100 Things

1. Create 'fingerprint' poem
2. Write a haiku
3. Learn an origami fold
4. Read one fiction book a month
        - The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles (January)
        - Girls Fall Down (February)
        - Brooklyn (March)
5. Organize art supplies
6. Make something from found paper
7. Write on the theme of the 'uncanny'
8. Start following a new blog
9. Start a new art course
10. Visit the AGO
11. Write 'CO' story
12. Draw a multi-coloured ink drawing
13. Post a print on etsy
14. Read a biography of an artist
15. Write a concrete poem
16. Re-read 'Meanwhile'
17. Learn to draw a new font
18. Complete a technology-themed still life drawing
19. Complete an acrylic painting
20. Design a repeating pattern
21. Brainstorm ideas for a graphic novel
22. Draw a simple graphic story
23. Research contemporary etching
24. Complete a drawing on scratch paper
25. Experiment with one large-scale linoblock print
26. Visit MOCCA
27. Brainstorm projects on the theme of heredity
28. Write a architecture-themed short story
29. Write a 3-D shape poem
30. Write an 'instruction' poem
31. Update mailing and contact lists
32. Send out a mailing
33. Combine photos with an ink drawing
34. Hold an arts night
35. Practice a new bookbinding method
36. Create a chapbook
37. Create an experimental book
38. Make a full roast dinner
39. Spend a day taking photos around the city
40. Write 'constellations' poem
41. Make ravioli from scratch
42. Finish a book you've half read
43. Begin an ideas journal
44. Experiment with embroidery
45. Enter a short story competition
46. Enter a poetry competition
47. Read more of 'Seven Page Day'
48. Memorize a poem
49. Make an angel food cake
50. Create fading linoblock prints
51. Reread 'The Medium is the Massage'
52. Start a new literary journal subscription
53. Make a stationary set
54. Brainstorm etching ideas
55. Make a blurb book
56. Read a short story collection
57. Go to the Toronto symphony
58. Improve the design of the blog
59. Write a stand-up routine with T
60. Buy a print for the apartment
61. Explore a part of the city you've never been to
62. Enlarge and frame a group of photos
63. Design better product shots
64. Look at bpNichol's work at the rare books library
65. Make handmade Christmas ornaments
66. Send a letter
67. Sketch outside in the city
68. Write a one act play
69. Organize wedding photos into an album
70. Have a picnic outside of the city
71. Watch 'Citizen Kane'
72. Read a book on the history of the motion picture
73. Research local printmaking
74. Study world geography
75. Make a handmade gift for a special occasion
        - H's Birthday Gift
        - Helen's Wedding Stamp
76. Watch an Audrey Hepburn movie
77. Make a paper cutting
78. Visit three new places on the D*S Toronto city guide
79. Work on anatomy-themed drawings
80. Write a series of number-based poems
81. Paint an accent wall in the bedroom
82. Go on a hike
83. Try a spin class
83. Buy a blues album
84. Learn the lyrics to the hymn from 'Junebug'
85. Reread Europe poems
86. Experiment with abstract painting
87. Learn to make a new cocktail
88. Write a science-themed short story
89. Read 'The Grapes of Wrath'
90. Listen to three episodes of 'This American Life'
91. Go to a poetry reading
92. Make Robin's lamb soup
93. Study perspective drawing
94. Send a postcard
95. Complete 'Nan' Poem
96. Make a Tin Can Lantern
97. Listen to live jazz
98. Sketch at the Toronto Metro Zoo
99. Make a donation to a local charity
100. Fully document my completion of the goals list

Happy New Year!

I hope you all had a wonderful New Year's celebration!

As we start into 2010, I want to send out a huge THANK YOU to everyone who reads this blog. I'm so grateful to each and every person who has read a post, left a comment, or checked out the etsy shop (which is a little sparse this days, but I'll be working on that this year too). Thank you so much for your interest and feedback!

We spent the final days of 2009 with great friends at their family chalet. Snow, fireplace, food, champagne - The perfect setting to ring in 2010.

I tried to work on my goals list for this year, but likely won't have it finalized until later this evening. It certainly won't be a good start to the New Year if I'm late on my list, but it's so blustery in the city that all I want to do is cuddle up on the couch with T and watch The Wire (again!).

More to come soon!

Back to Grade 10 Art Class

Now that I'm considering taking the full 8 week screen printing course at Open Studio, one of my goals for the winter is to build a new set of drawings to incorporate into potential prints. I'll probably work on ink drawings for the prints because they'll make clearer reproductions, but for now my goal is just some old school practice.

And by old school I mean Grade 10 art class and the classic still life.



Today's experiment revealed that I still have some serious issues with proportion, mainly because I don't plan ahead. Next time I'll have to remember to check the basic shapes for size before starting with the detail. Still, it was fun to work with pencil again and T kindly volunteered to eat the halved apple afterward so that I didn't waste it!

Happy Holidays!

I was really hoping to get at least one post up before I headed up north for Christmas, but after a crazy week of work, potlucks, and holiday prepping, I was ready to take a break from everything, including blogging.

I had a great time at my parent's house, which is situated in the middle of snowy, silent Ontario farm country. Lots of food, tea, poker, and holiday movies... pretty much perfect.

I'm back in the city now and feel 100% rested (and full of Christmas cookies). Over the next few days, my goals include cleaning out my art hutch, working on some still-life drawings, and completing my artistic goals list for 2010. My original plan was to come up with 365 items, but I'm starting to think that number is a little high. Maybe 100 goals is a little more manageable.

I think I did pretty well with my gift giving this year, although, as usual, my plan to make everything by hand went out the window by mid-December. I also received a bunch of fabulous gifts including a new digital camera! No more 'borrowing' my sister's camera for +6 month stretches. Well, hopefully not. One of my New Year's Resolutions is going to have to be don't drop any expensive electronic equipment.

My sweet husband also bought be this stunning Bonnie Bag from Sew Mo'


I've been coveting it ever since the Winter Fling craft show, especially since my wardrobe is always in need of a splash of colour.

In addition to the purse, T also gave me a horrible cold, but I won't hold that against him. If there's ever a good time to get a cold it's when your main activity of the day is to snooze on a couch and watch movies. Plus, look at the adorable company I had to nurse me through my illness.


I'm hoping to start posting a little more regularly now that things have calmed down a bit from the pre-Christmas rush. I'll have to add that to my goals list!

Screenprinting Heaven

I wasn't all that excited for my final Open Studio course because I didn't really think there was any chance it would inspire me to pursue any further work in the medium. Boy, was I wrong. The class was INCREDIBLE and, to my great surprise, I'm now considering signing up for the 8 week screenprinting course instead of the etching one.

My surprise was partly rooted in the fact that I seriously misunderstood how the process worked. I had the old school, stencil-style process in mind when I headed to class, but when our instructor explained the process of using light-sensitive emulsions to perfectly transfer black and white images I had a mini artistic flip out. I also immediately regretted not bringing photocopies of my own drawings into the class because I would have loved to practice with those images instead of a photograph.

The photograph I ended up using is this family classic. I worked with a photocopied enlargement of the whole image and it's a good thing I made the copy because step one involved soaking the paper in vegetable oil to make the white areas of the image translucent enough to let the light reach the emulsion on the screen.

Open Studio's step up for this process is pretty high tech. We exposed our screens in a special room using a large glass and vacuum enclosure and very bright, industrial-sized light. Apparently, this process can also be done on a much smaller scale at home, but I think I need to do a bit more research before I start squeegeeing large quantities of emulsion onto screens over my bathtub.

Once the screens had been exposed to the light long enough for the emulsion to capture the image, we washed out the excess emulsion and started printing. We worked in teams of two (although, we each printed our own image), and my partner and I chose a brilliant, golden yellow and a slate grey to use for a two-layer print.



I really wish I had pictures of the first, yellow print of the image because it looked so interesting. However, I have four perfect copies of the final print to play with as I mull over my printmaking future.


Etching or screenprinting?

Wonderful December

It was another super busy weekend in the city. Between arts shows, Christmas shopping, Christmas parties, and Christmas cards, I've barely had a moment to think about my own arts projects.

I was extremely excited for City of Craft, which was my first stop on Saturday morning. I had my heart set on a bunch of Snap and Tumble letterpress items and Tanya's table certainly didn't disappoint. If only I had an unlimited budget for beautifully printed paper!

I picked up two carte postales complete with envelopes hand crafted out of old atlas pages, a stunning botanical print card, and two ringed notebooks with letterpress printed covers (which Tanya was kind enough to bring in by special request - much appreciated!). Down the aisle, I also picked up a simple hand-bound journal from Night Jar Books. So lovely.


There were so many other amazing items at the show, but after weeks of crafts and art shows, I really had to keep my budget in check. Plus, my next stop was the Toronto Small Press Book Fair.

The show featured a really interest mix of presses, but I ended up spending the most time at the last table I came across, self-publisher Jen Pilles. Ink drawings! Hand-bound books! Homemade wrapping paper!


After a day of browsing the handmade work of others, I knuckled down and printed my last batch of Christmas cards. Hundreds of reindeer and +30 goodwill messages to co-workers later, I'm finally finished with all Christmas-relating printing. Hooray!


It took all afternoon, but I'm really glad I got them finished because the rest of this week is booked solid with classes and dinners. I'm not sure how many posts I'll get in before next weekend, but I'll do my best to at least write about my last Open Studio class. Up this week - Screenprinting!

Lithography 1, Victoria 0

My printmaking class was on Tuesday this week and just happened to coincide with a super-busy day at work. You might be able to tell from my sketch that I was feeling a little stressed by the time I made it into the studio.


This sketch started out as an old woman, turned into an old man, turned back into an old woman wearing a scarf around her head, then not, then squiggles, then... well, this thing is pretty much the worst thing I've ever drawn in my life.

Despite my disastrous sketch, the class was fascinating. I had no idea how lithography worked before the class and even after three hours of apprenticeship I'm still pretty in the dark about the details. The one thing I did fully absorb is the incredible amount of labour that goes into preparing and printing a lithograph. Any art process that starts with the slow and meticulous grinding of tiny metal particles against a large, flat stone is bound to be a time consuming process, but last night I discovered that stone grinding is only the beginning.

My shorthand of the very complicated process is something like this: Grind stone until perfectly flat, draw on stone using grease-based pencils, cover stone with talc powder, cover stone in gum base, etch stone with acid and gum base mix, clean off gum base, dry stone, transport stone to press, clean grease pencil drawing off stone, add chemicals including a tar like substance 'used to pave roads', remove tar substance, wet stone, ink stone, wet, stone, ink stone (repeat x 5), print stone.

Best upper body workout in town! However, for a girl who's already head over heels for etching, lithography is a pretty hard sell. It's more labour intensive, requires a lot of materials, and, based on the examples I saw in the studio, doesn't really suit my aesthetic. Granted, I did see one incredible litho print that perfectly replicated the soft, tiny strokes of a pencil drawing and THAT definitely impressed me.

The printing process still ended with a very gratifying slow peel of the image off the press. However, I quickly learned that the downside of printmaking is that when you make a crazy old lady drawing you end up having to take home four crazy old lady prints.


So lithography is probably not a medium I'm going to pursue in the near future. I'm happy to have seen the process though, if only to appreciate the work that is involved the next time I see a lithograph hanging in a gallery.