2012/365 - Day 18

another Experimental Art Night

I got this note from Shaqe Kalaj regarding the upcoming Experimental Art Night class at Art & Ideas Gallery in Plymouth, MI:

I am excited to offer the 3D class that I have been waiting to offer. I just received the supplies for this Tuesday. We will be using assemblage in order to make a 3 dimensional object. I have a vision for this project is to do a group installation with these works. Come and experience it. You will use a particular kind of creativity that I will explain on Tuesday. The class is from 7-8:30pm and is $17. Please let me know by 7pm tomorrow night (Monday) to reserve your spot.

I thought, "well...I haven't participated in the last few Experimental Art Nights and I like 3D and assemblage so I think this sounds pretty cool." My friend Ruth and I both decided to take the class.

Although it turned out to be not quite how I would define assemblage, it was kind of entertaining. Mine turned into an exercise in forced patience.

We were given the words "build" and "gravity" and all we could use were popsicle sticks and Elmer's glue. Then we were directed to defy gravity and build whatever we wanted to while trying solve the problem of making the structure get as vertical as possible. Shaqe is planning on making some sort of installation with all of the pieces done by students of her classes.






Shaqe with an example while explaining the process.
















Shaqe with another of her younger student pieces (she is listening to Kate talk about cantilever.)














the materials














I decided to try to get mine to grow vertically with as little visible support as possible. The glue works pretty quickly and I was surprised that the walls would stand up as they did.

I glued four sticks together side by side and added one more on top of the flat section in a diagonal so that it touched each piece in one small spot.




The forced patience came in the waiting for the glue to set up. It will dry clear(er).

I had to use a palette knife to slide underneath the flat glued sections to keep them from sticking to the paper on the surface of the table. Sometimes that would loosen all of the pieces and I would be forced to wait it out until the glue set up enough to move the section.




I wanted my piece to be three walls and have it be open on the fourth side so that you'd be able to walk around the walls and come inside on the open end (provided you were tiny enough to see this as a tall wall). It isn't a fort, it isn't a barricade or corral, it is just a sort of wall/structure that is open ended.

Everyone had such a different approach to working with the materials and concept:



Kate's piece


















Nancy's piece
















Sandra's piece













Ruth's piece














Another view of Ruth's piece -- she was going for a sort of house you might see in California with lots of decks and windows.













Another view of Kate's piece, with Nancy's in the background. Both of their structures cast really great shadows.












My completed piece. I don't think I need/want to make it any taller than it is. I accomplished what I set out to do and I am happy with it.

If I tried it again, I would go even slower and try not to use as much glue. The class session was from 7 - 8:30 -- I think we all got an impressive amount of work done in a short amount of time.










Yep -- that is plenty tall enough (for my liking) for materials of that size.

365 Day 263

another Experimental Art Night with Shaqe Kalaj

Whoa -- that was a F*U*N Experimental Art Night at Art & Ideas Gallery in Plymouth with Shaqe Kalaj.

If you know me, you know how much I dislike ANYthing to do with acrylic paint and painting.
This was pretty cool, though, and I am sure a lot of it will carry over to other projects.

We had to choose one of the shapes on the table that Shaqe made for us, then mix six little pots of paint for ourselves only using red, white and blue.




These are the shapes we had to choose from.

There were four of us tonight and I wanted the others to pick first. You know I wanted that black arrow one.






Yay -- it was one of the two that were left!

Shaqe said she had me in mind when she was making it.

At first glance it looked to me like a weather vane, then an ornate hand of a clock...then what it turned out to be.





It was cool -- the paint was in big pump bottles like ketchup and mustard at a serve yourself place.
















These are the colors I mixed up...I couldn't figure out how to make the paint get darker...I really wanted a dark, dark, blackish purple color.


We were also allowed to use plain white that was on the table and we were allowed to use the paint we mixed and mix new colors on the little palette/tray.









With the shapes, we were to draw whatever we felt like, using as much or as little of the shape as we wanted. We could freehand draw, use a part of the shape, expand the shape, trace the shape -- do whatever we were inspired to do.


I traced my shape's outline first.




Then I added parts to it, repeated parts, etc. I freehanded the bird's head and the ball.












Then we had to paint the picture.

I needed more colors, so I mixed tiny amounts with the brush and kept trying to get it darker, but it wouldn't. It just changed the purple-ness.














One of the last purples I mixed up on the tray.














Taa-daa...my finished piece.

It is a long-legged bird with a colorful tail balancing on a ball. He's got a circus act and he is just coming offstage by rolling the ball forward. That is a set of sheer curtains he is rolling through. I think this guy is probably really, really tall.












detail of the face










detail of the tail --

I was trying to make each section a slightly different color, hoping it would look a little like the feathers were in front of each other.

I would've outlined each one with the dark dark purple if I'd had it. I could probably still do that or use black at home.





detail of the body











Shaqe showing one of the other pictures and the shape...the shape is dark green underneath the picture.











Here is another one...the shape is dark blue.













Here is another one and her shape.










And there is mine with the black shape.










You KNOW I would never ever try and mix colors at home on my own, let alone sit down and play with paint...but I will do it at Experimental Art Night with Shaqe Kalaj! And now I feel just a little bit more confident about trying it on my own. I am sure this will come in handy somewhere down the road...

365 Day 228

another experimental art night at Art & Ideas Gallery!

This is the message we got from Shaqe Kalaj about the theme for tonight's Experimental Night:

"This Experimental night is one where I will ask you to probe your seeing. You will be given initial drawings that will be incomplete. Your task is to see something in them and then create. This experience will develop your seeing and problem solving ability, while bringing out your inner images. I often do this work in my surrealism classes."

Yeah. I was "in" -- no question about it!

We started out by Shaqe showing us a partial drawing...just a few lines...and she asked us what we thought it could be. Then she drew in a little more, based on what we were saying. Pretty much everyone said it looked like a horse...or a person. Then she drew a little more and I thought it was looking like a mailbox. She added more lines to suggest a mailbox. We went back and forth a few more times and the drawing ended up like in the photo.

mailbox horse






Shaqe added a couple more lines without looking at what she was doing.







Then Shaqe showed us her sketchbook. The drawing looked quite similar to something she was working on.


























Next Shaqe explained that she took us through that exercise because we were all going to collaborate with her. She had a stack of partially started images and we were to choose one and without knowing what it was or what it was supposed to be, we were to finish the drawing.







I was grabby and snatched this one right away because I could see a guy with a crown in it.
















I don't know WHERE the rabbit came from...you already know I'm afraid of rabbits. Well, okay wait...the rabbit came from the pointy line off to the left of the guy.

When/if we got stuck or thought we were "done" we had the option to scribble/draw without looking...so I did that at the top left of my drawing. I started to get some sort of horned spirit creature from the random lines.

Then we went around the table and talked about our drawings and people said what else they could see in the various drawings. Then we had a few more minutes to go back in and add more details and "finish" the piece. Then we discussed all of the drawings.





Here is a scan of my drawing from tonight. It looks like the guy's ear fell off and now there is a hole into his head. So I added a loose ear behind him that is just sort of flying around. The flying horned creature reminds me of a goat-ish version of a kirin from Magic: the Gathering.

I think I might want to take one of Shaqe's suggestions for a work-around to give the guy his ear back...maybe...I don't know yet.




Then I got up to go get a glass of water. Much to my dismay when I returned to the table what do you think was there?


duh duh duh duuuuuuh...the dreaded paints!

Actually, I don't hate painting at Experimental Night as much as I hate painting in my studio. Like painting my plaster cloth guys.

It is like I have no self-imposed pressure on what I am expecting of myself, so I just go with the flow of the class. At home with the plaster cloth guys I have a vision in mind of what I want them to look like and I just do NOT have the skills set to achieve it.

There were also some colored pencils and twistable crayons available.

Next we were given a choice of mostly completed images. There was a bird, a guitar, a dog-like guy that I was immediately drawn to -- he kinda looked like he could be from that animated Yellow Submarine movie. There were a few other images, but also this eye. (I forgot to shoot it before I started to color it.)

It is funny...I love it when synchronicity happens. Earlier today I was wrestling with the "what the heck is a landscape and when does a picture of say, a horse in a field, stop being a landscape of a field with a horse in it and become a picture of a horse...in a field"? And I tried to imagine something else more specific. And I was thinking of those tall grasses I photographed earlier this morning (in day 227's blog entry) and I was thinking how about if there was a tiger in tall grasses in the moonlight. Would that be a landscape or would that be a picture of a tiger in the grass? And then I drifted to thinking of just a tiger's eye in the dark sky over tall grasses.

Okay. I saw the eye picture was one of the choices. And I was trying very hard not to be grabby on the second round of choosing images to work with. Plus...you know I wanted that dog creature. But I was thinking "don't go for something you would normally do" -- which would be the dog creature. We were down to the last two of us to choose and the dog creature and the eye were still available. Man! The other participant told me to choose and I was still wrestling with the "do no take the dog...do the eye...how weird is it that it is even there" thing...so I chose the eye. Then it turned out she was going to choose the eye but she ended up with the dog creature and made a really cool picture of the dog creature in an outfit and a clown and they are both like racing toward the clown's rainbow wig/hat that was on the ground and you can't tell who is going to get to it first. MUCH cooler than what I would have done with it. I felt badly about the eye, though. But it all worked out I guess.


So then Shaqe was taking pictures of us working at the end of the session. I think I was done already. And I like taking photos of people taking photos...so there you go.












And here is my synchronicity piece...AND it is done in paint. Except for the very inner eye part. I started it with colored pencil, but went back over it with paint...but the pupil looked good with the "lemon yellow" colored pencil...which looked like it should have been chartreuse by the color of the pencil, but it turned out to actually be lemon yellow. (Obviously that little bit threw me for a minute or two when I was first starting...LOL)

So what we have here is a moon with a tiger eye in it shining over tall grasses -- that I am calling "tiger grass" because of the markings. Kind of like zebra grass, but this is tiger grass. And now to answer my own question...no, I don't think this is a landscape.

Synchronicity is pretty cool -- sometimes a little alarming -- but for the most part really great. And I wouldn't have tried making a picture about it and for sure I wouldn't have drawn the eye that well.


SO -- Another great Experimental Art Night with Shaqe Kalaj at Art & Ideas Gallery in Plymouth. I can't wait for the next one!

365 Day 200

Experimental Art Night at Art & Ideas Gallery with Shaqe Kalaj

Wow -- what a blast! Can you imagine ME drawing, and shading and then --
* gasp * -- painting, and with color?!?!

At tonight's Experimental Art Night the theme was micro drawing. I had no clue but I really love the relief printmaking class I am currently taking at Art & Ideas, and I enjoy taking classes and meeting other local artists and trying stuff...so yeah -- I was "in"!

Shaqe gave all of us a sheet of archival card stock. Then she gave us all the same enlarged detail of a photograph...enlarged enough so that you couldn't tell what it was. She had us give our impressions of what we saw, what it might be, the textures, the shapes, etc.













Then we made a frame on the paper and started to draw the basic shapes of what we saw...then we began focusing mainly on the changes in the shading and the light vs dark, the positive/negative areas, etc.



Look -- I initially thought I had copied the picture pretty well...but I only had 4 triangle-shapes at the bottom instead of 5...LOL.










I picked up mostly on the way the light area to the bottom left of the detail looked to me like a bird coming out from behind branches and a rock or something.

I tried really hard to keep a light hand and make a difference in the shades and just stop trying to figure out what the big picture was. That was very difficult for me. After a while I started to let go of thinking and just colored...then my hand started getting graphite-y and I found I could smear the colors...LOL...so I did.

I forgot to mention there were five of us plus Shaqe.

Next we looked at all of our drawings and discussed everyone's individual and different take on the task. Everyone was so successful but so unique!

Then Shaqe had us put the drawing aside and give back the detail/reference picture. She told us we were going to paint a new version from our drawing...again, focusing on the shapes and shading...but using COLOR and PAINT...yikes!

There were so many choices and colors -- I was a little panicky. I knew there was nothing for it, but to just do it. I tried to make the paint act as watercolor-y as I could. I wet the paper, I put just a dot of color on and tried to do a wash...hoping the paint would shade itself. How was I supposed to choose colors that would go together? How was I supposed to give colors to something I'd only seen as grays?

After I fought with the paint for a bit and realized it was going to win, not me, I gave in and just started playing more with the color I was most drawn to. I decided I would start with what sort of worked for me in the drawing -- we couldn't draw lines first...we just had to paint directly onto the paper. So I did the same thing as with the drawing...tried to let go of my iron grip ideas and just try and paint the bird.


The more I let go, the better it got. I found I could keep going back and layering on color(s). There are about 4 layers of green(s) on the dark parts and a really light green is the light part. While I was working on it, I was really disappointed with the lines and eye -- but after I was done I decided it was a part of the bird, not a literal copy of the lines from the drawing...so I began to like it.

I couldn't get the yellow-y color to go dark enough and there were lots of colors within that yellow-y container of paint...including a peachy streak...so I took that as a hint and started layering on a peachy color from another container. I was so hung up on the shading needing to be the same color -- like two or three colors of yellow -- then the peach color kinda sorta worked and I was kinda sorta amazed at the result.

Then we all did a show and tell and Shaqe held our drawing & painting so we could see it from a distance. It was so cool -- everyone's was SO different...and SO different from their drawing, yet you could easily match up everyone's drawing to their painting.




This class was SO fun! And I really enjoyed meeting the other artists.

You can take these Experimental Art Night classes separately or buy a "pass" and get a discount on 6 classes that you need to use up within 5 months. I am definitely getting a pass!

Art & Ideas Gallery is located right between Northville and Plymouth. If you are ANYwhere near here, and you want to have some fun with art, you really need to come and take this class!

P.S. -- the all-ages student show is still going on in the gallery -- come by and see the great work by artists aged 5-65...including one of my relief printmaking class prints! Check the website for details.