Pinterest Projects and Hopeful Words

So I work for Blick Art Materials and guess what happens to be one of my tasks, I get to come up with Pinterest projects!!! This is one of my favorite parts of the job, our page with all of our staff's projects just went live and these are my Cupid's Arrow Valentines! they were really fun to make, and I'm sure I'll be handing them out to people around the office. If you want to see what we've been making click here. Also it's been a long winter this year, but hope is in the air, I went to a friend's house last night for a group Bible study on Hope, and it was reassuring and makes all the little things that we complain about seem so trivial. In fact we have so many blessings that we take for granted that we really have no excuse for losing hope. So next time I start to get frustrated or irritated I'm going to picture myself shooting one of these arrows at my attitude, step over it's vanquished form and move toward hope :)

Project Revamp: Stage Three Hand Dying

 

So I'm trying my hand at hand dying, the satin from the wedding dress was still slightly yellowed so I picked up some iDye Poly dye for synthetics from Blick Art Materials. But be forewarned, if you want pastels only put like a 1/2 tsp in a big pot of hot water. Also if you leave it in for a long time the color gets way more intense. I tried just a sleeve piece first and really had to dilute it. I did the pinkish hue first and then made a blue gray mixture that I dipped the edges in and it turned lilac. Once the fabric is properly rinsed and ironed I will post some design sketches. 

Art, Ipsy, and a Bowl Full of Cherries

I've been working on catalog covers this week and playing with the delicious Blick Studio Acrylics, they dry super fast but the colors are really vibrant. Couldn't you just eat them. But seriously don't. I will post some of the ombre art I've been finessing soon. 

 

This week has been busy as I've been preparing for a pilgrimage for the March for Life, but I was super excited to get my first Ipsy bag! Ipsy is a subscription service and I'm all about a bargain. For $10 a month you can't beat it. I got healthysexyhair leave in conditioner, an Elizabeth Mott eye shadow pencil, Mica Beauty lip tint, Apothederm skin serum, and pomegranate makeup removing cloths, + you get a cute little bag too. I'm definitely going to keep this one up as I like trying new things and I don't have time to get out and shop much. ( check it out! http://www.ipsy.com/r/3xts)

On a side note, some friends and family of mine have been going through some tough and trying times. Please keep your loved ones in your prayers because even though they wear a smile they may be hurting underneath. So life often isn't a bowl of cherries, but you can still buy them frozen at the supermarket throw some sugar on top and count the many blessings that you do have.

Hot Air Balloons and Dancing Sketches

My friend from grade school, yes I'm still friends with people from grade school, that's how we roll-- we form tight bonds in the Midwest, is having her first baby and is going with a hot air balloon theme for the nursery. They haven't announced the sex yet so I tried to keep the colors simply fun! I did this pair of acrylics yesterday, or technically this morning because I'm basically nocturnal on the weekends. 

Also on the weekends I'm lazy when it comes to cooking and I have a lot of projects going so I do things like dress up my Ramen, which is absolutely delicious by the way. After cooking the noodles and adding the seasoning packet, I add chopping cilantro, green onion, and shredded cooked chicken. Perfect on a cold but productive winter day!

 Some of my sketches were featured in a Strathmore ad in the Blick Catalog, it's one of the perks of my job! Thanks Mom and Dad! I'm using my degree!!

Legal Graffiti and Lightsabers

I get paid to make art. That's my job...technically. We were working up some new cover designs and I did three layered graffiti texture paintings and experimented in just about every kind of paint I could get my hands on in the art cabinet, aka THE CAGE. It felt really good to get my hands dirty again. On a side note it was my birthday on Friday, and my friends and I celebrated with a bonfire and s'mores. It makes getting older just a little easier. 

Also my coworkers are pretty boss, they bought me a mini lightsaber. What was your best or worst birthday gift?

Block printing into existence

Now that I work for Blick Art Materials, I've been getting the hands-on bug again! Art is my therapy, my catharsis. My coworker was working on a catalog page and asked me if I had any block prints. I remembered a linocut I had done in college and dug it up. Today I rummaged around in the cage (our affectionate term for where we keep all of the supplies, and no joke it's a big wired cage in the warehouse!) and I found some really nice violet and turquoise inks to try out. This is the result. Feels good to be making things again, it reminds me that I exist. What did you do today to prove your existence?

Happy Fish, First Fridays. and Ribbon Records!

 

Friday night my cousin and I partook of CIAO First Fridays in Peoria, but first I had to make it out of her home filled with swanky vintage treasures from her latest road trip to northern Illinois. Happy Fish Sushi was our dinner of choice, a cool little joint in Campustown with super fresh sushi, although the tables are a tad too close together and there is that awkward moment where you feel like you are dining with the strangers next to you and you almost reach for something on their plate :) Carrie and I highly recommend the Miami Roll and the White Dragon roll.

 

Our next trek was Ribbon Records, a new favorite of mine, you will have to excuse the impressionistic photo I took below, but it is jam packed with bins of used records and the coolest vintage clothing collection you will find outside of a big city. This is a must see hole in the wall in Peoria. You can listen to music at your leisure as well!

 

We then traversed the artist studios of the Murray Building on Walnut street (Ribbon Records is in the first floor, artists are on the next 3 floors). We met Ken Hoffman, Ken Tiessen, Tracy Frugoli, and a few more very talented folk. Our night ended under the stars eating ice cream and discussing our life's passions. It was a pretty stellar Friday.

 

Carrie wants this lamp.

Room to think and grow

I've been delving into painting more recently, this is one that is currently in the works. I'm inspired by the fluid lines of art nouveau design as well as the subtlety of realism and surrealism. My subject matter runs the gamut, but I find figures and landscapes most fascinating. While at my day job, sometimes it's all I can do to keep myself focused on my work when images like these are fluttering through my waking brain, tapping on my forehead just begging to be set free. Turning off the TV these past few weeks has forced me to fill my need for visual stimuli in other manners. This Painting is only 10''x10'', I think I'm finally ready to go bigger and experiment with plein air techniques.

March in with a Mask

So, has anyone seen February, I just had it then I looked away for one minute and it was gone. It's been a busy month, and a fruitful Lent thus far as well. One of my non-Catholic friends asked me how long Lent was and I said 40 days. His response, "Yikes!" I look forward to Lent though I've grown out of giving up candy and ice cream, I've decided to evaluate the bad habits that are holding me back from being productive and focusing the necessary time for a healthy spiritual life. Distractions are a part of life but they grow on us like a warm blanket and we end up inviting even more in if we don't police it carefully. Thus I gave up Facebook, cut back on TV during weekdays, and invoked a 12pm curfew. And I must say the house is so quiet without the TV, I can hear myself think a lot louder and have been catching up on projects and visiting with friends. Recently I've been designing iphone covers for an online company as well as logos for a photographer and lawyer. I've been painting a lot more lately too, I go in spurts, and I'm going to embrace this batch of creativity while I can!

On a side note, I went with some friends to the downtown cathedral where Bishop Jenky held a prayer service for our now former Pope Benedict XVI, and we offered up our prayers for the new Pope to come. It was a gorgeous service and quite crowded. But the really cool thing that happened afterward, is Fr. Joe took my friend Jody and I to the reliquary chapel in the back of the cathedral - what people don't realize is that there are bone fragments in cases of dozens of the bodies of the saints. It's a little creepy, I agree, and odd to think of your body being split into a million tiny pieces when you die, but is was also really cool. They are very tiny but in beautiful little ornate cases and ornaments, even the hairs of Mother Theresa!

Inspiration from abroad

Last April I took my first trip to Europe and it was spectacular, I'm itching to back but need to save up some funds and find a justifiable reason to be there besides just having a fun trip. I was a bit under the weather by the time we reached Brussels so I didn't get to experience nearly as much as I wanted to but I did do the main things - like visit the Victor Horta House (in which I died and went to Art Nouveau Heaven!!!) And I went to the Bozar arts store: a fabulous museum gift shop with everything cool under the sun. They even had the movie Electroma by Daft Punk, which I've seen twice and was so very tempted to purchase it because you simply don't see that kind of thing in central Illinois, let alone in the states, but went for something a bit more useful: a design book entitled Echoes of the Future. A wealth of vintage inspired design abounds, and today I got it out and used it. I needed inspiration for an illustration and this is what fell out of my brain on onto the computer screen. Let me know what you think!

I love my job

So, once in a while my boss is too busy for some of the minor photo shoots for our magazine, so I get the pleasure of taking charge. We recently acquired a new client, an antique store/appraisal service business. They obtain some really unique items including this original Matisse, he would lithograph the lines on the paper and then paint atop that. It's not everyday you get to view a real Matisse, unless you work in a museum of course. I didn't even ask the price but it probably equaled my salary ha ha! Check it out along with other cool items at Sparrow Studio Antiques on Prospect.

A night out on the town

Jared Bartman and Friends is my favorite local band, they span genres, perform amazing original music and a cover here and there, they have the occasional string section and a six month old baby that wears noise-canceling headphones - what's not to love about this band?! I met the lead singer and his wife through Numéro and I've designed two album covers for them. Friday night they played at the Contemporary Art Center downtown and they were fabulous, if you ever get the chance to see them live, do it. I'm partial to their version of "Paperback Writer" by The Beatles and "Born Too Late" by the Ponytails. After the show I hopped over to May Street to visit another new artist spot as a part of CIAO first fridays--local artists open up their galleries for viewing and sometimes showcase live music and food. CIAO first fridays reassure me that Peoria is moving in the right direction as far as the arts go. Some people wonder why some of us artists stay in Peoria, given that the scene is not as developed as the bigger cities, but to that I say, if no one stays then nothing is going to get any better. There is a lot of diversity here, you just have to put forth the effort to support it.

Back to Painting

I have not completed a cohesive body of artwork in a few years now, but I'm slowing edging my way back into painting. My art and hobbies go through phases and lately I've been more into writing lately, as well as jewelry making and maintaining my Etsy shop. This painting I recently did as a gift, was a pleasant exploration of acrylics. What artistic hobby have you explored lately?

Unusual requests

You never know what kind of request you are going to get, when you are in the design field. Recently I've been commissioned to design coffee bags, particularly for Thirty-Thirty Coffee Company. This bear is for their bear claw coffee, if you've ever been to Thirty-Thirty, then you will get the joke. Also in conjunction with Dream Center Peoria, an inner city youth outreach company, I designed a logo and bag for the coffee that the kids roasted as part of an entrepreneurship program. Bags cost $13 and all proceeds go back to benefitting the programs.

Speaking of extra projects, I've been working with a local shop in town to design a line of jewelry, but more on that later!

Now that's what I call a canvas

I wear many hats in my job and in life in general, which I love, as they stack higher and higher it can be a real balancing act and once in a while I have to shelf one or two. Today at work I finished up painting a canvas backdrop, I left the paint cans in the pic for scale, its 11ft tall after all. I can't wait to see my boss use it for photography and it's got me in the mood for painting again. I don't think people understand what it is to be an artist, to have a swarm of bees in the hive of one's mind from dawn until dusk and the only way to calm them down is give them a window to be set free and come to fruition. I will be posting many of my upcoming projects soon. In the mean time tell me what are your favorite hobbies? 

A welcome to wanderers of the web...

Lady Popeko is a place where I may take the illustrious liberties of expressing my artistic and design related tastes and endeavors as I try to navigate this glorious God-spun web which we all inhabit. I hope you enjoy! I will attempt to post often, I promise. For now enjoy this Miss Peregrine portrait that I constructed during my free time after work, when I was most likely supposed to be doing something else. If you have not read Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, I highly suggest you read it before some Hollywood studio ruins it for the imagination.

With love and peace,
Nicole Blackburn
Graphic Designer + Illustrator
www.nicoleblackburn.wix.com/main
coleblk.etsy.com