Cherie's Progress

Cherie in her room at Shepherd Center in December

It's been a while since I noted Cherie's progress and I wanted to let you all know that her time at the Shepherd Center for Spinal Cord Rehabilitation in Atlanta has been extended! Her original discharge date was January 13, but they have given her another week, now she will discharge on January 19 and hopefully continue to receive outpatient services after that, until the end of the month.

Since Cherie has no health insurance and the rehab is being paid by Medicaid, we are all very happy and thankful for this extra time she has to perfect her skills with adaptive equipment. When I was there she told me that she was learning to operate the computer completely by voice, with Dragon software. She was also learning to control her electric wheelchair with "sip and puff" technology. Basically, since she is paralyzed from the shoulders down, all adaptive equipment utilizes "sip and puff" which is basically using a tube positioned near her mouth at all times, to blow or inhale, as a controller for highly specialized equipment.

Cherie maintains a positive attitude, she has made friends with another patient across the hall from her and now has someone to talk to and share down-time with. Her sister told me that they all enjoyed Christmas dinner in Cherie's room. It snowed in Atlanta this Christmas, I think it was the first time it did that in about 100 years! Maybe this is a sign of very special things to come for Cherie.

I wanted also to report that my fundraising book Art with Heart has raised over $500 to date for Cherie's family, which they are utilizing to convert her sister's home to accommodate Cherie, building ramps and widening doorways. The biggest expense they face is a customized van, the expense of this is overwhelming.

visit www.cheriestannard.com

Vadim Bora Legacy

Playful cat public sculpture, one of many by Bora in Asheville, NC

Vadim Bora, husband of my friend and Grand Bohemian Gallery director Constance Richards, passed away this week. My heart goes out to Constance, she did a wonderful job on Asheville TV, speaking of her husband's incredible artistic accomplishments.

read more about his work in my previous post

You can see Constance in the Asheville TV news story here:
WLOS ABC 13 News :: Top Stories - Vadim Bora Legacy

Workshops

I just added a new workshop at Village Gallery and Framing in Orange Park, FL. If you are interested in spending 2-3-4 days learning the art of collage, keep checking the right hand sidebar of this blog for an ongoing list of workshops near you!

Sweet Savannah

SCAD Graphic Design and Admissions Bldg. makes me want to go back to art school!

We left home on December 27 from just North of Orlando, FL. My husband and my two kids and I drove to up MA to visit my family for three days. After sledding and enjoying the snow (and food) in Western Massachusetts, we headed over to Northern New Jersey to visit my husband's family. After visiting NYC and getting over the novelty of snow and cold, we headed back home to the South.

Grand Bohemian Gallery at the Mansion on Forsyth Park, not to be missed on your trip to Savannah

Today we arrived in Savannah, GA. We wanted to stop here before our last four hours to Orlando so that we could stay at the NEW Kessler boutique hotel Bohemian Savannah Riverfront. Since Kessler hotel's Grand Bohemian Gallery represent my collage work, I wanted to visit the NEW Savannah property and go over to the Mansion on Forsyth Park to introduce myself to new Gallery director Sasha Nikulina. Sasha recognized me right away when we walked into the gallery, what a warm welcome!

Espresso Gallery, coffee, art, and very cool light fixtures

Walking around Savannah with the kids was a lot of fun. In a city that is host to such a school as Savannah College of Art and Design, you know I could replenish my collage glue! After having an AMAZING lunch at Kayak Kafe on Broughton Street, we ventured across the street to Primary Art Supply. Are you kidding? This is like a candy store for me and I wanted to just get glue but my husband was right, I HAD to look around.

TWO levels! All the SCAD students are shopping here with their class lists, reminds me of my freshman year at SU

Behold the paper selection!

Connor chooses a glittery version of printed floral, My husband Doug gets a kick out of his excitement.

Connor found the art papers selection and helped me pick out a few glittery sheets, he's always one for the BLING when it comes to paper. This place had a huge selection of art papers and I gathered a big pile of paper, in addition to my glue for the 4-hour road trip home tomorrow.

Savannah Candy Company, Connor and Emilie were in heaven!

After dragging the kids around the art supply, I had to take them to the Savannah Candy Kitchen to sample their famous pralines, buy some chocolate covered marshmallows and chocolate bark. Mmmmmmm, sugar.

View from our balcony, watching cargo ships head down the river from the port.

Back at the Bohemian Savannah Riverfront Hotel, we loved the lobby, the room, the rooftop bar and The Rocks On The River Restaurant for dinner. The restaurant offered amazing interior design, original artwork, excellent service, and a diverse menu. We thoroughly enjoyed our dinner.

I love Savannah and I'm super lucky to be represented by the Grand Bohemian Gallery here. It was great to meet Sasha in person and to share the experience with my family. Tomorrow we head out for Orlando. Since we only drove two hours today, I made minimal progress on my Yorkie collage. Tomorrow I might get close to finishing that piece now that I have more glue!

Yorkie, 12x16, cradled birch panel, in progress 

Peacock Complete!

Untitled, 12x24, collage on cradled birch, ©St. Hilaire Nelson

This morning we set out from Florence, SC to Savannah. Pictured here is my son and studio assistant Connor with the finished piece.

Road Trip - Collage on the Go!

Peacock in the early stages, started at my in-laws on the kitchen table

Last week I posted "Setting the Pace for 2011" and showed the sketch and underpainting for the 12x24 untitled peacock on cradled birch panel. I took this pre-prepped piece and a couple small dogs, along with my collage papers and glue, on the Nelson family holiday road trip.

hand painted collage papers divided by color in gallon bags, Starbucks cup full of water with paintbrush, plastic container of glue, my husband's leg...he's doing the driving while I work!

A rest stop in Delaware and the collage leaning up against the dash at the perfect angle to work. for the highest point of the top, I had to flip it and work upside down so that I could reach!

We drove from Orlando to Western Massachusetts, to Northern New Jersey, and back to Orlando. We are currently still on the road somewhere in South Carolina and I've managed to complete the Shiz Tsu 12x16 and the as yet untitled peacock.

Shiz Tsu was completed in our room at the Marriott Courtyard in Hadley, MA 

Working in the car and in the hotel room, I took advantage of all the tips and tricks I learned from working on the airplane. I found the glue dried very fast with the re-circulated air in the car, so I added water to my brush between each dip in the glue container, and I tried to keep the lid over the top of the glue as much as possible. We stopped for coffee breaks every now and then and I gave the brush a thorough cleaning in the rest room with soap, peeling off all the excess dried glue over the trash can. My kids were less than thrilled about the strange looks I was getting. What can I say, I hate to sit still!

Nearly finished here, but losing daylight fast

All in all today's 12 hours in the car proved to be very productive for the peacock collage. I even applied a piece of map from Richmond, VA that I found in my blue bag after we passed through there. I thought that was kind of fitting for the trip and would make a good "conversation piece!"

Just before I lost my light, I'm almost finished and will have a completed photo next posting

I am happy to say that just before it got to dark to continue, I finished the peacock. Too dark to take a photo but you can see here that there was not much left to work on. The drips at the bottom were created from discarded palette papers from my friend and fellow artist Kimberly Santini who sent them to me all the way from Oregon!

Tomorrow we'll arrive in Savannah, GA and spend the day. I hope to be able to meet Sasha, the new gallery director at the Grand Bohemian Gallery which shows my work, in the Mansion on Forsyth Park Kessler Collection Boutique Hotel. 

Landfill Hubcap Art - A Project for 2011

Ken Marquis of Wilkes-Barre Pennsylvania has created a widely popular eco-friendly art project that has captivated the world, Landfill Art Project. He has convinced artists to turn hubcaps into canvases and do what they want with them! He's sending out hubcaps every day to artists in this country and around the world. Today I received my hubcap.

Thanks to my friend and fellow artist Robin Maria Pedrero for encouraging me to take part in this project. She has already painted her own hubcap.

I am looking forward to collaging my metal canvas, although I have NO IDEA what I'm going to do!