a week has past. . .

. . . since this year's Natick Artist's Open Studios, and I think I may be recovered enough to share the experience!! (if ever so briefly)

Provocative (Rope Dress) held court in the hall

After much muttering and procrastinating (anyone who reads my facebook artist's page may have seen some griping about needing to clean my studio) ~ I had a wonderful open studio!!!! Many familiar faces came by to see what I was doing and to get some peanut M&M's!! A great success even though I really didn't get my studio very clean!!! I know the chaos did 'scare'' a few folks off, but those who were brave enough to enter, LOVED what they saw ~ a real working studio!!!

creatures in their different states of display

 I had many interesting conversations and fabulous comments on my newer work - my creatures and my wall painting that I began at the Vermont Studio Center. 

I had my creatures greet visitors as they entered my studio.

Art talk by the peanut M&M's

a bit of an idea of how messy most of the studio was!!

There was much positive feedback about my wall painting that I started at VSC this past March. It was fascinating to watch visitors stand in front of this piece and just get lost in it's magical world.  there was some discussion about me painting a wall in a house like this, which I would LOVE to do!!! 

series of Carbon Footprint Dresses with Poetry Dress

And I also was able to show all my carbon footprint dresses that I have done this past year.  These too got a lot of attention.  And, of course, I created a NAOS 2011 carbon footprint dress! 

after one day

NAOS 2011 carbon footprint dress

And I also rolled out my newest greeting card to much, much success!!! Still working out all the details but I hope to be able to offer these on Etsy or my web site, soon!!

 So, all in all, it was an exhausting yet exhilarating weekend ~ full of insightful conversation ( where is the creativity in the carbon footprint dresses?), joking, 'footprint'ing, exploring the mess and lots of fun.

 I thank everyone who stopped by during such a beautiful Fall weekend & for those who didn't, there is always next year?!? :) peace

an appeal for creative suggestions..

fortune dress on card

Here on the home front ~ i am doing a few more 'dress droppings'.  I love the whole concept of randomly scattering these dresses filled with good intentions, yet i have been wrestling with some aspects of this activity. Hoping that my cyber-community may have an idea or two!!  

First - i don't like calling them dress bombs, although 'bombing' is a graffiti term and scattering these dresses around has a 'graffiti' element.

to bomb :To bomb or hit is to paint many surfaces in an area. Bombers often choose throw-ups or tags over complex pieces, as they can be executed more quickly. From Wikipedia's graffiti terminology

I don't like using verbiage that refers to violent or military action.  I believe in the idea that all we do/say/think sends certain energies into our world ~ positive, negative, kind or aggressive energies; thoughts become reality.  This idea about violence in our language was very much in the press after Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords was shot. Articles were written about how our language is full of combative and brutal imagery.  Here is a link to an NPR article speaking to this issue.  So I am trying to find a more positive name/label ~ dress droppings ?!?, dress-ups ?!?, dress tags (another graffiti reference) Any thoughts?? I'm open to all ideas and would love any suggestions!

Also I experimented with putting the dress on a card with additional information.  It is about the size of a business card, and I listed my blog address, so I might get a record of where these dresses end up.  Although part of this process is the randomness of just putting the dresses out there, it would be fun to see where some end up.   But not sure I like the dresses attached to anything. Again any thoughts???

on a card or just free flying out there in the big wide world?!?!?

Fortune dress w/out card in Home Depot

fortune dress on car at Jo-Anne's Fabrics

And lastly I am experimenting with putting these dresses on greeting cards ~ 

hope to have a bunch done for Natick Artists' Open Studios ~                                                                                             October 15 & 16, 2011 ~ noon - 5 pm

So thanks for any idea & peace to all!!

if: remedy

This week's illustration friday's prompt is 'remedy'. For this week i reached back to one of my greeting card illustrations, an illustration for a get well card!!

I think the remedy for most anything is a little TLC!!

Wishing all a happy and safe 4th o' July!!! peace

Greeting cards....

Ok after many, many requests for greeting cards I have finally gotten my act together and I have a few on the zazzle.com site ~ hopefully it is going to go o.k. The first that i am posting is a detail from my Ribbon Dress. I picked this image because it represents many positive and creative intentions.
ribbons dress (detail) by va_fitzgerald
Shop for cards at zazzle
'>Ribbon Dress greeting card