Browsing an online art site is way easier than walking through a museum, and you can put your nose right up to the art without setting off an alarm. In your jammies!
Today, a resource highlight that is not to be missed: The Paul J. Getty Art Museum. Art teachers have used this site for years to access excellent quality resources for classroom use. The collection can be searched by keywords, or images can be viewed as part of online thematic or subject exhibitions. Images can be downloaded and used free of charge for educational purposes. It is such a great resource for obscure and unusual works of art in a variety of genres including sculpture, painting, jewelry, sketchbooks, and more.
Browsing an online art site is way easier than walking through a museum, and you can put your nose right up to the art without setting off an alarm. In your jammies!
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Sunday -- of a three day weekend for many of us -- a great day to get into an art project and put the usual Sunday chores off until Monday. My dear dad used to humorously say "Why do today what you can put off until tomorrow?" He also said that I would "lose my head if it wasn't tied on." The latter statement is true, so I am inclined to believe the former. Today, despite a severe flare in my spine since yesterday morning, art is on the menu. I need to feel like I am accomplishing something, even when my body will not obey my mental instructions. The beads, thread, and fabric are calling! It feels so good to actually be in the middle of multiple projects instead of being artistically stuck. Happiness awaits despite physical pain and difficulty. Here is an excellent article by art therapist Cathy Malchiodi about the relationship between practicing and learning about art and its effect on happiness, resiliency, and the brain. My favorite quote: "Repetitive satisfying art making may actually mediate depression and anxiety by stimulating the "accumbens-striatial-cortical" connection in the brain." I do not claim to know what that part of the brain really does or why it is important, and really I don't need a study to tell me that making art can make you a happier person. Still it is good to know that research is being done to prove what an artist's soul knows intuitively, doesn't it? What are you going to make today? I think many artistic people live with a certain amount of disorganization and material chaos. I know I do! Between my beading, painting, drawing, sewing, and collaging, there is a lot of stuff in my house. Add to it three dogs, two cats, and five parrots, a busy schedule, and a lack of natural cleaning ability. Navigating my house by Saturday morning is a wonder to behold. Somehow, enough gets done on the weekend to reset the clock for a Monday morning...but the mish-mash of stuff is never quite resolved. In a funny way, though, I like it. Artists are visually based people. A cluttered environment is chock full of reminders of inspirations, successes, failures, memories, and aspirations. The stuff of artmaking, really! Our physical environments influence the way we create. The fiber and paper jungle I live in turns into quilted mixed media pieces. I think I need to see "layers" of textures, shapes, and lines in my own world as well as my artwork, Besides, where else would Theo the cat be able to sleep in such comfort? What will you make today? When days are just a trail of clothes
Slung over poetry and prose A red reminder of the things I owe A songbird silenced in the setting snow I'm left here looking at the bones... These lyrics come from one of the best songwriters I've ever heard, Roddy Frame, whose descriptive flair snappy tunes, and use of natural imagery has kept me listening, spellbound. for over thirty years. This quote pops into my head every Friday as the busy week winds down. As the week gets busier and the energy dwindles, the clutter of life accumulates on a Friday. Piles of mail, laundry, and detritus of daily living that I just didn't have time to get to patiently wait in place for a weekend clean up. It is especially apt in the darkness of a cold January morning. The winter "blahs" are here and spring is not near enough to be the light at the end of the tunnel. Yet. Listening to Roddy's music (or Aztec Camera, his creation before releasing solo records) is medicinal for me -- his ability to use words and instruments has the ability to lift even the grayist, most overwhelmed soul up from the winter curbside. Art is like that! Whether you are creating it, listening to it, or looking at it, it has the ability to transport you to another way of thinking or feeling like nothing else. Engaging the mind in a creative act (or appreciating the creativity of others) can provide energy, positive thoughts, and sustenance, especially in these dark New England winters. Here's a link to the above song if you'd like to be crooned to this morning: Aztec Camera, Sister Ann What are you going to make today? Around 1:30 today, you might hear something loud in your area. I expect a groan of massive proportions to erupt in my classroom and spread to cover the state of Massachusetts. Today, I am kicking my 8th grade art class up a notch, and am giving them new artistic guidelines for the rest of the year -- they have to follow the copyright laws for class projects. Granted, I know many students (especially 8th graders) don't have the skills to produce an entirely original work yet and need to have visuals to learn about the world and represent it with visual accuracy, but the level of direct copying of other artists art for art projects has grown into a classroom virus that has to be cured. The text based memes that flood Instagram and Facebook cross my desk at an alarming rate. Many kids can't understand why copying a phrase of text onto a piece of paper, sometimes even ignoring the font style, doesn't express anything original. The thinking I want to see in my classroom is just not there yet. For the last two quarters of the year, my 8th grade elective Art Studio kids will have to follow the guidelines set out by copyright laws. Read about them here (short, easy to read About.com site that the kids understand.) At minimum, if they use a reference photo, they will have to cite the Internet or photo source on the back of the artwork. They can copy all they want in their sketchbooks and as freely created artwork. For official projects, thought, they have to be original. I can't wait to see what happens!! What are you going to create today? Today is a bleak cold morning. It is dark outside, and I would love to stay warm and asleep. I am grateful though that I have the choice to get up and go -- to be productive despite physical challenges that have kept me from doing so in the past. A new medication *might* be helping, or the disease process is just giving me a bit of a break right now. Either way, I will take it! So, it is coffee time and morning discussions with the birdies, brekkie for the pups and cats, and then off to the classroom where my students will teach me what is really important about art -- loving it, practicing it, playing with it, being challenged by it, and being in the moment with creative production. Paul Klee is an artist I love to look at when feeling like I've lost the playful edge in my own art (usually when in the midst of a long beaded piece, like the one I am doing now.) I remember the first time I encountered Klee's work. It was a college trip to NYC and there was an extensive exhibit of his work at the Guggenheim Museum. I was flabbergasted at what I saw. The lighthearted and free works were actually beautifully crafted and well made. Klee experimented with grounds, even painting on a dishcloth mounted to board. The geometric constructions he created on flat surfaces reminded me of the quilted pieces I was then experimenting with. His art struck a very powerful chord in me -- like a huge, ear shattering gong. He was an incredibly productive artist, too -- credited to making 8,926 works of art in his lifetime (lame citation, but I knew it was a really high number!) Now THAT is productive! After being dumbstruck by Klee's art, I did my usual artist obsession in reading every book I could get my hands on (pre-Internet, alas) and learning about why he made art. Could these highly abstract images have meeting? What was he trying to say? I delved into the Bauhaus movement and developed several other artistic obsessions along the way (Oskar Schlemmer, Lyonel Feininger, Kandinsky.) I also learned something that resonates with me more and more each day -- that Paul Klee had a serious autoimmune disease, scleroderma, and wrestled with it throughout his life. While I was learning about Klee and his persistence despite this physical challenge, I had no idea that a similar fate would be facing me starting at the age of 35. It seems like art was an intellectual escape from the physical realm, and his large body of work stands as evidence for success despite physical burdens. Cheers, Klee, cheers! An excellent article about a recent exhibit of Klee's work at Boston College can be read here. It describes the philosophical approach Klee took in his art, the one that must have helped him regularly create. I bet he made art every day!! What are you going to make today? Ideas for artwork can be elusive. An artist can be surrounded by materials, space, perfect lighting, and even time only to find out the muse did not care to visit. It is a frustrating place to be. There are books written on how to handle artistic blocks -- I think I have read almost all of them due to my own creative stumbles. One approach I really like is to think of something abstract and yet full of visual possibilities: just color. No matter the medium, exploring the many facets of a single color can bring back the creative mojo.
Color is expressive and emotive all by itself. A fantastic design structure is important too, but color alone can evoke powerful responses. Advertisers know this and use it to their advantage. The fashion industry clings to seasonal color forecasts, and interior decorating schemes have their own chronological palettes -- anyone want to take the paneling down in my kitchen to see the avacado, gold and tangerine wallpaper? Artists often have their own palettes that they frequent. A good resource on color schemes is Color: Messages and Meanings by Leatrice Eiseman. While this is from an advertising perspective, the presented color schemes and interpretations provide a jog to the creative machinery. What happens when you focus on only one color, with all its glorious variety? I love the book Red by Beaney and Littlejohn (Double Trouble). It is about explorations in fiber using red as the primary color. Having the theme of a color gave the artists freedom to experiment with subtle tone changes and intricate pattern work. They most definitely were not "stuck!" I have a book that was given to me when I was in Istanbul - not on amazon - by of all companies, Mavi Jeans. "Mavi" means "blue" in Turkish, and the photo book chronicled the color "blue jean blue" in all its variety and nuance. Certainly there is a work of art in there for an artist bereft of ideas. Monday! First off, I didn't post well this weekend. Already broke my record of posting daily. Well, even though perfection is overrated. I am happy that I am a little disappointed that I was not consistent. I will write off my missing day of blogging with the substitution of getting the Facebook page to run right, and re-doing the FB logo. That's a wee bit of art! Yesterday I had a normal Sunday filled with rest, healthy discussions with the parrots, no chores, and more rest. Now on to the MONDAY slam with renewed energy! In light of the time getting the better of me this past weekend, I am sharing a new productivity app that I've downloaded but not yet tried called 30/30 by Binary Hammer. It is a task list app with a built in timer, allowing you to set up your day's tasks according to the time you have. I've been a compulsive to-do list person for years. I often had literally fifty projects going with staged tasks ready to go at the first opportune moment. Trouble is, I could never get to any of the to do's with the work schedule and health issues I have. Can you say "frustration?" Eventually the to-do list would need to be wiped out (i.e. "revised") in favor of a new list. List-making takes time that could be spent beading! I'd also tried the Pomodoro timer apps, which set a timer for work and breaks from work, throughout the day. While helpful (some of my ADHD students have found this a good app to have) it didn't keep my projects straight. The 30/30 app seems like a novel way to look at time, and tasks. An essential task EVERY DAY will be to work on artwork! Now, bring on Monday -- it's trash day, recycling day, make birdie muffin day, and work. Let's see what art can happen, too. What are you going to make today? There are so many unfortunate situations in the world that it is easy to get overwhelmed by opportunities to try and make them better. Recently on Facebook I took the time to explore a post about the Soi Dog Foundation. This group works to free dogs from the...gulp..."meat trade" in Asia. As someone who has a very hard time with eating meat of any kind (anything with eyeballs is highly unpalatable, IMHO), and as one with three lovable pups, this is nothing short of disgusting. Add to the situation horrendous, inhumane processing and this charity has become my "faraway" cause for at least the year. Will donations go far enough to be effective? I don't know. Can a very hungry, very poor person be discouraged from eating man's best friend? Not sure. Does making a small donation let me sleep better about this situation? No. Not at all. Shortly after seeing this site, synchronicity arrived as I hit a chapter in the book "Rabid" by Bill Wasik. It described a jewelry artist who moved her company to Bali and opened an animal welfare center to address issues of both animal cruelty and the first ever rabies outbreak on the island. The company and the association, called BAWA, are doing really well and innumerable otherwise defenseless animals have been helped. How nice to see an artist be able to use her talents for the betterment of such a worthwhile cause. In another life and with a younger, healthy body, I could imagine myself starting a refuge for unwanted animals. When travelling to Egypt and Turkey I was confronted all too many feral cats and dogs that desperately needed help, but I could not give more than a meal and a prayer. Today I have to be content with serving my own fur and feathered beasts, all ten of them, instead of doing much to help in other places. At least I was able to sign the Soi Dog Foundation's worldwide petition (using the link above) and you can, too. What are you going to make today? Studying nature through art works really well for so many reasons. By looking closely at our physical environment, we become closer to it. Less cut off from our own physical selves and more connected to other natural forms. The structural designs found in nature lend themselves to beautifully balanced designs in artwork, as well. Natural forms often have symmetry, giving a work of art repetition and evenness. Fractal patterns, found in trees, plants and crystals, create harmonious compositions. The organic forms found in nature resonate with our organic selves, and offset our often geometric, man-made (and woman-made) world. When creating an expressive image both adopting the visual design present in nature or recognizing discord and representing that can be equally compelling design strategies. Of course, in a very broad sense, everything is nature. To quote a fab tune from the early 90's (I think!): "You can not go against nature / because when you do / to go against nature / is part of nature too." (Crooned by David J. Haskins, of my beloved fave group Love and Rockets) Of course, being aware of the photographic resource's ownership is essential in case that amazing art you create ends up being sold or published. Finding free-use images in the public domain is not that difficult. There are great sites out there featuring professional photographers' images -- just google your subject and the words "public domain photo." Here's and example. The USA.gov site has a good collection here. Another interesting resource for exploring images from nature is the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service National Digital Library There are some very nice old images on the site taken from painted glass slides, including this groovy bird. What are YOU going to create today? |
AuthorAmy Ropple is an artist and art educator who believes engaging in visual art can make life happier and more meaningful. This blog is a daily journal of creative habits and interests, as well as reflections on living with chronic autoimmune disease. Archives
January 2017
CategoriesDisclaimer: Yes, there may be parrots on this site. I live with five of them and they tend to work their way into everything I do!
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