ze arts
I'm so excited.. Saturday Rick & I are going down to the San Jose Museum of Art. There's 2 things showing there that I want to see, and actually have been wanting to hit that museum for awhile now!Yoshitomo Nara: Nothing Ever Happens and Art of Zines 04
Jem, do you want to join us?
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Speaking of arts and Jem... She joined me for the Stich & Bitch / Crafty Girls Night over at Becca's the other night! yay!
We had fun creating while we ate wine and cheese and I even got up & told the funny story about how Kazoo "has his way" with my teddy bear, Pudding (I have it on video, I just need to get it digitized! Wait till you see, it's disturbing and HILARIOUS)
Most of the girls worked on their knitting, but I brought a whole drawer full of stuff to get down all crafty-like: Paints, brushes, paper, pens, pencils AND this felt, thread, etc that I bought wanting to experiment w/ the idea of making some of my characters into stuffed animals.
My Drawer-o-Craft (umm, also with my 2 non-matching socks :) the blue striped one is my monkey sock, but I lost the other one - but I still wear it cuz I love it so)
First I started to paint. Which, as I've remarked before is kind of difficult for me. I'm so used to doing quick sketches and I love the fine line of pen.. not to mention the UNDO key :), but I've really been having the URGE to paint. I think I just haven't found my technique yet. So I'm willing to try!!
I did 2 small pieces... one where I played with painting the background and then using pen on top. The pressure of such a finished piece weighs on me though. I mean, I just have to get used to doing a ton... and not being so nervous about messing up. I'm so used to doodling like crazy - and then often I take my doodles; scan them in; and clean them up all handily on ze computer, so it makes it easy to "tweak the foot that came out looking really odd", see Exibit A :)
This is part of a rocker chic series I've started to doodle out... I have a bunch in my sketch book, so I thought i'd try it on a painting. I'm looking forward to doing more.
I tried to paint the monkey on my business cards, but as you can see I ran out of room - and overall I don't really like how it came out, but it was an exercise in painting the fills first & then outlining it at the end:
Wow! I just realized I forgot his tail! haha - I didn't have the card in front of me, I was going off of memory.
I only did a few paitings before I sorta got tired of them not turning out the way I want and decided I wanted to spend some time doing some sewing with the felt I brought. I have all different colors which is fun! Bummer was I forgot the stuffing, so I kinda made do just to sew a little and play with the felt anyway.
As you can see, I was focused on making monkeys:
Since I didn't have stuffing, I just sewed him on another piece of felt... but I had to give him a belly, so I stuffed scraps of felt in there :)
I haven't sewn probably since Home Ec in Junior High, so it was just cool to sew!
I still want to give him ears. And I plan to use my stuffing next time and make a real stuffed character! :)
::: Jem's Art
Jem brought pastel oils (? I think that's what they're called... they're very crayon-like) and created a magnificent portrait of me painting!
I love how fantastic my hair looks (I could only wish for a natural flip!) and overall she really did a great job!!! Thanks Jem!!
"Glass of Wine" by Jem Fanvu
She then ran out of things to draw... so she drew a rendition of my painting:
Monkey Fever!!!
Overall it was a fun night and we both met some cool new girls. Becca's decided to have them once a week now, but Jem & I will have to miss next week's cuz we'll be at Interpol/Secret Machines show (yay!!).
