After all this thinking about art class, and especially since my calligraphy class takes place in an art classroom, I was inspired to create a new group on Flickr:
http://www.flickr.com/groups/artclass/
If you have any photos of projects you created in art class, feel free to join and share them. 
The other day, I decided to pull out my old art portfolios from college, hidden under the bed and still in the box they were shipped out here from Illinois in. I scanned and photographed a few pieces that I felt were ok enough to share:
This series was done for a design class I took at a community college near where I grew up. The intent of the project was for us to learn how to mix acrylic paint to get the colors we wanted. The pieces are a lot sloppier than I remember them being, but they were the inspiration for the postcards I made earlier this year:
These came out a lot better, and I’d like to try playing around with this theme again sometime. It’s fairly easy to do and it’s a lot of fun to blend all the paints just so, in order to get those gorgeous streaks.
I thought these were perfect for this time of year, and both were done for a drawing class at UIUC, though I don’t remember much else about them. The one on the left was doen in chalk pastels, whereas the one on the left was done in oil pastels.
Finally, these are two shots of a collage piece I created for a drawing class at the same community college, one with flash and the other without so that you can see the full piece and still get the effect of it. This was a still life, done by tearing bits of magazine pages and adhering them to a background with gel medium, which was also used to create the lovely varnished effect over all of it. I remember really having a good time with this, especially for how it felt to tear all the bits of paper up, and then for the effect of using these fragments to create a larger image. It got a bit messy with all the gel medium, but it was fun to work on.
It was weird looking through all of these and the rest of the pieces (mostly hideous) in my portfolio, mainly because it feels like I worked on them an eternity ago (8 years now), but also because I never did pursue a degree in an art or design field. Not that these pieces were all for naught, of course, because I did enjoy working on a lot of them, even if they didn’t turn out as well as I wanted them to.
I think that’s enough time down memory lane for now though…
I went to the rubber stamp show in San Jose this morning, as planned, and it was pretty good. It seemed like they had fewer vendors there than in previous years, but there were still enough to check out.
What’s funny is that I didn’t buy a single rubber stamp, aside from some mini pre-inked hanko-style stamps from Japan. There were a lot of nice ones, especially the new acrylic-style stamps, but nothing that I just had to have. Instead, I bought stickers, origami papers, blank postcards, a glue pen that looks like a normal gel pen, and some neat shiny glaze that you put over regular gel pen writing to create a raised effect. Definitely enough new stuff to play with.
I was also very pleased to find a larger number of envelope templates available, at least from a company called Draggin’ Ink. They had the basic “square-velopes” that they started with, but there were also templates for making bags, boxes, expandable envelopes, and other cool stuff. I didn’t feel enthused enough to buy any of them, but maybe another time. Judikins had a few for sale as well, but I think I already had them all. 
Here are a few stamp-related links to leave you with:
Just a quick note to say that you can now read my blog via your LiveJournal friends list if you’d like. You can find the RSS syndication feed for it here:
I’ve been furiously working on my major cross-stitch project lately, thus the lack of posts here. I screwed up an even larger section of it, accidentally doing it all two “squares” over, but I’ve ripped all that out and redone it. I’m not sure if I’ll get it done in time to send it as a gift, especially since I’ll have to get it framed, but we’ll see. I’ll try to post a photo of it soon.
I started a calligraphy class last week, though the first meeting didn’t go so well. I arrived a bit late, due to parking problems, and by the time I caught up, I still felt very behind. A good percentage of the other students have been practicing calligraphy for awhile, whereas I only dabbled with it when I was younger. There are 7 sessions left though, and since they’re already paid for, I figure I should at least give it another try. I bought the additional supplies I needed, and even found some pink ink to play with.
I’ve also been trying to get involved in more crafty events, including the local craft group I found through Craftster. At our last meeting, we even talked about meeting more frequently, and will be gathering at a local restaurant for a “cake and crafts” evening. If you’re in the South SF Bay/San Jose area, please check out our new email list for info.
There’s also a rubber stamp show going on in downtown San Jose this weekend, and I’ve already bought a day pass for that. I’ve gone to a few of the previous ones organized by this company, and the businesses that set up booths there usually have some nice stuff for sale. I don’t usually buy rubber stamps themselves, but the papers, especially origami ones, are great and there are usually demos of various products to check out. More info on this show here.
Copyright © 2005-2010 Valerie Franek
