I'd rather..

Inspire Me Thursday: Heart Art

"I'd rather live one moment with you than an eternity without you"
- Oreo cookie

Into the Light

Inspire Me Thursday: Layers

Material: Chanel ad.

f r e e d o m

Inspire Me Thursday: Mantra for the New Year

The 100th Art Post

Inspire Me Thursday: Inspired by Design



Nice challenge. Different.

I was inspired by the composition of a page. Each section has different color but in the same hue. I intended to make similar but in loud colors. I collected colored page with text, not plain. But then of course, the composition became different because I could not always find the right size. I went on. I finished the colorful page but then… it looked better sideways for my sketch idea.

I created this artwork to mark The 100th Art Post of blucolage. I have made five 3-D artworks and 95 collages (including: one digital collage, two collages featured in IMT, and one collaboration work). I found the number only this morning. I was surprised to see how productive I am in
13 weeks.

Back to the theme, I realized that I have been ‘away’ from the inspiring design but I put it as part of developing an inspiration…

Uuugh!

Inspire Me Thursday: Paints


I’m late for this week’s challenge in IMT. Paints. I’m not into painting. I thought thought thought till I found watercolor-pencil in an office supplies shop last Monday. Hm.. this is technology that didn’t exist in my childhood days.

I was reading O magazine when I remembered that I hadn't answered this challenge. I got an idea. I enjoy my sketch recently, even I keep the cut-outs because I like the shape. I keep my style; magazine page plus collage. I chose one page and started to sketch the fat lady who's trying to pull the pipe. I ‘sketched’ using the watercolor-pencil and brushed her unevenly. I’m happy. The colors look alive! I would like to explore more of this pencil.

I didn’t glue all surface, so the cut-out looks alive, two dimensional.

Please help her… Uuugh!

Daun / Leaf

Inspire Me Thursday: Open Challenge

I still have problem with uploading pictures in Blogger so I use this slideshow instead.

I was challenged to try a new medium. It’s perfect because I have a leaf I fetched from my Papua supplier’s trash bin in Kuta – Bali. It was half burned. I slipped it in between papers for a few weeks till it dries.

The leaf gives me idea to picture a Javanese lady who uses banana leaf or any large leaf to shade self from sun, even from rain. The lady wears Javanese outfit -- typical outfit worn in kampong.

Enjoy the large red daun!

Time Out

Inspire Me Thursday: Black & White



Again, it’s about life of a woman. She dreams to have “time out”.

Thursday again?

Inspire Me Thursday: Music (non-visual art form)


Again, this collage is ‘product’ of my visit to my hometown. IMT theme is music (non-visual art form). Music connects me to a piano in my childhood home. It reminds me of my Thursdays 35 years ago :-)

I started to have piano lesson at home when I was 5 years old. I was so small that I needed a little black wooden stool for foot step. The lesson was once a week – every Thursday – at 16:00 for one hour. The tutor was a young short man that.. I didn’t really like.

I didn’t enjoy my Thursday afternoon for sure. I tried to find reason not to have lesson but hardly to get one. I had to get up from nap around 15:30 and got ready. Ugh..

I had the lesson for eight years, I recall. I stopped after I entered high school. What I got from those eight year? I can play piano – classical – but I do not excel. Later Mama told me that I should not have started too early, no passion from inside. Still, I’m glad that I can play now and surely will take piano lesson again in the future. With passion and no more…

Thursday again?

Shoo shoo..

Inspire Me Thursday: Child's Play



Interesting topic about using children’s art material. I have fluorescent oil pastel and colored pencil. I tried the former but I found out oil pastel doesn’t do well in magz paper. Sure, it’s glossy page. I ironed the excess but then I ruined the tracing paper I used to print a picture. For the first time I had to trash the 70% artwork. I learned tho.

Then I sketched again, I chose gecko this time. The past few days I used tracing paper for sketching. It’s easy to do cutting because the paper is transparent. I sketched using automatic pencil I bought the other day. This pencil is special because using colored lead, six colors, and the size is 0.7 – very soft. I like it because it has nicer effect than using the usual black lead.

I looked again my sketch and I liked it! I didn’t want to cut. So I worked more on the lines and fill up the blank with more colors. I made tiny tiny circles along the body instead of just coloring. The circles may not show in the picture. I really enjoyed doing it – like meditation by doing repetition on and on and on. I’m satisfied with the result. It looks like I used colored pencil (the usual type). The good thing about automatic pencil is.. ever sharp!

I made collage of frightened girl standing on a chair trying to shoo away the gecko..

Shoo shoo..

It feels like home..

Inspire Me Thursday: Numeral Art




This week challenge is Numeral Art. Very very unusual and interesting. I was eager to start creating since I checked the theme. I started to think about the number.

Like others, I have lots of number in mind. I chose one that came first, 37. My home and shop number!! Very real, very now.

I had started browsing my Indonesian magazines since last night. I have some travel and art magazines. I don’t read Indonesian woman magazines (I read… when in salon ha ha). Perfect! I found a lot of picture with cultural touch. Yes! I have made a lot of artworks with.. Swedish touch. I like simplicity but ethnic can be nice too for a change.

I didn’t want to cut an image to form numbers 3 and 7. That’s ordinary. I wanted something else and I found both numbers in dancer poses!

The girl represents 3. She wears Betawi (an ethic group in Jakarta) costume which influenced by Chinese.

And the man represents 7. He wears common Indonesian costume for man. Why is it common? Because many ethnic groups wear similar style combined with batik (shown) or other region textile. He wears big stone ring -- the style of old Indonesian man. If image is sharp enough, you can see cotter pins instead of buttons.

I put the image of Gedong Songo temple in Ambarawa, Central Java, in the corner. The image looks familiar, like home. All three images were done on sticky tape.

I put my words in kidnapper’s font. It’s not a poem, it’s just words..

Finally, why did I choose the image of drawers for background? It feels like home!

Sweet Dreams

Inspire Me Thursday: Image Transfers


I was happy to learn about sticky tape collage in IMT. I was a bit nervous about inkjet image transfer because of the use of gel medium. I am novice.

I remembered practicing this technique thirty years ago (?!!!) in school but I could not recall the result would be. So I made a trial before started the real page. And it’s funny, my trial tape was not successful. I didn’t know how to ‘scratch’ well to get transparent image. But I just went on..

I chose image for the base first. I chose picture of an empty room with two doors. I printed my young face (from the day I learned the technique??) and my favorite image of myself, painting of a Bali girl.

I used narrow packing tape, local brand (not 3M) to make the transparent image strips which I took from an interior magazine. First strip is image of an artist’s desk. I liked the atmosphere in the room, very me -- desk with creative mess. Second strip is image of an interesting red curtain. Again, very me. Vintage. Bohemian.

I soaked both strips in water for 20 minutes. The longer the easier to take off the paper without much damaging the surface (the transparent image). It took awhile for me to get the feel of peeling off the paper under water.

I was satisfied with the result. It looked natural with chip here and there. I loved to know that the image colors really transferred to the tape. Brilliant idea!!

I arranged both transparent image strips onto the page. I showed the Bali girl painting in the window of the strip with desk. The painting shows very well. Then I put my image on the floor near one door. I gave color to the page by putting red curtain strip on the left hand side. Perfect.

I liked the effect of the plastic tape, shiny. The tips said that we can sandpaper the tape to make it dull, but for me.. this is new. Different shine in a page. So I keep the shine.

Two words completed the page. SWEET and DREAMS.

I’m satisfied with the result. The empty room, the two doors, my image and ‘image’, and the dreams I have..

Sweet dreams..

Digital Art: Kakiku

Inspire Me Thursday: Body Parts


I took photos of my feet some time ago while I was waiting for photo-taking session to finish in my art shop. It was hot sunny Sunday. I was bored waiting and rested my feet on stone sculptures I have. I had camera in hand.

I started to take one. Ehm interesting… I took more. Later I enjoyed using these photos for my exercise to master Photoshop, my latest interest. I have not done well with the arrangement that I needed to draw black lines in between photos. It was a challenge to keep hand steady while drawing a ‘straight’ line. It looks naturally drawn by hand tho..

Enjoy a part of my stone sculptures and.. kakiku!
(Indonesian for my feet)

Clip Art: ..are they??

Inspire Me Thursday: Open Studio



Interesting topic this week, Open Studio. Again I made collage – which I like to call clip art.

I spent weekend and a few days of this week in Singapore (1.5 hours flight from Jakarta). I brought with me minimal tools to make collage when I’m traveling. It’s a new habit. I made one on the first day of my stay, Blogg.

I made ..are they?? on the second day. I woke up early and was inspired by leaflets and brochures I picked from airport and those available in room. I have been in many sale season in Singapore (May – July), it would be nice to record the event this time.

I was especially attracted by Orchard road map. Orchard is the main shopping belt in Singapore -- where I usually spent my time. I didn’t check many shops, only shops I liked. I’m a fast shopper. I don’t do window shopping a lot (except I have girlfriends with me. I enjoyed following them.)

Okay. I have Orchard map as base and the event announcement on top. I didn’t glue the word SALE so it looks like tag. I showed three shops I used to check. Then I drew dots of my track from hotel where I stay this time to all of three shops I used to visit using marker pen (I left my gold pen). I fixed first coin I got from my first shopping to make the piece alive.

I got the right quotation from a magazine, it says Happy days are here again – or are they? It said to me. It asked me. So, I put it as main soul of the piece.

This piece is more like journal to me.

The studio? Of course, my bed in my hotel room. It’s good that I took the picture. I was mesmerized by the mess I made. Now I can share the photo of my studio and the art I made.

Enjoy shopping!

Art Journal: Kaki Topangku

Inspire Me Thursday: Show and Tell Art



The SHOW is shown in slideshow. Below is the TELL:

1/10 The blank first page: I bought this spiral notebook at Borders Singapore just after I had PLV. I planned to make art-journal of PLV visitors. I just made six lay-outs but never finished the work. I stopped tracking down PLV’s visitors either.

2/10 Lay outing papers: I printed Ubudblu header on orange paper and tore the edge, then print my feet Photoshop-picture I made two weeks ago. Chose more recycled papers for background. Placed the lay-out draft.

3/10 Lay outing things: I checked my sewing kit drawer and was mesmerized by stuffs I collected from many travels. Bags of stone for necklace. Strings of beads in my colors. Lots of strings (many sizes and colors), wire in colors, elastic, and more materials. Tools! (at least four types of pliers). Oh. Where was I?

4/10 Smiley pin: I found this pin among the rubble in the drawer. I decided to fix it on band that ties the notebook. To remind me to always smile.

5/10 Book cover: Yes, the cover looks the same as the inside pages. It should be nice to have decorated cover but I save it for later. Long term project.

6/10 Close up header: That’s the final look of the header. I put stitched badge in the shape of universe with a little alien (me) on top. I had it for torn jeans but never had time to fix (better bought new jeans he he). Universe symbolizes “my world”, Ubudblu. I also drew a blue star. I am the star.

7/10 Sewn sand-beads: I sewn four tiny beads in four corners of my feet picture to look like nails. I chose four prime colors: blue, orange, red, and green.

8/10 Sewn (hook-n-)eye: I found an eye (without its hook) in thread box. I decided to sew it in the header as my “eye”. I fixed one side only so it dangles; meaning my eye should be free to see.

9/10 Title “Kaki Topangku”: I wrote “kaki topangku” using fluorescent oil pastel I bought at Spotlight Singapore. First time I saw fluorescent pastel. It does well in artwork because the color comes out. I also scribbled on the picture side to give effect to the whole composition (if I did right). Finally, I wrote the title of the artwork (same “Kaki Topangku”) using 2B pencil on left down corner. I put dates too! Like an artwork he he.

10/10 Finished page: That’s how it looks from distance. I was not happy when I saw the picture but after four hours now.. I like it more! It took me about 50 minutes to create: from lay-out to finish. Not bad for first page eh?

By the way, why Kaki Topangku? Literal meaning: (My) feet my support. I respect this part of body which supports the rest of the body and maintains balance when standing and walking. Keywords: self support and balance.