12 Self Portraits in 2014

This is a lot of photos of me in one blog post but I wanted to put the twelve images together in one place to acknowledge the completion of the series. It was one of the creative things I accomplished in 2014 that I am not particularly proud of because most of these are not good work. I love three of these, and the rest are meh because they were done out of obligation to meeting the goal.

high res version
January – A Chaos of Paper Scraps

February - Arranging constellations
February – Arranging Constellations

March: Blending In Or Standing Out
March – Blending in or Standing Out

Things on my mind
April – Things on my Mind

Nature's Embrace
May – Nature’s Embrace

Cutting Away (version 2)
June – Cutting Away

Feeling Silly
July – Feeling Silly

In Bloom
August – In Bloom

September self portrait
September – Living in Colour

Finger Mask
October – Finger Mask

Hibernation
November – Hibernation

Red Portrait
December – Red Portrait

I miss photography and being good at it. The end of this project has me considering whether or not to have a new photo-based project to work on this year just to feed the image making part of my brain.

Scenes From Bowen Island, Christmas 2014

The weather was sunny, beautiful and cold during the week we were on Bowen Island for Christmas. I walked in the forest every day, and took many photos.

Christmas on Bowen Island

Christmas on Bowen Island

Christmas on Bowen Island

Christmas on Bowen Island

Christmas on Bowen Island

Christmas on Bowen Island

Christmas on Bowen Island

Walking the city streets every day seems pretty dull compared to walking in the forest on Bowen.

One Self Portrait a Month: Red Portrait

I had big plans for my December self portrait of an elaborate set involving paper wings and creative photoshop manipulations. But when it came time to shoot something I chose to keep it simple and just get her done.

Red Portrait

I decided this final portrait needed to be red, which is my favourite colour, and I put on my best red hat, a giant red and black winter scarf, and found red fabric for the background.

I’m so glad to be done with this series. Working on it felt tedious. I’ve come to realize I don’t enjoy shooting self portraits the way I did in the past, and I’m okay with that.

2014: A Year End Review in Twelve Photos

I enjoy looking back through the year end review blog posts from previous years because it reminds me of things I’d forgotten about. I think all of the posts are filled with photos of nature and artwork, and this year is no exception.

Heart paper cut work
January

Hearting the Neighbourhood
February

Toronto graffiti & street art
March

Spring in Vancouver
April

May long weekend on Bowen Island
May

Kirigami paper cuts
June

Work in progress paper cut design
July

Untitled
August

Work in progress paper cut - detail
September

Work in progress - Moon
October

Anna's Hummingbird
November

TerraSkin paper - Circle series
December

May 2015 be a good one for us all!

Mega Etsy Shop Update

Over the course of this week I’ve been adding a whole bunch of new inventory to my Etsy shop.

Untitled

Those metallic gel pen drawings combined with paper cut work are now in the shop under a brand new section of Drawings.

Untitled

These two small altered book pieces recently came back into my possession, and they are marked down along with all the altered books in my shop.

I will no longer show any of my old altered book work and would really love to find them all a “forever home”.

Leaving Drawn Circles Incomplete

These are two small drawings recently created on cards for friends. I had the impulse to make instead of buy cards, and though my original intention was to cut a design I settled upon drawing.

Gel pen drawing

Gel pen drawing

I will make a few more and give them out as Christmas cards. Maybe you will be one of the lucky recipients.

Exploring TerraSkin Paper And Circles Part 2

Part two is for sharing the remaining three TerraSkin paper cuts exploring circles. Part one can be found here.

The series of six explores circles in new ways for me, as well as allowed me to work with TerraSkin paper more extensively. It feels slippery and light but is super easy to cut because there is no resistance to the knife. Each piece is 9″ x 11″, and each circle is about 7.25″ in diameter.

TerraSkin paper - Cricle series

TerraSkin paper - Cricle series-2

TerraSkin paper - Cricle series

TerraSkin paper - Cricle series

TerraSkin paper - Cricle series-3

TerraSkin paper - Cricle series-4

I backed these in black for the purposes of the photos but these will actually be displayed without a backing paper and unframed.

This work will be on display as part of Toronto Design Offsite Festival in January 2015 along with other designers and artists as a window display called, Vancouver Outside The Box. More details available on the website.

Exploring TerraSkin Paper and Circles

I’m going to share this small series of paper cuts in two parts because it feels like too many images for a single blog post. I shared in November about creating a paper cut using TerraSkin paper, which is made from stone rather than plant fibres. Over the last week and a half I created five more to meet a deadline for an upcoming exhibition.

The series of six explores circles in new ways for me, as well as allowed me to work with TerraSkin paper more extensively. It feels slippery and light but is super easy to cut because there is no resistance to the knife. Each piece is 9″ x 11″, and each circle is about 7.25″ in diameter.

TerraSkin paper - Cricle series-6

TerraSkin paper - Cricle series-7

TerraSkin paper - Cricle series-4

TerraSkin paper - Cricle series-5

TerraSkin paper - Cricle series-2

TerraSkin paper - Cricle series-3

I backed these in black for the purposes of the photos but these will actually be displayed without a backing paper and unframed.

This work will be on display as part of Toronto Design Offsite Festival in January 2015 along with other designers and artists as a window display called, Vancouver Outside The Box. More details available on the website.

Paper Cut Commission in 3D

I’ve had a few small commissions to work on for clients who ordered things during Culture Crawl. One of these is this small three dimensional paper cut for a good friend. She liked one of the pieces I had on display but wanted something similar in yellow rather than black.

Paper cut work in progress

Paper cut commission

Framed paper cut commission

The piece is small, only 5″ x 5″ from yellow card stock and backed with a lighter yellow in the framed version (which is too subtle to see in the photos). It resembles wheat blowing in the breeze rather than a wing as these pieces sometimes do. I’m inspired to do more work like this but on a larger scale going forward.