EL CORAZON SHOW: BATH HOUSE CULTURAL CENTER

Noli Me Tangere is out on display again at the El Corazon show in Dallas, TX.

The opening rececption is Feb. 4 at the Bath House Cultural Center on White Rock Lake and I am thrilled to be showing with Rebecca again.

521 E. Lawther Drive

Dallas, TX 75218

7-9PM  Free and open to the public!

This is the 18th annual El Corazon show curated by Jose Vargas.  This is one of those popular art shows that has an almost cult following.  Stop by and see all the heart art by talented local artists.  You will be glad you did.

My Plan / Tres Milagros 2013

I woke this morning with a very clear plan for the works I will do this next year in preparation for the 2013 show. I had originally thought I would do fewer larger works however I have scrapped that idea and decided I will do the opposite. I am going to work small, nothing larger than 8 x 8 … unless it is a large project composed of many smaller works.

4 quarters … 4 themes:
I am going to work within themes, and I will do one subject per quarter …. all body parts. I have the first 3 subjects chosen: hands, hearts, eyes. I am going to think very briefly about what these symbols mean to me and then I will study them a wee bit throughout art history and see what universal meanings I can find.

My challenges and assignments:
Working small, 4 x 4 or even smaller with trading card size it is tempting to go into production mode and think small size equals quick work that will sell. If I go at it that way I will soon feel like a machine and the joy of making things will evaporate. So instead of thinking about it that way I will be giving myself creative assignments with each batch of work. Maybe one month I will focus on using non traditional mosaic materials, fiber, plastic, metal. Maybe one month I will focus on really letting the drawing aspect of my work shine through. The goal with these smaller works will be to experiment and push myself creatively. Having a simple subject to focus on each quarter of the year will allow me to really explore process, materials and getting outside my comfort zone.

Benefits to working small:
I know scale is a very impressive thing, however by working small I will be allowing myself room in the year for other non-show projects, and that is very important to me this next year. Having these small milagros and simple subjects waiting for me each month means that if I ever do fall into a small creative slump throughout the year, I can surface from it by choosing the discipline of working on my small simple yet wonderful Milagro projects.

Meaning Versus Process:
The mosaics I did for this last show were very much about meaning in my work, and meaning in my life. It would be impossible to make works for a Milagro themed show that do not have a great deal of meaning behind them. This year I will allow those meanings to creep in however they may. I will not for example make each milagro a specific prayer for a specific person, it may end up that some will be very specific in nature, however I really want to focus on experimentation and on process. I am going to allow the meaning to evolve organically and not worry about it being the driving factor in my creating. By placing meaning in the backseat, and focusing on process I really do believe I can get to a deeper level with my work.

A Resource:
My first resource to utilize will be the Creative Arts Center. I will be taking different classes this year to create things that I will use in my mosaic works. Clay or metal enamled hands? Yea baby… 2012 is looking very fun!

Cool Cuff & Stuff

Playing on-line today. I have added a couple of new links to the resource page.

I really love some of the stuff over at Santos Cage Doll like these porcelain hands.

 

I am also still very enamored with the Etsy shop Tesoromexicano out of Austin. They do not have any milagro supplies, but they do offer great dod jewelry and milagro inspired jewelry too…. like the cuff below.

The site kbuenovintage.com has some great vintage Taxco Jewelry.

“Murmer”

Wow, a whole month and no posts, well we are done after all, or almost anyway. We still need to hook up and finish the community project. I suppose we girls should figure out what will become of the blog in between Tres Milagros shows. I am sure the New Year will bring new Milagro projects for us all to post about, I hate to let the blog sit for too long even though our next group show will not happen until 2013.

Today I started designing a small anatomical heart project that I may finish in time to enter into El Corazon. As I was glueing my paper down to my board I realized I needed to finish out some commitments to the last show before I enter a new one and so I finally sat down to write out a check for commissions to the City of Dallas. Yay, that felt very good. I will place that in the mail today to the center. Below is the design work for my next mosaic project. It is going to be called Murmer. It is 5 x 18, an odd fun size.

Apryl, you need to try and get out to see the Gaultier exhibit at the DMA when you get home from your travels.  Kat & I went last week with Joyce and the fashions were loaded down with metal Milagros. Katrina was excited to even see an internal organs Milagro on one gown. It is a very cool show and I can’t wait to go again. I think my favorite pieces were the anatomical body suits. The 4rth or 5th slide in the video below shows the muscle suit.

Thanks!

We are honored our show has been extended.  If you did not get a chance to come out and work on the Community Mosaic Project with us, I am setting up a table for you to still make a paper milagro for the mosaic.  Draw a simple milagro on the supplied paper and we will add your piece to the project.  All paper milagros will be protected by a layer of glass in the fashion of Rebecca’s work.  Thank you for attending the show, for all your great comments and prayers of gratitude, and for your support.  We appreciate every bit of it.

Paper Milagros for the Community Mosaic

Shot a few sold works

Today I shot the sold works that had not yet been shot and I will take them back down to the gallery later this afternoon. I will contact my clients today and let them know I can meet with them anytime between now and show close for them to pick up their works or they can pick them up on strike day once we have that planned. Hopefully most folks will want to let them continue through show close. I have purchased art a few times from gallery shows and I know how long the wait seems to take sometimes. I feel so fortunate to have people purchasing my work and supporting the arts in general.

In the slide show below are just a few of the sold works, a couple by Apryl, and a couple by me.

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YAY Encore!

Yesterday we were asked to extend the show 2 more weeks! So the 3 of us showed up at the center today and celebrated the fact that we have sort of been given an encore. Nobody was holding lighters in the air like at a concert, but we met with the new manager of the center  and we agreed to extend the show until December 2nd. YAY…. so anyway,  I’m calling it an Encore! Thanks so  much Rafael.

Evidently the show traffic has been great and there has been much interest in it. We took a few of the sold pieces home to photograph for the book we are doing next year and we will be contacting the owners to see if they want to pick them up now or allow them to continue to be on display throughout the duration of the show extension.

Apryl & Katrina and I  went and had some snacks and a glass of wine afterwards to celebrate and reconnect a bit. What a lovely afternoon with the girls. I shot some video that I will try to upload soon.

Tres Milagros Winding Down

I can’t believe that the show is closing this next Saturday. It seems like yesterday that we were scrambling to finish our projects. Last Saturday we worked on the community project with a terrific group of people that came out to play with us. The image above is the sky that evening. I really learned so much with this show, and the folks at the Oak Cliff Cultural center were so wonderful to work with.

One thing I learned a lot about with this show is the power of  “Titling” your work. Some projects named themselves and yet sometimes I found myself struggling with names for my work. One of my most personal works was titled ” My Mother Sends Me Redbirds” and it was one of those projects that was very easy to title. I have had so many people tell me stories about their Mothers or Fathers or best friends sending them birds. The title was an entry point into the work and really an entry point into a deeper connection with my viewing audience. I am humbled and honored that people were able to share their own experiences with me the way that they have.

Today I looked on the web for information on titling your artwork  and found a rather goofy tool for “auto generated titles“check it out …  http://noemata.net/pa/titlegen/.
I played with the auto tool a few times and found a phrase I liked “Peacock Denouncing a Briefcase”. I have no idea how the algorithms or whatever spit out titles and you have no way of giving it input.  It is a fun little gizmo, but I don’t think I will be using it for my titles.

I have a list below for further web reading on the subject of Titling Your Art:

http://www.artbizblog.com/2010/06/titles.html
http://drawsketch.about.com/cs/tipsandideas/a/namingdrawings.htm
http://lisapressman.blogspot.com/2009/06/how-do-you-title-your-paintings.html
http://fosterbk.wordpress.com/2010/02/08/titling-your-art/

Community Project Notes

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Last Saturday we started on a mosaic community project at the Oak Cliff Cultural Center. We are creating the center’s logo in mosaic and adding in some paper Milagros under glass. I say “we” however we are just there to help as the visitors to the center are doing all the work so far. Well that is not totally accurate, Katrina organized the materials and the basic design while Apryl did a lot of pre-cutting. I got the cartoon image transferred on to the board. Now we get to sit back and watch as other people discover the joy of piecing together a mosaic. Everyone that placed tiles down did such a great job, they were fast and really good at keeping a consistent look to the tile placements. I was very impressed.

Katrina does this sort of community work all the time however it is my first one to be a part of and it is really exciting. I was asking Kat about her fancy silver trays that she placed some of the pre-cut tile in and she says whatever it takes to jazz up the experience and get people hooked on Mosaics. I love that.

We will be at the center again on Saturday the 12th from 4:00-6:00 for anyone that wants to come out and play and help us finish up this fun project that we will be leaving with the center.

Special thanks to Juli Hulcy for the use of her sand-blaster!

A few more gallery shots

Well we are about one week away from the community Milagro project at the center. The 30 x 30 cradle board arrived for that project last week.  It seems so long ago that the show opened. I have been hearing from a few people that have made it by recently and the responses have been great.  I hope to get back over to the gallery soon to do some better photography shots, but for now I will post a few images from opening night. I have started a new mosaic project using some of my photography from Italy. It is a large work that will take a few months to complete.

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