I had never done an outdoor art fair until last weekend. My health has prevented me from participating since I have been actively working as an artist. I have been doing pretty well for the last year and I had the opportunity to be one of four artists in the Madison Art Guild tent at the Middleton Art Walk. This seemed like a good way to try it out, especially because it was a 1 day fair.
I worked really hard getting everything ready for the show. I tried to plan for as many contingencies as possible. The weather wasn’t supposed to be too hot and I was happy about that. Unfortunately, it was quite windy with a few sprinkles. Attendance was not very good. I didn’t make any sales and I felt really sick by 2pm. I think my UVA sensitivity was too much even in the tent with lots of 50spf protection from clothing and lotion. I had a 4 day migraine afterwards.
But I did it. I had some nice conversations and many people took my business cards. I got to know some of my fellow artists in the Madison Art Guild better. And I learned that I don’t want to do it again. So I’m calling it a success.
I sold 4 pieces in my April solo exhibit at the Art Hub in Cambridge, WI. Jacy, the owner of the gallery, did an amazing job hanging the show. We traded out some of the art that had been on display in the gallery before the exhibit with a few pieces from the show. Go check it out with all the other amazing art she has on view.
I call this piece Flourishing Spirals and it started with block prints of stamps I created inspired by a Golden Geometry class I took with Clarissa Grande. They started with the shape of the golden spiral and I ended up as a set of 4 stamps to create an embellished spiral. I only used the 2 largest stamps for this piece because I wanted white space in the center. I knew I wanted to enhance the prints in a variety of ways and I started with adding some water color on one side and gold paint on the other. Another form of enhancement that I had in mind was Zentangle patterns.
The above Zentangle tile is from a class I recently took. I participate in the monthly Tangle Lab online class with the talented Anica (ZenLinea) and I thought I could use these techniques on my block print. I really liked the idea of having components that went outside of the frame of the mandala. The subtle, simple background was very appealing to me, too. And I am a huge fan of Zentangled flowers, actually flowers of any kind.
Art with gold paint doesn’t photograph very well so I hope you will come to the Art Hub in Cambridge, WI to see it in person. The show will be up from April 1-26 and there will be a reception on April 4 from 6-8pm.
There is another opportunity to see me at the Art Hub in April. I will be teaching Art Journaling: Limited Composition & Mark Making ($68.00) on Friday April 11 from 6-9pm. All the supplies are provided and you will leave with a new (reclaimed) art journal with a start to art journaling. There are a few spaces left so register by clicking on the class link above.
Let’s transform old library books into lovely art journals. This class is perfect for someone just getting into making art but will also have novel techniques that will be interesting to the experienced artist. Learn how to repurpose a hardcover book using gesso, acrylic paint, writing tools and stencils.
We will introduce an element of play by using dice to make some of our design decisions. Our biggest decision will be on color selection. We will talk about the idea of using dice to take the pressure off decision making and as a way to limit your composition. We will talk about the value of setting limits when working in your art journal.
Art journals can be used in many ways to help you reach goals and improve your art skills, overall health, and satisfaction with your life. An art journal is a great place to experiment with art supplies and different techniques. We will do an art journal page layout using acrylic paints, junk mail or scrap paper and a variety of stencils, paint markers and pens.
I have finished some new pieces for the exhibit in April at the Art Hub in Cambridge. The reception will be the first Friday in April. Here’s a few of the new pieces you can see there. These first 2 are the finished pieces from my last post and the others are some floral, block printed mandalas that I have been playing with. The red and blue one is a new direction I have been considering but I’m not happy with how it turned out. It might not be in the show. I think there is potential here, but I’m not getting close to my vision.
Here is my favorite new direction. The lady in the photo is from a page from Demorest’s Monthly Magazine from 1878. I have a small collection of these magazines that I inherited from my great aunt and I have been hording them for years. I have decided it is time to share them. This lady is modeling a riding coat for stout ladies. I have another model from this ad that I will include in another piece. They just cracked me up and I love how she fits in with the mandala and the flowers. It makes me think she is walking in a fantastical garden. The gold gesso in the background adds to the magic of it, I think.
February has been a very busy month and I have taught 2 small classes. The Zentangle class had 5 people brave more than 5 inches of snow to create some Artist Trading Cards. They were all completely or fairly new to the Zentangle Method and it was so much fun to share this lovely art form. We focused on 2 tangle patterns, cadent and paradox. Both are from Zentangle, Inc. This class was held at the Art Hub in Cambridge.
The other class I taught was a fundraiser for my Unitarian Universalist church, James Reeb UU and was a still life made from gelli prints. We had so much fun and offering a class for the auction has become an annual tradition for me. I have some action shots and finished (or nearly finished) pieces.
In these crazy times it is more important than ever to come together and create joy in community. I will be teaching an art journaling class at the Art Hub in Cambridge on Friday, April 11. Register here to create some happiness with me. Wishing you peace and beauty today and every day.
I started the year with a slightly larger work in progress on gessoboard (16″x16″) and a Zentangle challenge on Instagram. The WIP has a lot of pieces that I am using to cover up an old piece of work that never quite worked for me. The Instagram challenge was A Fragment of Your Imagination hosted by 7F5R (7 forests 5 rivers) using Zentangle Fragments – specially curated by Debbie New, Ildica Boyd and Nina Dreher-goeddertz. They are all Certified Zentangle Teachers and put together a great collection of patterns.
I am still on my 100 mandala journey and compiled the fragments into a few small and one large mandala. They are numbers 57/100, 58/100, and the large one is 59/100.
The floral mandala that I am working on is going over an old piece that didn’t work. I sanded it and covered it with gold gesso. Then I used my torus mandala blocks to print an offset mandala that I’m using as a guide and background. I added a layer of leaves gelli printed on tissue paper and some stenciling and writing. Now I am playing with different arrangements of the leaves and flowers and adding depth and texture to the individually stamped and cut out images.
This will be part of my solo exhibit at the Art Hub in Cambridge in April. There will be a reception on the First Friday in April and I hope to see you there. Come see the finished version of this piece and so many others.
Today I was notified that a piece of mine was accepted in the juried show “Midwest Seasons” at the Center for the Visual Arts in Wausau, WI. It’s a piece I just finished called “Olbrich Summer Dreams.” The orchid stamps are inspired by the orchids at Olbrich Gardens and there is a map that includes the gardens in the background. It’s a combination of block printed flowers, stencils, Zentangles and a lot of different kinds of paper.
Next week I’m going to be demonstrating gelli printing at Crestwood Elementary (5930 Old Sauk Rd in Madison, WI) from 6-7 pm. It is part of their Explore Arts Night and I’m curious about how it will go. It looks like there will be eight other artists doing demonstrations at different stations. It seems like such a great idea. That same night is the first open studio at Kindling Community Art at my neighborhood community center and I hope to stop in there for a few minutes.
On Thursday, December 12, I will be participating in a holiday art shop at Weichart Realtors at 2045 Atwood Avenue in Madison, WI from 5-8. I will have a selection of handmade books and little coloring books as well as some smaller pieces of art that would make wonderful gifts. There will be 5 other artist there and I believe their work includes jewelry and ceramics in addition to wall art, prints and cards.
Then on Saturday, Dec. 14 I’m teaching an Introduction to Zentangle class at the Art Hub in Cambridge, WI. It costs less than forty dollars and you will leave with your own Zentangle kit. It’s not too late to register here. We will learn some introductory patterns and then play with them in some festive ways. The circles of paper are called Zendalas and you will go home with your own finished Zendala.
After all that in one week I will be ready to rest. However it is Carve December on Instagram and I’m trying to carve a block/stamp every day. I think I may need to take a few days off next week. I’m also still working on my 100 mandalas challenge and I’m trying to use my new blocks to make mandalas. I have been taking a class from Clarissa Grande on Golden Geometry and it is fascinating. I will have a lot more to post about that class when I get caught up, but in the meantime I’m carving blocks to create golden spiral mandalas. The bottom 3 prints are the beginning of that and I have so many ideas of how to use them!
This is my most recent big piece and I call it Blue Skies. It’s kind of ironic because my sun sensitivity this summer was really bad so I stayed inside and worked on this off and on since June. The central picture is very early in the process and is mostly the original block print. I added Zentangles and watercolor and acrylics and colored pencils and I am calling it a mixed media monoprint. I think I’m going to submit it for an exhibit at the University of Wisconsin Hospital in January. At least every other week I walk past the place that local art is exhibited. Seeing my own art in medical facilities I go to was one of my main goals when I started making art again 10 years ago. It makes me so happy to share it with the nurses and medical professionals and they love it too. It makes us all more three dimensional to each other.
In the past I have done my own challenges during which I aspired to make mandalas (almost) every day for 100 days. I have been able to work on a mandala almost every day but a lot of my work takes more energy than I have on a given day. Frequently when I try to make a simple one it becomes complicated. So I once again am aspiring to make 100 mandalas by the end of the year, or make a whole lot and finish up a lot of works in progress. I started the project when there was a little more than 100 days left in the year.
Here’s an overview of week 1. I’m off to a good start! I did make 7 mandalas, but one is in the same sketchbook as the art supplies inventory rainbow so it’s not in the overall photo. Another one also appears twice as I combined a completed mandala with one that was in progress and not going well.
Sketchbook Revival class on art supply inventory taught by Janine Vangool of Uppercase MagazineCombination of dragonfly mandala and zendala featuring a pattern by Debbie Huntington.This zendala is from a class in the Tangle Talez workshop taught by Shie Naritomi.This zendala is a combination of one of my handcarved stamps and some Zentangle patterns.A collection of my handcarved stamps with some mixed media Zentangles and enhancements.Another Tangle Talez zendala. This one was taught by Anica Gabrovec (Zen.linea).The central portion of this mandala is another tile that was taught at Tangle Talez by Anica. I incorporated it into a collage that uses my stamps, zentangles and mixed media.
Newly completed collage titled Dane County Garden. Can you see the map in the background?
This month I am the featured artist at the Wisconsin Art Hub in Cambridge WI. This article provides answers to questions about my process of making art and development as an artist. It also provides more information about the classes I will be teaching there this fall. In April I will be having a solo exhibit there. Lots of exciting things going on!
Index Card a Day is an Instagram challenge intended to encourage a daily art practice. I have a pretty robust daily art practice and this year I created some small works on index cards for this challenge. Some are Zentangled, some are collaged, one is stitched and many include practice components for pieces that I am working on. I frequently use these index cards either on a plain book page or as part of a collage to create a note card for friends and family, as seen in the first photo.
Can you see components from these 2 mandalas in the index cards? I have a new solo exhibition scheduled for 2025 at the Art Hub in Cambridge. It is going to include 100 mandalas, some old and some new. These 2 are going to be part of that show if they don’t sell before then. I currently have 5 pieces in the $100 and Under show at the Art Hub this August and 3 of them are mandalas. I also have a prototype from a still life class I will be offering in October and a block print in that show.
So if you are in the market for some affordable art, head on over!
Jeanette Clawson Art 