I Don't Know Why

I really like this for some reason.

Green Grid No. 2

Green Grid

This is from the back side of another marker drawing. It's a bit of a departure as the grid itself has been highlighted in green.

In this second example I cut and pasted purple dots, pink dots and green squares from the original drawing. It's interesting to note how the green outline can be totally dropped out using Enhance - Adjust color - Replace color.

In Progress On Grid

Here's a work in progress utilizing some of the marking pen dots shown in a previous post. The grid was created with black acrylic paint and masking tape.

892 Unique Ways: The Movie

I think about grids a lot. I would be lost without some sort of grid to support my dots. Pattern thrives on a grid. So I was excited to learn from The Design Observer Group (via things magazine) that there are 892 unique ways to partition a 3x4 grid into unit rectangles. Hugh Dubberly's article is illustrated by a lovely poster which can be downloaded in .pdf format. And there is also a neat video clip which runs you through all of the possible configurations.

Now if you increase that area to 3x5 I wonder how many more variations would be possible? I'm sure librarians everywhere would like to know.

Moon Dots for Peter

Here's Another One

There is something so satisfying about this process. It's like having unlimited Colorforms. I'd like to have this one on fabric.

Colorforms were invented in 1951 when two art students, Harry and Patricia Kislevitz, began experimenting with flexible vinyl as an alternative to paint. Colorforms were one of the first brands in the toy industry to be advertised ("It's more fun to play the Colorforms way!") on television. I loved the colorful basic shapes set as a child. Didn't you?

Paul Rand (designer of the IBM, UPS and General Electric logos) created the Colorforms logo.

I Can't Stop

Diagonal Marker Cross

Another new discovery: the "magnetic" lasso! Now I can cut and paste shapes with irregular outlines.

This exercise is done with a scan from the reverse side of the previous Marker Cross drawing. I love how the markers bleed through the paper and look like watercolor.

Marker Cross

Amazing tool, that Photoshop lasso. It has freed me from the limitation of the dot shape for cutting and pasting.

More Marker Dots

These are from scans of the back side of marker drawings, which bled through the sketch book paper. I love the effect. Then I manipulated in photoshop.

Here's another version of the one with the green pin-wheel. It looks like it was painted in watercolor. I figured out how to use the lasso tool to outline one of the white areas behind the four dots. Then I painted the area yellow with the brush. Then I cut and pasted the shape so the white and yellow areas alternated. I re-applied the dots to the yellow areas using cut and paste also. Then I rotated a square area (using the square brush selection tool) in the center to get that ribbon candy shape.

Meg Hitchcock's Visual Mantras

Meg Hitchcock's reassembled text collages serve to illustrate how obsessive a devoted book altering artist can be. I just discovered her work while following up on ACA Galleries' advertisement for their upcoming show Fragments: Modern and Contemporary Collage (April 30 through June 11).

On her Art Blog, Meg reveals a bit about her method: "Briefly, my creative work goes like this: I cut up sacred texts letter by letter, disemboweling the word of God, and then reconfigure them letter by letter to create another sacred text." Visit her website to see her lovely paintings (in three series: Gates, Totems and Knots) and more collage work.

There is also a clip on YouTube featuring the artist talking about her installation in process, re-writing the Koran as the Book of Revelation. She is a wizard with that x-acto knife! I found the viewer comments, which discuss the distinction between art and religion, to be interesting as well.

And, in postscript, I want to mention that Tony Fitzpatrick, my favorite collage artist from Chicago, will also be showing work in ACA's Fragments show.

New on Anita's Bead Blog

I usually don't cross-post but I am so proud of myself for my accomplishment today that I am making an exception.

I've been making up for lost time over on my neglected bead blog today. I am adding information about the properties of minerals in a category titled About Stones. As of this posting there are twenty-five descriptions with photographs all of which are indexed on the sidebar for easy retrieval. This information has been buried on both my Anita's Beads and Toad Hollow Mineral sites so I hope that getting it up on Anita's Bead Blog (which receives a surprising amount of traffic considering how infrequently I have been posting there) will help it find a wider audience.

Pictured above are free-form cabochons of Beryllium Opal, also called Bertrandite or "Tiffany Stone."

Brian Dettmer's Book Art

Brian Dettmer is known as "the Book Surgeon" for his technique of carving up old volumes to create beautiful sculptural art. Taking collage to the next level, he neither adds nor rearranges, only removes using scissors and surgical tools transforming dictionaries, old medical textbooks, and out-of-date encyclopedias into mind-boggling dioramas.

My Modern Met features fifteen illustrations of Dettmer's bibliotransformations as well as an exclusive interview with seven more photos. Visit the website of Brian Dettmer to view additional work dating from 2005 to 2010. Recent press includes an article on The New Yorker's "Book Bench" titled Postmodern Deconstruction. A solo show is scheduled for May 19, 2011 – June 11, 2011 at Kinz + Tillou in New York City.