Well thanks to my alert friend, Keiko Meowkami – I know what table corn I’ll be growing next year. Can’t this year – because they sold out already – so I’m on board for next year’s seeds. It’s called “Glass Gem” and will be available from a little place called Seed Trust.
Check it out! 
Ok, so I’ve toyed with Pinterest for a couple of months now – and basically it seems to be a site that’s pretty much all about consuming. Shopping, food porn, home and garden upgrades, weird shoes, awesome outfits, rainbow hair and this sort of thing. I’m not saying that’s all bad – but it doesn’t quite scratch that itch I have for wanting some substance to bubble out of the screen.
Mind you, this is coming from an online shopping enthusiast and make of stuff that gets pinned and repinned. So, yes, I’m benefiting from the experience a little – but not to the extent that goes much beyond feeling sort of like a buffet that features mostly carbs.
Whenever I check in or pin something I feel like I’m consuming what’s been created rather than creating something. This is probably the whole idea, lol. Is this your experience too or are you getting something out of it I’m missing. Tell me, because being a visual person I am so motivated to have this do something more for me!
Mother’s Day is coming right up and if you’re like me you often wonder what token can you buy that will convey your appreciation for your awesome mom? Well nothing, of course. There’s no one thing a kid can buy that can tell a mom that much – but a little original drawing depicting some of the wonderful love-energy a kid can have for a mom is a nice little start.
I made these with this in mind. If you like one just message me. They’re $15 each (for you, special price!). They’ll come wrapped in colorful tissue with a gift card and ribbon and can go anywhere your mom is! I accept Paypal (martimu@gmail.com). Your token of appreciation will go out in that day’s mail!
Ok, so by now you’ve probably heard that Edvard Munch’s painting they call “The Scream” just sold for $119.9 Million smackers. I heard all sorts of discussion leading up to the auction from numerous experts but this whole situation leaves me, an artist, feeling a bit flat.
The artist said: ”I do not believe in the art which is not the compulsive result of Man’s urge to open his heart.”
His work was exceptional in its time. He made this version of “The Scream” in 1893. You’ll recall that was smack dab in the middle of the more lyrical, buttoned up (literally) Victorian time. So we have to acknowledge this for being an image that came up and out of the artist from a whole new place. So I have nothing against this piece being considered a masterful and highly influential work of creative expression. I think it was. I think it IS.
But I am taken aback by the power of money to lay claim to the expression and assign it this weird other value because simultaneously in the back of my mind is the wondering about current artists right now who are exploring the deep space of human creativity in completely unique ways who remain totally unsupported financially. I think: what if this almost $120 million had gone to 120 artists working today each getting $1,000,000. Imagine the results of something like that!
Oh, and I would like to be one of the recipients, of course, lol. Actually in that case we better cut the grant down to $500,000 – now we can give it to 240 artists – because if we get too much we may rest and stop making our art! You could even halve that once again to $250,000 and support 480 artists and get galleries and museums full of amazing new concepts, pieces and explorations.
But instead we got all these news stories swirling around this one transaction for one angst ridden piece of art that I think probably did as much to confuse the general public about what art is as it may have enlightened them. And that rather sucks.
But like Edvard, we’ll all carry on with our work regardless of public support or comprehension, because for us it is about the inner drive to do it. Money be damned. But when you get the chance, pick up our tab at the restaurant. It’ll help. 
A friend who runs a B&B (First Farm Inn) that offers trail riding as an add-on option up near Cincinnati came up with an interesting challenge last week. “Can you make a felted unicorn horn to go on a horse’s bridle?”. Apparently a guest had wondered if she could book a birthday ride, and did Jen have any unicorns.
So after a semi-ok prototype, I landed on a better design and made one up! This reminded me of a couple of things about product development which is what we fine craft artists are actually doing when we’re creating a new line of work. We have to work the bugs out of an idea before we offer it for sale.
Art that hangs on the wall or sits on a pedestal doesn’t have this onus – but art that has a use must be designed to be able to carry out its function well. A cup should be able to hold liquid, a sweater should hold together and a unicorn horn can’t flop down on a horse’s face! Nor be too stiff so as to pose a real risk to the unicorn handler.
I went back to the drawing board and fine tuned the armature I was using as the superstructure and added a sleeve so the contraption could be used on multiple browbands for different bridles. I also lengthened the horn so it looked a little more natural on my model’s noggin. I liked the results and delivered it to Jen. She loved it! So I made another and now have them offered for sale in my Etsy shop. I’ll let you know if I get more buyers. I think I will – wearing one turns ANY horse into a unicorn for photo opps!
Because you never know where opportunity is going to pop, I try to keep an open mind – even when I’m experiencing an art show with what appear to be slow sales. Such a thing seemed to happening one beautiful fun weekend in Gainesville, Florida in the early 1990′s for me. I wasn’t selling a ton – though I was enjoying myself, the other artists and the people thoroughly!
A German man came up and started asking a ton of questions and ended up buying pretty much anything I wasn’t officially selling: my lunch bag (I got to keep the contents, lol), my jacket and a prototype for some “art dolls” I was creating. In his thick accent he said he was there teaching a symposium in International Law and had a friend back home who was an arts book publisher and also had a gallery who would love my things. So, ok. That’s cool.
Back in Chicago a month or so later I got an international call – which before Skype was a pretty big deal. It was Peter Gilles (the professor) on the line with his friend Norbert Haun – whom I came to call Norby. Norby wanted a whole slew of stuff and was going to wire transfer (predating PayPal here, kiddos) a bunch of cash to pay for it. His timing was amazing! I made the stuff and sent it and apparently he sold it all very quickly. So quickly he proposed an idea – why don’t I go there, live in he and his girlfriend’s extra apartment and make a bunch of art that he would buy and then sell. This way we wouldn’t have to ship the art – just the artist!
This worked out wonderfully well and we ended up doing this a bunch of times.
I was thinking about these times this morning so here’s today’s sketch!
The place was sort an very old mill settlement where individual owners has split apart the collection of buildings all sort of connected in that charming old world way into individual units. Mine overlooked the river and had an odd vibe. Back then it freaked me out – these days I would know how to adjust its energy.
I have a friend who has a cat for some reason or another I find I can connect with from a distance and take in her energy. Call it animal communication for lack of a better term – but this isn’t a skill I feel I have developed particularly well. Still, there are times I pick up intention – especially from her kitty. So she contacts me from time to time with a little challenge.
Yesterday her query was why is “Mini” yowling all over the house and acting stand offish? I find that when connecting with animals it’s best for me to come at it sideways. Kind of like how I access my creative flow. So I didn’t plop down on a cushion and open the golden highway like some animal communicators do. I slept on it and waited to see if anything bubbled in. Something did.
The notion that Mini isn’t yelling but singing came pretty much right away. But because I have a fairly active imagination I always worry that I’m making these things up. So this morning that thought still felt like the plausible explanation and with it came a sort of vision.
I have found that for myself in our very old, seasoned house full of history and emotions that sometimes the energy seems to get flat, even buzzy; in corners especially. Animals are very sensitive to such subtle forces so it doesn’t surprise me that a kitty cat would take matters into her own paws adjusting the harmonics with her voice!
I wrote a fairly detailed step by step process about how to adjust energy in another blog – QuantumSparks – I maintain whose subject is Animal Assisted Inspiration. If this concept interests you, you may want to have a look.
This morning’s drawing is a little play on the horizon line.
Today’s sketch came from that little part of my brain that remembers the joys of living with a weensy chihuahua. Here the pooch’s happiness wafts up into the collector funnel, is concentrated and put into little pills for later popping! Addictive, but not dangerous. Unless CUTE and HAPPY are dangerous traits.
Today’s morning image allowed me to wrap my thinking around how bears might take matters into their own paws when it comes to human land development if we let them in on the process a little earlier.
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