art progress

Thank goodness for Pandora when working long hours in the studio - but as usual, I always find new music to purchase....check out this song. I can't get enough of it, classic rock meets electronica, falls in love and has a strange, wonderful child.

Onto the process photos...here we see cut fabric that will be sewn into bunny skins:




And here is a mound being made out of plasticine clay (there's a one gallon jug of olive oil under the clay) - plaster will be put over this, then removed to make a domed plaster shell, which will then be filled with expanding insulation foam to create a solid yet light under-structure for the fabric creatures. This one is for the middle sized one. Notice my favorite sculpting tool of the day, a white plastic spoon.

art show....beginnings

I'm about to embark on a crazy adventure; creating 5 free-standing bunny-esque sculptures from fabric, plaster, wire, and clay, and shipping them to a gallery in two weeks.

I just hope I don't give myself stomach problems, because it's going to take a lot of coffee.

This is a life-sized sketch I made to reference as I go, with fabric swatches pinned underneath each character.



The idea is this. Five rabbit type creatures are marching along, in ascending order (or descending), with baskets strapped to their backs....with various materials in the baskets: smooth stones, moss, balls of yarn and thread, flowers, and human molars. But I kind of want to work rusty nails in there somewhere. We'll see.

Anyway, you won't be able to tell if they're coming or going - are they on their way to assembling something? Or have they come from a hunt, or a harvest? I hope I can make it work, building freestanding plush sculptures in this scale requires learning some building skills I nave never done before.

Remodel Progress II

Progress has slowed a bit, due to other projects, and needing to measure and purchase more materials, but I thought I'd show what we've done on the sink wall. We've done the exact same thing on the opposite wall, where the workbench is.

Here you can see the sinkwall, stripped of any cosmetic touches, the pipes, bare walls, and dryer ducts. (click for larger pictures)




...and here we have installed the studs and pegboard, and painted it a light aqua color. There will be some cosmetic framing around the outlets and lightswitches, and those air ducts are going to be painted white very soon. Also, a short white curtain will hang from the rear of the ducts, to obscure the dryer vent from view but allow easy access if maintenance is necessary.

The washer and dryer and sink are all pulled forward - the water valves will not be visible when everything is back in place.


There is still A LOT to do, but it feels good to make some progress!

impulse purchase

Without much thought, I placed a small bid on an Ebay item, on a whim, before going to a staff meeting.

When I came back, I realized that I had just won an auction for a Mason jar full of dried squirrel feet, with no real reason to purchase them. Of course I'll use them, for something.....eventually....

Progress Report: Soap Lab

The lab is coming along, slowly. I spend all of yesterday clearing it out, and there is still stuff down there, but my plan is to just shift it around and work in sections, I'm tired of moving it all upstairs, and running out of storage space in the living room.

This picture makes it look like I'm doing the dirty work, but in reality it's Jon who has been an amazing engineer-type, measuring and cutting and devising support systems for the studs he made. But I just wanted to prove that I can rock a respirator mask, because Liquid Nails is toxic, and smells that way.


here you can see that I've cleared the area out down to the bare walls and ceiling beams. The previous owners painted the walls a sickly green color, but you won't even know it when we're done. You can see the stud system Jon has adhered to the wall over the workbench - all of the walls will be covered with hardboard and pegboard panels: clean and new and easy to keep that way.



More progress reports as we make more progress....

hmmmmmm

You know, as a soapmaker, sometimes I think to myself, "Somewhere, somebody might be rubbing soap I made all over their naked body."

It's true. I guess I don't often give that much thought to how intimate a product I make, ha ha.

straight and crooked thinking

The great/terrible thing about Pandora is that I end up discovering great music that I can't help but buy. Last weekend I discovered the album "Tri-State" by trance artists Above & Beyond:


It's really well-built, intelligent, beautiful dance music. Granted, I think the whole album is the same bpm and the songs are repetitive and long, but it is meant for throngs of dancing people, so repetition and recognizable musical cues are a given. I listen to a lot of EBM and dance/industrial, so repetition doesn't exactly bother me.

The female vocal tracks don't thrill me as much, but the other ones have a really accesible pop sensibility to them, and even the instrumental tracks are great, with really big, wide-open expansive chord progressions, and good overall sound variety and song structure.

I found some samples of these songs on Youtube, if you're into this kind of thing, give these songs a listen....and then run out to iTunes and get them for yourself, ha.

Alone Tonight

Stealing Time

For All I Care