Liquid Rainbows

It's watercolor refill at school today.  My fingers hurt from squeezing out the tubes.  Good stuff must be about to happen with this much watercolor.

Shoes in the City

I have a friend who stopped counting her shoes at pair 150.BTW: This is a little ATC I drew and gave to one of my students.


Are you a shoe-a-holic too?
What crazy collections do you keep in the closet, or out in plain sight?

Happy Friday, dear friends!

Hey Girl, Guess Who Who?

Here comes the flower girl.

I think she's me. My bridesmaids dresses sort of looked like this, almost 7 years ago. And the bouquet was modeled after my own...but I don't think there were any Masked Owls at the ceremony.



My students started their animation section (see here, and here) and I think they are really loving it (who wouldn't?!). But this comes from another of my prep drawings. It might show up in the shop soon, but I have yet to find time to post it.

One Cute Chick

Continuing on the preparation of leading my students in an animation section, here's what I've come up with.
Can you see I've got Valentine's Day on the mind? And I've been inspired by my overwhelmingly talented and successful friend, Kate Rietz for a long time.
I thought he was so cute, I posted him in the Etsy shop (for super *cheep,* I might add) in order to share the love this Valentine's Day.

Too Good

Valentine's Day is right around the corner. What are you going to do?

We are going to start an animation section in class soon and I'm just brushing up...not really an illustrator/ cartoonist.

Oh, and I've taken some new pics of the kids' drawing for the student blog so be sure to check back soon. I promise, you won't believe high schoolers did this!

Catalina: Campus by the Sea

Each year our Juniors and Seniors take a 3 day trip to Catalina Island, where they bond, are challenged spiritually and physically, and learn much about each other and their Creator. This year, Jon and I got to chaperone for the first time. I'm tellin' you, we had as much fun as the kids.
We were very excited to do this event, especially since this year's seniors were Jon's and my first class that we taught 6 years ago when they were in 7th grade. They are like our first born children, but are more like little siblings.On competition day, there was a relay race, in which students had to begin with a 9-person wheelbarrow, followed by a goldfish transport (with the mouth being the vehicle...fish must remain in tact for points; only 2 got swallowed), and ending with a spelling bee where they had to spell a word on the ground with their bodies.

They also did eating contests (baby food, sardines, cat food...), cow tongue basketball (exactly what it sounds like), and bobbing for pig's feet. Needless to say, there were a few pukers. I did NOT volunteer for those games.
There was a flag-making competition, which included clever team names and a team cheer or song. Jon's was "Pink Eye...Fear the Puss (Ya, we're contagious)!" They won extra points for following the theme of Fear Factor. Gross. Seriously.In the midst of all the fun, we had a very entertaining, very stirring chapel speaker named Jurgen Mathisias (or Gurgles Mattresses, according to spell check). Many of our students found themselves brought tearfully to their knees, moved and convicted between bouts of laughter and outrageous praise.

The competitions ended with the ultimate competition: teachers stood on the floating dock with colored flags on our waist. One person from each team had to swim to us, pull their team's flag and swim to the kayak in the distance. That's me on the dock on the right.The rest of the kids screamed and rallied their racers from the shore...I was proud of the one GIRL who competed in this one; and she placed 3rd!We had beautiful solitary times as well, campfire songs and worship under the stars, s'mores and night hikes. This was, in many senses, the best camping trip, chaperone event, or vacation I've had in a very long time.
I'm crossing my fingers to get to go with them this May on their Senior Europe trip too. Let's get those prayers rollin' now folks!

In the Dining Room...with a Paintbrush

Being a bit of an art historian, I've long since surpassed the juvenile infatuation I once had with French Impressionists, preferring for the more obscure Dadaists, color theorists, and pop artists. But as I've been prepping for a shiny new power-point version of my previously antiquated methods of teaching art history (we only got a projector last year in the art room), I was reintroduced to a few lesser seen images by secondary characters among the motley crew from Paris.
One is this painting called "In the Dining Room" by Berthe Morisot. I've always liked her, but first believed her to be a somber, melancholy woman who was isolated in a world of men, as depicted by the image of her sister in "The Cradle." I now see that she was strong in her femininely directed subject matter and was greatly accepted for her honest depictions and for painting what she saw, just like all the other impressionists did.

I love the color, which is not too soft, but still a bit ethereal, the pink, glowy skin, and the halo around every edge. There's also something about those impressionists who, while influence by Japanese woodcuts, found other ways to emphasize edge without outlining it. And the inclusion of a bit of black in this color palette ensures she is not washed out, instead is anchored in her surroundings, her home. She may be only in the dining room, but she belongs there, and fits there.

I also recently read a fictional novel (that took some broad liberties in her relationship with her colleague and husband's brother, Edouard Manet) in which I fell in love with Morisot as a real person. Sometimes women in art are either ignored, or falsely elevated, due to their being a woman, but it was nice to see this little story, however fictional, told from her perspective at the turn of the century in France.

(On a side note, I am selling this book on Amazon, a recent habit I've gotten into as I've had much time to read this summer and the used books are piling up. I'd be glad to send it your way, just go here.)

And did you know that Morisot was the great neice of Jean Baptiste Camille Corot? Goodness this girl painted in some high society company! I'm not crazy about Corot and his landscapes, but the man was a genius, after all.

Another artist I've had my eye on is Childe Hassam. Stay tuned, maybe I'll blog about him a bit later.

Do you get excited about art? Old or new? What have you seen lately that excites you?

Sweet Korean Pancakes from a Sweet Korean

Image here

When a foreign exchange student comes to visit, one thing they do is go by an Americanized version of their name. This past year I had an AMAZING girl who went by Katie; she was quiet but always smiling, had a great sense of humor, and was an incredible artist. It wasn't until the end of the year that we got any personal info out of Katie, and come to find out she was only a 10th grader who was graduating this year.Another thing she told us was her real name, Eun-Ji. That's so much more original than Katie...so we got to call her this for the last week of school.

One day we asked Eun-Ji what her favorite Korean food was and she had a hard time explaining to us what Korean Pancakes were, so the next time she went to the Korean market, she brought some back for the class. She wasn't too pleased with the authenticity of them, so at our end-of-the-year party she made some from scratch and let me tell you...

They were to DIE for! So I thought I'd share this little recipe, in her own words, all the way from the bottom of Eun-Ji's heart.

Sweet Korean Pancakes

Ingredients:
Flour- 100g
Glutinous Rice Flour- 60g (from the Korean market)
Yeast- 1/2 teaspoon
Salt - 1/2 teaspoon
Warm water- 1/2 cup
Green Tea Powder - 1 teaspoon
Vegetable Oil

For the sauce:
Brown Sugar- 3 teaspoons
Cinnamon- 1/2 teaspoon
Chopped walnut and peanut

Soak yeast in bowl with the warm water for about 5 minutes. Add flour and glutinous rice flour. Add warm water if needed and mix so it is thick. Cover bowl and let ferment for 30-60 minutes. In a separate bowl mix sugar, cinnamon, and nuts for the sauce; set aside.

In your hands, widen the dough with your hands and put a spoonful of sauce on it. Seal the dough. Repeat it for the rest of the dough, making sure there are no holes for the sauce to escape. Fry in oil on low heat, turning like a regular pancake.Also visit this site for more explanation.

I mentioned that Eun-Ji is a great artist, well check out this, one of her last projects: it's a little picture book of a group of little sheep who get creative in how to escape the clutches of imminent danger....all those wolves had to eat was a measley sunflower as the herd spent the night stargazing. Thanks, Katie! Miss you!

Also, be sure to check our student blog, the Drying Rack, for more amazing art from my class. We're building it slowly, but the art is sure to impress.

And let me know if any of you try this!

Art Festival Success (aka My Students are AMAZING!)

Let me preface by saying that I have received countless compliments this year on my students' work. Initially, I was pleased with the job security that comes along with having successful classes, but quickly I realized that the bar was being set quite high. If I don't produce equally amazing work in successive years...well these guys may have made me look good this year, but they're quickly becoming a threat! Tone it down, guys, come on; I like my job and want to keep it!
I will post more about my students' work on their blog, The Drying Rack, soon, but here's a little preview of their incredible skills. Above are 10th grade, below are 11th...

...and both of these are seniors (above and below). They just blow me away. I can't believe these guys!

And the Winner is...

.....Nancy! She'll be receiving this shrink-wrapped, matted print from me soon.

Thanks to Dionne for the random number generator; I haven't yet chosen a name for the site, there are just too many good ones.

Mural Update, Week 2

Last week the floor went in at the dental office, so I wasn't able to do any work on the mural until Wednesday. My trusty intern, Allison, was there along side me, keeping me going. I asked her to paint the background for Africa, to do the drum and costume as well. This girl is amazing, and I don't know where I'd be without her. I painted most of France (I think she's my favorite, so far), India's costume, and started the American boy. He frustrated me hugely, as most American boys do, so I need to make some adjustments.

We began to name these little ones, as they have started to come to life and have little personalities. Really, it's fun to spend my day with them. I'll have to reveal the names at the end, so stay tuned!I'm back to work again all day tomorrow, likely for another 6-8 hours or so. That's hard work to have one hand in the air all day as construction-ers are blasting all around me. I left with a killer headache, but the evening ended well with a dinner in Carlsbad with some friends from home (SLC) where we spent 2 1/2 hours laughing and cajoling about old times. That's a good long day.

PS! If you haven't given your ideas for our Name the Student Art Blog contest, now's the time. I'll be revealing the winner and the prize tomorrow!

New Student Art Blog and Giveaway

I am going to start a new Student Art blog and need ideas for a name! Submit your ideas by Friday March 20 and enter for my first giveaway! Just comment to this post with your idea (I'm open to anything, this is my advanced High School Art 2 & 3 class in which we draw, paint, do art history...the whole shebang).

(photos: Sketching Room at the Getty, Erin's colored pencil Flower, Brianna's graphite Johnny Depp).