The 2011 exhibit for the Flint Hills is coming up soon:  VISIONS OF THE FLINT HILLS BENEFIT AND SALE is a juried exhibit featuring art of the Flint Hills. The exhibit will run from October 7, 2011 thru November 25, 2011, in the Buttonwood Art Space, 3013 Main Street, Kansas City, Missouri. Open to paintings, photographs and 3-D works influenced by or depicting the Flint Hills geographic area in Kansas.   All sales will be 50% of sale to artist and 50% to Flint Hills charity. Juror: Gallery Director, Jamie Lavin.  All artwork will be juried on a piece by piece basis.  If you have questions, please email info@ButtonwoodArtSpace.com

I am excited about this show because I will have 2 fiber/felted pieces in among all the photography and paintings.  It’s fun for me and great for diversity within the show.  I love working with fiber!

This is one of my felted pieces accepted for the show.

August 4th or 5th, I received a text message on my phone, informing me that a grandbaby had been born and I needed to save the August 3rd sunrise. So yesterday, August 17, I talked to my friend who is has passed into that grandmother phase of life. She was telling me how she had kept a journal for one year when her daughter was born until she was one year old. So a few months before her daughter delivered the baby, she mailed this journal to her. It meant so much to her and my friend’s description was so touching. Today, I went upstairs to mat the August 3rd sunrise. As I turned it over, I saw I had made a quick journal entry on the back of the sunrise, a stormy and dark sunrise. The weather here had been extremely hot and the 100 degree temperatures were becoming unbearable. On the back, it said “Hoping for rain.” I don’t journal on the back of my sunrises very often, maybe 5 times a year, but when I do, it is a result of a strong response to the morning or situation. And it is always just a few words, but they are enough words that I know exactly how I felt. When I saw that and knew that journaling was intertwined with the lives of this family, I was so touched! How wonderful life can be….

There is always a debate between artists working together: music or no music. I remember when I was in grade school, our teacher had us listen to music and draw what we felt. This abstract idea was so appealing to me and the concept has stayed with me all these years: Music is so influential to our mood and our thoughts. With or without words, it is the mind’s director. This is the reason I choose not to listen to music while I’m conceptualizing a new body of work. My concentration is easily broken and the thoughts I had are gone! Because I have so many evolving in and out, quiet is much better for me. The feeling of losing a dream when you first wake up or forgetting what you came into a room for is the type of feeling I have when distracted from that creative space in my mind. The distraction of another’s creativity, the musician in this case, interrupts my direction without a chance of retrieving it again. When I am working with felting and doing the non creative parts which require only physical involvement, then the rhythm of music can really help keep structure and movement in the process. Other than that, I am pretty happy being with my own thoughts. And with that luxury of listening to myself, I can compose visual music!

On many occasions, I have heard fellow artists mention how they are not interested in exhibiting their art unless it is a prestigious place or unless they know they will sell work.  As a rural artist, there are so many rewards beyond meeting “impressive” people or selling work.  Yesterday, a group of artists and I spent the day in Wilson, Kansas at a bed and breakfast (Simple Haven).  It was for their Czech Festival.  We all had such a fabulous time and I, for one, have again met some amazing people.  It was especially rewarding to meet an older couple, artists from Lyons, Kansas.  Gordan and Rae Zahradnik.  What wonderful conversation we shared with these fabulous watercolor/collage artists!  But the real jewel of discovery had to be Susan and Joe Curtis, owners of Simple Haven.  We learned about Susan’s brother, James Pruner.  He was a well established artist in the 1970′s and 80′s and passed away in 1987.  His work was outstanding and put him on the map of great Kansas artists.  I did not know about him, but was amazed at his introspective view of the world and how he perceived so many future problems from the 1980′s lifestyle.  He seemed to have such an accurate insight into the direction our country was headed.  His work was very strong in substance.  We also got to read some of the poetry and words he had written.  He lived a simple life, had converted a Cleveland city bus into his living space and then built his own house all the while creating art.   His work on the subject:  “Man and Machine” is part of the permanant collection at the Spencer Museum of Art in Lawrence.  Here is the website if you want to see a small sampling of his work:

http://empweb.nhm.ku.edu/eMuseumPlus?service=ExternalInterface&siteId=1&module=artist&objectId=19136&viewType=detailView&lang=en&actionListenerClassName=ch.zetcom.mp.presentation.tapestry.util.customCode.ActivateDetailTabPos2ActionListener

Of course, his sister Susan has a large collection of his work.  If you want to treat yourself to a lovely evening, book a room at Simple Haven Bed and Breakfast in Wilson and treat yourself to seeing the inspired work of Jim Pruner.  It’s worth the trip.  My next stop needs to be Lyons to visit Gordan and Rae.  It would be fun to see what they have going on there!  Kansas artists need to be aware of each other and make these simple, encouraging connections!  We are spread out across this state without knowing who we are or what one anther is doing in the world of art.

All this new awareness due to a small, one day exhibit at a bed and breakfast in a small rural Kansas town!   Don’t underestimate the power of small places!

If you’re an artist, there will have been some time you have had to interpret the color Green.  It is one of the most complex colors here on the prairie.  We are taught that the grass is green so we learn to pick up a green crayon to show grass.  It’s something we have to unlearn if we want to show the true spectrum of colors.  Even the plant names depict something different:  Goldenrod, Buffalo grass, big and little Bluestem, Purple Coneflower, Indiangrass.  Throw in some rocks, trees, seasonal changes, hourly light shifts and clouds and the formula of green complexities become even more challenging.  These subtilies  are what we train our artistic eye to see.  It’s the viewer’s delight.  So instead of picking up a grass green pastel stick, I might pick up purple, red or yellow.  Which becomes second nature as I paint the landscape.  However, this all changes again when painting a  landscape in wool.  Showing the color changes offers new challenges.  The opportunity to also show textures is even more exciting.   These two landscapes, one a distant vista, the other a little closer view, were incredibly fun to work on.  They are both of the Flint Hills grassland.  The closer view with Buffalo actually uses real buffalo hair felted in with the wool.  I KNOW I got a very true color for the animal.  Can’t get much more true than using the real thing!   The challenge for both pieces, was of course, the grass.

As an artist, I love problem solving.  Using the felting techniques to paint give me plenty of opportunities for many directions.  Working with fiber is a fulfilling artistic endeavor.

Dining on the Flinthills

Burning in Alternate Years

Kansas.  It seems our state government is catipulting us into a blah state as we watch all our government funding being removed from under our feet.  Or had we already been considered a “blah” state before the removal of funds ever occurred?   Not only by the rest of the nation, but by our own homegrown Kansans.

Last night, I attended an exhibit by a young artist in my area.  She had a lovely calming and soft exhibit.  And of all subjects….the Sparrow.  I asked her what her inspiration was.  She said one of her professors had encouraged the students who really weren’t sure what their subject should be, to paint the very familiar,  objects in their pathway they seldom noticed.  As Angela looked out her window, she looked upon the sparrows with new eyes.  As most of us have been taught, the sparrow is a lowly, undesirable bird.  One lacking of color and quite boring to look at.   When I look outside and see birds, and when I see it’s just a sparrow, I don’t pay attention any longer.  This is what I was taught since I was a little girl and I’ve never really questioned that as other more colorful birds flew around my yard, outshining the sparrow every time.  Angela captured the sparrow in her work in such a way that made me take notice and appreciate this common creature.  She used the softeness of tea dyed cotton over batting, painting her little realistic renditions of the birds with graphite, watercolor and some stitching.  And capturing a soft emotion in her representation of the sparrow.  After listening to her explanation, I suddenly thought of the state of Kansas.  Just about every child in Kansas is brought up with the belief that Kansas is dull, boring, lifeless and colorless.   Reenforced by other states and now by our own govenor.  Kansas is a sparrow.   We have to turn off this sort of brain washing and look around at the quiet, soft beauty of this state.  The colors of the land are really incredible.  The patterns established by nature in contrast to the quilt patterns formed by the farmer’s hands are striking and our big sky without obstruction for observing sunrises and sunsets are some of the best!  Now, more than ever in our recent history, the flavor and character of the state of Kansas falls much into the artist’s hands.  We ARE so essential to the morale and esteem of this state.

After painting the Kansas sunrise daily for 6 years, I never tire of the beauty of our sky!

Work has been full of framing sunrises, painting banners for a church and working on new fiber pieces. And the opportunity to teach others to find a voice through their art. Except for framing, I am getting paid to do what I love. And the framing is a residue of doing one of the things I love the most, waking up each morning to a glorious sky and recording what I see. What a great way to start out my day.
I am so fortunate to be able to record each day and then one step beyond that….share what I’ve recorded. I so enjoy this merging of stories. Yesterday, a woman bought the sunrise for September 3, 2006. I had a note on this sunrise: “Hannah’s death”. I had been asked to paint fairies and butterflies on a little girl’s casket. She was dying with a brain tumor and wanted a pink casket. Her parents had it flown into KC from Australia and then had a driver bring it to my house on September 3. That afternoon, as I began painting on her casket, she was at home picking out the clothes she wanted to be buried in. Later that evening, I received word that she had passed away. The driver picked up the casket the next morning and returned it to KC, a 3 hour journey. Their story and my story merged on that casket while my story through the recording of the sunrises became another woman’s story to celebrate her wedding date! It was a very pink day which, at the time I found quite symbolic of Hannah. Hopefully, it was an appropriate symbol for an anniversary, too!

Got one more small mural finished this week.  Just in time for the Master Gardener’s Tour.  This one is outside.  The yard it is in is very quaint and will be a delight to the 1,000 plus visitors it will have next week.  And I am so thrilled that my work gets to be part of this garden!

Trompe L'Oeil on Garden Shed

I painted a shovel and a small pitchfork on the garden shed

When my kids call, I am ready to go.  So this week, I spent time with my oldest daughter, helping her paint in her home.  We painted her bedroom wall gray, her kitchen cupboards lemon white with coral hardward, the backsplash coral, and the walls turquoise.  It was lots of fun.  And, of course, she had to have me paint a mural on her bedroom wall.  So we did that, too.

Flower goes from near the ceiling and close to the floor.

These diamonds changed from black to coral.

Melissa came up with the great idea of using the same coral spray paint, (a high grade professional artist’s paint) to paint her white curtain.  But before she sprayed it, she laid the leaves from a black walnut tree over it.  This is her father’s favorite tree so it’s very symbolic to her, too.

White curtain sprayed with coral paint over walnut leaf design.

Felted Tapestry for "What's That You're Wearing?".

During the week of Spring Break, around 15 kids were allowed to enroll in this workshop called “What’s That You’re Wearing?”  They got to learn about all our clothing, the history of it and the present state of synthetics many of us wear.  They got to work with mosaic and artist Alicia Scott.  Melissa Wagner, a textile expert, spoke to them about what the clothing they had on was made of and about renewable and non renewable resources.  Then Neal Kindall, artisan and recreater of Native American clothing, tanning and tools spoke to them about materials used for clothing in another time.  Artist, Donna Sandburg taught them how to spin yarn from wool and they got to make some small pieces of art with the wool they spun.  Finally, I taught them how to felt.  Each one got to make a handmade piece of felt before we began the large piece for the zoo.  We incorporated different parts of the animal(what they wear), from snake skin, to claw sheaths to various animal’s locks of hair into pockets on the wall hanging.  We even had a lion’s dreadlock.  It was a lot of work and still didn’t get done, so I took it home.  Since I was so busy with other projects, I didn’t get to work on it until a couple of weeks ago.  Now it will hang in the museum at the Rolling Hills Wildlife Adventure zoo.  Stop off on the Hedville, Kansas exit on I-70 just west of Salina.  The zoo is one of the best right there in the middle of the Smokey Hills!  The musuem has the largest taxidermy collection in the U.S.!  They moved it in years ago via 66 semi truck loads of animals!