Virtual Paintout - Cape Town, South Africa

My Virtual Paintout submission for this month's location, Cape Town, South Africa.

I took the approach that I was standing in the street at the corner of Fox and Hartbees, quickly sketching this person's laundry. The sketch was quickly done using a Sharpie pen, loose watercolor wash was laid down over the top and some clarifying pen was added over the top to add depth and to the sketch. The page spread is in my sketchbook (Strathmore mixed media journal with pre-painted pages (greenish blue big brush marks at the right and bottom).

Zine Swap

On Monday, March 21, 2011 the MCBA Visual Journal Collective met to exchange journal zines. Participants had signed up last fall and had until March to complete the assigned task of creating a zine. Zines could be created a couple of different ways, all using the same size format so everyone who completed the swap could create a small case to hold their new zine collection on Monday night when we met. My cased zine collection is pictured above. I made the case with a 140 pound watercolor paper that was painted with Golden liquid acrylics.

Options for zine content and creation were:
1) Use a folded sheet of paper and draw/sketch/journal directly on the correctly sized template sheet (regular copy paper size, quarter folded), then make enough doubled sided copies from your original to make zines for the swap.
2) Scan or photograph journal/sketchbook pages, then use a desktop publishing program (Photoshop, Publisher, any program that will allow you to import, move into place, flip, and re-size images); print masters on your home printer ensuring correct sizing (no cut-off edges or folded images) and make enough double sided copies from your masters to make enough zines to swap.
3) Collage photocopies of journal/sketchbook pages onto the front of two regular sized sheets of copy paper. Have double sided copies made from these collages - this method would yield the most abstracted zine, with partial images visible.

The image below shows how to orient your two master sheets so that when you create your double sided copies and fold your sheets, everything is right side up and where it belongs. The sheet also includes instructions on completing your zine publication by cutting and a simple pamphlet stitch.

My cased zine collection, flap opened, zine spines showing.

My new zine collection spread out on the table. I have to say I am thrilled with it. The content is so varied and everyone's approach was so different, it is exciting to look at them again and again. Just ask my family and friends, I have been showing my zine collection to anyone who stands still long enough for me to wave the little box in their face and rave about all the zines (and the little box which I am admittedly in love with).

I would be delighted to start a new zine collection with blog followers as well. I have extra copies of my zine, "repose", that I would be happy to trade. Simply follow the instructions on the image in the post using sketchbook or journal images and create your own zine. When you have made your zine email me (sznnhghs@gmail.com) and we can exchange addresses and trade through the mail.

Making a Zine

For this month's meeting of the MCBA Visual Journal Collective, we had a zine exchange. For the exchange each artist had to create and make copies of their zine to share with the group. Now if you are confused, a zine is a tiny book or magazine that is created using a single sheet of regular copy paper with content that you as the zine artist create (for an instruction sheet on layout see Roz Stendahl's blog here).

I have never made a zine before and I found it to be lots of fun. To create my zine, I decided on a theme and then went back through three years of sketchbooks to find sketches that fit the theme. I scanned in all of the drawings I wanted to include and then sized them down to the correct size and layout in a Photoshop document. I printed these sheets on my home printer and then brought the sheets to a local copy center to have them copied as double sided sheets to use in my zine. The sheets were then cut in half, folded and stitched together with a simple pamphlet stitch.
The image at the top of the page is a view of my studio table mid-process.
My theme was "repose" and I used images of my pets and family members at rest or asleep. It was interesting to create a book out of separate images that were created at different times and I am extremely happy with the results.
I made a bit of a happy mistake when I had my copies run and I have 15 extra copies of my zine. I would be willing to trade zines with any of you who want to make your our zine. It is easy and fun and we would get to trade artwork! Just email me (sznnhghs@gmail.com) when you have your zine ready and we can trade mailing info.
More on the exchange and zine collection in coming days.

Virtual Paintout - Romania (last month's location)

Here is my Virtual Paintout submission for last month's location, Romania. Time got away from me and it never got sent to Bill at his blog, so I guess it is really unsubmitted and just a sketchbook drawing of DN10 in Bradet, Romania. Oh well. I liked the way this landscape turned out, so I figured I would post it here on my blog anyway, whether it went to the official blog or not.

This drawing is done on a prepainted page in my altered Strathmore journal, with a micron pen (05), and Daniel Smith Primtek watercolors.

Trapped in Winter

I have had it with winter.

This is a small group of birch trees in the parking lot of the high school where I work, trapped in the snow that has been piled around them all winter.

This is a page in my current sketchbook, the blue on the page was pre-painting done in liquid acrylic; drawing done in sharpie pen with watercolor added.

Out to Eat with a pocket sized sketchbook

Yesterday we went out to eat at Mozza Mia, a wood grilled pizza place in Edina, with my mother and father -in-law. My husband and I got there earlier than they did and I had a tiny (3.5x5) pocket sketchbook and pen with me and sketched while we talked and waited.
The food was great and they have an open wood fired kitchen, so you can see the chefs working and the fire in the big open ovens.
I had never done that before, sketched in a restaurant, and I think it was a nice way to pass the time and notice as well as remember someplace new.
Neither sketch took very long, 10 -15 minutes, with a pen.