….thanks Cee for hosting Odd Ball Photo Challenge
In Carla Sonheim’s, Year Long Video a Day: 365, on-line class we were assigned a photo challenge. We had to stand in the middle of a room and with our eyes closed start shooting the space while turning around. Here are a few shots of my living room that were taken with my eyes closed.
….a cross between a carnation and a chrysanthemum with eucalyptus and rose leaves
Obviously this is not a real flower. For one of my assignments in Carla Sonheim’s 365: A Video a Day, year long art class we had to pull apart flowers and create a new species.
Hope you enjoy these variations of Carmums.
….a lesson on blending analogous colours and warm and cool colours
Using chalk pastels and in some cases oil pastels, my grade 3 students designed a stained glass tree of their choice. They were asked to draw their lines to the edge of the paper and use thick black marker lines to represent the lead used in real stained glass art.
If they drew an evergreen tree they had to make sure that the negative space contrasted the actual tree and they were instructed to use the opposite colour choices for the background. In other words if they used warm colours for their tree than the background would be in cool colours and vice versa. If their tree was a deciduous tree than the spaces between the branches and the negative space were the only areas that were coloured with bright analogous colours that blended nicely together.
For the most part my students understood the concept. Hope you enjoy the slide show of their work.
….I love the finished collage projects that my grade three art classes produced
It took close to three weeks to get this assignment finished. The first week we collected and assorted coloured pages from magazine and discarded books. The second week we cut up and glued geometric shapes into cityscapes or country landscapes. In the final class we added line detail and dots to give the scene texture and interest. I think the boys and girls did a wonderful job.
…..thanks Cee for Share Your World
Do you prefer juice or fruit?
I’m definitely a fruit person. I stopped drinking juice a long time ago when I found out how much sugar is added to juice and how much of the fibre is removed. Eating one piece of fruit is much more satisfying than drinking a glass of juice (equivalent to 2 or 3 pieces of fruit).
Did you grow up in a small or big town? Did you like it?
I grew up mostly in a large city. For a period of 4 years I lived in a smaller town and I have fond memories of playing in the neighbourhood and riding my bike. When we moved back to the big city I lived directly across from the skating rink, the park, my school, the tennis courts and the outdoor swimming pool. I loved it. There was always something to do.
If you were to paint a picture of your childhood, what colors would you use?
I would use bright colours like blue, red, pink and green.
Ways to Relax List: Make a list of what relaxes you and helps you feel calm.
• reading a book
• knitting
• painting and drawing
• having tea with friends
• enjoying a cup of coffee after dinner with my husband
• doing yoga
• going for long walks with my husband
• going out for dinner
• lying on the beach at the cottage
• having a pedicure
Optional Bonus question: What are you grateful for from last week, and what are you looking forward to in the week coming up?
I’m grateful that my father is adjusting to living on his own again and finding a new purpose at the retirement home where he resides. I spent time with my family this weekend and was introduced to our daughter’s new dog. She’s a beautiful French bulldog. A and J named her Olive. Winnie wasn’t too sure about this new addition in her aunts’ home but I’m sure both baby and puppy will adjust and get used to each other in time.
I’m looking forward to finishing my report card comments this week and doing some more art assignments from Carla Sonheim’s 365: A Year Long Class.
….starting with a visit and an open house on New Year’s Day
What a great way to bring in the New Year. Visiting a long time friend and catching up over wine and cheese and then going to a New Year’s open house at another friend’s house directly across the street from where we live. More wine and nibbles and great conversation, catching up with the news in the neighbourhood. Thank goodness I was able to walk to both venues and didn’t have to worry about driving.
On Sunday, I started participating in a new year-long on-line art class with Carla Sonheim. The interesting thing about this class is that Carla posts a new video every day for 365 days. I was hesitant to sign up for another class but I knew I would miss it if I didn’t. So far I’m not disappointed. The videos can be short mini lessons on techniques, supplies, quotes from celebrities and interviews from other artists. So far we’ve had a lesson on making your own cloud stencil, a quote from Alan Alda, an interview from Carla’s nephew who is a clown, a photography assignment, a blind contour assignment, a glue resist lesson and a lesson on quinacridone paints. I haven’t even checked out todays class.
It’s very interesting how some of the other 400 plus students interpret each video. Even when there isn’t an assignment many of them, including myself, play with the concepts from the videos and create a piece of art. My son sent me a small journal and I’ve been painting and drawing in it every day since the class started. It won’t be long before this one is filled and I’ll start on the other one another friend from school gave me.
I’ve also been knitting on my knitting looms. For my daughter’s birthday I knit her a large infinity scarf to match the hat we gave her for Christmas and I knit my granddaughter a hat and a small neck warmer. On Thursday I drove to Hamilton and brought my looms with me. While Winnie was sleeping I taught my daughter how to use the looms and left her one to make another hat. I even knit Winnie a little pot holder for her little kitchen.
When Winnie woke from her nap we played together while her mom and dad prepared lunch for us. She’s at the age where she likes to play peek-a-boo but she runs to hide behind a table or chair and then peeks out to see if I’m watching. When she wasn’t running she did sit with me for a minute and I read part of a book. After lunch we dressed up warmly and went for a walk over to James St. N. to look for fabric for a quilt that G wants to make and then to another store where she had a gift certificate from her birthday that she wanted to spend.
On Saturday I finally took down our Christmas tree and vacuumed up all the needles. I also put together the organizing unit that J gave me for Christmas and I’ve already filled it with my art supplies. I have one more shelving unit to assemble for my pens. Already my drawing table is much neater and ready for more art projects.
Today I’m hoping to get to the ROM to see the Chihuly exhibit. It’s the last day so I may not be able to get in but it’s worth a try. I still have a lot to do around the house and even though I had two weeks off it seems I never get to the mundane things like cleaning my bedroom. Having said that though, I did have a lot of fun and spent time with family and friends.
Cheers!
…..last Saturday I attended a ‘culture days’ event at Humber College
Culture Days was founded in 2009 and raises the awareness and participation of Canadians in the arts and cultural life of their communities. Hundreds of thousands of artists, cultural workers, organizations and groups, volunteers and supporters host free public activities that take place in hundreds of cities and towns throughout the country over the last weekend of September each year.
Culture Days offers a wonderful opportunity for Canadians across the country to explore and participate in the cultural communities that exist in their neighbourhoods that they may have not even be aware of before.
The event that I was most excited about was the Tunnel Tour. Humber College by the Lakeshore took over the old psychiatric hospital which closed in 1979 and restored the original facades of all the the cottages and main buildings. The buildings were connected by an underground tunnel that were used to transport food and laundry to the patients. The tunnel itself was dug by the patients and a cross section cut out of the wall shows the primitive technique used to cement together the pieces of slate that were probably found on the property.
The tunnel is still used today to house gas, water and sewer pipes and to transport supplies from one cottage to another. Part of the tour included talking about the history of the psychiatric hospital and how the different cottages were used. Cottage D housed the detox patients and K cottage was home for the children who lived at the hospital. That was the saddest part of the tour. Apparently when children suffered from epilepsy and/or ADHA they were admitted to the hospital where they spent the rest of their lives. Nurses used to walk up and down Lakeshore Blvd. looking for children that had been deserted by their parents because they thought their seizures were signs of being possessed.
I also learned that a ghost lives in cottage G. She’s been seen by the care taking staff and security. Apparently she’s friendly and is a former nurse who worked at the hospital. Cottage G is the last cottage to be renovated. Our guide kindly took us inside. It certainly didn’t look haunted.
After the tour I took a walk over to the Assembly Hall and watched the dancers in the Pow Wow.
Later in the afternoon I took part in an art workshop. We were a very small group. First we took a walk through the grounds towards the lake and picked up natural materials off the ground. When we returned to the classroom we were presented with old nature books that were being discarded and numerous art supplies to create our nature inspired piece of art. It was very relaxing and I walked away with two samples that I can use in future art classes at school.
….acrylic still life
I’ve done still life in watercolour and pencil crayon and I’ve played with acrylics mixed with glazes. In the last two weeks I’ve been checking out Bob Burridge’s youtube channel and decided to try his technique of laying down lots of colour and then painting in the negative space to create a vase of flowers. Here’s one example of how I started. It is actually the second piece that I painted.
It’s hard to imagine that the finished piece came from the first painting but it did.
I had so many positive comments on my first piece using this technique that I decided to donate it to our school’s silent auction. Here’s what it looks like. I have since framed it.
I went on to painting a wine bottle using a slightly different technique but the application of light and dark and adding a shadow are the same.
Finally I painted a pear using a very simple circle/triangle technique to create the pear and then adding dark and light to the background and a shadow to create depth.
If you’re interested in the technique I used for the flowers check out Bob’s video.
….an assignment from one of my many on-line classes
One of the classes that I’ve taken this year is from Sketch Book Skool. We had 6 different instructors who all assigned different sketching and painting projects. One that especially intrigued me involved getting a young child to draw in my sketch book and then work a drawing around the child’s original piece.
At school I have a couple of students who like to come to the library after school and help me put books away. When I was given this assignment I asked J in grade one if he would like to draw in my book and then allow me to draw around his work and create a new piece. He was more than happy to do that and he took my book and very carefully and thoughtfully began drawing his picture. I thought he might draw the typical house and tree with him and his family standing in front but to my surprise he drew six flower pots with a flower in each.
Here is J’s work and then what I created from it. I used watercolour and ink around the pencil crayon drawings.
….I just signed up for two more art classes
In January I decided to take another year long course with Carla Sonheim called Y is for Yellow. Every two weeks there’s a new lesson with homework. So far I haven’t been very good about finishing all the assignments but there’s one that I really liked and I keep drawing more examples of famous artists.
Today I signed up for a 31 day sketchbook challenge that starts tomorrow and another sketchbook class that goes for six weeks. The first mini assignment for Sketchbook Skool was to put some ink blots on paper, press it against another piece of paper, let it dry and then draw a sketch around what you see. This was fun to do and was somewhat similar to some of Carla’s assignments from past classes.
Here is what I did today:
Last week I shared my Dali sketches with you. When I demonstrated the technique with my grade two class on Friday I did another Dali and an Andy Warhol. I took them home on the weekend and finished them. I haven’t added the doodles yet. I think I’ll leave the Dali as is and only draw doodles around the Warhol piece. What do you think?
Mama Cormier 