stephanie lee - Semiprecious Salvage

Studio Fruit Friday - the last one

It's June and I'm wearing socks and a sweatshirt. Cool weather and rain has been the story but I'm happy to see that the garden growth persists. In the not-so-distant future, I see jars of dilly beans, pickled beets, heaping piles of steamed chard drizzled with balsamic reduction, sauteed crook-neck squash, and fat sliced tomatoes with pepper and smoked sea salt splayed out on plates and devoured. **mouth watering**

I'm creeping in on the eleventh hour before the Lake Oswego Art Fair. A growing number of details are waiting in the bread line. I clock them through, one by one, being sure never to look up to see how many are left knowing I would slip into some OCD-like behavior and start calculating how many minutes each detail is allowed to all be accomplished before the time is up. I just keep at it one at a time because i have learned - both the hard and the easy ways - that this is the best method for me.

I've decided that this will be my final Studio Fruit Friday before the show. I need to focus on building my stock pile. I have absolutely no idea if I have "enough" art for the show. I have absolutely no idea what "enough" would be. It's an easy thought for me to panic about and my panic usually looks like avoidance. I fold laundry, run errands, water the garden instead. I'm doing better with than than I was a month ago and intend to abandon my avoidance all together any second now. My goal is to just keep painting and leave the rest to the powers that be. Before I leave I'll share images of all the finished pieces for you to gawk at. It may or may not matter to you that one out of three kitties approve. (The other two would likely approve, too, if they were not out hunting or napping.)
So. Two little pieces to share. I've been having conversations with simple, strong, black inky lines. They show up mostly as shapes - cages and ladders and firework flowers. The strong black lines are holding me in place somehow. It's a good thing - these ties to where real life is. I have no need to float away into some dreamy, airy place. I find all the answers to my questions, all the solutions to my mistakes, all the love to my fear in the strong black earth.

"untitled"
6" x 6" x 1.5"
plaster, acrylic, encaustic on wood

**unavailable**

 

"Open"
6" x 6" x 1.5"
plaster, acrylic, encaustic on wood

**unavailable**

 

freebie technique video

BIG thanks to everyone who has registered for my Pipe Dreams e-workshop! Just what you needed...another totally logical reason to sequester yourself into the studio and request dinner to be served hot to your worktable. With dessert immediately following. You're welcome.

So as I'm putting all the puzzle pieces together for this workshop - which is a matter of arranging and rearranging and re-rearranging all the technical and actual components - I thought it might be fun to give you a little peak into what you can expect if you have not yet registered and are considering it. I have a system I prefer when it comes to the videos for my class to keep them simple, consise, clear and super informative. Then I flood you with written content that supports the video as well as informs you on all the variations on the theme I can think up. I like to serve you an information sandwich with all the fixin's. A Dagwood of epic proportions. Though my videos are not "professionally produced" (which would not change the information at all...just the setting and, ahem, cost of production) they are absolutely full-on me giving you my all. Thanks to a tall, zoom happy, and skilled chair-balancing husband-camera-man, you get to get up close into what I'm doing in a way that even a live class can't give you. I love that about videos. Just love it.

So, I pulled this little video (7:22 minutes long) from my Homesteader's Metalsmithing online class/ebook. Not only does it give you a peek into what an online class with me is like, it also gives you something to do today. Because I know that you are just like me...bored with absolutely NOTHING to do. No twenty mile long list. No sir. Not us. We're free birds.

(if for some dang reason the video says "sorry, the creator of this video has not given you permission blah blah blah..." just click on the video title under the block to view it directly on vimeo. I've been wrestling it all morning and haven't figured out the problem.)

Enjoy!

Flooding Metal with Solder from Stephanie Lee on Vimeo.

**Go here for more information about my Pipe Dreams e-workshop.**

 

 

Studio Fruit Friday - a break

Yo guys. So here's the deal. I've been pulled in a lot of differnt directions this week and have no new artwork for studio fruit friday. Friday kinda, um, snuck up on me. I still have prints in the shop, though, and new artwork being made every day so I'll be back again next week with some more offerings.

Thanks so much for everyone who has registered for my Pipe Dreams summer eworkshop. I'm loving the enthusiasm and can't wait to go live! I'm shooting the video from my "new" studio where the lighting is better and the space is more...spacey...so I anticipate great things as I continue putting it together. I visited the chiropractor today and got my neck adjusted (wow...eyeballs are NOT supposed to feel like they are being pulled into your head by some invisible chord attached to the back. Did you know that?), I have a belly full of salad, the sun is shining, the bean and beet sprouts are up, my allergy pills are working, and life is all cram packed with stuff to be grateful for.

Oh, and the puppy-slash-pooping-lightning-bolt is pretty insistent on keeping her bad habits. I'm practicing patience and wondering when she decided that singing like a wolf is something cool to do.