having several different pieces going at the same time is nothing new, nor is working in series. That's what I'm doing now.

 

STARTS

I laid 22 supports on my work table, got out a huge box of papers and set to work, choosing papers from the compost* in response to what was already on the supports. I set the timer and worked for an hour, pulling papers one by one and choosing additions to the starts according to color and to whim.

CHOOSING PAPERS, THE FIRST ROUND

This morning I started again, but this time I chose a bit more carefully, adding from another box, thinking about pattern, color combinations, even a bit about content, though that comes much later. I’m still working intuitively.  After about 45 minutes I decided it was time for neutrals, so yet another box came out and for half an hour I added neutrals to each set of papers… browns, creams and beige, black, mixed no-name neutrals of painted papers. And then it was done. 

STARTS, AFTER ADDING NEUTRALS

I ended with 20 sets of papers sitting on their supports, waiting for me to more carefully work them into finished collages. At this point I'll bundle and bag each start and set to work on just a few at once, still working in series and concentrating on a manageable number of individual pieces.  Some won’t make the grade. Most will bear no resemblance to their beginnings. 

Two of the white originals didn’t get going at all and that tells me something about how I work. My natural way to work is to respond to what’s already there. I need a starting point. It isn’t the fear of the white page; it’s simply not knowing what to do with the white paper unless I have a plan. 

START #1

MORE STARTS

Maybe you’ve been there, too. If you’re looking at a white piece of paper or a page in your sketchbook wondering what to do with it.  I have some ideas for you.

Work intuitively and claim the paper.  

·         Choose a piece of paper that you really like and glue it down somewhere on the page.

·         Load a big brush with a beautiful color and swipe it across the paper.

·         With a pen start drawing a convoluted line from one edge of the paper to the opposite edge.

·         Respond to whatever mark you made. Add something else: another paper or color or line.

Make a plan.

·         Sit down with your studio journal/sketchbook and draw. Work from something that’s in front of you or from a photo and make several thumbnail sketches for composition and value. 

·         Fill a page with thumbnail designs based on shape, line, form, pattern, etc..

·         Cut a viewfinder (a square or rectangle cut from the center of a piece of paper) and run it over magazine pages to isolate possible designs. Draw these as thumbnails.

Now get to work.  I’d love to see what you do and have you inspire me with your creations.

*Compost. A box of assorted papers, scraps, trimmings, photos, images that I paw through whenever I need something for a collage. The jumble of color and pattern works together to inspire new combinations.

Limited materials, limited palette

 

Songs of the Soldiers
Jo Reimer
Collage on Paper
7.5" x 7.5"

 On a recent week at the coast I determined to limit my art supplies and took only a small box of compost with an assortment of black and white and a limited palette of colored papers and supports. It was a good decision that forced me to seek variety within limits. I learned that it's possible to do satisfactory work with limited means and is an appealing challenge.

The name of the above small collage came from a piece of sheet music with my uncle's signature, dated 1918-19. Keith lost one arm as a teenager and couldn't serve in WWI but he loved to sing and I can imagine him thinking about those at war as he sang the songs that were currently popular... "Over Here" and "Over There" among them. The picture of the baseball player also was from that era.

Red Maple - Late Fall
Jo Reimer
Collage on Paper
12" x 12"

Red Maple - Late Fall is the main work I intended to do that week, an abstraction of the colors I saw from my front door, taken from this photograph:

Then I got out some paint (still the same color palette) and did a quick painting, remembering some recent weather:

Unsettled
Jo Reimer
Acrylic on Paper
9" x 12"

Then back to the collage box for the next piece:

Under the Clouds
Jo Reimer
Collage on Paper
9" x 12"

All these papers were ones I previously painted or dyed except for the brown, upper right corner.

And this is the final one in the series:

Teatro
Jo Reimer
Collage on paper
9" x 12"

 

From my sketchbook... another 5

by Jo Reimer

There's not much of interest to draw in a hospital exam room.

 I used a Pentel Pocket Brush pen for this drawing. I like the bold line but I need to warm up with writing or drawing before I tackle a drawing because my hand can be a bit shaky.

The swing on my back  deck

 I love porch swings, had one at my childhood home, one at the farm, and now one hanging from the pergola on my back deck. All my grandkids have grown up sitting on Gramma's lap in the swing or sitting beside me as we see how high we can go. I don't usually look at it from this angle.

Two drawings, two villages

 The upside down umbrellas are from among the many which hang from the ceiling in Marcos Cafe in Multnomah Village. The building is in Cannon Beach, OR.

Anniversary drawing

Using painted book page in my sketchbook

I don't remember that I'm a collage artist when I pull out my sketchbook! Now what's with that? Bits of paper ephemera such as those used here add lots of visual texture and interest to an otherwise dull page. A few years ago I bought a dozen small Japanese novels, at least I think they're novels, at a book sale. I've used them for altered books and for sketch journals, and have painted pages from one  in various colors to put in my compost.

Artful Compost Revisited

Just Sayin'
Jo Reimer
7.5 x 7.5
mixed media collage with painted papers

I keep a small basket of 7.5" substrates, mostly 140# and 300# weight, to use for collage. A full sheet of watercolor paper tears down to this size with no waste. When I travel I can grab a few sheets and toss them into a box of "compost" along with scissors, a tearing ruler, and glue so I have something to play with when the mood strikes.

I've talked before about my compost and if you click the link above you'll see some pictures of some of my compost piles. My blog header is a photo of a pile of compost in my studio. I'm not talking about making rich dirt. My compost consists of paper, piles of paper which I've painted and dyed and printed in various ways. I call it compost because as I search my piles and boxes of paper it all becomes a jumble of color that often suggests new, rich uses.

I don't use much ephemera or other commercially printed paper in my collage practice, preferring to paint original papers so that the artwork I create is completely my own. The painted papers add a complexity that I can't get from commercially printed papers. Most images in my work are my own photos or drawings. I don't see anything wrong with appropriated images when they're transformed in some way by the artist using them; it's just not my way of working.

Have you started your own compost pile? It's satisfying... like Just Sayin'.



Collage Made From Compost



In the Garden
Collage on paper
8x8"
 

My boxes of compost are my most cherished art supply. I've talked before about how I build compost out of colored papers of all kinds and that I call it compost because as I dig through the piles of papers and stir up the mix new and exciting color combinations and compositions happen naturally.  That's what happened here.


The bright orange is the substrate which I painted by smooshing acrylic paint around on the surface. There's a bit of paper napkin, a photograph of maple leaves, a magazine image, and a color copied strip from an old painting. Simple items and a combination of stripes result in a happy piece.

Then there's this one.



Chaos
Collage on Paper
8 x 8"

It's a similar layout and color combination but to my eyes it isn't as successful as the first one, but who am I to criticize it? I'm always critical of my own work; there's always something that could be improved, especially that strip of orange up the middle.

Let's analye it according to the elements and principles of design:

• Line: vertical and diagonal suggest movement.
• Texture: visual texture of printed vs plain vs translucent invites touch.
• Color: Complementary violet and yellow with an accent of blue green.
• Composition: Cruciform
• Balance: yes, in all directions
• Value: ah, there's my problem with the orange strip. It tipped the scale of value toward equal balance of value. Without the orange strip the dark areas dominate and composition is better. But I just couldn't leave well enough alone.
• Repetition: There's plenty of repetition within each color family as well as repetition of line.
• Contrast: yep, lots of that.
• Dominance, unity, harmony: check.

The list is longer but these will do for today.

Do you ever pull out your list of elements and principles and use them to check your work? I find it's helpful when I'm puzzled about why a piece leaves me with a negative feeling.



Daily Collage - Man

MAN

5x7"

Some of the surfaces I'm working on were from a failed acrylic painting that I cut into 5x7 pieces. This section of the painting actually worked quite well as the background for the collage. Serendipity rules again... these 3 pieces were lying together in my compost box as if to say, "Take us, take us. Glue us together." So I did.

A Collage a Day as warmup for working

BROOMS QUILT

35" X 30"

In 1994 I took a Mixed Media Quilt workshop from Joan Schulze at Arrowmont in Gatlinburg, TN. In an intensive 2 weeks I learned to be a collage artist although I thought I was just taking another quilt workshop. At the time I didn’t know that I was learning how to see and how to approach a subject but over the years since then I’ve used what she taught me in just about everything art project I tackle.

BROOMS QUILT - DETAIL

Joan taught me to go on a photo safari, to find one thing that’s interesting and explore that one thing from every angle and then to apply what I learned to design a piece of art. We learned some great techniques including acrylic transfers and monotype which I’ve used over and over.

The brooms quilt started with a series of photos of a rack of handmade straw brooms and the detail a transfer of the key photograph. Other images and designs in the quilt are based on the linear pattern of the straws, the bindings, the marks the end of the broom would make in dust. Once I made a big collection of images on fabric I cut and tore the fabric to form the quilt.

Some of Joan's good advice I’ve followed, some, not so much. I’m just now re-reading old notes… Joan said “Every evening write what my day was about, goals for tomorrow, ideas generated. Write poems.”

Well, let me tell you that poetry and I don’t mix, and as for being disciplined enough to write about each day at the end of the day, forgetaboutit. She said “don’t resist change”. I’m resisting discipline, but I can change. I know I can.

All that came into my conscious because I wanted to tell you about a habit I developed because she told us about her own daily collage practice. At the time Joan kept a small area of her studio set aside and set up for making small collages as a way to start the day, to encourage creativity. I do that for awhile and then lose interest for awhile but I always come back to the practice, and today I started again.

 I found a bunch of heavy paper torn to 5x7” and a box to put them in. I’ve set up a place on my studio counter with the box, a glue stick, an old phone book that I’ll glue on top of, and a box of my collage compost, mostly scraps. In the first 5 minutes I made a little collage and then I grabbed a small book I recently made from a failed watercolor and made another 5 minute collage in that. I’ll switch back and forth between the book and the single sheets for awhile until I figure out my favorite.

Maybe you would like to start your own daily warm-up, and then download a summary of your day and plans for tomorrow, either to paper or computer, or maybe on the back of the morning’s collage. Now that’s an idea!
You can read an article I wrote about collage here or link from my sidebar on the right under Articles.

LITTLE JO

7.5 x 7.5

I took a box of collage compost with me to use while on vacation at the beach, not realizing how appealing making a simple collage would be to my grandchildren. I took only enough supports for my own work but of course I soon realized that it was more important that I share with these budding artists.

The first girl to have a go was my 8 year old granddaughter who created a masterpiece right off the bat. Granted I kept control of the glue spreader (I had YES! paste with me and a broad plastic palette knife) so the work was neater than she normally produces but it was amazing. See for yourself...

Sarah's House

6.5 x 5

Soon my other granddaughter joined the fun and made this

And by week's end we had a gallery lining two windowsills...

Charlie's Chasing the Green Flash.

Jill's Tree

And the rest are mine.

Gracious and Victorious

I admire artists who do commission work but I've never enjoyed doing commissions and usually refuse... but right now I find myself working on my own commission: to get all 9 of the current pieces in the sermon notes series done by the end of this week so that they can be printed, mounted and hung in my church by Easter. I've finished 8 and have the design ready in my head for the last one.

The big challenge is that the last two are done without my hearing my pastors sermon or having any notes and I'm hoping I get it right. All I have are the titles Obedient and Victorious, a lot of Bible knowledge and a good dictonary, and a bunch of help from God. Victorious" is already done and I am the one feeling a bit of victory. I did the background for this one for Gracious and when it was finished with it's glorious colors I just knew it was perfect for Victorious.



Then I tackled Gracious and went with greens because my son opined that gracious was a green word. This one is painted. I started by painting my 140# watercolor block with a couple of different yellows... acrylic. Then I worked back on top of the dry paint with several green layers but didn't let them dry before overlaying a large leaf stencil and removing color by scrubbing over the stencil with a damp paper towel, removing much of the greens and leaving a hint of yellow leaves. Because of its simplicity of design and topic it needed a quiet layer of words which I stamped out letter by letter.


Yes, it takes a lot of time to do the work but I so enjoy this quiet time for meditation and prayer and I don't mind the work at all. However, I got so caught up in the lettering for the following piece that I didn't realize that my posture was so bad and gave myself a painful neck ache.








And here is Victorious, the Easter centerpiece.

I have one more to do, Obedient, and I'm excited about the composition I've come up with. It hasn't come together yet but I've been playing with papers and colors. I want the dominant color to be purple with splashes of all the other colors I've used, but when I dipped into my compost I couldn't find enough variety of purple paper, nor could I find the right color of purple paint or ink. However, I had an aging stash of Procion Mx dyes that I once used to dye fabric.

Fabric dyes lose their potency after a couple of years, producing less intense colors, but I had nothing to lose except time. So I pulled out the purple, magenta, and a blue and started playing. I stirred the powder into a small amount of water and poured that onto cartridge paper (standard copy paper) and spread it with a brush and squirted it with a spray bottle of water. Great color! As I continued to play I added a bit of magenta for a different hue, then added blue to more purple for a more blue-violet hue. The colors stayed intense when the papers dried, although I'm wondering whether the colors will run when I apply glue. It can't be much different than watercolor, and I'm not concerned about lightfastness.

After the papers dried I ironed them all, hoping that this was sufficient to heat set the color on the paper as on fabric. I know several watercolor artists who paint with dyes with no discernable problems. Tomorrow I'll tackle the papers and do some experimenting with water and glue and see what I have.

Compost

Perhaps you'd like to see what my Compost piles look like, the ones in the studio, not the big one in the garden. The first photo shows the contents of one of 3 large plastic Compost-to-go boxes, 10" x 14" x 4" boxes with a hinged lid.

The second photo is looking down into one of the large drawers in my work table. You'll notice that there aren't a lot of magazine pages or ephemera in my boxes other than those that somehow relate directly to my life.

Although I once worked with appropriated images torn from whatever books or magazines I came upon I didn't find that to be very satisfying for my more serious work, and I felt that the resulting work could have been done by anyone. So I started preparing my own collage papers and using my own photographs as well as those of family and friends. I do love using ephemera in my travel journals; these bits and pieces of papers collected on location add so much about the place I'm visiting as I work in my journal.

Who Are You?

When I began this blog my intention was to post once or twice each week and show you some of my weeks worth of work. I'm finding that's easier said than done. I've been IN the studio, working quite often, but most of the results aren't what I want to show the world, but I'll show you a couple of works.

Blue Door is more realistic than I usually paint but I had a photo I liked and gave it a try. I like doing little watercolors like this in my sketchbooks or journals but as an acrylic painting it just doesn't work for me. I'd like to be more abstract but this is what came out that day. Mother would like it! I didn't; so I quit trying and we took off for a couple of vacation days the beach where I played with my collage papers and had some fun. I turned one of the collages into an illustration that fits into a continuing series which I call Sermon Notes. Here's Who Are You?

I usually take copious notes during the sermon on Sunday mornings because our pastors' messages often speak directly to my heart. Some time back I decided to turn these notes into art. This is number 32. All are done on a 9" X 12" 140# block of smooth watercolor paper. I use a block for a substrate for this series because it stays nice and tight while I add the layers of paper, glue, paint,ink, stenciling, stamps, and lettering. Otherwise a loose sheet of paper would buckle with the glue and water and because of the tension exerted by the papers as they dry. When I cut the finished piece off the block my rough edges are preserved and the finished piece is flat. Of course this means that I had to buy several blocks so that I can have more than one collage going at once. That's just for the Sermon Notes; other times I work on stretched canvas, board, or heavier watercolor paper.

I prepare collage papers ahead of time, often during dry spells when I feel uninspired to work on a specific project, or in the evening when my energy lags, or even when I'm working in a room with other people and can't concentrate on making art. I use all sorts of paper for collage: art tissue, text-weight paper, various washi (Japanese rice paper), unwaxed sandwich paper, or other relatively thin papers. Color is added to the paper in many forms: fabric dye and paint, acrylic paint for crafts and artist grade, watercolor, ink, pastels, watercolor crayons and pencils, and anything else that has color.

I keep my papers in drawers and in portable tubs and refer to them as my Compost. I continually stir the pile of papers, tear them into pieces, and generally keep them well mixed because the juxtapositioning of color against color often suggests a new direction and feeds the growth of my work.

My favorite adhesive is acrylic medium mixed with PVA applied with a plastic palette knife. The finished work gets a finish coat of acrylic medium and acrylic varnish.