Monday, April 25, 2011

FRIDA KAHLO "GYPSY WOMAN " CLOAK HANGERS

FRIDA "GYPSY WOMAN" CLOAK HANGERS

Frida "gypsy woman" cloak hangers

Since I’m suffering from Frida mania right now, I’ll be posting items as I finish creating them. I Just completed 3 Frida “Gypsy Woman” cloak hangers. If you’d like to see details of how I created them, please click here. I will sell two of them and keep the third one to place in the closet of the Tuscany Suite so that my students can enjoy it during the August sculpture class

Number 1 - I used antique lace doilies, canvas and digital image of my Frida

Back of number 1

Number 2 - I used digital flowers from my garden, canvas and oil paint

Back of number 2

Number 3-created with cloth and lace

Back of number 3

If you are interested in purchasing one of my cloak hangers, please e –mail me and we can go from there. I have priced them at $38.00. I’ll be glad to stop by the post office and get a shipping price for you to your particular oountry or state. Thanks so much.

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Monday, April 18, 2011

FRIDA KAHLO!

FRIDA!

FRIDA MANIA!

Frida Kahlo Rivera-mixed media original oil collage

Mexican icon, Frida Kahlo, has been represented throughout the years in many different mediums. I never really thought too much about her until a few years ago when I had the pleasure of taking a tour of Mexico. While in Mexico City, I visited the museum of Diego Rivera. It was there that I became attracted to the busy look of his fabulous paintings. Frida attended the renowned National Preparatory School where she met Diago. He was painting a mural in the lecture hall. They later married only to have an on again off again marriage. I started to study their lives and now I see what all the fury concerning Frida is about.

Close-up

Diego Rivera's mural in Mexico City, Mexico

Magdalena Carmen Frida Kahlo was born in 1907 in Mexico City. She contracted polio as a child and walked with a limp because of the damage to her leg and foot. As luck would have it, she was forced to leave her study of medicine to begin painting after a terrible street car accident immobilized her. Being forced to remain in bed in excruciating pain for long periods at a time, she chose to explore the world of art and became quite famous.

Frieda is richly decorated in vibrant oil color and embellishments

In creating my own Frida oil painted collage, I decided to vicariously put myself in her shoes, pick up her palatte and see through her eyes as I painted. I chose to create a painting in the fashion she would have used. She said when interviewed, “I paint myself because it I know myself better than anyone else.” She created 143 paintings and of those 55 are self portraits.

Crackled flowers

I found an old frame at the flea market and painted it in bright Mexican looking colors. I glued digital images of flowers behind the area where I roughed in the face. I modge podged the flowers, crackled them and then oil painted several in and around the crackles to create depth. I then finished painting her face, neck and dress in oils.

Wooden palette

I was given a beautiful palette for Mother’s Day last year, but after taking an oil painting class, I found that it is much more cost-effective and much easier to use the disposable palettes. I decided to use my wooden palette as a focal point in the painting. I hand wrote two of Frida's quoted sayings in Spanish. I also added two paint brushes that were my father, James Galloway’s. He was a well known landscape artist. I inherited all of his art materials when he passed away several years ago. Some of the brushes were dried out and I wanted to put them to good use.
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Beautiful painting found at resort in Playa Del Carmen, Mexico

Another busy but beautiful painting

I wanted the painting to look very much like one Frida would have created of herself. I was also influenced by two paintings in the hotel where I stayed in Playa Del Carmen this past winter. Yes. "Busy" is in with the old Mexican artists and mine is certainly no exception.


Finished Frida oil collage measuring 36" wide x 66" high! She's larger than she looks here.

My Frida is standing rather stoic (that is the way Frida usually painted herself,) with the bright flowers and traditional Mexican dress she most often chose to wear. The look she conveys in her paintings is of a surrealistic nature. She said. “I never painted dreams. I painted my own reality.”

I printed her biography in Spanish and crackled it, placed it on the dress, used gesso to splash over it and little by little…she started to come to life.

She was a long time in the making but finally I can present her for show. I hope you like her. I plan to place her in my kitchen for now. I just know I’ll love the color and life she will add.

FRIDA MANIA!


Frida sculpture and oil collage shown together in my studio

I used lavish embellisments to adorn her hair and neck

Now..here is where the real Frida mania comes in. I didn’t stop at the painting. I also sculpted Frida, I created journals of her, placed her on my “gypsy woman" cloak hangers, made art paper dolls and various other Frieda items. I’ll be doing a post of them soon, but for now, here is a picture of the sculpture I created of her, which is for sale. I have priced her at $300. She is 23” tall and 12” wide. I can ship her anywhere and give you an estimate on shipping price. Please e-mail me if you are interested and we can go from there.


Another view of Frida sculpture


And yet another view

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Wednesday, April 6, 2011

GODDESS FACE PLANTERS

GODDESS FACE PLANTERS

I have named this exotic planter "Minerva" She is the Goddess of Wisdom, Medicine and Crafts

Finally! I have finished my Goddess clay face planters and have them ready to display and sell at our local farmer's market. Sales are usually very good for the planters but this year our market is under construction and I’m not sure if we will get our usual crowds. The renovation has been planned in segments. First, our market square building will be completely revamped. This building held some really quaint shops and restaurants but the building itself is ancient and in need of some major changes. Next, our Center in the Square Museum will be renovated to include a butterfly garden, an aquarium and a roof top restaurant.

Here are some of the planters all ready for their showing this weekend


One thing about life that we can be sure of is change. Even though most of us cling to keeping things constant, change can be a good thing. It has been a struggle down on the market for all of us. Many have lost their businesses because of the construction. I will loose the gallery that I adore since it will now become divided into upscale high end shops, and I will have to either find a new gallery or hope for some big market or Etsy sales when I remove all that I have displayed there. You’ll probably be seeing a lot of my gallery work on my blog very soon.

More glitzy planters ready for the market

Back to the planters. I didn’t mean to divert because I really am excited that I have the planters ready for Saturday. This winter, (I always sculpt the planters over the winter) I threw my heart and soul into these planters. They are very different. I probably should have waited to take pictures of them in my booth where they would be in full daylight, but I was so anxious to show them that I took all shots from my studio. You will notice that some of the planters are similar to the ones I will be teaching my students to sculpt this summer in my class. If you are interested in participating, please check out my sculpture school at the top of my right hand side bar. It will be an all–inclusive, meaning I have hired a chef to cook for us and I’m including all meals and beverages (including wine of course) and room accommodations, side trips and other instructors who will visit. Of course, I will be there 24/7 teaching. I have a swimming pool for evening swims. I’m accepting 5 students and have 3 already…so there are just two spaces left. Hope you will join us on August 8th-15th.

This planter is similar to the one we will make in my sculpture class

Back to the planters…there I go again. Anyway, I sculpted my planters using stoneware clay, fired them in the kiln at a high temperature and then adorned them with all sorts of embellishments I had in my studio.

Native American planter I have titled "Nampeyo"

I’m off and running now since one of my good customers is coming over today to get the first choice of planters for the year. Dreama says she likes the ones with the pot at the top of the head. I have several of those for her to choose from. I wonder which one she will take home to live with her.

Very rustic planter that looks as though she has been dredged from the earth. I've named her "Maeve" This is a Celtic name meaning mythical queen

Wiccan earth planter titled "Azura" meaning Sky Jewel

"Algoma" A native American name meaning Valley of the Flowers

"Tania" a fairy name meaning Fairy Queen

I added a bit of silver and gold to this one

Earth Angel

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