Yes, my friends, I'm not much for blogging this month. We're running around town hunting down a house and I'm in a twice weekly ceramics class and work is bizzizzy and I simply look at the computer differently. So there. That's the set of excuses I have. But then for every excuse there is a neat thing like the Image Bank for Everyday Revolutionary Life or Ayumi Horie's fabulous ceramics. I'll blog em.
Me and my exhaustion, though, gots to get to sleep. Work a day, work a day, work a day.
see ya,
Rachael

This morning I heard a short report on Morning Edition about color, science and art . Dr. Berns is here in Rochester working on color restoration and science. Even if I wasn't in this town thinking constantly about color, I would have listened intently.

I snuck away to the Adirondacks this weekend to see family and look around for bears. I should have gone into Blue Mountain Lake and checked out their art center, but instead I sat around and did little but draw trees and paint swatches of blue I could call sky or water if I wanted to.

And I read about Yambo.

My clay is getting more interesting the more I mess around with texture , pressing all sorts of ridiculous things into the wet clay and hoping for the best. I still make wobbly vessels and pulling up is a chore but the more I talk to potters, I figure I'll be learning this for the next half of my life so, there is time.

OK, see ya,
Rachael

Thanks to all who have inquired about what books I am missing. It's truly OK but yes, if you have any extra Dove, Burchfield, Prendergast or John Berger books lying about, I'll take 'm off yer hands. I have ready access to a top notch art library, though, so I'm not hurting for the books I no longer own. I'll trade art for books sent.

My pottery class rocks. Sure, I helped hire the teacher and I make sure the school runs well but it is a real kick to go from day job to play and sit for 3 hours at a potter's wheel to learn how to throw somewhat less wobbly forms. Yea, yea, wabi sabi and wackadoo nutty forms are in I know but it's not exactly intentional for me yet. So I'll practice, practice and mo' practice.



And to end on books, here are a few pages from my latest sketchbook. I killed it tonight and am on to another. In between stints on the wheel that is.



See ya,
Rachael



(That's Justine's fancy flower on the right hand of the last page. She drew it for me in Atlanta. She great, see here. )

There's a good bit of information sharing between artists lately. At least in my neighborhood. Just today I was told about Play Doh's Fun Factory extruding tools as a trick for clay (since I had so much fun with my garlic press, the idea of shmushing clay through other shapes is exciting).

I want to get my hands on the latest Art on Paper for the article Todd mentioned. And there's all of the good resources at NYFA and especially this how-to-use-our-resources-resource .

My clay class part 2 (summer intensive) starts tomorrow night and should provide plenty of opportunities to shmush clay. I will report. I will share.

have fun!
Rachael

I've been spending a lot of time alone, staring into space and wandering around like an idjiot in order to get myself drawing again and it's working. Managing to keep my sketchook pretty full with images and my head pretty clear this weekend. Drawing is often how I think, see, process, and relax. I'm trying some new things in my book but even when I just scribble the same old crap it's part of my making stuff-ness. The sketchbook is the gestation, the incubation, the messbook, the safety blanket, the thing I have clutched under my arm.

This morning I took the long way into the clay studio (where I had a tremendous time pushing clay through a garlic press like I've watched the little kids do in their clay class.) On the walk in, I looked a lot at the ginkgo trees.
Cleft leaves emerged in clusters from the trunk but then grew from branches higher in the tree.
All this was a few blocks from where I'm staying, a corner I cross pretty frequently but until I stopped to draw, I never saw the leaves.
Danny has a great little post about drawing, here.
I'm off to sleep relaxed and renewed and ready fer another crazy workweek with flashes of time to play clay and draw and dream of winning the lottery.
See ya,
Rachael