I am staying focused, at least when I am working in the shop.
1. work 1-21-2009, 2. work 1-21-2009, 3. work 1-21-2009, 4. work 1-21-2009, 5. work 1-21-2009, 6. work 1-21-2009 Created with fd's Flickr Toys.
Now in the house... I need to focus on family, tax info prep, and fiberart.
First of all, I am a few days late on my blog carnival entry. January's theme is favorite publication. I have lots of favorite art books, too many to choose from. My current magazine favorite is Cloth, Paper, Scissors, a publication devoted to intuitive mixed media collage style art, made primarily of cloth and paper.
I realize that it's not metal related at all. I find the metal magazines to be a bit stiff, and not at all related to my lifestyle as work-at-home-mom, artist, household manager, cook, etc... Isn't that odd? So many practicing metalsmiths are all that and more, but the magazines don't talk about or relate to our art as a part of our lifestyle. The metal magazines don't speak to me heart to heart. Somehow Cloth, Paper, Scissors does that, and inspires me too. I do not make the type of work I find in the magazine, but I love reading the creative processes, seeing the workspaces, seeing the narrative quality to the work and the complete lack of pretentiousness. I get a sense of artists simply being, living, practicing, and spilling their guts out into their work.
Go these blogs to see what the other carnival participants enjoy
Lora Hart Jewels
Elaine Luther
Tonya Davidson
Tamra Gentry
Second
SmokyRick asked how I managed to get all those shots of myself working. It's no secret that I love to have pictures of myself, but no one around here is as camera-happy as I am. The kids have a hard time standing still long enough to take a focused shot. Nor do they enjoy taking the dozens of shots necessary to get one decent shot. I on the other hand, will take pictures of myself all day! well... maybe...
It's fairly simple once it's set up. I put my camera on my sturdy tripod. I get it all set up for the right angle and light settings. I set it on a 12 second shutter delay and also use a remote clicker. (What are those remote clicker things called?) Then I get my work all ready to go. I click on the remote to get the timer started, race to my workspace, and start right in. I have it all fairly close together and the remote clicker lets me be that much closer to my workspace. I do this over and over again, as I work, changing angles occasionally. It really doesn't take that much time once I get the initial settings.
I did not get metalwork done for a few days due to sick kids and ridiculously frigid temps, but I did do fiberart in the house. Of course I took some photos!
1. More Me, 2. More Me, 3. More Me, 4. More Me Created with fd's Flickr Toys.
Click on the links for the full size shots. The photo mosaic is also in my Xanga photos, if you can't access flickr.
I finished up these Black Hearts. You all know the blackhearted people, the ones you alternate between loving and hating?
Click on the photos below for details. All of the hearts are available in my Joyheart shop on Etsy.
A facebook friend and fellow metal artist recently asked me how I liked blogging and internet networking in general. I replied that I really do enjoy it, even though I haven't been blogging so much recently. I consistently use xanga, blogger, facebook, flickr, and twitter. It's not quite as much work as it sounds like.
I post all of my pics to my flickr pages. Think of flickr as a way to share and educate, not to market. Flickr is not intended for commercial use. However, as we all know, sharing and educating does expose a greater audience to our creative works. I also upload some of my pictures to my Xanga account and to facebook.
I blog first on xanga, then cut and paste my blog entry to blogger. I like Xanga's blog editor- super easy to use. I don't need to know html, but I can manipulate the html to suit my needs. I think blogger gives me better overall exposure on the internet and it gives me a much better looking blog in general, with an easy to adjust blogging template and fantastic widgets. Blogger is a part of google, so I can use it easily with google analytics, google reader, gmail and all of the other great google tools. In any case, having the same blog in two different places gives me that much more exposure.
After blogging, I put an update on twitter, which automatically updates on facebook. So really I blog once. The rest is cut and paste. The majority of the work goes into the photography and photo editing. If I spend too much time on the social networking, it is because I am admittedly goofing off and enjoying the social aspect more than the networking.
Now, when I'm not goofing off online.... I do work in the studio! I am still working on the railing that I don't want to work on- an old trade that needs to be out of my life. I would like to say that this struggle of a railing will lead to some sort of creative epiphany, but I'm not sure it will. The big revelation is that I do not intend to make railings anymore! I will create the sculptural nature elements that I love making, but someone else can cut, measure, fit, and weld it all together.
I motivated myself to work on it yesterday by focusing on...well.... ME. I took my new dslr camera, set it up on the tripod, and took pictures of ME, working. Camera clicking, plus my moody "be good tanyas" music station on Pandora, kept me going for a good four or five hours. Kids are home from school today, because of the extreme frigid temps, so I am busy with domestic life. When they get back to school, I will be using the same motivational strategy- more and more and more action shots of ME.
Click on the photo titles under the photo mosaic to go to each individual photo, larger size, in flickr.
