Nostalgia: Where We Come From

Hands down favorite nostalgic toy: Fashion Plates.

I was  reminded of this wonderfully creative (let's not dissect all the cultural/gender connotations that could be applied) toy that I had growing up while Jo and I were watching Season Seven of Project Runway (burlap sacks, but that's another post).   

Basically Fashion Plates consisted of different templates divided into torso, legs, and heads.  One could mix and match each part to create an exponential varity of looks.  There were tennis skirts!  There were bell bottoms! There were leg warmers! There was Farrah Faucet hair!  This was the early eighties, after all.  The templates were then covered in paper and rubbed in charcoal (think the process you use on old gravestones), with colored pencils to finish the designs.

 OH! How I wish I had the Fashion Plates now- I would incorporate them seamlessly into my collages.

After finding this picture of a set online- I am amazed at how much this toy has influenced my aesthetic.  If you don't see the connection- just look at "Flocking Together Can Be Over Rated."  The line quality, the pouty lips, the suggested features, the hairstyle.  Wow.  This is where she came from.  If anyone sees a set at a yard sale- will you please pick it up for me?  I will pay you back.

Eat your Heart out, Tim Gunn.

When In Doubt, Clean it out.

just starting this one for next week's first friday...

view from Cyr's snowboard

I cleaned my studio on Tuesday.  Recycled probably forty pounds of magazines that I had strip mined for collage material.  Uncovered work I hadn't touched since October.  Moved my desk from one side of my cubicle to another.  Started re-cataloging scraps of paper.   Then I got to spend Wednesday up at the mountain under blue-bird skies.  Maybe it was the sunshine, or the spine-rattling splat I took, but my brain feels more uncluttered and ready for art.  And now, back to work.

started in October, need to get back to it.

a short yogic intermission

full pigeon, my absolute favorite.

Last Saturday, I competed in the Oregon Hatha Yoga Championships.  Competition and Yoga? Sounds odd, I know.  I trained to compete last year, but didn't end up going as I was out of town.  This year, I started working on the routine of seven poses in late October.  About twelve people from the Bend Bikram Yoga studio practiced intensely for the last two months, and each of us deepened our practice in incredible ways.  One of our teachers, Delana Miller, came in third place at the competition.  I don't know my score, or how I placed among the almost fifty other women, but the rewards of focusing so much on my practice and sharing that with some amazingly supportive and dedicated people was what made being on a cold stage for three minutes in a leotard in front of about a hundred people worth it.

standing bow and bow

upward stretching

Beautiful Losers

About twenty people gathered at the PoetHouse last night for a screening of the documentary Beautiful Losers.   It makes me want to go live in the studio...

we drive east to find art

Jo, Cyr and I went on another art drive today, first stopping by a pedestrian tunnel near Pilot Butte, then heading east on Highway 20.  Jo and Cyr had gathered a gold star-shaped mylar balloon to use as a prop, as well as an old lamp and a vintage suitcase.  I captured quite a few photos that I am going to use as references for collages, the mood both whimsical and lonesome.

I don't know what it is about these drives, we find the oddest things.  Driving through the badlands we came upon a huge pile of cinder that ODOT must use to salt the roads.  The ruddy color against the stormy sky was beautiful, scrambling to the top of the pile was rewarding.   Along the same stretch of BLM land we found an abandoned tiny play house, still filled with toys.   A gift left by superstitious ranchers to some feral child who was being raised by wolves, I imagine.

A Wall.

Wahhh. Wahh. Wahhhh. Wahhhh....


I don't want to create tonight.  I am sitting in the studio, scissors staring at me, this piece staring at me.  I started it in July.  It's January.

There are ways to get around this wall.  I know it. Bust through, perhaps.

There is an artist named Tom Friedman, who is very conceptual.  Sometimes he is a smartypants.  Or he was a few years ago, anyway.  I saw a show back in 2001 at the New Museum of Contemporary Art in New York that was full of his works that were hilarious and infuriating at the same time.  One was a piece of artists paper, framed and mounted to the wall.  It was blank.  The title and medium:  1000 Hours of Staring.  Yep.   I know how it feels, buddy.  

See Shells

Cyr has been collecting egg shells for a while, with the intent of using them in a still life.  In a speedy shoot this afternoon, we drove up Skyliner to a deep patch of snow with the eggs and the following props:

• gold embroidery floss
• an old fashioned scale
• paper cranes made by her friend Kate out of tea bags
• old photos of her grandmother
• tiny fake apples
• a rosery
• some greenery
• a wishbone from a Christmas game hen

Unfortunately, Cyr had to rush to work before we could look at the outcome of this silly little shoot.  I am enjoying being her assistant these days.  I have been keeping a Moleskin in my pocket (thanks mom and dad) when we go "on location" in order to write down the flood of ideas that come up.  Sometimes, I get a little, well, cheesy.  What if we wrote fortunes for the eggs, like fortune cookies?  What if we took a marker and colored the cracked edges?  What about this heart-shaped confetti I brought?  One idea leads to another, to another, to another, to another.  Not all are successful, but that's part of it.  I may not be spending much time with scissors or brush in hand lately, but ideas are fermenting.

It is interesting to view another person's creative process, observing the value systems in an artist's inner eye: Cyr composes her shots from a complex place, one that has immediacy, like juggling.  She thinks in black and white, in color, and in light (as I'm sure many of my photographer friends do) all at once; sometimes I feel like I am getting a tutorial in image making by accompanying her.

Make a Little Art Every Day

Cyr called me after I got out of New Year Yoga yesterday.

"I've decided today is the first day of the rest of our lives, or however Bright Eyes says it.  I'm picking you up."

It had been a few weeks since we had been on an Arting Outing (I'm still looking for a proper name for what we do when we wander around and find things we think are pretty).  The sky was gorgeous East of town, and we felt fine.   Alfalfa lead to Powell Butte to Redmond to the Peterson Rock Garden, and back to Bend.  There was an animal theme to the drive, animals with sweet eyes and curly hair we found amusing and anthropomorphic.  They tolerated two silly girls and the tripod quite well.

While I gathered ideas, Cyr gathered some amazing images.

Day one of the rest of our lives.  Day one of creating/gathering.