Studio Sunday-Colored Pencils, Pens, and Quotes

Thanksgiving

Writing thankful as my Thanksgiving message seems like such a facebook era thing to do. Before I never would have thought of expressing the holiday by an adjective describing how I feel but here it is. I am thankful to live in a place where I can see this on my walks.

Wishing you a happy Thanksgiving where you are. As Gertrude Stein wrote:

Anything one does every day is important and imposing and anywhere one lives is interesting and beautiful.

Blog Giveaway Update

Thanks to all those who have commented on the Neruda quote. Here's an adaptation to the way the giveaway works. You can either put your email in the comment or you can comment without it and then send me a message at susan at susangaylord.com. I do need to have a simple way to get in touch. Giveaway ends tomorrow morning.

Blog Giveaway-Pablo Neruda Quote

After last weekend's Eudora Welty postcard, I was inspired make more postcard sized art with quotes. We were given 300 lb. Fabriano artistico soft press from the Newburyport Art Association for their postcard project. All I could find easily available in 300 lb. was Arches hot and cold press. I started out not liking either as well. The soft press has more texture than hot press but not as much as cold. As I worked again with a ruling pen and Higgins eternal ink, I came to rather like the cold press and the rougher letters that emerged.

For Thanksgiving, I am offering the Pablo Neruda quote as a blog giveaway. Please leave a comment by Wednesday at midnight to be in the drawing. REMEMBER: If you do not leave an email address so I can contact you, you will not be entered in the drawing even if you leave a comment.

Studio Sunday-More Inspiration from Mike Gold

Mike Gold's Contemporary Scripts workshop for Masscribes was full of inspiration. I went with some trepidation as I hadn't taken a calligraphy workshop since 1988 and rarely work on calligraphy for more than a few hours at a time. There was nothing to be concerned about. I'm not sure why I had a picture of myself glued to a table and not moving from 9 AM to 5 PM. There was lots of instruction and demonstration and we worked in concentrated bits of about an hour at a time. Mike was a fabulous teacher. He was teaching attitude and approach more than technique. He said, "Don't just make letters. Make art." He was generous, thoughtful, and kind. I had such a good time!

And the good times continue back home in the studio. I spent a couple of hours yesterday playing with a ruling pen and ink with pastel highlights to make this piece for the postcard show at the Newburyport Art Association. I picked up my 5" x 7" piece of heavy watercolor paper a few weeks ago at the NAA and will be delivering it today. All of the postcards will be on display starting November 28. Each sells for $30. and the artist will only be revealed after purchase.

The postcard was inspired by an exercise Mike gave us using black paper with white gouache (my tablemate Sharon Eisman was so kind to share her supplies, I came with only black and brown) and pastel highlights. Our instruction was to use Roman letters and play with their arrangement, angle, etc. Here's Mike demonstrating:

And here are the pieces I did at the workshop:

I look forward to working more with material from the workshop and sharing it with you.

ibookbinding Correction

Sorry about forgetting to add the link to this past Book Arts Tuesday post on ibookbinding. Here it is:
http://www.ibookbinding.com

Book Arts Tuesday-ibookbinding

Here's a great resource for bookmaking information from Paul Thomson—paper marbling, glues, various binding styles, and much more. There are tutorials and videos, book lists and galleries. New information is added frequently. Have fun exploring ibookbinding.com.

Studio Sunday-Ink Bottle Holder

I learned so much at Mike Gold's wonderful Contemporary Scripts workshop last weekend for Masscribes. It's going to take time to work through all I learned. I did immediately adopt one practice of his—making a holder for my bottle of Higgins eternal ink with a tin and pieces of sponge. No more spills. I look forward to sharing more from Mike's workshop in coming posts.

Book Arts Tuesday-Library Cafe

Library Cafe has an amazing collection of interviews. Here is how it is described on the website:

The Library Café is a weekly program of table talk with scholars, artists, publishers and librarians about books, scholarship, and the formation and circulation of knowledge. It is hosted by Thomas Hill, and can be heard on WVKR FM 91.3 Wednesday afternoons between 12:00 Noon and 1:00 p.m. ET (15.00-16.00 GMT) during the academic year.

Here are some recent programs:

JOHANNA DRUCKER

Scholar, artist, printer, and visual theorist Johanna Drucker, Breslauer Professor of Bibliographical Studies at the Graduate School of Education and Information Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles, discusses her book Graphesis: Visual Forms of Knowledge Production, (Harvard 2014).

"Information graphics bear tell-tale signs of the disciplines in which they originated: statistics, business, and the empirical sciences. Drucker makes the case for studying visuality from a humanistic perspective, exploring how graphic languages can serve fields where qualitative judgments take priority over quantitative statements of fact. Graphesis offers a new epistemology of the ways we process information, embracing the full potential of visual forms and formats of knowledge production."

BARBARA A. OLSEN

Barbara A. Olsen, Associate Professor of Greek and Roman Studies at Vassar College, talks about her book Women in Mycenaean Greece: The Linear B Tablets from Pylos and Knossos (Routledge 2014).

"Women in Mycenaean Greece is the first book-length study of women in the Linear B tablets from Mycenaean Greece and the only to collect and compile all the references to women in the documents of the two best attested sites of Late Bronze Age Greece - Pylos on the Greek mainland and Knossos on the island of Crete. The book offers a systematic analysis of women’s tasks, holdings, and social and economic status in the Linear B tablets dating from the 14th and 13th centuries BCE, identifying how Mycenaean women functioned in the economic institutions where they were best attested - production, property control, land tenure, and cult. Analysing all references to women in the Mycenaean documents, the book focuses on the ways in which the economic institutions of these Bronze Age palace states were gendered and effectively extends the framework for the study of women in Greek antiquity back more than 400 years."

WOLFGANG ERNST

Wolfgang Ernst, Chair of Media Theories at Humboldt University, Berlin, talks about media archaeology and his book Digital Memory and the Archive, published last year by the University of Minnesota Press.

"Digital Memory and the Archive offers the most compelling and insightful account published to date of how and why objects matter. Moving beyond textual analysis, its careful, theoretically rigorous engagement with the relic—the physicality of the archive—promises to change the direction of the digital humanities. Thanks to this book, we will all now be addressing the microtemporality of archives and the mechanics of remaining. Finally, a definitive collection in English of one of the most brilliant and influential media archaeologists." -- Wendy Hui Kyong Chun

Happy listening!

The Library Cafe

Book Arts Tuesday-Water Conservation Book to Make & Share

Ginger Burrell has created a great little cut and fold book (what I call a hot dog booklet) about water conservation with original haiku and images. You can download and print the page and then follow the directions on her blog to make a book to share the message.

Here's Ginger Burrell's free book for you to make and share

Studio Sunday-Creating Yesterday's Image for Samhain

For the first Studio Sunday after my little blog vacation, I thought I'd share the steps for creating yesterday's image for Samhain.

1. Go out into the garden and take photos.

2. Choose one of a hosta leaf and open it in Photoshop CS 6.

3. Write Samhain multiple times with my Pentel brush pen and scan into computer (600 dpi, black & white).

4. Choose one and open it as a new image.

5. Convert image to rbg color.

6. Add a second layer, select a dark brown from the leaf image with eyedropper tool, and fill the new layer with the color (paint can).

7. Change layer from Normal to Screen. The word is now dark brown instead of black. Flatten image.

8. Duplicate layer and place it on the leaf image.

9. Change layer from Normal to Multiply. Adjust size and placement.

10. Done.

May I add that my knowledge of Photoshop, such as it is, has been acquired in a haphazard manner. I make no claims to work efficiently.

Samhain

As autumn turns to winter,
the new year comes in with a blaze of color,
giving us light for the dark days ahead.

See you tomorrow for Studio Sunday. I'm back from my blog vacation.