A Mixed-Media Face in 18 Ingredients
I was asked recently during a Mixed-Media Faces How-to virtual workshop, “Okay, so we made a basic face with our pencil, but how do we make it ‘mixed media’?” Great question! Answer: Add everything you want and then a bit more… Really! And so we did. From floral repurposed paper napkins and scrap paper with mathematical calculations that inspired tissue paper with bold, graphic numbers to pink markers and pink paint for cheeks, a little show & tell about eyelashes, and all the possible supplies we could use – our group gabbed, shared notes and shared projects. With a few minutes left in our session that evening, everyone shared and…
Blackout Poetry: Finding Stories in the Words
Imagine looking at a page full of words and seeing a story begin to appear. That’s what happens with blackout poetry. It’s the story you tell from the words already told… mostly. Let me show you what I mean…. Here’s how to create your own blackout poetry: Gather your supplies: a page from a book, newspaper, or magazine a permanent marker – might be black, but doesn’t have to be a pencil maybe a pair of readers – some of us need them! 🙂 your imagination and curiosity Next, scan the page for cool words. Blackout (fancy word: redact) the words you won’t use. But, wait! Before you commit to…
They’re Back!
The voices, that is. Finally! Â NOTE:Â I started this blog post on February 7, 2016, but never shared it. Not sure why not(?), but here it is…. celebrating the return of the voices in my head. What an awesome feeling it was! Â Feb 2016:Â If you’ve followed this blog for a while, you know that I suffered through a long spell of silence in my head as I struggled through difficult personal and professional changes over the past year. The silver lining was finding other ways to express me, namely mixed-media art. But as I created art, I longed for the voices to return… While that may sound…
COVID-19 and Staying Connected
How did we get to this strange and unfamiliar place in our history? I remember reading about pandemics in high school in the early ’80s. It was a vague concept in which a lot of people got sick and died. During those times, the sickness took over. Now here we are. 2020. By all accounts, the numbers of death and sick are rising daily. How do we wrap our heads around that fact? That in 2020, we do not have the supplies and medicines to protect lives. How do we stay connected in this time of ‘social distancing’? Will this new focus on our homes and families change how we…
Read. Think. Sleep. Repeat.
Do you read? A lot? A little? Not at all? Many people I know, do not. Or do very little. Or do only for daily tasks (e-mails, road signs, contracts, notes from kids’ school, etc…). But wait. You’re reading this. Just sayin’…. According to Mr. Warren Buffett, reading a lot helps make us smarter. My takeaway when I read his advice is this: Reading often (and varied) gives us an advantage because we can oftentimes use that information in new ways as we piece different ideas, opinions, or facts together to form new ideas, opinions, or possibly – facts. This is the essence of creativity: making something new out of…
