Whenever I need to slow down or get back to the basics I do cross-stitch – and recently hooking rugs.  It sort of feels like stretching before a cross country run. (Actually; I have no idea if that is true – it has been a very long time since these legs have run.) I just feel like I need to build up an internal momentum to get back into painting again.

The embroidery in the large image above is a pillow that I did about 10 years ago. I was very in to knots that year.

The cross stitch above with the quan yin peeking over is one I did about 25 years ago.

I recall spending summers at my grandparents.  My grandmother taught me how to embroider starting with those tiny kits that you sew shoestrings through.  Through the summers growing up I graduated to embroidering tea towels and then to hankies.  Ha – I still recall how hard it to was to use an embroidered hankie!

Do you have any happy memories linked to needle work?

Since I recently moved I find this almost as a “nesting” period that I need to create this warm safe space before getting to the point of putting acrylic brush to canvas.

Why am I telling you this???

In Art & Fear (Bayles/Orland) it says:

“Making Art and viewing art are different at their core” … “the process of making the art only matters to the artist; the experience of shaping that artwork.  The viewers concerns are not your concerns…”

Similarly; a friend tells me what others think of me is not my concern.

“Your job is to work on your work… Virtually all artists spend some of their time and some of the artists spend virtually all of their time producing work that no one else much cares about… The function of the majority of your artwork is simply to teach you how to make the small amount of your artwork that soars. “

The pillow case below is a current embroidery. I tossed the colored embroidery thread and am doing a series of white embroidery with just a hint of color throughout; in this case yellow with a touch of green here and there.

All of this in preparation to soar!

I mentioned that I was trying to get back into the groove of my ‘normal’ blogging/painting life. And all these other little jobs keep I need to do keep waving thier arms and yaking in my ear “choose me… choose me…”  and pulling me off course.

I recall this in Anne Lamott’s bird by bird :

“Left to its own devices, my mind spends much of its time having conversations with people who aren’t there. I walk along defending myself to people, or exchanging repartee with them, or rationalizing my behavior, or seducing them with gossip, or pretending I’m on their TV talk show or whatever. I speed or run an aging yellow light or don’t come to a full stop, and one nanosecond later am explaining to imaginary cops exactly why I had to do what I did, or insisting that I did not in fact do it.   I happened to mention this to a hypnotist I saw many years ago, and he looked at me very nicely. At first I thought he was feeling around on the floor for the silent alarm button, but then he gave me the following exercise, which I still use to this day.

Close your eyes and get quiet for a minute, until the chatter starts up. Then isolate one of the voices and imagine the person speaking as a mouse. Pick it up by the tail and drop it into a mason jar. Then isolate another voice, pick it up by the tail, drop it in the jar. And so on. Drop in any high-maintenance parental units, drop in any contractors, lawyers, colleagues, children, anyone who is whining in your head. Then put the lid on, and watch all these mouse people clawing at the glass, jabbering away, trying to make you feel like shit because you won’t do what they want–won’t give them more money, won’t be more successful, won’t see them more often. Then imagine that there is a volume-control button on the bottle. Turn it all the way up for a minute, and listen to the stream of angry, neglected, guilt-mongering voices. Then turn it all the way down and watch the frantic mice lunge at the glass, trying to get to you. Leave it down, and get back to your shitty first draft…”

Although Anne is talking about the first draft of writing a new novel I think the same applies to any sort of self expression. While creating, we are open to learning from our mistakes, learning from good advice, learning from constructive criticism. To remain that open, we need a method of dealing with negative, carping criticism. Occasionally this comes from outside, but most often it’s inside ourselves.

I am leaving you with this field of sunshine from last weekend’s road trip.  It is hard to believe that it is almost time for another weekend and another road trip!

ninotchka beavers says in her comment the other day that she can’t wait to “see” more…

I didn’t get the patio finished…             :-l

But I did paint a bit on my light table.  A new Scatterlings in the making; and the above is just a peek! I have changed them a bit and am looking forward to hear what you all think.

In The Spring, At The End of the Day, You Should Smell Like Dirt.
Margaret Atwood

Hurrah! For all the effort that I have put forth I finally once again have access again to images off my Lacie! Now it is a merely fine tuning the process of creating a blog via a different method. I won’t bore you with the details – that isn’t what you came here to read.

I mentioned earlier I moved into my new home/studio last month. One of the things I am most excited about is the patio extends the length of the living room. Logically this is where my light table and workstation are set up. I picture myself standing there painting; glancing up every now and again to see the assortment of birds and bees and flowers and trees.

Our weather finally warmed up, and I am preparing to work on the patio tomorrow. Right now it is a massive heap of thirsty trees, thousands (hundreds?) of planters and empty bird feeders.

What better day to tackle this than Earth Day ? ! .

I will return by Monday, having cleaned the dirt from under my fingernails, and to get back to some serious, and not so serious, blogging.

This is my guilty post.

It has been such a long time since I’ve posted, I feel like I need to re-introduce myself. Not really ‘that’ long, but it seems like forever.  I haven’t posted since January. In fact I even still the stabbed turkey on this front montage!

It’s been a good kind of busy, but busy nonetheless. I have tried to write up several posts along the way, but I always end up scraping them and starting over.

Let’s just go with bulleted thoughts:

• I moved.  A mere 8 blocks away… you would think it was 8 states away with all the work involved.  The last time I had moved I did not have near as many tools and art supplies as I do now. This apartment/studio that I just moved into is a smaller art space so I tried to sort through the ‘fossils’ of my art life with the care of an archeologist. I’m not sure what I hoped to find but I began slowly and methodically looking at each item.

That process became a central question: Am I the artist that I want to be?

• This question slowed my packing even further. Will I actually finish hooking that rug? (Yes, for the kitchen.)  Do I want to continue to craft as much as I had in the past? (I want to be a painter, not a crafter.) This means a certain amount of assemblage can go out the same door it came in.  Easier to say than to do.  More questions: Why do I have hundreds of empty yogurt cups? How much paint do I hope to mix in my lifetime? Why do I eat so much yogurt?

“Have patience with everything that remains unsolved in your heart. Try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books written in a foreign language. Do not now look for the answers. They cannot now be given to you because you could not live them. It is a question of experiencing everything. At present you need to live the question. Perhaps you will gradually, without even noticing it, find yourself experiencing the answer, some distant day.” Rainer Maria Rilke

Ok.. but; do I keep the 15 Altoid Tins (future tiny assemblages)? What about these pieces of plywood with old advertisements glued on to them (think: MadMen); pieces of wood which I toted from Iowa to Wyoming, from Wyoming to California. I have kept this very same box of plywood with ads for over 20 years… and I still haven’t finished them? Do I want to keep them (I did) I have 8 paint chips – take them? Toss them?  Take them? Toss them? I have three glass pitchers filled to the brim with found objects.

I often thought of the reality show ‘Hoarders‘ as I packed. No small wonder that there are so many ‘collectors – crafters – artists‘ on that show. Sometimes junk is junk. Toss it. Quit trying to make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear.

A friend of mine tells me:

“So…. you have an apartment full of art materials… that must mean that you are an artist”.

• There is good news in that for you… I am really anxious to move (read: sell) my finished art so I never have to move it again!

“Art isn’t art until it’s sold. Until then it’s an obsession and a storage problem.”

• Art stuff is heavy. Sometimes surprisingly heavy. I twisted a rib and was tempted to update my “What Condition My Condition Is In” post as there was an internal/external cascading phenomena; everything fell like dominos. I was forced to (re)remember that I am not the spring chicken I was the last time I made a major move.  These two issues forced me to face my mortality: “What do I want to do with my remaining years as an artist?” Of course I hope there are at least 50 more years of creating.  But what if there isn’t? I need to choose my projects wisely. So more items made it through the door.

• Then I had a birthday and a surprise birthday party with my family and children! What a fortunate girl am I! Maybe 50 (+) (:-)) more years won’t be such a bad thing.

• I bought myself a little something something for my birthday; a MacBook Air! This will help with the limited amount of work I can actually get done with my old G4 Mac.

Like I can play games that I could not play previously! Ok – I had to put a stop to that time waster. I killed my tv so I won’t have that distraction. Now listen to Pandora again as I paint.

• I moved in. On day 1 of unpacking we found this.  So we stopped; and got an exterminator to come.  Twice.  Grrr. Ok; maybe I won’t finish that hand hooked rug for the kitchen floor. In fact maybe I won’t use the kitchen at all.

• Since then no “studio elves” have magically transformed my stuff into an organized workspace. Studio elves exist; they are called interns. They work for free, but you have to be a famous artist to have one. Or, if you are rich, they are called studioassistants. You have to pay them. I cannot afford one.

• Here I am, again, to post!

Oh wait; I have yet to figure out how to access my Lacie and my 7600 for PhotoShop so I can post images. And wouldn’t it be nice to hook up those speakers to Pandora? When I download new photos do I want to save them on both my new computer hard drive AND my LaCie – how is that going to happen? I am still working on those issues.

But get this: now I need to update my WordPress… and guess but first I must update my PHP (my what?) and my plugins. Oh and of course my theme. But wait; the child theme gets updated first.

Oh for crying out loud!

• I have been blessed with a creative high the past couple of weeks that I am still most graciously riding, and that has given me a renewed push, strength and desire to just keep creating. Good news for me and you – with this new computer those paypal buttons are easier than when I was hand-coding them!

That’s all for now, but rest assured I AM alive! As much as it seems like it, I have not given up on this blog just yet, and I look forward to putting out some content soon.

A Passion For The Past; Pointillism; Pen and India Ink.
More Pointillim/Stippling on this blog.

~~~

As the wild-colt
at meadow,
round its mare’s feet,
they beat
ecstatic dance-beat.

“Choros Translations” by Hilda Doolittle (1886-1961), U.S. poet.

~~~

The ceremonial dancee touch upon the mystery of the giving of life that life may be maintained; an exchange that links together the different forms of life and enhances the joy of living.

Native Americans are skilled and spiritual people which you can see in their art. The designs are inspired by the nature surrounding them. Most artworks have a deeper meaning. Some art forms: jewelry, dream catchers, bead work, basketry, pottery, masks, totem poles, instruments and dolls.

Pointillism Wiki

Hilda Doolittle Wiki

Native Americans in the United States

Native Americans Art and Music

List of Dance Styles

A Passion For The Past; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Medium: Acrylic and Watercolor; Pen and Ink on Crescent Board. Sold

I began a sketching group a few weeks ago. The timing was perfect with the 34th World Wide Sketch Crawl going on. It was fun to think of joining with sketchers world wide – sketching at the same time… a virtual sketching marathon!

I would like to get to some museums and draw there. Also; to begin to paint En Plein Air. I thought sketching in public might be the way to begin getting over the fear. It’s really interesting how sketching makes you think an awful lot more about a piece of art you want to develop before you start it.

Ours is presently a small group which makes it that much cozier. I really enjoyed seeing other people’s sketches and was not nearly self conscious as I thought I would be. In fact most people don’t care – they are the ones that feel more self-conscious.

I start with the architecture first and then start filling in with the people. I found that in drawing people publicly that if I wear dark sunglasses, and don’t move your head too much, no one can really tell if I’m drawing them. If they look uncomfortable I just act like I’m drawing the person by them. Works every time. I always worry that they might demand to own the illustration – that I might be forced to tear it up. Strangely; critiques and such are welcome.

Do you enjoy sketching/painting in public?

More Ascender’s Perspective Renderings on this blog.

We headed up Highway 1 to Stinson Beach for Christmas. Lunch on the beach as we watched a family (school?) of dolphins swimming up the coast.

“In 2002, a surfer was attacked by a 12-to-15-foot-long
great white shark, while surfing off Stinson Beach.
The young man survived, but received more than 100 stitches
to close his wounds…. In 1998, Jonathan Kathrein was
attacked by a great white shark, straight out from the
main lifeguard tower. The surf off Stinson Beach is within
an area known as the Red Triangle, where there have
been an unusually high number of shark attacks.”
(Stinson Beach Wiki)

We watched the fishing boats bring tomorrow’s menu items into harbor. Marauding seagulls have been known to swoop in on diners from time to time.

Beginning in the 19th century, Stinson Beach ranches used the rolling hills to raise milk cows. (They do look like happy cows, don’t they?)

In 1870, the first road was built along the Pacific coast from Sausalito, California, and a tent settlement sprang up amongst the willow trees at the beach, which gave rise to the town’s original name, Willow Camp.

I am not sure what this is; near the beach – some sort of iron ‘something or other’ that was sunken in the Bolinas Lagoon. They decorated it for Christmas.

“The 2010 Census reported that 629 people (99.5% of the population)
lived in households, 3 (0.5%) lived in non-institutionalized
group quarters, and 0 (0%) were institutionalized.”
(Stinson Beach Wiki)

Redwoods Haus Bed & Breakfast; very kitschy. Like staying in someone else’s (an older, distant relative) house… A brass unicorn door fixture, a guitar in the shared living room, tons of (yes, they still exist) VHS videos galore, and packed full of funky soulful knick-knacks that give off a glow of a thrift/antique store vibe.

This was a quick photo out the car window… a carousel horse in a back yard.

Near Dogtown. I always take a photo of this place when passing it. Wouldn’t you love to flip this place? (Have you seen FlipMen? My latest addiction. Biohazards, squatters, meth labs, and goldmines – all in a day’s work.)

That one is for Carla who taught me to say “Pet Your Llama” for “Petaluma”

Painting on a building near Stinson Beach.

No paint-by-number that one. Speaking of Paint By Number… (that was smooth wasn’t it?) I have had a few requests to redo the PBN exchange. I have a lot of projects which are up in the air; so I mentioned that I would do a shout out to any other blogger who might want to host a PBN exchange at your convenience. Drop me a note, if so.

End of the day; heading back home on 101; coming out of the tunnel and seeing the Golden Gate in the distance.

Below is a photo I took today; it looks like my Lumix is not going to last much longer. This is actually three separate photos glommed together into one. (Sigh.)

What kind of camera do you recommend?

Here I am… happily attending the Burlingame Art Society 2011 Holiday Awards Luncheon. I received a $100 scholarship toward the purchase of a sturdy and adjustable easel. Woot! Check the BAS scholarship page if you wish to read more of this scholarship.

The Awards Luncheon was held at the Elks Club in San Mateo this year (Thus; the photo of the elk adorned in Christmas lights in the above photo) (Just in case you were wondering how I was going to weave that into the story )

Cryptic and subtle green, hedgerows
Hiding mysterious deer, the start
Of a rabbit, as if towers and clouds
Had suddenly shadowed an open field—
These would be the events of the day,
Life having narrowed down to please
Natural hungers and thirsts, the grass
Thick at our feet, and, above our heads,
The stars, their fireworks anemones.

Another Life by Howard Moss

Title: I Rose From Marsh Mud. (cropped)Medium: Acrylics on stretched canvas. 10-3/4″ x 12-3/4″ ” Purchase this original piece of art through Paypal $75.00 + shipping with Priority Mail Flat Rate.

“I rose from marsh mud
algae, equisetum, willows,
sweet green, noisy
birds and frogs.”
Lorine Niedecker

Niedecker was born on Black Hawk Island near Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin and lived most of her life in rural isolation. She grew up surrounded by the sights and sounds of the river until she moved to Fort Atkinson to attend school. This world of birds, trees, water and marsh was to inform her poetry for the rest of her life. Niedecker’s earliest poetry was marked by her reading of the Imagists, whose work she greatly admired and of surrealism.

Above and below; cropped views of I Rose From Marsh Mud.

This acrylic painting evolved on it’s own; and as I do with my dry pastels. I place paintbrush to canvas and just begin, turning and looking closely to what is emerging on the stretch canvas. It is my first painting on canvas, rather than dry pastels, in which I have used this methodof not having a preconceived image in mind prior to beginning.

I hope you enjoy viewing it and questioning it’s message as much as I did creating it.

Title: Snow Angel. Medium: Collage on Paper. 11″×17″ . Sold.

Snow in California? Ok – not so much. I keep thinking I’ll wake up to some. But the the weather’s been uncommonly nice.

What’s it like living in Northern California during the holiday season?

The cold beach sand does not crunch like snow. It can take some getting used to. Growing up in Iowa, I knew winter was approaching by the falling snow and the breath of vapor I saw each time I exhaled. But here… well… you look around you see palm trees swaying in the warm breeze, an abundance of freshly manicured green grass lawns, and a landscape filled with freshly blooming flowers!

Hmmm; it’s kind of like having your Christmas ‘wish’ every day of the year.

Regardless; we all decorate our homes with white snowflakes.

Out of the bosom of the Air,
Out of the cloud-folds of her garments shaken,
Over the woodlands brown and bare
Over the harvest-fields forsaken,
Silent and soft and slow
Descends the snow.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

(I must be nostalgic for snow… right now I am reading A Winter Haunting by Dan Simmons, Spies by Michael Frayn and Picasso by Timothy Hilton)
What are you reading?

“With darkness closing in on him, Dale decides to return to his boyhood home in Illinois. Drawn by a recurring nightmare that has plagued him since his youth – and a troubling certainty that something is waiting for him there … he reaches the outskirts of the dying town of Elm Haven. There, he moves into the abandoned farmhouse that was once the home of his closest boyhood friend, the strange and brilliant Duane McBride, who lost his young life in a grisly “accident” back in the terrible summer of 1960. Hoping to find peace in isolation, he settles in for the long, harsh winter.” (Dan Simmons)

Title: Inside Blizzards. Medium: Collage on Paper. 11″×17″ . Sold.
text: “blizzard flurry confusion; inside snow”

Annie; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Laying With The Lily; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Dreams of Queens; Collage on Tile print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Click here for Ascender’s remaining limited run (25 ea) prints.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – they won’t be listed here again at this sensational price.
I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95.

(above) “The Beast“; Photo. NFS

This may not look like it – but it’s a self portrait. If you look into the reflection of the bowl; that is me in the center.

Again this year I am fortunate enough to take the photos as the work being done. Do I have a system worked out, or what?

We are all about the turkey stuffing around here – I’m talking about the crunchy bits on top of course. My favorite Thanksgiving component. What’s yours?

Our secret ingredients. Shhhh…

Now it is five – six hours of sports…

Phew; exhausting.

(Check out this fun gif of playing with seven dogs by the amazing photographer; Emily DeWan. (blog))

This is Co Co (or is it Ko Ko?) doing all the work around here.

And this is Co Co’s mom; the beautiful Jade, returning to a very tired puppy.

Chow.

And then it’s on to pie. Please; let there be pie. Pie, pie; me – oh my, I love pie.

(above) Another Scatterlings (in progress!) It’s what’s on my desk this week. I find it sometimes difficult to walk away from a piece in progress. This series is going to have a bit of a twist and I find myself enthused to see the end product.

Speaking of new Scatterlings… did you notice that I uploaded my remaining Scatterlings Minis on their own page? They are priced perfectly for that last minute Christmas gift; if I do say so myself.

And in progress…

Above is sneak peek to a new acrylics on canvas – I will be blogging about it in full in a few days. It is different from my usual work with the impromptu factor I use within my dry pastel works.

My collage journaling book (above) is now so fat that it now opens in a complete circle and can no longer close. Sometimes I feel driven to finish it, though I realize with the details I am placing in each it will be a very, very long time before it will be truly finished.

If I told you that I have already spent more then a thousand hours on it would you be unduly impressed?

While my interests within the arts are diverse, creativity is my single-minded passion. It’s great to get out and take some photos and get re-energized. I hope to get some great photos in a new neighborhood (to me) on Thanksgiving.

Our Thanksgiving weather will be rain, followed by rain, with a little bit of rain on the side.

I have been working on bringing newcomers to my bird feeder. Here is our latest feathered friend who has given up it’s shyness to join us. My little chick-a-dee. I think it looks cuddly. They seem to travel in groups and have very loud voices before they land.

We hope to create some of those hanging pinecones with peanut butter and bird feed stuffed inside to attract assorted breeds. Anyone have some intriguing recipes?

(above) Title: Aztec Drum Adornment. Medium: Photo. NFS.

Just one (more) (very belated) post for Stephanie’s (of Rodrigvitz Style) and Rebecca’s (of Recuerda mi Corazon) Dia de Bloglandia.

In most regions of Mexico, November 1 honors children and infants, whereas deceased adults are honored on November 2.

This is indicated by generally referring to November 1 mainly as Día de los Inocentes (“Day of the Innocents”) but also as Día de los Angelitos (“Day of the Little Angels”) and November 2 as Día de los Muertos or Día de los Difuntos (“Day of the Dead”).

Scholars trace the origins of the modern Mexican holiday to indigenous observances dating back hundreds of years and to an Aztec festival dedicated to a goddess called Mictecacihuatl. She is said now to preside over the contemporary festival as well. This festival celebrates the living while honoring the dead.

Aztec culture and history is primarily known through archaeological evidence found in excavations such as that of the renowned Templo Mayor in Mexico City and many others, from indigenous bark paper codices…

from eyewitness accounts by Spanish conquistadors such as Hernán Cortés and Bernal Díaz del Castillo, and Spanish clergymen such as the famous Florentine Codex compiled by the Franciscan monk Bernardino de Sahagún with the help of indigenous Aztec informants.

On November 1st and 2nd people go to cemeteries to be with the souls of the departed and build private altars containing the favorite foods and beverages…

as well as photos and memorabilia of the departed.

The intent is to encourage visits by the souls, so that the souls will hear the prayers and the comments of the living directed to them.

Celebrations can take a humorous tone, as celebrants remember funny events and anecdotes about the departed.

During the three-day period, families usually clean and decorate graves…

most visit the cemeteries where their loved ones are buried and decorate their graves with ofrendas (“offerings”), which often include orange mexican marigolds.

Day of the Dead: Unique Memorials — image slideshow by Life magazine

Young Fiber Artist; Pointillsm/Stippling; Pen & Ink. Sold.
More Pointillim/Stippling on this blog.

Creative work is play. It is free speculation using materials of ones chosen form.
Stephen Nachmanovitch

I captured this particular image in a children’s art center, going on to work it in pen and ink as she reminds me a great deal of my oldest daughter.

Fiber art is a style of fine art which uses textiles such as fabric, yarn, and natural and synthetic fibers. It focuses on the materials and on the manual labour involved as part of its significance.

Fiber artists face the same dilemma of all artists; determining “what is art?” More so with fiber arts, in that even if a particular potholder or doily is pleasing aesthetically, does that make it art?

Typically, pieces like potholders, which just follow patterns without doing anything more, are not considered works of fiber art. Fiber art works are works of art that communicate some sort of message, emotion or meaning and go beyond just the literal meaning of the materials. Fiber arts face the challenge at times of the message or meaning of the work of art being eclipsed by the study of the materials used and their history, rather than what they contribute to the overall work of art.

Five amazing fiber art blogs:

Laura Lee Burch

TAFA

Melanie Testa

ragged cloth cafe

Spirit Cloth

I am sorry to say that the above Young Fiber Artist is old out. Browse remaining pointillism prints from a huge selection of limited run (25 ea) prints.

A Passion For The Past; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Touch of Culture; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Decade of Growth; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Sombrero Surprise; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

A Few Of My Favorite Things; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – they won’t be listed here again at this sensational price.
I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95.

Title: Calavera Confectionary Medium: Acrylics on stretched canvas. 24″ x 18″. Sold.

I have only slipped away into the next room, I am I and you are you. Whatever we were to each other, that we still are. Call me by my old familiar name. Speak to me in the easy way which you always used. Play, smile, think of me. All is well.”
Henry Scott Holland

According to popular belief, on Dia de los Muertos the spirits of the dead return to commune with the living. Dedicated to remembering and honoring those that have passed before us, the celebration also focuses on the artistic expression of the living as families leave homemade offerings for these deceased family members. Decorated sugar skulls are part of these offerings, along with food such as pan de muerto, candles, marigolds, and folk art skeletons, to name just a few things that can decorate specially-designed altars.

Day of the Dead wiki

Join these two sites on November 1st, 2011 for Dia de Bloglandia; a blog celebration of the tradition of Dia de los Muertos, honoring loved ones that have passed. Links to tens (hundreds?) (thousands?) of blogs with a works of art, journal pages, shrines, essays or a poems to share: rodrigvitzstyle and corazon

5 blogs with altars for the Day Of The Dead: Crafting The Sacred, terrallectualism, lauriezuckerman, celebrate-day-of-the-dead, elinterior

5 blogs talking about the Dia de Los Muertos: Ilikemargarine, ofrenda, lrntn, dayofthedeadoaxaca, birzerphoto

5 Blogs showing sugar skulls: theworld, sbthp, babycenter, creatingthehive, skulladay

(image above – front of Two-Sided ATC/ACEO
Text: teardrop waterfall
below – back of Two-Sided ATC/ACEO). Sorry, this two-sided atc/aceo is sold.)

Autumn is definitely my favorite season; something about the shorter days that makes me want to head to the kitchen and back something. I also love the fact that soon we can light the fireplace, and I can settle into my gold wingback armchair and read. (Right now I am reading Fear & Art by David Bayles, The Hiding Place by Trezza Azzopardi and Muse and Reverie by Charles de Lint)

What I love most about autumn are the colors. While we don’t get the dramatic leaf show that I grew up with in the MidWest – the trees and vines that do turn, pop out suddenly when the weather shifts dramatically. One moment there is fog, and the next bright sunshine. After the burnt out end of summer, everything turns a baked brown, it’s a virtual kaleidoscope of colors.

In the deep fall
don’t you imagine the leaves think how
comfortable it will be to touch
the earth instead of the
nothingness of air and the endless
freshets of wind? And don’t you think
the trees themselves, especially those with mossy,
warm caves, begin to think

of the birds that will come — six, a dozen — to sleep
inside their bodies? And don’t you hear
the goldenrod whispering goodbye,
the everlasting being crowned with the first
tuffets of snow? The pond
vanishes, and the white field over which
the fox runs so quickly brings out
its blue shadows. And the wind pumps its
bellows. And at evening especially,
the piled firewood shifts a little,
longing to be on its way.

Mary Oliver

AscenderRisesAbove is proud to present a huge selection on a limited run (25 ea) prints.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – they won’t be listed here again at this sensational price.
I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95.

Special Medicine Woman Healing; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Tightrope Walker; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Laying With The Lily; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Sanctuary of Grace© Scatterlings©.
30″w x 20″h; Matted and Framed: 40″w x 28″h.
One-of-a-kind (!) Framed and Matted Scatterlings now available for purchase. Sold.
Or pick up a print for only $17

Scatterlings is a collection of self-directed enchantment art which combines actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums. Hidden among the actual and rendered foliage are an enchanted assortment of Scatterlings; mythical animals and fairies. Jacquelyn succeeds in forming ’something’ out of ‘the nothing’ often overlooked in everyday life. These one-of-a-kind folk art pieces take up to a year to complete as flowers and leaves are collected, pressed, preserved and finally hidden within a vision that evolves continually. (Mixed Media; Pressed Foliage, Watercolor, Colored Pencil, Pen and Ink on Handmade Paper)

Jacquelyn allows her visionary concepts to evolve with this wonderfully detailed collection of fine arts. To review this collection is to allow yourself a glimpse in this journey of intuitiveness by creating a completely new non-traditional art concept.

Sanctuary of Grace; click on image for larger view. Pick up a print for only $17. limited-run 11×17 print + shipping and handling.

Guess who went to the Picasso exhibit at the de Young.

It’s a large selection of works from the Musée National Picasso in Paris, which is currently being renovated.

Picasso is a fountainhead of quantity, styles, innovation, reinvention and powerful inspiration for his contemporaries and generations following him. Even with a roughly chronological order through the galleries, there is dizzying variety in each room. It’s difficult to believe that so many styles — some radically different works are displayed side by side — could come from one artist. It’s almost easier to discuss what’s not there than what is.

Sadly I was not able to use my camera inside the gallery.

Instead here are a few photos of Picasso upon emerging from the gallery.

Besides identification tags and a few Picasso quotes high up on the walls, there is no explanatory text in the galleries. This is a stipulation of the lending museum, which does not want anything to distract viewers from the art.

There isn’t a medium he didn’t explore; he experienced everything he could get his hands on. But he was not without his flaws and the show reflected upon this with such compassionate beauty, highlighting his sufferings, his losses of loved ones, his denizens of women, his children, his loves and unloved; revealing how these personal experiences effected his art at its’ very core, making this show a must see for any and everyone that has a creative spirit.

No matter the tragedy, if you are truly passionate, your passion can save you and lift you up into the ether.

Unlike most artists’ studios, Picasso’s work space was, for him, a lifeline to what was going on around him. What happened in the studio rarely escaped the artist’s eye and his studio life often provided the dollop of paint into which he dipped his brush.

Recently I learned that Picasso was never allowed a childhood; he was immediately thrown into the hands of his parents the moment his talent was discovered. To have a normal childhood and to draw like a child would have conflicted with his very strict father. Picasso’s father’s admiration of his son’s talent turned into a father-son rivalry that caused Picasso to leave his childhood behind and rebel.

“It’s funny that I never made children’s drawings. Never. Not even when I was very little. I remember one of my first drawings. I was maybe six, or even younger. There was a Hercules with his club standing in the hall of our house. So I sat down in the hall and drew the Hercules. But it wasn’t a child’s drawing, it was a real drawing that represented Hercules with his club.”

To have the talent to draw Hercules at the age of six, Picasso had to give up a most cherished part of life: his own childhood.

BTW… my favorite Picasso? Portrait of Olga In An Armchair. It made me itch to get home and put paintbrush to canvas.

Masked; Pointillsm/Stippling; Pen & Ink. Sold.
More Pointillim/Stippling on this blog.

I cannot grow
I have no shadow
To run away from,
I only play
WH Auden

Browse available pointillism prints from a huge selection of limited run (25 ea) prints.

A Passion For The Past; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Touch of Culture; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Decade of Growth; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Sombrero Surprise; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

A Few Of My Favorite Things; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – they won’t be listed here again at this sensational price.
I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95.

Burning Man festival participants have come to expect art that impresses, outdoes previous projects, and pushes the limits of scale, engineering, and visual spectacle. Tens of thousands of participants gather in Nevada’s Black Rock Desert to create Black Rock City, dedicated to community, art, self-expression, and self-reliance. They depart one week later, having left no trace whatsoever.

At 2010′s festival, one work stood out among the rest. Both visually breathtaking and a feat of construction, Marco Cochrane’s Bliss Dance.

When Marco begins a sculpture, he asks his models to be themselves. At first they respond by posing, but after a while they start to relax and just be. The models demonstrate what Marco seeks – the pure expression and the core truth we all share; unfiltered magnificence we see in babies and small children.

It is hard for each model to believe at first, but then they see it too: what they have done is real, be it angry or sad or blissed out or dancing – it comes from their centers. Remarkably, this rare glimpse is captured in the sculpture, retaining the raw emotion for eternity. Marco’s sculptures express the profound beauty and true essence of who they are.

Title: “I Know There Is Hope”; Journaling in Collage, NFS

I know there is hope
But where, when, how?

Just keep looking within,
look back, look ahead,
imagine, dream

All that I desire.
I will be.

I continue to work on what seems like my “Never-Ending Scrap Journal”. I open to a page within and work on it. I look ahead and work on it. I look behind and work on it. I imagine it and I work on it. I dream and I work on it.

I try not to control it, what comes out on the page. I try not to judge or remove what doesn’t make sense, or is not martketable.

I let it be.

Want more journaling?

It’s a Paint-By-Number world…

Bridge being painted over by South San Francisco.

Here’s What’s On My Desk right now. Acrylics on stretched canvas.

Until my paintbrush broke.

I was sure there must be some way to fix it. I tried stuffing it all in there and pinching the metal-job-y with pliers. Nope. I tried twisting the metal-job-y with the pliers. Nope.

I set it aside to watch the afternoon news. I got sucked into a Hoarders marathon.

Then I got up and threw that brush away.

(Photo: Sunset at Fort Funsten)

Bring me the sunset in a cup.
Emily Dickinson

An Indian Summer evening here in California.

September Equinox – it’s time, again, to wear socks. In Annapolis, Maryland in the United States, boatyard employees and sailboat owners celebrate the spring equinox with the Burning Of The Socks festival. Traditionally, the boating community wears socks only during the winter. These are burned at the approach of warmer weather, which brings more customers and work to the area. Officially, nobody then wears socks until the next equinox.

The History Today Quiz: October 2011. There are no prizes for getting them all right, just the respect and admiration of your peers.

So sad; Farewell, ReadyMakers

Scatterlings “Unscene”©
Original now available for sale; 30″w x 20″h; Matted and Framed: 40″w x 28″h.
One-of-a-kind (!) Framed and Matted Scatterlings now available for purchase.
Or pick up a print for only $17

Scatterlings© is a collection of self-directed enchantment art which combines actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums. Hidden among the actual and rendered foliage are an enchanted assortment of Scatterlings; mythical animals and fairies. These one-of-a-kind folk art pieces take up to a year to complete as flowers and leaves are collected, pressed, preserved and finally hidden within a vision that evolves continually. (Mixed Media; Pressed Foliage, Watercolor, Colored Pencil, Pen and Ink on Handmade Paper)

Title: Acceleration. Medium: Pointillism/Stippling; Pen and Ink; Prints are sold out.
Remaining Pointillism/Stippling Limited Run Prints here.
More Ascender’s Pointillism on this blog

It was Mabbie without the grammar school gates.
And Mabbie was all of seven.
And Mabbie was cut from a chocolate bar.
And Mabbie thought life was heaven.

The grammar school gates were the pearly gates,
For Willie Boone went to school.
When she sat by him in history class
Was only her eyes were cool.

It was Mabbie without the grammar school gates
Waiting for Willie Boone.
Half hour after the closing bell!
He would surely be coming soon.

Oh, warm is the waiting for joys, my dears!
And it cannot be too long.
Oh, pity the little poor chocolate lips
That carry the bubble of song!

Out came the saucily bold Willie Boone.
It was woe for our Mabbie now.
He wore like a jewel a lemon-hued lynx
With sand-waves loving her brow.

It was Mabbie alone by the grammar school gates.
Yet chocolate companions had she:
Mabbie on Mabbie with hush in the heart.
Mabbie on Mabbie to be.

The Ballad of Chocolate Mabbie by Gwendolyn Brooks
Gwendolyn Brooks Wiki
More Gwendolyn Brooks Poetry

~ • ~

Remaining Limited Run Prints here.
These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated.
Click on images to see poster in full.
These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – a great opportunity to purchase.
I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition.
Shipping: $4.95.
(Contact me at AscenderRisesAbove if you wish to purchase multiple prints and I will adjust the shipping price.)

A Passion For The Past; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Touch of Culture; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.<

Decade of Growth; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Sombrero Surprise; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

A Few Of My Favorite Things; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Title: Yesterday’s News; Photo. More Ascender’s Photos on this blog

a new year–
the same nonsense
piled on nonsense
Haiku of Kobayashi Issa

~ ~ • ~ ~

What Does a Year of Garbage Look Like? at Organizing LA

Starting over with a clean sheet and a tidy studio at Making A Mark

Kirsty Hall – Tidying the Studio and Living with Less

Open Studios around the world

Title: “Clearing After Dark”; Journaling in Collage, NFS

I Never Travel Without My Diary… One Must Always Have Something Sensational To Read On The Train.
Oscar Wilde

Techniques of collage were first used at the time of the invention of paper in China around 200 BC. The use of collage, however, remained very limited until the 10th century in Japan, when calligraphers began to apply glued paper, using texts on surfaces, when writing their poems. The techniques fascinate me. Collage work is intuitive. Naturally stories construct themselves as pieces are pasted images together. I am swept away, by words that flow, and images that surface .

What happens to us growing up? We begin to fear criticism, and tend to keep our creativity to ourselves. Many people keep journals, of writing or sketching, but not many share them with people. (When was the last time a friend invited you to read their diary?)
1000 Journals

See 5 more collage journaling at:

Be Dream Play

Crescendoh

iHannah

orly

cut + paste

(Below – “Hide And Seek Me”; Journaling in Collage, NFS)

Above: B/W; Perspective Rendering in Pen/Fluorescent Ink on Paper.

~ •  ~

Take one Pompeii-eyed old man
with a brush, poised in midair
near Mont Sainte-Victoire,
take one strange young man
filled with light,
bopping at the piano
in Minton’s.

who are you, dull-eyed
mathematical seer?
Who are you —
monsoon-sound maker?

I force the two of you
together — mix you
in a blue bowl and
you rise like a Blake fantasy —
a vorticism unto yourself,
left-handed with keys and brushes.
I call you Cézmonk…

In Walked Bud With a Palette By Clarence Major

~ •  ~

More Ascender’s Perspective Renderings on this blog.

It’s ripe, the melon
by our sink. Yellow,
bee-bitten, soft, it perfumes
the house too sweetly.
At five I wake, the air
mournful in its quiet.
My wife’s eyes swim calmly
under their lids, her mouth and jaw
relaxed, different.
What is happening in the silence
of this house? Curtains
hang heavily from their rods.
Ficus leaves tremble
at my footsteps. Yet
the colors outside are perfect–
orange geranium, blue lobelia.
I wander from room to room
like a man in a museum:
wife, children, books, flowers,
melon. Such still air. Soon
the mid-morning breeze will float in
like tepid water, then hot.
How do I start this day,
I who am unsure
of how my life has happened
or how to proceed
amid this warm and steady sweetness?

August Morning by Albert Garcia

The poems of Albert Garcia teach us the essentials of how to live richly with exactly what we have. By attending to ordinary life with extraordinary sensitivity, they tap the mystery that lies like an aquifer below the surface of things, quietly informing everything we do. We come away refreshed, feeling wiser and more compassionate, our senses sharpened. (amazon)

To live richly with exactly what we have:

Stencils, masks, and stamps

Quiet mornings

Song of Tanzania

I must have been a happy baby

Vegetable smile

The lives of ants

“Self Portrait”. NFS
Original 30″w x 20″h; Matted and Framed: 40″w x 28″h
One-of-a-kind (!) Framed and Matted Scatterlings now available for purchase.
Or pick up a print for only $17

~ ~ • ~ ~

I see myself in the shadows of a leaf
compressed to the green blades growing
to a point like the shards of miles of mirrors
falling and cracking to perfect gardens.

I never inspect the withered assumption
of my face’s petty dialogue in raindrops,
the deceptive spreading of the words
oozing from the skin to the edges of water
etched on the ground by gravity and wishing.

Passing for the seriousness of my eye,
platitudes of my white collar or
the perfect posture of my lips, it skirts
from the leaves of the plant hiding me
and sits stoic like stone in my pupil,
mute and unassuming, like Rashi.

To gather myself I will swim naked
in the wind, bending my blind elbows
in circles, stopping now to dance
like the cherubic gold on the ark,
and gather myself from the particles
of this excitement another structure,
one closely resembling the beginning.

Self-Portrait by Afaa Michael Weaver b. 1951

detail

Scatterlings© is a collection of self-directed enchantment art which combines actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums. Hidden among the actual and rendered foliage are an enchanted assortment of Scatterlings; mythical animals and fairies. These one-of-a-kind folk art pieces take up to a year to complete as flowers and leaves are collected, pressed, preserved and finally hidden within a vision that evolves continually. (Mixed Media; Pressed Foliage, Watercolor, Colored Pencil, Pen and Ink on Handmade Paper)

detail

detail

detail
detail

AscenderRisesAbove is proud to present a huge selection on a limited run 11″ x17″ prints.

These posters are printed on 80 lbDull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!)
Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print.
These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – a great opportunity to purchase one of these 50 assorted images. They won’t be listed here again at this sensational price. I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95.

Jacquelyn L. Berl … is a versatile and prolific artist with a strong drive towards finding an original signature style. She creates art with a seemingly unlimited assortment of media, fusing various schools and trends into a conglomerate body of work. I would categorize her style as gravitating towards the surreal, often with fabulous qualities; it characterizes in various degrees her mixed media works, collages, ink, watercolor and oil paintings. To my mind Berl achieves best results with the more combinative efforts, and while the more traditional artwork exhibits engaging pristine and figurative qualities, it is in the more complex and “dirty” pieces that her creative potential finds a unique outlet.

Viewing the “Scatterlings (c),” … is a rich and magical experience — not surprising considering the “mythical animals and fairies” … Jaquelyn alludes to gravity, which forces the leaves and the plants she uses down to earth. Thus she may be proposing an idealized artistic view of the physical world around us, everyday objects being the media and the ground they rest upon the surface. But even without this allegory, her artwork bears a purely visual resemblance to abstract expressionism, all the while retaining the concrete form of the inserted magical characters — the result is a fascinating surreal mishmash.

Clever use of perspective, compositional rhythm and color toning, combined with actual flora creates a bewitching effect of three-dimensionality. I cannot decide whether the artist panders to the younger audience by incorporating real objects, seeking to emulate depth with actual depth on the paper, but it certainly appeals to the child in me, evoking an inner smile. I also think that it is this kind of works of art that more than usual encourages children to want to become artists — it could be the appeal of using objects found in nature, something every playful kid does as a matter of fact anyway.

Elijah at Art & Critique

above – front of Two-Sided ATC/ACEO
Text: teardrop waterfall
(below – back of Two-Sided ATC/ACEO). Sorry, this two-sided atc/aceo is sold.

Between people’s
ideals
and their realization
there is always
a greater drop
than in the highest
of waterfalls…
Perpetuum Mobile by Marin Sorescu 1936–1996 (full text)

~~ • ~~

I’ve just begun reading The Way The Crow Flies by Ann-Marie Macdonald. What are you reading?

Wish to explore more? Check out:

Lucian Freud’s passing

Fridamania

Victorian furniture with zing

Chariot of the Gods

Assemblage Dresses

~~ • ~~

AscenderRisesAbove is proud to present a huge selection on a limited run (25 ea) prints.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – they won’t be listed here again at this sensational price.
I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95.

Close Your Eyes And Pretend You’ll Be Strong Soon; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

I’ve Read Of Bravery; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Paying Jobs, Detective, Doctor, Lawyer; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Title: “The Investment”; Medium: Pointillism/Stippling; Pen and Ink; Prints are sold out.
More Ascender’s Pointillism on this blog.
Remaining Pointillism/Stippling Limited Run Prints here.

Late, I have come to a parched land
doubting my gift, if gift I have,
the inspiration of water
spilt, swallowed in the sand.

To hear once more water trickle,
to stand in a stretch of silence
the divining pen twisting in the hand:
sign of depths alluvial.

Water owns no permanent shape,
sags, is most itself descending;
now, under the shadow of the idol,
dry mouth and dry landscape.

No rain falls with a refreshing sound
to settle tubular in a well,
elliptical in a bowl. No grape
lusciously moulds it round.

Clouds have no constant resemblance
to anything, blown by a hot wind,
flying mirages; the blue background,
light constructions of chance.

To hold back chaos I transformed
amorphous mass—and fire and cloud—
so that the agèd gods might dance
and golden structures form.

I should have built, plain brick on brick,
a water tower. The sun flies on
arid wastes, barren hells too warm
and me with a hazel stick!

Rivulets vanished in the dust
long ago, great compositions
vaporized, salt on the tongue so thick
that drinking, still I thirst.

Repeated desert, recurring drought,
sometimes hearing water trickle,
sometimes not, I, by doubting first,
believe; believing, doubt.

The Water Diviner by Dannie Abse b. 1923

~~~

Remaining Limited Run Prints here.
These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated.
Click on images to see poster in full.
These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – a great opportunity to purchase.
I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition.
Shipping: $4.95.
(Contact me at AscenderRisesAbove if you wish to purchase multiple prints and I will adjust the shipping price.)

A Passion For The Past; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Touch of Culture; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.<

Decade of Growth; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Sombrero Surprise; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

A Few Of My Favorite Things; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Well, my friends give me purple flowers and orange tea
and goosedown spinning quilts and torquoise chairs
we greet one another in a wild profusion of words
and wave farewell amidst the wonderment of air
In the laughing times we know we are lucky
In the quiet times we know that we are blessed
And we will not be alone
Dar Williams

Orange Interiors at Apartment Therapy

Nasturium Orange at Rodrigvitz Style

Orange Accents at Poppytalk

Orange! at Urban Sketchers

Orange Miniature Realities at Lenscratch

above – front of Two-Sided ATC/ACEO
Text: Whaling Ship. When I visited the Maldive Islands I took a boat to a secluded island. Sworn to Secrecy
(below – back of Two-Sided ATC/ACEO). Sorry, this two-sided atc/aceo is sold.

The world below the brine,
Forests at the bottom of the sea, the branches and leaves,
Sea-lettuce, vast lichens, strange flowers and seeds,
the thick tangle openings, and pink turf,
Different colors, pale gray and green, purple, white, and gold,
the play of light through the water,
Dumb swimmers there among the rocks, coral, gluten, grass, rushes,
and the aliment of the swimmers,
Sluggish existences grazing there suspended, or slowly crawling close to the bottom,
The sperm-whale at the surface blowing air and spray, or disporting with his flukes,
The leaden-eyed shark, the walrus, the turtle, the hairy sea-leopard, and the sting-ray,
Passions there, wars, pursuits, tribes, sight in those ocean-depths, breathing that thick-breathing air, as so many do,
The change thence to the sight here, and to the subtle air breathed by beings
like us who walk this sphere,
The change onward from ours to that of beings who walk other spheres.
The World below the Brine By Walt Whitman 1819–1892

AscenderRisesAbove is proud to present a huge selection on a limited run (25 ea) prints.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – they won’t be listed here again at this sensational price.
I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95.

Annie; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

The Skating Rage, Double Turns, Figure Eights, Skating Backwards; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

The Parlor Door; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Title: Kitchen, Perspective Rendering. Medium: Watercolor on Crescent Board.
Inquire about a rendering of your home. More Perspective Renderings on this blog. More Ascender’s Watercolors on homepage and this blog.

It’s a kitchen. Its curtains fill
with a morning light so bright
you can’t see beyond its windows
into the afternoon. A kitchen
falling through time with its things
in their places, the dishes jingling
up in the cupboard, the bucket
of drinking water rippled as if
a truck had just gone past, but that truck
was thirty years. No one’s at home
in this room. Its counter is wiped,
and the dishrag hangs from its nail,
a dry leaf. In housedresses of mist,
blue aprons of rain, my grandmother
moved through this life like a ghost,
and when she had finished her years,
she put them all back in their places
and wiped out the sink, turning her back
on the rest of us, forever.
A Room in the Past by Ted Kooser. Homepage. Wiki

“Flights of Childhood”© Original now available for sale.
Original 30″w x 20″h; Matted and Framed: 40″w x 28″h
Framed and Matted Scatterlings now available for purchase.
Or pick up a print for only $17

“the dreams of childhood – it’s airy fables, its graceful, beautiful, humane, impossible adornments of the world beyond; so good to be believed in once, so good to be remembered when outgrown…”
— Charles Dickens

Scatterlings© is a collection of self-directed enchantment art which combines actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums. Hidden among the actual and rendered foliage are an enchanted assortment of Scatterlings; mythical animals and fairies. These one-of-a-kind folk art pieces take up to a year to complete as flowers and leaves are collected, pressed, preserved and finally hidden within a vision that evolves continually. (Mixed Media; Pressed Foliage, Watercolor, Colored Pencil, Pen and Ink on Handmade Paper)

Jacquelyn L. Berl … is a versatile and prolific artist with a strong drive towards finding an original signature style. She creates art with a seemingly unlimited assortment of media, fusing various schools and trends into a conglomerate body of work. I would categorize her style as gravitating towards the surreal, often with fabulous qualities; it characterizes in various degrees her mixed media works, collages, ink, watercolor and oil paintings. To my mind Berl achieves best results with the more combinative efforts, and while the more traditional artwork exhibits engaging pristine and figurative qualities, it is in the more complex and “dirty” pieces that her creative potential finds a unique outlet.

Viewing the “Scatterlings (c),” … is a rich and magical experience — not surprising considering the “mythical animals and fairies” … Jaquelyn alludes to gravity, which forces the leaves and the plants she uses down to earth. Thus she may be proposing an idealized artistic view of the physical world around us, everyday objects being the media and the ground they rest upon the surface. But even without this allegory, her artwork bears a purely visual resemblance to abstract expressionism, all the while retaining the concrete form of the inserted magical characters — the result is a fascinating surreal mishmash.

Clever use of perspective, compositional rhythm and color toning, combined with actual flora creates a bewitching effect of three-dimensionality. I cannot decide whether the artist panders to the younger audience by incorporating real objects, seeking to emulate depth with actual depth on the paper, but it certainly appeals to the child in me, evoking an inner smile. I also think that it is this kind of works of art that more than usual encourages children to want to become artists — it could be the appeal of using objects found in nature, something every playful kid does as a matter of fact anyway.

Elijah at Art & Critique

Flights of Childhood; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in perfect condition. Shipping: $4.95.

See full line of remaining prints.

Be Kind (#1); Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Blessing the Birds; Collage on Tile print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Be Kind #2; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Three In The Bush – Acrylics on Canvas print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

AscenderRisesAbove is proud to present a huge selection on limited run (25 ea) of selected 11″ x17″ prints (here).

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!)

Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print.

These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – a great opportunity to purchase one. I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95.

This Child Lost; Pointillism/Stippling; Pen and India Ink; Prints are sold out.
More Ascender’s Pointillism on this blog.
Remaining Pointillism/Stippling Limited Run Prints here.

Out of the cradle endlessly rocking,
Out of the mocking-bird’s throat, the musical shuttle,
Out of the Ninth-month midnight,
Over the sterile sands, and the fields beyond,
where the child, leaving his bed,
wander’d alone, bare-headed, barefoot,
Down from the shower’d halo,
Up from the mystic play of shadows, twining and twisting as if they were alive,
Out from the patches of briers and blackberries,
From the memories of the bird that chanted to me,
From your memories, sad brother—from the fitful risings and fallings I heard,
From under that yellow half-moon, late-risen, and swollen as if with tears,
From those beginning notes of sickness and love, there in the transparent mist,
From the thousand responses of my heart, never to cease,
From the myriad thence-arous’d words,
From the word stronger and more delicious than any,
From such, as now they start, the scene revisiting,
As a flock, twittering, rising, or overhead passing,
Borne hither—ere all eludes me, hurriedly,
A man—yet by these tears a little boy again,
Throwing myself on the sand, confronting the waves,
I, chanter of pains and joys, uniter of here and hereafter,
Taking all hints to use them—but swiftly leaping beyond them,
A reminiscence sing. …
Out Of The Cradle Endlessly Rocking excerpt by Walt Whitma

Out Of The Cradle Endlessly Rocking; full text

Walt Whitman Wiki

Walt Whitman at Project Gutenberg

~~~

Remaining Limited Run Prints here.
These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated.
Click on images to see poster in full.
These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – a great opportunity to purchase.
I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition.
Shipping: $4.95.
(Contact me at AscenderRisesAbove if you wish to purchase multiple prints and I will adjust the shipping price.)

A Passion For The Past; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Touch of Culture; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.<

Decade of Growth; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Sombrero Surprise; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

A Few Of My Favorite Things; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

With freedom, books, flowers, and the moon, who could not be happy?
Oscar Wilde

Photos: Belmont California, Music In The Park, July 3, 2011. ©AscenderRisesAbove

Someone once told me that fear and courage are like lightning and thunder; they both start out at the same time, but the fear travels faster and arrives sooner. If we just wait a moment, the requisite courage will be along shortly.
Ralph Keyes (The Courage to Write: How Writers Transcend Fear)

The Trick Is Not to Rid Your Stomach Of Butterflies…; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image on the right for larger view of this print. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Title: Farm 3; Medium: Watercolor; Pen and India Ink on Crescent Board
More Ascender Perspective Renderings on this blog.
More Ascender Watercolors on this blog. Contact me directly to request a custom rendering.

… Into the rooms flow meadow airs,
The warm farm baking smell’s blown round.
Inside and out, and sky and ground
Are much the same; the wishing star,
Hesperus, kind and early born,
Is risen only finger-far;
All stars stand close in summer air,
And tremble, and look mild as amber;
When wicks are lighted in the chamber,
They are like stars which settled there…
Country Summer By Léonie Adams

We are continually overflowing toward those who preceded us, toward our origin, and toward those who seemingly come after us. … It is our task to imprint this temporary, perishable earth into ourselves so deeply, so painfully and passionately, that its essence can rise again “invisibly,” inside us. We are the bees of the invisible. We wildly collect the honey of the visible, to store it in the great golden hive of the invisible.”
— Rainer Maria Rilke

European Honey Bee aka Apis mellifera

Bees… in the hive… in a tree.. in a museum… located at CuriOdyssey (formerly known as Coyote Point Museum)

Bee colonies are transferred from bee keepers. From time to time when the colony loses a queen or swarms, the bee keeper will come in and install a new colony from one of his hives. Honeybees have been colonized on every continent except Antarctica.
Queen’s lifespan is 2 years. The life span of a worker bee varies according to the time of year; approximately 28 to 35 days. Workers that are reared in September and October, however, can live through the winter.

Honey bees’ wings stroke 11,400 times per minute, thus making their distinctive buzz.

“In Search of a Miracle”© Original now available for sale (read more).
Original 30″w x 20″h; Matted and Framed: 40″w x 28″h

“Maybe we should develop a Crayola bomb as our next secret weapon. A happiness weapon. A beauty bomb. And every time a crisis developed, we would launch one. It would explode high in the air – explode softly – and send thousands, millions, of little parachutes into the air. Floating down to earth – boxes of Crayolas. And we wouldn’t go cheap, either – not little boxes of eight. Boxes of sixty-four, with the sharpener built right in. With silver and gold and copper, magenta and peach and lime, amber and umber and all the rest. And people would smile and get a little funny look on their faces and cover the world with imagination.
Robert Fulghums

In Search of a Miracle; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!)

Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print.

These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – a great opportunity to purchase one of these 50 assorted images. They won’t be listed here again at this sensational price. I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95.

If you wish to order more then one print; contact me and I will combine shipping prices for you.

Beware Of People Who May Accidently Spill Something; Mixed Media. Prints sold out.
Remaining limited run print on this blog.

Accidently spilling… tumbling…. did you see how I tied those two in together? 

I didn’t really know what Tumblr was until Stephanie (her tumblr) mentioned it to me a month ago. I thought ‘Oh great – one more thing I don’t have time for…’

I already have a Linked In
and a Squidoo
and an Art Bistro
a Facebook
a Facebook Fan Page
and a Twitter

But I thought I would give it a try anyway.
And now I am addicted.

How to explain a Tumblr if you don’t have one? It is a little bit of everything: a little bit of WordPress, a little bit of Facebook, and a little bit of Twitter. Thank goodness it’s not about long, rambling blocks of text which most of us would rather not read. I am all about the “art candy” (I just made that word up)!

It is about what’s on your mind, but it takes into account that you think, dream of, and imagine. You can post anything: a short note, a video, a soundbite, or a picture. You can be as interesting and expressive as you can be (and probably really are.) Looking at a Tumblr page is like taking a peek into a person’s stream of consciousness.

Tumblr is to be reblogged consistently. It’s blogging as a conversation with other Tumblrs: individual streams of consciousness coming together to keep a conversation going. Do you have a Tumblr?  Talk to me!

The Luckiest Girl In The World #2; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

The No Good; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Soft Lullaby, Speaking Rain; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Do Things, Doing Things; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling

The Sisters Three; Pointillism/Stippling; Pen and Ink; Prints are sold out.
More Ascender’s Pointillism on this blog.

in Just-
spring when the world is mud-
luscious the little
lame balloonman
whistles far and wee
and eddieandbill come
running from marbles and
piracies and it’s
spring
when the world is puddle-wonderful
the queer
old balloonman whistles
far and wee
and bettyandisbel come dancing
from hop-scotch and jump-rope and
it’s
spring
and
the
goat-footed
balloonMan whistles
far
and
wee

[in just] by ee cummings

Remaining Limited Run Prints here. These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Click on images to see poster in full. These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – a great opportunity to purchase. They won’t be listed here again at this sensational price. I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95. (Contact me at AscenderRisesAbove if you wish to purchase multiple prints and I will adjust the shipping price.

A Passion For The Past; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Touch of Culture; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.<

Decade of Growth; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Sombrero Surprise; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

A Few Of My Favorite Things; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

I Was On A Journey To Catch The Sunrise From The Summit; Photo. More Ascender’s photos on this blog.

As from the house your mother sees
You playing round the garden trees,
So you may see, if you will look
Through the windows of this book,
Another child, far, far away,
And in another garden, play.
But do not think you can at all,
By knocking on the window, call
That child to hear you. He intent
Is all on his play-business bent.
He does not hear; he will not look,
Nor yet be lured out of this book.
For, long ago, the truth to say,
He has grown up and gone away,
And it is but a child of air
That lingers in the garden there.
To Any Reader by Robert Lewis Stevenson

(above) Practically Swept Away, Illuminated Tile; 4″ square marble tile – altered, Mixed Medium

I am burning. I have to live, I have to sing, I want to transform myself into a thousand different characters and carry their life with me onto the stage where it’s so bright and so dark at the same time, just knowing there are three thousand people out there longing to be swept away by the passion that’s about to flood out from scarlet curtains, to this I consecrate my body and my soul, I can give no more than all of myself, I feel my heart is a throbbing engine and my voice is the valve, like a wailing train, it has to sing or blow up, there’s too much fuel, too much fire, and what am I to do with this voice if I can’t let it out, it’s not just singing. I am here as a speck, but I don’t feel scared or about to be blown away, I feel like all New York is a warm embrace just waiting to enfold me. I am in love. But not with a person. I am passionately in love with my life.
— Ann-Marie MacDonald

(Contact me for Practically Swept Away, original tile, availability)

Practically Swept Away; Collage on Tile print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Under The Tuscan Sun, Altered Paint-By-Number

I could live there all alone, she thought, slowing the car to look down the winding garden path to the small blue front door with, perfectly, a white cat on the step. No one would ever find me there, either, behind all those roses, and just to make sure I would plant oleanders by the road. I will light a fire in the cool evenings and toast apples at my own hearth. I will raise white cats and sew white curtains for the windows and sometimes come out of my door to go to the store to buy cinnamon and tea and thread. People will come to me to have their fortunes told, and I will brew love potions for sad maidens; I will have a robin…”
— Shirley Jackson

I altered this paint-by-number; not for ‘the exchange‘, but for someone that I know has I watched “Under The Tuscan Sun” at least a hundred times. In fact it has become her ‘happy place’ and I wanted her to know that I know.

She’s always dreamed of a life in the beautiful countryside of Tuscany, a house of her own, with a big vineyard, sipping wine in her terrace enjoying a view of the rolling fields. Not to mention restoring a 300-yr-old villa, learning a new language and setting up a new life in the village. It’s more of the notion of leaving behind life’s baggage, moving on and finding what one really wants in life.

I used Golden Acrylic including the Interference Acrylics and the Iridescent Acrylics.

When Interference Acrylic colors are viewed from different angles the colors “flip” between a bright opalescent color and its complement. Over white or light colored surfaces the Interference color is less obvious and the flip effect is more obvious, over black or dark surfaces the color is more obvious and the flip is less obvious.

Iridescent Acrylics achieve their reflective properties by synthetically reproducing several natural phenomena – the nacreous, or pearlescent, qualities found in fish scales or the dust of a butterfly’s wing (think Scatterlings!), and the shiny and reflective qualities found in certain metals and minerals.

I find it a bit more whimsical then the original; all shabby-chic to English, French and Tuscan… A golden view of the Tuscan countryside with red (and pink) (and magenta) poppies.

I didn’t care for how flat the original illustration was so I used my particular painting style. In a similar manner as the first PBN that I did I changed the road into a babbling stream. Last time was an accident but this time was on purpose.

I started Early — Took my Dog –
And visited the Sea –
The Mermaids in the Basement
Came out to look at me –

And Frigates — in the Upper Floor
Extended Hempen Hands –
Presuming Me to be a Mouse –
Aground — upon the Sands –

But no Man moved Me — till the Tide
Went past my simple Shoe –
And past my Apron — and my Belt –
And past my Bodice — too –

And made as He would eat me up –
As wholly as a Dew
Upon a Dandelion’s Sleeve –
And then — I started — too –

And He — He followed — close behind –
I felt his Silver Heel
Upon my Ankle — Then my Shoes
Would overflow with Pearl –

Until We met the Solid Town –
No One He seemed to know –
And bowing — with a Mighty look –
At me — The Sea withdrew –

I started Early — Took my Dog — by Emily Dickinson

Local Lego fans with 1,000s of Legos at this year’s Maker’s Fair.  Legos are also the key to world peace and prosperity. True story. Seriously, imagine if all the world’s leaders got together and played with Legos and built. More photos from Maker Faire.

And here is a self portrait below. This flower is my very confused amaryllis bulb. A present from my daughter a few years ago. It’s a bit stunted because I did not bring it in for six weeks of dormancy.

The key to getting them to re-bloom from year to year is to treat them just like any other houseplant for the rest of the year. After the big flowers fade (just after the Christmas holidays if your timing is good – my timing is terrible), cut off the stalks but leave the green foliage to keep growing.

In late May put it outdoors for the summer in an inconspicuous corner of the garden and ignore them till late September or early October. Definitely bring them in before the first frost.

But it’s June and is blooming seven months early? I know there are Master Gardeners out there reading this. How do I get my flower back on track?

“Yesterday’s Dream”©. Scatterlings © Original now available for sale.
Original 30″w x 20″h; Matted and Framed: 40″w x 28″h
Framed and Matted Scatterlings now available for purchase.
Or pick up a print for only $17.

“Your children are not your children.
They are sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you.
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For thir souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit,
not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them,
but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the make upon the path of the infinite,
and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness.
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
so He also loves the bow that is stable.”

Khalil Gibran

Scatterlings© is a collection of self-directed enchantment art which combines actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums. Hidden among the actual and rendered foliage are an enchanted assortment of Scatterlings; mythical animals and fairies. These one-of-a-kind folk art pieces take up to a year to complete as flowers and leaves are collected, pressed, preserved and finally hidden within a vision that evolves continually. (Mixed Media; Pressed Foliage, Watercolor, Colored Pencil, Pen and Ink on Handmade Paper)

Jacquelyn L. Berl … is a versatile and prolific artist with a strong drive towards finding an original signature style. She creates art with a seemingly unlimited assortment of media, fusing various schools and trends into a conglomerate body of work. I would categorize her style as gravitating towards the surreal, often with fabulous qualities; it characterizes in various degrees her mixed media works, collages, ink, watercolor and oil paintings. To my mind Berl achieves best results with the more combinative efforts, and while the more traditional artwork exhibits engaging pristine and figurative qualities, it is in the more complex and “dirty” pieces that her creative potential finds a unique outlet.

Viewing the “Scatterlings (c),” … is a rich and magical experience — not surprising considering the “mythical animals and fairies” … Jaquelyn alludes to gravity, which forces the leaves and the plants she uses down to earth. Thus she may be proposing an idealized artistic view of the physical world around us, everyday objects being the media and the ground they rest upon the surface. But even without this allegory, her artwork bears a purely visual resemblance to abstract expressionism, all the while retaining the concrete form of the inserted magical characters — the result is a fascinating surreal mishmash.

Clever use of perspective, compositional rhythm and color toning, combined with actual flora creates a bewitching effect of three-dimensionality. I cannot decide whether the artist panders to the younger audience by incorporating real objects, seeking to emulate depth with actual depth on the paper, but it certainly appeals to the child in me, evoking an inner smile. I also think that it is this kind of works of art that more than usual encourages children to want to become artists — it could be the appeal of using objects found in nature, something every playful kid does as a matter of fact anyway.

Elijah at Art & Critique

Yesterday’s Dream; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in perfect condition. Shipping: $4.95.

See full line of remaining prints.

Cherries Jubilee, Mixed Media. See information on purchasing a print at the bottom of this blog entry.

Life is short
and there will always be dirty dishes,
so let’s dance.
James Howe

I appreciate all your comments and encouragement to return to blogging after being hit by the hack. It’s been a bit difficult to get back into the swing of blogging again.

We returned to Maker Faire again this year. Geeks and hackers galore! You would think after being hacked that the Maker Faire would be the last place I would want to be…

Maker Faire is a bit hard to describe. Most often to be said to be the Burning Man of the Geek World.

Started in San Mateo, California in 2006, and also being held in Detroit and New York, Maker Faire is the premier event for grassroots American innovation. As the World’s Largest DIY Festival, this two-day family friendly Faire has something for everyone – a showcase of invention, creativity and resourcefulness and a celebration of the Maker mindset…

We wanted to get there earlier this year so we would not miss the stage shows. It took over an hour to find a parking spot: a record crowd of 100,000 techies, do-it-yourselfers and fun-seekers!

We made our way through the main gate, through the masses and into the main performance area in time to see the end of the main event. Mike Rowe (Dirty Jobs) was being put into a cage – a performance by a group called Arc Attack.

Soon, the cage was be bombarded with electricity from two Tesla coils singing the Imperial Death March music from “Star Wars”

Too quickly the song is over, Mike Rowe emerges, shakes hands with (the very blurry) Adam Savage (Myth Busters)

After being electrocuted, Rowe told the crowd “you’ll be hearing from my lawyers” and Adam Savage danced The Robot inside the cage.

And just like that Mike Rowe was off the stage and gone.

‘Eh, Big deal’ you say ‘… a meager assortment of photos. And blurry at that.’

Fast forward three hours of Maker Fair, three hours of mostly walking and taking photos of countless examples of do-it-yourself robotics, and engineers, and programmers, and tinkerers, and 3D printing, and steampunk kinetic sculptures, and evil geniuses, hackers and much, much more.

My daughters, friends and I spent some time taking photos of Lindsay Lawlor’s Electric Giraffe Project. This giant electric giraffe robot walks and even talks. It features tons of LEDs, and this year, Lawlor’s team has engineered it to give “LED feedback,” in the form of lights that turn on when someone scratches the giraffe’s chin.

We were confused when some security people (about 50 of them!) shoo us out of the way so the giraffe can get through. We do not pass up the opportunity to joke (mostly flirting) with the guards: “How many security people does it take to keep a giant robotic giraffe safe, anyway?”

None of the other robots had security.

When who should magically appear?

Mr Dirty Jobs himself! Woot.

After filming more than 300 episodes of “Dirty Jobs,” Mike Rowe said his best job was replacing the water tanks atop New York City apartment buildings, his dirtiest job involved cleaning the pumps at the bottom of an urban sewer system filled with poop, and his latest job involved finding dinosaur bones, preserving them in plaster, and then hauling them back to civilization. He was wandering around the Faire looking for material for a new series he is developing, tentatively dubbed “Shut Up And Make It.”

He was just standing right there!

I mean I was standing so close that I could reach out and button his shirt if I so wished.

Not that those camera guys would let me do it.

Not that those security people would let me do it.

Especially one security guy who failed to see the ‘ha ha’ in anything.

Needless to say I want my photo taken with Mr Rowe!!

A no go; there are too many security guys.

He looked pretty sad about it too.

I do the next best thing. Using the self portrait setting on my camera I try to capture myself next to Mr. Dirty Jobs.

But look!

Some chickie is right there. Cutting in on my guy!
Didn’t she know that just a few minutes ago I could have been buttoning his shirt?

More on the image featured above:

Cherries Jubilee, Collage on Board Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!)

Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print.

A great opportunity to purchase one of these prints at the affordable price of $17.00. They won’t be listed here again at this sensational price. I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95.

See the full line of remaining available prints here.

Sputters; Pointillism/Stippling; Pen and Ink. SOLD
More Ascender’s Pointillism on this blog.

Yet there are moments when the walls of the mind grow thin;
when nothing is unabsorbed, and I could fancy that we might
blow so vast a bubble that the sun might set and rise in it
and we might take the blue of midday
and the black of midnight
and be cast off and escape from here and now.
Virginia Woolf

Limited Run Prints on selected pointillism/stippling images while supplies last.

My Feather Bed; Mixed Media, Sold out.

Feathers filled the small room.
Our laughter kept the feathers in the air.
I thought about birds.
Could they fly if there wasn’t
someone, somewhere, laughing?
Jonathan Safran Foer

Laugh. Sometimes it is all you can do. I have been bogged down by day to day life. I have a boundless amount of subjects I want to write on, explore, and share with you… but then they get lost in the shuffle. “The harder I work — the behinder I get.”

This weekend I will be attending Maker Fair with my friends. The sad thing is I still have not gotten up all the photos from last years Maker Fair, Plus: I can’t even direct you to those due to the the p*rm* h*ck taking down the majority of my archives.

Here are some feather-ish items that I hope will tickler your fancy! These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!)

Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. $17.00 each. I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95.

Other remaining Limited_Run Prints

It’s A Slippery Hole; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Be Kind (#1); Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Sing Me A Lullaby; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

We are each given a block of marble when we begin a lifetime, and the tools to shape it into sculpture. We can drag it behind us untouched, we can pound it to gravel, we can shape it into glory. Examples from every other life are left for us to see, lifeworks finished and unfinished, guiding and warning. Near the end our sculpture is nearly finished, and we can smooth and polish what we started years before. We can make our progress then, but to do it we must see past the appearances of age.”
Richard Bach

During the summer of 1994, 10 master carvers from Papua New Guinea worked in residence to create a permanent outdoor sculpture garden of New Guinea Art at Stanford University.

Jim Mason, Project Director and graduate student in anthropology, is responsible for bringing the artists from the Middle Sepik River Region of Papua New Guinea to Stanford.

The project is not an attempt to recreate a traditional New Guinea environment but, according to Mason, “an opportunity to experiment with and reinterpret New Guinea aesthetic perspectives within the new context of a Western public art space.”

The artists participating in the project came from the Iatmul and Kwoma societies of the Middle Sepik River region of Papua New Guinea (PNG).

During their four-month residency at Stanford, these Kwoma and Iatmul artists produced a variety of large relief carved poles, free-standing individual figures, garamut slit drums, and other large-scale site-specific works. These works were carved using indigenous carving woods selected by the artists in Papua New Guinea and shipped to the U.S.

This artist/designer collaboration begins with the realization that New Guinea artists have never been simply craftsmen reproducing ancient templates, but rather have always worked as creative agents producing unique works that express a specific intention and subjectivity in relation to a specific context, purpose, and audience. Through this process, the collaboration resulted in concrete expressions that visually challenge the constraining narratives of art/artifact, authenticity/inauthenticity, and primitivism that are often forced onto non-western artists.

Watercolor; Pen and India Ink on Crescent Board

I can be happy and building at home.
Let the sofa be mountains, the carpet be sea,
There I’ll establish a city for me:
— Robert Louis Stevenson

Loving this painting by Sargent of Robert Louis Stevenson and his wife
Another painting by Sargent
Platinum Print of Stevenson

More Ascender Perspective Renderings on this blog.
More Ascender Watercolors on this blog. Request a print.

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.

Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.

It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.

We ask ourselves,
‘Who am I to be brilliant,
gorgeous,
talented,
fabulous?’

Actually, who are you not to be?

You are a child of God.
Your playing small does not serve the world.

There is nothing enlightened about shrinking
so that other people won’t feel insecure around you.

We are all meant to shine,
as children do.

We were born to make manifest the glory of God
that is within us.

It’s not just in some of us;
it’s in everyone.

And as we let our own light shine,
we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.

As we are liberated from our own fear,
our presence automatically liberates others.”

Marianne Williamson

“Bird’s Eye View”© Original now available for sale.
Original 30″w x 20″h; Matted and Framed: 40″w x 28″h
Scatterlings © Originals, Limited-Run Prints now available.

I confess I do not believe in time. I like to fold my magic carpet, after use, in such a way as to superimpose one part of the pattern upon another. Let visitors trip. And the highest enjoyment of timelessness-in a landscape selected at random-is when I stand among rare butterflies and their food plants. This is ecstasy, and behind the ecstasy is something else, which is hard to explain. It is like a momentary vacuum into which rushes all that I love. A sense of oneness with sun and stone. A thrill of gratitude to whom it may concern-to the contrapuntal genius of human fate or to tender ghosts humoring a lucky mortal.”

Vladimir Nabokov

Detail Close-Up

Scatterlings© is a collection of self-directed enchantment art which combines actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums. Hidden among the actual and rendered foliage are an enchanted assortment of Scatterlings; mythical animals and fairies. These one-of-a-kind folk art pieces take up to a year to complete as flowers and leaves are collected, pressed, preserved and finally hidden within a vision that evolves continually. (Mixed Media; Pressed Foliage, Watercolor, Colored Pencil, Pen and Ink on Handmade Paper)

Detail Close-Up

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Jacquelyn L. Berl (also known under the artistic monicker “Ascender“, see more works at her site) is a versatile and prolific artist with a strong drive towards finding an original signature style. She creates art with a seemingly unlimited assortment of media, fusing various schools and trends into a conglomerate body of work. I would categorize her style as gravitating towards the surreal, often with fabulous qualities; it characterizes in various degrees her mixed media works, collages, ink, watercolor and oil paintings. To my mind Berl achieves best results with the more combinative efforts, and while the more traditional artwork exhibits engaging pristine and figurative qualities, it is in the more complex and “dirty” pieces that her creative potential finds a unique outlet.

Viewing the “Scatterlings (c),” which, according to the artist, “combine actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums” is a rich and magical experience — not surprising considering the “mythical animals and fairies” populating these pieces. In a way it replicates the ritual of reading a fairy tale to a child: each night the infant would ask for another reading of the same story and each time the story would sound different. It is possible to see each scatterling as a meta-illustration of a fairy-tale, existing or not. Perhaps even more radically, each piece is indeed a fairy tale, only of a visual kind. This would make sense considering the arduous process, taking up to a year, of making (”writing”) them.

Technically they may be seen as Pollock’s logical continuation: he painted while putting the canvas on the floor, letting gravity participate in the process, and Jaquelyn similarly alludes to gravity, which forces the leaves and the plants she uses down to earth. Thus she may be proposing an idealized artistic view of the physical world around us, everyday objects being the media and the ground they rest upon the surface. But even without this allegory, her artwork bears a purely visual resemblance to abstract expressionism, all the while retaining the concrete form of the inserted magical characters — the result is a fascinating surreal mishmash.

Clever use of perspective, compositional rhythm and color toning, combined with actual flora creates a bewitching effect of three-dimensionality. I cannot decide whether the artist panders to the younger audience by incorporating real objects, seeking to emulate depth with actual depth on the paper, but it certainly appeals to the child in me, evoking an inner smile. I also think that it is this kind of works of art that more than usual encourages children to want to become artists — it could be the appeal of using objects found in nature, something every playful kid does as a matter of fact anyway.

Elijah at Art & Critique

Mixed Media, Two Sided Tag by AscenderRisesAbove.

Your wedding completely changes the direction of your life, you know, no matter how greatly you desire it. I think that moment of doubt and faintness comes from all those imagined and now impossible futures all pressing in on you at once. It is your last chance to experience them, you see, and they all want to be lived at that moment.
Sharon Shinn

Antiquity; Stippling/Pointillism; Pen and India Ink

The fairy poet takes a sheet
Of moonbeam, silver white;
His ink is dew from daisies sweet,
His pen a point of light.”
Joyce Kilmer

Stippling wiki. Stippling techniques; artyfactory, wetcanvas, paintingrealism, noli novak, gurneyjourney, art market blog, jan toorop, art market blog, camille pissarro

More Ascender’s Pointillism/Stippling on this blog

A Passion For The Past; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

A Touch of Culture; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Decade of Growth; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Sombrero Surprise; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

A Few Of My Favorite Things; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

AscenderRisesAbove is proud to present a huge selection on a limited run (25 ea) 11×17 prints. These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – a great opportunity to purchase one of these 50 assorted images. They won’t be listed here again at this sensational price.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!)

Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95.

Her shoulder-blades meet across her back like the wings of a small butterfly.
And as she stares at the chalk figures, her mind lodges in those white circles,
it steps through those white loops into emptiness, alone. They have no meaning for her. She has no answer for them. She has no body as the others have.

Virginia Woolf

Perspective Rendering; Watercolor; Pen and India Ink on Crescent Board.

Why then did she do it? She looked at the canvas, lightly scored with running lines. It would be hung in the servants’ bedrooms. It would be rolled up and stuffed under a sofa. What was the good of doing it then, and she heard some voice saying she couldn’t paint, saying she couldn’t create, as if she were caught up in one of those habitual currents in which after a certain time experience forms in the mind, so that one repeats words without being aware any longer who originally spoke them.

Virginia Woolf

Conditioning. Family, friends, and educators may discourage us from pursuing an artist’s career. There is the mythology that artists are somehow “different,” and this mythology of difference inspires fear. If we have negative perceptions about what an artist is, we will feel less inclined to do the diligent work necessary to become one. (Artist Way)

Oh those ‘hypercritical inner censors and perfectionists’. Everyone has an internal censor. For some it may be loud and intrusive. For the luckier ones, it may only be a squeak. I haven’t been listening to them. I have been productive:

I continue to inventory; I hope to be adding a page every other day or so. You can find those listed across the top of my home page under purchase -> individual categories. My next page going up will be my remaining matted and framed pointillism prints.

I put my list of Inspirational Links again. You can find that page in the menu at the top of my home page under my name -> contact -> inspirational links. I am pulling out dead links and adding often. I might change that location later. You can also find it on the bottom of the page in the first column.

Stephanie pointed out that it is difficult to find where to comment. I even had a hard time finding it! It is in small print next to the date in the right hand column. ——->

“Cascading Colors” Scatterlings©
Original 30″w x 20″h; Matted and Framed: 40″w x 28″h. Inquire to purchase original.
Scatterlings © 11 x 17 limited-run Prints now available.

your laughter must raise
its foamy cascade,
and in the spring, love,
I want your laughter like
the flower I was waiting for,
the blue flower, the rose
of my echoing country.

Pablo Neruda

Viewing the “Scatterlings (c),” which, according to the artist, “combine actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums” is a rich and magical experience — not surprising considering the “mythical animals and fairies” populating these pieces. In a way it replicates the ritual of reading a fairy tale to a child: each night the infant would ask for another reading of the same story and each time the story would sound different. It is possible to see each scatterling as a meta-illustration of a fairy-tale, existing or not. Perhaps even more radically, each piece is indeed a fairy tale, only of a visual kind. This would make sense considering the arduous process, taking up to a year, of making (“writing”) them.

Technically they may be seen as Pollock‘s logical continuation: he painted while putting the canvas on the floor, letting gravity participate in the process, and Jaqueline similarly alludes to gravity, which forces the leaves and the plants she uses down to earth. Thus she may be proposing an idealized artistic view of the physical world around us, everyday objects being the media and the ground they rest upon the surface. But even without this allegory, her artwork bears a purely visual resemblance to abstract expressionism, all the while retaining the concrete form of the inserted magical characters (visit her blog for close ups) — the result is a fascinating surreal mishmash.

Clever use of perspective, compositional rhythm and color toning, combined with actual flora creates a bewitching effect of three-dimensionality. I cannot decide whether the artist panders to the younger audience by incorporating real objects, seeking to emulate depth with actual depth on the paper, but it certainly appeals to the child in me, evoking an inner smile. I also think that it is this kind of works of art that more than usual encourages children to want to become artists — it could be the appeal of using objects found in nature, something every playful kid does as a matter of fact anyway.

see full critique here.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!)

Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95. Remaining prints limited to stock on hand.

Although you can’t tell by looking here on my blog… I have been quite busy. I continue to try to take my own advice: stay calm.

For instance I have changed the style of this page at least 500 times – trying to find the perfect plug-in to create a here in WordPress.

I have been doing inventory on my stippling framed pieces, illuminated tiles, ACEOs. Acrylics etc etc etc – trying to get them listed on their own page. Of course to place those pages up I need that perfect table. Sure; I could code it by hand – which I have tried to do – only to get to the bottom and get one tiny letter out of place; just a < will re-flow the entire page.

I have been working on editing my book and spending the rest of the time trying to rid myself of my bad habits and to create the perfect “o” while holding on to the paint brush.

There are several bits of good news in that statement. Not only am I finally using my thumb but also holding a tiny paint brush again. woot.

I will be work with one or two more practice boards and then begin a new series that I have been thinking about for the better part of last year.

Happiness, not in another place but this place…not for another hour, but this hour.”
Walt Whitman

Happiness isn’t something that depends on our surroundings. It’s something we make inside ourselves.”
Corrie Ten Boom

Someday I’ll wish upon a star,
Wake up where the clouds are far behind me
Where trouble melts like lemon drops
High above the chimney top that’s where you’ll find me
Oh, Somewhere over the rainbow way up high
And the dream that you dare to, why, oh why can’t I?
Israel Kamakawiwo’ole

That large very top image is my post card for the paint by number exchange. This is the third piece created to add to the project I am working on with my daughter.

Here (to the left) is my daughter’s pbn with the wild duck in a river. She is using the original color key. I painted a piece to accompany hers by tossing the color key and using colors from her color key.

You can see in the last altered pbn that I did (here) I picked up her purples and greens and used them my piece.

(You will also read a further explanation on that page about how I accidentally turned the dirt road into a raging river. :-l )

In this most recent pbn (top of the page) I didn’t change a lot from the original color key (to the left). Again I picked up my daughter’s purples and brought them into my altered pbn.

Before I started I had sketched in the words; “stay calm” in the center of the board; however, these were the final details in the image. The colors I used to fill in each letter are a mixture of 3-to-1 (3 white to 1pure color). I chose whatever pure color was touching each letter. For instance on the door touching the “M” I mixed 1 drop of brown paint with 3 drops white paint.

As you see in the large image (at the top of the page) the letters appear translucent — a subtle, almost-pastel, mantra floating above the water, yet in front of the chairs. My goal was to do this in a manner that you aren’t even aware that the pbn was altered.

It was a nice day, and I don’t mean that it was sunny either. It was humid and not too cool, like winter was getting annoyed with itself and wanted it to be spring just as much as everyone else.”

Gabrielle Zevin

When you are not surprised, not surprised,
nor leap in imagination from sunlight into shadow
or from shadow into sunlight
suiting the color of fright or delight
to the bewildering circumstance
when you are no longer surprised
by the quiet or fury of daybreak
the stormy uprush of the sun’s rage
over the edges of torn trees
torrents of living and dying flung
upward and outward inward and downward to space
or else
peace peace peace peace…

When You Are Not Surprised by Conrad Aiken

(detail of Sombrero Surprise; Pointillism/Stippling; Pen and India Ink)

“I see these images as engravings of dreams. Pixelated and disintegrating dreams, they morph one into the other and then dissipate, dot by dot, until awakening. The pieces in front of us capture the last most vivid vision. In fact, this brings me to the notion that one possible way to recall dreams forgotten right after the awakening moment could be by dots — a simple and elegant solution! The lack of lines deprives the viewer of a continuous visual reference, hampering focus; as a result the paintings appear to be covered by a gauze (made of the innumerable microscopic white dots), which further enhances the dreamlike quality…”

Critique of Ascender’s Poinitillism/Stippling at Art and Critique

Sombrero Surprise; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

thoughts like larks spontaneously rise
into the morning sky; whose flight, unchecked,
outreaches life and readily comprehends
the language of flowers and of all mute things.
Charles Baudelaire

I took advantage of a break between storms to run out on the porch and shoot photos.

Quick back inside… here comes another rain cloud!

“Beyond the Visible Terrain“©
Original 30″w x 20″h; Matted and Framed: 40″w x 28″
Purchase a limited run print below.

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods,
There is a rapture on the lonely shore,
There is society, where none intrudes,
By the deep Sea, and music in its roar:
I love not Man the less, but Nature more.

Lord Byron

Scatterlings© is a collection of self-directed enchantment art which combines actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums. Hidden among the actual and rendered foliage are an enchanted assortment of ‘Scatterlings’©; mythical animals and fairies

Beyond the Visible Terrain; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!)

Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95.

I have been trying to rush spring along – and here’s my first flower.

Ok -it’s a weed. I was pretty happy to see it sprouting out anyway. Let’s see if I am this happy about weeds in August.

This post is about me sticking my toe back in the ‘blogging water’; seeing if that dreaded h-a-c-k (shhhhhh) is still in my system folder.

I want to thank the WiseWomen group and Drew Harkey from Harkey Studio for walking me through a couple of confusing html issues.

I understand there are some odd code things going on with this layout – but I just love this layout so I am going to try to work those kinks out. Let me know if you see any odder-then-usual things going on here!

Our Paint By Number Exchange will soon be coming to an end. (Now closed.)

This is not your ordinary exchange. We each chose a PBN and promptly tossed the color key and began altering them in any medium we chose: Collage it, embellish it, alter it, writing message in the center. Use oils, acrylics, colored pencil, collage, pen and ink, crayon, velvet, embroider it… (did I forget something?)

Keep an eye here for some photos as they come rolling in…

(Now Closed.  See this post for the results)

“The No Good…” 11 x 17 limited collage print available below

One of the reasons my blog here at Ascender Rises Above has been relatively quiet is the dreaded “ph*rm* h*ck.”. I am disgusted just typing its name.

I try to remember: “Expecting the world to treat you fairly because you are a good person is a little like expecting a bull not to attack you because you are a vegetarian.” (Frank Oz).

Essentially a hacker left a worm somewhere in my complicated blog code through my server and let that worm hatch wherever it wanted.

Before I go any further, the worm is not a threat to the computers of those who read my blog during the hack! It takes the code of a wordpress blog and quietly exploits the highest-ranking and most valuable pages by overriding the title tag and by inserting spam in Google or other search engines.

Update: continuing to work on this and fine tune. Please stand by!

The No Good; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

I have always imagined that Paradise will be some kind of library.

Jorge Luis Borges

My framed limited-run prints just went up at Burlingame Library located at 480 Primrose, Burlingame, CA. I loved libraries as a kid, and still do. The Kindle doesn’t have a place around it – it’s almost purely about content! The library is a charming Spanish Revival style building, designed by architect E. L. Norberg and completed in 1931; a wonderful building well-supported and well-used by its community, and a well worth a visit from you. My art will remain up throughout the end of the year. (Hours and Location)

(This is not my studio!) (I wish it were my studio!)

Jean-Paul Rabaut Saint Etienne sketch by by Jacques-Louis David, one of several sketches for the unrealized painting of The Oath Of A Tennis Court

Jacques-Louis David; a highly influential French painter in the Neoclassical style, whose cerebral brand of history painting marked a change in taste away from Rococo frivolity toward a classical austerity and severity.

(But I like Rococo.

Anyway…)

The picture was meant to be massive in scale; the figures in the foreground were meant to be life-sized portraits. The funding for the project was to come from over three thousand subscribers hoping to receive a print of the image. However, when the funding was insufficient, the state ended up financing the project.

Essentially, the history of the demise of David’s The Tennis Court Oath illustrates the difficulty of creating works of art that portray current and controversial political occurrences. Political circumstances in France proved too volatile to allow the completion of the painting. In this unstable political climate David’s work remained unfinished. With only a few nude figures sketched onto the massive canvas, David abandoned The Oath of the Tennis Court. To have completed it would have been politically unsound. After this incident, when David attempted to make a political statement in his paintings, he returned to the less politically charged use of metaphor to convey his message.

Perhaps this answers the question of “Why there is no current political art?“

Back by popular demand… Kitschy Craft-ing!

I am beginning yet another (Vintage!) paint by number (sans the color chart that accompanies with it). Many people wished to paint along so I have opted to make a party out of it and host a Paint By Number Exchange.

(05.01.11 update: The challenge is now closed)

Here’s the rules:

1. Sign up by sending me an email. Include your mailing address as everyone in the group will mail you a copy of theirs. You will mail them a copy of yours.

2. Paint a By Number; in any medium you like; follow directions or toss the color key if you like. Collage it, embellish it, alter it, write a message in the center. Use oils, acrylics, colored pencil, collage, pen and ink, crayon, velvet, embroider it… (did I forget something?)

3. Let me know when you post about it to your blog and when I update on my blog I will drop a link back at you. If you don’t have a blog send me a .jpg and I will post it here giving you credit and sending you a link. Feel free to alert me to your posting even before the item is finished; it’s fun to watch them progress in different mediums!

3. Make copies when finished. You can turn them into post cards for a decreased price of stamps. You can mail full sized copies. You can make one full sized copy and cut it down to cropped post card sized images. You can collage them, embellish them, yet again before mailing. You might also create an unfinished paint by number of your own so that others can receive a new project in the mail.

4. Mail them to all the addresses I provide you by December 31st March 31st. Copies will be trickling into your mail box during this time with messages from afar.

New Rule -> 5. Indicate if you wish to play internationally; you will need to pay the difference in postage to those folk as well as international participants to the United States.

This exchange is on the honor system. Be honorable.

05.01.11 update. Here are the results:

Liz Jones (Children’s Writer/Illustrator/Mythologist!) at Liz Jones Books brings us this amazing piece. I was struck how empty the original seemed after she finished with it.

Liz says:
Lots of strange things stirring in the waters here!

Here’s the paint by number I started with, entitled Archway to Venice, easily available online, if you want to try a makeover all your own:

and “For my makeover, I knew I wanted to move from day to night, knew I wanted a lot more things going on inside the archway, but really only discovered what I wanted this to *be* after googling images and stories of Venice itself, with its rich Carnival history, and its sense of bordering two worlds–one all dark water, full of dragons and demons, one dry, bright and and focused on the divine.

Carnival seems to be a good metaphor for that line between dark and light.
If you look carefully, you can find angels and dragons here, manuscripts illuminated and otherwise, some of the lions that guard the city, and quite a few people dressed for Carnival.”

Read more about her process here!

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Maggie Tomei (Vernacular Mixed Media Artist!) at Lost In Art

I love how she created the envelope. She dismantled a regular envelope and used it as the template. Here she has used an ad out of a magazine and used a bone folder to create the creases.

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Faith Harkey (Allegorist/Registered Yoga Teacher/Poet!) at Harkey Studio

I was excited to get Faith Harkey‘s Paint By Number entry in the mail; the second to arrive.

If it looks familiar it’s because I featured it earlier in the year when she sent me a jpg. This is the actual card. The ‘oh-so-clever’ Faith changed a princess paint by number (Cinderella?) into the Goddess of Yoga. Sri Yoga Devi is the Center of Power from which flows constantly the Divine power and love. She symbolizes the feminine energy (Shakti), which sustains all creation and life.

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Lisa Rivas (Master Computer/Fiber Artist!) exchanging internationally at Flying Colors

Here’s Lisa Riva’s (of FlyingColors) postcard for the Paint-By-Number Exchange “All Mundi Button Branch” – inspired by acrylics paint-by-number kit: “The Almond Blossoms” by Vincent Van Gogh. Read more of Lisa’s thoughts on her piece here.

Check out Lisa’s etsy shop for prints.

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Ninotchka (Epic Artist/Epic Writer/Epic Photographer!) at Ninotchka Beavers

“You’re Coming With Me”; Ninotchka Beavers, a child’s paint by number; watercolor and pencil.

Here’s Ninotchka at Ninotchka Beavers entry for the paint-by-number exchange. I like how the dream-like girl is able to get close enough to the deer to tenderly tie it with a tiny string. The deer does not resist. The card has a very stained glass look to it, the colors appear to continue to be liquid.

Ninotchka says it best: “The mosaic look and exposed number code spoke to me. Like a metaphor for life, fragmented, yet specific.”

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Lovely Lia (Juxtaposing Collaging Artist!) at Art Junk

Lovely Lia’s (Art Junk Girl) postcard arrived the other day…. It’s from the recent paint by number exchange — the postcards keep trickling in!

And below is an inchies postcard she had made from one of her previous exchanges. Inchies are a teeny evolution of the popular artist trading card revolution. Everything from traditional art to altered art to art quilts are made in one inch squares. Their small size make them perfect for trying out new techniques.

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Here is the remaining paint by number (sans the color chart that accompanies with it) by Wendy Burton at Winns Angels. It will be joining the others here.

This one arrives via airmail! I am looking forward to collecting that stamp.

Wendy says it well: “Creativity allows my voice to float up in echoing reverberations from that place in my soul where emotions thrive. It gives wings to my words, flight to my thoughts. Creativity allows my hands to share a piece of my heart with those who take time to see. Nature brings inspiration ~ colours and sounds, taste and touch. I thank God for this gift ~ this wonderful gift of creativity, the wind in my wings.”

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Mary Stebbins Taitt (Imagik and other blogs) cleverly paints herself (!) into this paint by number selection. It made me smile – much like she is here. I can’t stop looking at her amazing concept and efforts.

Isn’t it an amazing piece? I believe she used acrylics in this piece. She painted some swan feathers into the piece as well.

This is what the set looked like before she altered it.

I agree with her, it was quite the undertaking and took more time than we all anticipated. The others are still rolling in and we will decide later if there is enough interest to do it again.

~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~

Rachel Conine (Grant Writer/Editor/Curator!) from Colorado

Here is Rachael’s post card for the Paint By Number Exchange, entitled Paradise, a peek out her window perhaps? I couldn’t resist photographing it with these fresh cut flowers – spring is on it’s way and we will all soon be in Paradise everyday.

Rachael altered this PBN by using Sharpies rather than the acrylics which packaged with them. (Those tiny pots and plastic paint brushes are very difficult to use!) Her Sharpies gave the image a much more brilliant look than the color-keyed image (on the left). I also felt like there was a texture to her version; as if needle-pointed?

~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~

Deborah Gorr (Kinetic Earthworker/Queen Of Textile!) playing internationally at Bee Creative

Thanks for your supportive comment on the Paint By Number Exchange. I will be placing these all on one post soon, there will be no need to surf around to find them. Meanwhile here is the next postcard I received by Deborah Gorr at BeeCreative. She took a paint-by-number and collaged, painted, scanned and then digitally altered in Photoshop Elements. I really enjoy the text ! (read more of her process)

~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~ • ~ ~

and me, of course, Jacquelyn Berl (Today’s Kitschy Craft-ing Paint_By-Number Muse!) at Ascender Rises Above

Happiness, not in another place but this place…not for another hour, but this hour.”
Walt Whitman

That large very top image is my post card for the paint by number exchange. This is the third piece created to add to the project I am working on with my daughter.

Here (to the left) is my daughter’s pbn with the wild duck in a river. She is using the original color key. I painted a piece to accompany hers by tossing the color key and using colors from her color key.

You can see in the last altered pbn that I did (here) I picked up her purples and greens and used them my piece.

(You will also read a further explanation on that page about how I accidentally turned the dirt road into a raging river. :-l )

In this most recent pbn (top of the page) I didn’t change a lot from the original color key (to the left). Again I picked up my daughter’s purples and brought them into my altered pbn.

Before I started I had sketched in the words; “stay calm” in the center of the board; however, these were the final details in the image. The colors I used to fill in each letter are a mixture of 3-to-1 (3 white to 1pure color). I chose whatever pure color was touching each letter. For instance on the door touching the “M” I mixed 1 drop of brown paint with 3 drops white paint.

As you see in the large image (at the top of the page) the letters appear translucent — a subtle, almost-pastel, mantra floating above the water, yet in front of the chairs. My goal was to do this in a manner that you aren’t even aware that the pbn was altered.

“A River Runs Through It”; altered paint by number

I tossed the color key when I began working with my daughter on some paint-by-numbers. The color key was very pastel, nauseatingly pastel. I picked up colors in the painting my daughter was working on so that she might have a series of paintings in similar tones.

Had I used the color key this is how the painting might have turned out:

Having barely even glanced at the color key I used primarily colors from her set, using Golden polymers to extend the amount of paint she would have to work with; and added at least three shades of each color. It also gave it the thickness of impasto which I like; causing the stream to flow, the shadows shimmer. I added an evening skyline with a setting sun. I changed the sign over what I can only assume is the bait shop from ‘Peg’s Cove’ (ho hum) to ‘Love Shack’ (baby).

I first looked at the color key at the very end of the painting… and that it when I noticed it: the stream flowing in front of the houses should actually be a mud road. I had thought with the boat placed in this location it must be a stream. Who in the world would leave a canoe along the side of the road and not keep it sitting in the bay? It certainly brings a lot of humor within the painting; should the residents inside the home wish to leave, they will need to walk through a flowing stream to get to their boat.

Oh, sometimes I humor myself.

Self portrait at Caffe Sportivo in Red Wood City.

Thunder is good, thunder is impressive;
but it is lightning that does the work.

Mark Twain

Today we installed my exhibit at Caffe Sportivo in Red Wood City (Directions and map); a few Scatterlings originals and some of the limited run prints.

My oldest daughter helped… or was it me who helped her? I forget.
I like the way “Dreams of Queens” looks over her shoulder in this photo.

The show runs August 1 – 27th, 2010. If you are going to be in the area; let me know and I will meet you for a cup of organic coffee.

And when all is said and done; guess who gets the credit for all the labor?!
That’s right!

Got Moo? of  “When The Curtain Parted”; Pastel

Did you notice? I have been busy updating pages which I had gotten behind during the festival season.

•) I updated my Exhibitions Page: I am preparing for my upcoming exhibit at Caffe Sportivo. August 1 – 27th, 2010: Selected limited-run prints. Caffe Sportivo (site) (blog) (facebook) • 965 Brewster Avenue, Redwood City, CA 94063 (Directions and map). Return on September 2, 2010 for more information and photos.

•) I’ve also added Burlingame Public Library. (info) November 1 – December 31, 2010. Two month exhibit. Woot! What a great way to wind up the year!

•) Five weeks remain to see “Sombrero Surprise” and “A Few Of My Favorite Things”; Pen & Ink stippling / pointillism prints at the Pacific Bank in Burlingame July 1 – September 1, 2010 on exhibit with other Burlingame Art Society artists(Directions and Map)

Guest artist award-winning Mary Stahl gives a pastel demonstration at Burlingame Art Society on Tuesday. (site) (Mary’s upcoming events) (contact Mary)

Mary uses alla prima techniques and paints in a representational style. Use “Alla prima” if you are after a quick, fresh and spontaneous look in your paintings. Alla prima; also known as “direct painting” or “wet on wet”, is an Italian term which means “at first”. Using this technique, you complete entire paintings in one session or two without waiting for the paint layers to dry completely.

~~~

Perhaps you have noticed on my left sidebar that I have added another art festival: June 12 – 13, 2010. Burlingame Art In The Park? (info). Sharing a booth with other Burlingame Art Society artists

* and *

May 1 – July 1, 2010. “Hopes and Promises” and “Offering Gold” (images below) collage on tile prints can now be viewed with other paintings by the Burlingame Art Society artists at the Pacific Bank (Directions and Map)

1) Offering Gold; Collage on Tile print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.
2) Hopes and Promises; Collage on Tile Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Check this page for the full line of limited run prints.

I Still Seek You, Collage and Acrylics on Canvas Print. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping & handling. See more here.

~~~

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
call to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting –
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

Mary Oliver

I have been running around in circles, gearing up for the Danville Arts Festival in mid-June. (info)

I am rethinking my booth from my Tiburon festival to make room for the limited run prints; how to package those (in clear envelopes?) (with backing?) (take a file cabinet?) (make a file cabinet?). Should I bring the framed prints or hang them on a clothesline and let people pluck them off? Will they get damaged that way? I don’t want to get in peoples’ way rehanging them. The thought process of festival preparation is never ending.

Do you have any tips on festival preparation that you can pass along? What is it that you recall about a great booth you have seen in the past? What is your chief complaint?

So many questions and running out of time.

I am also taking down “Beyond the Visible Terrain”© and putting up another painting at the US Bank with the Burlingame Art Society artists. (Directions and Map). I think, perhaps, I will put up a print there this month and to announce that all the prints will be available in Danville.

Hmmm… I dunno.

I also don’t know what this framed cage-like thing is doing in the woods above. Or this hallowed out tree next to a giant redwood near Pescadero last weekend?

Speaking of Burlingame Arts Society; it turns out that there will be a Burlingame Art In The Park this year and I will have four Scatterlings originals available there and helping with the booth for a few hours.

I was thinking maybe the below was some sort of outdoor patio area; can you picture it at night with lights wrapped around the poles; two long tables with benches down the center?

You can see that I am getting distracted by things.

There is also the Tiburon Arts Festival judging to think of; drop off a piece to be judged and pick it up the next day. (Who can complain about an extra trip to Tiburon?!) Followed closely by hanging an exhibit at Caffe Sportivo (site) August 1 – 27th, 2010. (Directions and map)

How many years do you think it takes to regrow a Christmas Tree lot?

Focus… focus… focus…

I Still Seek You, Collage and Acrylics on Canvas Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Rebirth Of Ideas; (close detail); acrylics on tile.

~~~

The space that I can call mine.. is so small that my ideas have become small. I am like a caterpillar in a cocoon of paper; all around me are sketches for sculptures, small drawings that seem like moths fluttering against the windows, beating their wings to escape from this tiny space.. Every day the ideas come more reluctantly, as though they know I will starve them and stunt their growth.”

Audrey Niffenegger (The Time Traveler’s Wife)

Rhapsody In Plume; Acrylic on Canvas. Contact Ascender for availability.

~~~

The dream was always running ahead of me. to catch up,
to live for a moment in unison, was the miracle.

Anaïs Nin

I continue reading Memory and Dream, the novel I mentioned the other day… I have been thinking a lot about it. It speaks provides a great deal of insight into both the creative process and the student/teacher relationship. The artist begins to discover an ability to bring faerie creatures to life through her paintings. These creatures “cross over” from “the before” to take up real lives in Isabelle’s world.

What if?… Would I be responsible for this shape-shifting peacock? Would it follow me around, slipping in and out of the wallpaper?

To see a peacock in your dream, represents spring, birth, new growth, longevity, and love. It is a good omen, signaling prestige, success and contentment in your relationship and career.

In Greco-Roman mythology the Peacock is identified with Hera (Juno) who created the Peacock from Argus whose hundred eyes (seen on the tail feathers of the Peacock) symbolize the vault of heaven and the “eyes” of the stars.

In Hinduism the Peacock is associated with Lakshmi who is a deity representing benevolence, patience, kindness, compassion and good luck.

Similar to Lakshmi, the Peacock is associated with Kwan-yin in Asian spirituality. Kwan-yin (or Quan Yin) is also an emblem of love, compassionate watchfulness, good-will, nurturing, and kind-heartedness. Legend tells us she chose to remain a mortal even though she could be immortal because she wished to stay behind and aid humanity in their spiritual evolution.

In Babylonia and Persia the Peacock is seen as a guardian to royalty, and is often seen in engravings upon the thrones of royalty.

… Themes of renewal are also linked to alchemical traditions to, as many schools of thought compare the resurrecting phoenix to the modern-day Peacock.

Contemplate the powers of the Peacock when you need more vibrancy and vitality in your experience. The Peacock can also help you on your spiritual Path, and breath new life into your walk of faith…

Beaded Pink Rose, Photo. More Ascender’s Photos

Let the rain kiss you.
Let the rain beat upon your head with silver liquid drops.
Let the rain sing you a lullaby.”

Langston Hughes

I’ve just finished an acrylics on canvas and will show you the whole piece in the next few days. Today (while listening to the pitter patter of the drops) I am prepping another hand-painted tile.

Soft Lullaby, Speaking Rain; Collage on Paper Print. Click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

I received a critique on my Scatterlings© Dreams of Childhood from Ann McMillan (blog) at last night’s Burlingame Art Society “Wine & Cheese” Critique. Ann suggested that I might create a series of Scatterlings© illustrations for children’s books… I am seriously considering.

Ann is a Central Coast artist studies the interaction of light and color in the tradition of California Impressionism.

Ann works in two styles in oil; palette knife work, and Impressionist “dab” work, using a brush or a pastel stick. These dab paintings take a long time: cleanly mixing each color and each daub is a pure stroke resulting in a lovely luminosity. Her pastel work taught her how bright and precise paint needs to be.

Her recent work emphasizes the intensity and subtlety of sun and shadow working to organize her painting around solid design and carefully mixed color. (I loved her “Tools of The Trade“… thick and creamy colors and texture – like painting with frosting!)

Interested in a limited run print of my Scatterlings© Dreams of Childhood? (click on image for larger view). Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Got Moo?

I first moo’ed about a year ago; and they have went like hot cakes. I’m on my third batch. These tiny, wonderful photo calling cards, measuring 1-1/8″ x 2-6/8″, can be used for anything from business cards, to trading cards, to even gift tags – an ideal way to trade or display your artwork.

More Moo’ers: Ancient Artist, Another Starving Artist, Art of Manliness, Pixel Spread, Red Mum, Make A Moo, Snicker Doodles, Dot’s Life, Jpg Magazine, Art Chix, Altered Antiquity, Design Hole, simone walsh

New to moo.com? I received a mini-coupon card with a code for 15% off a first time order. Comment here and I will pass it on to you.

Masked; Pointillsm/Stippling; Pen & Ink. Sold.
More Pointillim/Stippling on this blog.

I cannot grow
I have no shadow
To run away from,
I only play
WH Auden

Browse available pointillism prints from a huge selection of limited run (25 ea) prints.

A Passion For The Past; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Touch of Culture; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Decade of Growth; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Sombrero Surprise; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

A Few Of My Favorite Things; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – they won’t be listed here again at this sensational price.
I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95.

Something from the deep, dark, archives …

“Life; printed in the 1987 Wyoming Arts Edition; Publisher Charles Levendosky. 11 x 14 by Jacquelyn Berl, Casper

“My art is a great emotional release for me and aids in processing certain events and feelings; resulting in my ability to come so some sort of terms with it. I feel that if I am able to provide the viewer with a glimpse of that emotion, even if momentarily, than I have been successful.

Jacquelyn Berl is a graphic artist for the Star-Tribune and did some art work for Kathryn Warren’s article “Escape” on wife battering. She won first place from the Wyoming Press Association for general merchandising in 1986.

Title: Yesterday’s News; Photo. More Ascender’s Photos on this blog

a new year–
the same nonsense
piled on nonsense
Haiku of Kobayashi Issa

~ ~ • ~ ~

Resolved: Stop Trying So Hard by Accidental Creative

Video Demo: Getting Things Done at Pimp Your Work

What Does a Year of Garbage Look Like? at Organizing LA

Creativity In Crisis? How To Stop, Breathe And Begin Again by Coach Creative

The Big, Fun, Scary Adventure Challenge at nano

Top 100 Art Blogs (updated) at LakeTrees

Ten Freelancing Resolutions for the New Year at Freelance Switch

Build a Better To Do List by Renegade Writer

What’s In Your Shop Window? at Shop Herald

Recycle, reject, and renew for the New Year at Art Biz Blog

Making 2008 Your Best Year Yet at Marketing Mix Blog

starting over with a clean sheet and a tidy studio at Making A Mark

10 Really Rad Righteous Blogging Tips at Lorelle’s

TITLE: Autumn Surprise; Scatterlings©
DIMENSIONS : 6″ x 8″
TYPE : ORIGINAL WATERCOLOR PAINTING
MEDIUM : WATERCOLOR & MIXED MEDIA ON CANVAS
Check for availability on the Scatterlings Minis page

This particular painting is 6×8 inches. Professional watercolors, adhesives, and sealants were all used to create this beautiful, soothing piece. Whimsical, hand drawn subtly sparkling elements. For this particular painting I used hand made paper with leaves pressed in, watercolor paint, assorted archival pressed flowers, polished rocks, shells, feathers. The painting is covered many times with a polymer medium which creates a protective film over the entire painting. The sides of the canvas are finished, so this could also be displayed on an easel.

Scatterlings© is a collection of self-directed enchantment art which combines actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums. Hidden among the actual and rendered foliage are an enchanted assortment of ‘Scatterlings’©; mythical animals and fairies.

Forming ’something’ out of ‘the nothing’ often overlooked in everyday life, these one-of-a-kind folk art pieces take up to a year to complete as flowers and leaves are collected, pressed, preserved and finally hidden within a vision that evolves continually. Although preserved in the same manner as a piece of handmade paper. Within the larger pieces packets of silica gel are placed between the original and the frame to absorb humidity. As with most pieces of fine art; the original should not be placed in a window or beneath bright light.

If you find yourself drawn to this one of a kind, mini art treasure – grab it as it’s the only one!

detail

detail

detail

TITLE: Startling© Scatterlings©
DIMENSIONS : 6″ x 8″
TYPE : ORIGINAL WATERCOLOR PAINTING
MEDIUM : WATERCOLOR & MIXED MEDIA ON CANVAS
Check for availability on the Scatterlings Minis page

This particular painting is 6×8 inches. Professional watercolors, adhesives, and sealants were all used to create this beautiful, soothing piece. Whimsical, hand drawn subtly sparkling elements. For this particular painting I used hand made paper with leaves pressed in, watercolor paint, assorted archival pressed flowers, polished rocks, shells, feathers. The painting is covered many times with a polymer medium which creates a protective film over the entire painting. The sides of the canvas are finished, so this could also be displayed on an easel.

Scatterlings© is a collection of self-directed enchantment art which combines actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums. Hidden among the actual and rendered foliage are an enchanted assortment of ‘Scatterlings’©; mythical animals and fairies.

Forming ’something’ out of ‘the nothing’ often overlooked in everyday life, these one-of-a-kind folk art pieces take up to a year to complete as flowers and leaves are collected, pressed, preserved and finally hidden within a vision that evolves continually. Although preserved in the same manner as a piece of handmade paper. Within the larger pieces packets of silica gel are placed between the original and the frame to absorb humidity. As with most pieces of fine art; the original should not be placed in a window or beneath bright light.

If you find yourself drawn to this one of a kind, mini art treasure – grab it as it’s the only one!

detail

detail

detail

detail

Masked; Pointillsm/Stippling; Pen & Ink. Sold.
More Pointillim/Stippling on this blog.

I cannot grow
I have no shadow
To run away from,
I only play
WH Auden

Browse available pointillism prints from a huge selection of limited run (25 ea) prints.

A Passion For The Past; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Touch of Culture; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Decade of Growth; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Sombrero Surprise; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

A Few Of My Favorite Things; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – they won’t be listed here again at this sensational price.
I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95.

Title: Seated in Mercy’s Garden; Scatterlings©
DIMENSIONS : 6″ x 8″
TYPE : ORIGINAL WATERCOLOR PAINTING
MEDIUM : WATERCOLOR & MIXED MEDIA ON CANVAS
Check for availability on the Scatterlings Minis page

This particular painting is 6×8 inches. Professional watercolors, adhesives, and sealants were all used to create this beautiful, soothing piece. Whimsical, hand drawn subtly sparkling elements. For this particular painting I used hand made paper with leaves pressed in, watercolor paint, assorted archival pressed flowers, polished rocks, shells, feathers. The painting is covered many times with a polymer medium which creates a protective film over the entire painting. The sides of the canvas are finished, so this could also be displayed on an easel.

If you find yourself drawn to this one of a kind, mini art treasure – grab it as it’s the only one!

detail

detail

detail

detail

detail

TITLE Bluebird and Blooms; Scatterlings©
DIMENSIONS : 6″ x 8″
TYPE : ORIGINAL WATERCOLOR PAINTING
MEDIUM : WATERCOLOR & MIXED MEDIA ON CANVAS
Check for availability on the Scatterlings Minis page

This particular painting is 6×8 inches. Professional watercolors, adhesives, and sealants were all used to create this beautiful, soothing piece. Whimsical, hand drawn subtly sparkling elements. For this particular painting I used hand made paper with leaves pressed in, watercolor paint, assorted archival pressed flowers, polished rocks, shells, feathers. The painting is covered many times with a polymer medium which creates a protective film over the entire painting. The sides of the canvas are finished, so this could also be displayed on an easel.

Scatterlings© is a collection of self-directed enchantment art which combines actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums. Hidden among the actual and rendered foliage are an enchanted assortment of ‘Scatterlings’©; mythical animals and fairies.

Forming ’something’ out of ‘the nothing’ often overlooked in everyday life, these one-of-a-kind folk art pieces take up to a year to complete as flowers and leaves are collected, pressed, preserved and finally hidden within a vision that evolves continually. Although preserved in the same manner as a piece of handmade paper. Within the larger pieces packets of silica gel are placed between the original and the frame to absorb humidity. As with most pieces of fine art; the original should not be placed in a window or beneath bright light.

If you find yourself drawn to this one of a kind, mini art treasure – grab it as it’s the only one!

detail

detail

detail

detail

Title: Standing in the Garden, Still; Scatterlings©
DIMENSIONS : 6″ x 8″
TYPE : ORIGINAL WATERCOLOR PAINTING
MEDIUM : WATERCOLOR & MIXED MEDIA ON CANVAS
Check for availability on the Scatterlings Minis page

This particular painting is 6×8 inches. Professional watercolors, adhesives, and sealants were all used to create this beautiful, soothing piece. Whimsical, hand drawn subtly sparkling elements. For this particular painting I used hand made paper with leaves pressed in, watercolor paint, assorted archival pressed flowers, polished rocks, shells, feathers. The painting is covered many times with a polymer medium which creates a protective film over the entire painting. The sides of the canvas are finished, so this could also be displayed on an easel.

I ship with priority mail, flat rate with delivery confirmation, insured.

If you find yourself drawn to this one of a kind, mini art treasure – grab it as it’s the only one!

detail

detail

detail

detail

detail

detail

“Bird’s Eye View”© Original now available for sale.
Original 30″w x 20″h; Matted and Framed: 40″w x 28″h
Scatterlings © Originals, Limited-Run Prints now available.

Scatterlings© is a collection of self-directed enchantment art which combines actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums. Hidden among the actual and rendered foliage are an enchanted assortment of Scatterlings; mythical animals and fairies. These one-of-a-kind folk art pieces take up to a year to complete as flowers and leaves are collected, pressed, preserved and finally hidden within a vision that evolves continually. (Mixed Media; Pressed Foliage, Watercolor, Colored Pencil, Pen and Ink on Handmade Paper)

Detail Close-Up

Detail Close-Up

Detail Close-Up

Detail Close-Up

• ~~~ • ~~~ • ~~~ • ~~~ • ~~~ • ~~~ •

Jacquelyn L. Berl (also known under the artistic monicker “Ascender“, see more works at her site) is a versatile and prolific artist with a strong drive towards finding an original signature style. She creates art with a seemingly unlimited assortment of media, fusing various schools and trends into a conglomerate body of work. I would categorize her style as gravitating towards the surreal, often with fabulous qualities; it characterizes in various degrees her mixed media works, collages, ink, watercolor and oil paintings. To my mind Berl achieves best results with the more combinative efforts, and while the more traditional artwork exhibits engaging pristine and figurative qualities, it is in the more complex and “dirty” pieces that her creative potential finds a unique outlet.

Viewing the “Scatterlings (c),” which, according to the artist, “combine actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums” is a rich and magical experience — not surprising considering the “mythical animals and fairies” populating these pieces. In a way it replicates the ritual of reading a fairy tale to a child: each night the infant would ask for another reading of the same story and each time the story would sound different. It is possible to see each scatterling as a meta-illustration of a fairy-tale, existing or not. Perhaps even more radically, each piece is indeed a fairy tale, only of a visual kind. This would make sense considering the arduous process, taking up to a year, of making (”writing”) them.

Technically they may be seen as Pollock’s logical continuation: he painted while putting the canvas on the floor, letting gravity participate in the process, and Jaquelyn similarly alludes to gravity, which forces the leaves and the plants she uses down to earth. Thus she may be proposing an idealized artistic view of the physical world around us, everyday objects being the media and the ground they rest upon the surface. But even without this allegory, her artwork bears a purely visual resemblance to abstract expressionism, all the while retaining the concrete form of the inserted magical characters — the result is a fascinating surreal mishmash.

Clever use of perspective, compositional rhythm and color toning, combined with actual flora creates a bewitching effect of three-dimensionality. I cannot decide whether the artist panders to the younger audience by incorporating real objects, seeking to emulate depth with actual depth on the paper, but it certainly appeals to the child in me, evoking an inner smile. I also think that it is this kind of works of art that more than usual encourages children to want to become artists — it could be the appeal of using objects found in nature, something every playful kid does as a matter of fact anyway.

Elijah at Art & Critique

“Cascading Colors” Scatterlings©
Original 30″w x 20″h; Matted and Framed: 40″w x 28″h now available for sale. Inquire.
Scatterlings © 11 x 17 limited-run Prints now available.

your laughter must raise
its foamy cascade,
and in the spring, love,
I want your laughter like
the flower I was waiting for,
the blue flower, the rose
of my echoing country.

Pablo Neruda

Viewing the “Scatterlings (c),” which, according to the artist, “combine actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums” is a rich and magical experience — not surprising considering the “mythical animals and fairies” populating these pieces. In a way it replicates the ritual of reading a fairy tale to a child: each night the infant would ask for another reading of the same story and each time the story would sound different. It is possible to see each scatterling as a meta-illustration of a fairy-tale, existing or not. Perhaps even more radically, each piece is indeed a fairy tale, only of a visual kind. This would make sense considering the arduous process, taking up to a year, of making (“writing”) them.

Technically they may be seen as Pollock‘s logical continuation: he painted while putting the canvas on the floor, letting gravity participate in the process, and Jaqueline similarly alludes to gravity, which forces the leaves and the plants she uses down to earth. Thus she may be proposing an idealized artistic view of the physical world around us, everyday objects being the media and the ground they rest upon the surface. But even without this allegory, her artwork bears a purely visual resemblance to abstract expressionism, all the while retaining the concrete form of the inserted magical characters (visit her blog for close ups) — the result is a fascinating surreal mishmash.

Clever use of perspective, compositional rhythm and color toning, combined with actual flora creates a bewitching effect of three-dimensionality. I cannot decide whether the artist panders to the younger audience by incorporating real objects, seeking to emulate depth with actual depth on the paper, but it certainly appeals to the child in me, evoking an inner smile. I also think that it is this kind of works of art that more than usual encourages children to want to become artists — it could be the appeal of using objects found in nature, something every playful kid does as a matter of fact anyway.

see full critique here.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!)

Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95. Remaining prints limited to stock on hand.

TITLE : There is Peace in the Garden; Scatterlings©
DIMENSIONS : 6″ x 8″
TYPE : ORIGINAL WATERCOLOR PAINTING
MEDIUM : WATERCOLOR & MIXED MEDIA ON CANVAS.
Check for availability on the Scatterlings Minis page

This particular painting is 6×8 inches. Professional watercolors, adhesives, and sealants were all used to create this beautiful, soothing piece. Whimsical, hand drawn subtly sparkling elements. For this particular painting I used hand made paper with leaves pressed in, watercolor paint, assorted archival pressed flowers, polished rocks, shells, feathers. The painting is covered many times with a polymer medium which creates a protective film over the entire painting. The sides of the canvas are finished, so this could also be displayed on an easel or simply hung on a nail.

If you find yourself drawn to this one of a kind, mini art treasure – grab it as it’s the only one!

detail

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“Yesterday’s Dream”©. Scatterlings © Original now available for sale.
Original 30″w x 20″h; Matted and Framed: 40″w x 28″h
Framed and Matted Scatterlings now available for purchase.
Or pick up a print for only $17.

“Your children are not your children.
They are sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you.
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For thir souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit,
not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them,
but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the make upon the path of the infinite,
and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness.
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
so He also loves the bow that is stable.”

Khalil Gibran

Scatterlings© is a collection of self-directed enchantment art which combines actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums. Hidden among the actual and rendered foliage are an enchanted assortment of Scatterlings; mythical animals and fairies. These one-of-a-kind folk art pieces take up to a year to complete as flowers and leaves are collected, pressed, preserved and finally hidden within a vision that evolves continually. (Mixed Media; Pressed Foliage, Watercolor, Colored Pencil, Pen and Ink on Handmade Paper)

Jacquelyn L. Berl … is a versatile and prolific artist with a strong drive towards finding an original signature style. She creates art with a seemingly unlimited assortment of media, fusing various schools and trends into a conglomerate body of work. I would categorize her style as gravitating towards the surreal, often with fabulous qualities; it characterizes in various degrees her mixed media works, collages, ink, watercolor and oil paintings. To my mind Berl achieves best results with the more combinative efforts, and while the more traditional artwork exhibits engaging pristine and figurative qualities, it is in the more complex and “dirty” pieces that her creative potential finds a unique outlet.

Viewing the “Scatterlings (c),” … is a rich and magical experience — not surprising considering the “mythical animals and fairies” … Jaquelyn alludes to gravity, which forces the leaves and the plants she uses down to earth. Thus she may be proposing an idealized artistic view of the physical world around us, everyday objects being the media and the ground they rest upon the surface. But even without this allegory, her artwork bears a purely visual resemblance to abstract expressionism, all the while retaining the concrete form of the inserted magical characters — the result is a fascinating surreal mishmash.

Clever use of perspective, compositional rhythm and color toning, combined with actual flora creates a bewitching effect of three-dimensionality. I cannot decide whether the artist panders to the younger audience by incorporating real objects, seeking to emulate depth with actual depth on the paper, but it certainly appeals to the child in me, evoking an inner smile. I also think that it is this kind of works of art that more than usual encourages children to want to become artists — it could be the appeal of using objects found in nature, something every playful kid does as a matter of fact anyway.

Elijah at Art & Critique

Yesterday’s Dream; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in perfect condition. Shipping: $4.95.

See full line of remaining prints.

TITLE : Running Rampant; Scatterlings©
DIMENSIONS : 6″ x 8″
TYPE : ORIGINAL WATERCOLOR PAINTING
MEDIUM : WATERCOLOR & MIXED MEDIA ON CANVAS
Check for availability on the Scatterlings Minis page

This particular painting is 6×8 inches. Professional watercolors, adhesives, and sealants were all used to create this beautiful, soothing piece. Whimsical, hand drawn subtly sparkling elements. For this particular painting I used hand made paper with leaves pressed in, watercolor paint, assorted archival pressed flowers, polished rocks, shells, feathers. The painting is covered many times with a polymer medium which creates a protective film over the entire painting. The sides of the canvas are finished, so this could also be displayed on an easel.

Scatterlings© is a collection of self-directed enchantment art which combines actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums. Hidden among the actual and rendered foliage are an enchanted assortment of ‘Scatterlings’©; mythical animals and fairies.

Forming ’something’ out of ‘the nothing’ often overlooked in everyday life, these one-of-a-kind folk art pieces take up to a year to complete as flowers and leaves are collected, pressed, preserved and finally hidden within a vision that evolves continually. Although preserved in the same manner as a piece of handmade paper. Within the larger pieces packets of silica gel are placed between the original and the frame to absorb humidity. As with most pieces of fine art; the original should not be placed in a window or beneath bright light.

If you find yourself drawn to this one of a kind, mini art treasure – grab it as it’s the only one!

detail

detail

detail

detail

detail

detail

Scatterlings “Unscene”©
Original now available for sale; 30″w x 20″h; Matted and Framed: 40″w x 28″h.
One-of-a-kind (!) Framed and Matted Scatterlings now available for purchase.
Or pick up a print for only $17

Scatterlings© is a collection of self-directed enchantment art which combines actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums. Hidden among the actual and rendered foliage are an enchanted assortment of Scatterlings; mythical animals and fairies. These one-of-a-kind folk art pieces take up to a year to complete as flowers and leaves are collected, pressed, preserved and finally hidden within a vision that evolves continually. (Mixed Media; Pressed Foliage, Watercolor, Colored Pencil, Pen and Ink on Handmade Paper)

Title: Calavera Confectionary Medium: Acrylics on stretched canvas. 24″ x 18″. Sold.

Getting drunk, a friend called women
He had slept with, men he hated,
And then 911, repeating
“Emergency” like a schoolboy.

“Try 999,” I suggested,
Giving him the hot-line number
That Malaysians, once, imagined
Was the extension of the dead,

Their calls, instead, directed to
The homes for police and firemen
And medical help, dispatchers
Picking up for thousands who thought,

Immediately, they had linked
With the calm voices of the dead.
Cautions? Disclaimers? Those callers,
Regardless, asked about heaven’s

Lifestyle, what it meant to be dead.
They chanted incantations to
Ward off whatever might travel
Through phone lines from the afterlife.

“What’s the story with you,” my friend
Kept on repeating, receiving
Sympathy, curses, threats, a fine.
And the Malaysians? They, at last,

Asked for help with the lottery—
Because surely the selfless dead
Knew the winning numbers, the sort
Of thing you heard in paradise.

The Extension of the Dead by Gary Fincke

Calavera aka Sugar Skulls

José Guadalupe Posada; calavera artist

Day of the Dead

5 blogs talking about the Day of the Dead: Dia de Los Muertos, Lily Ruth, the Blue Voice, Home Sweet Mexico, 11yfleey

5 Blogs showing sugar skulls: iconARTe, Oakland Goods, Phare-Camp Art Journal, the Madonna Idea, Have He(Art)

Title: Nectar’s Delight
DIMENSIONS : 6″ x 8″
TYPE : ORIGINAL WATERCOLOR PAINTING
MEDIUM : WATERCOLOR & MIXED MEDIA ON CANVAS
Check for availability on the Scatterlings Minis page

This particular painting is 6×8 inches. Professional watercolors, adhesives, and sealants were all used to create this beautiful, soothing piece. Whimsical, hand drawn subtly sparkling elements. For this particular painting I used hand made paper with leaves pressed in, watercolor paint, assorted archival pressed flowers, polished rocks, shells, feathers. The painting is covered many times with a polymer medium which creates a protective film over the entire painting. The sides of the canvas are finished, so this could also be displayed on an easel.

If you find yourself drawn to this one of a kind, mini art treasure – grab it as it’s the only one!

Title: Breena
DIMENSIONS : 6″ x 8″
TYPE : ORIGINAL WATERCOLOR PAINTING
MEDIUM : WATERCOLOR & MIXED MEDIA ON CANVAS.
Check for availability on the Scatterlings Minis page

This particular painting is 6×8 inches. Professional watercolors, adhesives, and sealants were all used to create this beautiful, soothing piece. Whimsical, hand drawn subtly sparkling elements. For this particular painting I used hand made paper with leaves pressed in, watercolor paint, assorted archival pressed flowers, polished rocks, shells, feathers. The painting is covered many times with a polymer medium which creates a protective film over the entire painting. The sides of the canvas are finished, so this could also be displayed on an easel.

If you find yourself drawn to this one of a kind, mini art treasure – grab it as it’s the only one!

Title: Afreda
DIMENSIONS : 6″ x 8″
TYPE : ORIGINAL WATERCOLOR PAINTING
MEDIUM : WATERCOLOR & MIXED MEDIA ON CANVAS
Check for availability on the Scatterlings Minis page

This particular painting is 6×8 inches. Professional watercolors, adhesives, and sealants were all used to create this beautiful, soothing piece. Whimsical, hand drawn subtly sparkling elements. For this particular painting I used hand made paper with leaves pressed in, watercolor paint, assorted archival pressed flowers, polished rocks, shells, feathers. The painting is covered many times with a polymer medium which creates a protective film over the entire painting. The sides of the canvas are finished, so this could also be displayed on an easel.

If you find yourself drawn to this one of a kind, mini art treasure – grab it as it’s the only one!

Sanctuary of Grace© Scatterlings©.
30″w x 20″h; Matted and Framed: 40″w x 28″h.
One-of-a-kind (!) Framed and Matted Scatterlings now available for purchase. Sold.
Or pick up a print for only $17

Scatterlings is a collection of self-directed enchantment art which combines actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums. Hidden among the actual and rendered foliage are an enchanted assortment of Scatterlings; mythical animals and fairies. Jacquelyn succeeds in forming ’something’ out of ‘the nothing’ often overlooked in everyday life. These one-of-a-kind folk art pieces take up to a year to complete as flowers and leaves are collected, pressed, preserved and finally hidden within a vision that evolves continually. (Mixed Media; Pressed Foliage, Watercolor, Colored Pencil, Pen and Ink on Handmade Paper)

Jacquelyn allows her visionary concepts to evolve with this wonderfully detailed collection of fine arts. To review this collection is to allow yourself a glimpse in this journey of intuitiveness by creating a completely new non-traditional art concept.

Sanctuary of Grace; click on image for larger view. Pick up a print for only $17. limited-run 11×17 print + shipping and handling.

Self Portrait”. Scatterlings © Original. NFS.
Original 30″w x 20″h; Matted and Framed: 40″w x 28″h
Framed and Matted Scatterlings now available for purchase.
Or pick up a print for only $17

detail

Scatterlings© is a collection of self-directed enchantment art which combines actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums. Hidden among the actual and rendered foliage are an enchanted assortment of Scatterlings; mythical animals and fairies. These one-of-a-kind folk art pieces take up to a year to complete as flowers and leaves are collected, pressed, preserved and finally hidden within a vision that evolves continually. (Mixed Media; Pressed Foliage, Watercolor, Colored Pencil, Pen and Ink on Handmade Paper)

detail

detail

detail
detail

AscenderRisesAbove is proud to present a huge selection on a limited run 11″ x17″ prints.

These posters are printed on 80 lbDull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!)
Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print.
These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – a great opportunity to purchase one of these 50 assorted images. They won’t be listed here again at this sensational price. I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95.

Jacquelyn L. Berl … is a versatile and prolific artist with a strong drive towards finding an original signature style. She creates art with a seemingly unlimited assortment of media, fusing various schools and trends into a conglomerate body of work. I would categorize her style as gravitating towards the surreal, often with fabulous qualities; it characterizes in various degrees her mixed media works, collages, ink, watercolor and oil paintings. To my mind Berl achieves best results with the more combinative efforts, and while the more traditional artwork exhibits engaging pristine and figurative qualities, it is in the more complex and “dirty” pieces that her creative potential finds a unique outlet.

Viewing the “Scatterlings (c),” … is a rich and magical experience — not surprising considering the “mythical animals and fairies” … Jaquelyn alludes to gravity, which forces the leaves and the plants she uses down to earth. Thus she may be proposing an idealized artistic view of the physical world around us, everyday objects being the media and the ground they rest upon the surface. But even without this allegory, her artwork bears a purely visual resemblance to abstract expressionism, all the while retaining the concrete form of the inserted magical characters — the result is a fascinating surreal mishmash.

Clever use of perspective, compositional rhythm and color toning, combined with actual flora creates a bewitching effect of three-dimensionality. I cannot decide whether the artist panders to the younger audience by incorporating real objects, seeking to emulate depth with actual depth on the paper, but it certainly appeals to the child in me, evoking an inner smile. I also think that it is this kind of works of art that more than usual encourages children to want to become artists — it could be the appeal of using objects found in nature, something every playful kid does as a matter of fact anyway.

Elijah at Art & Critique

“Cascading Colors” Scatterlings©. Original now available for sale.
Original 30″w x 20″h; Matted and Framed: 40″w x 28″h.
Inquire to purchase original.
Scatterlings © 11 x 17 limited-run Prints now available.

“If a man could pass through Paradise in a dream, and have a flower presented to him as a pledge that his soul had really been there, and if he found that flower in his hand when he awake – Aye, what then?”

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

~~~

Scatterlings© is a collection of self-directed enchantment art which combines actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums. Hidden among the actual and rendered foliage are an enchanted assortment of ‘Scatterlings’©; mythical animals and fairies.

Forming ’something’ out of ‘the nothing’ often overlooked in everyday life, these one-of-a-kind folk art pieces take up to a year to complete as flowers and leaves are collected, pressed, preserved and finally hidden within a vision that evolves continually. Although preserved in the same manner as a piece of handmade paper. Within the larger pieces packets of silica gel are placed between the original and the frame to absorb humidity. Though framed, each piece continues to be fragile and must be handled with extra care. As with most pieces of fine art; the original should not be placed in a window or beneath bright light. Each original piece is copyrighted.

Title: Kitchen Perspective Rendering. Medium: Watercolor on Crescent Board.
Inquire about a rendering of your home. More Perspective Renderings on this blog. More Ascender’s Watercolors on homepage and this blog.

—

It’s a kitchen. Its curtains fill
with a morning light so bright
you can’t see beyond its windows
into the afternoon. A kitchen
falling through time with its things
in their places, the dishes jingling
up in the cupboard, the bucket
of drinking water rippled as if
a truck had just gone past, but that truck
was thirty years. No one’s at home
in this room. Its counter is wiped,
and the dishrag hangs from its nail,
a dry leaf. In housedresses of mist,
blue aprons of rain, my grandmother
moved through this life like a ghost,
and when she had finished her years,
she put them all back in their places
and wiped out the sink, turning her back
on the rest of us, forever.

A Room in the Past by Ted Kooser

—

Ted Kooser’s Homepage

Ted Kooser Wiki

Kitchen Design Wiki

Hell’s Kitchen

Gordon Ramsay’s Group

“Flights of Childhood”© Original now available for sale.
Original 30″w x 20″h; Matted and Framed: 40″w x 28″h
Framed and Matted Scatterlings now available for purchase.
Or pick up a print for only $17

Scatterlings© is a collection of self-directed enchantment art which combines actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums. Hidden among the actual and rendered foliage are an enchanted assortment of Scatterlings; mythical animals and fairies. These one-of-a-kind folk art pieces take up to a year to complete as flowers and leaves are collected, pressed, preserved and finally hidden within a vision that evolves continually. (Mixed Media; Pressed Foliage, Watercolor, Colored Pencil, Pen and Ink on Handmade Paper)

Jacquelyn L. Berl … is a versatile and prolific artist with a strong drive towards finding an original signature style. She creates art with a seemingly unlimited assortment of media, fusing various schools and trends into a conglomerate body of work. I would categorize her style as gravitating towards the surreal, often with fabulous qualities; it characterizes in various degrees her mixed media works, collages, ink, watercolor and oil paintings. To my mind Berl achieves best results with the more combinative efforts, and while the more traditional artwork exhibits engaging pristine and figurative qualities, it is in the more complex and “dirty” pieces that her creative potential finds a unique outlet.

Viewing the “Scatterlings (c),” … is a rich and magical experience — not surprising considering the “mythical animals and fairies” … Jaquelyn alludes to gravity, which forces the leaves and the plants she uses down to earth. Thus she may be proposing an idealized artistic view of the physical world around us, everyday objects being the media and the ground they rest upon the surface. But even without this allegory, her artwork bears a purely visual resemblance to abstract expressionism, all the while retaining the concrete form of the inserted magical characters — the result is a fascinating surreal mishmash.

Clever use of perspective, compositional rhythm and color toning, combined with actual flora creates a bewitching effect of three-dimensionality. I cannot decide whether the artist panders to the younger audience by incorporating real objects, seeking to emulate depth with actual depth on the paper, but it certainly appeals to the child in me, evoking an inner smile. I also think that it is this kind of works of art that more than usual encourages children to want to become artists — it could be the appeal of using objects found in nature, something every playful kid does as a matter of fact anyway.

Elijah at Art & Critique

Flights of Childhood; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in perfect condition. Shipping: $4.95.

See full line of remaining prints.

TITLE: Hidden© Scatterlings©
DIMENSIONS : 5″ x 7″
TYPE : ORIGINAL WATERCOLOR PAINTING
MEDIUM : WATERCOLOR & MIXED MEDIA ON CANVAS
Check for availability on the Scatterlings Minis page

This particular painting is 5×7 inches, slightly smaller then the other Scatterlings© Minis. Professional watercolors, adhesives, and sealants were all used to create this beautiful, soothing piece. Whimsical, hand drawn subtly sparkling elements. For this particular painting I used hand made paper with leaves pressed in, watercolor paint, assorted archival pressed flowers, polished rocks, shells, feathers. The painting is covered many times with a polymer medium which creates a protective film over the entire painting. The sides of the canvas are finished, so this could also be displayed on an easel.

Scatterlings© is a collection of self-directed enchantment art which combines actual foliage with watercolor and color pencil mediums. Hidden among the actual and rendered foliage are an enchanted assortment of ‘Scatterlings’©; mythical animals and fairies.

Forming ’something’ out of ‘the nothing’ often overlooked in everyday life, these one-of-a-kind folk art pieces take up to a year to complete as flowers and leaves are collected, pressed, preserved and finally hidden within a vision that evolves continually. Although preserved in the same manner as a piece of handmade paper. Within the larger pieces packets of silica gel are placed between the original and the frame to absorb humidity. As with most pieces of fine art; the original should not be placed in a window or beneath bright light.

If you find yourself drawn to this one of a kind, mini art treasure – grab it as it’s the only one!

Woot, Woot! I was selected as a winner of the JorjDotOrg PhotoHunt challenge for a photo theme of “Roses”. As a winner, I get the added responsibility of judging the next challenge of “Portrait”. Come join the fun in the upcoming photo theme of “Collage”…

A Passion For The Past; Pointillism; Pen and India Ink.
More Pointillim/Stippling on this blog.

~~~

As the wild-colt
at meadow,
round its mare’s feet,
they beat
ecstatic dance-beat.

“Choros Translations” by Hilda Doolittle (1886-1961), U.S. poet.

~~~

Pointillism Wiki

Hilda Doolittle Wiki

Native Americans in the United States

Native Americans Art and Music

List of Dance Styles

Antiquity; Stippling/Pointillism; Pen and India Ink

… What pages blotted, blistered by our tears!
What lovely landscapes on the margin shine,
What sweet, angelic faces, what divine
And holy images of love and trust,
Undimmed by age, unsoiled by damp or dust!
Whose hand shall dare to open and explore
These volumes, closed and clasped forevermore? …

Morituri Salutamus: by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (full text)

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Wiki

Chronicle Wiki

Native American History

Geronimo Wiki

Geronimo New York Times Obituary

More Ascender’s Pointillism on this blog

A Passion For The Past; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

A Touch of Culture; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Decade of Growth; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Sombrero Surprise; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

A Few Of My Favorite Things; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

AscenderRisesAbove is proud to present a huge selection on a limited run (25 ea) 11×17 prints. These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – a great opportunity to purchase one of these 50 assorted images. They won’t be listed here again at this sensational price.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!)

Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95.

“In Search of a Miracle”© Original now available for sale (read more).
Original 30″w x 20″h; Matted and Framed: 40″w x 28″h

“I have read somewhere that the birds of fairyland are white as snow.”
W. B. Yeats

Masked; Pointillsm/Stippling; Pen & Ink. Sold.
More Pointillim/Stippling on this blog.

I cannot grow
I have no shadow
To run away from,
I only play
WH Auden

Browse available pointillism prints from a huge selection of limited run (25 ea) prints.

A Passion For The Past; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Touch of Culture; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Decade of Growth; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Sombrero Surprise; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

A Few Of My Favorite Things; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – they won’t be listed here again at this sensational price.
I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95.

A Passion For The Past; Pointillism; Pen and India Ink.
More Pointillim/Stippling on this blog.

~~~

As the wild-colt
at meadow,
round its mare’s feet,
they beat
ecstatic dance-beat.

“Choros Translations” by Hilda Doolittle (1886-1961), U.S. poet.

~~~

Pointillism Wiki

Hilda Doolittle Wiki

Native Americans in the United States

Native Americans Art and Music

List of Dance Styles

Title: “Rendering; Yellow Tufting”
Medium: Watercolor on Bristol Board

Of yellow leaves and gossamer
In autumns that there were
With morning mist and silver sun
And wind upon my hair

J.R.R. Tolkien

Title: B/W; Pen/Fluorescent Ink on Paper
More Ascender’s Perspective Renderings on this blog.

A Passion For The Past; Pointillism; Pen and India Ink.
More Pointillim/Stippling on this blog.

~~~

As the wild-colt
at meadow,
round its mare’s feet,
they beat
ecstatic dance-beat.

“Choros Translations” by Hilda Doolittle (1886-1961), U.S. poet.

~~~

Pointillism Wiki

Hilda Doolittle Wiki

Native Americans in the United States

Native Americans Art and Music

List of Dance Styles

Young Fiber Artist; Pointillsm/Stippling; Pen & Ink. Sold.
More Pointillim/Stippling on this blog.

Browse available pointillism prints from a huge selection of limited run (25 ea) prints.

A Passion For The Past; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Touch of Culture; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Decade of Growth; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Sombrero Surprise; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

A Few Of My Favorite Things; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – they won’t be listed here again at this sensational price.
I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95.

Title: Perspective Rendering “Corner”.
Medium: Marker, Pen and Ink on Crescent Board
More Ascender’s Perspective Renderings on this blog.

Interior Design Wiki

ASID; American Society of Interior Designers

Perspective Wiki

Geometry of Perspective Drawing

Masked; Pointillsm/Stippling; Pen & Ink. Sold.
More Pointillim/Stippling on this blog.

I cannot grow
I have no shadow
To run away from,
I only play
WH Auden

Browse available pointillism prints from a huge selection of limited run (25 ea) prints.

A Passion For The Past; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Touch of Culture; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Decade of Growth; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Sombrero Surprise; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

A Few Of My Favorite Things; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Cropped as shown. Copyright notice is to protect the digital image. It will NOT appear on the actual print. These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – they won’t be listed here again at this sensational price.
I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95.

Title: “The Investment”; Medium: Pointillism/Stippling; Pen and Ink; Prints are sold out.
More Ascender’s Pointillism on this blog.
Remaining Pointillism/Stippling Limited Run Prints here.

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Remaining Limited Run Prints here.
These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated.
Click on images to see poster in full.
These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – a great opportunity to purchase.
I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition.
Shipping: $4.95.
(Contact me at AscenderRisesAbove if you wish to purchase multiple prints and I will adjust the shipping price.)

A Passion For The Past; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Touch of Culture; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.<

Decade of Growth; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Sombrero Surprise; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

A Few Of My Favorite Things; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Sputters; Pointillism/Stippling; Pen and Ink. SOLD
More Ascender’s Pointillism on this blog.

Limited Run Prints on selected pointillism/stippling images while supplies last.

Title: Farm 3; Medium: Watercolor; Pen and India Ink on Crescent Board
More Ascender Perspective Renderings on this blog.
More Ascender Watercolors on this blog. Request a print.

Title: Acceleration. Medium: Pointillism/Stippling; Pen and Ink; Prints are sold out.
Remaining Pointillism/Stippling Limited Run Prints here.
More Ascender’s Pointillism on this blog

It was Mabbie without the grammar school gates.
And Mabbie was all of seven.
And Mabbie was cut from a chocolate bar.
And Mabbie thought life was heaven.

The grammar school gates were the pearly gates,
For Willie Boone went to school.
When she sat by him in history class
Was only her eyes were cool.

It was Mabbie without the grammar school gates
Waiting for Willie Boone.
Half hour after the closing bell!
He would surely be coming soon.

Oh, warm is the waiting for joys, my dears!
And it cannot be too long.
Oh, pity the little poor chocolate lips
That carry the bubble of song!

Out came the saucily bold Willie Boone.
It was woe for our Mabbie now.
He wore like a jewel a lemon-hued lynx
With sand-waves loving her brow.

It was Mabbie alone by the grammar school gates.
Yet chocolate companions had she:
Mabbie on Mabbie with hush in the heart.
Mabbie on Mabbie to be.

The Ballad of Chocolate Mabbie by Gwendolyn Brooks
Gwendolyn Brooks Wiki
More Gwendolyn Brooks Poetry

~ • ~

Remaining Limited Run Prints here.
These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated.
Click on images to see poster in full.
These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – a great opportunity to purchase.
I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition.
Shipping: $4.95.
(Contact me at AscenderRisesAbove if you wish to purchase multiple prints and I will adjust the shipping price.)

A Passion For The Past; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Touch of Culture; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.<

Decade of Growth; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Sombrero Surprise; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

A Few Of My Favorite Things; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

This Child Lost; Pointillism/Stippling; Pen and India Ink; Prints are sold out.
More Ascender’s Pointillism on this blog.
Remaining Pointillism/Stippling Limited Run Prints here.

Out of the cradle endlessly rocking,
Out of the mocking-bird’s throat, the musical shuttle,
Out of the Ninth-month midnight,
Over the sterile sands, and the fields beyond,
where the child, leaving his bed,
wander’d alone, bare-headed, barefoot,
Down from the shower’d halo,
Up from the mystic play of shadows, twining and twisting as if they were alive,
Out from the patches of briers and blackberries,
From the memories of the bird that chanted to me,
From your memories, sad brother—from the fitful risings and fallings I heard,
From under that yellow half-moon, late-risen, and swollen as if with tears,
From those beginning notes of sickness and love, there in the transparent mist,
From the thousand responses of my heart, never to cease,
From the myriad thence-arous’d words,
From the word stronger and more delicious than any,
From such, as now they start, the scene revisiting,
As a flock, twittering, rising, or overhead passing,
Borne hither—ere all eludes me, hurriedly,
A man—yet by these tears a little boy again,
Throwing myself on the sand, confronting the waves,
I, chanter of pains and joys, uniter of here and hereafter,
Taking all hints to use them—but swiftly leaping beyond them,
A reminiscence sing. …
Out Of The Cradle Endlessly Rocking excerpt by Walt Whitma

Out Of The Cradle Endlessly Rocking; full text

Walt Whitman Wiki

Walt Whitman at Project Gutenberg

~~~

Remaining Limited Run Prints here.
These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated.
Click on images to see poster in full.
These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – a great opportunity to purchase.
I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition.
Shipping: $4.95.
(Contact me at AscenderRisesAbove if you wish to purchase multiple prints and I will adjust the shipping price.)

A Passion For The Past; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Touch of Culture; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.<

Decade of Growth; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Sombrero Surprise; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

A Few Of My Favorite Things; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

The Sisters Three; Pointillism/Stippling; Pen and Ink; Prints are sold out.
More Ascender’s Pointillism on this blog.

“Forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet
and the winds long to play with your hair.”

Kahlil Gibran

Remaining Limited Run Prints here. These posters are printed on 80 lb Dull Cover paper with HP Indigo Inks on an Indigo 5000 press (a commercial printer, not a home printer!) Printed to the border, signed on the back and dated. Click on images to see poster in full. These prints are at the affordable price of $17.00 – a great opportunity to purchase. They won’t be listed here again at this sensational price. I ship flat inside a sturdy nonbending envelope using First Class USPS mail to assure it arrives to you in newborn condition. Shipping: $4.95. (Contact me at AscenderRisesAbove if you wish to purchase multiple prints and I will adjust the shipping price.)

A Passion For The Past; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Touch of Culture; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.<

Decade of Growth; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Sombrero Surprise; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

A Few Of My Favorite Things; click on image for larger view. Purchase limited-run 11×17 print for $17.00 + shipping and handling.

Watercolor; Pen and India Ink on Crescent Board

More Ascender Perspective Renderings on this blog.
More Ascender Watercolors on this blog. Request a print.