Getting in a groove with #100daysofcollage

So for those of you out there who haven't read my blog before, I just wanted to say welcome, glad you stopped by. You have found me in the midst of the #100dayschallenge where I have dared myself to complete 100 collages in 100-ish days (you can find other participants on Instagram by searching #100days). 

While I am still in the first quarter of this challenge, I thought I would begin to cover some of the basics about my process so far. For starters, the paper. I knew that I wanted to work in a relatively small scale because my studio space is rather small and a lot of artists will tell you that the scale of their work is often informed by the size of their work space. 

This 6x8" pad seemed like it had the perfect dimensions for what I had envisioned. Ideally, I would have purchased Arches paper and cut it down, but I was looking for something more low maintenance. I then made myself a view finder so that I could have a better idea of how my finished piece would look while I'm still in the layout phase.

Here is my rough draft of a collage. I can adjust the layout, change proportions and switch out papers before settling on the final design.

Already, I'm accumulating quite a stockpile of scraps. Think I'll have to start using these up soon before they totally take up my work space!

Any of you big Snap chat fans? I just joined up and am posting there on a somewhat regular basis. I'm rachelloewen with no spaces if you wanted to add me!

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When life gets crazy, I collage

The past nine months have been kinda crazy for my extended family medically speaking. Biopsies, cancer diagnosis, myasthenia gravis, feeding tubes, hospice care, heart transplant, infection, DNR, DNR repeal, DNR again, more biopsies, no cancer but abnormal cells, autoimmune responses, vitreous detachment, and on and on.

This week my grandfather-in-law finally passed away. He was a dearly loved man and left behind an amazing legacy of love and family. We are all taking comfort in the fact that he is no longer in pain and was fully ready for things to end. That being said, is is just hard and sad right now.

As we run around trying to get ready for the 10 hour drive that awaits us, I stepped away to have a little time in my studio to collage. It is what I do when I need to work with my hands and engage color but am a little bit of a mess inside.

What do these textures look like next to each other? How does this color relate to that one? This is my favorite kind of therapy. 

Prints of these and others are available here in my shop. 

What are your favorite creative coping mechanisms? Would love to hear your stories!

In my sketchbook: playing with borders

This is just one of those weeks where I am having difficulty getting any studio time. Sketching time, however, has been much easier to come by. 

(Look how nice and sweet our cat looks! Don't be deceived!! He loves to drool all over my sketches! Yet another reason why I am not much of a cat person.)

I really like to have parts of my designs go off the paper so that it feels like they extend beyond the work itself. Sometimes this can feel kind of awkward as I haven't always got the feel for a shape down before my pen hits the paper. I had the idea this week to draw a border about 1" around my paper so that I could have those initial movements outside the finished piece. 

Then I thought it would be interesting to do two pieces side by side on the same sheet.

After that I tried to see what would happen if I had a piece in the middle overlap both working areas. I already had multiple shapes down so it didn't work so well. 

The next time, I drew two shapes overlapping both work areas. The final design in the left one ended up being significantly stronger than the one on the right. 

Lastly, I kept things simple and had just one shape overlap. That gave me much more freedom to then work on each side individually because I want both sides to be interesting. 

Left side:

Right side:

This whole, "What happens if I try this?" process is what really fuels my creativity. It keeps me from getting stuck in a rut and keeps my curiosity alive!

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In my studio: ink experiments

Last Friday night I was hanging out with my husband when an idea hit me. What would happen if I used a spray bottle on an ink drawing? 

The black ink I draw with would do absolutely nothing because it becomes permanent so quickly, but I had no clue what would happen with my new blue-green ink. 

Well, the result (I thought) was kind of amazing. The amount of bleed was definitely impacted by how close the water bottle was to the paper and the angle that I held the sketchbook. Having watercolor pencils nearby, I added some washes of blue to create depth. 

The next morning I taped down some paper that I thought was watercolor paper (but now am pretty sure isn't) and played around with washes, drips and spraying. The result was nice but different from what I achieved on the watercolor paper. 

This time around I made sure to use the same sketchbook paper from the first time. I had my camera set up to record and take close ups afterwards so you could get a better idea of what I was up to. 

Kinda cool, right? Now I should warn you that I have not made any type of multi-media video since like the fourth grade. Seriously. Fourth grade. I'm not sure which is more shocking, that I was able to figure out how to use an app to add text to my video or that my kids were quiet while I shot it! 

Stay tuned to see where these experiments lead, or if I ever attempt to record again! :-)

In my studio: ten minutes at a time

As a wife and momma, I sometimes long for extended times to spend working in my studio. As Herman Melville wrote in a letter to Nathaniel Hawthorne, " I am so pulled hither and thither by circumstances. The calm, the coolness, the silent grass-growing mood in which a man ought always compose, --that, I fear, can seldom be mine."

This notion that I had to have at least three hours to work if I was going really make art was all fine and dandy when I was young and had fewer responsibilities. Now, that just isn't going to cut it. I would never make anything if that was still a requirement for art making.

Ten to twenty minute spurts are how I seem to best operate now. Washing machine cycle is almost over... Run!! I can glue down those collage pieces before it is finished! 

The kids are about to wake from their naps. Can I get those canvases primed in time? Yes!

Sketching while simmering soup for dinner? Of course!!

The couple of pieces I am currently working on have been made in short increments of time. 

(Still in the beginning phase)

Here's to making it work while still getting on with life's work!!

My process: quilting with paper

So, I thought I would talk a little bit about my process today. Specifically, how I select the papers I use in a particular collage. Most of the papers I use come from magazines because they are convenient and are otherwise headed to the recycling bin!

My stash isn't too big, but I do have the goal in the back of my head that I should try to use it all up by the end of the year. This helps me avoid hanging on to "favorite" pieces or treating them as precious. The second I start being concerned with "ruining" a piece by cutting it up, I know I'm going to get stuck!

So, I'm sitting on my couch with these piles of paper before me thinking, "Where should I start?" The easiest place for me to begin is to grab the first piece that really jumps out at me. Then I start flipping through the stacks pulling out other pieces that I think would go well with that first piece. In the picture below, I started with the page that is on top.

If you are a quilter, you will probably think that this sounds quite a lot like the process you use when pulling fabrics at the store because that is really how I view a collage, a quilt out of paper. 

I try to find an interesting balance between warm and cool colors, semi-solids and patterns and so forth. Sometimes I'm really successful at this and sometimes not so much!

Often I go and pick out paper for multiple collages at once with the intention of doing all the cutting and pasting in the very near future. This has lead to multiple "What was I thinking?" moments when I look back at what I've previously assembled. :-)

Anyway, selecting the papers I'm going to use for a piece is one of if not my favorite part of the process. Would love to know if any of you work this way as well!

Happy making!