Tales from Studio Mailbox

Faschings Pigeon

This happy fella keeps popping up in my life.  I made him a few years ago after having a bird's eye view of the Fasching's parade out of my old Wuerzburg apartment. 

My friends Cat and Andre had a house warming party where they asked for framed photos to hang on their bare wall.  I thought they were a mixture of raw courage and pure insanity for this request, but being the last one to contribute to their project -- I have to say their living room looks incredible with all kinds of meaningful images.

After scratching out the background of my photo and trimming it down to give it a wierd stroke line, I mounted him on top of an artist paper titled, "Haunted Night" that was designed by Jennifer Fahey.  I liked the tree branches and who doesn't love a scull...? 

If you've never done photo scratching before, you need to immerse your picture in water for about 30-45 seconds before using a blunt instrument to "erase" everything you don't want to see!  If it's a large photo, you have to keep returning it to the water in order to keep it soft and to rinse off the little balls of photographic emmulsion that build up as you're removing it.

For magnificent inspiration with photographs, I would suggest a book by Karen Michel who is a mixed media goddess!  (I pray she will come to Germany and teach a workshop... the "build it she will come" voice just went off in my head again)...The Complete Guide to Altered Imagery has so many projects it could keep you busy for a year or more.  It's also a great example of how you can keep "taking things further."  Lots of crazy messy fun... as for this simple bird, a little present for my friend who used to pop over to visit among the pigeons.

Heart Sachet with Pocket

We had the honor of being invited to share in the baptism of our neighbor's daughter.  Using some of the harvest from last fall's lavendar bathtub, I created a crazy patchwork heart sachet in a red, white and denim style. 

I was pleased with the addition of a little pocket in the front that was trimmed with piping from a stash of doll-clothing rick rack. 

I was thinking that this would be a fun way to leave little notes for the children in the future... maybe a fairy or gnome magic message hiding place!

Neighborhood Shrine Love

I've lived in Europe long enough that I've stopped noticing some of the magnificent things that are right in my own neighborhood!  Things that ordinarily would have me running for my camera have started escaping my attention.  Well not anymore! 

Could you imagine owning the cottage that's set behind this beautiful old shrine?  It makes me wonder things like; does the shrine belong to the village?  Is it property of the homeowner?  Who maintains it and keeps that candle burning?  (I will have to take a night shot for you, for a totally different effect and mood).

This shrine makes me want to build one myself.  Think about the enhanced curb appeal!  Well for now, I'll just envy my neighbors.

Plunder Comeback

For those of you who don't know what plunder is, get informed here. 

For the rest of you, I have a little admission:  I thought I had lost my edge!  I was getting increasingly irritated with the kind of vendors who are attempting to sell stuff like rusted bottles of hair mousse for 3 euros apiece.  Umm last time I checked you could go buy a new can of mousse at the drugstore for 3 euros and it probably actually still foams up in your palm.

But just as I was leaving the flea market defeated, I spotted these.  A box with two layers of old wooden printer blocks.  Mostly A's, J's and G's but who cares?  It instantly reminded me why I love the thrill of the hunt.

Inchie Pinwheel Pattern

 Here is a downloadable .pdf for you to try out your very own Inchie Pinwheel block.  You'll need to create 38 total inchies, broken down between three color schemes.Download PinwheelInchiePattern_neu

Here are some tips for you when designing your inchies:

First: I would stick quite rigidly to the color-scheme in order to not cause any confusion at the end when the bigger pattern comes together.  What I mean by this is that in this pattern there are light, dark and bright (green) squares.  The light squares should be made with light or neutral images onto a light or neutral background.  The dark squares were made with darker images on dark blue or black backgrounds and the green squares were made with greenish images onto green backgrounds.  Don't put a green image on a light square because at the end your eye will go to the color and the end pattern will look like it's flawed. 

Second: any of the inchies that will need to be cut down to represent "half-squares" should be made relatively symmetrical or simple.  VW buses were perfect images as were olives or plants and flowers.  Images like these are still readily recognizable once sliced in half. Cut these inchies in half by flipping your square over, penciling in a diagonal line and cutting by hand.  I tried using a slicer to cut them but they're so small they want to slip.

Third: use a one-inch punch to cut all your inchies backgrounds for the project.  I had a few that I had cut by hand and at the end this was noticable when it came time to piece them together.  You need all your lines to come together perfectly if you want to see your overall design.

Have fun, good luck and please link back to me if you give it a try... I want to see your results too!

Inspirational Images and Inchies

April's daily creative action turned out to be a month-long project, worked on at a semi-regular pace instead of in daily 15 minute intervals as in Jan, Feb and March.  

The perfectionist in me says I have failed at the whole point of the challenge being daily, but the realist in me is quite satisfied at the completion of the month's goal despite being sick for half of the month. 

It started out as a frustrated cluttered feeling of all the magazines and printed materials that have piled up in every corner of my life waiting for me to "go through"  them before chucking them into the recycle bin.  

When you don't really know where you're going, you just have to start somewhere.  I picked one pile of mags out of the window sill and started ripping out images.  I made two general piles.  One a stack of small scale images suitable for inchies, and the other pile consisted of larger images that were inspirational for any number of collage excitement.

Then I did a small-scale rendition of something I have always said should be done with inchies:  I made a pattern using three basic colors and designed my inchies according to a larger plan!  I had so much fun putting them together wondering if it was really going to work out in the end like I envisioned.  I have so often day-dreamed of making a huge inchie project based on a cross-stitch pattern.  I now know it can be done!

Other ideas that occured to me during April's project were:

• Why not make monthly smaller blocks based on traditional quilt patterns that would come together as a 12 block paper inchie quilt at the end of the year? 
• Or why not make a website for a crazy big-scale pattern where people could submit inchies from all over by mail and then the host would piece it together and update the website letting the participants know which colors were still needed?  (Somebody, please do this - wouldn't a collabrative world-wide inchie project be fun??) 
• Or why doesn't somebody publish an inchie book much like all these artist journal pages books that are out there?  

As for May, the problem that I'm now experiencing is that since I fell out of my daily 15 minute habit, I can't seem to discipline myself back into the practice.  Because of this, I have come up with something a bit off-beat creatively, but nevertheless necessary in the business world.  I believe that sometimes you need to MAKE yourself do exactly whatever it is you're resisting the most.  Stay tuned!

Day Off

Not just out of the office, but practically out of my mind.  Even my horoscope suggested taking the day off if I could swing it.

So let's play hookie.  Why fight the stars?

Blog Banner Blues

Ok gang.  I worked all morning creating a new banner for this blog..it's bold, it's brave, it's Bavarian!  

The irony of me finally getting this done is that Typepad is having problems uploading files.  Just to top it off I went and got all impatient with the delete button behind the scenes.  Oops.  It sort of looks like I deleted my old banner hey?  Note to self: get a new banner waving before deleting stuff, especially when the upload function is non-functional.  Uhhhhh...duhh.. (caveman grunt).

So in case you're wondering where you are, this is the official blog of Studio Mailbox, the tales of a foreign artist in Germany.  Your source for German culture and all things creative.  Hopefully there will be a new "twisty" look for you soon... I guess the upside of this little problem is that now I've been able to create some pretzel suspense!  I hope you won't be disappointed...

Zine Button Discovery

Is it serendipity that I stumbled across this button I had made years ago for my non-existent website? 

Maybe it's a sign after my last post...

Gardening and Gnomes

Gardens and gnomes are the perfect combination.  One of my earlier goals when coming here to Germany was to make a 'Zine based on these hard-working creatures known as "Zwerges."  As with so many of my ideas, Studio Mailbox's first publication, Home of the Gnome has drifted off into "someday" land. 

In any case, with blisters the size of grapes on my fingers from toiling in my weed patch over the weekend, I still managed to spray paint these darling ceramic figures from a painting kit which was given to me as a birthday gift! 

A true present that keeps on giving, I haven't decided if I should coat them in an outdoor protective sealant or keep them in my kitchen where they currently reside.  In reality, I should nestle them in the bottom of my baby stroller to have them at hand in order to pose them for photographs in various settings throughout the neighborhood...