Patti Smith: An Illuminated Apprentice

While compiling my fourth Play List on The Temporary Blog last night I re-discovered the music of Patti Smith. This seems fitting as I have recently read her book, Just Kids, which was recommended to me last spring by Mrs. Neutron.

Funny how you can come to appreciate things later in life that you blithley overlooked at a younger age. Check out this 1978 interview with Tom Snyder where Patti says: "I'm more materialistic about my soul than I am about objects."

Until the End of the World never made the list, but it should have.

Animation & Cool Photosets

I found a nice example of vintage animation via the blog Stickers and Stuff. Titled Magic Highway USA, it is amazing to see how creative the predictions were. The idea of a road surface that would melt snow and evaporate rain would be a great alternative to the frost heaves and snow banks that are in my immediate future!

I just added the photostream (found via Letterology) of Piet Schreuders to my Flickr list. Some amazing images there, including the one displayed at the top of this post.

There is nothing of note happening collage-wise as my entire existence has been swallowed up by The Roof, but I will leave you with these: Howlin' Wolf performing Dust My Broom at the 1966 Newport Jazz Festival, Walt Disney's Oscar winning history of music titled Toot Whistle, Plunk And Boom and an animation set to Cab Calloway's Saint James Infirmary.

Artists of the Month

My friend Sharon Lee and I have a show this month at the Gafney Library in Sanbornville, New Hampshire. We're having a reception to meet the artists on Thursday October 20th from 5:00 to 7:00 pm so stop in and say hello if you get a chance.

Art Group leader Peter Abate curated the show and did a fantastic job. I am always amazed to see my work hanging outside of my crowded little gallery. And it displays well with Sharon's work, which is frequently composed on a grid similar to mine.

More information on The Art Group blog.

The Total Woman Show

Here I am with Cheryl Webb Scott and her wonderful crew on the set of The Total Woman show last week. You can see a bit of my collage titled "Do Not Adjust" in the background. I was interviewed about my collage art for a cable television segment and I'm looking forward to seeing the episode which I hope to share with you once I receive a copy on DVD.

I Feel Like a Star

Yesterday my friend Sharon drove me to Stoneham, Massachusetts where I was interviewed about my collage work for a cable television show called The Total Woman Show. Everyone on the staff was so wonderful that I was not nervous one bit and the producer, Cheryl Webb Scott, made me feel perfectly at ease on camera!

I spoke with my friends Karen and Yola just prior to making the trip South and they both voiced the opinion that they sensed in me a new optimism. In thinking back this morning, I think they are right. Here are a couple of cross designs from my sketchbook that seem to foreshadow that.

From the back the second drawing has a slightly softer quality. Repeated I think it would make a nice scarf.

Blanche No. 4

I've been working on adding collages to my Tumblr site. It all started with putting some links on my latest blog, Future Dead Artist, which showcases my sketchbook drawings. I created a new banner for FDA, as well as little image links to Quilts, Crosses and Collages. I discovered that I only had a few of my collage images up so today I am working to remedy that situation.

My favorite has got to be the Blanch series. Pictured above is Blanche Becomes Alanis (Blanche No. 4) which was a small study done for Blanche Big or The Inspiration (Blanche No. 6) my largest collage to date at 30x39 inches.

I was listening to Alanis Morissette a lot at the time I made No. 4. (Also love this one.)

The Perfect Square

This one I call "The Perfect Square" because it is one of the few drawings where I made a pencil grid first. Little quilt below:

The Magic Carpet

Funny how I don't usually like some things right after I do them, but then later I do. Today's drawing is in that category.

Darkening the background in photoshop changes the feel of it. Reminds me of batik in a way. And here it is repeated, just because I can.

Fortune Teller Cross

I call this one my Fortune Teller Cross. The repeat pattern has some problems.

I like how the colors can be manipulated in photoshop. Out of all the different versions shown on the gray background, I think I like the one in the center the best.

I've Got A Secret

I'm going to confess that there is something that I have been holding back. I've been hesitating to go public with my secret, although I have let the cat out of the bag to a few of you who have visited Anita's Beads this month.

I'm going to be interviewed about my collage work on television.

The interview will be broadcast on a cable TV show out of Massachusetts called The Total Woman Show. It will be shown in some 50 communities, and my web address (this address, the address of this blog) will appear on the screen throughout the interview. How cool is that!

A 30 minute segment will be taped during the first week in October. It's coming up fast. I think I'm getting nervous.

Happy Cross

It pays to de-clutter once and a while. I found this along with a few others that I will post by and by. What a happy find from back in June when my old computer died. The photoshop version on dark gray looks like a chalk drawing.

Today's Crosss

Too nice out today to spend much time at the computer. The weather is perfect to celebrate the first day of fall. I have spent most of the day trying to de-clutter my collage work area. I recently had a huge stuffed chair removed from the room so the chi is really moving. Tonight I will sit on the porch and smudge, as I found a box of my favorite incense herbs. I used to love making incense.

Thoughts of You on Gray

This is from a sketchbook page dated July something, cropped and given the Photoshop treatment.


I liked this next one on just black the best until I tried it on gray.


When I went over to my Tumblr site to post it I encountered this marvelous quotation. My goal is to bear it in mind all day!

Statistically, the probability of any one of us being here is so small that the mere fact of our existence should keep us all in a state of contented dazzlement. ( - Lewis Thomas)

(So dazzled that I can't even spell.)

Be Yourself Trivia

I noticed that Joseph Cornell and I had the same Little Golden science book. Note the vertical array of colored dots on the rectangle of black in my collage titled Be Yourself shown above. Look to the left of Mrs. Gardner. The colors change from orange at the top to blue at the bottom.

OK, now advance to 4:43 on this Joseph Cornell slide show on YouTube. (I mentioned it once before two posts ago.) In the bottom left Cornell has used the same array of dots in the same order, orange at the top to blue at the bottom.