Art Stroll

Art Stroll: New York Botanical Garden

A couple weeks ago Kim and I decided to take a little trip to the Botanical Garden in New York City to see the Roberto Burle Marx Exhibition. It was such a treat – even though going that far uptown is quite a hike.

One thing that the visit reminded me instantly of is what an amazing artist nature is and how inspirational it is to go to a Botanical Garden.

From Flowers that look like something from a fairy tale

To plants with leaves that look as if they were painted on.

We loved the Garden part of the Roberto Burle Marx exhibition a lot – gorgeous pattern on the pavement- beautiful plants with tons of patterns, texture and lines. As he said: “A garden is a complex of aesthetic and plastic intentions; and the plant is, to a landscape artist, not only a plant – rare, unusual, ordinary or doomed to disappearance – but it is also a color, a shape, a volume or an arabesque in itself”

Made me appreciate plants that I usually do not really think of wanting to have

Another amazing plant with awesome leaves! “One might think of a plant as a brush stroke, as a single stitch of embroidery; but one must never forget that it is a living thing. ” Roberto Burle Marx in a 1962 lecture.

Looking into the water in front of the fountain.

We also happened to come a day too early to see the “Corpse Plant” open.It rareley blooms and only for about 1-2 days. It was a coincidence that we went right when it was going to bloom as we had planned the trip for quite some while but it was cool to see this amazing plant right before it opened. We were spared of the insane smell it releases when it opens (hence the name) but fear not …the ride home at 94 F on the NYC subway probably was worse when the Corpse Flower smell hahahah ;)

This is some kind of ginger – isn’t this insanly cool? I love ginger and this makes me love it even more .

Let me sneak in another awesome plant …and nope we did not go into the Botanical Garden with a white paint brush LOL –

Water plants- where is the frog. I am always fascinated by water plants must be all the stories and fairy tales too.

Look at the color !!!

And these cacti – it is so funny to me that these delicate flowers are blooming out of this really prickly sturdy thing.

Palm tree pattern and texture

And a giant allium – I need one of those for our garden .

Inside the Library we found this beautiful glass on the floor

And then enjoyed some gorgeous paintings – the one above on fabric by Roberto Burle Marx.

I found it fascinating to look at his paintings after walking through the garden and seeing pictures of his gardens.

“If I do gardens, I don’t want to paint; if I do paintings I don’t want to do woodcuts; if I do prints from woodcuts, I don’t want to do lithography. Each specialty calls for its own technique and medium of expression…I will not do a painting that is a garden. Without a doubt painting and and all sorts of artistic issues have influenced my whole concept of art. I have always sought to avoid being restricted by formulas…” Roberto Burle Marx 1973

I love the shapes and colors and some of them look like gardens or landscape to me

Here is a tapestry by him – also pretty amazing.

Another favorite part of the exhibition was the interactive tile making – based on Marx’ tiles some tile post-its were provided along with different blue colored pencils.

After painting the visitors were encouraged to place them on the wall – it was so beautiful – and fun to see this post-it tile wall.

A wonderful exhibition with an awesome mixture of nature and art. If you have a chance to go – it was so worth the trip!

Nat

Comments (3)

  • theresa

    |

    thanks Nat for the refreshing walk through the gardens…isn’t nature soo inspiring…the patterns…colours…textures…love it all…

    Reply

  • Sue Clarke

    |

    Nat, I totally enjoyed this post this morning! Thanks.

    Reply

  • Jeanine Robb

    |

    These are gorgeous photos…beautiful exhibition! Thanks you.

    Reply

Leave a comment

A Look Back – Cool Stuff You May Have Missed 07

A Look Back – a blog series to show you some projects and posts that you may have missed – sometimes going WAY back in the archive. I think it will be fun to revisit a few ideas that we haven’t seen for a while. I’m excited to see how a little look back might inspire something new in the future :)

This time I’m looking at some stenciling ideas from my blog archives – projects and techniques that make the most of your beloved stencils. Here’s a look back. Enjoy!

This was a cool page I did back in 2013 with my Circuit stencil. I sprayed my stencil with black spraypaint and while it was still wet I flipped it over and rolled it with a brayer. Voila! Reverse printed stencil magic :)

This was a stencil project I did on my staircase when we moved into our apartment in 2013 – and funny enough, now we need to paint over white again as we are moving to our new home soon :) It was a neat idea to personalize the risers of the stairs with a message, but it could be also nice to do a pattern stencil like my Amsterdam or maybe Van Vorst…. Hmmm thinking about decorating ideas lol

Back in this 2014 post a friend surprised me with a piece of handmade pottery, glazed with my Elephant March stencil on it! I am still thrilled with this and love how many different types of artists can use my stencils for amazingly creative things.

In this 2016 art journal page I used a stencil and a baby wipe to remove paint and create a pattern. This is so easy to do and it lets you use your stencils in yet another way.

And finally when you have a really crazy colorful background that needs some toning down and unification, I go for a stencil. Here I used my Art Deco Wallpaper stencil and some gray and white paint to bring this 2014 art journal page together.

I hope you enjoyed A Look Back through my archive and maybe you are inspired to try some different things with stencils.

Here are some of the supplies that were used in these pieces:


Nat

Leave a comment

Cyanotype & Stencils – Play Date

This was such an interesting and exciting play date with Kim – so excited to share it with you today! I have wanted to try cyanotype (aka Sun Printing) for a long time and we finally did. Now this did require some prep ahead of time, and it definitely is an active process, but the results are very cool.

I purchased a cyanotype kit on amazon (link below) that was a 2 part mixture. You can find the chemicals a lot of places, just be sure to follow the directions on the packaging. My kit required some prep 24 hours before we did the actual “printing”. As for supplies, we used the cyanotype kit, large paddle brushes, gunked up stencils (YES – this is one argument for not cleaning them lol), and a surface to print on. We chose wood frames, some fabric, and watercolor paper. Following the directions of our kit, we painted the surface with the mixture in a dimly lit room and let them dry. Ours worked best when we allowed them to fully dry.

Then it is time to head outside on a nice sunny day. We first did the frames. Here you can see 2 frames covered with an array of stencils. If it is windy you will need to weigh the stencils down.

Here is my Santiago stencil on the frame, catching the sunlight. Our mixture was a greenish yellow when it went on and slowly turned to a bronze color when it had been exposed to enough light.

And here is my Toledo stencil on a frame.

When they have exposed enough, you race them inside and rinse them until the water turns clear. The covered areas will wash away to reveal the wood color and the areas exposed to sunlight will begin to turn a beautiful blue.

Over the next few hours they will cure to full color and look just gorgeous!

Stencils with thicker lines worked a bit better and we learned that it is safer to weigh the stencil down in case wind picks up.

I just love the variety you can get and it all just works together because of that wonderful blue.

We also tried fabric with stencils (Hamilton and Star Struck here) and leaves. Weigh everything down and try to find flat leaves so you get defined edges. The fabric and paper exposure was really quick – so have a plan and all your stencils and objects ready to immediately put down on the fabric when you bring it outside.

Here is some paper with leaves and grass – all of these blew in the wind very easily so we did not get a good print here. I would put rocks on them next time. The top paper had some stencils and rocks. Setting up multiple papers at once was a bit hectic as they started changing very fast. Make a plan, have plenty of extra material (stencils, leaves, rocks, etc) and expect to just roll with it.

The paper process was the same – rinse immediately after bringing inside. Here you see a print I made with my Buenos Aires and Versailles stencils getting a rinse.

We let them dry in the sun and you can see some interesting results.

Definitely something to play around with here.

After a bit, the blue really came out.

My Valley Road, Park Blvd, and Broadway stencils came out very crisp.

We rinsed and dried the fabric as well. Here you see some leaves, vines, and a peek of my Exchange Place stencil in the corner.

These were pretty unplanned compositions. It is worth getting familiar with the process and just playing at first. Kim and I are planning a second play date now that we know how it works and then we can better prepare for what we make in the end.

Regardless, it was really awesome to see the potential and beauty of cyanotype printing.

We are imagining all sorts of fabric and clothing projects :)

Another variation we did: stamping with my new rubber stamp sets and black stazon ink onto transparency film.

I stamped the film with my Fantastic Large stamps and then put it on top of a treated pillowcase… It blew off several times in the breeze hence the “double vision” look to the print.

But still a really cool idea for future cyano projects!

So as you can see there is so much potential to using this medium with your stamps and stencils. We are just getting started and will definitely share future adventures with you as well. Don’t be intimidated by the process – it isn’t that hard and the results can be sooooooo nice and surprising some times. I hope you give it a try!

Here are some of the supplies that we used:

Nat

Comments (3)

  • loopdlu

    |

    Love these! One tip is to place picture frame glass on top of the leaves/stencils/transparency/etc to hold everything down and in place.

    Reply

  • Rae Lynn

    |

    These turned out so cool! I love the blue!

    Reply

Leave a comment

Outside the Box – Art Journal

“Sometimes trying to think outside the box ends up in thinking right in the box!”

I began this page by sketching a figure… but sometimes what you don’t know is how an art journal spread came together- see me fighting off my cat and spilled ink – and then just deciding to live with it on a weird Monday afternoon in this video:

Although it was fun to have Pretzel’s paw make a cameo, arting with your cat can be tricky. I don’t recommend it lol

But I do recommend just going with what happens when you are working. The spilled ink and all! Actually to bring my page together I used my Paint Splat Mixed Media Chip as a stencil (very fitting with my messy process that day). And I added a stamp from the Fanfare set too.

Here are some of the supplies I used:


Nat

Leave a comment

Food for Thought – Jennifer Gallagher

Hello everyone – time for a post from my Creative Squad! Today we have Jennifer Gallagher and her upcycled candy box turned recipe box and cards using my Fantastic Large stamps and my Buenos Aires stencil. This month’s theme is Food for Thought – Let’s take a lighthearted look at food! While the culinary world has become an art and a science in terms of preparation and presentation, sometimes it is the simplest foods that bring us the most joy. Simple fare or elaborate family traditions, we all have our favorite foods. What is yours?

This month we are discussing food for thought. Well, I am a southern girl. We take our food and our traditions very seriously. So when I received this month’s prompt, I instantly thought of family dinners, holiday celebrations, and those recipes that get handed down from person to person. This month, I am sharing with you a fun way to recycle a candy box into a recipe box. Let’s get started.

I had been holding on to a candy box left from Valentine’s Day for a while now. I knew I could turn it into something fabulous. I started by applying a coat of white gesso to the box. (It ended up needing two coats.) 

While the gesso dried, I created a series of papers to use for collage. Using just basic computer copy paper, I stenciled acrylic paint through Nat’s Buenos Aires stencil with a mini blending tool.

Next, I cut some shapes out of the stenciled paper. This is one of my favorite ways to push my stencils and stamps to get more out of them. 

Using matte medium and a small brush, I glued down the cut out shapes in a pattern that was pleasing to me. I followed this pattern around the entire side of the box.

I painted the top of the box green. Once it was about half way dry, I dabbed the paint with a baby wipe to give the top texture and a distressed look. Then I dabbed a little dark grey acrylic paint along the edges of the top of the box.

I cut out three more shapes from the painted paper and glued them to the top of the box. I added doodles around the designs with a black posca pen. I liked it so much I did the same around the sides.

Now we need recipe cards. I started by stamping the Solid Fan in one color onto copy paper and then stamping another color in the Fantastic Large designs over that. I used archival inks for this process. I cut each one out, modified it slightly with scissors, and glued it to my blank 4×6 inch recipe card. I added a little doodling with a black pen and wrote in my recipes.

Saving our traditions to pass down to others is very important. I have so many cherished recipes that not only help me keep those traditions alive, but remind me of people that have passed and good times that are now memories. I hope you have enjoyed this tutorial. Remember, play along with us and share your creations!

Thank you Jennifer! I love how you cut up the stencil design to pull out some cool shapes. You can find all of my Rubber Stamps and my Stencils in my online shop. In addition to a candy box, here are some of the other supplies Jennifer used:

If you are working on something yourself that you’d like to share, please do!  I love to see how you interpret our monthly themes. Email me how you used my stencils and stamps with the theme and email me an image – I would love to share your projects in my next  “n*Spiration From Around the Globe“.

Nat

Leave a comment

Aging – Art Journal

“Aging is an extraordinary process where you become the person you always should have been” David Bowie

This spread was tons of fun. I used dye spray paints on the left to stamp with my Far Out Stamp, then I used the Large and small Hex Rubber stamps with an inkpad to create a pattern. The area that is painted in acrylic and green was over stamped with white ink and the Far Out stamp- it is very subtle but I like the repetition of the pattern.

Some ink and acrylic paint for the lady and voila ..another very mixed media spread.

Here are some of the supplies I used:


Nat

Leave a comment

New Product Announcement: Solid Shape Rubber Stamps

I am happy to announce that the 4 new rubber stamps in the collection are here! This makes the “family complete” as these new Solid stamps are a great addition to the Hex and Floral Tile sets.

The Solid Hex Large is fun to use on its own with different color inks or even black and white. But as with all these new stamps, it is an amazing partner with its patterned counterpoint… the Hex Set Large stamps and as seen below the Hex Set Small stamps.

You can stamp a field of them and then add the patterned stamps overtop:

The pattern above also includes the cute little Solid Hex Small stamp:

This is again, great on its own…

… but WOW is it fun to pair up with the Hex Set Small stamps:

Next up is the Solid Square Large:

Simple and bold on its own…

… but oh so nice to stamp with under the Floral Tile Large set!

And finally the Solid Square Small stamp:

This one is amazing for checkerboard backgrounds:

And then you add some stamps on top like my Love Tag or Hope Tag or Star Tag ;)

And here is a sample mixing up the Large and Small Solid Squares with my Floral Tile Large and Fanfare sets for some yummy pattern:

And another pattern getting the Solid Fan Large and Small and Fantastic Large and Small in the mix :)

You can find all my rubber stamps in my shop here and here are some of the supplies I used for these samples:

And don’t forget that now is a great time to get the online workshop Creative JumpStart 2019 – on SALE!!! Sale ends July 17th at 11:59pm EST so SIGN UP HERE TODAY. JumpStart YOUR creativity this summer!

Nat

Leave a comment

Inspired By: Loew’s Theatre, Jersey City

A couple of weeks ago my husband and I attended a fundraiser event at Loew’s Theatre here in Jersey City. I have heard so many wonderful things about this theater I couldn’t wait to finally get a look.

Can you say Wall-paper bliss? LOL- but let’s start from the beginning- What is this theater? Loew’s Theater was opened in 1929 as one of the five Loew’s Wonder Theaters.

It was closed in 1986 and remained closed. An investor bought the theater and wanted to demolish it to build a new monstrosity on the spot. Preservationists began a campaign to save the structure and succeeded in saving the building from demolition.

The theatre was subsequently sold to the city of Jersey City, the current owner. Since then it is operated by a volunteer organisation, the Friends of the Loews.

During the 7 years the Friends of Liberty fought to save it, “the Theatre was abandoned and it decayed accordingly. Pipes froze and burst. Mold grew on the worn-out upholstered seats. Paint peeled from the dampness and cold. The roof leaked. Every surface became covered in dust. Before the City of Jersey City bought the Loew’s in 1993, an architectural report made it clear that nothing worked within the Theatre. The report estimated that it would take about $5 million just to get the Loew’s minimally operational, and at least $12 million to make the Theatre fully functional and up to code.”

The Friends of the Loews have been doing an insane amount of work to repear, and preserve the theater which had been in a horrible condition. Every weekend for years and still they met up to work in the theater.

Here is yours truly goofball lady shooting an infinity mirror photo in the foyer of the ladies room.

The theatre reopened in 2001 thanks to the FOL. Not all parts of the theater can be accessed for the public as to fire code regulations and problems and there is still a ton of work to do. There are some movie screenings, events and even weddings.

But oh my- tell me it wasn’t sooo worth it to preserve this place.

In 2010, the Village Voice called the Loew’s Jersey the “Best Movie Theatre in New York” — even though we’re located in Jersey City!

I loved the total overboard grand ceilings- all the details are just insane.

Look at the curtain

and the velvet paneling

I was just in awe seeing all this

Here is the men’s foyer- a little smoking room – go figure- LOL.

Wherever you move – amazing details.

The movie theater was amazing as well – I wanna see a move soon there. Above is an organ – it is not the orginal anymore but like the one that was there.

The ceiling and the balcony of the movie theater – you cannot go to the balcony- that is off limits for now.

Swoon !!!

Part of the appeal for me of course was that it was a bit run down and it showed the age- although I am fully aware that this is not good and that everything has to be done to preserve it.

I am amazed by this neighborhood organization ! I hope the city will step up to it’s commitment and give the funding it promised a long time ago to make this place fully functional again.

Maybe the city needs a Push!!!

BTW – I was super excited to learn that the The Strokes did their official video Under Cover of Darkness in the Loew’s theater. I am a huge Strokes fan – so I finish with that video for you :)

Nat

Comments (2)

  • Sue Clarke

    |

    What a fun post Nat!
    I just love old buildings that have all that history and detail.
    The video was fun to watch as well.
    Hats off to the FOL for all their hard work.

    Reply

Leave a comment