Worldwide Artist Blog Hop and four questions

Thank you for the invite Anneke! Anneke is an crochet artist living on the west coast of South Africa in the cutest little town called Paternoster. We met on the facebook site "Ons Hekel" where Anneke is a huge inspiration to all with the beautiful T shirt yarn carpets she crochets.  She recently became well known on the "Ons Hekel" facebook site for her 'twisty' neck warmers! :)  

 Anneke hopped over to challenge me with 4 questions...

Question 1. Why do I do what I do?

Before answering the 'why', let me explain a little about myself...  I have always loved the creative process. To learn a skill and to make something was always very appealing to me. Thus I have explored quite a lot of mediums, from journaling, to poetry, to exploring painting on fabric, making mosaics, working with stained glass, doing an oil painting class, working with paper, photography (especially macro photography) to name a few.  Then about 3 years ago I came across a picture of the most beautiful crocheted blanket in a magazine.  The pattern was right there.  So in that week I went to buy what was needed and started to teach myself how to crochet.

Why? I find crochet to be an amazing way to cope with stress.  I have a work with long hours and it is such therapy to quickly crochet a few stitches during my lunch hour or when I get home.  It has a way to relax me that is awesome and you get a crocheted object at the end of it also!  From the "Ons Hekel" group on facebook I found the "Hekel innie Kaap" group that is more localized.  They have monthly meetings where I have met amazing people who I can now call my friends! 

This is a pic of a T shirt yarn doily shaped carpet that I crocheted earlier in the year...
(inspired by Anneke and her lovely crochet work)

At the beginning of the year I also got totally hooked on the idea of keeping a sketchbook journal.  From April I have been participating in two sketchbookskool.com semesters as well as a Sketchbookery class from Mary Ann Moss. All were awesome!  Why? I love the idea of recording what happens around me and that which are special to me.  It is also a good idea to remember fragments of you life better.  If you have drawn something - chances are you will remember it much longer!  How special will it be to have such a record of your life!

The following is a fun drawing - one of my very first!  We had to draw our breakfast :)

I have also participated in a "30 Days of Collage" online class in May.  The class was from the inspiring Stephanie Levy.   Why?  I had been an online student of Stephanie's in the past - participating in her "Creative Courage" course.  So I just could not resist to explore her collage work.  It is something I would love to add to my sketchbook journal!

And.... something big is coming up in about a weeks time!!.... I will be traveling to Berlin to attend a 5 day collage workshop with 9 other ladies from around the world with Stephanie giving us hands on teaching!

The discovery of the online creative community is an awesome experience! I can go on about this for a long time!  But the bottom line is... find that which lies closest to your heart and then go find the community in your area, but also explore the communities on line!  I have made amazing friends in The Netherlands, Slovinia, US, Belgium ect..

Here is a collage I made in Stephanie's online class... it was made in anticipation of the live workshop I am attending shortly...

Question 2. How does my work differ from others of its genre? 

I do not like to compare myself to anyone else.  I feel that we are all individuals.  The important part for me is that you find your passions - that which lies closest to your heart. And that you go about this in a truthful way to who you really are.

Question 3. How does my creative process work?

I believe that when I live close to my heart and my passions, then the life that happens around me will inspire me ultimately.  This I can truthfully say is the short answer to where my creative processes start.  For me it is then important to act on that heartfelt impulse when it is triggered!  To feel the 'fear' of thinking that you would like to try something, but you would rather not because you think you would never get it right - this is a very common feeling - and a reason why people would not try things and thus never explore to get closer to their own heart and passion and way of expressing something from their heart.  To feel fear and still go forward that is the goal!

Question 4. What am I working on now?

At the moment all focus is on my upcoming trip to Berlin.  I have been making sketchbook travel journals for my travelings - as being inspired by Mary Ann Moss's online travel journal class called "Ticket to Venice" (yet another online venture I found so much fun!) 

I am also crocheting fun little flowers - but why? ... this will be revealed in the next 3 weeks ;)

Thank you so much Anneke for inviting me to participate in the Blog Hop! How fun is this!!

Anneke and I met for the first time about a month ago at the very first Yarn Indaba held in South Africa!  It was in Pretoria - a 2 hour flight from Cape Town.  We took part the very morning that the biggest yarn bomb in South Africa was set up!  Here is some fun pic's of the event...

This last pic is a fun one of Anneke that I borrowed from her blog...

I would love to tag my dear and very talented husband, Hugo to participate in this blog hop.  He will be posting on Monday, 1 September!

Sketchbookery

What a whirl wind of creativity the past few months had been!  While quite exhausted - I feel so grateful for the amazing experience of exploring my creativity through sketching!

A month or 2 back I discovered the art filled sketchbook journals of Mary Ann Moss and it was love at first sight!  It was just in time to join her Sketchbookery class.  Luckily for me (having also committed at the same time for semester two of Sketchbookskool ) the concept of her classes is to buy a year (or longer) access to a particular class. 

I loved her class so much that I just had to sign up for her 'Ticket to Venice' the making of a travel journal class also!

With the sketchbookery class I did my first blind contour drawing!... of my hand :)

...and I loved trying out the 'Modified' contour drawing - where you look at the subject most of the time - but are 'allowed' to look at the page to make sure lines meet up...

Mary Ann also taught me the importance of making a palette card of the watercolors you are using.  Now I cannot paint without it! ;)

In the same way she showed us the importance of playing with your color palette and making color wheels of the different color reactions to each other...

Mary Ann introduced the idea of lettering to a sketchbook which I totally loved and had to give it a try!

Since starting with these classes of Mary Ann, I had the opportunity to travel away from home the other day and I could not wait to try out my very first travel journal!  

More on this in another blog post...

Playing with collage

During the month of May I participated in "30 days of Collage" - an online class by the amazing Stephanie Levy.  I had no experience with collage... My reasons for doing this class was two-fold.  

This year is the year for me to challenge myself to keeping a sketchbook journal. To be visual in the remembering of the moments that make up my life. So I thought that a collage element would be lovely to play with in my sketchbook journals.

The other reason why this class seemed like the right thing to do is because I will be flying of to Berlin early September to participate in one of Stephanie's live collage workshops! I cannot wait!

During our "30 Days of Collage" online class Stephanie gave us an huge amount of info on collage, with a blog post every day! Some 20 different inspirations for collage making  as well as 10 guest interviews with collage artists!

The first collage prompt I followed was the 'black and white' collage...

After playing around with different images, I made my very first collage...

Then I tried the "Warm color" collage...

...which ended up looking like this...

After visiting the Skinny Laminx shop in town, I started playing around with off cut fabric pieces I bought there...

...the end product of my 'Fabric' collage...

I love all things vintage! Thus the theme got me going on a collage playing with the idea of women gathering in Berlin for tea and playing with collage elements such as glue and scissors...

I loved the challenge of playing with all the random papers that were any way piling up in my studio... ;)

Sketchbook skool!

At the beginning of April Sketchbook skool started!  I joined in mainly because I would love to make drawing an every day experience.  I have been keeping a journal filled with words for a very long time. Yet I began to crave the idea of also filling a journal with sketches.  Although I am a total beginner at sketching I believe that anything is possible if you set you mind and heart to it! 

So on 6 April I made my first sketch...

Danny Gregory was our first teacher and he prompted us to sketch some of the new art supplies we bought.

Another challenge was to draw our breakfast...

As we were encouraged to draw from our life experiences and the things around us... I got intrigued with drawing a piece of spine - as I was starting at that time to experience recurrent back aches...

I work very long hours in a hospital laboratory... thus the following drawing...

Koosje Koene was our second teacher... she challenged us to work with color pencils... and a friend at work gave me a beautiful pear to draw...

Then along came Prashant Miranda as a teacher who inspired us with his beautiful watercolor washes. On a lovely sunny autumn day my husband and I went sketching at a beach nearby with a clear view of Table Mountain...

Jane LaFazio was our fourth teacher encouraging us to explore the use of grids... 

Next was Roz Stendahl - what a teacher!! She shared her passion for drawing animals and prompted us to visit a museum or draw toy animals as to practice before trying your hand at real animals...  On a very cold day I decided to visit the SA museum in Cape Town and managed to draw an Aardvark and also a close up gesture drawing of his feet... before running off to the coffee shop for hot chocolate ;)

A toy animal, as well as a drawing of a wood sculpture of an antelope followed...

So after 5 weeks we were introduced to the wacky Tommy Kane, our last teacher for this first semester of SBS.  Tommy was all about seeing the detail in everything!  Taking your time and always finishing off what you started...  He mesmerized all the student to the level that before long every one was drawing him! ... so I just had to too :)

Sketchbook skool was an amazing adventure!  And after 2 months I have almost filled my very first sketch journal!  My husband is also totally hooked, so we have been off to quite a few places over weekends with our sketch books :)

A window shutter from Kalkbay

On Sunday we went to Kalkbay - a picturesque little village close to Cape Town.

It's main street is filled with arty shops...

... and its location right next to the sea gives a real holiday feeling...

There are lots of little restaurants adding to the relaxed atmosphere...

We could not resist the cosy bookshop...

Then in a little alley way called 'Memory Lane' I found an old green window shutter in a vintage shop that asked to be bought :)

My husband peeled off the paint and gave it a layer of white paint and covered the back with board... Whalla... a pin board for my studio has been born :D

An Art festival on a whim...

One evening early in April while eating dinner my husband and I decided on a whim to go to a grand art festival held 500 km's from us in Oudtshoorn! We organised for leave that same evening as well as for accommodation in Oudtshoorn and at 5 am the next morning we were on our way! At 10 am we arrived :)

It was a week long event with lots of shows.... we decided to only focus on the art that was on exhibition, as this is always a grand occasion.

Louis Jansen van Vuuren had a exhibition of larger than life paintings... as well as some interesting jewelry art pieces...

We were lucky to attend a showing of art by famous SA artist Sandra Hanekom... and had Leon Vermeulen to tell about his art...

Well known SA ceramicist Hennie Meyer told us about his process ... going about an interesting constellation...

Gordon Froud shared his experiences as an artist in his reconstructed studio (especially done for this art festival)...

Jan du Toit exhibited some beautiful work...

...as did Phillemon Hlungwani...

and Jaco van Schalkwyk...

The absolute highlight of this art experience was to meet and experience the phenomenal artist, Willem Boshoff.  To see his reconstructed studio (especially done for the art festival) and to go on a artist walk with him ... to learn from him to look closely to every detail around you... especially in nature walks... there is so much detail to interpret into art...

Willem explaining the artist walk to us before we received a map to the 'mystery destination'...

Some of the detail i saw on this artist walk...

After two days filled with unexpected art we were filled with gratefulness for an amazing shared experience between husband and wife... a passion shared... and celebrated...

(There were so much more thought provoking art and encounters with artists... but all sadly cannot fit into a single blog post...)