Grabbing Life by the Cojones

2013 y’all! I still feel like I’m in the 90s. Or maybe I’ve finally arrived at “that” time in my life – being stuck in a particular time warp.

Quick catch up! I miss this place. Where once upon a time I blogged every other day or week, it has seriously fallen off  my radar. But, this year is looking to be ah-mazing! After a particularly difficult 2012 where I fell into a bit of a funk and didn’t know how to get out, things bubbled up and I found the courage to make many a change and potential difference in my life and that of my kids’. Even if these changes are not supported, not successful, I’ll know that they have made a positive difference and that’s all that counts. Turns out that taking out the trash is a very cathartic experience, especially when the trash was just someone else’s crap that they dumped in my backyard. We are all in such a good place. Finally!

So what has 2013 got in store for me?! Well good question, but here are some of the things I am super excited about it:

• I have an intern/assistant for my personal projects!! Still in discussion phase, but looking good!
• Teaching online. Yes!
• Visiting artists! Yes!
• A new community project with students at Chapman Primary School – Yeah!
• Nearly coming to an end of the community project with the Queanbeyan council and there has been discussion of possible further projects with them. Yes!
• Mosaic Symposium in Melbourne August 23 – 25

Last year I asked one of my repeat students if she’d be interested in assisting me in some of my personal projects. I’m hopeful this will work out as she’s truly lovely and I really like the way she works. There will be an introduction soon! I’ve been re-working an old design, getting what was in my head out on paper, based on my sister’s mermaids. Just a couple more elements to add and she should be ready to go – though the enlarging on this one will be interesting… It’s a big’un.

Teaching online? Mmhmm! This has been running through my head for some time now and out of the blue one of my first clients who commissioned me to make Odette, got in touch to ask if I’d be interested. So the rundown is this – AU$75/hr. I use either Skype or Facetime. I will cater the lesson plan to your needs/your project and also generalise the information where appropriate so that you can feel confident that what you are creating will last in the area that you live. I am not one of those teachers who tells you what products to buy and then leaves it at that. I get into the details of what to look for in a product and why so that no matter where you are in the world, no matter what the climate is, you have the know-how to source what you need for the project at hand. I feel this is a much more empowering method of teaching and learning. I also include class notes as a pdf. Interested? Email me!

VISITING ARTISTS! Wow, I have THREE (3) confirmed visiting artists this year!!! I know, I’m so excited. Canberra, we are so lucky. Really!! All three artists have very different styles so I think they complement each other well. In addition, all three have been teaching and creating mosaics for a number of years and are well respected in the mosaic world (and further afar too as a matter of fact!)

Susan Crocenzi will be teaching her popular class “TEMPERED, TRANSPARENT & TEXTURED GLASS AND POLYMER CLAY TILES” August 30, 31 and September 1. Susan hails from Northern California in the USA. If you have ever been to one of my classes you will recognise one of the below pieces, Crossroads, which she made for me back in 2008. It sits on my wall in my living room. Hard to miss really and always admired. Don’t miss out on this opportunity! I don’t know when or if she’ll ever be back! Places are limited. Besides, the reunion of Susan and Crossroads will be a thing to behold!

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Also on my list of Visiting Artists this year is Marian Shapiro! She had such a great time last time she was here that she has agreed to come back!! This time Marian is going to demistify “WORKING WITH SMALTI”. I. Can’t. Wait. Because yes, I’ll admit I am a little skeered of the stuff!! This class will be held November 8 – 10 and students will need to come armed with about 1.5 kgs of smalti to create either an indoor or outdoor wall hanging. Smalti Australia has agreed to a discount for all registered participants! If you happened to take Marian’s class in 2011, Creating 3D Susbtrates for Mosaic, you are welcome to mosaic one of your substrates in this class!! Great opportunity to complete a project! Let’s face it, we all have unfinished projects…

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I’m happy to be able to announce that I’ve just secured a third visiting artist. Timing is of the essence on this one as Carol Shelkin will be in the country from  the East Coast in the USA around the same time as Susan. I know, hard on your wallets people, but seriously these are two AH-mazing artists who won’t be making their way back to Australia any time soon!!! Christmas must come early and you don’t want to miss the partay. They each have their own style, their own teaching methods, their own everything. It’s, simply put, not to be missed. Carol’s class is titled “MAKE YOUR OWN MOSAIC WORKSHOP!” She will teach the use of modern mosaic techniques to understand structure, cross contour, highlights, colour, gradation, value, composition, design and types of shadows in realism using Stained Glass. Students will learn how to mix glass values and colors to define planes, and how to use colour most effectively with artist tricks. If your interest lies in creating realism in mosaics, then there’s no one better to learn from in the contemporary mosaics field today. Carol’s class is slated for August 18 & 19 (a Sunday and a Monday). So… think about putting in for leave now!

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Check out my website for full details on the Visiting Artists Series and check back for Carol’s workshop – my copy of Dreamweaver has just gone bust so I’m unable to update it immediately!

Community projects? Yep – They’re continuing! I’ve just been commissioned by Chapman Primary School to work with staff and students there to create three murals that will be permanently installed out the front of the school. The murals are all in celebration of Canberra’s centenary. Exciting stuff! Themes for the three of them have been decided upon. It’s now a matter of designing, enlarging and coding the murals for a term 2 start (no biggie!!). Deadline is the beginning of term 4 with an unveiling in Week 2 of that term as this is Children’s week. We even have rosters ready to go for all students in all years and when they will work on the mosaics. I love how organised this school is.

We’ve just completed the seventh panel for the Crawford st precinct. Pretty satisfying! The kids and staff at the Axis Youth Centre made their panel, mostly independently of me. They should be really proud of themselves! I think they did a great job. I’ve also just got the Landcare group started with theirs. Their theme is River Life. I’m looking forward to how this will turn out! A few finishing touches on the design for the HOME in Queanbeyan panel and the design will be hopefully OK’d by them! Last but not least is a playgroup of 3-5 year olds! Design yet to be determined, but as the playgroup is for Indigenous children it will  involve Indigenous elements. Almost there!

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The Mosaic Association of Australia and New Zealand (MAANZ) is hosting another Symposium, this time located in Melbourne. I will be there. Keynote speaker is UK craftivist, Carrie Reichardt (not Dusciana Bravura as previously advertised by MAANZ). Carrie is AWESOME!!! It’s going to be pretty bloody amazing! I was lucky enough to grab one of Carrie’s flying eyeball mosaics last year. Proudly hanging out the front of my home waiting to be included into a larger mosaic.

Grab life by the cojones! That’s the theme for my year! Life is too short.

Mid year already?!

How can it be?! The trees are already blossoming, it *almost* feels like the chill may be dissipating – though Winter will come back with a vengeance to be sure. It is August after all. Yay! I made it through July. My least favourite month in Canberra…

Sometimes I feel like the world is moving around me in fast motion – everyone so busy going here, going there. It’s nice to not feel like I need to participate in all that. Just sit back and watch, potter around in my garden, so to speak. Things are blossoming in my metaphorical garden, but I admit to sometimes wishing I had more time. I’d like more time to read. I’d like more time to devote to my other hobbies: crochet, roller derby and more recently raising chickens. I’d like more time to spend with my kids. Sometimes I feel cheated that I can’t spend more time with them – that’s probably been the harshest wound that divorce brings. By the same token, it is also a gift in that we cherish our time together.

The last year or so has also brought many lessons both good and challenging. Lessons are always a gift, even if hard to swallow. What it meant was that I didn’t create as much as I had planned. Not even sure that I had planned much. I still, however, feel that procrastination is in fact a good thing. There’s a lot that is happening in the quagmire of one’s brain whilst playing in a different stomping ground and I’ve learned to embrace it. Through embracing it, I feel like I am more confident in certain areas of what I do and so now I allow myself the time I need to process, even if subconsciously.

So… what have I created? It feels like not much, but I’m not sure that’s all true or important! There’s a lot going on in my brain and I’m no longer rushing to get it all done. I have time. I have plenty of it as it turns out…

What I have started to do is make my own projects a priority. I finally got some concrete poured and created a floor mosaic. So it’s not finished… yet! But I’m almost there. Literally less than a square foot left to do! Part of it lies on the floor in my living room at present. I look at it, and look at it some more. And while I look at it and work away on this, I’m thinking about my other projects.

The community project for the Queanbeyan Council is going well. We’ve entered stage 2 of the project. Two more groups will begin tomorrow to fabricate their mosaics. It’s pretty exciting! I went past the other day and saw that the Queanbeyan High School’s three panels have been installed. The morning we were meant to do it was too cold, so I never saw them get adhered to the seating… The themes explored are Youth, Education and Sports respectively: -

 

I recently learned that I have had some of my work published in a book. I havn’t yet seen the book, but lots of great artists in there and I’m very stoked I got in!!

Lastly, I am still teaching. I’ve made a few changes but for now am keeping with the classes I have always offered. Registrations for all mosaic classes are on my website. This semester they include the basic mosaic classes as well as a Mosaics on Mesh class and a glass class (Patterns & Shapes: Push-in Technique). Next year will see at least one or two new classes which I’m quite excited about. It’ll also be nice to teach some new things!!

Anyhoo! I’m off to tend to my garden…

Midnight Garden – a community mosaic project with children

As I’ve mentioned previously I was contacted a little while ago by a public primary school here in Canberra to  lead a mosaic project with their students. What came out of the brief discussions we had was to create a feature mural and some extra mosaics that will float around the courtyard. The theme of which is a macro garden.

I went away and created a design that fit to the brief, but that was also going to be simple enough for a whole school to participate in. In my opinion, too much detail can be overwhelming. I also like stylised designs, as I suppose one can tell from my work. I suggested some colour themes and created colour packs for them to refer to, but emphasised that these were suggestions only. I think ownership comes from choice in process and it was important to me not to take that away. I worked in small groups with kids once a week and the teacher leading the project worked with kids throughout the rest of the week. All the kids cottoned onto the hows and whys pretty easily and then took the information and passed it on to their peers who had not yet participated. As we fabricated, the kids made changes to some of the colour selections. The kids have been so great! Most of the panels have been fabricated already. There was always a lot of interesting conversation, a lot of problem solving (not only of the mosaic, but also of social matters in their lives). It was a lot of fun to listen to them all talk. Of course, the part they loved the most was smashing tiles!

It makes my day to hear things like:

“When I grow up, I want to be an artist” and  “This is so fun, I wish we could do it all day”, amongst many other uber cool other statements.

Yesterday I started on the installation. One of the teachers walked past while I was working and she said to me “you are such an inspiration to these kids.” I wasn’t too sure what she meant by this and after chatting with her she remarked on me being a woman doing what I am doing and how it is inspiring for kids, both male and female, to see me creating large scale mosaics: teaching, fabricating, installing etc… I never thought of it like this. Ever! Wow. It was a pretty empowering moment and one that makes me feel like I am on the right path for me. I am exactly where I should be.

Anyway, a year 6 teacher was keen for her kids to be involved. They’ll be assisting me in the rest of the installation as well as grouting the project which will basically happen next week and the week after which puts us in line to completion for the end of term.

I also had a number of students discuss with me the name of the mural. They came up with Midnight Flowers, which I thought was way cool. We settled on Midnight Garden, after some discussion, to include the whole scope of the project.

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Big THANKYOUS to all those involved: students, parents of the community and teachers, in particular Hazel who is leading the project from the school perspective and the Principal, Lindsay whose understanding of the value of art for children is invaluable.

I’ll post final pics when we get there

How Mosaic Art Assists Childrens’ Learning Abilities

I’ll be meeting with a primary school this week to discuss a potential artist in residence opportunity and create some work with their students. The prospect is an exciting one but I am also keeping a level head about it at this early stage… This, together with the children’s workshop I will be facilitating through the Sydney Children’s Festival in October, motivated me to put in writing how mosaic art affords some real, concrete learning opportunities for children. This is what I came up with. I’m sure I’ll be updating this post as time goes by so please let me know if you feel there is anything not listed here.

Mosaic art assists in the development of:

• Counting
• Matching
• Sorting
• Recognition
• Assembling
• Decision making
• Manual dexterity
• Concentration
• Attention
• Patience
• Problem solving
• Memory
• Logic
• Perception
• Imagination
• Creativity
• Intuition
• Trust
• Spatial and visual organisation (basics of geometry)
• Fine motor skills
• Coordinating a child’s thoughts and actions
• Hand and eye coordination – extremely important step to help a child achieve difficult tasks easily, including reading and writing
• Correlation between seeing and doing (sight and touch senses)
• Math skills as the child learns about basic calculations, surface area, the best way to break down a larger area into smaller ones, shapes, spatial visualisation
• Skills children will need to learn to read and write
• Curiosity
• Language skills as the child listens and follows instructions and talks about what they are doing
• Creative self expression
• Self exploration
• Self discovery

In addition to the above, larger community projects teach:

• Peer to peer interaction (subtly helps children to understand the relationships between people while learning to deal with them effectively)
• Collaboration
• Cooperative learning strategies
• Self esteem
• Confidence
• That a child is one of many, each as valuable as the other
• Tolerance
• Difference
• That a whole is made up of many parts – each one valid, each one value-adding
• Community spirit
• Responsibility
• Safety
• Friendship
• That a child’s voice is heard, valid and celebrated
• Art appreciation

How does mosaic art help the teacher/parent/caregiver?

• Making mosaics provides an opportunity for formal learning experiences
• The care provider can watch children work alone or in groups
• They can monitor they way in which the children speak, move and concentrate
• It allows for observation of a child to assess their development
• It also allows for the care provider to understand what interests the child has, what engages them and why

Most importantly, kids love it!!

New Mosaic Classes, Canberra ACT

I’m excited to say that earlier this year I released some new mosaic workshops that will take place here in Canberra. One of which will be my first Visiting Artist, Marian Shapiro. Marian will be heading down from Sydney on November 19 to teach a one-day workshop on creating 3D substrates for mosaic.

The focus of this one day course looks at creating three types of small 3D substrates for mosaic. Students will create:

• a wall-hanging mask or torso using the technique of sand casting and
• an undulating or folded wall hanging substrate,
• one small free standing form using polystyrene

All substrates are suitable for exterior use.

• Health and safety issues are discussed and a slideshow of inspiration pieces will accompany the lecture portion of the workshop.
• No experience necessary and beginners welcome.
• Full course notes and resource lists are provided.

Super exciting to be able to have that level of control over your own substrate, but also to have that creative freedom! Marian is an award winning artist, well known in the mosaic world and we’re lucky to have her on these fine shores. Places are limited and registrations are made online via Eventzilla or through my website (which will redirect you to the Eventzilla page). Email me if you have any questions!

Floradora © Marian Shapiro

Another class I’m happy to be offering is a class that spans over six weeks on a Monday morning. I’ve called it Mosaic 301: Journey into Mosaics as this is exactly what we will do. It is essentially an extension of Mosaic 101 and Mosaic 201 whilst also venturing into other techniques such as tempered glass and making mosaics on mesh, as well as using a variety of materials. Over  the six weeks, students will learn how to create a mosaic from start to finish. We will meet once a week for three hours and create two pieces, one for interior use and another suitable for exterior use, grouting both on the last day. The interior mosaic will be made using glass while the exterior mosaic will be created with ceramic on mesh. We will discuss how to prep the substrate, appropriate selection of materials, adhesives, safety, tile setting, design basics & terminology. A list of resources is available in the handouts provided. This class is suitable for the beginner as well as those with some mosaic experience who would like to extend their knowledge of making mosaics. Students will gain a strong foundation in this versatile medium. No art or mosaic experience necessary!

I also finally managed to get some sample boards made up for my classes to show how opus and grout can completely change the vibe of the same mosaic. Come join a class – there are many on offer!!

Mosaic Faux Pas

Yes it’s true. This really is installed like this. Snapped at the local primary school, where you know the dumbass got paid 50% more than regular installs purely for the fact that it’s a public school.

Mosaic Mirror Workshop in Canberra Australia

If you’re interested in learning how to create a mosaic mirror from scratch using predominantly glass tesserae (vitreous glass, stained glass, glass gems etc) then I will be running a workshop in November. Dates are Saturday 20 November (10:30 – 4:30pm) and Sunday 21 November (10:30 – 4pm).

You will learn how to cut out your final shape using a jigsaw and learn how to cut different kinds of glass and assemble the mosaic. The class is catered to creating a piece with an approximate dimension of 40cm square. Get creative, though, and think about making a mirror where the mirror itself is off centre, use strips of mirror instead of a block piece etc… Get funky and deviate from the normal square/rectangular mirror! There is no grouting in this class so if you have not grouted before I do recommend signing up to my Grout Clinic.

Cost is $185 + a $45 materials fee. Check my website for more details and if you want to sign up then email me!

Examples of Mosaic Mirrors follow.

By Sue Edkins of Mostly Mosaics in the UK.

by Carl and Sue Bryant of Showcase Mosaics.

Bubbles designed by Calligaris.

Queen of Hearts Mosaic Mirror by Erin Haworth.

Star Mirror 5 by Erin Haworth.

Fire in Bloom by Crystal Thomas.