Jo Reimer's Collage Adventures, classes at Village Gallery

 

Baby Brother ***

JO REIMER'S COLLAGE ADVENTURES

I'm looking forward to upcoming classes at the Village Gallery in Cedar Mill. One-day classes/workdays seem to work out best for most busy people, as do weekends.  Each Saturday class runs from 9:30-3:00 and is $90. To sign up for classes please stop by the gallery which is at the east end of the library building in Cedar Mill, or download a registration form HERE. The classroom is small and classes are limited to 10 students.

BOOTCAMP
Saturday March 12
    
.... an introductory workshop for beginners to the art of collage.  You’ll learn about supports, papers, adhesives, tools, and simple composition. There will be several demonstrations of the various techniques throughout the day, and you’ll have time to make several experimental collage paintings in your sketchbook.  Classes will be small so there’s plenty of time for one on one attention. 

THE CREATIVE PROCESS

 Saturday, April 16

Beginning and advanced artists alike will benefit from this hands-on class filled with discussions and demonstrations as we explore basic composition for collage. You’ll receive a prototype of my patent-pending Design Wheel and learn about the elements and principles of design and how to make them work for you as you build interesting collages. We’ll develop a collection of Design Templates and experiment with working with Layers. The skills you learn are applicable both to collage and to painting.

PRINT AND PLAY

Saturday, April 23

 

Roll up your sleeves and prepare to get your hands dirty as we dig into creating unique collage papers.  We’ll learn simple printmaking using the Gelli-Plate; we’ll make Magic Paper; create unusual stamps, work with stencils, and more. Prepare for a hard day of fun and take away lots of beautiful papers and collage sketches in your studio journal, prototypes for future collages or paintings.

***

Baby Brother is a sketch I did as a demo for a BootCamp. I started by building a neutral background, then stacking rectangles, sort of like making a layer cake, on which I added a favorite image of myself as a snotty little 3 year old holding my competition, a new baby brother.

Here are some recent drawings, done while on vacation. I'm drawing for several hours each day and enjoying every minute.

As I was drawing this building a man stopped to talk. He's the owner of the local bike shop, a former medical illustrator and flute player. I enjoy the people who stop to talk.

This is Mike's bike shop.

And next door is the kite shop, Once Upon A Breeze.

Sketchbook Pages, Week One

 I've drawn in one of my sketchbooks every day this week and I intend to keep it up. It's a bit embarassing to post my wonky drawings but this blog is, in my mind, a way to record my work and progress so it serves my own purpose.

I'm working in an 8" square sketchbook I made. The pages are an assortment of watercolor papers, all shapes, sewn together to make nearly full sized pages. I save all my paper scraps as well as paper samples (waste not, want not) and this seemed to be a good use for them. Some papers work better than other. This first page is 7.5" x 3.5" and is sort of the introduction page.



 


 


I did this page yesterday and am NOT happy with it. The pots are okay (I'm working on ellipses which are hard for me) but the pen I used wasn't waterproof so the minute I started adding watercolor the black ink made the page gray preventing me from painting bright colored tulips.

Perhaps you can get a better idea about the sewn together, pieced, pages in this example where the larger but shorter section on the right was zigzag stitched to the narrow piece on the left. I rather like the look.

From my Sketchbook ...

by Jo Reimer


Freesia

I keep a tiny metal alphabet stencil in the back pocket of my sketchbook and use it when I remember. The stenciled letters adds interest to any page. 



 

Geranium

 Cannon Beach Oregon is known for incredible flowers. There are planting beds and big pots of flowers and shrubs everywhere with blooms lasting most of the year in the mild climate. The misty ocean air is good for the plants and whoever tends the beds knows just how to keep the soil in tip top shape to stimulate growth. This September the geraniums were at their peak and gave me a good reason to sit on a bench and draw a nearby flower, noticing for the first time how the buds hang from this particular variety.

Calla Lily

 There are calla lilies everywhere, along fence lines, in big pots and beds alongside the sidewalks. In one neighborhood every yard has masses of calla lilies, leading to the suspicion that neighbors are generous with their plant starts.

Leaves

 The leaves of a vine outside the coffee shop window held their pose for me this morning.

Pink with text

 Sketching is a great activity when one is waiting for something to happen...

Red Japanese Maples

Our son planted about an acre of Japanese maples "Bloodgood" just before he left for the army right out of high school. We sold that place 21 years ago and there are still several dozen of the trees left in the field. Perhaps I should have titled this Nostalgia.  I hate to think about how many farming acres near cities, including this one, are slated to become housing developments. This is where my daughter rode horse, where our son had his first job working for a neighbor on his nursery, where we started our own nursery business, where birds sang and dogs ran free. Yep, Nostalgia. It's bittersweet.

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.