Sask Culture Days Kickoff

Yesterday was the kickoff to Sask Culture Days. My students and I were creating hexagons with the community outside City Hall on a beautiful sunny day. It was great fun. We made 118 hexagons in one hour. Great job and thanks to Shanille, Madeline, Emily, Ryan, Eric and Costos (and parent drivers).  Thank you as well to all of the City of Saskatoon employees that helped to make the event a success. Photo credit to Eric Christensen

More Bee Panels

I have created some more large bee panels. They are 9 feet tall and 27 inches wide. They are 12 block linocuts.

The Honey Pot Game

The other piece that will be going into the Toy Exhibition in December is....

The HONEY POT game. It is a modification of the game board for Mancala. It is made from clay and acrylic and the little bee game pieces are stylized versions of Napoleon's Bees.  The bag to contain the bees also has the symbol of the bees that Napoleon often used.

 

Fabric is created using a block printing technique. 

Paper Dolls

My paper doll piece(s) are finally finished. It was an amazing amount of work to carve the blocks, print the blocks, cut out the clothes and then glue them all together.  The piece(s) are part of the series Affluenza.


They will be in an exhition at the Sask Craft Council called

Toys
December 5, 2014 - January 13, 2015

 

Ravishing in Red

 

Beautiful in Blue 

 

Breathtaking in Black 

 Fabulous in Fuscia

 Gorgeous in Green

 Pretty in Pink

 Vivacious in Violet

 Whimsical in White

 Youthful in Yellow 

And below is how they will be displayed or possibly in a rainbow line.

Thank you to Janice and Elizabeth for helping me name the pieces. 

Ordinary to Impossible

What's happening in my studio this week??  It is difficult, mentally challenging, intricate and time consuming, all the things I seems to like about making art.  I am creating a wall size print by creating 8 different blocks that tesselate. The bees on one block connect to the next block and the block can be moved and changed to new positions and still create an entire piece. It is one of the hardest pieces I have ever done. I haven't proofed them all yet but will know very soon if my big idea worked. It is called "Ordinary to the Impossible" because what an indivdual bee does might be ordinary but together they do the impossible, just as many humans do the impossible when working together as a team.

The Arts Happen Here

The school renovations may not be done yet but.... the banners are up!!!! Our "The Arts Happen Here" banners were installed today.  Thanks to the City of Saskatoon Light and Power team and to Arts Smarts 21st Century Youth Creativity Challenge for awarding us the prize money to make this project possible. First an image of all the banners in proof format and then installation images. Congratulations to all of the students that had their graphic designs and photography selectedf or the project. There were many very very good graphics and photos and the selection process was a difficult one.

 

Hexagon Building with Former Student

I had the pleasure of linking some clusters together with Gabriella Fortugno, a former student. She is working on an Advanced Placement Sculpture portfolio and wants to include some clusters. She will have her very own tree on the river to put her clusters in. It is so fun to continue to be part of my students' lives after they leave my school.

 

And the secret of connecting them together is revealed!!!!

Hexagons go International

A week or so ago I had the pleasure of creating links with my cousin's children and his wife while they were in Canada from San Jose - California. The hexagons have now gone international!!!!!