Friday, April 20, 2012

Essence and a Book Signing

self portrait by Donna Watson, collage
(this is not my self portrait in the book)

BOOK SIGNING!!
The Pulse of Mixed Media:
Secrets and Passions of 100 Artists Revealed 
by Seth Apter
local artists Leslie Avon Miller and myself
will also be there doing demos
Bellevue Art and Frame, Bellevue WA
May 5th, 12-2
20% off of all books purchased during signing and DOOR PRIZES
 Seth Apter invited 31 artists to create self -portraits for his book.  Below are 5 artists who submitted their self-portraits.   "We are not free when we are doing just what we like.  We are only free when we are doing what the deepest self likes.  And there is getting down to the deepest self!  It takes some diving."  D.H. Lawrence
Alicia Caudel lives in the Pacific NW.  She says her inspiration for her self-portrait is simply all that she treasures.  "I am a quirky girl with many loves and adoration, and as such I wished to represent as many of these affinities as possible."  website here and blog here

Your handwriting.  The way you walk.  Which china pattern you choose.  It's all giving you away.  Everything you do is a self-portrait.  Everything is a diary.  --Chuck Palahniuk, Diary
Jen Crossley lives in Australia.  "Reflections" shows the many layers of mica over the image which represents the many layers of Jen's life as a mother, wife, best friend and artist.  blog here.  

Art is not making a beautiful surface, or drawing a realistic apple.  Art is getting to an essence, reaching the senses.  -- Shoichi Ida

Robyn Gordon lives in South Africa.  Her wood carving has become a form of meditation.  "I decided to portray one of the most important facets of my life, and that is the serenity that I feel while creating art."  her blog ArtPropelled here  
What we make, why it is made,  how we draw a dog, who it is we are drawn to, why we cannot forget.  Everything is a collage,  even genetics.  There is the hidden presence of others in us,  even those we have known briefly.  We contain them for the rest of our lives,  at every border we cross.
Michael Ondaatje
  
Bridgette Guerzon Mills is a mixed media artist who currently has two young children.  Her self portrait is a female figure who conveys motherhood and fertility but also a gatherer, and nurturer.
website here  and blog here

There is nothing like returning to a place that remains unchanged to find ways in which you yourself have altered.   --- Nelson Mandela

Don Madden works with clay.  He was not an artist all his life.. coming from the corporate world so he is now busy working with new techniques and creating unique wonderful pieces.  He also has a very funny sense of humor which you will find at his blog here.  

A person is never as quiet or unrestrained as they seem,
or as bad or good, 
as vulnerable or as strong, 
as sweet or as feisty;
we are thickly layered, 
page upon page, 
behind simple covers.
-- Deb Caletti