January 4 2011 A New Year begins

The holidays are over and the new year has began.
I didn't make any resolutions this year because I soon forget them

and go on doing the same things.
In the past I didn't post very much of my work because I am computer challenged and it seemed such a frustrating experience, however,I made the decision to post more so I can learn to do it faster and better.

Sometime in 2010, I started an art journal,I love the process of finding words, phrases and pictures to represent what I feel at the moment so
I have selected some of the journal pages at random, to practice posting.

Frida Kaehlo

It has been a while since I posted any work, but this past spring I took a weekend workshop with Lynne Perella, the subject was Frida Kaehlo one of my favorite painters.

We used Lynne's favorite resin paper for substrata, used gesso on the front and back to prime it, thus making the resin paper very strong and pliable. Oil pastels were liberally applied to obtain the desired background. The pastels were vigorously rubbed in with paper towels,then more colors applied until the background was completed. I then used stamps, collaged my favorite pictures of Frida, houses, birds, and other ephemera to represent what she loved. To finish the book I hand-stitched around each page and completed with a tassel.

The first picture is a view of the front and back page. The word Sadja, appears several times in her diary and it's a variation of the Sanskrit word Sadha meaning Heaven and earth. The numbers 3, 7, 9 have a mystical significance but Frida did not explain their importance in her life.
I loved working on this book and reading Frida's diary. She was a tormented soul but an extraordinary artist and an incredible human being

In this spread , second page of my book, which unfortunately didn't photograph well, I used two different borders, the bottom one across the bottoms of the pages shows elephants in motion the big elephant in bottom left is a cut out from a travel magazine is most gorgeously dressed for a parade, a small px pf my husbands and i is also included on the left, the right page has few items from passport etc, I hoped to convey our beginning of the pilgrimage to the sacred Sites of India.

Tis is my favorite packet spread., the background is made with alchool inks on wax paper
the green pockets are made with indian glossy paper and the two center pockets are done ,again in a lovely Indian paper with crewel flowery design. tags will have tassels that I am working on.

In this next spreads I made packets on the right side, the tags have Buddhist Sayings,
On the left side of the page the background is very rich as yet not finished but I just love the way it came out. the trouble is I can't remember how I did it!

Pockets

There are three spreads with POCKETS,
in this first photo, I folded the pages,and put the round wheel
with Buddhist symbols, It actually turn. ( The turning of the wheel is very symbolic in our tradition.)