Arles

I went to Arles this afternoon. This is an old town, founded by Romans: with the Rhone running in the middle:
and lots of beautiful old houses:


It is also the town where Christian Lacroix was born, and from which he takes his inspiration to create dresses and jewels. This year, he has been invited to reorganized a museum (Musée Réattu) where he spent many hours as a teenager. He has selected pieces of art from artists he loves. Those pieces, and some of his dresses, jewels, etc are exhibited in this old museum.






It is quite amazing. Unfortunately, pictures were not allowed inside. But I found a link to a diaporama:

http://www.arlestourisme.com/a5/expo_christian_lacroix_arles.htm

The dresses do carry the Arlesian tradition, even though they are very modern too. It is amazing how he achieved the mixture between past and present in them. And they are always full of contrasts, either in colors or in textures (silk mixed with felt, knitting with high-couture embroidery, etc...). They are all gorgeous, most of them with large footages of fabrics. The whole exhibition is homogeneous, in theme, inspiration, colors. Christian Lacroix has presented us with his culture. He would be a great example to follow in our Studio Journal course :-) (yes, there were some of his sketchbooks too).

Journal - color wheel

Still working on colors. This is a color wheel made of "things".

Journal - fly

While I was working on my journal last Sunday, I was bothered by flies. To the point of preparing a double-black page for them...
I've started with the drawing, from a picture seen on Internet. Then I saw a bit of paper remaining from the lovebird collage of yesterday. It looks a bit like the torso of the fly. And the dotted image was good for the eyes. The wings are:

• either too transparent if I use only the plastic wrap,
• not transparent enough if I add white paper. Tracing paper may do the trick???
• and their shapes and location is not adequate. This fly looks much more like a ciccada ;-)

I might free-machine the wings, on some solvable support, or use some black lace.
Angelina fibe would be perfect for the torso. Metallic variegated threads is inspiring too.

Studio Journal

I continued the exercises with some on the color wheels (and I would add about painting altogether... I clearly lack the practise, and some good brushes). After working on a painted background, it seems odd to work on a white one... As Sharon asked, I'm trying to make a color page each day for 5 days. For the moment, it is easier as I thought.
This page is about a failure in my garden: I love bright colors, and day lilies. So I purchased some in September, all either orange or bright red. But even for me, this collection has a little too much energy :-). So I will purchase some white or cream flowers to balance that. Hence this page.
My neighbor told me on Thursday that he saw a lovebird in the trees. Was it one of mine. No, mine were all there. We both though that the magpies or the cats would catch it very soon. So I was very surprised to find it yesterday, hanging on the aviary outside, clearly longing for real food and company. But I could not catch it. Until I opened the window in front of my cockatiels. Curiosity was stronger than prudence, and it went to see those weird birds. As I approached, it flew away, but inside the house, where I finally caught it. And it became the theme of another page:
I wanted an abstract lovebird. Will have to rework it a bit, but I like the first shot.
And here is the guy (dark green) among mine.

GTS

Green Thumb Sunday


Join
I'm a bit late, but the weather did not allow good pictures yesterday, whereas today it make the tibouchina even brighter:


Gardeners, Plant and Nature lovers can join in every Sunday, visit As the Garden Grows for more information.

Your comments

Yes Fifiquilter, I made a note with the recipe of the jam on my journal. And note to myself, as a novice jam maker, either buy twice as many jars as you think you need, or don't make jam on a Sunday... I ended with 11 jars instead of 5 or 6. By chance, I've found some I kept for other uses.
Acey, Tanguera, Lisa and Magpie, I very surprised by the result. I was sure I could not do that :-), until I tried :-) It is really fun and liberating too. And maybe addictive...
Doreen, thanks for the comments on rubbing. I hope you had as much fun with yours as I did with mine.
Prairiethistle, I appreciate the small sketchbook I can carry with me, but for some studies, it is too small. So I have a large notebook too.
Wanda, glad I helped for blackwork :-)
Nikkipolany, Startare, Conni, Teresa, I was not going to do something with the van Gogh, but after your comments, and working more on journaling, maybe i'll try to tanslate it to textile, as soon as I find the time :-) or need the inspiration.

Thank you all for your comments! They are as motivating as the ones of fellow students in the Joggles forum.

Have a nice Sunday!

Studio Journal

The second lesson of the Studio Journal by Sharon B arrived yesterday. It is as good as the first one!

This is the weekend, and a very hot one. The kind that makes you sleep on the couch after lunch, and find any excuse not to move... But I had to be honnest, the real reason I could not get myself to move was that I felt guilty to spend time on something my education considers useless: creating! Silly me, I'm 50 and free to do what I want, so let's go.

I saw in many articles about journaling that a white page blocks many persons. I never felt that way. So when I saw that Sharon started the lesson with hints at painting the blank page, I did not think much of it. Although I think journal, studio or arts journals, are prettier with background. But I'm not creative (see above), can't draw, etc, so up to now my trials at journaling were on blank pages. But to start me moving, I decided to start with this painting. Would take me a couple of minutes, so why not? Those are my two painted pages, one with clingon, the second with salt.
First surprise, that looks good, much prettier than the blank page! And I did it!
In the meantime, I had gathered clippings for the first color exercice about the color of the day, and now the opposite page looked dull. So I painted it too. The clippings represent the plums I have prepared this morning to make jam. Yellow plums, with sugar and pepermint. Hence the yellows and the little hints of green.

As Sharon suggested, I searched fabrics and threads that would match the clippings. In a previous course, Sharon suggested to keep threads and fabrics by color. What a great idea! Just one box to open instead of browsing through the entire stash! And this I found. In fact, the fabrics are little leftovers, so I won't have enough to make a great quilt. That's not a problem, this can become an ATC.
That was the second surprise: yes, collecting bits of paper can lead to textile creation. Maybe not today, but when I want to make a post card or an ATC and lack inspiration, these pages will be there waiting for me. With some indication on where the threads come from, and even the recipe for the jam :-)

To end this journal session, I went back to the first exercise of the first lesson: writing down the reasons to keep a studio journal. The painted pages were just waiting for that: I've enjoyed those few hours very much...