Ghost Images: Making Plans and Impressions

Image Transfer and Planner Making

The things you'll need:
Gel Medium (gesso or mod podge also works; gloss or matte), a palette knife (spoon, stick, bone folder, letter opener, or paint brush); papers, envelopes, exacto knife, paper clips, labels (if you want your image transfer to be a planner); an image (xerox or photo copy); a place on which to transfer (fabric, wood, paper, etc.; this will be the planner covers); not pictured: bowl of water and brush (wide sponge brush works best)


The Steps to Take
1) Coat image with medium, using palette knife, turn over and place on transfer surface, brandish with palette knife handle (or bone folder eq.), and allow to dry thoroughly (overnight is safest, but hair dryers work, or heat)







2) Once the image is completely dry, wet with sponge brush and water, and carefully peel paper off. You can use the brush to remove most of the paper, and can roll the remaining debris with fingers.







3)Once the paper is mostly removed, coat with gel medium, and allow to dry



4)To begin making the planner, measure holes evenly along either the top or side edges of the front and back of the planner. Use an awl, or a nail, and smooth with sandpaper. Poke the holes from the face to the inside.
5) Cut planner papers, hole punch evenly with holes on the front and back covers. Use two pages as end pages, and with a thin paste, glue them to the inside covers.
6) In order to connect it all, use binder rings (found at any practical office supply store); size to needs.



The End

You can label tabs with a typewriter, to section off your parts.

Mourning the Loss of a Treasure: Cowboy Dances

When mourning the loss of a treasure, I highly recommend making a new one.


this is an old record book found at the bins. If you are familiar with the bins, then you are lucky. It became a cd book, as a birthday gift.







Because our sorrow is useful energy. And rarely do we let ourselves benefit from its power.



the cds in the book are mixes, inspired by titles of old contra dances.








You may decide to give this thing away; you may not be able to love it in your current state.


called such things as 'dive for the oyster', 'cheat and swing', 'don't you touch her', 'rattlesnake twist', etc.






But that's okay. Because surely, someone else can. In his or her current state.

the word is...chair: the 10,000 project

10,000 people project

There's the weapon you hold, there's the thing you hold it to, and the thing you hold dear

If you send me something, even if it's a photocopy from a book, I will love to include it in this current events/history book. My address: 4928 NE 36th Ave Portland OR 97211. The pages are predominantly blank, at the moment, but I do have some work from some friends. I said I was done with books, but I'm not, quite.

Florida is my Power Animal

"The path [to home] runs straight as a plum line, worn smooth by feet and baked brick-hard by July..."

The Damsel Is Done

This is the final anthropomorphism in the series, but it didn't make it in the sketchbook. Sometimes we're not done, when the deadline arrives, and passes. Deadlines aren't reasons for conclusions. Now this project feels done, and is remotely concluded. It was a sketchbook project, after all, which I take as exercise; strength building for the thing we do truly. I have some projects that I needed to get started on, is what I am saying. The quilt is coming... expect more embroideries, a larger scale, more detail, sequence, and a canvas with intersecting lives, family history. Families as we know them: unlikely juxtapositions, that are rational in the Dawson's Creek sense of the word.

The Yellow Harlequin Frog: An Exploration Into Color

I wouldn't sincerely try to convince you that this is yellow. My range of blues is wider than my yellows, and yet not enough. The next color study I do will push the barriers of range, to make you believe some things are closer than they appear... others further. Something about shadow... more surprise, still convincing. Atmospheric perspective through value range, and temperature, then some shadow, more unity in blending, more use of the complements. Still, he's a sweet little frog, and the final addition to the sketchbook Everyone We Know project. The sketchbooks are going to Atlanta (Feb. 27), Philadelphia (March 4), Chicago (March 8), Brooklyn (March 13), St Louis, Boston, and Washington DC. For a list of venues and dates: go here