Tag Archive for 'book'

water paper paint

Published
by
robayre
on January 4, 2011
in General Update
. 8 Comments

For a Christmas present to myself I bought a copy of Heather Smith Jones book Water Paper Paint. I’m sure I’ve raved here before about Heather’s artwork, so I was thrilled last year when I found out she was releasing a book. I swooned when the book arrived, because the cover paper has a watercolor-paper-like texture to it. A truly perfect book for this artsy girl who also works for a printing company and loves everything book, paper and ink related.

1.1.11 circles

The book is filled with projects and so I’ve been making myself go through it in order and not skip around. I took Watercolor in college and still use the paints all the time. One of the things I love about Heather’s work is that she uses it like I like to use it - in mixed media. I’m sure almost all of my mailart postcards have watercolor in them, my circle series pieces, etc. I’m having lots of fun so far and really enjoying the book.

1.1.11 squares

Since the projects are like little practices for experimenting with watercolors, I had a great idea to do mine on small postcard pieces of paper and mail them out to friends.

Watercolor tip: Heather suggests taping your paper down and I’ve seen a lot of people do this perfectly fine. But, if you want to soak your paper and stretch it, I suggest the following. When I was college our instructor had us buy Homosote board (which you can find at some hardware stores), soak your paper, then staple it right into the board. The staples and paper release from the board easy and you don’t have to worry about wet paper staying taped down. You can use a hair dryer to dry the paper or wait overnight and the paper dries taught.

Create, Adventure, Self Love

Published
by
robayre
on October 6, 2010
in General Update
. 6 Comments

Last month I finished reading the book Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert. I don’t think it was until I saw the first movie trailer that I even  found out about the book. I love Julia Roberts and thought the trailer looked fabulous. I’m not really sure why I decided to read the book, but I’m guessing it was entirely to do with wanting to see the movie and being too impatient to wait. It only took me a third of the book to decide I no longer wanted to see the movie. Already I was afraid by watching the movie, my memory of the book would be tainted or destroyed. It was the kind of book that I underlined many passages in throughout.

After completing the book I was on an Elizabeth Gilbert bender and had to read and watch everything that I could about her. One interview I read described the book Eat, Pray, Love as a universal book. While I would agree that it was a “Universally acclaimed book” I wouldn’t say that it was universal in general. I don’t know many people that live a jet set lifestyle comparable to Elizabeth’s, and I know I don’t have the fortune to allow for a year off of work. And while I usually am drawn to books where I relate to the main character, I can’t say that is where my attraction to this book lied. In fact, I can’t really relate to her much at all. She’s a woman who has traveled the world with ease, a woman who has been married, divorced, and describes herself as a latcher. Instead my interest lies in the desire to grow, expand my experiences, get over my hang-ups and become a better person.

On page 29 I underlined a sentence that said “the philosopher Rumi once advised his students to write down the three things they most wanted in life.” Immediately it made me put down the book and think about what three things I wanted in life. I grabbed my sketchbook and drew out “Adventure, Create, Self-Love“.

Adventure came immediately. I thought of this pin, (above) from laurelhill on etsy, that I bought for my friend Nikki. As much as I loved it and wanted to keep it for myself, I knew that I had to give it to her because it was a perfect mantra for what we both want out of life. Next, for my second word Create. As long as I can remember I’ve had the strong drive to create, life is empty without that. Lastly, I thought Love, but more specific to me, I think that I struggle with loving myself, and not being mean and negative to myself. I truly believe that I could accomplish anything I set my heart upon, if only I’d allow or push myself to do them. Also, there is the saying “You can’t really love someone else, until you’ve learned to love yourself” and so for the last thing I want most from life, I chose Self Love.

Since then, I have often found myself repeating the new mantra in my head, in the moments after prayer and before sleep.

So, now I ask you. What are the three things you want most from life?

Summer of Love

Published
by
robayre
on June 23, 2010
in General Update, My Artwork and life
. 3 Comments

Cover, originally uploaded by robayre.

I signed up for Kara Haupt’s online class “Summer of Love” and then promptly missed the first several days. I swear the class didn’t start until next week, but I decided to sign into the group blog to see if there was any early action. Imagine my shock and sadness when the first post that pops up says “Prompt Day Three”. Argh.
Oh well. So goes my life.

Any way, one of the main projects to make an altered book and all of a sudden I remembered this book I made back in 2007. It was for a huge group swap, where tons of artists were involved. Each person was to make a book and then pass it to the next person on the list, do a page in the next book, then pass it down the line. By the time your book would come back to you it would be filled with other people’s artwork. Cool huh? Yeah, well, it turned out to be not so cool. I made this totally kick ass book, above. I still think it’s awesome and still represents my style, check the grass. Anyway, I sent it to the next person in line, got the next two or three artists books, worked on them and sent them down the line. Turns out the girl after me in line, I think her name was natalie, was a total flake and scammed all of those books and never sent any out. It wasn’t until that point where the person that was behind Natalie was getting worried that she hadn’t received ANY books, when the group realized what was going. Needless to say I lost my own book, but then I felt even worse because I also sent other artist’s books to her as well. Man, that really hurt.

Moral of the story. Don’t be lame and flake out on others.
Also, pay attention to the calendar. I feel sort of like I’m living one of those dreams where it’s finals week and I just realized I forgot to go to class the whole semester.

Don’t have a lot to say

Published
by
robayre
on April 6, 2010
in General Update and My Artwork
. 1 Comment

Here is a yarn I spun on Monday. That was a record for me. One complete yarn in one day, woah. You can see other yarns I have spun over the years here in this flickr photoset.

And, I made a few more little book page spreads. The rest can be seen here.

Day Fifteen - More Pages

Published
by
robayre
on February 15, 2010
in General Update, Projects and life
. 1 Comment

Today I did a couple more pages in my little book. The left page is covered in metallic blue star stickers and the right is watercolored, then sprinkled with salt for texture. On top of that was silvery glitter pen and pastels in swirls.

When I went to take the picture at first the camera didn’t focus. I retook it, but when I saw the blurry one I actually liked it because it kind of went with the dreaminess of the image, so I put them together for a diptych.

For the first time in my life I have laryngitis. I’ve always thought it would be cool to lose my voice, just to see what that was like. It’s kind of funny and it doesn’t hurt so no harm done. Matt says he enjoys it because now he can get a word in, lol.

I just realized it’s the second half of the month of February. Halfway through the Thing-a-Day challenge.

Day Eight - More Pages From My Book

Published
by
robayre
on February 8, 2010
in General Update
. 2 Comments

Today I worked on more pages in my mini book for my Thing-a-Day post.

Today was a very busy day. I have all these projects I’d like to do for Thing-a-Day but very little time to set aside for them. On top of that, the house is a mess, to-do lists a mile long and I have so many completed items that I’d like to photograph and add to my shop, but no daylight in which to photograph in.

Day Six - Mixed Media Page

Published
by
robayre
on February 6, 2010
in My Artwork, Projects and lists
. 1 Comment

A while ago I did a post where I listed a bunch of cool things that I had received recently and I completely forgot to mention this book. Today I finally broke it out and used it for my thing-a-day.

In December my sister and I went to the One-of-a-Kind show in Chicago where I purchased the above book. It’s a beautiful green leather covered, mini handbound/stitched book with an assortment of encyclopedia pages mixed with quality drawing papers. I’m in love with the book from GreenTrikePress. Check out her shop, seriously, her books are gorgeous and amazingly constructed. When my sister saw these books she said to me “here is a seller after your own heart”.  I was beyond thrilled because I had actually been working on making more books like this. I just love that the pages are filled with a variety of pages. I’ve decided to fill the pages with collage and mixed media work.

Here is the first page, that I did today.

Cool stuff and thanks

Published
by
robayre
on January 22, 2010
in Artists, Cool Links, General Update, etsy and life
. 2 Comments

I’ve received so many things lately and I wanted to post a long overdue public thanks and share some of these wicked cool items.

I was sent a copy of The Happy Book by Meg Leder and Rachel Kempster. I’m all about Happy so I was glad to receive it. Imagine if the Listography Journal and Wreck this Journal had a teenage daughter. I think it might be The Happy Book. It’s one of those books that encourages you to carry it around and fill it up and the more you use it the less it will look like what it did when you brought it home. The Happy Book is filled with almost 200 pages of prompts for you to fill up, paste-in, list and draw all the happy and positive things in life. One of the rewarding things about this book, and others similar to it, is that you can pull it out later when you might be feeling down in the dumps and it will hopefully fill you with joy again. The manifesto of the book is “Thinking about what makes you happy, makes you happy. Writing about what makes you happy, makes you happy. Reading about what makes you happy, makes you happy.” I had an idea when I was first reading the introduction that I’d like to keep the book in a somewhat public place (car, coffee table or carry it with me in my bag) and encourage my friends, family and acquaintances to also fill out pages in my book. That way when I opened it up it wasn’t just my happy thoughts, images and experiences, but other’s as well, and I would be able to draw fresh inspiration by other’s happy things.

It has been years now and I am still so grateful that Rosa Murillo saw my website and sent me an email introducing herself. We have become friends and I treasure that. She calls me, I don’t answer (hehehe), but we’ve skyped a couple times and I am always thrilled to see a new blog post on her site. She is such a creative inspiration to me (although she’d probably cringe at my liberal and frequent use of that “i” word). She sent me a wonderful package before Christmas and it contained the ring above. I don’t see anymore in her shop right now, but she’s made a bunch here. I commented on one and low and behold she sent it to me. I love it! Of all jewelry I love rings the most. But not just any ring. Believe it or not, I’d put my nose up to a tiffany diamond ring, but I can’t say no to a piece of artwork adorned on my fingers. Thank you again for the lovely ring, Rosa! I’m compiling a package for you and hope to send it soon, but really, what is soon? You know me, and that might not be until summer, wah wah wah.

This ring came from my new penpal (through the penpal party) Angie of PangeaStore. I have a special place in my heart for lockets. It probably stems from watching the movie Annie too many times as a child. At any rate I admired the rings from Angie’s Etsy shop that have eensie teensie little lockets on them. When her next letter arrived it had one in it! oh my goodness. It’s a ring, it has a locket and it’s miniature! I know, I know, I almost fainted. I’ve been thinking about what I need to put inside of it. I was going to just print out tiny pictures, but then this week I saw this post on the Black Apple about lockets with tiny drawings in them.

And finally this week I stopped by the P.O. Box and was delighted to find this scarf from Trisha at Made During Sleepytime. I had entered her giveaway for this super cozy and stylish scarf and WON IT!  I wore it all today and love it so much that I think I will need to follow her tutorial and make myself a couple more. Honestly though, Trish, you should sell these. I’d probably save myself the aggravation of sewing it and just buy more from you :) Love it!

The Time Traveler’s Wife

Published
by
robayre
on August 2, 2009
in General Update, My Artwork and life
. 7 Comments

I finally did it! After reading 20 pages here and 20 pages there I finally finished reading The Time Traveler’s Wife. Check another one off the list!

Years ago my sister lent me her copy of the book, telling me I’ll love it. It sat on the book shelf forever. I don’t know, it just sounded 1. like a sci-fi book and I can’t stand reading sci-fi and fantasy books, and 2. It sounded like a romance novel and I don’t really do that really either. She added, it mentions things that you will enjoy like the Violent Femmes and Joseph Cornell.

At the beginning of the year, for some reason, I finally picked it up and read the first 20 pages.  I thought, ‘yeah, I might enjoy reading this’, so I added it to my 2009 list of things to complete.

I think what made me start reading it was the fact that I picked up the book and read on the back that the author Audrey Niffenegger is a professor at Columbia Book and Paper in Chicago, a place I’ve visited several times. A place I’ve dreamed of attending, a place I’m already on the mailing list for, and a place that has/had halls lined with letterpress type.

Almost immediately, I realized my preconceived notions of this book were incorrect. It was not what it seemed. It’s not really sci-fi, no time machines, I promise.

As I got into the novel, more and more references that hit close to home were revealed and I started thinking that this book might be “my perfect book”.  I’ve always said, if there was a perfect movie made just for me, it would have to be Amelie, and now I wonder if a perfect book was made just for me, it might be the Time Traveler’s Wife.

I loved reading about characters I could relate to and who’s interests are so close to my own. Clare, the time traveler’s wife, was a fiber artist and I’ve taken quite a few fiber arts classes in my day. I probably squealed while reading a section where the main character Henry is in the alleyway behind the Metro and can hear the Smoking Popes playing from inside. The Metro is the first concert venue I went to in Chicago as a 15 or 16 year old, and the Smoking Popes are a band I’ve followed far and wide to see around Northern Illinois. Clare has an art show at the Cultural Center, a building close to my own heart and that I almost always stop in while visiting Chicago. The Cultural Center has an Art-o-mat and they always have several art galleries with excellent shows going on absolutely free.  On the last day that I was reading there was a tie-in to my city, DeKalb. Clare visits a record store in the city and sees a guy wearing a Seven Dead Arson shirt. Seven Dead Arson was a record store/label downtown DeKalb while I was in high school, and bands would play often in their basement. My brother reminded me yesterday that the owner was Ethan Hastert.

This month a movie of The Time Traveler’s Wife will be appearing in movie theaters across the country. If I had not read the book and only saw the commercials I would probably NEVER see this movie. It looks like your typical Message in a Bottle and The Notebook romance schlock. All of this romance movie comparison started making me wonder, “Is the book just a sappy romance novel, and I just got hoodwinked by the disguise of all the local references to the Field Museum, Brookfield Zoo and Chicago Street names?” When I first started reading the book I would have said emphatically NO. It was a smart novel, with plenty of educated and cultural references as well as an advanced time line. Although I had no problem, I could see that it might be hard to follow with the way the storyline skipped around, following one character and then another at different points in time. Is it just a romance novel, or no? I have to admit the closer I got to the end of the book, the more the idea crept into my head. Perhaps it was seeing too many of the commercials tainting my perspective. I also blame Kelly now too. I was telling some friends that they should read it, and my friend Kelly, who’s opinion I think highly of, said she had already read it and she just seemed so unimpressed with the book. I guess to really decide I’ll have to think more about it. Will this book leave any significance on history and our culture? Does it challenge and make its readers think in ways they might not have thought before? I guess you’ll have to read it to decide for youself. Have you already read it? Let me know what you think. Haha, I feel like I need to join a book club just devoted to this book, lol. I do have to admit, I am excited to see the movie now, just in hopes that the Violent Femmes make an appearance and well, Eric Bana isn’t too hard on the eyes either.

On a completely different note: Tomorrow I will begin my August Challenge of creating a new piece everday (Monday - Friday) and listing it to my shop. Come back to check it out, and if you feel so inspired, please join in and create something new each day as well.

Friday Archive

Published
by
robayre
on May 30, 2008
in General Update
. 0 Comments

archive drawing, originally uploaded by robayre.

It’s that time again, Friday Archive!
This piece was done in kindergarten, I remember the teacher transcribed my story and then I drew the pictures. My mother jokes that already at such a young age I was broaching spicey topics in this book titled “Girls Meet Other Girls”. The book ends with “Lisa and the other girl went back to bed” and had a picture of two girls holding hands.
The book is hilarious though. Very train of thought, especially for a kindergartener, or even an adult Robyn to this day. My favorite part is when the main character comes inside and puts a twig next to the door. That’s it. She puts the twig there and later on in the book you are wondering what was the significance of that twig by the door, but you’ll never know.