These make a nice pair

I took the original photos while on walks on the island of Curacao. I liked how the plants were featured in front of the plain, colorful walls. In each, I've embedded text or handwriting, handmade papers and shredded U.S. currency. Each is 12"H x 9"W. The shot of them together also shows some fossilized corral from the island.

Preparing

A year from now I'll have my work on display in the Quad City International Airport Gallery, so I'll be making work this year with an eye towards filling my part of the gallery there. This is a 12"H x 24W" image of the Tetons. I made it more abstract than recent works by adding in pieces of art papers, leftover image strips from other landscapes and even some sections of Brazilian paper currency a friend gave me.

Another Chicago scene

After getting good feedback on the last blog posting and in email concerning the Chicago landscape piece, I worked with an interesting photo I'd taken in Millennium Park, downtown Chicago. This view stopped me in my tracks when walking through the park last autumn. All of the upward movement of columns and buildings intersecting with the sweeping curve ... the old architecture and the new... the unexpected angle of the tall building in the upper right corner overlapped by the bit of vine with red blossoms - wow! So, I made some digital alterations of the photo - including combining one with a filter called "acidic", which seemed appropriate for what city buildings deal with - and started combining strips. Interesting how I can divide an image into a series of horizontal pieces and the vertical thrust is still quite strong in the image!

New images, new directions

I've recently worked on two pieces with images from our trip west and tried some new techniques.

In the 12" x 9" piece, I put down the base layer of shredded pieces, then I used some new techniques with acrylics to build up a feeling of depth somewhat similar to an encaustic work.  Another new addition was to add 3 angled strips of imagery that echo the line of the hillside.

In the square collage, I experimented with using vertical strips in the mountain/sky/tree with a horizontal foreground.

Input welcomed!

and so it begins...

I'm hoping to update this with the latest work created by Rob and me. I'd love to get feedback on new directions I may be taking and how my work is evolving. Rob has been taking photos of his latest limestone sculpture as a "work in progress" so I'll get those photos from him to upload as well.

The collage shown here uses two bird photos taken by my friend, Sheila. I've merged the branches of the two photos with paper to make it look like one scene.