Time-Travel Tuesday

Here's a little piece of art I crafted sometime right around the turn of the century. Mind you, I still equate 'turn of the century' with 1900, but this piece came into being about thirteen years ago at the turn of a different century!

I used to have a small entrepreneurial business called art❤️warmers for seven years, but that is a story for another day.

Today's story is the fun of remembering the origins of the various layers of this piece, each layer of which is a larger fuller story in its own right, also for another day.

For now:

• the hearts were drawn into a styrofoam meat tray, inked up, and printed as part of a once-a-month get-together of yore called Round of Art at My Table with friends Anne, Joan, and Linda,

• the hearts were printed on paper that was from a stash of remnants from the printing business where the husband of a friend worked,

• the printed music came from a hymnal sold at a fundraiser yard sale,

• the black foam was scrap from the gasket company where my husband used to work, and

• the mat board was garnered from a frame business willing to donate its scraps.

Happy anniversary, B&K!

The Real Deal
4x4"; mixed media assemblage on matte board
[gift]

Twenty-Nine Years

Buildings could burn 

right next to us in the car, 

and 

if we were in the middle 

of a kiss 

we wouldn't notice. 

–Jane Hamilton, The Book of Ruth

Hey, L&J, buildings are burning! Right next to you!

Happy anniversary : )

In the Middle of a Kiss
4x5"; acrylic and oil pastel on paper, mounted on cardstock
abstract
2018
[gift]

Yin and Yang

I have been fighting the good fight this summer, muscling both ends of a thick rope in a big ol' game of tug-o'-war: (a) wanting my home to be tidy, spare, spacious, and free from clutter, and (b) wanting to hang onto this and that—this magazine page, that painting experiment, this report card from when Scott started kindergarten, that report card from when *I* started kindergarten.

Today, though, I do not see opposing forces but forces that are complementary, interconnected, and interdependent; I see how they give rise to each other as they interrelate.

I snip a found composition from a 2016 painting exercise, pull out a bright fuschia envelope in which my friend Bo (follow the link!) sent me a note months ago (she found the envelope in her basement where she keeps things), and locate in my scraps box a letter from a high school friend typed on pale green stationery.

These forces come together along with today's sunshine and summer air to become an anniversary card that will leave my house—more space!—to transport love, color, and beauty 600 miles down the road to celebrate Meg and Michael.

What Can Happen When You Take a Chance
4x5"; acrylic, India ink, and oil pastel on card stock
abstract
2018
[gift]