Face nr. 12: my own little world

Thanks so much for visiting and leaving your lovely comments! I didn't manage to get to all the participants of PPF this week, and since it's almost Friday again, I'm not going to anymore. Oh well, ... time just flies too fast. I'm always trying to catch up with it and getting frustrated in the process.

But I managed to finish my painting today! Still have to make a good picture, so I'll post it tomorrow.

For today, it'll just be the daily face. Here she is:

I think most artists can relate to this ;-)

Thanks for stopping by! See you tomorrow!

Daily girl and artists that inspire me: Olga Gouskova

Olga Gouskova is a Russian-born artist, who immigrated to Belgium in 1996 and still lives there.

 I've known her art for years now and I love it. The contrast between the muted realistic figures and the more outlined illustration-like hair, flowers, butterflies etc. makes her work really interesting and different.

She usually paints women, beautiful, melancholic and strong women.

Her paintings have a dreamlike quality.

I love how she makes those patterns in the clothes. 

And the hair is beautifully done as well...

Her women often have flowers or butterflies coming out of their hair. Love it!

Look at that lace. So beaufitul ...

You can find lots more of this eye-candy on her website. She has a Facebookpage too. Go have a look, you won't regret it!

Today's one-line-girl is having trouble remembering things.

Reminds me of myself sometimes ;-) Especially when it comes down to technical things. My hubby has to explain things time and time again, and I keep forgetting it. My 9-year-old daughter knows better how to handle the moviebox than I do ... Strange how my memory is excellent when it's about painting and techniques and materials and artists' names .... I guess that shows where my real interests lie, right !?

Well, that's it for today. Hope you enjoyed Olga's art, I'll see you tomorrow with another one-liner. Thanks for stopping by!

face 10: responsibility

Oh my, I still haven't gotten around to visiting all participants from 29 faces, let alone the ones from PPF. Will visit some more today. But I'm happy because I painted today. Oh, that felt so good. Even though I got stuck and didn't know how to continue. But I think I'll be able to finish it this week. And I'm working on 2 new backgrounds too! Yesss! Looking forward to starting a new painting again.

Here's my daily girl. I seem to like the absurd quotes ... ;-)

I will have to make some more backgrounds for my girls, they're almost all used up. I spray some paint in my watercolour journal, it's size A4, and then divide it in 6 squares, and that's where my girls go. I have 2 squares left ...

Okay, that's it for today, I'll be back tomorrow with a new inspiring artist, and a new face of course :-)
Thanks for visiting! See you tomorrow!

Daily face

I am determined to catch up at least with all the participants of 29 faces today. So this post will be short.

I just want to say thanks for the great suggestions and encouragement on my last post. I'll take it all into consideration. It's great to hear about your experiences too!

Here is my daily girl. I tried a profile this time.

The quote is so absurd it makes me laugh every time. So it had to be a part of my "funny girls-series", as I now call them.

Thanks for looking! See you tomorrow!

I'm back

It feels as if I've been away from the internet for a long time, although it's only been 2 days. Since we have one spare day in the 29 faces challenge, I decided last night was the perfect day to use it. I'd been busy all day trying to get ready for the market and I was knackered by the time I went to bed.

But from now on, I'll be here every day with a new one-liner. Here's face no 8, and she expresses perfectly how I feel sometimes ...

Thanks so much for all the kind words and well wishes for my market in the last post. It lifts me up, and especially after today I needed to read it. So thanks again!

About the market .... well, how shall I put it? I could say it was interesting, but it was not. It was boring. Bo-ring. In fact, I could even say it was a bit depressing. Why? Well, for starters: there were no people. And secondly: there were no people. And thirdly: there were NO PEOPLE. And if there are no people, it's hard to sell something, right?

Of course there were some people. But they were few and far between. And as a wise friend once told me (and I think she's right): when you make art, there's one-third of the people who'll love it, one-third will hate it, and one-third will be indifferent to it. So if there are not many people, and only one-third of those will be interested in what you make, well, you can make the math ...

I sold my doodle-box. That's it! And I could've kissed the lady who bought it. She made my day (as far as it was still salvable). I got lots of ooh's and aaah's over my mirrors, but buying? No way Jose!

So it was kind of depressing. And made me rethink the whole market idea. This was the first market I did in Australia, and I made a wrong choice, that's obvious. Will it be better at another market? Who knows? It might be worth a try, but I'm not sure I still want to do it.

I've done quite a few markets in Belgium before I moved here. Sometimes with good results, sometimes I felt like screaming out of frustration. Everytime I mention to my family that I want to do a market, they heave a collective sigh. Because they know that the week before the market all surfaces in the house will be full with half-finished stuff, my stress-level will gradually increase to screaming-point and the day before the market they will all have to help out with the practical stuff that I've "forgotten" about because I was too busy creating ....

This week I'm taking a break. I'll have to because the last 2 weeks I neglected all other things. The house is a mess, there's a pile half a meter high of paperwork that I have to sort out, my inbox is overflowing, and my businesscourses are at a standstill.

So I'm giving myself some time off to rethink things, and to paint. Oh gosh, how I missed painting last week! I like making mosaics, I like painting boxes and making magnets, but it's painting I love and can't live without. I wish I could just paint and leave all the marketing stuff to someone else.

Here's my daughter, assisting me in my little stall.

She was so looking forward playing cashier ... I doubt whether she'll want to accompany me to another market after today's disaster. But we had fun laughing with our misery.

And since I always try to see the positive in everything.: if there'd been many people and all the stall-holders around me would've sold heaps, and me only one box, well: THAT would really be depressing. So I'll just see it as a learning experience. To find out more about a market and the public they're expecting before subscribing for anything.

I have a lot of catching up to do on following all your blogs, but I'll get to it, promise!

Thanks for stopping by, see you tomorrow!

Daily face and Paint Party Friday

Okay, I didn't finish my painting this week, I didn't even touch it (boo), but I did paint a little, so I guess it's all right to still participate in PPF.

I'll just show you the things I did do, mostly things for my market on Sunday, and of course my daily one-line-girl for the 29 faces challenge.

First of all the things I did paint:

I had painted these before, but I "forgot" (read: didn't feel like doing ...) the sides. So I spent half a day finishing them. Lesson learned: ALWAYS do the sides while you're still working on the painting! Much easier that way and less work.

These are some magnets I made. I found canvas with a magnetic backing and immediately my mind went into overdrive about all the things I could do with that. So I ordered a few sheets, divided the sheet in 9 rectangles and started painting.

I used a drawing I've made a few years ago, when someone wanted to trade ATC's with me. I don't like working small, so I thought this was a good solution...

But I didn't listen to my inner voice when I started. The voice that said: "shouldn't you first put some gesso on there and sand it down, because the canvas structure is really prominent?" No, I'm an impatient person and I wanted to start right away. It was hard to paint that small on the rough canvas, but the trouble really started when I wanted to write my little quotes on there. It looked like it was written by a geriatric 90-year-old. So I put some transparent gesso on there and sanded it down. And removed some paint in the process. So I had to start over in some spots. Grrr! Since I usually mix my colors, it was hard to get the exact same tint, which meant I also had to repaint the spots that were still good :-(.
Lesson learned: ALWAYS listen to your inner voice!

These are the magnets cut up in rectangles (the size of an ATC)

This is another box that I painted without encountering any troubles. Thank goodness for small pleasures ...

Okay, what else did I do? Yes, my mosaic mirrors... Two of them are finished, still working on the third one:

 The trouble I had with these make me tired even thinking about ... First of all: it was the first time I made the mirrors myself, and following my hubbies' advice I didn't glue them down (something to do with wood that's working and mirrors that don't work so they could crack ...), but stuck them on there with special tape. Which made them about twice as thick, and thicker than most of my mosaic pieces. Which was very ugly.

What to do? The round ones were more or less okay,  I could find pieces that were about as thick, but the rectangular ones were already very thick to start with. So I had to make a frame with papier machee to put on top of the wood. That's the one that isn't finished yet. It's actually a pretty good solution, so I'll do it with the other one as well.

The round ones had their own challenges. My mosaic pieces have straight edges, so how to make them fit the round edges of the mirror? With the above one I drew a square, put glue in it and threw some glass pieces in there. Never for one moment thinking it would work, but I was desperate. And the next morning they were all glued on there very strongly! I'm still not sure whether I like it that way, but it was the only way to get it ready in time.

Because for the other one, I used different mosaic pieces, and boy, that was a LOT of work!

It's a good thing I still had that many mosaic pieces ready (I make them myself), but if I do this again, it's gonna be on a smaller scale. It's actually nice to do, it's like making a jigsaw puzzle, but not when you're stressed for time.

 Lesson learned: THINK before you do something! And don't leave everything to the last week!

Last but not least: my daily face for the 29 faces challenge:

Paddling like the devil is what I did this week, but I'm afraid I didn't always manage the keeping calm and unruffled ... ;-)

Sorry this was such a long post, hope I didn't bore you with all the grissly details. Thanks for stopping by, and I do hope you'll have a very enjoyable weekend! Might be next week before I'll be able to get to your blogs, but I'll get there eventually!

Check out the other artists of PPF and 29 faces! Lots of great work to be seen there!

Day 6: perfect

I didn't paint today, boo! Worked on my mosaics, finished 2 and will (hopefully) finish the third one tomorrow. Put varnish on all my paintings and generally got a lot of work done. So I'm happy. but I really missed my painting this week. Next week I'll definitely finish it.

It's almost bedtime here, so I'll just quickly post my face, and then I'm off to bed!

Here she is, little miss perfect ...

Thanks so much for visiting! I enjoy reading your comments!