Blue Helmet

Blue Helmet
salvaged wood, tea bag papers, paint, vinyl
11.5 x 17 inches

I love tea.  Might as well use every part of my obsession in my work, right?  I glued nine tea bag papers to the salvaged wood before painting and sanding.  After I added the vinyl I sanded that, too.  You can see the edges of the papers making a squarish design, ghosting through the top material.

Crashing Wheat

Crashing Wheat
salvaged wood, paint, vinyl
11.5 x 17 inches

This is one of the first I made in this series.  The wood came from shelving pulled from an apartment complex on the Plaza that was being demolished.  I painted the background and sanded it before the paint had set, so it pilled up and showed the original paint underneath.  You can also see the layers of paint added by the original inhabitants of the building along the edge where it met the shelving support.  Another time-traveling collaboration!

Prairie Wind

Prairie Wind
salvaged wood, vinyl, paint, 1970s pattern paper
11 x 17 inches

Welcome to a series I worked on last year that I haven't shared here on the blog...or in real life too many places, either.  I went on a collecting frenzy of found wood and wanted to go abstract, like some of my larger clocks, but...not clocks.  Lately I've been thinking about this technique (hand cut vinyl, individually placed) and wanting to revisit it.  The most common advice I get from artists is to GO BIGGER.  It's scary, because you use up time and material and what if it doesn't sell?  (Likely.)  Well, you made art, you big baby, be grateful!

Anatomical Heart Shadowbox #8

found wood, fabric paper, vinyl, paint
8 x 10 3/4 inches

Anatomical Heart Shadowbox #7

found wood, paint, paper, vinyl
8 x 10 3/4 inches

The image here is from a 1970's National Geographic picture of a flock of flamingos in Northern Africa...upside down.

Anatomical Heart Shadowbox #6

found wood, old book pages, paint, vinyl
8 x 10 3/4 inches

The book is The Christmas Carol, this edition published in 1899.  I glued it down then sanded it before painting the heart in and adding the vinyl lines on top.

Anatomical Heart Shadowbox #5

found wood, paper, vinyl, paint
8 x 10 3/4 inches

I think this was the first one I made last  year...so I  put the frame on first, then painted it and added the design without painting the lath.  I like the natural look and the more roughly painted edge inside.

Anatomical Heart Shadowbox #4

found wood, paper, paint, vinyl
8 x 10 3/4 inches

Inside the heart here is a reproduction of found fabric from the farm.  I think it's got a certain sophistication.

Anatomical Heart Shadowbox #3

found wood, vinyl, paint, newspaper
8 x 10 3/4 inches

That pile of 1961 Wichita Eagle newspaper has really done me right!  It takes paint so nicely...I love working with it.

Don't forget, I'm on Instagram!  

Anatomical Heart Shadow Box #2

found wood, paint, paper, vinyl
8 x 10 3/4 inches

The heart has an enlarged reproduced map of France from the 1930s, found in one of my kin's textbooks from that time.

Anatomical Heart Shadow Box #1

found wood, pencil, paint, vinyl
8 x 10 3/4 inches

I enlarged my popular anatomical hearts and added a bit of a frame to change it just that much more.  The background is siding from my house that needed to be removed and the frame is made from lath taken from our (ongoing) bathroom demolition.  I simply white-washed the wood, sanded it, and added more paint in the heart lines to pop it out.  I traced the lines around the vinyl with pencil to give it a little oomph.  The frame is nailed on with rusty nails (uh, because I left them outside all winter) that came out of the same wall as the lath. 

When I started making these, my husband called me an Art Earthworm--taking trash and making it useful again!  I took it as a huge compliment.

Lessons Learned in the Kitchen

Lessons Learned in the Kitchen
found wood, wallpaper, vinyl, paint, paper
9 x 26 inches

This new-old stock wallpaper looks like it could be in any grandma's kitchen left over from the '60s.  Maybe she taught you how to make cookies there.  Probably not in heels, though.  That's ridiculous.

The flowers cut out here came from a found greeting card.

See this piece in person, as well as many others I've recently posted, at the Smoky Hill River Festival in Salina, Kansas, this weekend.  It's my first showing there, and I'm looking forward to tapping into my inner Prairie Girl and enjoying a weekend of sweet breezes and cool art!

Magic

Magic
salvaged wood, paper, paint, vinyl, colored pencil
19 x 10 inches

 Layers of hand-cut papers with vinyl and highlighted with colored pencil.  This flower is called Indian Blanket and it's red and yellow when found in the wild.  The dots were all cut out in open spaces left over when cutting out larger pieces over the years.  No waste!

Four Seconds

Four Seconds
found wood, newsprint, paper, paint, ink, vinyl
10 x 26 inches

Everyone has really enjoyed the first piece (One and Four Girls) that used this series of a woman doing eye exercises from the 1930s, but it's a rather large commitment, so I made a smaller version in a neutral palette...and I love this image so anytime I can use this woman I will!  

The base is found wood, of course.  To that I glued (pH neutral/archival glue!) several pages of "Used Equipment Directory" from November 1969--the Craigslist of its day, I suppose.  Then I drew petal shapes on with my favorite roller pen (uni-ball eco, FYI), sanded it, painted it white, sanded it again, put on digitally cut vinyl and filled in with more grey paint.

I think we can all relate to her expressions here...just imagine what she just heard to get this reaction.

Shifty!

You can really see the pattern here, and I love the chippy edges and layering!

Not Watching

Not Watching
found wood, wallpaper, paint, vinyl
20 x 26 inches

Is she really not watching?  Or maybe she wants you to think that.

Astro

Astro
flooring, acrylic paint, spray paint, vinyl
33 x 33 inches

This is my show piece--I rescued this sub-flooring from a Dumpster at 36th and Cherry here in my neighborhood (they let me really get anything I wanted from it--thanks, guys!).  I painted it white and stared at it for months and months.  Then I painted it every other color, sanded it a lot, and decided to add the hearts (white and metallic) when I knew it was meant to have Spunky Siren on it.  Many more layers of paint and sandings later, I added her lines in vinyl in three parts and painted inside the lines (mostly).  I added the final bling of metallic stars all over to give her a story--a story different for every viewer.

Some Sort of Buttercup

Some Sort of Buttercup
found wood, newspaper, paint, vinyl
11.5 x 35.5 inches

Three layers of vinyl lines over painted, found newspaper on found shelving pulled from an apartment complex coming down on The Plaza.  Newspaper is a 1961 Wichita Eagle found in my neighborhood.  The wood was painted approximately one million times.  Buttercups do not have a stem like this, FYI.

detail: This piece gets the "reminds me of Andy Warhol" comment more than the others.
I'll take it.

Pedestal

Pedestal
found wood, vinyl paint
17 x 36 inches

I'll be sharing some new, larger scale work I'm taking on the road this season made from found  materials.  

The source material for this piece is my Great Aunt Henriette's high school graduation.  I had been painting and adding vinyl to the wood (found somewhere...not the farm, I don' t think) for months in stops and starts, and was just stuck.  Then the idea of extending her skirt up and up, as if she's going on forever, or was squeegee'd flat, hit me.  The deer imagery adds to a narrative the viewer and make up themselves and changes each time I look at the piece myself.

Put your foremothers on a pedestal, like a piece of art or a support for your memories.

detail: vinyl was painted over, sanded, painted, then pulled off
and sanded and painted again

detail