by Susan Lobb Porter | Art, Process |
Remember this? My first attempt at a concrete orb. The one that b.r.o.k.e.
Well, that was THEN.
This is NOW. A bowl of succulent goodness.
A learning curve, so I tried again.
THEN: Second attempt. Clean hands. Clean clothes. Great manicure, NOT.
More THEN.
Ahhhh, but NOW: My very own double orb planter. The first of what will be many. Someday…. Many thanks to Deborah Bridges for sharing her knowledge.
Remember these layers? Well that was then, maybe a week or two ago.
This is NOW. Is it finished? I dunno. But it’s different. Calmer.
And THEN, there’s Studio Grande. Two weeks ago.
NOW, like today. Holy crap, pinch me! Am I dreaming? Guess I’ll find out for sure tomorrow when I wake up.
But I’m pretty sure it’s real. Heart emoticons here. Lots of ’em.
by Susan Lobb Porter | Studio |
Oh my Sweetums…I know you’re waiting eagerly to see the photos of the new studio that I promised would be here today.
But they’re not.
It’s for your own good. Really. I would hate for you to pass out from the shock of it. Or worse yet, gag on your coffee and spit it all over the keyboard. Oh no, can’t have that now, can we?
So you’ll have to trust me. Right now the new! improved! Studio Grande is being moved into. Which means it’s a mess. Chaos. Boxes of art supplies stacked willy nilly, like something from an episode of Hoarders.
But I do have something to show you. Something SO COOL, so ESSENTIAL for an art studio I don’t know how I ever got along without it.
I was in IKEA. In the kitchen area. I don’t get there too often, it’s well over an hour away. But that’s where we bought the studio cabinets. So while Mr. Spouse was doing boring math things with the helper man, I wandered around, within hollerin’ distance in case he needed me.
Wandered into the place where all the kitchen carts are and found THIS!
Like it wants to hang out next to the easel, you know. Standing right there with paints. Brushes. Water. Hooks from the top shelf for things to hang from. Things like towels. Or containers that hold brushes. Three shelves for art supplies. Wheels only on the front. Or is it the back? Whatever. It’s easy to move but won’t roll away.
But it’s the top shelf that’s the kicker. It’s really a drawer. And the top is reversible. Flip it over, line it with shiny paper or glass and you’ve got the perfect palette.
Is this COOL or what?
And the best thing is it was UNDER thirty bucks. Okay, a penny under but UNDER. One whole cent. But still, it’s way cheaper than something like this would be in an art supply store.
And it was easy to assemble. You can read all about it here.
Meanwhile I’m going to keep plugging away at the move. Got a day job and the weather is cookin’, so it’s slower than I thought. But I’ll keep posting photos and maybe, just maybe, I’ll be in and painting by early next week.
by Susan Lobb Porter | Art, Life, Writing |
Oh my sweetums, I have been so busy this week. So so so so SO busy.
Effin’ busy, matter of fact.
Woke up about ten days ago with an idea. A little bitty whisper left over from a dream that worked its way into the thinking part of my brain. The part that consciously mulled it over, gave it a sniff, a taste, a couple of mental pokes until lo and behold, an actual IDEA was born.
Don’t you love the way that happens?
Happens a lot to me but I usually roll over and go back to sleep. Or come up with excuses and talk myself out of it.
But this time I rolled with it and said YES!!!
Fist pumpin’, back flippin’, cartwheelin’ YES!!!
And that’s what this post is all about, the power of YES!!! The power that comes from listening to dreams and making them happen. Of saying YES!!! and moving forward one step at a time.
I told you when I took last week off from Arty Life that when I came back I would have a surprise.
Well, do I ev-ah! Oh yes, indeed… Ta-da, drumroll please… dum dum dum dum dum tsssssh…. Introducing Arty Life’s new sis-tuh blog, BIG BOLD BEAUTIFUL YES!!!. It’s a stand alone blog with it’s own URL but it compliments Arty Life.
Like chocolate compliments everything.
You can access it through the nav bar up above. One of these days I’ll get around to putting a button on the sidebar. Check it out. Please do. And if you like what you see spread the word. Tell your friends. Like it on FaceBook. Shout it from the rooftops.
But creating a whole ‘nuther blog was NOT the only thing I did this week.
If you look up at the nave bar you’ll see a new category…FREEBIES!!! Wee digi gifties for you to download and print. From me to you. because I love you all so much. Much enough to stay up way past my bedtime making these suckers and figuring out the technical stuff. Just. For. You.
Right now there’s only one, a fun poster. But there will be more. I have all sorts of stuff in mind. And I’m saying YES!!! to things now so they’ll probably actually happen.
Imagine that!
But that’s not all…
Geeze, at the risk of sounding like an infomercial shouter, I’m dangling MORE goodies in front of you. Remember the Arty Life newsletter? The one I said would go out every month. But never did. Because it was one. more. thing. Well, I finally had an AHA! genius moment. I don’t know how much ‘news’ my newsletter will have but it WILL have art. Every month, some sort of digi download. Free! Just for letting me send you a newsletter once a month. No more than that, trust me.
But…but SUSAN!!! What about the STUDIO??? The NEW! IMPROVED! STUDIO GRANDE???
You guys are wearin’ me out. I’ve been BUSY, y’know. Studio’s there. Just a couple of tweaks and it’s all done. I’m starting to move in, one paintbrush at a time. Come back Wednesday. There WILL be photos. Promise.
by Susan Lobb Porter | Mr. Spouse, Studio |
Mr. Spouse likes to play in mud. Big boy mud. Concrete. He has his own mixer. Actually, it’s his second one, the first having gone belly up a few years back. Because he used it that much. Seriously. One concrete marvel after another.
But until this weekend he never got to realize his big dream…countertops.
It was the one thing he was adamant about when he offered to build the new studio. I agreed, as long as he understood it’s a working art studio. His countertops will not be precious. They will be used. Most likely abused.
He was okay with that.
First he built the forms on the base cabinets. The lower section is my office area. Computer, scanner, printer, stare out the window at the squirrels office area.
Saturday morning we got up bright and early. Too early for me since I’d only gone to bed a few hours before.
My job was to mix the color into the dry cement. I don’t remember how many buckets I mixed. I do remember grasping the stir stick in both hands and feeling like a witch hovering over her cauldron. My lower back remembers it too.
I had black concrete dust in all my pores. On my clothes. Under my clothes. But not in my lungs because I wore a mask. Which in the end was the only part of my face that remained clean.
The first plops buckets of wet concrete hit the forms.
First layer gets troweled.
Then covered with a sheet of steel mesh before layer number 2. The edge is reinforced with rebar. You’ll have to trust me on this.
Lots of troweling. Lots of waiting. This is Mr. Bobby, our concrete friend, with his handy-dandy concrete vibrator. This excited the concrete and allowed Mr. Bobby to have his way with it. ‘Nuf said about that.
By late afternoon it was looking good. Starting to firm up. Forms were popped. Edges repaired. More troweling. Mr. Bobby and Mr. Spouse were both adamant that I NOT scribe into the oh so tempting, oh so succulent, oh so WILLING countertops in process.
So I decided I had better things to do. I headed down to the old studio to photograph art. I’m setting up an e-commerce site and need better photos.
Sunday Update
Show and tell!
Yee-haw and Yowser! Doin’ the happy studio dance, oh yes I am! Because Mr. Spouse is a handy man indeed. The weekend construction man super hero!
And in a couple of days we’ll be coming up on our 30th anniversary. The traditional gift for 30 years is pearls. The modern gift, diamonds. In our family it’s looking like concrete. And that’s okay with me!
by Susan Lobb Porter | Art, Life, Studio |
It rained hard enough last night for the power to go out. Poured throughout the day today. Snow. Hail. Going to keep on going like that for another 24 hours.
Welcome to April.
When I came home from work tonight the first thing I did was check the studio. The new studio, Studio-Grande-under-construction. Even though the sky was opening up like some fanatical end-of-the-world-scenario, it was dry inside. DRY!!! Not a puddle in sight. No drips. No buckets. No horse shavings strewn around the floor to sop up the puddles.
It. Was. DRY.
Oh, what a difference a roof makes.
I went inside and savored it. Walked around feeling the space that for the first time did NOT include some reminder of the outdoors. A space that completely sheltered me from the elements. The air was cold but it wasn’t moving, wasn’t blowing in through cracks. The rain was on the other side of the windows. It smelled like lumber in there. And cold concrete, if there is such a smell.
Each phase of the construction has filled me with a sense of gratitude. Because this place is being created to honor my creativity. It’s my space to paint and spill and celebrate whatever it is inside me that HAS to make things.
And I’m so grateful for the love that’s gone into this place. For Mama, who left me the money to finance the construction. For Mr. Spouse, who also has the need to create and has taken this project beyond what I first envisioned.
This weekend we’ll put up the insulation. Weekend after that, the sheetrock. There’ll be cabinets to assemble, concrete countertops to pour. If all goes as planned, I’ll be in there in early June.
And I can’t wait! Got a business to get up and running. Painting. Teaching. Marketing. Letting my light shine.
It’s about time.
Speaking about business, be sure to check out my Facebook page, SLPorter, Mixed Media. I’ll be posting a little something there every day. Brief little bits of studio news, new art or something from my classes. Arty Life Lite. And if you like what you see, please do me a great big favor and click the ‘like’ button on the top of the page. I want to get more ‘likes’ than Coca-Cola. I only have 41.something million to go.
