I’m counting the ways—a new assemblage of love

oh boy, I am definitely in a rut. I seem to keep being invaded by emotions of love while I’m working these days. Perhaps it’s because Matt and I are celebrating our 20th Day-we-met-iversary. (we’ll be married 16 years this July). I’m finding myself reminiscing a lot.

So in celebration of all this love, here is a new assemblage I just finished up, called “I’m Counting the Ways”.

Come see it in person at 55 White Place during Open Studios this weekend, and let me know what you think.

click here to get a map

More Produce! Making art never tasted so good!

Here is more of my work in progress! I’m really enjoying this new artistic path. It’s something I started playing around with last year for my HC Studio show in this piece. Essentially I’m working from a black background instead of white. It makes you look at negative space in an entirely different way.

 

These are the little produce inspired pieces that I promised you yesterday in my Ketchup Post.

At this point they are all about 1/2 way done. This technique requires me to work on multiple pieces at the same time to keep from going mad. You have to keep letting the paint dry before going onto the next step…My mom said patience is a virtue—I say it’s more of a necessity.

Scroll down to take a look at each of the finished pieces!

Better yet, stop by this weekend for

Open Studios in Brookline!

April 30 & May 1, 11am-6pm

brooklineartists.com

I’ll be in my normal location—my house!

55 White Place
Brookline, MA 02445

 

 

 

 

 

More tomorrow as we count down to Open Studios!

Jenn

Getting Ready For Brookline Open Studios 2011

My ketchup in progress…

My ketchup finished!

I dig ketchup. Seriously, when I eat fries (which is not often), I do so purely as a vehicle to get more ketchup in my daily diet.

This is a new direction that I’m trying out. This piece is on the larger side and I have been working on a similar technique with produce in a much smaller size.

Stay tuned for a sneak peak on those!

In the meantime, mark your calendars for Open Studios in Brookline, this weekend!

April 30 & May 1, 11am-6pm

brooklineartists.com

I’ll be in my normal location—my house!

55 White Place
Brookline, MA 02445

Mental Poetry

This and other new art works are showing in the month of March and April at HC Studio.

Stop by for the opening reception
March 28th
3-5pm

If you miss the show, please feel free to come by my studio on May 1 and 2 during Brookline Artist Open Studios
11-6 both days

I'll have extra maps available at my location.

Stay dry and enjoy the onset of Spring!

IF - Fast

Finally!  I have time to work on another Illustration Friday Prompt! (as well as 10 other things going on right now!)
Today I wanted to do a piece about sending love through the mail--Fast.  Sure an email will send the words I LOVE YOU fast, and a text will send it even faster.  You could Facebook it or even twitter it. But is Fast always the best way?  What about the time when Carrier Pigeons were the FAST way to send mail.

But what if we used good old fashioned air mail to send our hopes, dreams and desires to those we loved. Is that the fastest way to send something so fragile? I live with the person my heart has always longed for so there is no need to send him a letter but I need to make sure he always knows his Place in My Heart.
Place in My Heart
Jenn Mason
October 2009
Gelatin Print, Found Objects, Pen and Golden Threads.
If you're here from IF, welcome!  If you're a regular reader, thanks for coming back.  If you're lost and just happened upon here, Have a great Friday and I hope you get back safely.

All Hands on Deck

I'm so excited to be part of this fundraiser!  If you go to the www.alldecksonhand.org website you can look under artists and see all the amazing boards that were turned in.  If you're interested you will be able to bid on line when the auction starts.

Hello and welcome to the studio!

Well, not the studio but the open studio.

You may have seen the cover of Cloth Paper Scissors Studios Fall 2009. You would be looking at my home!

This picture at the top? And the one below it? Both of these are "before" pictures of our home as it once stood just two short years ago. A carriage house turned wood worker shop.

The house was built in 1850 and I'm not quite sure how I got past the claustrophobia of it all and saw the possibilites but we made an offer and started construction the day it became ours.

Eventually we'll get to a couple photos of my studio but first I thought I'd show you some behind the scenes look at the photo shoot for the cover. I had always wanted to know what happened at one of these and now I do!

It's a lot of fidgeting things a round, moving lights and MacGyvereing things into place. Although the space stays pretty true to the actual thing, we had to shift things just slightly here

and there to make sure they looked good on camera.

Here you can see that they already have an idea of the cover layout before we even get a real shot. There were two "advance team" trips out to take photos before we had the hired guns show up.

And show up they did. With full sized computers and screens, cameras and lights. We moved around a ton of furniture just to make room for the equipment!

It was really fun to watch the process and I'm honored that I got to play a role in the September issue.

I'm especially proud of it because it's not just my artwork on the walls that I'm able to share with you but also my home. This was a labor of love of both my wonderful husband Matt and I. We designed the whole house by ourselves and we had a wonderful contractor (Stealth Construction). Who gave us everything we wanted and more.

I'm not sure if it really comes across in the photos but that big wall with all the art on it? It's really on a diagonal.

We designed that wall especially for Open Studios here in Brookline, MA.

The space is big and modular making it possible to move a few pieces of furniture and entirely recreate the space.Starting this month I will be teaching workshops in my home/studio. We've hosted a Soup Crawl, book club and during Open Studios I host 4 other artists in the space as well as a mixed media gallery!

So here are a few shots of the actual studio which sits just off this main room in the photo. It makes it easy to stay in touch with the kids while they do their homework and to work on dinner and a project at the same time. I hope it's helpful to hear that I struggle with all the same things that you do. Finding time to make art, keeping the studio cleaned up enough so that I can find things, storage, etc.

A couple of the things I love are the little nook with the shelves (this is where my under the counter cd player lives) and my closet with a sink! OH Joy! And I love that it has punches of electric green in it too.

If you want to find out what I'm up to please feel free to subscribe to my blog. You can also check out my workshop schedule on my Create Everyday Workshop Blog. My personal artist website is www.JennMason.com and you can find out more about my books, licensed artwork and fine art there!

And my latest endeavor is www.EverydayArtistStudio.com where our mission is to encourage you to live more creatively every day, regardless of family plan, age or career path!