Inspiration: a beautiful balustrade

Interior stairwell
Comfort Suites
Atlanta Downtown
Convention Center

Eyes wide open, I wandered past the elevator on the lobby level of the Comfort Suites Atlanta Downtown Convention Center, and saw a beautiful marble stairway with an elegant balustrade. Photo op. Inspiration piece.

Interior stairwell
Comfort Suites
Atlanta Downtown
Convention Center

Google was completely unhelpful in my search for the history of this building, which was converted, redesigned, refurbished for either Comfort Suites or a previous owner. I'd be curious to know more...

Thanks to Vickie Brown, Ray English, and Marvette Colbert, the wonderful and talented staff at the career office at Georgia State University College of Law for inviting me to speak to part-time students on "2nd Career Law Students" and for selecting this hotel with its inspiration pieces.

Creativity: Have paint, will travel

The Great Leafy Bunny
of New Hampshire

Whether you are planning a winter vacation or plotting your summer 2012 adventures, I hope that you are inspired by my friend Rachel Zelkind, who inspires me every time art and travel come together. Bring your gear!

Tall Silo of Iowa

Because I travel often for work and always take paint and paper, I have named my painting kit "The Rachel" in her honor. It  consists of three Daniel Smith Travel Kolinsky brushes, an Arches Paper block (postcard, 7x10 or 9x12), 4 or 5 tiny tubes of watercolor, a small pencil, an eraser, and a pencil sharpener, and it fits nicely into my carry-on. Also, it goes right through TSA security.

It helps that I will only paint indoors and know how to ask the hotel concierge nicely for better light in my room by saying: "I am a painter and a reader, and the only good light for either activity is in the bathroom. Can you help me?" That strategy has not failed yet.

Rachel, on the other hand, paints outside and she is always prepared:

In her car:

"I have in the car a chair of some sort at all times." She also has a three-legged camp stool that can attach a day pack, which can be used for sitting and can also act as a little table. Not surprisingly, she always has a paper palette pad and a spray bottle for water. The rest, she says, "is just a few tubes of paint." The chair, she emphasizes, is a must, and the camp stool can go on walks, which is good, because she hikes.

When traveling in San Miguel, her chair-substitute was an upside down bucket. "It's portable and stuff can be put in and carried. It really makes sense," she says, and it is not uncomfortable. To her, "It looks more natural on the street than sitting in a chair."

Wherever you go, and whatever your art -- Bring Your Gear!!!!

Ohio-Tennessee Glaze: new nano and new tool

Tiny Tines Work in Progress

Trilobite: Four by Five

In the spirit of cooks and their knives, carpenters their hammers, and gardeners and their tools, I find that Photoshop is my new favorite creative tool.

Roller Coaster Work in Progress 1

Roller Coaster Work in Progress 2

During the past few weeks I have begun to explore Photoshop C-4, taking a single image and playing with colors and spaces, making small friend Theresa Trilobite into  Trilobite: Four by Five. I spent time in Photoshop yesterday with Roller Coaster, an unfinished watercolor that creates beautiful patterns, and with Tiny Tines, a work in progress based on part of a large salad fork.

O-T Glaze #1

O-T Glaze #2 (flipped)

O-T Glaze #3 (rotation 1)

I face a dilemma now.

Ohio-Tennessee Glaze, the new nanoscape which I began on a Pass the Baton trip to University of Akron and Vanderbilt law schools, is finished in its life as a watercolor. It now presents a delicious Photoshop challenge: which way does it look best? Let me know what you think.

O-T Glaze #4 (rotation 2)

Admittedly, this is not a bad problem to have.

But between you and me and the mouse, O-T Glaze has not yet really begun its Photoshop journey. In these four images I simply (I can say that now) flipped and rotated the original without changing any of the colors. Options: color, no color, textures, posterizing, and much, much more...Can't wait.

Commerce Note: Prints of Trilobite Four by Five are available through imagekind.com your choice of sizes and framing options.