Art Unraveled, part 1

I've been to two events at Art Unraveled so far, and so far it's a blast!!! I definitely need to save my $$ and vacation time, and sign up earlier next year, so I can take more classes!! This week is crazy for me, between these classes and trying to get set up for the first Mafia Trunk Show, but next year I will definitely budget my time better, so I can spend much more time there.

This is a rather dark glimpse of Sunday evening's Meet the Artists event... a number of the artists had tables with samples of their projects, so you could see them, and talk to the artists about the classes they're teaching. I saw quite a few things I'd love to take classes on next year! Marney Makridakis (founder of the Artella website and print magazine) gave the keynote address, which had to do with creating a "mission statement" for yourself, like large corporations do, so that we can incorporate creativity into our everyday life more easily. I wasn't sure I was even going to go to this event since the hotel where it's being held is on the north side of the city (and kind of a far drive from Maricopa), but another attendee, who lives in Ahwatukee, AZ (south suburb of Phoenix), e-mailed me and asked if I'd like to carpool with her... how nice was that?? (thanks, Amanda!!!)

This is an assemblage by one of the instructors, Michael deMeng. I couldn't even tell you what all the components are, besides the most obvious: matches, a screw, some copper wire, and unidentified metal bits... all his pieces were all amazingly detailed and very small (the one pictured was probably only 1 x 3 inches...??). I find it intriguing, but also frustrating in a way, because I don't think I could ever put something like this together. The scientific/linear part of my brain would win out, and I would get stuck on "am I doing this right??" before I could ever make something that turned out like this. That means I admire people who can do it even more! This is one of the pieces I made in my Monday night class, Monochromatic Collage, with Cindy Kovack. She is a local artist- a story about her in the paper is how I remembered about Art Unraveled being in Phoenix, actually! Cindy recycles everyday objects that might otherwise get thrown away (old CDs, bottle caps, plastic Mardi Gras beads, shotgun shell casings, anything really...) to make small but elaborately decorated collage pieces with bases made from small tins or boxes. She had 2 tables full of supplies for us to use in our work, along with boxes of tins and containers to pick from. I completed two pieces in class and brought home the "ingredients" for another one, along with tons of freebies she handed out. This class was really fun, because I don't often work in 3D, and it was "freeing" in a way, to pick through all the brightly colored bits and beads and put them together in rather unconventional ways. (look closely, and you'll see that along with the bottle caps, there are mini Christmas light bulbs in this piece!) This is my second piece, constructed on the lid from an Altoids box. The picture is probably from a calendar, and was my inspiration for the piece. All the colors used echo the colors from the picture. The scalloped edging is actually older large-style pop tops glued onto the tin with sequins and rhinestones. This class used a lot of E6000 adhesive, lots of toothpics to apply it, and I did end up with a small pile of teeny beads, unused sequins, and trims at my table (some of them came home with me for future use- you know us artists, we don't waste anything if we can help it!) Unfortunately, it was only 3 hours, and the time really flew by! Everyone was super-nice, and I chatted with my seatmate, who is attending AU from her home in Alaska. People really do come from all over- I also heard an Australian accent in the hallway somewhere! See more pics of our finished collages and more of Cindy Kovack's work on my Flickr page...

I get to take two more classes yet, too!! more on them after... I'm sure I'll be brimming over with ideas, projects, and free stuff to share!