Digital Image Transfers

Thanks to my friend Charie from Bad Art Night, I'm now up and running doing digital image prints. She is such a doll - full of good energy and so helpful with all the tips and tricks.

She turned me on to Bonny Pierce Lhotka's new book - Digital Atelier Studio Series, or something like that. I did these image transfers using the special transparencies and hand sanitizer.

Then, I did these using hand sanitizer and regular old photo paper with the ink jet printer.


I'm loving it!

It Stings When Someone Calls Your Activity a "Fad"

I stumbled across a blog post from a local artist, Connie Andrews, that talked about Bad Art Night. You can read the post here.

Connie's post talks about how the term "Bad Art" bothers her and she uses her writing to process through to the conclusion that calling combining the term "bad" with "art" is wrong.

  "Deliberately creating bad art does not "free" you-it locks you into the idea of creating something that you and everyone around you considers substandard.  It locks you into all the negative connotations that are associated with the word "BAD". Its a cheapening of your art and Art in general."

I like that as a fellow artist, Connie is challenging me. She states right in the top of the post that her comments are likely going to be controversial and possibly lose her some students.

And, I feel stung when she says Bad Art Night is a fad and nothing more than a social gathering.

"One last point: Bad Art night is not Art,  its a social gathering.  What's wrong with a social gathering?  Nothing.  But why not gather in the name of good art or Heart and Soul night or something with positive overtones"  

While it is new in Half Moon Bay - only 6 months since we started these meetings, it is more than a social gathering, and it's been going strong in St. Paul MN where artist Laurie Phillips and her writer husband Jon Spayde started BAN more than 16 years ago.  Up to 10-15 artists come every week and I hear one story after another with positive statements about how artists are expanding their horizons:

- Photographers expand into painting and drawing and then see their photography in a new light.

- Fiber artists work now in three dimensions on collaged boxes.

- Mixed media collage artists discover new techniques and ways to express ideas on paper.

- People with no art experience or confidence whatsoever are trying watercolor and collage and experiencing success without the pressure of having to create masterpieces from the get-go.

I welcome Connie to come to Bad Art Night so we can get to know one another and so she can experience it for herself. Meet us fellow artists and try it before concluding "bad" is bad. The last thing in the world we need is for our opinions about art to divide us. For me, art is about collaborating and uniting. Artists and their art are what is going to heal the world.

For Sale!

Currahee by William Daniel McHugh

PJs at Bad Art Night

Tonight we wore pajamas to Bad Art Night. We had such a big crowd - overflowing with people all over the house doing bad art.

Here are the two pieces I completed tonight.

Art Spa Fun

What fun we had at yesterday's Art Spa for the winners from Art in Action's Atelier silent auction fundraiser in March. After a light lunch, we dug into making journal covers and memory boxes using handmade papers and wine bottle labels collected by Denise and Dani in Tuscany. Relaxing, creating, unwinding our minds....perfect way to end the week.

Half Moon Bay Bad Art Night Info

We do Bad Art Night (BAN West) on the 2nd and 4th Friday of every month in Half Moon Bay (HMB).

Here's the 2011 BAN HMB calendar. For information on the location and to be added to the group announcement email list, contact Laura McHugh.

For more information about what BAN is, read this article from Patch Half Moon Bay, January 2011.

Bad Art Night in San Luis Obispo

I was in SLO this weekend for an antique fair. What fun! And, I took a few art supplies so I could do some Bad Art on Friday night while catching a recap of The Royal Wedding. The inn we stayed at had a British influence and they were serving Prince William's cake in the lobby. Yum!

Something Beautiful I Saw Yesterday

And I admit right up front that it is going to be very impressionable on my work.

Kurt Kemp and Marc Perlman collaborated on these drawings/encaustic panels at Aurobora in SF:

Fast Shots Out the Window

I carry my camera with me in the car. I'm usually alone, thus I'm driving. Especially along 280 between San Jose and Hillsborough, there are some really beautiful trees and the green this time of year accentuates their graceful presence.

Here's a shot I took yesterday. Opened the passenger window, stayed in the right-most lane and held up my Canon 40D and pressed the shutter. Hoped for the best.

This photo - unretouched. I didn't even have to straighten it up.

Paper Doll Study - Susie, Sharon, Sally and Sonia

I Want to Work More With Paper Dolls and Playgrounds

Here's a (photoshop) start:

Susie and Bear

Bad Art Night - February 25 2011

I just love Bad Art Night - it is so relaxing. Here's what I created last night.

Look Who Showed Up to Bad Art Night

Kristen, where changes have been made

The couple - he is just so blah, blah, blah

and

Rachael, the Hassidic Jew's daughter

More Funny People

I'm going to be posting my doodles of faces here. I'm working up to being committed to making some "portrait" type art using this method I saw somewhere on-line for drawing better faces.

I doodle the outlines in meetings, then color them with either watercolor or in photoshop.

Here are the first two: the Socialite and The Gym Teacher.

Being Out in the Studio Is Almost As Good As Making Art

This weekend was time for a long-overdue cleaning of the studio. Things have been piling up around my ears since October, when I returned from the Anna Corba workshop and got into that bender of creating things for the December craft faire.

I was in Bellingham and picked up a bunch more exquisite ephemera while there, then we have been doing Bad Art Night and that meant I could justify leaving art materials out because it was just going to be pulled out again in a few days.

Saturday, I just committed to putting a few things away. That quickly turned into everything getting re-stowed, sweeping the floor and tackling a large bag of yarn that my cat-like dogs had tangled together. I was kidding myself to think I was going to rewind these balls. It was difficult to sacrifice yarn to the garbage, but I just couldn't bear to deal with it. The only consolation was that I got a really good deal on the yarn to begin with.

I was rewarded with a spectacular sunset through the top of the garage door windows. Saturday during the day, I used the IKEA tool to design a new studio for the new house. I probably won't paint the walls pink, but it was fun to play with the wall tool.

Bad Art Night Press - Half Moon Bay Review

It's Good to Be Bad

The press on the first West Coast Bad Art Night at my house last Friday night is in and it's good, or is it bad? Because right now, bad is good.

Reporter Stacy Trevenon and staff photographer Lars Howlett did a great job of writing about the first Bad Art Night, in words and pictures. They really got what it is all about, which is the luxury of creating imperfect things and finding the beauty in the mistakes.

I love the quote they included in the box: 

“Some of the best art I’ve ever made has been because there has been an accident. Something unintended: I spilled on a painting, it didn’t go the way I wanted it to — it was exactly what the piece of art needed.”

Claire says I say this all the time. Must be true for me.

First N Cal Bad Art Night

Laura Squared: 365 Photos in 2011: T-Minus 364

Laura Squared: 365 Photos in 2011: T-Minus 364: "Mick Mailboxes Along Miramar Beach Mo Manzanita tree. One of Amanda's nicknames (minus tree)."

1/1/2011 - Photo a Day