For years, I engaged in rational, analytic study of metaphor and empathy in dialogue. Despite my best academic intentions, the imagination resisted being quietened.
In the middle of life, after cataract surgery, I plunged into painting. Years of painting that required an intensive search for my lost intuition via personal development courses, including Tara Mohr Playing Big, Julia Cameron The Artist’s Way, Chris Zydel Painting with Fire, Wild Heart Expressive Arts Teacher Training. And contemplation of women’s lives through the lens of women philosophers: Bracha Ettinger, Iris Murdoch, Simone de Beauvoir, Simone Weil. And teaching my own online course Catching the Whispers. And continuing conversations, shared readings with creative women friends. Filling notebooks with ideas and thoughts.
Now, I’m bringing all this life together to offer exploratory workshops to enrich others’ creative practice.
If you join us, you will
· experience the impact of intuitive painting techniques (bring your painter self or your non-painter self)
· be led in intense conversations around your process
· discover what can happen when you ‘go beyond the given’
If you have been with me for awhile, you know that I do annual art challenges. #pumpkinaday in October, #turkeyaday in November, and #heartaday in February. It keeps me creative, and often makes others smile as I post to social media. This year I’m doing a three clue challenge #heartaday. I will give one clue per day, and at the end of the third day I share the art work the clues come from. Join me on my other social media pages to follow the fun!! (I know longer of X. I made the switch to Bluesky!)
This could be fun to do with your students also!!!
Have you ever made vinyl sticker art? I saw an amazing idea to use vinyl sticker sheets (like the kind you use for a Cricut machine) on this post by Helloroscreates on Instagram. Cutting these into shapes is an easy, mess-free way to make modern abstract art! The kids had a fun time and we got LOTS of compliments on this project because they were all very successful and they were very eye-catching from a distance.
This type of art is also called non-objective, if it doesn’t have any representational elements in it. I did have a student make a scene with a fish in it, so at that point it wouldn’t be considered non-objective. (I didn’t have that requirement for my students and his picture was awesome.)
But these examples below are non-objective. When I explain what the word non-objective means, I say that it is art that uses shapes, lines and color to show a mood or idea and does not have real images in it (no people, animals or trees). Here is further explanation about non-objective and abstract art.
How to Make a Vinyl Sticker Art Project
I created a short time-lapse video of the progression of this artwork so you can see how to make it! It’s easy- to make your vinyl sticker art all you need to do is cut out a variety of shapes and stick them down!
I would do this project with no younger than 3rd grade, as at that age they will have the dexterity to peel the stickers themselves.
Supplies for the Vinyl Sticker Art Project
I bought several packs of vinyl sticker paper in order to get a nice variety of colors. The great thing about this project is there is no waste. Keep ALL of the scraps in a basket and the kids can make new shapes even from the smallest scraps.
(Amazon affiliate links used at no extra cost to you. The small amount of commission earned goes towards maintaining this website, which is to help other art teachers with ideas and resources. Thanks for your support!)
From Chapter 14 The Independent Woman, I extracted statements that Simone de Beauvoir makes about women artists and writers, in particular and in general. Doing this is an act of noticing and attending that you might want to do for yourself. If not, you can find the list of quotes here: List of quotes from Chapter 14, in order.
The next step was to TURN each statement*, using I … rather than she, woman. For example:
she tries to deny her intelligence as an ageing woman tries to deny her age
This list has accompanied me throughout the last 8 years I have pondered it, read it aloud while walking the room, hidden it, refound it, and been re-energised by it countless times. They have become a list of affirmations, a kind of creed, a manifesto.
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*I’ve come to appreciate TURNING or reversing as a technique from the Byron Katie’s Four Questions in her book Loving What is, from Jung’s ideas of the Shadow, and David Richo’s book Shadow Dance.
In the next post, the themes of Chapter 14, a summary.
Another day of voting!! I was at 6th …now at 10th (in my group..whatever that means?!) You can vote once a day. Please DON’T pay for anything..free vote is more than enough. I’m just doing this for fun. Thanks for your consideration and support!! Click on the link below!!!
In The Second Sex, Chapter 14 The Independent Woman, Simone de Beauvoir offers a devastating critique of the problems facing women who want to be artists and writers. Much has changed since she wrote it in 1949, but also much has stayed horribly familiar.
In earlier posts, I’ve shared how I’ve worked with her words since first encountering them, constructing ‘turnings’ from her original. These turnings are not statements of ‘how it is’ but rather motivations/values/desires. In this summary, I group my turnings under four themes. Her critique turns into something like a personal manifesto and/or set of affirmations.
Speech Flowers, acrylic on canvas, 100 x 100cm, Lynne Cameron, 2018
the woman, the work, the world, and transcendence
My wings are not clipped
I go beyond the given through artistic expression
I throw prudence to the wind to try to emerge beyond the given world
I dare bold flights towards goals, and thereby risk setbacks.
I do not lack audacity to break through the ceiling
I adopt in front of the whole world, the disinterested attitude that opens up wider horizons.
I can be counted on to blaze new trails
I dissipate mirages and do not exhaust my courage – I do not stop in fear at the threshold of reality
I penetrate other shadows beyond clarity
I go beyond the pretext
I traverse the given in search of its secret dimension
I project my spirit with all its riches in an empty sky that is its to fill
the woman, the work, the world
I fully assume the agonising tête-à-tête with the given world
I abandon myself to the contemplation of the world: I am capable of creating it anew
I set the world apart. I question it. I denounce its contradictions. I take it seriously.
I approach nature in its inhuman freedom, try to decipher its foreign meanings and lose myself in order to unite with this other presence
I feel responsible for the universe
I think myself authorised to work out the fate of all humanity in my particular life
I make my history, my problems, my doubts and my hopes those of humanity
I attempt to discover in my life and my works all of reality
I enrich our vision of the world
the woman and the work
truth itself is ambiguity, depth, mystery: I acknowledge the presence of this enigma, and then I rethink it, re-create it
I passionately lose myself in my projects
I commit myself entirely to my enterprise. I am not tempted to give it up
I do not settle for a mediocre success. I dare to aim higher
I forget myself and generously aim for a goal
I aim for an object rather than my subjective success
I envisage art as serious work
I do not consider it to be a simple ornament of my life
I acquire technique. I do not balk at the thankless solitary trials and errors of work that is never exhibited, that has to be destroyed and done over again a hundred times. I do not cheat or hope to get by with a few ruses
I work
I do not attach too much importance to minor failures and modest successes
I have the courage to displease
I dare to irritate, explore, explode
I disown reasonable modesty
I refuse to orchestrate the mystification intended to persuade women to ‘remain women’
I can be a creator
the independent woman
I may feel alone within the world: I stand up in front of it, unique and sovereign
I posit myself as a freedom
I refuse to be object and prey
I will not waste my time on shopping and dress fittings and such
I do not deny my intelligence… or my age
I will not repudiate everything in me that is ‘different’
I have this madness in talent called genius
I will not stifle my originality; I trust it
I am solidly sure that I have already found myself
When the struggle to claim a place in this world gets too rough, there can be no question of tearing myself away from it; I emerge within it in sovereign solitude to try to grasp it anew
I learn from the practice of abandonment and transcendence, in anguish and pride
This is another project that is abstract and involves sticky materials! This washi tape art project is always a hit with kids! It uses two very fun art materials: patterned washi tape and Kwik Stix paint sticks.
● There are many different kinds of washi tapes that you might enjoy. I tested out several different sets to share with you and these vary in quality with some being completely useless, ripping as you try to unpeel them to others that unpeel and stick easily. The ones listed below I have tried out and like how they unpeel and stick. (The others I just returned!)
Set of 27 Monet Inspired Washi Tape rolls (some with gold foil)- when I first opened the package it didn’t look as bright in person, but when I unrolled the tape onto white paper, the colors were very nice. I say these are inspired because I’m not sure all of these patterns are directly from his paintings.
Whether or not intuition can be described (only) as “instincts…honed through use and experience”, it’s the next sentence that struck me:
you reach a point in life when they are usually right
How unusual to hear this from a woman. How wonderful!
I’ve been journalling on what I might do differently if I (finally) accepted this … and wanting to share that thought with all the women who read my blog.
I could not get these photos to load in any kind of order for the life of me!?!?!
The show was a huge success, and everyone really seemed to enjoy walking through, participating in the activities(kids and parents), and as always…the cookie table was a hit!
I purchased a book from Amazon that was the Cryptids of the United States. Each class learned about a different state and the cryptids found there. (Pretty much every state has a Big Foot & Locke Ness type creature.) They all seemed to love the theme. They created about 4 pictures total in that theme, and were able to select their favorite. You will see a lot of classes went for the same project to put in the show because they loved the media/style we were working.
Students working at one of the activity areas!
Former Student (no mid 20’s) Former Student Teacher
Layering has long been important in my painting process. It’s a simple notion: on day one, I paint the first layer; on day 2, I paint on top of the first layer; on day 3, I paint on top of the second layer; at some point, the layers, what’s hidden and what’s revealed, form a composition that satisfies, and the painting is finished.
Of course, it is much more complicated, and more contingent, than that.
I paint with acrylics, which means that layers dry fast. On top of acrylic paint or ink, one can layer oil paint, oil sticks, graphite, pencil, pastels, acrylic markers, more paint. A layer of paint over paint can be scumbled (applied very dry) or glazed/washed (very wet). Layering the same colour intensifies the hue; layering another colour changes it.
