beetlegrass

Spawn of the NorthEast-- A Conversational Jab

Tuna WAS actually the bone of contention in this argument. Seemed to make sense to turn the combatants into cats.

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Spawn of the NorthEast-- Conversations With the Opposite Sex

Conversations with menfolk: good dialogue fodder.

Some of this dialogue reminded me of an Aesop fable-- small animal saving large animal's life-- which is why I decided to go with a Mouse and a Lion as characters.
The Lion was a guy I liked/dated in college. Needless to say, he was having a tough time dealing with his parents' recent divorce, and these feelings seeped out in this conversation which began innocuously.
After the above exchange, I was stung.
I asked, "Is that what you think I'd do?"
He said, "Maybe not at first. But later you would. All marriages turn out like that."
Eesh.
This guy was 6' 10" (and claimed to be of Viking descent); I am 5' 2". (And a quarter.)
The first time my mother met this guy, she exclaimed, "Oh, Honey, he's just too big for you!"
Classic line.

If you are single, there will always be someone in your life who wants everyone paired and marching up the ramp into Noah's Ark-- s/he will feel the need to play Matchmaker.

An acquaintance from church squealed to some guy she knew that I was single.
He phoned me, and after an initial "Hi" and a "This is So-and-so", the above was what he opened with.
Thought he was being funny, which is why I responded the way I did.
Errr, he wasn't being funny...

We ended up going out for lunch, where he watched the TV over my head for most of the meal. Wow, that doesn't bode well.

Part of the date conversation:
Him: Do you have any piercings or tattoos?
Me: ...
Him: I said, Do you have any piercings or tattoos?
Me: Oh, I heard you. I'm ignoring you.

Bad manners are not a good way to woo me.

Spawn of the NorthEast-- Conversational Punchlines

Two different friends. Two different conversations. Two different punchlines that caused laughter.
I've changed the title of this Altered Book project from Spawn of the North to Spawn of the NorthEast to differentiate it from the original book and the movie starring Henry Fonda.
One of the definitions of 'spawn' is: a swarming brood; numerous progeny.
As one of five kids, I think I qualify as a spawn. Plus, I live in the NorthEast. So there you have it.



A friend from the UK (hence the use of a Bulldog) visiting in NYC, dropped off by a cabbie blocks & blocks away from his hotel. Accosted by a guy who was hellbent on reciting his "poetry", and wanted a donation. This friend, in going into his money belt to see if he had a five dollar bill on him, had a twenty taken from him. In return, had bad poetry both read AND given to him, in the form of stapled-together pages.
(A pickpocketing poet: sounds like a character belonging to Oliver Twist or to Pinocchio.}



Pushing a fear of being a self-employed artist to the extreme and turning it into humor: really healthy & resilient.
This friend has a great collection of T-shirts, so here she is in her ice cream sandwich one.
She wanted to be portrayed as a pig, BUT: women portraying other women as PIGS seems to me to be a recipe for a CAT fight.
So, instead, she's a fawn.

Other Spawn pages here and here.
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Spawn of the North, part 2

A continuation of conversational tidbits...

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Conversational Interactions With Other Life Forms

Have been wanting to record snippets of conversations I've had over the years. Last night it began to take shape in the format of drawing over pages of a book called Spawn of the North (published in 1932), that I got for altered book work and for its amusing title.
I used black ballpoint pen and gesso for the white areas.
I won't tell you which character I am in the exchanges, but here's a clue: glasses.
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In the past month, I have read the following Graphic Novels:

• Maus a Survivor's Tale: My Father Bleeds History by Art Spiegelman
• Metamorphosis written by Franz Kafka, illustrated by Peter Kuper
• Black Hole by Charles Burns
• David Boring by Daniel Clowes
• Ghost World by Daniel Clowes
• Capote in Kansas written by Ande Parks, illustrated by Chris Samnee
• Shutterbug Follies by Jason Little
• Monkey vs. Robot by James Kochalka
• Peanutbutter & Jeremy's Best Book Ever by James Kochalka

Some of these books have to be gone thru twice. Read them once for the great storytelling; a second pass to really study the art. Kuper, Burns, Clowes and Samnee are amazing: know how to orchestrate B&W to create drama, atmosphere, texture, pattern, and interesting shapes and lines.

Altered Calendar Pages

When I was in California recently, I was able to photograph the altered pages that I did in my sister's calendar, from when we were part of a round robin group ("The Corrupted Calendar Grrlz") in 2004.
This was a Sierra Club weekly engagement calendar, with the photographs on one side, and the day grid on the other.

Above: The photograph of the landscape with moon on the left was the established image. This caused me to go through all my files of images of moons & wolves. It got me to wondering, "What if a wolf is howling at the moon because he wants to be an astronaut?" Then I had to fit the wolf's head into the astronaut image that I had. The colors of blue & orange were kind of determined by the images that I had on hand, so I emphasized this by the blue ripped paper (left side) and the orange marker (right side background). Then I learned that wolves don't really howl at the moon! Who knew that doing altered art could be so educational?

Above: The butterfly on the left side was the established image. I really wanted to play up the idea of "monarch", so I added the crown. When I think "monarchy", I think: England, so the maps (scrapbook paper) seemed to be a perfect match-- plus: the colors were working with my scheme! The shapes the land masses were making also were echoing the shapes of butterfly wings and caterpillars, another bonus. The domino stickers spelling out "monarch" had that nice dottiness that harkened back to the dotty butterfly wings.

Above: The mushroomy scene on the left side was the established image. Since my sister likes owls, and I like mushrooms & little woodsy characters, I decided to do a combination of those things. The wooden owl on the upper left hand side is a pin (back removed) that was a tag sale find, and other images came from a Japanese children's magazine, a calendar, catalogs, and a stock photography book (another tag sale purchase).

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Three Heads Are Better Than One

More altered calendar (1990 Kaffe Fassett) pages, using Dover publication images (as discussed in yesterday's post) on the right-hand side.

The original art image was three heads of lettuce over three heads of lettuce, rockin' the botanical look.  Some black gesso to block out extraneous info.  I used the stickers on the left that I got at Mark Twain's house as inspiration to create the Lettuce People. Hand-tinted the b/w copies with colored pencil.

See what you can PRODUCE when you try? (Har, har...)

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Cheery Blossoms

I heard on Good Morning. America this... morning... that TODAY is the PRIME day for viewing the cherry trees in Washington, D.C., and that the Japanese had given these trees as a gift.

I thought I'd share this double-page spread from an Altered Calendar Round Robin group that I did a couple of years ago.  I did this collage in Marion's Van Gogh calendar, and the original painting (right-hand side) was VG's Plum Tree in Bloom.

I used a variety of materials, including: illustrations from a Japanese calendar; color copy from a book on Czech folk toys; stickers; scrapbook, origami, and quilling papers. The lamps and bridge on the left-hand side were from Vacation Bible School curriculum that were made 3-D by folding and using foam tape to 'pop' them off the page.

Hope you are enjoying beautiful weather where you are today!

p.s. Clicking on image will allow you to see it larger.

Flashback Friday (2004 etc.)

Happy St. Patrick's Day, everybody!  Two years ago we had a family get-together, for which we drew names and had to write a limerick for that person.  I made this thing as a 'presentation box' for the limerick. I challenged myself with only using stuff that I had on hand.  And, what is my mantra?  "NEVER throw anything away."  So I had plenty of stuff to choose from.

Girls on the front of the box are from a card I made in the '80s (they're doing a "cut up" manuever), also shown: map of Ireland, painted wooden cubes with stickers attached, confettios... A ribbon serves as a closure...

Above is the side & back of the box, featuring a portion of a T-shirt I wore past the point of being decent (from an Irish Step Dancing event); my 4-H membership card from 1976-77 (more on 4-H another time); wide ribbon along spine; pieces of magazine...

The box opened...

Close-up of the inside of the box: a rainbow pin from highschool days, scrapbook papers, a realtor's postcard, trim, stickers, more confettios, several different layers of 'grass' from magazines/ grass advertisements.  Leprechaun dude was a craft store find that I had bought years prior with no real reason behind the purchase.  Cuz when you think about it, leprechauns are way down on the list of Essentials.

Door of box, with a pin from a 1983 Irish Step Dance event, also the pocket wherein the limerick would be held (with rickrack on top). An illustration by B.B. Sams I do believe, more ribbon, more scrapbook paper, more stickers, and more confettios (the shiny leprechauns).

Top of the box, so that you can see the continuation of the rainbow theme.  The three shamrocks jutting out of the top of the box once graced cupcakes that I consumed in college.  I told you I never throw anything away.  But you have chosen not to believe me.

So, the person I had to write a limerick about/for is my mom:

A young girl from Conneaut,
Of children, she had naught.
The lass wanted a dozen,
But she married her cousin,
So 12-minus-7's all she got.

(By way of explanation, my dad is into genealogy.  Through his research, he found out that he and my mom are actually seventh cousins.  So I'm my own eighth cousin.  Explains a lot, doesn't it?  All that inbreeding = high-strung, nervous, and a tendency towards dramatic fainting spells.) (Not really.)  (My mom did actually want twelve children.  Dad wanted: ZERO, haha!)

B&W Altered Book

Here's a double-page spread I did in a book called Modern Marine Engineer's Manual.  I got the book at a second-hand store called Finders Keepers (not to be confused with its sister store, Losers Weepers) in Stamford, CT.  The theme of this book is Black & White.

These figures were capstans which I've learned are machines for moving or raising heavy weights that consist of a vertical drum which can be rotated and around which cable is turned.

** click on the image to see a larger version**

I embellished the page using Dover Books copy-right-free Victorian images (hats, hair, etc.).  The picture frames were made from those little annoying Subscribe Now! cards that come fluttering out of magazines.  These happened to come from Country Home magazine.  The background pattern is from the inside of a security envelope.

There is such a wide variety of patterns on security envelopes!  Here are a few samples:



A fun thing to do with these envelopes is to carefully unglue them, turn them inside out, re-fold and glue, and send out as a funky envelope.  There are lots of cool ideas in the book Creative Correspondence by Michael Jacobs and Judy Jacobs.