Symbiosis

Symbiosis - acrylic 9" by 12"

This painting was dreamed up a few months ago but I finished it over the summer at my cabin. I was having an art block one day so I asked Sebastian to draw me a plant....and this is what I ended up with! Ha ha :)

It's one of our stranger collaborations, but I kinda like it. I enjoy the odd pairings of life in this painting, which seem to be both reliant and independent of each other. It's always fun to paint some crazy idea from someone elses head!









 It took me a few weeks to pick a title but I finally settled on "Symbiosis," which refers to the essential relationships between all of the different kinds of life found on our planet. 
This acrylic painting is painted on a 9" by 12" gallery wrapped canvas and is available in my Etsy shop!

As You Are

This little project started a few months ago. Sebastian composed a mix of one of our favorite Kimbra songs and wanted me to put together a dance for a video project. The song is five minutes long so it took my most of the spring and summer to complete the dance and get it ready for filming. 
 

It's nice to take some time and focus on myself as a dancer. I spend so much of my studio time on my students and I am often too tired at the end of the day to take a personal dance moment. I wanted this particular dance to be technical...so it ended up being a full competition lyrical solo. Haha
We spent two hot mornings in the studio working it all out. There are things I love about it and some things I will do differently next time! As I get back into the regular dance season I'm hoping I will find a little time to put together some more little dance projects.

Life Force

Take root in the Earth and feel it's pulse.We are all connected through it's energy; it's life force surges through our veins. Do not take this Earth's kindness for granted as its power is unimaginable and our dependence is complete. 

This painting started a long time ago. The original drawing is in my old sketchbook that I completed last Christmas. Sebastian dreamed up the concept for this painting and I used a photo of his hand as the reference. It took me a long time to paint all the details in this painting and I could only work on it when I had my camera, lights and tripod set up which dragged it out over the last 6 months. It is probably my favorite painting this year....so far!
Life Force is now available in my Etsy shop!

Dancing In The City

Despite the fact that I danced everyday last week I found some extra energy to do some dancing outside on Sunday afternoon. I danced down the street, up some stairs, across a ledge, up a hill and then all the way back down. I improvised everything and wasn't dancing to any music although I had an instrumental piece stuck in my head from a morning rehearsal.
I only got a few weird looks from people although one guy almost crashed his bicycle into a fence when I was warming up for the pointe section. lol 
Sebastian (aka The Vinylist) created this song specifically for this dance project and we have been waiting for the perfect day to film. This was the first real test of our recently purchased flycam and camera dolly. 
We had a lot of fun making this little video and plan to make more in the future.
While making this video I learned that dancing up-hill is a real struggle but despite the fact that concrete is not an ideal surface to dance on I must say I enjoyed the moment....and ripped up my shoes a little! ;)

Rainy Day at the Cabin

We spent this past weekend at the cabin....again! When we woke up Saturday morning we realized that the weather man had been right and it was going to rain all day long, making it the perfect day for an indoor video project. I always travel with extra art supplies and paint but the majority of this project is created with found objects. Sebastian went foraging in the woods while I painted the background and then we set it up beside the window so we would have as much natural light as possible! 
The whole project took about three hours to complete. We spent about an hour taking 243 photos which then turned into only 15 seconds of video. Stop motion animation is very tedious and slightly stressful as the slightest bump of the table can ruin the whole project.

The worm worked out surprisingly well in the little butter container. I think he was really high off of the yellow nail polish fumes. He managed to move at the perfect speed although he slowed down a bit near the end and needed some help. 
This little project has inspired a larger one that I am currently working on the background for. This next one will be longer and much more complex. Rainy days sometimes inspire the best ideas and concepts!

Robert's Feature Film

You may have noticed that a few of my videos feature a prickly little Hedgehog. This little friend is Robert, and yes she is a girl. Robert lives a privileged life. She sleeps and lounges in a blanket with multiple doors, tunnels/vents and has two rooms to run around in. She is trained to poop in a box (most days) and is sometimes smarter than I want to give her credit for. This video features some of her more mischievous moments!

 

You may also notice that her head is a little crooked. Almost exactly a year ago she had what we think was a stroke. She couldn't walk properly and was presenting symptoms associated with wobbly Hedgehog syndrome (yep, that's a thing.) I was scared she was dying and for a few days she barely ate or moved. After about a week she was walking slowly but crooked and since then has made a full recovery...except for her lopsided little ears. She has not had any more episodes so I don't think she is a wobbly hedgehog, which is a relief. Her crookedness just gives her character! lol 

Painting Doors

This project has left me pondering why most doors are painted white? It seems we are missing an opportunity to decorate our lives. Painting murals on walls is reasonably common but doors, for whatever reason are not common mural locations.
We got tired of looking at an ugly door. Most of the walls are filled with art but amidst the paintings is a sad looking dilapidated door. This door was never painted properly and was missing large chunks of what used to be white paint. It was also duct tapped together since the front panel decided one day to separate from the rest of the door. It was a sad situation. So I suggested that it should be painted....with something cool! After a little discussion I bought some paint and we started. Sebastian was really excited about this project and when I returned from teaching one Saturday he had painted more doors and had drawn out his designs for them.
The first door I completed was the one on the inside of the room. The hook is real so I painted a hanger and the shirt (with our initials logo) and the weird alien guy with loooong arms. Haha
The next one is based of the newly discovered prehistoric bird: Llallawavis scagliai. Painting bones is fun so even though this took me many hours I enjoyed the process. 
The third door took me much longer to finish. I don't really know what to say about it. It's fun and interesting even though I'm not quite sure what is going on! lol

The Whalien

I have finally completed this odd painting and I am going to attempt to explain it a little. Before Christmas I was snooping through Sebastian's sketchbooks looking for something to turn into a gift for him. I came across this whale (I thought it was a fish...although upon further examination it is definitely a whale) which I have always liked but forgot about.
 I asked him what the story behind the fish was and he replied that it was a whale, floating in space...aka a Whalien! lol
I immediately started researching galaxy paintings and painting test galaxies for the background. I also started sketching it out in my sketchbook so he could add in the planets and other alien life. 

Progress on this painting was slow and tedious but only because I didn't want to make a mess and have to start over. I spent a weekend intermittently painting stars as white dots quickly get boring, but the overall effect is pretty cool. My sister was a fan of this painting from the initial sketch onwards and has since claimed it as her own! So I have 11" by 14" prints available on Etsy!

Lunar Gaze

This painting has been in the works for quite awhile and I am happy to have finally completed it. It is a collaboration of sorts between Sebastian Olejnik and myself. We took the reference photo I used for this painting two summers ago at the cabin when I was doing my morning yoga on the deck. This past summer I finally got around to sketching it out in my sketchbook. The heron and the moon were Sebastian's ideas as was the title of the piece. 
The original is 11" by 14" mixed media (acrylic ink, glass beads, gloss varnish, pearl paint) on watercolour board mounted on a painted (black) cradled wood panel. 
 










I struggled with the moon. I wanted it to glow and reflect the way the real moon does. After painting it in ink I applied a gloss varnish that has tiny glass beads in it. It adds a very interesting texture as well as a little sparkle.

I then applied a mixed media paint appropriately named Fantasy Moon - Pearl over top of the beads to give it a luminous finish. I made a test moon to make sure that all my paints would work together the way I wanted them to because I was pretty terrified that I would screw up the moon and have to start the whole thing over! Luckily things worked out and I think it is reasonably effective. 


You can find this painting in my Etsy shop along with the rest of my completed art!  

Inktober Week 2

This week I managed to complete 5 mini ink paintings. Which is pretty good considering that I did nothing Thursday and Friday and then spent Thanksgiving weekend relaxing at my cabin. I did however get lots of painting done in that relaxing time.
Two of these fun inks were drawn by Sebastian and both of them are alien themed! The first is an alien leaving earth. He is fed up with humans and their stupidity. The second is an alien visit during a magic mushroom experience. I don't know where he gets these ideas but I really enjoy bringing his drawings to life.  
All of these paintings are available in my Etsy shop!
Happy Thanksgiving to Everyone! 
The cabin weather was pretty decent and I spent some quality time with Squeeker, my favorite squirrel! We made sure he was stocked up on nuts for the winter and Sebastian had a little photo shoot with him on his favorite branch, looking his cutest!