A chat with Jane Davies, a trash walk through my studio ...

I just got a lovely email from Jane Davies, author of Collage Journeys. She and I have been chatting a bit about using recycled items in one's work. I told her that I would tell her a bit of what I have done, but I thought that you all might enjoy the conversation too. The photos that I will be telling you about all come from a work entitled Prayers II which I did in 2006.

This view has one of my favorite uses for "reconfigured trash". There are three letter beads caught in what I keep calling bubble packaging - plastic packaging that is blown out to generally conform to the shape of the item inside. There is usually a flat outer rim which is perfect for sewing, or gluing, onto one's art surface. This bubble was around a short camera battery and I must not have liked the color of the torn off cardboard because here I cut a rectangle a little smaller than the outer shape, clipped the corners and turned the fabric under making a reverse applique hole for the bubble to fit into. I sewed it all down with size 11 seed beads.Next there were some polymer clay fish cut from a pancake of bits and pieces left over from another project. That center blue diamond is very carefully stitched foil that once graced a rather nice chocolate. :)


Sorry about the fuzzy focus on this one: between some more reverse applique I sewed little tiny bottles of the chopped up purple plastic of a raisin tub top. What if one could buy little bottles of LOVE from the apothecary? I wondered... These bottles came from stampington.com

Here is more of that purple top cut to fit the applique and blend nicely with some more beads. Above the triangles are more leftover clay buttons. Very marvellous how a bit of faux gold leafing classes them up.


I hope that you can see these well enough. They are water bottle tops over the little world maps that are printed on those fake credit cards they used to send us in the mail.

More chocolate wrappers cut to echo the shapes that I had sewn. Those are little blue birds settling in made of shrink plastic. DID YOU KNOW that #6 plastic (a very brittle plastic often used for bakery and deli foods at our local grocery store) is shrink plastic?? Depending on what you buy at the grocery store, this could be good news.More shrink plastic ... I drew the hearts and borders in gold marker and it kind of bubbled up as I heated/shrank it. Interesting.Here I put in two dollar coins with a shisha stitch and a cancelled USA stamp. The purple cardboard had been another piece of junk mail.And lastly an image from an old Tibetan incense box. In China two fish mean "abundance". Is it the same in Tibet

In Prayers II I put 24K goldfill beads next to plastic beads and real coins next to trash, but cut and framed by cloth, and thread, and bead, it all starts to make sense. Just like prayers.

Did you enjoy this little walk through my studio? Leave me a comment, I'd love to hear what you are doing with your reconfigured trash.

Chang E, The Lady of the Moon is published!

Greetings!

I am so pleased to let you know about my latest picture book:
Chang E: the Lady of the Moon
The book is available at:
http://stores.lulu.com/store.php?fAcctID=542011

As a fortuitous treat, the printer is making a special offer good through September 30th.
Go to: http://stores.lulu.com/store.php?fAcctID=542011
Click “Buy” and enter the code ‘LULUBOOK’ at checkout and receive 10% off your purchase!
Void where prohibited.

Chang E is the story of the Chinese Moon Goddess and how she came to live on the moon. Each year at the Autumn Full Moon Festival people in China, Viet Nam and all over the world gather with their families to celebrate the harvest, our children, and being together. When you read the story you will find out why this night is so special to Chang E and her husband, Hou Yi. This year her festival falls on October 3rd in Asia and on October 2nd here in North America.

Chang E is a picture book that I drew for my Asian born children back in 2001 when they were very young. Our adoption group has read this story to the children every year at the end of our own Autumn Full Moon celebration. We too look up at the moon, and imagine.

I have always wanted to share this story. This past year I polished up all of my original drawings and prepared the book for international publication. It is done; the book is ready.

I invite you to curl up with your children on this special night, enjoy the gorgeous colors of this picture book, and whisper your wishes to Chang E.
.
The book is available at: http://stores.lulu.com/store.php?fAcctID=542011

Please pass this on to anyone else who might enjoy this retelling of the wonderful

Chang E, The Lady of the Moon

and her brave husband, Hou Yi, now, just in time for the Autumn Full Moon Festival.

Oh! And if you love this illustration you can find it on a mug and some other items in my store at http://www.cafepress.com/sunneshop

Yay! O Blessings are everywhere! This is all wonderful.

Happy Day to you too.

Artellaland...

Oh. Wow. I have just found a, a, an amazing web-land: http://www.artellaland.com/affiliates/jrox.php?id=1442

I have dial-up. This is gonna take a while. Their site is soooo chuck-a-block full of beautiful downloads, and intriguing classes, and the most lovely attitude about art - about saying "Yes."

So I really reccommend that you go take a look around. Actually, a lot of little - and even huge - downloads are free.

And you can get a membership as an art journalist, a business artist, an image junkie (my words, not theirs) and more and more, and MORE!

wow.

Happy Days!!

I tell you: I have some major star allignment going on!

First, I was made the Featured Member Artist on the Maine Crafts Association web page for September. Go take a look: http://mainecrafts.org/2009/08/31/robinsunne-rockport/ Hooray!

Next, I was notified that my work was chosen for inclusion in the upcoming book by Quarry Books entitled 1000 Artisan Textiles. Yay, O Yay! The book is being released next May. I can hardly wait - the book will be a feast of inspiration. Wow. There is more info on the book here, at their website: http://1000artisantextiles.com.

Stay tuned for some happy news about Chang E, The Lady of the Moon, my new picture book. Oh, and if you want to see what Chang E and her husband Hou Yi look like go here to see them: http://www.cafepress.com/sunneshop

May you all be fabulous, and lucky, and have excellent work to do just like me.

Chang E is delayed

Ooooh! Noooo!

I have received my second proof of Chang E. There is a mistake. We are not entirely clear why the revisions that we sent did not complete properly. One of the pages is incorrect. Phooey! It is some combination of a human misunderstanding of a computer program that was problematic and then, we thought, corrected. Oh. >sigh<

It probably doesn't matter. It is just an error to fix. An opportunity to breathe deeply. Find God (Whomever.) Practice my stitches as I enter into the work for my next book. (Yes, the next one is another art/craft How-To book, this one blissfully about stitching, one of my very favorite activities here on Planet Earth.)

I have been sooo on edge, so excited. I really love this Chang E story - I love the way we (the families-by-adoption group) have been telling it to our little crowd of children for years. How sweetly the littles have grown up to be big kids and now have joined in to read the book aloud to the new little kids in our group.

I want you to see it. The colors are so pretty. The heroine so strong, the hero so brave. Qualities I am honored to bring as a gift in this story. And clearly patience and a willingness to see to the details are also gifts from this story. I can do this. Not much more than another week to see this third proof through its process.

Breath. I will sew, wash dishes, what is it - chop wood, carry water. Different chores but the same process: look for blessings in the 'what-is'.

I can do this.

waiting for Chang E

I, personally, am going insane waiting for Chang E (my proof copy) to arrive. Oh, >sigh<.

Bead Ribbons are now available!

I have been making Bead Ribbons as my part in getting Chang E began to slow down. It seems to calm my heart, get me breathing regularly again.And I have been wanting to show these to you.
They are so amazing to hold.
They look like a ribbon, but being made of glass seed beads they are actually heavy.Go on over to etsy and have a look.

Chang E is at the printer

I am waiting ... waiting ...

Chang E, my newest Picture book, is now completely uploaded and at the printer. So, I wait for the final proofreading and O.K.

I thought that in the meantime I would update my website and some other places. So I am at the library where they have a much faster internet connection ... except that it is not working very fast today.

>sigh<

I am working on a new handmade book and some ATCs while I wait.

So here is an ATC journal that I made about a year ago.

And here is a new handmade journal that I started working on last night.

Above you see it closed with a thread loop and rose quartz bead. Lovely handmade paper from our local art store.

Below it is open. I have sewn the signatures at quite a distance apart on purpose - so that I will be able to add lots of 3-dimensional treasures. It will keep me busy and keep me from getting too impatient while I wait for the final proof of Chang E.

Chang E reaching the printers!

Eeeeeeee!

I am so excited! I am in the process of getting Chang E: The Lady of the Moon off to the printers. It won't be long now. Lots of proofreading at this point, making sure that what we are sending them is actually what got over the web waves to them. There was a bit of a snafu last night, but my computer guy will fix that this morning.

I am self publishing at lulu.com. This is a print-on-demand publisher. Actually, they are a printer. I am the publisher: Robinsunne Postcard Press. I had this all figured out when I was 11.

I have been doing a lot of thinking about this in the past week: I have always thought that I didn't know what I wanted to be when I grew up. I always stared in wonderment at my friends who left college and went out and got a "real" job. You know: in a bank, or a business, or went to graduate school, got some alphabet after their name (LCSW, MSED, MB, PhD) and then went and actually got a job doing what they had studied. I have always been so impressed and so totally helpless to do anything of the sort.

What I am seeing now is that I was in an educational system, just not one that gives out sheepskin. I have had a rather unglorious string of jobs that have actually included fast food joints. Of course there were some pearls in there too (ever been to Coyote Moon in Belfast?) But I haven't been making the money that my peers have. I don't have more than a BA on my wall, and that is in History. I still haven't figured out what that was all about.

So I have always wondered: what is my job? What is my work? What am I doing here?

Well, now I know. Sort-of. I actually think that I am doing the thing that will take me to the real work of my life. Anyway: I write books. I have been wanting to tell stories and teach art most of my life and now, with the miracles of the internet and print-on-demand publishing, I can just write out all of the stuff that has been gathering in my brain for decades.

It is very exciting. Chang E is my second picture book and next on my list (already underway, in fact) is another how-to art book. It is odd. I actually know a lot. I have been practicing stuff that isn't out on the art shelves at the bookstores yet, and I think that you all will enjoy the books a lot. This next book has many, beautiful and amazing art quilts in it. Yeah, they are all by me, and I don't mean to be bragging, just to get you excited about the technique because it is simple and, well, just plain luscious. You can do this and you will make even more thrilling pieces than I can imagine.

Anyway, I belong here; in this way, doing this thing: writing books.

Keep checking in. We are only a week or two away.

!!!!!!!!

bead ribbons

It has been all about bead ribbons lately ... yeah, that and messed up computers. Thus: the long blogging vacation.
But lots of beads!

Birthday Party Thanks!

You are all so lovely to have joined me at my birthday party! Thank you so much for your good wishes. We have filled our list of 21 party favor recipients and I will be posting them ASAP!

If you commented earlier but haven't sent me your postal address, please do: robinsunne@robinsunne.com

Please think about attending Miss Vanessa's Mad Tea Party in a couple of weeks. Visit www.collagediva.com to pick up your invitation and the details. Vanessa's Tea Party is where I learned about blog parties! She is amazing!

Happy Solstice!

Birthday Party Favors

There are a few party favors left ... remember to send me your postal address - robinsunne@robinsunne.com - and I will send one off to you! Love, Robinsunne

Happy Birthday to me!!

Hi, hello! Welcome to my birthday party! I am so glad that you could come over for a visit.

May I get you some iced tea?

I have always loved my birthday because it falls in the early summer when the flowers are out and gardens are looking so, so beautiful. Will you come see?

My birthday is less than a week away from the Summer Solstice. This turning of the Wheel of the Seasons is all about our connections to water, the rivers, lakes, and oceans, and to the gods and goddesses who rule them. Blue and turquoise are the colors for this season. Please come in and see how the garden and the Great Wheel conspired in beauty for me this week:

Oh! And look! There is someone behind the flowers...

Why, it is two of my studio friends! They have been hanging out with me lately as I have been designing their clothes. I call it a Single line Doodle.

Here is a close-up (albeit a fuzzy one). I started at his heart and then moved out to the squiggle, on to some swirls, and leaves, and more squiggles. The trick is to never lift one's pen from beginning to end and fill the whole area with designs and writing - anything you like!

Both of these puppets are made of two triangles about 9" tall. I cut separate heads, hair and hands. I used doublestick tape to affix them to their sticks and planted them in an empty flower pot.

Well, let's have some cake, all right?

My birthday table has rose petals from another part of our garden, and that lucious cake was made by Boynton-McKay Restaurant on Main Street in Camden, Maine. I ordered it especially and one of the owners and her daughter invited me in back to help decorate it with these georgous flowers. Don't worry, it was after hours and I wasn't in the way at all. Boynton-McKay is one of Camden's hot spots, keeping locals and visitors well fed and happy.

Aren't the flowers great?

And look at this rose petal - it is a heart!

Will you have a slice? Look at all of these layers!! I love this cake! Perfect, perfect for a party. Thank you, Susan!

Later today, as a treat, some friends and I are going to go to Pizza Hut to support their very generous partnership with A Family For ME - the adoption program in the state of Maine to match children and families. If you are in Maine from 4 - 8 PM on June 16th, I hope that you will join us!!

Now I would love to give you a party favor. If you leave me a comment or write to me at robinsunne@robinsunne.com then I will send you one of the little packages I have... there are a couple of ATCs, a tiny book or two, a couple of postcards and some other treats from my studio. I have 21 little packages to mail out, because ... well ... I am over 21!

Thank you so much for spending some of my day with me. Send me a note and I will send you your little birthday gift!

Birthday Blog Party soon!!

Hi, Do you remember last fall when I had a blog party? And last year on my birthday I had an ATC give-away? Well, this year I thought that I would combine the two ideas and have a Birthday Blog Party! I am really excited about this: there are so many details to figure out: decorations, the menu, the guest list - well, that's easy: you!

So: my birthday is on June 16th and I invite you to stop by for some tea and cake. I have invited a few other friends as well who all would love to meet you (and, of course!!!) I will have some party gifts for you!

And in the meantime: I was interviewed by Anya this morning about ATCs for her magazine, and she told me about a website that I hadn't been to before. Check it out: http://www.europeanpapers.com/ Lots of ATC and collage in general materials. Have fun.

Belfast ATCs and other news

I had a lovely time yesterday at Natasia's Belfast, Maine Library ATC Swap. I arrived only a couple of minutes late and the room was jumping! I met lots of old and not quite so old friends ... Peggy, and Rachel and Laura and Chris. I got a wonderful trade from the girls at skipthechips. I made a couple of packing tape transfers with the group and finally found out that I have a tendency to rub too hard and take off the ink as well as the paper! I made a few cards and have a stack of half-made cards to work on later.

If you want to trade for one of the three atcs just send me an email: robinsunne@robinsunne.com.

We will trade addresses and get these babies on their way!

I am not at all sure why these last two pictures uploaded sideways ... it isn't the way they are oriented within my photo program or on my desktop ... very odd ... my electronics take on a mind of their own!

Anyway: a thrilling surprise showed up in my mailbox: amazon.com has just taken on the listing of my two books! Now the wierd thing about this is that both their listings for Nannee and The Great Library ATC Swap are more expensive than the places where I regularly sell them, because they have to make their cut, you know. So I will recommend etsy for Nannee and lulu for GLAS, but I really appreciate being tagged by amazon and hope to publish again in the future in a way that works out even better for our partnership.

My next book out is a picture book about Chang E. She is the Lady of the Moon and presides over the Chinese and Viet Namese Festival of the Full Moon in September. I actually wrote the book years ago for our local Full Moon Festival. My job now is to prepare it for print.

With sewing in between for meditation.

(And I was going to give you a peek at the latest, but now my camera has decided to glitch!! How does a card lock and how does one unlock it??) (I'll find out and get back to you.)

A Visit to Haystack

Oh My Goodness. The Universe conspired to give me a long weekend at Haystack Mountain School of Crafts this past weekend and I revel in my good fortune.

Away back in 1980 I attended my first workshop at Haystack with Barbara Shawcroft: "Knotted Sculpture". My world spun differently after that. I made sense there. In 1982 I was able to go back and studied "Celebrations" with Debra Frasier, Dan Bailey and Peter Adams. That class started me on a long path that led me to San Francisco from Boston, through adding a couple of new pierces to my right ear, on to changing my name and then to moving to Maine. Where I have written books, and stitched hundreds of thousands of beads, and made prayer and family.

Back in February I received an email from the Maine Crafts Association to invite us all to a May weekend of art to juice our '09 Season. I am a single mom. Trips away from my Dear Ones don't come often. Nigh on never. But I thought that I would ask around and see how our May shaped up for the possibility anyway. The children needed care: their various schedules needed accomodating, their various needs had to be met... One by one every person I asked for help said yes. Every situation that at once seemed problematical became smoothed. I'd go along with it all, and then think, "No, this cannot be correct. Surely I am pressing too hard." And yet consistantly I kept hearing the Instruction to keep trying, to allow this to happen. A week ago I thought I'd faint for the pressure of setting all of this goodness in motion, but just kept following my Instruction.

This is the opening view of the Haystack decks. It is something like a gasp to come up the steps and see the Gulf of Maine beyond the trees, islands dotting the bay like stepping stones on one's visual trip out to the Atlantic and the Great World Beyond. I began remembering. Years of attending Haystack workshops in the summer and fall. Friendships, and sunny days - and more weather than that, for the coast of Maine can't be confined more than a couple of hours in that way - and the projects I have made from tiny embroideries to huge masks, pencil drawings, desktop environments. I have been bewildered on that campus, hurt, entranced, lovely, challenged in every way and always, always so content doing this work of color, texture and philosophy. I don't argue in my head so much when I am there. God/dess exists inside my hands and no one seems to be quite so pissed about that. What an excellent reprieve.

My workshop this past weekend was again with Debra Frasier, this time in collaboration with Catharine Ellis. Debra became a writer and illustrator in those intervening 27 years. Catharine is a dyer and weaver. We learned Osage, and Cochineal, and Indigo, and the words that those colors speak to us. Catherine taught us shibori dye techniques, and Debra passed out colored papers with the writing lessons and prompts. We listened to each other as we wrote. Millions of plants can make a yellow dye, the Cochineal is a bug that dyes that rich red, though there are other ways of getting reds, but indigo is one of only two plants, worldwide, that through a long, complicated and somewhat toxic process can give us blue.

I was both confused and absolutely sure while I was there. I am so correct here at home again and ever so much in our agenda. I toss a bit. The edges and details swerve and dip as they do.

I will send you more. The shibori was a gift of delight. I want to show you. The words came at me ... I want to tell you.

I will.

Healing through artmaking

Oh, My. Go read this. And look at this slideshow. (Thank you for passing this along, Red Thread)

Ross Bleckner has been chosen to be the next United Nations Goodwill Ambassador: he has been painting with children who were abducted and conscripted in war.


These from the NY Times article linked above:


Mr. Bleckner said that when United Nations officials first approached him, they asked him whether he thought art could perform a useful role in drawing attention to the plague of human trafficking, which they said still receives too little attention, despite the widespread use of children in many conflicts in Africa.

“And I said to them that if art can’t perform a role like that, then it has no role at all,” he said on Tuesday.


He said that after several days of teaching them rudimentary painting and drawing skills, many began to open up to him and to create work that powerfully expressed their experiences.


Mr. Bleckner said that he planned to return to the area early next year to enlarge the painting project and that — in his role as ambassador — he hoped to enlist many more artists to become involved in efforts to fight child enslavement and trafficking.


And it is more than stopping the child abuse: Mr Bleckner wrote this in the catalog of 200 of the children's paintings to be sold in New York for their benefit, “It is a personal interaction which gives someone the tools to create something that they can be proud of, and which can help them on the arduous path to restoring their dignity and sense of self-worth.”


Art Saves Lives

I took part in the Interdependence Tree Project that the International Fiber Collaborative. I made some leaves to put on this tree!

More info here:
www.internationalfibercollaborative.com

The tree is 28'x25'x25'. There were more then 7,000 leaves in total from 23 Countries & 39 US States!

They had a grand opening this past weekend and then will be installing it permanently in the Earlyworks Childrens Museum in Huntsville, AL in August.

What a cool idea.

beaded embroideries with trash

Now there's a lovely title ... ! But look here:

Some more photos of Asteroids.

Even a little bit of feather stitch - which I love.

I learned a couple of years ago that most of the asteroids in our solar system hang out all together in a gang that orbits between Mars and Jupiter: between the last of the rock planets (Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars) and the start of the gas planets (Jupiter, Saturn Uranus and Neptune).

And a little bit more to show you from the piece titled "Your Name Here":

I edged that blue and like it so much better.

And tucked in these green beads here which work nicely I think.

Embroiderings

I have been sewing, and embroidering, and beading, and have one movie and one book to pass along. But before I do, let me tell you of a career milestone here:

I got an email two days ago from Gina Brown, who, with her co-author Sandra Salamony, is writing a book called 1000 Artisan Textiles for Quarry Books. Gina wanted to personally invite me to submit. Wow.

She had seen my work in the Lark book !Molas! and found me on the internet and here we are. Wow, again. Breathe. Submit - of course!

Well, let me show you a bit of stitchery:

This first one I called "asteroids" - I'm reading a book called Earth: The Biography. It is sooo interesting and amazing. So asteroids are on the brain a bit. This one will get beads for sure, but no trash as yet.

However, the next one is getting nice and chunky with all manner of plastic, card and metal refuse: see the chocolate coin wrapper? The plastic pill packaging? The fake credit card? The inventory code strip? The plastic coated wire? It keeps me entertained.

And here is the book I spoke about in the 1st paragraph: Sarah Vowell's The Wordy Shipmates. I have an audio book version. A lovely way to get a chunk of history. Hilarious. Reverent. She, Sarah Vowell, reads this audiobook, her speaking voice adding perfect layers to her written voice. (Also some other actors' voices including Dermot Mulroney's. Yum. Really. I'd be pleased to hear the man read the phone book.)

And the movie: Lost in Austin. Pride and Prejudice re-work. Not purist Jane Austin, but lovely and romantic. Heroine gets pulled into the book, chaos ensues, several happy endings. >sigh<

I am teaching a bunch of children how to sew doll clothes today. Bringing lunches, fabric, thread, buttons... Just settling in for the day.

I am bringing my own Waldorf style doll of course. (Yes, I know, she needs her hair. I need to knit, wet, and unravel some black wool to get it nice and curly for her. Thanks, Pam! Long and luxurious, Whoopie.)

But today: another dress for my dollie. Hard to tell who will have more fun: the children, me, or my doll. :)