Copycat Mashup

Seriously - I'm Still Here

2011-09-24T16:43:00.020-04:00

I know. You wouldn't know it by my stagnant blog posting habits. But rest assured, I'm still active on this blog. In fact, I've slowly and steadily been working on something. It's hard to be inspired to make things after a long day of work, which concludes with me making our dinner, my lunch for the next day, catching up on blog reading, and an hour of television of watching before I head to bed. (And in case you're wondering, my bed time these days is around 9:30, but more on that later.) So I leave art creation to the weekends. This piece is about 3' x 5' - that's pretty darn big. As you can see from sneak peak shot above, it doesn't just entail slopping on a coat of paint.

As you can surmise, I'm nowhere near finished, so there's no mashup to post. I figured I'd take the time to tell you about the other things I've been up to during these last few weeks.

First, I've become consumed/obsessed with shopping in the bulk bins at Whole Foods and putting my purchases in mason jars. Dried beans, lentils, flours, nuts - I think I have a sickness. I can't stop. But thanks to Whole Foods, I've learned that I have a new love of raw cashews (I was originally a roasted girl) as well as eating medjool dates stuffed with walnuts and these Energy Chunks as a pre-workout snack. I love the Cacao Gogi Berry and Cha Cha Chia bars, but sort of wanted to puke up the Mixed Berry Blast (those will be thrown out soon).

The pre-workout reference leads me to my next activity. For the past two months I've been working out at 5:30 am before I go to work (hence the 9:30 pm bedtime). What a change that has been. Getting up at this time means no meal before running/biking/stairclimbing/weightlifting, because that would require me getting up even earlier. So now I pop in a date or an energy chunk on my way the gym, and I have to say, they oddly do the trick. It's amazing how your body can adapt to a workout schedule if you stick with it. I really like working out that early pre-breakfast and work. It definitely makes me ready for the day.

So onto breakfast. The next big change has been my abandonment of eating cereal. For six years, I would have a bowl of Kashi Go Lean with banana, blueberries, and raisins. FOR SIX STRAIGHT YEARS. During this past spring, my body suddenly starting rejecting the kashi. I felt gross at work and sluggish. These feelings, combined with my desire to decrease/ween off any processed carbohydrates has led me to abandon all cereals. So what do I have now? I have this.

A smoothie usually filled with vanilla protein powder, rolled oats, chia/flax seed, some greek yogurt, spinach, bananas, peaches, mango, pineapple and fresh ginger. It may not look too appetizing, but it tastes amazing and makes me feel totally energized. I am never going back.

The single-serving smoothie blender is also key - super easy to clean and prep. Along with making my lunch at night, I also prep my smoothie (minus the frozen fruit).

[I need to thank my sweet friend JL of JL Goes Vegan for clueing me in to medjool dates and green smoothies!]

Next up: I bought a new "used" car. It's a sage green 2008 Nissan Altima (my previous car was a '99 Altima) and I'm in love with it. No seriously - LOVE. I want to cry every time I sit in it. It's the little things, ya know?

And finally, Pat and I made it to the Big E. It was what I always expected - lots of food I would never want to put in my body (e.g., fried dough, fried twinkies, fried kool-aid, the "Craz-E Burger" comprised of a bacon cheeseburger sandwiched between two halves of a glazed donut. Barf.), people who would be classified as "real lookers," and freak show exhibits of epic proportion.

I actually took a photo of the Hercules Unicorn Cow, but it was so horrible to see that I feel terribly guilty posting it.

Despite these oddities, we had a pretty good time. We went with some fine friends, rode on some rickety fair rides, got a good dose of carnie-sightings and spent a nice, hot (and super humid) day outside.

Marvel in my productivity! I will be back soon - I promise.

5,4,3,2,1 Things About...

2011-08-06T14:47:00.012-04:00

I am constantly looking to other blogs to find inspiration and a good laugh. A new series created by Craft is called 5,4,3,2,1 Things About...

Craft usually profiles one of its staff members, but recently has suggested other blog writers to include their button (see below and to the right) on their blogs and to submit a post of their own.

So here we go!

5, 4, 3, 2, 1 Things About Copycat Mashup

I am oddly the most normal looking one in this photo.

One Project You Are Particularly Proud Of

There are a few projects on Copycat Mashup that I really love, but the one that I think I am most proud of is the scherenschnitte of Shakespeare's Hamlet. It was the first time I ever attempted a papercut and I was so nervous the entire time that I was going to rip the paper! When all was said and done, I love walking by this piece in our new apartment and stopping to look at it.

Two Mistakes You've Made in the Past

2. Not measuring things (i.e. fabric, paper, wood) when I should. You'd think I'd learn after the first mishap, but I never want to spend the time to measure anything.

1. Getting frustrated too easily when I start a project. The perfectionist in me wants the process to be beautiful and smooth every time.

Three Things That Make Your Work Unique

3. It always changes! Depending on the artists, one piece will look completely different than the previous one.

2. I like to tell a story when it comes to the art, as I almost always have some sort of previous exposure/experience with the artist.

1. It's random. Some of the mashups (lessor known artists, novelists, food products, etc.) are pretty out there.

Four Tools You Love To Use

4. X-Acto Knife - I'm happy that I no longer live in New York City, where all X-Acto knives and blades are locked behind a glass cases. Talk about a pain in the neck to check out a blade! Good thing Massachusetts seems to not worry people will start stabbing each other.

3. Transfer Paper - What I like to call "cheating paper." Yes, in art courses in high school and college I was taught to sketch out the piece. But with the help of my trusty iMac (Madeline is her name), I can do all that "sketching" on my comp, print it out, and transfer it on to the canvas or paper.

2. My iMac - Going on six years now (*tear), Madeline has been great. Sure she is starting to sound like a broken vacuum when she gets too hot, but she has helped me on way too many projects to count.

1. My 2B graphite pencils - Bringing it back to my 9th grade Drawing I class, the 2B is my go-to sketching pencil. Always.

Five Inspirations

5. Nature. Especially now that we are living in Western Mass and I drive through a mountain pass (!) to get to work.

4. Anthropologie - Clothes that I love and can't afford, I just love their photographs and styling. Great inspiration for the new apartment!

3. My father - He's an inspiration but also a resource. I will come to him with an idea, usually something I want him to build for me, and he will tell me whether it can be done. (Sometimes my ideas defy gravity. Stupid gravity.)

2. Marquetry - This is a long-term inspiration and project. I've been too scared to try it. Right now I am obsessed with Rob Milam's portraits.

1. All of the blogs listed to the right of this page. Check them out!

Trolling in South Hadley

2011-07-31T15:23:00.018-04:00

Don't worry - this is not a picture of our new apartment.

It is, however, similar to what you would see on the windowsills of the South Hadley Electric Company. When Pat and I entered the town building on Monday morning to set up an account, we were greeted by at least 40 troll dolls behind the ONE woman who runs the shop. We couldn't look at each other the entire time we were there. Not when we saw the troll dolls. Not when we were told there was no online billing system. Not when we were informed that the only credit card they would not accept was VISA.

Where the hell are we?

Certainly not Queens.

I don't think I set up one account in New York that didn't involve going online or walking through an automated messaging system on the phone. But South Hadley is not New York. South Hadley does not have street lights. South Hadley sells gas at $3.68 a gallon. South Hadley has driveways, backyards, and diners. (And I mean legit diners; hole in the wall, small and stifling spaces and not the behemoths in NYC, where you can't look in one direction without spotting a chandelier.)

Talk about extremes. It seems I can't do anything in stages. I leave Exeter, RI, where I lived next to a farm and on three acres of land to Queens, NY, where I was lucky to find a parking spot on the street and a two bedroom apartment that didn't cost $2,000 a month. And now here I am - living in the mountains. Crazy.

You know what else is crazy? Our awesome apartment.

Our living room - not enough furniture to fill this puppy.

Two views of our extremely long kitchen (love it!)

Pat's office

The bedroom, and yes, that huge closet is just MINE!

Two views of my art studio. It's kind of empty (but not for long!).

Our back deck with our new grill (thanks Mom and Dad!).

Don't get me wrong - there are kinks in this place like any other rental. Light switches that do nothing, outlets that don't seem to work, wonky window blinds, etc. But already Pat and I are really excited to call this space ours for the time being and exploring the hood without the threat of a parking ticket or a meter maid!

This week has been spent performing lots of chores - buying food from the local farms, scouting out new gyms and getting some new duds for my new job (that starts tomorrow...gulp).

While I haven't been blogging here, I have been blogging elsewhere, including some blogs of some friends. I hope to be back soon with a new art piece!

Where else you can find me:

Stop Chasing Skinny - The Last Judgment

OMG Blog Love - A Quandary of Cuisine

On Blog Reading

2011-07-10T15:19:00.019-04:00

A few weeks ago I was having a discussion with my Uncle Steve, whom I would classify as the most easy-going, crunchy person on my father's side of the family. This is a man, while joining me on a 13-mile hike, answered a cell phone call by whispering, "I can't talk right now - I'm in nature's cathedral." This is a man whose house I drove to every night after work to watch the entire coverage of the 2006 Tour de France. I remember those nights, particularly the moment when we stared at each other across the room, mouths agape and eyes bewildered, as Floyd Landis came back in Stage 17 with a victorious ride. I remember the sadness in our faces after discussing his subsequent doping charges.

So back to the discussion. I was explaining a friend's recent blog post focused on buying and getting fitted for a proper road bike. I was saying how the post made me laugh, as I basically did many of the actions the post advised against (i.e. buying a super expensive bike, not testing out saddles, buying clip-less pedals before I was ready, not getting back on my bike after a nasty fall). Of the numerous reactions I anticipated from my Uncle Steve ("Oh, you need to get back out there and ride." or "I was out on my road bike the other day..."), this was not one of them: "You read a lot of blogs, huh?"

I don't find Uncle Steve to be a critical person, but I do find myself to be a hypersensitive person, so this comment gave me pause. Do I read a lot of blogs? Has living in New York taken me away from nature and left me to dwell inside of a tiny apartment behind a computer screen? And if I do read a lot of blogs, is there something wrong with that?

I'll admit, the comment did bring me a tad bit of shame. I slightly felt like reading blog after blog classified me as having no life; as some voyeuristic sad Sally. His question evoked an equivalent reaction to being told you play too many video games or watch too much television.

But the fact is, I do read a lot of blogs. For me, blogs are the equivalent of reading an amazing article in The New York Times or staring at an incredible painting at the MOMA. They are, quite simply, a vortex of inspiration. Without blogs, I wouldn't have learned about Trisha Martin's passion for Eating is Art and created a mashup based on her work. Without blogs, I wouldn't have been inspired by Cindy Ferguson's papercuts. Without blogs, I wouldn't have learned what a nanibird is!

And then there's cooking. Blogs have helped me plan my dinner - from this recipe to that recipe to this recipe. Pat was just diagnosed as gluten intolerant, and without the help from this blog, I wouldn't know where to start.

Blogs also help me keep up on my friends - from those who are in the process of moving far away to those whom I have been countries apart for years.

So yeah, I guess I do read a lot of blogs and I am so thankful for it. Besides providing me with endless inspiration and fascination, they also manage to give me a much needed laugh after a long day at work. I'll leave you with a blog I just discovered, Better Book Titles, by Dan Wilbur. I've shown a few of my favorites below - see if you can figure out the original titles. [Uncle Steve, I think you will like them. I also think we should come up with two of our own and submit!]

And my personal favorite...

Also, you may not hear from me for a few weeks. I'm FINALLY in the process of packing my stuff for the big move to Massachusetts next Saturday. This means my art supplies have officially gone on vacation and my computer will soon follow. I have a few ideas percolating and always welcome a Copycat Mashup Challenge (like this one and this one), should the mood strike you!

Peace,
Beth

Boondoggling in Brooklyn

2011-07-08T15:31:00.021-04:00

Didn't know boondoggle was a word? Me neither. But thanks to my trusty thesaurus, I learned it's a synonym for procrastinate, and since I'm a sucker for alliteration...

That's right folks, yours truly has been boondoggling all weekend when she should have been packing and cleaning her itsy bitsy apartment. For this first time this week, I realized that a tiny little apartment can hold a whole lot of crap. As you can see, I've really done nothing.

[Click on photo to see larger]

And you know what? Rightly so! Pat has, after all, been slumming it in Las Vegas all week. He's "at a conference." Why should I be proactive and do the work of two? Why shouldn't I just go to Brooklyn and explore?

"Why would you go on this outing without Pat?" you ask. Well, for the sake of blog fodder (for this blog and my old, now defunct blog, "The Queens B"), I've dragged Pat all over this place for the past two years - museums and theatrical productions in Manhattan, Socrates Sculpture Park in Long Island City, Brooklyn College, and one strange festival on Staten Island. Pat has since learned from all this, and unless the outing will end with a steak dinner, he's not too eager to join me these days.

His absence was the perfect excuse for me to take the 1 1/2 hour bus and train rides into Brooklyn, specifically Park Slope (or as my sister accidentally referred to it one day, "Pig Slop"), and grab some lunch with my friend and Brooklynite, Alice. And grab some lunch we did!

Homemade turkey burger (none of that Jenny-O stuff) with garam spices gruyere cheese, pickled veggies and roasted potatoes. Amen, sister.

This was the moment when Alice discovered how we could avoid raising the debt ceiling over her huevos rancheros with heirloom beans and 3(!) salsas.

After sufficiently filling our stomachs with the superb food of Juventino, we decided to take a walk in Prospect Park. Unfortunately, I was sweating like a dog the whole time and was too lazy to take photos.

But I did take this photo of a row of brownstones in Park Slope....

...through Alice's car window. The reason why I took it through the car window is because we were seriously sitting for 10 minutes, waiting for woman (who puked out the side of her car then proceeded to stuff her face with pretzels - no lie) to give up her parking space on the street.

Ah New York, you sweet bitch, I'll miss you.

Nanny Peg

2011-07-02T16:31:00.018-04:00

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When life hands you potatoes, you make potato salad.

With Cain’s Mayonnaise – none of that Hellman’s stuff.

And green peppers and slices of hardboiled eggs.

And enough onions to make the Soup Nazi cry.

When life gives you a stomachache, you take some flat ginger ale, preferably Schweppes.

And eat Hostess Cinnamon Streusel Coffeecakes – cinnamon settles a stomach.

When life presents you with a rural road, brake sparingly.

There’s no need to stop at stop sign when you can easily roll through one.

Who needs Old Wives’ Tales and Farmer’s Almanacs when you can listen to the sound advice of Peg Morgan?

Margaret “Peg” Morgan was an awesome woman – straight up.

She was independent, non-judgmental, self-sufficient, and my grandmother. She was a woman who taught herself to drive a car at age 60. She was a woman who would spend hours peeling 2 lbs of potatoes, despite painful arthritis in her hands. She was a woman who would send you a card for any occasion, bring you to orthodontist/dentist/doctor/music appointments multiple times a week, and steam all of your clothes even when you told her you didn’t need your “dungarees” ironed.

To me, Nanny Peg has always been an amalgamation of different characters. She had hints of Mother Abbess from the Sound of Music, given her habit of saying the rosary every night and always singing an octave higher than everyone else at church.

She was a combination of all four Golden Girls, as she was the height of Sophia, enjoyed her smut like Blanche (she watched Days of Our Lives for over 30 years), exhibited the occasional innocence of Rose, and was a no-frills talker like Dorothy.

She also reminded me of Richard Alpert from Lost, given the fact that she always had the same appearance no matter the decade. Take 1983 – white permed hair, clip-on earrings, purple pants. Now look at 2009 – white permed hair, clip-on earrings, purple pants.

The summer before I moved to New York City I spent many days with Nanny Peg and my sister. Wednesday afternoons were spent running errands and eating lunch, and some of my most special memories of Nanny Peg come from these moments. I really struggled with moving to New York City for many reasons, but one of them was the fact that I would lose these Wednesday afternoons. Before I moved, Nanny Peg gave me this small wire angel; a symbol that would protect me in New York. This angel has been hanging my apartment for these two past years and thus far has accomplished its job.

Last week, Nanny Peg passed away at age 90.

As much as you can anticipate something like this, you are never totally prepared.

I wasn’t ready to say goodbye to her when I left for Queens and I’m not ready to say goodbye to her now.

While I was mentally and emotionally getting ready for the services this week, I knew I wanted to make something for her; something that she could take with her and that I could keep with me. Printmaking seemed like a logical medium, given that I could make multiple copies of the same piece. When I was trying to think of what I wanted to carve in the linoleum block, my eyes drifted over to the angel she gave me.

After carving the design, I inked the block and pulled two prints. I placed the first print (with the most ink on the block) in her casket. The second print was for me. In a way, it seemed poetic; I am a piece of her, after all.

Despite this last week and the difficult moments that lie ahead, these past few days have given me hope. If anything, they have given me an appreciation for my family – my parents, aunts, uncles, and cousins who all pulled together and gave each other their support, their shoulders, their hands, and their hugs in order to make it through this event. It made me realize that like Nanny Peg, my family is awesome – straight up.

Bright Eyes & H-Dubs

2011-06-27T17:04:00.015-04:00

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So it’s been 4 months, 1 day, and some odd hours since I’ve written a darn thing on this blog. That’s a long, long time - eons, in fact. I mean, that’s on par with the length of the spaghetti noodle Lady and the Tramp slurped up, the 17 minutes and 4 seconds David Blaine was submerged in water, and 15 seasons of ER.

There are many things I could have done while I wasn’t writing this blog.

I could have attended the Royal Wedding – but I didn’t.

I could have come down with a sick case of Bieber fever – but I didn’t.

I could have tweeted with Anthony Weiner – but good lord I did NOT!

Instead:

I beat my smart friend Scott at a game of Bezzerwizzer. [Zing!]

I’ve been reading The Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan and am severely freaked out by what we’re putting in our bodies. [Corn! I’m taking to you! You are scary. So scary that I threw out a frozen bag of you that had been hiding in the freezer for 7 months in a fit of rage last week.]

I’ve also been rewatching the entire series of Lost in efforts to uncover so many of the burning questions that left me bitter and empty on May 23, 2010. For the record: I have no clue why the black smoke killed Mr. Eko; Ilana and Jacob’s relationship is never explained; and I still don’t get what “Mother’s” deal was. Am I nerdy enough to keep a small pad next to me to notate all my thoughts while watching? Yes, I am that nerdy.

Oh yeah, and I took EIGHT HOURS of teaching exams, got a NEW JOB, and am MOVING TO MASSACHUSETTS!

“What the what?” you ask. It’s true, my one dear independent blog reader and 20 family members. Yours truly is packing up her stuff [boyfriend included] and leaving NYC in one month to embark on a new adventure in Western Massachusetts.

New adventures are fun. I love them.

Ok - now THAT was a lie. New adventures scare the bejeezus out of me. I do not like change, new places and new people. It seems my perfect world would include living in one of those snow globes where the scene and weather never change [Except I’d replace the snow with a brisk 63 degree day. Liz Lemon and I love sweater weather.] But this change is a good change – we’re heading back to New England, Pat’s working at a college he loves, and I will be starting a new career as an educational writer. Scary – but cool. Oh yeah, and our potential apartment is TWICE THE SIZE of our current apartment for almost HALF THE RENT and equipped with a BACKYARD and DECK. Now that’s exciting.

These new changes and the impulse to rethink my life have also led me to rethink this blog. I certainly love the idea of Copycat Mashup and fully intend to continue its efforts, but it takes a lot of time to think of an idea, execute the art, and then write about it. Hence the haphazard blogging. So in the future, I think I might post a few “Beth insights” in the middle of the art, just to keep things fresh.

This post is a little bit of both. The art above is a piece I had been working on for my sister, who graduated from her Occupational Therapy Masters Program on Friday. Sarah is a pretty cool sister. She’s got great style and an incredible way of telling a story; seriously, I could listen to her residency tales for days. She also introduced me to the band, Bright Eyes, who is one of the artists in this mashup. I guess you would classify Bright Eyes as an indie band, and on more than one occasion, their lead singer Connor Oberst has been labeled a modern Bob Dylan. I’m sort of a lazy fan because I really just listen to one of their albums, I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning, and love the song Landlocked Blues, which is the inspiration of this mashup.

I know – if you scan through the last few blog posts you would have seen an awful lot of papercuts. The fact is, I love the art of papercutting just as much as I hate the carpal tunnel and hand cramps that come with it. And as I was just about to feature another cutting artist, Pat remarked how much this piece reminded him of one of the drawings our friend Heather [H-Dubs] did in grad school.

Yikes! Did I just steal a friend’s idea? You might as well name me Lady Gaga and call it a day. [Right!? Her song “Born This Way” sounds an awful lot like Madonna’s “Express Yourself.” And that other one – “Edge of Glory” – can we just say Cher wants her “Do You Believe in Life After Love?” hook back.] Pleading “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery,” I’d like to believe Heather’s art subconsciously inspired my sketch. It does seem fitting, given Heather showcased this drawing during her art show at Springfield College, where my sister Sarah just graduated, and where Pat was just hired and prompted our impending move. Ah, I love circular logic.

Congrats Sa – I love ya!

Papercuts and HATE

2011-02-27T09:22:00.010-05:00

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Yowza. The whole month of February has almost gone by without a post. I admit, to the fairweather viewer, it must look like I've given up on this blog. Rest assured, I haven't, but I also haven't been around much these past few weekends to hunker down and make something. Last weekend, Pat and I went to Philly (for the first time) to celebrate a belated Christmas present. Living in NYC for almost two years has pretty much prepared us to live anywhere. Philadelphia is such a manageable city - I mean seriously, no place is as frustrating and insane as New York.

Despite 65 mph winds during our walk to the Art Museum (no - we DID NOT sing the Rocky theme song while climbing all those steps, but true to form, others around us did), we had a great time. It's kind of unbelievable that the two us have been dating for almost four years - it really doesn't seem that long.

I met Pat on my 25th birthday. He accompanied my good friend Heather, a crazy little lady who lived across the hall from me during my freshman year of college. This time, both Heather and I were in our first years of graduate school; I was studying at the University of Rhode Island and she was at Springfield College, where Pat was also enrolled in a doctoral program. Heather and Pat had only known each other for four months, but she convinced him, along with with their friend Nate, to drive the 2 hours to come celebrate my birthday (a girl neither Pat nor Nate had ever met) at the Mews Tavern in Rhode Island.

Four years later, Pat and I are going strong and Heather and Nate are engaged (Hence the loving term "Hate" - eat your heart out Bennifer.). A few weeks ago, Pat and I went to visit Heather in Connecticut to spend some time with her before she moves out to San Diego and begins her life with Nate. [So jealous of her new weather situation, not jealous of her new packing situation. The girl's got a lot of stuff.]

Pat and I are Heather's bridesmaids, a duty we are super excited to have. [You can learn more about Heather and Nate here.] As one of Heather's old maids, I felt I wanted to give her something in lieu of her decision not to have a bridal shower. So I decided I would make a 3-tone papercut of her and Nate. Let me tell you, this was an ambitious endeavor for a few reasons. First, I hadn't make more than a one tone cut before [see here and here]. Second, it's extremely hard to create a piece of art that MUST look like people you KNOW. I mean - you could really offend them if it comes out unattractive and then they sort of are obligated to keep the piece of crap in their house, so when you come to visit you can see it properly displayed.

Lucky for me, they both seemed to like it. Congratulations Heather and Nate!

A picture of my little "treasure" on the steps of the Philadelphia Art Museum.

Norman Rockwell & Dawbis of Lovely Paper

2011-01-22T15:48:00.012-05:00

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Happy New Year! Let me begin by saying 2011 has started by totally bamboozling me with snow. I've never been one who likes snow, partially because I am always cold and I hate having wet feet. Snow pretty much rots and snow in Queens pretty much uber rots. For the last 3 weeks I've been driving around my hood with a shovel in my backseat, looking for a spot to dig out and park my car. After a hellish 7 hours of work each day, let me tell you that's the last thing I want to do. Despite my negativity towards my current situation (shocking, I know), I have been working on some art during these cold, frigid nights.

But onto to Norman Rockwell. Many of us are familiar with Rockwell's depictions of every day life - Thanksgiving around the table, trips to the dentist and doctor's offices, and his paintings for the Boy Scouts of America. But did you know that he tried to enlist in the U.S. Navy during World War I and was denied because he was underweight? In a dire attempt, he spent one night devouring bananas and doughnuts and made weight. Despite enlisting, Rockwell was given the role of military artist and never saw any action during the war.

Dawbis (or Dawn) is a self-taught paper artist based out of Texas. I came across her blog one day and was smitten with her crazy illustrations. [You can check out her work at Lovely Paper Blog or by clicking here.] I love how she creates a scene with her little paper people - each one tells its own story through expressions and actions, and sometimes even the paper she uses to create them. Let me tell you - after making a few paper people of my own, this is one tedious process!

For this mashup, I took Norman Rockwell's theme of every day life - in my case, it's the types of people I see on a given day at the bus stop - and depicted them in Dawbis' style. I'm already anticipating some reactions along the line of: "Beth, these characters are awfully stereotypical." The fact is, I'm not exaggerating in any way. This IS what I see. To be trite, NYC is the melting pot of ethnicities, and many of them never assimilated into "American" culture. When I first move here, that realization was a little overwhelming. Living here for almost two years, I can safely say I appreciate the ownership of one's culture that much more now.

I know my mashup is a little small on the screen, so feel free to click on the photo for a larger view.

NaniBird Update (because apparently I love updates these days)

2010-12-23T08:15:00.006-05:00

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Great news! My NaniBird, Gustav, was chosen to be part of "Batch 4" on the NaniBird website. Check out the other 39 finalists here. There are 3 pages of birds so make sure to click the next page button at the bottom of the screen.

Some of my favorites:

CiwiBot & Robot Bird

Esoteric Day & Night

F*CK CMYK (the graphic designer in me found this utterly amusing)

Yo! (a gangsta bird if I've ever seen one)

The piece above was a papercut I did of a Leonberger for the lovely woman who raised Pat, Mary Lou. She actually breeds Leos (think Dreyfuss from the TV show Empty Nest) and you can check out her site here.

Christmas Update

2010-12-17T18:55:00.030-05:00

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So this holiday ornament swap experience turned out to be pretty cool. I not only challenged myself to make an origami ornament, but I also received some incredible masterpieces in return. I felt the need to share with you all the talents of my fellow swappers below. The painting above is a Christmas present for my friend Chris. It's a painting of her baby, Grace, who is seriously the coolest, most chill baby (with the cutest chubby legs I've ever seen). I gave Chris the painting on Sunday at her Christmas party, so I feel okay with posting it on this blog. She and her incredible husband Kirk loved it.

Onto the ornaments and I wish you all a Merry Christmas!

Spider Ornament from Jill in Los Angeles. It came with a lovely folktale explaining how spider webs were the inspiration for putting tinsel on Christmas trees. You can check out Jill's other work at: www.etsy.com/shop/JillKinLA.

Fabric ball from Kat in North Carolina. You can see Kat's work at www.flickr.com/photos/kitkabbit.

This ornament from Kris in Pennsylvania came with a note that read: Give Peas a Chance. Too cute. You can read Kris' blog at artwasabi.wordpress.com.

I love the neutral colors of this ceramic ornament from Krista in Arizona. You can check out her shop at http://www.hernameismud.etsy.com/.

Melissa in Florida sent this beaded candy cane. She has a great invitation and stationary site at http://www.lovelypaperiebymeli.com/.

This frosted mirror number comes from Naomi in Arkansas.

Last but not least, this wire Christmas tree is from Michele in Pennsylvania. The joints in my hands started to ache thinking about all that wire wrapping.

Origami & Happy Holidays!

2010-12-02T18:54:00.012-05:00

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Just to squash any of your doubts, no, I wasn't taking a hiatus from this blog over the last month. In fact, I was in the process of creating some pieces to give as Christmas presents (can't post them now for obvious reasons, but will update soon). I also signed up for a holiday ornament swap via the blog Freshly Blended. This was my first ornament swap and I have to say, so far it's pretty cool.

The rules were simple: submit your name, address, and email. A few weeks later you are sent an email with the names and addresses of your fellow swappers who are located all over the country. The deal is to create identical ornaments and send them to the folks on your list. They, in turn, do the same and voila! Nine new Christmas ornaments arrive on your doorstep just in time for the holidays.

When I first signed up for the swap I thought, "In theory, this is doable." Flash forward a week later and my nerves had gotten the best of me. I made the mistake of viewing some Flickr pages of past swappers' ornaments and got totally intimidated. I managed to completely stress myself out over Thanksgiving weekend trying to create the most original ornament. I finally decided I would go back to my roots and create something from origami.

When I say "roots" I by no means mean that I am a master paper folder from Japan. Rather, the roots take me back to 3rd grade when my Uncle Mike came in and showed 33 young students how to fold a paper crane after we read the story, Sadako & the Thousand Paper Cranes. Let me tell you, I was a rock star after that show and tell. For the remainder of my elementary years (that would be grades 4-6), someone would ask me when Uncle Mike was coming back to fold some more animals. My love for origami has stayed true since that day.

I spent a few hours researching the perfect ornament style and finally settled on the 8-pointed star. While searching, I also decided that I would make it out of fabric instead of paper in order to increase its durability. Folding fabric into a permanent shape is no easy task, but with the help of a starch paste called "Stiffy" (a rather unfortunate name if you ask me), you can instantly turn your weak fabric into a much more sturdier material.

Now I just need a Christmas tree (and a Charlie Brown one at that).

*Once all the ornaments come in, I promise to post some pics!

Frida Kahlo & the Art of Pen & Ink

2010-10-24T19:05:00.022-04:00

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So yeah, it’s been two months since I’ve posted something. Yowsa – have I been a deadbeat blogger. In my defense, I’ve spent these last two months interviewing for a new job title, succeeding in obtaining a promotion, and settling in to my new responsibilities at work. Alright, and I’ve also been totally unmotivated to do ANYTHING. Once the weekend comes, I check out from productivity. Nonetheless, I’ve gotten my ass in gear to finally create.

I have always felt a connection with Frida Kahlo – her spirit, her art, and her unibrow. I remember vividly learning about her and her relationship with muralist Diego Rivera in my high school art class. What a torrid affair that was! Adultery, communism, violence, passion, sickness – all the inspirations for fabulous art. I sometimes wonder if the monotony of my daily routine is the reason I feel uninspired at times. I quickly assure myself that it is better to wait for the inspiration than find it by learning my husband has been having an affair with my sister (no ideas Pat and Sarah).

One of the themes that has always struck me about Frida’s art is her ability to just paint herself, unapologetic and honest of her emotions. So many times she is just staring out from the painting, almost saying to the viewer, “This is me. This is my pain,” or “This is where I find happiness.” I decided that I wanted to create the same type of painting – a self-portrait of the way I feel living in New York City. The way the buildings, and people, and well, city life, feel like they’re looming over me, ready to crush me or give me a severe case of Jimmy Stewart vertigo.

Pen and Ink is one of the oldest mediums in existence. Whether it was used in early Chinese art on silk or by Renaissance painters Leonardo Da Vinci and Raphael, pen and ink was a highly adored art form. There are many techniques used to create different values or shades, including “cross-hatching” (making lines in a criss-cross pattern; the closer the lines are to each other, the darker the shade) or “stippling” (making small dots to create different grayscale values depending on how clustered the dots are to each other).

Once I began this piece, I realized how long it takes to create a handmade pen & ink drawing. We’ve all gotten so used to the instant art created by Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator. A click of a mouse and the photo you’ve just taken instantly becomes a pen & ink sketch. While I do love certain aspects of technology (my kitchen sink and coffeemaker instantly come to mind), there are other aspects that I feel prompt us to lose some of life’s beautiful simplicities (hello texting).

Before I digress into my feelings on Twitter, let me get back to the drawing. This mashup uses a Frida-esque composition with the artistic medium of pen & ink. I had originally slated to just keep this simple black & white, but the result felt oddly incomplete given Frida’s use of vibrant colors. In the end, I decided to “tint” the drawing using colored pencils.

My initial drawing.

Gustav Klimt & Nanibird

2010-08-29T09:48:00.020-04:00

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I know what you're thinking - what the hell is a Nanibird? Good question. It's one I asked myself when I discovered the website http://www.nanibird.com/ibird.com/ and the story of its creator, Josh McKible. Short story is, Josh moved to Japan and found he was constantly asking himself, "What?" or "Nani?" in Japanese, throughout the day. To document his experience, he created 100 paintings of birds asking "Nani?" and then took the format to a more 3-D (and in my opinion, much more fun) arena. After creating his own series of Nanibirds and a template, he set out to find other designers who could make the structure their own. Thus, the Nanibird website was hatched. Josh is now roosting his fourth batch of Nanibirds and I sent him my own design (fingers crossed he'll pick it!).

I appreciate Josh's venture for a few reasons. First, I really like how there's a community of Nanibird artists and that no matter your background and geographic location, there's this common meeting ground found among these birds. Second, living in NYC for the last year, I found that I ask myself the same word over and over again to keep some sort of sanity. In this case it's not the word what, but rather, seriously?

The car that nearly sideswipes me on the way to work. Seriously? My landlord who rings the doorbell at 10:30 at night. Seriously? The man who is singing his heart out to Wu Tang Clan on the subway. Seriously? I feel your pain Josh - and I'm still living in my country of origin. (Although, at times I question that last statement.)

The creation of my own Nanibird also allowed me to use an artist's style I've admired for a while - Gustav Klimt's. Klimt was an Austrian painter in the late 1800's during the Art Nouveau movement. Art Nouveau, French for "new art", explored art through geometric and organic shapes. Klimt is best known for his decorative embellishments in paintings, most often of erotic images and femme fatales. His work also incorporated gold leaf, which produced some striking images. In this mashup, I took some of Klimt's styles from the paintings The Kiss and the Tree of Life.

While this on my wall to enjoy, it was by far the most fun I've had in creating a mashup. I've named him Gustav. I encourage you all to check out the Nanibird website and make one of your own!

One Year Anniversary

2010-08-22T13:55:00.009-04:00

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No - I didn't paint this (I wish I did!). Hide and Seek was painted by Pavel Tchelitchew over the course of two years during the 1940's. It is amazing. Just take a few minutes to examine it and you'll find there's more than meets the eye. I first learned of this piece when I was a senior in high school. As part of an art course, my class took a museum trip to NYC to visit The Met, Guggenheim, and the MOMA. This was the only piece I wanted to see - not Van Gogh's Starry Night or Dali's Persistence of Memory - and as luck would have it, it was in storage during the time of my visit. It took me eleven years to seek it out again and yesterday, I was able to see it at The MOMA in all its glory. Yesterday not only marked this special event, but also marked my one year anniversary of living in New York City.

One year of driving the crazy streets of Queens. One year of listening to airplanes fly over our house towards LaGuardia airport. One year of walking the streets and having no clue what language a passerby is speaking. One year of paying an obscene amount of money for a box of cereal. One year of randomly yelling, "I hate this place!" to myself while on my way to work.

As my family can see, my outlook on this city hasn't changed from my first month of living here. But like staring at Hide and Seek, I've realized that taking a long hard look at NYC is more involved than I originally thought. Sure, there's the surface level details - the subways are dirty and there's some pretty creepy people who ride them; driving can be a harrowing event on a daily basis; the bus will never be on time. But then comes another level of NYC that took some time to understand.

I work with such a diverse array of people, from cultures I would not have been exposed to if I remained in Rhode Island. I've learned of religious customs of which I never was aware. And within this diverse, massive population, Pat and I still feel totally alone. I'm not going to Pollyanna out on you all - it's hard for us here. While we've managed to form those co-worker relationships one has to in order to survive in a new place, those familial relationships that keep you emotionally alive - that bring you joy and sense of belonging - well, we're still playing hide and seek for those.

NOTE: This post was meant as a sort of intermission between mashups. I have been percolating some ideas but have been busy/traveling these last few weekends and haven't had a chance to sit down and produce. I promise - they're coming! :)

George Orwell & Salvador Dali

2010-07-18T16:44:00.047-04:00

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Let me begin this post with a brief background on Mashup Challenger #2. I met Scott the second day of my freshman year of college. We quickly bonded over competitive taunts that we both knew all the words to Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start the Fire." The taunting become so intense that we actually had a matchoff, which of course, I won. [I'm sure Scott is reading this now, shaking his head in disagreement and yelling out loud: "I would have won the rematch of REM's "It's the End of the World As We Know It!" ] Over the four years of college, we continued to stay friends. I supplied Scott with water and a sleeve of Saltines every time he was drunk, which was quite often. He supplied me with apple crepes on my 21st birthday. I lived with him during my senior year with two other ladies. We dubbed ourselves The Golden Girls (Scott was Blanche due to his promiscuity and I was Dorothy by default), and mocked him for acting like an old man with his penchant for crossword puzzles, Jeopardy!, and rocking in his rocking chair. Ironically, I presently do all of these things. Scott, you were ahead of your time.

Long story short, Scott presented me with this Mashup Challenge: George Orwell & Salvador Dali. Because Scott is incredibly intelligent, I figured he chose these two men because he knew George Orwell HATED Salvador Dali, partially because of Dali's artistic style and mainly because he pussyfooted out of fighting in the Spanish Civil War; a war that Orwell fought and whose experiences inspired the novella, Animal Farm. Orwell went so far as to write an essay, "Benefit of Clergy," where he completely tore apart Dali's autobiography. Orwell writes: "It is a book that stinks. If it were possible for a book to give a physical stink off its pages, this one would - a thought that might please Dali, who before wooing his future wife for the first time rubbed himself all over with an ointment made of goat's dung boiled up in fish glue."

And on to the mashup!

George Orwell's stories, Animal Farm and 1984, have been on the required reading list of high schools for decades. Both are focused around his strong distaste of communism and totalitarianism. Big words, I know. Basically, Orwell believed that greed, corruption, indifference, and ignorance would pollute any sort of Utopian (or perfect) society. Both stories also address how propaganda, spurned by the government or those in charge, can create unrest and fear within a society. With 1984, this propaganda is propelled by the posters ubiquitously placed throughout the land of Oceania with the slogan: Big Brother Is Watching You. [Yes, this is the original Big Brother, who unfortunately was the impetus for that horrible reality show.] Besides this slogan of the Inner Party, 1984 has many great catchphrases including: War is Peace, Ignorance is Truth, and 2+2 = 5, all ideas that seem confusing and impossible. The goal of the Inner Party is to create such confusion, to use contradictory ideas all the time, that the citizens are incapable of independent thought. In this way, the citizens are in such a state of confusion that they must depend on the Inner Party (aka the government) to tell them what to think, which is the party's technique of psychological manipulation. Pretty heavy stuff (and sometimes hits a little too close to home, huh?).

For decades Salvador Dali has been affectionately referred to as that guy with the melting clocks. True, Dali's The Persistence of Memory has quite the legacy, with posters often hung next to John Belushi's Animal House photo in college dorm rooms nationwide. As a Spanish surrealist painter, Dali tapped into the unconscious and his dreams for inspiration, abandoning reason and logic in his paintings. In college I had to write an analysis of Dali's film, Un Chien Andalou [translation: An Andalusian Dog]. Talk about an acid trip gone wrong. The film is sixteen minutes with no sound and opens with a razor blade slicing a woman's eye. Take that Freddie Kruger - but I digress.....

Whether you agree with Orwell's view of Dali and his work or you click the "like" button on Dali's facebook page, you have to admit, the guy was pretty fascinating as were his paintings. In this mashup, I chose to use one of Dali's techniques, a composition of spheres, to create a Big Brother propaganda poster. This challenge was great because it forced me to do two things I hadn't done since 1999: read 1984 and draw with pastels.

In progress....

Scott, I hope you enjoyed the results. Thank you for being a friend. I figured I'd end this post with a little Golden Girls humor for the both of us.

Blanche: I've decided what I'm going to use my bonus check money for.

Dorothy: What?

Blanche: I'm gonna have my breasts enlarged!

Rose: Blanche, why would you want to do that?

Blanche: Rose, breasts are back in fashion! Besides, what God didn't give me, Dr. Newman will. He's the Picasso of plastic surgery.

Dorothy: Fine, Blanche. Just make sure he doesn't attach one to your forehead.

Shakespeare & Scherenschnitte

2010-07-12T13:03:00.027-04:00

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If I could think of two activities that require an immense amount of concentration, patience, and perseverance, they would be reading Shakespeare and the art of papercutting. For both, the process can be quite a bastard, but the payoff is almost always priceless.

When I was in grad school, I was required to take an advanced-level Shakespeare course. I dreaded it. Not only did I find reading Shakespeare cumbersome, but I also found lugging The Riverside Shakespeare, a hardcover anthology of 7.7 lbs in my backpack, exceptionally oppressive. When all was said and done, I was surprised how much I really enjoyed the class and how much I really loved reading Shakespeare. I know Shakespeare is revered for his words more than his stories (predominately because he was the P. Diddy of his time, sampling many of his plots from existing tales), but I just love the drama. The tragedies - they're like bad episodes of General Hospital - one guy will kill his mayoral brother to get his wife and his power. The tortured son is suffering from teenage angst and is leading on his girlfriend with false promises. Her brother is sort of a prodigal son, who returns upon the accidental death of his blubbering father and seeks revenge. Oh yeah, and the mayor who bit it earlier in the episode pissed off another family (let's pretend they're in the mob) and they are on their way to pop some caps in the dead guy's gang. So, I pretty much just summed up Hamlet (in probably the most disgraceful way possible).

Hamlet is right up there as one of my favorite tragedies (Othello and King Lear are close behind) and this mashup allowed me to revisit the classic. It's funny - rereading Hamlet proved to be much easier than I remembered. Perhaps it was because I already knew the story or because I appreciate the text so much more now that I'm older. In any case, I encourage everyone who is hesitant to read Shakespeare or a self-proclaimed "Bard-hater" to revisit the plays one more time.

Scherenschnitte, pronounced "Sharon-shnit-uh," is the German word for scissor cutting. I'm sure you've all taken part in a scherenschnitte or two in your lifetime. Did you ever make paper snowflakes or those people garlands where they all are connected by holding hands? Thought so. There are tons of paper cutters out there, each with his or her own style and subject matter. I didn't realize this fact until I really started to research - and boy are some people AMAZING at this craft. Two of my favorite cutters are Beatrice Coron and Cindy Ferguson.

Beatrice Coron has an extensive resume, showing her papercuts and graphic designs around the world. One of her cuts was featured in the F train, a subway line I often ride. I would stare at this cut, cramped in my subway car, trying not to inhale the noxious odor coming from the person's naked armpit directly in front of my face. One of her series, Identity Project, are life-size cuts of the different "layers" we have and contribute to our identity.

Cindy Ferguson also has numerous years of paper cutting under her belt. She has a great blog called Scherenschnitte, where she posts templates and "How To" videos for others to use as a resource. She was also commissioned to do a series of papercuts for an expo at the Tower of London (how appropriate for Shakespeare!). This image is the beheading of Anne Boleyn - morbid but marvelous.

With all this knowledge and inspiration pulsating through my veins, I set out to do my first schereschnitte for The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. I knew I wanted to incorporate the main image of Hamlet along with some small mini scenes and a quote. I ultimately chose the scene when Hamlet stabs Polonius behind the arras and when he discovers the skull of Yorick. To me, both scenes encompass the mood of the play - death, depression, anger, impulsiveness and hesitation - and echoes the quote.

The materials I used included a cutting mat, X-acto knife, silhouette paper, a drawing I created through various sketches, and a lot of PATIENCE (and let me tell you, this 'lil Italian struggles with that attribute more than any other). There were many times when I wanted to rip the whole thing up. There were many times when I would get a finger cramp or sharp stabbing pain in my back from being hunched over my kitchen table for hours. But, in the end, I was so happy with the way this came out, I might just become a full-time papercutter - now accepting commissions!

A work in progress

Alexander Calder & Tricia Martin

2010-06-27T08:30:00.015-04:00

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Let me begin by saying I would cringe every year in grade school when we would embark on the dreaded gymnastics unit in P.E. class. Besides the fact that I couldn't do a cartwheel (I still can't do one to this day), it seemed like every task in the unit required a talent I struggled with: balance. Over the years, I've come realize what a pivotal role balance plays in our lives. Besides the need for balance when performing physical activities (i.e. riding a bike, walking in heels), we are told as a society to "eat a balanced diet" or to "find a balance between work and play." It is the common theme of balance that brings these two artists together in Mashup #5.

Alexander Calder's most famous contribution to the world of art was his invention of the mobile. A mobile is a kinetic sculpture, where particular parts may be moved by wind or other forces, sometimes with the help of cranks and pulleys. Most often, a mobile is hung from above (think the devices one hangs over a crib to entertain a baby) and depends greatly on equilibrium. Calder also created the stabile sculpture, which is defined as a self-supporting, static abstract sculpture. Some of his stabiles were inspired by animals, like The Crab. One of Calder's stabiles, Bent Propeller, was built for the World Trade Center and was stationed there for 30 years until September 11th.

Find balance was pivotal in Calder's art and is also the focus of Tricia Martin's creations in her blog Eating is Art. I discovered this site through my friend Sophie and have loved reading it since that day. Martin, who holds a Master's in Fine Arts and Design, transforms the process of cooking and baking into beautiful, interactive forms of art. I love how she tries to stay true to the ingredients she uses (most often natural, whole foods) and employs them in a creative way. She is also the creator of Pietopia, a yearly writing/baking competition in Portland, Oregon (a city I have LOVED for many years). The premise: What would your life taste like it if were a pie? Entrants are encouraged to answer the question in a short essay and supply the recipe for their pie. I love this challenge of stretching your imagination. [On a side note: Another one of Tricia's projects that I adore is The Favorite Series, where she creates a full sensory experience for an individual and a person of his/her choice. It's amazing.]

For this Mashup I decided to answer the Pietopia question for Alexander Calder, playing on his need for balance. I knew the recipe would have to incorporate the equilibrium of sweet and savory, smooth and crunchy. The recipe: Peaches and Almond Cream Pie. The challenge: Creating a stabile to go on top. I don't make pies often, usually because after making them there's that problem of actually eating them. Now, Pat and I could probably devour a whole pie, but neither of us, nor our waistlines, are up to that proposition. I also loathe having to throw out food. So I decided I would make this pie for my parents' annual Fourth of July cookout.

I adapted this recipe from Cooking Light's Apple and Walnut Cream Tart. I love peaches and since they are in season, I figured it was an appropriate substitute. The pie came out pretty good, although in the future, I think I would substitute a more substantial crust (possibly cinnamon graham cracker) in place of the phyllo dough. This stabile, an American Bald Eagle, was created from a pineapple, toothpicks, and blueberries (for the eyes). Trying to sculpt this creation was tough and made me appreciate food artists even more than I already do. Food is such a hard medium to work with! Depending on how ripe a food item is can greatly affect its structural capabilities (in other words, this pineapple was damn juicy!). In the end, I think my family appreciated their artsy dessert, or at least, fed my face with false compliments. :)

Happy Fourth of July!

Peaches and Almond Cream Pie
(adapted from Cooking Light)

2/3 cup chopped almond

1/2 cup sugar

1/4 cup whole milk

1/8 teaspoon salt

1 large egg

2 tablespoons sugar

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Cooking spray

6 sheets frozen phyllo dough, thawed

5 cups sliced peaches (about 2 pounds)

1 tablespoons sugar

Preheat oven to 400°.

Place almonds in a single layer on a jelly roll pan. Bake at 400° for 5 minutes or until toasted; cool. Reduce oven temperature to 350°.

Place almonds in a food processor; process until smooth (about 1 minute), scraping sides of bowl once.

Combine almond butter, 1/2 cup sugar, milk, salt, and egg; stir well with a whisk.

Combine 2 tablespoons sugar and cinnamon. Coat a 9-inch pie plate with cooking spray. Working with 1 phyllo sheet at a time, coat sheet with cooking spray; sprinkle with 1 teaspoon cinnamon mixture.

Fold phyllo sheet in half lengthwise to form a 13 x 8 1/2-inch rectangle. Gently press folded phyllo sheet into prepared pan, allowing ends to extend over edges; coat phyllo with cooking spray. Repeat procedure with remaining phyllo sheets and cinnamon mixture, arranging folded phyllo sheets in a crisscross pattern. Fold edges of phyllo under.

Combine sliced peaches and 1 tablespoon of sugar in a bowl. Arrange on top of phyllo crust.

Pour egg mixture over peaches. Bake at 350° for 50 minutes or until center is set. Cool 15 minutes before serving.

Eric Carle & Georgia O'Keeffe

2010-06-24T13:15:00.002-04:00

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There are two books that stand out in my memory as my "go-to" childhood reads: The Cat in the Hat by Dr. Seuss and The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle. While Dr. Seuss' cadence of words was captivating, it was Eric Carle's visual compositions that completely memorized me. His ability to create a collage that was original (he makes his own papers) and told a story is truly fantastic. When I flip through this book today, I find that I love it just as much as I did when I was four. I love how Eric Carle uses the book pages in a creative way to propel the story. If you are ever in Amherst, Massachusetts, I totally suggest visiting The Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art. It is definitely well worth the trip and you will not be disappointed.

When I was a senior in high school, I had the privilege of being selected to enroll in "Senior Portfolio," a year-long course focused around creating a portfolio for admission into art school. This was my favorite class during my four years of high school. I became very close to my classmates and my art teacher, Mrs. Zoglio. For my birthday, she gave me Eric Carle's The Very Quiet Cricket, because she felt that it reflected who I was as a person, as a student, and as an artist. It was one of the kindest presents I'd ever received. I still own the book and every so often flip through it to remember Senior Port. I learned so much about history and technique, and I really challenged myself artistically. One artist I studied who stuck with me with was Georgia O'Keeffe.

Besides being a strong woman artist in a male-dominated area, she also brought American art to Europe and lived until she was 98. The woman was a pretty kick-ass lady. She would camp out in the deserts of New Mexico so she could feel close to the environment, battling winds that would knock over her easel and the scotching sun, which would force her to crawl under her car for respite. O'Keeffe was best known for her abstract paintings of rocks, skulls, flowers, and the desert. I must note, it took a while to find a painting to include in this blog that did not resemble female genitalia (O'Keeffe repeatedly denied that she painted her flowers to look vaginal...I'm not quite buying it.) We watched a documentary on her in Senior Portfolio, which was shot towards the end of her life. I would suggest renting it - she really is one-of-kind.

So Mashup #4 uses the collage technique of Eric Carle to create an O'Keeffe abstract floral composition.

Materials: Handmade collage papers made from paint and tissue paper; illustration board; X-acto knife and cutting board; paintbrush & glue; image to work from & tracing paper; pastel pencil.

1. The first item of business was to create my tissue papers for collage. Eric Carle has a great step-by-step presentation on his website showing how to do this. [Click here to watch.] I will say, after creating these papers I respect Eric Carle even more than I did before - this job was so tedious!

2. I then traced out the major pieces of my image and cut the illustration board (on which I would glue my tissue paper) to the correct size.

3. Working with my tracing, I placed it over one of the pieces of tissue paper and cut out the image. I then glued this cutout onto the illustration board, using watered-down glue and a paint brush. Working in batches I continued the process until the entire image was glued on the board.

4. To define some of the petals I used a pastel pencil to outline the contour lines.

I did enjoy the process of the mashup, although I'm still on the fence about the final product. I'm not sure if you can tell it's a flower, but then again, at least I know it's not a vagina.

Shepard Fairey & Bob Dylan

2010-06-13T23:40:00.002-04:00

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When I was a freshman at the University of Rhode Island, I would frequently take a walk up the campus hill to the Emporium, a one-block stretch of coffee shops, restaurants, and stores. On my way back to the dorm, Bess Eaton iced coffee in hand, I would wait to cross the street at the corner of Fortin and Upper College Roads. That's where I first saw it - right on the stop sign, staring ominously back at me. While I never followed the world of wrestling, I did recognize his face from my all time favorite movie, The Princess Bride. Andre the Giant's mug was on a sticker and he was telling me to OBEY. You may not have heard of Shepard Fairey from his Obey Giant and Andre the Giant Has a Posse stickers, but I'm positive you are familiar with at least one piece of his work. Recall the President Obama HOPE poster, plastered everywhere during his campaign? That was Fairey.

Shepard Fairey holds many titles, among them are street artist, DJ, and guerrilla marketer. A graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design, he once owned a small printing business in Providence, Rhode Island where he produced T-shirt and sticker prints. Fairey has come a long way from his Rhode Island days - he has served on the boards of nonprofit organizations, worked on campaigns for Pepsi, and designed cover art for The Black Eyed Peas and The Smashing Pumpkins. He has also been arrested numerous times for displaying his art, his message, on public property. His technique centers largely around graphic and poster design, silkscreening, and stenciling.

From what I can recall, the first time I heard Bob Dylan sing was in my grandmother's car. I was 13 and we were listening to the Forrest Gump soundtrack. There she sat, mimicking her best Bob Dylan voice while singing, "Everybody must get stoned!" It was quite an audio/visual experience. My love for Bob has flourished since that day and picking my favorite Dylan song would be like asking a mother to choose her favorite child. They each hold a special place in my heart for different reasons. I view him as a poet - when I really sit down and read the lyrics, I am so amazed at the fluidity of his writing and how important every word feels.

As I said before, there are too many Dylan favorites for me to choose from, but I did decide on "It's alright, Ma (I'm only bleeding)" for this mashup. I feel this song really captures the mood of the time period - the anger, resentment, and just an utter disappointment at life. I wanted to capture this mood somehow in a Fairey-esque painting, but really struggled in selecting a subject. I had Pat pose for a few reference photos until I finally came to the realization that I knew the man speaking in this song - a man who is suffering and insecure on the inside but puts on an "It's Alright Ma" bandaid to cover it all on the outside - Don Draper from my favorite series Mad Men. The character of Don Draper puzzles me so much! I hate him, I love him, he disgusts me, he enchants me - I can't figure him out! I watch him and think that he knows he is sinking, that the lies he tells and the secrets he keeps are pulling him under - yet the mirage of a life he has built somehow keeps him afloat. As I read through the lyrics of the song, the following section really stood out and justified my choice of using Don in my mashup.

"Advertising signs they con
You into thinking you’re the one
That can do what’s never been done
That can win what’s never been won
Meantime life outside goes on
All around you

You lose yourself, you reappear
You suddenly find you got nothing to fear
Alone you stand with nobody near
When a trembling distant voice, unclear
Startles your sleeping ears to hear
That somebody thinks they really found you

A question in your nerves is lit
Yet you know there is no answer fit
To satisfy, insure you not to quit
To keep it in your mind and not forget
That it is not he or she or them or it
That you belong to. "

[To view the entire lyrics to this song click here.]

This mashup was quite a challenge for me. I'm no painter and I knew painting Don Draper was going to be tough. I started out by searching photos on the internet that I felt could be represent the song. I knew I also wanted to include the "falling ad man" that is featured in the opening credits of the show. Upon deciding on an image, I sketched it out, based solely on the shadows and highlights. From there, I transferred by sketch onto the canvas using carbon paper (Yes! They still make carbon paper and you can buy it at Staples. If you want, you can also purchase graphite transfer paper from your local craft store.) I then chose the four colors I knew I wanted to use and worked section by section applying the color. The project took a little over a week to complete. I think it would have taken longer but I was diligent in my quest to complete it, spending many nights painting on the living room floor (this girl's gotta buy an easel).

I hope you like it - I know I'm pretty happy...now I just have to figure out where to hang it.

Shepard Fairey artwork courtesy of www.obeygiant.com

Bob Dylan lyrics courtesy of www.bobdylan.com

M.C. Escher & Rembrandt

2010-06-04T18:01:00.005-04:00

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This first Mashup Challenge comes from none other than my boyfriend Pat. I should note that my relationship with Pat is built from a strong foundation of love, friendship, humor, and extreme competition. This obsessive (and sometimes insane) need to compete with each other can be displayed through lunchtime games of Boggle, nightly viewings of Jeopardy, and our most recent hobby, to outdo each other in geography (i.e. naming as many countries as we can from a particular continent, European cities, state capitals, etc.).

A few weeks ago I was describing this blog to Pat with the utmost enthusiasm, explaining to him how I would encourage readers to challenge me with an artist pairing. Without skipping a beat he says, "I've got one for you. M.C. Escher."

"No problem," I think to myself. I had been thinking of an Escher-esque piece for a while.

"Yeah, M.C. Escher and Rembrandt."

"Rembrandt?" I squawk. "Are you freakin kidding me?"

It took some time, some research, and some general self-talk of "Yes, I can do this," to finally commit to this mashup.

Maurits Cornelis Escher was a Dutch mathematical master who loved to explore the areas of architecture and geometry in his pieces. He worked predominately in lithographs and woodcuts. Escher loved to manipulate perspective, repetition, and reflections. I could spend hours looking at one Escher print and never fully comprehend the intricacy of his work. The patterns are never-ending and the relationships between every single object within the print are so complex, my brain hurts even thinking about it now. What is so amazing to me is that Escher had no mathematical training -he relied solely on his intuition- and yet, mathematicians and scientists love to ponder over his work to this day.

One of Escher's most famous artistic constructions is the tessellation. A tessellation is a sort of tiling, where figures cover a plane without overlap or gaps. To me, a tessellation refers to that horrible Honors Geometry project I had to complete in 9th grade, for which I received at B-. Geometry and I do not have a strong relationship and I felt that this mashup was my chance to overcome our feeble past.

Rembrandt, also Dutch, is considered one of the greatest portrait painters in art history. These portraits were either commissioned by others, self-portraits, or Biblical scenes. Rembrandt is often noted as having the ability to combine human and spiritual aspects seamlessly in one painting. This initial biography proved to be quite problematic for me. I am not a strong portrait painter and I had absolutely no clue how a portrait could be tessellated. It was in my research that I discovered Rembrandt, like Escher, was also a printmaker and his prints specifically focused on Biblical stories and allegories.

Ah allegories, one of this English teacher's favorite words. An allegory is sort of symbolic story - the representation of an abstract idea through characters or events in a narrative. [Think Aesop's fables.]

This new insight into Rembrandt's artistic style allowed me a little creative freedom in this mashup. Two of my favorite allegorical stories, A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving and Lord of the Flies by William Golding, would provide me with symbols to tessellate: an armadillo and a conch shell.

A week of recycling graph paper, re-sharpening pencils and grumbling, "Tessellations suck," I was beginning feel like I was back in 9th grade. Luckily, I found a wonderful website on creating tessellations and found a loophole: The Gap Method. Yes, this method doesn't really account for angles and shapes, and I didn't need a protractor to accomplish the task, but heck, it's still a tessellation.

As for the DIY portion of this post, I have to say, I created the final piece in Adobe Illustrator, using my graphic design background as a crutch. I did still have to create the armadillo and conch shell illustrations to tessellate, which are featured below.

While this was my first mashup challenge, I have to say, it was quite the "uber" challenge....but Pat, I still won.

Piet Mondrian & Louis Comfort Tiffany

2010-05-28T14:53:00.001-04:00

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A few years after graduating from my university with a Bachelor's in Communications, I debated returning to school to pursue a career in art education. I signed up for a basic foundations course at another college and sat through long hours of art history with a pompous professor and ten 17-year-old freshmen. It was torture. I would leave class feeling like I knew nothing about art and that my skills as a craftswoman were feeble at best. Despite feeling these degrading emotions, I did learn something in the course - I learned about Piet Mondrian.

I'm not sure how his name managed to elude all of my previous art training (four years in high school along with four art courses in college). I remember distinctly when my professor projected a Mondrian painting on the screen, my initial thought was, "What's the big deal?" Blocks of primary colors? Are you sure this didn't come from a kindergarten student? Since that day, I've come to appreciate Mondrian's style, if not respect it. He felt that by simply placing lines on a canvas, using his own awareness of the space but not exact calculation, he could create something natural and beautiful.

Louis Comfort Tiffany, widely known for the Tiffany lamp, was an amazing stained glass artist. Stained glass has always mesmerized me. My extreme fascination of the craft stems back to being forced to attend Sunday mass as a child. There I would sit in the church, rear end becoming numb from the wooden pews, staring wide-eyed at the large stained glass windows that surrounded the building. Tiffany liked to use glass with impurities because of the interesting composition the overlapping contrast in hues would create. When he couldn't convince glass manufacturers to retain the impurities, he began making his own glass.

So this MASHUP takes the geometric style of Mondrian and collides it with Tiffany's work with overlapping shades. Since I do not have access to a glass making studio (or the skill set to work with glass, period), I chose to create this stained glass look with magazines. I have to say, this project was arduous and extremely time-consuming, but I am utterly happy with the final result. Below is my step-by-step guide to creating this mashup if you feel compelled to try it out yourself!

Materials:
1. Canvas
2. Black Paint
3. Paint brushes (medium-sized)
4. Painter's Tape
5. Magazine clippings of various hues, grouped by color family
6. Decoupage Sealer (I used Mod Podge, which works as a glue and sealer)

Step-by-Step

1: Paint the entire canvas black and allow time to dry.
2. Now use the painter's tape to grid off the type of geometric design you wish to create - horizontal, diagonal, squares, rectangles, triangles - the possibilities are endless!

3. Working in one taped off section at a time, apply a layer of sealer to create a glue base.

4. I liked to cut triangles (but you can cut whatever shape you like). Position the first triangle on the layer of glue.
5. Continue adding more layers of different colors and applying a layer of sealer on top to, well, "seal" the layers.

6. Continue the process with the other taped off sections, using whatever color families you've created.
7. After all the areas have been sealed, peel the painter's tape off and viola!

*Note: I found I did have to touch up some of the squares after I peeled off the tape. For this reason, I wouldn't recycle your leftover magazine clippings until after the project is finished.

What Is Copycat Mashup?

2010-05-27T16:17:00.001-04:00

"Why reinvent the wheel?"

I learned this invaluable phrase during my three years in graduate school, while working towards a Masters in Education. Never mind the important theories of Backwards Design, Multiple Intelligences, and Constructivism - it was this idiom that I secured tightly in my mind's creative vault.

While my current career pathway has taken a detour from the original itinerary, I find that the art of taking what already exists and molding it to be even better can be applied to any situation. It could be changing the assessment in a successful lesson plan or adding an extra ingredient to a much-loved recipe.

With this mindset, I began to percolate the idea of Copycat Mashup. Why try to invent a new method of art and design when so many wonderful techniques exist? Why not take these techniques and mold them into my own craft? Why reinvent the wheel?

Copycat Mashup is a blog that celebrates art, design, craft and creativity. It is part art history lesson and part DIY project. It is a place for me to challenge myself creatively - the challenge of taking two completely different artistic styles and combining them into something beautiful (and if not beautiful, then most definitely, ahem, "special").

In retrospect, I can see how this way of thinking has been stewing in my subconscious for years. Take this deconstructed guitar. I created this piece almost five years ago, completely unaware that I was initiating a mashup between Bruce Gray and Jackson Pollock. Looking at this piece, I love how the chaos of the paint drips coexist with the purposeful placement of the guitar shapes. Two techniques - deconstruction and abstract expressionism - mashed together.

I hope you enjoy reading about my creative mashed up experiences and feel compelled to try some of them out yourself! I encourage you to challenge me with your own mashups by posting a comment. I have completed my first mashup for this blog and can't wait to share it, but I'm waiting to have it framed prior to posting. So, come back and visit!