2011 Collected & 2012 Began - Part 1

Cole Here - I am a self-confessed planner.  I love to look back and collect those things I loved about the last year & begin the new year with a vision-casting session for myself.  This is the start of a multi-part series on refocusing your art in 2012

I have spent a lot of time thinking, praying and talking through my art goals.  I believe it is one of the reasons I am as productive as I am.  Smash (hubby) said something to me this year that helped me focus - "climb up a coconut tree every so often and see if you are still going in the direction you chose, then hit the ground and go powerfully in that direction!"

• UFO's - to continue, to set free or to return to stash as a cuttable piece.  Let it go with grace!
• Successes - I love to Collect all my art successes on one journal page - it always makes me feel great.
• Learning I want to continue to incorporate into my work - do you have techniques that you just plane forget to do, even though you love it?  I have a technique page in the back of my art journal that I fill with successful techniques.  Just to keep track of them. I flip to it when I am stuck on a painting.
• I have a few learning binders where I put articles I want to keep.  I also try to flip through and purge these at this time.

More tomorrow.... Squirt is up!

ARTIST TOOLS - Dover Images

Dover Pubulications - http://store.doverpublications.com

If you haven't poked around on this website yet - go do it! I often check out Dover books from the library and I even own a few books. I love this resource for artists.

How I use the images~

• I love taking the old architecture images and pulling out details to inspire stamps & stencils. I like to tweak the image to my liking. I often make both a stencil and a stamp so I can use the images both in the positive & the negative.
• Sometimes practice my drawing skills by copying images
• Use patterns in my rug hooking. Often I am trying to find interesting border patterns for rugs I hook.

Here is an image of the favorite rug I have done so far. I call it a celtic family rug.

From the Library - The Book of Kells

The Book of Kells: Reproductions from the Manuscript in Trinity College Dublin, ©1974

Secret of Kells project continued ~

This is a beautiful book that I flipped through then more intentionally sat and took out my sketchbook and here are the results. Very little of this could be considered copies. This is meant to be more of homage to the book itself, than a copy. I am always trying to bend drawings to make sure I can then use those in my original artwork.

· HHistory of the Manuscript - Said to be of the Early Middle Ages, it is a Gospel Text, in Latin long lines, written on calf vellum, the age of the pages had a beauty to them, I loved the stitching that is visible in the high res plates in the book. Quills were the tools for both the text & illuminations. Other tools they were thought to have - rulers, set-squares, compasses, and early french curves. Housed in Trinity College in Dublin (Check Dublin just got a star next to it in my travel journal).

I loved the illuminated Celtic beginnings, knot work and crazy creatures. It is a stunning achievement of precision craftsmanship.

INSPIRATION FOR THE FLAGS~ I put an alphabet together to work on the prayer flags… loosely based on the text in the book of Kells.

Tomorrow the St. John’s Bible – Yummy book.

Secret of Kells inspiration- peek into my sketchbook

After watching the movie a lot... I have been sketching with Kells on the brain. Here r some of my sketches from the movie. Tommorow I will share the book of Kells...