more studio shots

I'm having a great week and feeling really good about my progress with the Natural Selection show. I thought this would be an interesting process picture for the ol' bloggeroo--remember those pictures from a few entries ago of my drawings and the pieces in progress? Sometimes I work quite intuitively, and a piece falls together without me putting pencil to paper at all. Sometimes I draw and then execute, which is sort of what I am doing here, except this particular piece has so many shapes and sizes in the small elements that need to fit together in the end. I thought I should employ a combination of all my artmaking tricks.

Using a large piece of paper, I laid everything out flat on the table and then drew in the lines where the wire armature will go. Some of these pieces are still too plain and will need some spiky or nubby elements, so this process also allowed me to draw those in where it seemed imperative, and this weekend I will make them, as well as creating and attaching the wire armatures.

Another trick I used here was to squint at the piece to make sure the overall shape is right. I have simulated that experience here using my Photochops. I want this piece to have a giant open leaf shape. The jury is still out about color, but as I mentioned before, that's a decision I will make late in the game.

It's almost time to submit my ad for American Craft Magazine as well. As you may remember, I recieved a generous Career Opportunity Grant from the Oregon Arts Commission that supports a color ad in this excellent national publication. I got a bee in my bonnet to start thinking about the design yesterday, since I want to be able to sit with it before committing on this expensive endeavor. I would love it if my ad were placed next to that of Velvet da Vinci, since they are the ones who sell this work and take out their own regular ad that always looks great. A trick I like to use when creating a print ad is to see how it will look on the pages of the magazine. I printed my latest version of the ad out full size and laid it on the page I'd most like to be. There's a few more details to work out before I can commit, but I think I'm pretty close to what I will end up with.