Wild Geese: a poetry podcast

I’m trying something pretty new today—a poetry podcast! I won’t write too much because I want the podcast to speak for itself, but this is a podcast of me reading and talking about one of my favorite poems, “Wild Geese” by Mary Oliver. Also, as I mention in the podcast, here’s the post with the written words of this poem from Kerri at Songs of Light.

OK, so here it goes—a little something to look at first, and then the podcast. Please let me know if you have any troubles listening!

Wild Geese: the podcast:

New: An Illustration Portfolio!

I wanted to let you all know about a new part of my blog. I am now officially starting to put myself out there as an illustrator, and so have created an Illustration Portfolio to showcase some of my work, and give people an idea of my style.

If you’re looking to add a unique touch of creativity to a project (think books, pamphlets, e-books, event posters, magazines), or would like to have a fun and one-of-a-kind way to promote your business (think business cards, fliers, postcards, and anything else you can dream up), I’d love to talk to you! Check out my portfolio:

You may be wondering, “what is the difference between an artist and an illustrator?” Well, I think that depends a lot on the type of artwork you do and where it’s used. I tend to think of illustration as “art for a particular purpose” (it also kind of blurs with graphic design). The first thing that comes to mind is children’s book illustration, but really, illustration encompasses a whole world of things: technical illustrations (think vacuum cleaner manual), magazine illustrations, posters and promotional materials, the surface of packaging, and the list goes on—basically any drawing that is adding a visual component to something. This is a very non-technical definition—I am kind of new to these distinctions, so this is my own personal working definition.

I have often been told that my particular style works well for illustration—it’s simple, fun, and easy to reproduce. I have also been really gawking at magazine illustrations lately and thinking it would be fun to get a little more into the illustration arena. A lot of artists that I’ve seen, working in contemporary styles similar to mine, are also doing illustration work, and I have started to do that with a few recent projects—most notably some greeting card designs that are currently going through reviews at a greeting card company (more on that in coming months).

I think, especially with my work, art and illustration are really blurred, more than say, with someone who does abstract art. I often create drawings that really illustrate a message, and I find it fun to figure out a unique way to represent something visually. I think it would be fun to bring that creativity into more venues. So, check out my portfolio! If you’ve been following this blog, you will probably recognize most of these illustrations/drawings, but basically I organized some of my best illustrations into some applicable categories.

Art at Nina and Tom

I just dropped off a whole bunch of art at Nina and Tom, a cute little gift and hand-screen printed clothing shop in downtown Davis, CA (where I live).

Above, you can see a picture of their store—it’s the cutest little shop with so many lovely creative items—often handmade and local. The owners, whose names happen to be Nina and Tom (coincidence?) are a very creative duo. As you can see by their website, they’re more than just a store—they create many wonderful screen printed items themselves and sell them near and far.

I’m so happy to be a part of their creative line-up! You’ll find Blue Bicicletta originals, prints, buttons, cards, and my Eat Well & Slowly Tote Bag too! So, if you’re local, or happen to be in the area, go and check out my work in the flesh!

Life as an Artist: update 4

Hello, I’m here to give you another update on “life as a full-time artist,” a series of posts I’ve been doing about my first months as a full-time artist. You can see the previous posts here.

If I could give this post a sub-subtitle, it would be “ups and downs.” Everybody has ups and downs—it’s just life. Even when you’re doing your dream job, there are still good days and bad days. A couple of weeks ago, I had a pretty low week—worries about whether or not finances were going to work out for the creative shenanigan that is my life right now, were consuming me. I felt a bit like I was dragging around a couple of heavy weights in my heart, as I worried my way into a case of the blues. Talking to my husband, he said these sage words, “Everybody has down days.”

While this phrase did not immediately pull me up into the sunshine, it worked on me, it stayed in the back of my mind. As I continued to work on myself—realize that my worries were not helping me in any way (actually they were hurting me)—I was able to make a little peace with my blues. I ended that week with a little champagne to celebrate all that I have, and many prayers for guidance in figuring out how to navigate things. A few days later, I was on fire with possibility, and last week became a week of great possibilities—some new ventures, a lot of new ideas, and much renewed hope.

Writing this, I begin to wonder what the lesson is, or why I’m sharing this information. I suppose the moral could be what my husband said, “Everybody has down days,” even when they’re doing what they love. Actually, I think it can catch you even more by surprise when you’re doing what you really want to do. You wonder, “why am I not happy? I was supposed to be on cloud nine here!” As I’m learning, there will always be ups and downs, no matter what you do, but the real test is how you deal with them. I’m finding that if you just keep doing your work, the downs will pass, and if you keep asking for guidance from your inner self, the universe, god, whatever larger power you see in life, you will find your way, even if it’s slow. And sometimes it may be slow. But maybe it’s not supposed to be fast? This is something I struggle with often—patience is a virtue that I wish I had more of. From my art desk: I’m wishing you patience, the courage to carry on, and of course, as always, buckets of hope!

Black Friday Celebration: FREE SHIPPING on FRAMED Originals

Hello! As some of you may know, today is Black Friday—the biggest holiday shopping day of the year in the U.S. As even fewer of you may know, this coming Monday is known as “Cyber Monday,” because everyone goes back to work after a weekend of shopping just to continue their shopping online. Artists and crafters on Etsy are having lots of fun sales all weekend, me included.

I am offering FREE SHIPPING on all of my FRAMED original drawings. This is quite a deal, if I may say so myself, since these items are the bulkiest items to ship (compared to just a single, unframed drawing or print), so if you’ve had your eye on one of my framed originals, now’s the time to grab it up! My free shipping sale is going on through this Monday (from 11/27/09-11/30/09). Check out this section in my shop. Also, you can see this post and this post to see all of the framed originals I have recently mentioned. Here are a couple of my favorites:

Eat Well & Slowly

Value Your Time More Than Your Money

It Runs in the Family

It’s a good thing when you share your spouse’s particular brand of weirdness. The other night at dinner when my husband described to me a giant tumbleweed he saw on his bike ride home and suggested he might like to go pick it up and photograph it, I didn’t think this was weird at all. My main comments were various suggestions on how we could get it home. “We could drive,” I said. “I don’t think it would fit in the car,” he said. “Could we put it on the top?” I questioned. “That might work,” he replied. In the end, we decided to walk.

It was dark by that time, so the actual size of this tumbleweed remained elusive to me until we were upon it. As we walked alongside the large field this tumbleweed was said to inhabit, I began to make out a giant orb. The plan was for Mike to somehow hoist this mass of viney limbs on his back and carry it the 10 minutes back to our house, while I managed the dog. I wish I had had a camera. The sight reminded me of a Diego Rivera painting, with one of those enormous bundles of flowers on someone’s back. I couldn’t help myself from giggling all the way home. Towards the end, the tumbleweed began to catch on too many trees, so Mike began to drag it. What a sight he must have been to innocent bystanders, walking along the side of the main road with an enormous ball of limbs.

We decided, as we discussed how he would photograph it (he wanted to take it out of its context and create kind of a “studio portrait), that even if the photos didn’t work out, it was a really interesting natural sculpture on its own.

It reminded us of Andy Goldsworthy—such a perfect sphere that it almost looks man-made, or perhaps it is what man would try to create in order to imitate the perfection of nature. We plopped it in our front yard, and it nearly took up the whole space. Mike quickly dragged it to the back yard to try and capture it with the black backdrop of night.

Now, when I look out my office window, I see it sitting there, like a giant guffaw from nature. Even more, it reminds me of Mike, and how I love our brand of weirdness, and I hope we just continue to get more joyful in our weirdness as the years go on.

Check out Mike’s Post on the tumbleweed. Also, Happy Thanksgiving to all of my fellow countrymen.

[in case you didn't know, this is me being silly with the tumbleweed in our back yard]

The Makings of Black Hole

You may remember this post recently about the book I’m working on called Black Hole. Well, I’ve been working on it for the past month or so, and am beginning to accumulate quite a few pages. I’m so excited about it, that I couldn’t resist giving you a little more of it—and bringing you into the world of what I think is best described as an adult fairytale.

This is a picture of most of the pages I have so far, and here is the beginning of the story. Click on the picture to make it a bit larger so you can read the words:

It feels amazing to be working on this book—it is so much of me—the story, the drawings, the individual words—that every time I work on it, the work fills me up. I suppose I could say this about much of my art, but there are some pieces that really run deep. This is one of them. It is like nothing else to be doing work that lives so deep in you. It is an experience that goes beyond any job or career.

I realize that while it would be nice if someone else wanted to look at it, or if I could sell many copies once it is finished, I would make it even if no one else was ever going to see it. I need to make it that much. This is the kind of work I want to always be doing—this is what I want to drive my life—experiences that feel like this.

Saving the World: the card set

After thinking about it for quite some time, I finally put together a card set of all 11 designs from my Saving the World drawing series:

The set includes 1 card of each of the 11 designs, and here they are:

I’m especially partial to this series of drawings because it really got me started on my current style, and the messages are so important to my own life. I’m really happy with this card set because it allows me to share all of these messages with you in a really affordable way, and they’re great cards for the whole year—you can send these fun messages to your friends anytime.

They’re now available in my shop—you can find them in the cards section.

A Shop at Papernstitch!

Have you heard about Papernstitch, the wonderful online exhibition space?

Well, I have a shop over there for the next few weeks:

I put some of my favorite items in my Papernstitch shop—it’s kind of like a little curated exhibit of my Etsy Shop. Check it out! (click icon below)

Free Art, Get Your Free Art: hope

Yes, you did read the title of this post correctly—I”m giving away FREE ART. I’ve been admiring Jen’s Feed Your Soul Project over at Indie Fixx for some time now—to share art during this financially challenging time, she has organized having a different artist give away a print (via a downloadable pdf file) every month. It is amazing—and she has people lining up (an extended waiting list of artists) who want to be a part.

Recently, I have been thinking a lot about why I do art, and why I want to keep doing art—it’s because I want to share inspiration and ideas, and help people to see things in a new way that makes their lives richer. To me, the best way to do that is to put lots of art out there—get it to people in as many ways as possible, and so I thought, “Why don’t I give away free art every month?”

To start us out on this Blue Bicicletta free art project (I don’t yet have a nifty name for the project like Jen), I’m posting up a notecard version of my new hope drawing. I”ve been mentioning this drawing a lot lately, I think because hope is really important to me right now, and really always is. Also, even though I’d like to be one of those very diplomatic artists who says they couldn’t possibly pick a favorite drawing, I’ll admit it—I love this drawing right now—it really speaks to me, perhaps I am in love with it. I decided notecards would be best because then you can even pass the message along to someone who really needs it.

So, it is with this free art that I wish you all of the hope in the world—an entire ocean of hope. I wish that it would swoop down and sweep you off your feet so that you could live in a land of infinite possibility. Without further ado, you can download my hope notecards here:

hope_notecard

About the cards: As you probably already realize, this artwork is for PERSONAL USE ONLY. You can print out as many as you’d like, send them to friends, share the love, but they are not for resale. These cards work great printed out on an 8.5 x 11 inch piece of card stock or heavy-weight paper. All you need to do is cut the sheet in half on the long side (at 5.5 inches), and then just fold each card. They fit perfectly in any A2 size envelope that you can find at office supply stores. I generally get better blacks when I print in color, but black and white printing will do fine too.

Please let me know if you have any difficulties with the file—since this is my first time putting a pdf on my blog, I’d love to hear about any kinks in its use. Thanks so much for being a part of Blue Bicicletta! Expect to see more free art next month this time—how about December 17 (as 17 is one of my lucky numbers)?