Greetings from Dallas! Climate, politics, Texas freakin’ politics, protests and wars, oh my! It’s all happening.
Personally, I’m on indictment watch while I carry on with my Art biz. And have you seen Uppercase magazine #58 yet? I’ll show you the full page photo of my piece in the “whimsy” section. And of course some new stuff I’m working on.
So I’m set to start a YouTube channel soon. The timing is auspicious. Look for Genie Geer Artyology.
I created some new pages here on the blog which you can link into and find pics for miles. The pages are listed at the top of the blog. Check out the ones featuring friends’ inspiring homes (hey there, Mary Korfanty, Barbara Gold, Dwight West, Linda Goodwin, and Dr. Ladenberger).
(This is a new blog format/theme and I am having a hell of a time getting the fonts right. Apologies if it comes out wonky. It is very very late at night.)
After a year on the wait list for an apartment at the Juliette Fowler retirement community, the move happened all of a sudden at Christmas. Around that time we BA ’66 grads lost one of ou icons, one of our beloveds, to cancer. I was so glad to have spent a little time with Bobby Bassett over the last few years; mainly at art venues and then later in hospice. I sure hope I see you in the afterlife.
Bobby is on the left. Middle: Brent; right: BryanLots of artwork in various media going on here in my new home. It’s only 600 sq. ft. and I’m pretty used to living small, but I do have to have my art supplies, artwork and treasures! I’m comfortable here and the 2 big windows with expansive views plus high ceilings, keep me from feeling closed in. I’ve joined the artists’ group here, and have committed to the water aerobics class by purchasing a new swim dress. I was without Wifi for awhile, so couldn’t post. Today and evening I got caught up on blog posts by creatives I follow. That was cool.
Meantime, here are pics from The Lakewood Library 54th Annual Artists’ show on view all of May. I am thrilled to have 2 pieces in it; cardboard and fabric doll, and acrylic painting using the techniques I learned from Lynn Whipple during her online class, The Essence of Still Life. I will never paint the same old way again!
Isabel kitty is happy here! Thanks for visiting!
I let go of almost half of what I owned before the move. Painful at times, yet freeing. Cousin Julie, who had also just downsized, sent me her copy of “The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: the Japanese art of decluttering and organizing” by Marie Kondo. A revelation. If the item doesn’t “spark joy” when you touch it, let it go to a new owner who might love it. (or just throw it away). Serious magic, indeed. Important to follow the order she prescribes, as your confidence and clarity grows throughout the process. The only thing I couldn’t do was fold all my blouses/tops for storage in drawers. I prefer hangers and I’m NOT a young petite person like Ms. Kondo. You get the idea.
So now we come to the “After” pics:
See the tall, narrow coffee cups? With the Dutch canal houses on them? A serendipitous gift from friends and newlyweds Jennifer and Marcel. He’s Dutch, she’s a Dallas gal and now she lives in my favorite country, Holland, with Marcel and his two darling daughters. The coffee cups are from Amsterdam. They replace my favorite cup which somehow got left behind during my move and for which I grieved, silly as that sounds….my son Eric made the wood plaque for me when we lived in The Lehigh Valley for a few years. I still miss the snow and the scenic views.
And my 50th high school reunion was so cool, that none of us got as many photos of each other as we wanted. I could only stop talking long enough to take a few.
This formatting is about to kill me. I can’t figure it out. Something changed.
During all this life readjustment, I had cataract surgeries on both eyes. Long process. These sketches were all done during that time, and around the presidential election, which was also a cause for my watery, blurry eyes. And general depression.
It happened to me, what was unthinkable…..running out of money and resources in retirement; this Boomer who never planned for the future and was blind-sided by job losses and home equity losses, et al, blah blah blah. Now made the tough decision to sell my cottage on a tree-lined street near my beloved White Rock Lake, and – ohmygod, will rent an apartment for awhile. Perhaps a long while. After ten years of ownership, my equity is non-existent due to the housing crash, and this old cottage now needs upkeep and repair I cannot make. I dreamed of hanging on long enough to get a nice reverse mortgage, but the bathroom floor will have long caved in before that ever happens.
To my chagrin, I find that I qualify for subsidized housing for a one bedroom apartment. So that’s what I have to do. The For Sale sign went up in my yard today, and there have been three showings already.
My grandson will move back home with his mom and sisters and her boyfriend, and my son will have to find someone else besides me to stay with. I’ve done all I can do, and now it is time to let go and move on. I can’t help but think about everyone who rails against entitlements for the poor and ashamed to admit that in my callous youth, I was a snob. I wasn’t priviledged, just ignorant and naive. I wasn’t smart with money, and I gave most of my inheritance away or made bad investments during the recession. But I always worked and supported us, and paid my taxes. Now it’s my turn to hold out my hand for help from the government. There you have it.
So I made this little sampler cloth that had a horizontal piece up top, and it looked sort of like a pagoda, or perhaps an irregular cross. I had another piece of brown and cream toile by Laura Ashley and I cut a section out that had a female profile with an outstretched arm on it. After that, I drew a larger profile beside the printed toile one. She wanted boots for walking, so a periwinkle pair were stitched and stuffed, trapunto-style. Hands outstretched, she is garnering the courage to journey forward.
Here are photos of little paintings by Claudia McGill, whom I discovered by linking into blogs here on WordPress. I adore her work! She is very generous, and had a giveaway on her blog. In exchange, I sent her a sampling of my work and am tickled to learn that she’s keeping them together like a little art journal. So cool.
I took photos of every piece of artwork (well, I think I got it all) that was on display at theSmall Gallery and Slant Gallery recently and will share them with you. To start, here I am at the Reception attempting a selfie against my cloth head-ladies dolls.
That wraps up the Midtown gallery tours for April. If you made it this far into my blog post today, I hope you enjoyed it!
I am musing now…..does it matter where I live as long as I am surrounded by art that sustains me? I still have friends, family, and a host of folks to admire in social media and the blogesphere. But….Hopefully a view of leafy green or at least a flowering hanging basket from apartment windows. Pride, pride go away….give up the dream of home ownership. If it is a burden, then it is too much for me to handle. Been there, done that, as we say. Time to move on.
Here on my blog, I’ve updated some pages, As well as the page that features pics of various artisans’ work in my private collection::
In My Collection – Work by Other Artists
I’m inspired to make my own little stitch works by fiber artists in the blogesphere and learning so much from Jude Hill. I updated my page, here:
Visit my “Blogs I Follow” l to see where I get my inspiration from!
Evolving Studio Reorganization
A few weeks ago, before launching into some new projects, I decided my living room/studio required another sort and rearrange. Besides gaining some wiggle room I found an old sketchbook with drawings from my foray into the Sketching in the Gallery events at Dallas Museum of Art in 2001. I thought I had lost them. My graphite drawings reminded me how much I used to love using charcoal. Now I get a thrill knowing I can seal these babies with my new spray fixatives (matte or semi-gloss).
Before and After –
Before and at the Point of Overwhelment:
And After, At Last:
Trying New Supplies and Techniques
In response to a call for entries for artworks inspired by the iconic Frida Kahlo at an upcoming curated gallery exhibit at The Bath House at White Rock Lake, I had an idea for a cloth doll posing with some of her (the doll’s, not Frida’s), self portrait sketches (done by yours truly). I wanted to experiment with some of my new art supplies, but it was also important to me that I use fabric, trims, and doll hair already on hand. And the DOLL selects the materials she wants.
I like to shop online. I HATE shopping in person. My vertigo kicks in and I always get a tummy ache. In a store, decision-making eludes me. I have been known to leave a store empty-handed. If I could order groceries online for cheap, I would. Anyway…..
The drawings are done on four different papers, approx. 5” x 7”, using a variety of tools including chisel tip pens, markers Pigma pen, pastels, acrylic, charcoal. Why had I been afraid to try new techniques? That’s an interesting line of thought, I think.. I found I love the soft pastels, especially on this new Yupo ‘paper’. So slick and smooth! Spray with fixative and you’re done.
I was uncomfortable using the calligraphy pens and lost control of my marking a few times. So much so that I cut out the boo-boo and pasted on a new piece of paper, and drew over that. Ouch. The damn chisel tips bleed when dampened by a dot of Elmer’s. That would never do with a wash. I’ll stick with my trusty Micron Pigma Pens. In the end, none of my sketches remotely resemble Frida, but why quibble over details? In any case, I changed my mind about using them with my Frida doll entry. They will turn up in a future project, probably.
Recent sketchbook drawings with new supplies:
Inspiring Studio of Artist/Writer Linda Garten Goodwin
Is it any wonder I like to hang out in my friend’s carefully collected and curated studio space?
My Frida Sketches
In Order to Execute One Task, I Drift Off Into Another In Search of the Elusive Muse
I was also playing around with piecing small scraps of fabric. Maybe use some on cloth dolls. Maybe just see what becomes. I was stuck in the select-and-pin phase; the thing was getting too big and pissing me off, when I happened to take a Pinterest break. A Pinterest “break” usually becomes a BINGE.
Luckily my Textiles-Fiber Arts Pinterest board includes work by Jude Hill and I happened to swoop into her Spirit Cloth blog . Serendipity! She was just starting a new online sharing project and soon I had segued into beginning my first cloth sampler. I’ll try a nine-patch soon, but it scares me because I have a hard time with measurements and squaring things up. Don’t know how much of that fear is due to mental block or mental handicap. **humphf** But for this first project, I want intuitive design, imperfection, and simple hand stitch. I love that Jude uses just a few simple but perfect, tiny embroidery stitches. The folk art feel appealed to me, but with the hope of producing something that is somehow primitive and modern all at once.
Meanwhile, My Doll Making Muse Butts In
So OF COURSE this stitch-play led to the dubious decision to stitch my Frida doll BY HAND. Which I loved doing, but it really slowed me down and I was only 97% finished with her in time to meet a contest photo-entry deadline, so I had to tack her clothes in place, pose and snap the photo, and wait until later to give her rings and embroidered shoes. I used my new pastels along with pen, fabric paint and spray fixative on her face. I’m pleased with her hair. It’s mohair + synthetic doll hair. She wears new earrings from Kalachandji’s Indian gift shop. She doesn’t look like the real Frida, but she FEELS like her to me. I enjoyed researching the real Frida Kahlo in any case, and remembered I want to add the movie to my collection someday.
Color Play
Adult Coloring Books have become so popular, and friend Linda Garten Goodwin and I spent an afternoon at the Bath House at White Rock Lake indulging in a coloring event with folks from the East Dallas Creative Arts Center. I hope to take a class there someday. Anyway, while I enjoyed the outing, my colored page SUCKED. A four year old could have done better. I was duly humbled. Linda didn’t like hers either, but I thought she did pretty good considering her advanced age (ha!). She complained that her hand was cramping up. Excuses, excuses….
Speaking of child play……So the kids who graduated high school the year before me were in town for their 50th reunion. Lesley Ivy stayed with Linda and Mr. G, (who live just a couple blocks from me in the White Rock area), and I was lucky to get a play date with her and Linda before Lesley returned to her home in Taos. (I know, right? Taos. *sigh*)
We had a sublime lunch at East Dallas’ Kalachandji’s Indian restaurant/gift shop/temple, where you eat outside in a lovely courtyard. I bought Frida-doll’s earrings there. Beautiful afternoon with beautiful ladies!
Check out Lesley’s colorful and distinctive murals, mosaics, painted furniture and more, here Colorwork I’ll take one of each, please!
I continue to rework some older cloth dolls as the mood strikes me. I am still incubating ideas for new pieces. Often, before I fall asleep, I rehearse a technique and assemble all the parts completely in my head. I might even paint a picture (also in my head). Too bad all the inspired work going on in my head doesn’t actually come to fruition. Is this normal behavior?
Artists/Makers/Teachers whose work has influenced me lately are:
Claudine Hellmuth – collage
Lynne Perrella – collage, mixed media
Thread and Thrift – textile artist, printmaker
The Pale Rook – cloth doll art
My mom, D.J. Geer, who passed sixteen years ago, would have turned 90 this past July. She was an artist and especially loved any sort of textile art. We were playmates. She loved birds. When she died, I took her favorite ceramic purchase, a fat budgie. This is my watercolor of it.
Hey, New York: Hipsters thrive in Texas too!
Over the last few months, I have been fortunate to supplement my social security income by typing, and helping edit, a dear friend’s memoir. It is turning into therapy for us both (besides the obvious learning experience). In addition, we are working on an art project together; I am scanning and mounting her drawings. Here’s a little sketch I made of her after a memoir session at my kitchen table:
April to present was filled with difficulties related to family issues and there were times I couldn’t make much art, or even read blogs; it was a struggle to open my email and Facebook. Just wanted to sleep round the clock. My memoir-writing friend has lent me her Inspector Gamache and The Walk novels, as I confessed to only reading my collection of “research” material related to Art or Decor or Fashion.
I needed an escape, and boy do I love Louise Penny’s and Richard Paul Evans’ work now! I’m an addictive personality and can barely put them down long enough to return to Blogs and Art. I expect to learn some things about Life and People, and maybe….maybe that will lead to some new Artwork, as well. Hope returns.
Commissioned work scares the hell out of me. And not because I am afraid the piece won’t turn out well, but because some of the magic of spontaneity may not find its way in, that even one limitation to the work’s intuitive process (some specific requirement as requested by the commissioner) will limit me in such a way that I become very uncomfortable. Never mind that the buyer’s ideas may make my artwork even better, perish the thought! Clearly, I have control and ego issues.
But I love it when someone likes a finished piece so much he/she must have it, and when this occurs, nothing could be sweeter. You feel as if you have truly communicated your intention as told to you by the artwork itself.
The photos show recent sketches and a couple of cloth dolls – I’m calling them BodyParts Dolls, as I continue to assemble, or in some cases, disassemble dolls; changing hair, making new clothing bits, faces, hats…..
I continue to draw and paint, usually drifting from one project to another. That’s a great benefit of having let my “studio” space be the very same as my “living area”. Can’t separate them.
I have a plan. I want to gather it all to me. Goal setting has come late to me in my life, but it’s coming together, and I needed to get on social media to really begin to understand the powerful potential of our internet. How we can, collectively, harness its power to reach out to one another, find some common ground, share our talents and dreams and find freedom of self-expression!
So I will be talking about, and linking to, other artists, lifestyle and photo blogs I’ve discovered, my journey-in-progress and my art; public figures I admire, writers and bloggers and ….you know how we are….
Shout out! to Loretta of The Art Motel of the Finger Lakes, Jennifer of JMayerDesign, Beth of caprichostudio1.com, and Linda of LoveGarten.com. Just as soon as I know what I’m doing, I’ll give y’all a link!
Genie Geer Artyology 