fartograpy

I did another photo shoot last night and these are some of the beginning stages of my photos. I'm going to mess around with them in photoshop but I'm pretty excited with how they are so far. I filled my room with balloons so that was fun. My room is still filled with balloons. It's sort of magical. I wish it could stay that way forever. Did I mention I love balloons?

My class that I'm teaching went well today. I was sort of in a grumpy mood but came out of it when I saw some of the great things my students are doing. I'm so lucky to have such great students. We're doing intaglio right now and they are getting pretty frustrated with the process but they are hanging in there. Maybe I'll post some of their final prints on here.

Thank you sooo much to those who responded to my questions on the last post. I realize I really do need to make prints of my work. I've just been a little nervous about it. Everyone's advice only confirmed that I do need to do this so thank you!! You guys are the best!

I have a crit with one of my faculty today and then a group crit in class tonight. Wish me luck!

Take care!

Bad Dog Gallery, New Night New Show

Last Thursday night at the Bad Dog Gallery one of the painting professors at NIU, Frank Trankina, curated a show called AbstWACKtion. Besides the silly title the show was really great.

These first two pieces are by Nina Rizzo, another painting professors at NIU. I love Nina's work. Check out her website for more great work.

(I like when people show pics of opening nights and no one is looking at the art.)

Sometimes at Bad Dog Gallery the PBR bin gets as much attention as the art.
This is by Paul Nudd. His work is really grossly beautiful. He had a video playing that made everyone stop and wonder just what the hell they were looking at. Look through his website for more beautiful gross outs.
Ben Stone made this piece. You may remember his piece from the last Bad Dog show of Calvin on praying Calvin. Ben's work is always really humorous.
The rest of the work is unidentified but I really love it all.

The show was really neat. Thursday night the Fibers department is having a show called Homebodies. My good friend Cassie is going to be in that show. I hear she and some friends are making a tent house. I can't wait to see this.

I've been nursing a cold since yesterday. Lots of emergen-C, vitamins, tea, water, whining and allergy pills have been involved in making me better. I'm going to go out to my studio and try to ignore it. I'm really really pleased with what's happening in my studio these days. Tomorrow I'll write a blog all about it. And then I will go teach my class Softground... eek!

Teaching them hardground went really well. I'm so pleased with what an amazing class I have. They are all so attentive and even though I talk their heads off and probably driving them crazy with my sometimes ditziness they seem to like me and I like them, too. Lets just hope that by the time I get through this intaglio stuff we are all still liking each other. Fingers crossed!

Bad Idea... Good Idea

Bad Idea: Painting my fingernails this hideous yellow color... yesterday... and still not taking the polish off. The nail polish itself is really crappy so it looks like i just grabbed some acrylic paint and painted my nails in a quick and crappy way. But again... still haven't taken it off yet.

Good Idea: finding a home for my Luke Perry/ Dylan doll... on top of this unicorn.

Bad Idea: Never cleaning my counter. Ever.
Good Idea: This new piece I'm working on... Not sure how it will look in the ultimate end but I like what I have so far.

Now that I have that said, I have to get to the printshop and prepare to start the long, scary journey of teaching my class intaglio. Hardground today, Thursday, Softground. Then, next Tuesday, the scary scary scary days of aquatint. Cross your fingers and toes that my class and I all get through this together.

And hello to new readers sent to me from Claudia's blog. I hope you enjoy the place. Take your coat off and look around.