Blown up

That's how my brain feels this evening. It was a day of struggling with getting ecommerce to work on a friend's website, writing a grant application in a hurry, dealing with a dog whose tummy is not happy for unknown reasons, getting an urgent request for a final draft of something I volunteered to do (didn't know there was going to be a timeline), thinking about my homework for this week, worrying about what I will teach on the Saturday before the Super Bowl and, finally, working a little on the Ivory Tower project.

The neat thing is that I blew up an image of Photo 51 until it was fourteen inches across. It is a grainy image at best but it is still amazing how much more I understand the photo when I see it large. I was able to extract/abstract the important pieces and create patterns for applique.

Time = 49 min

Experiments

I spent a large part of the snow day experimenting with ways to reproduce a photograph. I am working with the critical Photo 51 which was the image that Watson and Crick used to deduce the structure of DNA. I would like to use a direct copy of the picture but it is not in the public domain and has not even been released for non-commercial use. So I need to replicate it in a pleasing way and one which keeps the important elements intact.

I started with some fake dupioni silk from my stash and overpainted several pieces with different combinations of paint and medium to see how the texture was affected. I pinned them all under the dog hair dryer and was able to proceed with the next steps fairly quickly. I wanted to apply a haze of darker specks over the surface. I tried pouncing with Painsticks, flicking with a paintbrush and dabbing with pigment laden medium. Nothing worked to my satisfaction.

I retreated to the computer and read more about the photo. I now have a completely different plan which will require careful applique but won't be subject to the vagaries of 'radnom' paint distribution. It is also a better idea and will convey more meaning in the end. And it lets me justify my weirdly large collection of semi-sheer polyester fabric.


Time = 2 hr, 51 min

Playing with pattern

A side effect of my homework this week.

I might follow this up someday. It would give me an opportunity to play with colourful fabrics since everything else I do is grey.

Challenges

I encountered some interesting challenges today.

I became embroiled in an email exchange about an administrative matter which I think has greater ramifications. It took a lot of work to remain somewhat diplomatic. Only time will tell if I was successful.

Then I had to create a two hour playlist for my Sunday Zone 2 cycling classes. Last week I asked the participants to anonymously list their favourite song and their guilty pleasure song. Today I had to track all of the music down on iTunes and eMusic. It required some detective skills. People don't actually know the titles of many songs and even fewer know the artists. Then I had to organize the very diverse list so that it made sense from a training, emotional flow and musical standpoint. Unfortunately the selections only added up to 105 minutes so I had to add my own choices using the same criteria and a good cool-down selection. Last week they played 'name that tune'. This week we will have the added complexity of naming the 'chooser'.

Then it was on to some work in the studio. I had to make the equivalent of doll's clothes. I don't think I ever had a doll with a wardrobe. I have certainly never constructed tiny outfits before. It was easier than I thad anticipated but still challenging. I have to keep in mind the wear and tear on the art quilt if it is selected by the juror. So far I have made a little dress, figured out how to affix it to the figure with some natural "ease" and determined that it is possible to sew the whole thing down to the background. Next step is to figure out how to create a non-hokey double helix.

Then I worked on the homework for the Jane Dunnewold course. The assignment was to break the rules - not difficult at all for me.II knew what I wanted to do but struggled cutting paper. It's done, though.

Time = 1 hr, 11 min

Back to work

It has been a week of galloping but I have put a lot of responsibilities behind me. I can see the end of one or two others within the week and today is the last day I work with the ringette team. That is another 90 minutes saved every week.

I went back to work on the Ivory Tower piece today. This may not look like much but it is proof of concept and permits me to define the final height of the piece. Two other major steps are dependent on that decision so I am glad to have it done. This also gave me the chance to play with the figures using two different general types and modifying angles etc. I now know what I prefer so that I can draft the final outlines for both the male and female figures. The next step is 'dressing' them and I can use these drafts to play with color and texture.

I did a quick check on colors of Inktense pencils and Neocolor crayons on the Kraft-Tex paper that I will use for the figures. The color never looks the same after water has been applied so it better not to be surprised. I think a combination of two or three of the Neocolor crayons will do the trick for heads, hands and feet.

Time = 2 hr, 43 min

More galloping

My days are consumed by other people's business - an article for the urology nurses' journal, lots of SAQA business and helping with a website. And then there's the course I am taking for myself and the classes I teach, topped off by a two hour class every Sunday night.

All the loose ends are almost tidied up. After Wednesday my time will be more my own. I can't wait. Those Structures pieces are haunting me.

Words to think about

I am taking an on-line course with Jane Dunnewold. Our homework for the first week was a writing assignment. I have selected a few words from what I wrote:

grey
inflexible
rough
polished
armor
complex
shagbark

Those are interesting to me. I don't know where the course will take us but the act of doing that assignment (and several others this week) has already been helpful,