Boston Marathon Benefit Auction Art

12x12 "Home" nest collage on flat birch panel

finished in flight from Orlando to San Francisco today

The art is finished! 

The art is finished and the bidding is on. Bidding stops at 8pm EST on Friday night. Please share this with anyone you know.
100% of proceeds will be donated to the American Red Cross of Eastern MA (Boston) in memory of those who lost their lives at the Boston Marathon this week.

Being from Western MA, born in Boston, with most of my family still residing there, this is near and dear to me. My sister is a marathon runner and I am a triathlete.

Please bid high on my Facebook Fan Page! retail value on this 12x12 piece is $395

Boston Marathon Benefit Auction

12x12 Nest titled "Home" to be completed this week

100% of Proceeds donated to 

American Red Cross of Eastern Massachusetts

I couldn't watch it yesterday, I got the news via text and was told what was happening, but I couldn't bring myself to turn on the TV. A close friend texted me to say "are you ok?" and that meant the world to me to hear. 

I am from Massachusetts, my entire family still lives there.  My sister is a marathon runner, I am a triathlete. The athletes in Boston yesterday should have been celebrating a milestone, a huge accomplishment. Not only to have finished, but even to have qualified to race in the first place! A long time in the making, to get to the Boston Marathon, only to have it marked by tragedy. 

I am super sensitive to the issue of bombings and acts of terror. Too many memories for me that are too close, just under the surface. Rather than watch the news, I decided to help in my own way. (Thank you artist Kimberly Kelly Santini for the suggestion).

This auction is live now and on my Facebook Fan Page. Please share this information with a friend, forward it, post it on your wall. This piece is in progress, as it comes together in the magic of collage, images will be added to the Facebook Album. 

Please put all bids in the main comment field that appears on the fan page under the original album entry. At the time of this publishing we are up to $150 to be donated to the American Red Cross of Eastern MA

Book Giveaway!

Author Mary O'Connor interviewed me for her recent book Life is Full of Sweet Spots; An Exploration of Joy quite some time ago. We talked about how my artwork brought me happiness and how a day in the studio was truly joyful. It takes a long time to write, edit and publish a book. So this week I was thrilled to receive my copies!

Trevor Turtle starts the chapter on wonder and imagination

Wonder and Imagination

As I flipped through the book, my turtle artwork peered out at me from the chapter on wonder and imagination. I read my "Case in Point" See Beyond the Surface Image where I talk about my best way to experience joy being to learn and do something new:

If you ever have an opportunity, you can take a workshop and just kind of explore and play with new material. See if it might be fun to learn something new. Go in with no expectations and don't feel that you have to come out with a masterpiece. Give yourself permission to throw it out and just enjoy the process. What's most important is that you enjoy doing it; you shouldn't let someone else's opinion stop you from enjoying and doing what you love to do. 

Wonder as an Instigator of Joy

"Wonder, in its own breathless, fantastical way, is far from ordinary when it comes to the senses. In the hierarchy of things, wonder is an emotion—and a most important one at that. We might think of it as an engine that fuels our ability to make the most of our five primary natural senses. It's tempting to call it our sixth sense.

But call it what you will—a sense, an emotion, a mindset—one way or another, wonder opens the door to the delights of imagination, of curiosity, creativity, intellectual discovery. " -- Mary O'Connor


After speaking with Mary at length, I realized that it was the imagination and creativity that she saw in my work that led her to me as a potential interviewee for her book on joy. Becoming lost in a state of wonder, imatination, creativity, is so often a door opener to joy.

my autographed samples arrived this week!

Win A Signed Copy!

Respond in the comment field below (or on the Facebook post) with how you go about finding (and keeping) joy in your life. 

The top two winners will be selected by Mary and myself to receive and autographed copy (both of us will sign) of Life is Full of Sweet Spots.

This is a feel good book full of ways to find joy and happiness in simple things.  We could all use a little bit more of that.

Cherie's Progress

Cherie, up and supporting much of her own weight, with the PT

It's been a while since I did a post on Cherie. I've been visiting her pretty regularly in Vero Beach and she's been making a lot of progress! She's working really hard with all of her weekly therapies and her dedication shows! 

Cherie has started her own amazing blog that tells her story of the accident and the following days, weeks, months of her life. She's an AMAZING writer and she has an incredible story to tell. If you ever wanted to be thankful for being able to scratch your nose, or if you ever felt down on yourself, Cherie's story will make you sit up and take notice of all you have to appreciate in life. 

She sent out this update today, things are looking amazingly positive:

Hello All, 

Just a quickie here… I am gaining so much, so fast that we have actually had to start keeping a journal wherein we write progress incidents almost daily. With the use of the standing frame every week I seem to improve all the more rapidly. Not only am I gaining in muscle tone in my legs but I am also gaining sensation off and on. My level of injury dictates initially, paralysis from the shoulders down. Obviously this isn't true any longer. But the interesting thing is that true sensation does seem to follow the path of the injury from the top down. So now I am feeling hot water, texture from bath towels and more touch specifically along my upper back and upper chest. My cold receptors turned on first which of course is ridiculously uncomfortable when you know it's 80° outside! Now I am getting more warm receptors and hopefully one day my thermostat will level out!

Anyway long and short of it, too much to say and try and condense an update. My hope is that I can transfer from the updates to the blog. I will catch my blog up to present day. And anyone who wishes to keep tabs can sign up to receive updates via e-mail. I have just posted page 7 of my blog. Anyone can comment, anyone can read. I want to be able to help people with the things I share. And just a word of caution if it hasn't already been obvious, I'm not going to sugarcoat what's difficult. On the other hand I am not going to allow the painful parts to dampen or suppress "me" my spirit or my forward motion.

Love you guys, for everything every one of you has contributed past present or ever after. There's a saying "It Takes a Village". Perhaps in some existential way, you are my village! Big hugs!

Cherie

http://castannard.blogspot.com/

Fabulous AND Flawed

"fortune" from the Dove Chocolate that came with our 

Sushi from Minami Japanese Restaurant

Who can honestly claim to be perfect? Certainly not me.

Last night in Sedona, AZ my friend Katie from Michigan and I spent the night at the Lark Art Gallery for the First Friday Gallery Walk. After the gallery walk, we decided to get some sushi for dinner. Last year when I rented a road bike and pedaled the hills of route 179 in Sedona I came across a little unassuming Japanese restaurant just at the edge of Oak Creek Village. I stopped and took some sushi away with me that day, because I was all bike sweaty and stinky and figured I would not expose anyone to that in the dining room. I sat and had a beer at the bar while I watched Yoshi make my tuna rosettes, beautiful.

Sedona offers amazing color in the spring

This trip I decided that Katie and I needed to eat-in at Minami. We really enjoyed talking with Yoshi about being from Okinawa and having been in the US for over 30 years. We met Michelle from the North of Boston who's accent sounded just like half of my family. She said that when she first moved to town folks asked her if she was from Australia. Michelle introduced us to Ian who had hobbled in on crutches sporting a bright green leg cast, Yoshi had to help him through the doorway. Looking over at Katie, who had just had "work" done to her face and was sporting swollen lips and tender upper arms, I realized we are all flawed in one way or another.

Our "fortune" made Katie and I laugh, we where relieved to hear that we were going to be OK.

Yours Truly teaching and talking about my love affair with torn paper

shot by Katie, who knows how to capture my "good side"

Standing up in front of a group was never really a big deal for me, I'm pretty confident when I know the subject matter. But 15 years ago when I was pregnant with my daughter, I contracted Bell's Palsy. This is a compression of the facial nerve, which results in paralysis. 85% of people heal spontaneously and completely within three months. Not me. 

I have been left with permanent nerve damage. Flawed. 

It took me a long time to feel better about this situation. I tried all kinds of miracle cures. I have had biofeedback, facial retraining, vitamin B12 injections, sublingual vitamin B, massage, and Botox. Still flawed. 

Somewhere along the way, my self confidence started to come back. I began to realize that things could be a lot worse, and that you can be Fabulous AND Flawed. Let's see, I have a wonderful family that loves me, I have talent, and I have a great job. I love what I do and I am very lucky to be able to do what I love and be myself on the job. I can have pink hair, a pierced nose, visible tattoos, and not have to answer to anyone but myself. 

How fabulous is that?

These days I'm OK putting my face out there in front of my Paper Paintings Workshop class and talking to people with my crooked smile. I'm ok with it because I know that I am a pretty good teacher, I'm very sensitive to folks who may not be very confident in their artistic ability, and I can usually make you laugh. Typically everyone in my class has a really good time. I'm confident sporting pink, purple, and teal  hair, knowing it will draw attention to my face. To use a popular saying these days, "it is what it is."

Ann came all the way from NYC to take this class with me in Sedona, 

and she looks like she's having a fantastic time!

This is my fourth time teaching at SAC where they welcome me 

with open arms and make me feel at home

This weekend I'm teaching in beautiful Sedona, AZ loving my job

Guess what? Being flawed makes you more empathetic. My heart goes out to others who may be suffering something similar, or worse. It's impossible to hide your face, it's the center of your expression, your emotions and communication, and the window to your soul. I met many people in the early years of my support group who had suffered facial paralysis due to trauma, tumors, Ramsay Hunt Syndrome and more. I learned early on from this group that what I was going through was not really all that uncommon and one of the best things we could do was to reach out to others.

For years I practiced a "controlled smile" (big smiles make my right eye squeeze shut) I still prefer to use the self facing camera to take the photo of the two of us together, rather than let someone else do it. Why? I can see what I look like before I push the button. 

Katie and Yours Truly via the front facing camera

Recently I submitted a wine glass collage to my art licensing agent for reproduction on a wine journal by Target. He called me and said (in his awesome British accent) "Elizabeth, this is lovely but the glass is not symmetrical and you need to fix the one side." What? not symmetrical? Who cares? It's art, it's impressionistic, and I like it just the way it is.

Chardonnay / 9x12 / collage of hand painted papers

"Well Michael, I'll fix the image in photoshop for your purposes, but I'm not changing the original." Is what I told him. Because I think it's fabulous, just the way it is. 

Thank YOU for being a part of my art journey.

Elizabeth

Unconventional Art Supplies

Jumbo erasers in Target's $1 bins

More often than not, art supplies can be found in some unsuspecting places. One day while wandering aimlessly around Lowe's Home Improvement, I found that a silicone sink liner worked as an amazing stamp! I picked it up for around $7. 

Today I want to share with you how to make a wonderful stamp from a jumbo eraser. I was so excited about creating these stamps that I popped up out of bed at 4:30 this morning with nothing else on my mind, I headed out to the studio with my coffee and my dogs. 

most artists have this handy tool in a drawer somewhere

These erasers are soft, flexible, and they carve like butter with traditional linoleum carving tools. I bought several of these jumbo erasers (I love that they are "jumbo" because we all know that bigger is better), I figured that I could not go wrong for a dollar. When I got them home I took them out of the packaging and sanded off the screen printed images of cats and pigs and peace signs with household sand paper I had tucked into a drawer in my studio. These images were insanely distracting and who knows what kind of things that ink would do when covered with acrylic paint. Better safe than sorry, or distracted.

Images sanded off quite easily, leaving me with a clean slate for carving

I had a very easy and good time carving the eraser material

 These erasers come in round, rectangular and square shapes, I bought a few of each for variety and size of stamps. I also switched the carving tool tips for a variety of thick and thin lines in my stamps. Anyone who knows me knows that I love the spiral, so of course my first stamp was concentric circles!

Stamp inked with acrylic paint I spread on a disposable palette sheet

I figured in homage to Target, I'd print this up in red. I mean really, THANK YOU TARGET. I transferred the acrylic paint to the stamp on a sheet of palette paper for a nice even coverage on the surface of the stamp.

Some great effects, I really like the distressed look of the line

Now, most artists learn techniques from sharing swapping, and DVDing other artists. This idea is not my own original concept. I must give kudos to my mother-in-law Tricia Nelson, fiber artist, for not only sharing this wonderful technique with me, but also for purchasing the original pig stamp for me so that I could try it myself. Of course I went back and bough six more! The circle is my favorite. 

Good luck and enjoy!

Do you have some unconventional art supplies you'd like to share? Leave some in the comment field. I'd love to hear about them. It just might keep me up at night. 

Lavender Lemonade iPhone 5 Case

Custom made Lavender Lemonade Case-Mate *

I loved this image so much I've made it available as an iPhone 5 case and I've ordered mine today. Very excited about my new phone replacing my old phone which was silent due to collage glue having made its way into the speakers. (don't ask)

**This is a custom order case, no returns unless the product is somehow defective

product description for Barely There Slim Case Here