Friday, July 24, 2015

Projects in an Artist's Studio

Mixed media artist and Blogger Win Dinn asked readers to post a link to show what was going on in their studios. Photographing for this blog post made me realize how many projects an artist may have going on at once. For this post, I didn't include what was happening in the office regarding the selling of art. I know I spent sometime in the office yesterday printing off labels for cards and fabric packaging, as well as researching 'Made in Canada' labels, and ordering a maple leaf stamp through Creston Card and Stationery.
Check out what's happening in my studio below.

Developing a new card design. Hand painted textile bookmarks. I am trying out a removable glue for attaching them to a card. So far so good. (this is the only thing I moved in my studio for this photo shoot as I had just placed these on a shelf the day before)
Bookmark backing pieces left over from the 50 bookmarks already made.

Ironing interfacing onto my hand (dye) painted fabric for textile cards.

Sewing details on the card tops.

Threads from fraying the edges of the cards and bookmarks. What a tedious job!

Folding card stock for the textile cards.
  
Gluing the textile card fronts to the folded cardstock.

Weighting the cards down for the glue to dry

I couldn't resist showing you my favorite card from this group. As a matter of fact my husband liked it so much he removed it from the stack headed for sale at Creston Card and Stationery.

And my favorite 'Art' dog. If you look closely at the photo, with the sewing machine in it, you will see her treat jar in the background. I think the cool floor as much as the treat jar is what is keeping her happy in the studio.
 
A sewing project from a family member to make two scarves out of this one large one, one for her and one for me.

I dug this book out when I grabbed books for weighting the cards. I need to review bird anatomy for a community project I am involved in, teaching a group to paint birds in watercolour.

Fabric from my recent Indigo dyeing that is waiting for to me to price.

Hand painted sky and designed material waiting to be trimmed, pressed and priced. I am working towards two Quilt shows where I will be a vendor. One in Nelson, BC and one in Canmore, AB in Oct. I have to be organized ahead because the highlight of my year, art wise is coming up in Sept, well actually all of Sept and I am going to be busy painting in watercolour. I look forward to telling you all about it. It's going to be fabulous.
 
Well there you have an example of one person's studio. Feel free to send me a photo or an email about what you have going on. egidman@kootenay.com

2 comments:

Win Dinn, Artist said...

What a fabulous post, Eileen - I love seeing all the things you have on the go, and Casey does look extremely relaxed in the midst of it all. John would be all over that fisherman card too - I'm not surprised Greg snatched it! SO glad you linked to this!

Mellowood Gallery said...

Interesting as always Eileen. I like the new card idea and your bookmarks are lovely. When I read about the removable glue, I wondered if you had considered double sided tape.I bought some acid free ATG tape to use when backing my canvases and it is surprisingly strong. I just tried it; attached a 10 x 24 in. piece of fabric to a piece of watercolor paper with a 7 inch piece of the tape, shook the whole thing and it all stuck. Then I peeled the fabric off the paper and removed the tape. I think I will be using the tape for more things than I thought - lol. Have fun!