PEACE & JOY

 May your Christmas Holi-daze be as blissful and peaceful as this lovely lady appears to be!

PEACE - PAZ

A page from my sketchbook.

happy-peaceful: A.T.C. - (A Terrific Christmas!)

Happy Christmas & A Happy New Year to All!

Happy Xmas…

 Xmas is for the children

Happy Xmas and a Merry New Year.

PEACE

One from the archives.

THEME: "HAPPY" "PEACEFUL"

I decided to go ahead and take two off the Hoffman Institute Feelings List as they both certainly relate to this time of year. I hope you are all feeling HAPPY and PEACEFUL and with all good wishes for the Holiday Season my fellow Kollage Kit artists! Be well and creative.

CARING: The House of Love

 Carlo Carrà (1881-1966) was an Italian painter and a leading figure of The Futurist Movement.

I had the bandaged man sitting on my work table and he seemed just right for this theme

and this painting by Carrà.

Caring: In 2050, Pops meets his new Robo-Help.

Several robots are being developed as companions to help the aged live independently for longer.

‘Robotics are essential for the health sector and for older adults because in 20 to 30 years’ time there’s not going to be enough people to take care of the ageing population,’ said Estibaliz Arzoz-Fernandez, Project Manager and Deputy Coordinator of a joint EU-Japan project called ACCRA.

Caring..........................Teacher's Pet

Caring

 I do try and comment on all your amazing collages..but for some reason it doesn’t allow me and sometimes even my comments can’t be seen by. Michael to approve them…where do they go?

So just know..I love seeing all your reactions to the themes set and your comments…I am too worried if I try and alter my settings it will be hard to get back on to the blog.

Anyhow..two collages:-

1. Accidental find in a book which seemed to answer the brief

2. Collage which involved a limited amount of scissor work.

Caring.......................Animal Hospital

From the archives.

THEME: Caring

 Here is another courtesy of the Hoffman Institute feeling list:

Caring

Safe - Hide away from the world

 

Reading can be a way to escape into another world, safe from the daily worries.

 

Safe: When the Stunt Bruins Practise their Moves - Best "Gerroutoftheway!"

SAFE.............. Gun Owners Of America - Stay Safe This Winter!

One from the archives. Dangerous machines but with added safety measures.

SAFE

 

I was browsing through my stash of vintage magazines and found a 1938 advertisement for the Kodak Cine 8mm movie camera. I cut some of the headline copy out that talked about preserving memories for all your life. Then found 'Life Preserver'  or 'Safety' vests in a 1969 mail order catalog.

Personal note:

I am very grateful for all the life I have been allowed to live thanks to life saving efforts by my mother. When I was slightly older than the two children playing by the water's edge, I fell off a dock into a lake. I did not know how to swim and I was clearly drowning. No one else was around.  I vividly remember going under and trying to come up for air. My mother was up a hill in the vacation home we were renting. She claimed something told her I was in trouble. She saw the furious splashing and sped down as fast as she could and rescued me. 

P.S. As a result, I never learned to swim and I ALWAYS wear a Safety vest when I am on the water.

Safe

 Sometimes you have to let children try unsafe things in a controlled manner…

I would have been happier wrapping our son in bubble wrap and never letting him out though!

THEME: "SAFE"

 I happened upon a list, published by the Hoffman Institute, a rehab facility in California, that is called "Feelings List" and includes a section called "Body Sensations". I reviewed the list and loved all the adjectives and thought "WoW! These would make great challenges for collage themes!"

I randomly picked one for the first of the next couple of months of feelings & sensations to fuel our creativity.

HOMAGE: Edgar Allan Poe

We all know the symbolism contained within Edgar Allan Poe's famous works. But do you know the story of the three red roses?

Starting in 1949, on Poe's birthday, a mysterious male figure would arrive at Poe's grave and drink Martell Cognac and leave the unfinished bottle and three red roses on Poe's grave. It is said the roses were for Poe, his wife, Virginia Clemm Poe and wife's mother, Maria Poe Clemm, who are all buried in Westminster Presbyterian Church, Baltimore, Maryland. The tradition stopped in 2012. Apparently the toaster had also gone to his great reward. The tradition has been resurrected as of 2015.

Enjoy this video on YouTube from the Baltimore Historical Society so you can learn more about this annual tradition:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h7YZUoAbRRY&t=314s

OR

read this about the "Poe Toaster" from Wikipedia:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe_Toaster

Homage - Johannes Vermeer

Johannes Vermeer (1632-1675) has painted the famous artwork "Girl with a pearl earring". I used her face in this collage and gave her a modern look. To be honest, Vermeer is not my favourite artist, but I love his work and it is easy for me to find second hand books about him. He lived in Delft, a small Dutch town, not far away from my hometown The Hague.

Homage To Joseph Cornell

From the archives.

David Sedaris

 Thank you Ron for your themes….much appreciated.

I like listening to David Sedaris on the radio..but I also enjoy reading his books….which I hear in my head as David reading it to me…

He does have an unusual and daring dress sense too which I admire…although it does look like he is wearing his pyjama bottoms with a suit jacket here…(as he gets older people might start thinking he hasn’t realised…)

Very funny man.

Derek Boshier (1937-2024)

David Hockney said of Boshier that he has always kept his sense of wonder.

Derek Boshier appears about 3.30 in this clip from Pop Goes The Easel.

https://archive.org/details/twitter-1110233467000942594

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Boshier

HOMAGE to poet Julie O'Callaghan (b. 1954) "White Sound"

 What a coincidence! This is our holiday card this year. And this is the poem that inspired it!

When rain

whispers

it is snow.

Theme: Artist or Author homage.

I don’t think we’ve done one of these for a while.

One of your favourite artists or authors image and/or works in collage form.

Signing off from theme captaincy for now as November comes to an end.

Thanks for all the fine collages over the last couple of months ….Ron

Upside down - Double trouble

 

From the archive.

UPSIDE DOWN featuring TheTopsy Turvy Twins

Inspiration taken from a deck of reproduction antique playing cards which featured a flower bedecked Queen of Hearts!

Luckily, I had TWO copies of a book that pictured this lovely miss and TWO copies of "Garden Flowers in Color" that had these beautiful examples of 'Cosmos'.
 

upsides-down-etc.: On Me 'Ead Son!

Whoops Upside Your Head!

Nwod edis Pu

Michael collaged the car ages ago . I found it in his gander pile…I thought the machine looked like it would be handy for turning things up side down.

The sewing one is because I am doing a lot of sewing.
 

Upside Down- Back To Front.................Protorist Mactical Magazine

Theme: Upsides Down/Backwards etc..

Collages welcome from the topsy turvy, the over under sideways down, the backwards worlds etc…

Using eulg, repap and srossics, of course. :D

North & South - Next time we'll go south again!

 

North + South or Polar Opposites

Photograph shows Martha Jane Burke (1852-1903), popularly known as Calamity Jane, standing by the grave of Wild Bill Hickok in Mt. Moriah Cemetery, Deadwood, South Dakota circa 1903. 

I've added a circa 1961 high fashion model clad in a 'Maharajah's tunic' of black dyed Southwest African Persian Lamb from an advertisement of Fifth Avenue, New York French Couturier in Fur Georges Kaplan.

In case you are interested in the colorful history of Calamity Jane go here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calamity_Jane

I could have created a lot of polar opposites, but I liked the juxtaposition of these two women.

north+south: Southpaw

north+south: Northern Songs

From the Archive.

North & South - Map Readers

Let’s all fly South…I feel the chill of winter approaching.

 

We met a bird watcher the other day who had a series of clicky counters on his binocular tripod…he was madly clicking every few minutes and said he had counted over two thousand wood pigeons heading South that morning…we could just about see lots of tiny black dots in the distance…he seemed to know what he was doing.

North & South - Flying South For The Winter

One from the archives .

Theme: North & South

I’ve noticed it’s now getting colder in my Northern location and wishing I could fly south for the winter...

Hopefully, as far away from (in Cockney Rhyming Slang) Trump’s “North & South”. :D

So, inspired by Ka’s recent East & West theme, looking for collages, involving one or both of the other compass points.

ATC's on playing cards

 

ATC with "artistamp".

 

ATC's - More ATC's

Art Deco themed -- ATCs

I just finished making an Art Deco themed shadow box for a good friend's birthday. I had many cut out images I did not include in the piece and this "Free for All" ATC theme was perfect to make these ATCs!

atcs: Compact Cassettes

Clown ATC's

An old collage I had on my work table. Sliced it up into ATC sized cards and added a few more bits including the clowns from an old children's book.

ATCs blugh!

 Feeling really rough with COVID this week and couldn’t even face trying to work how how big the card needed to  be for an ATC…Michael kindly cut me some as I was in a can’t be bothered with this mode…and nOT having a theme really threw me as I couldn’t think…total brain fog…but finally scrapped these together…so I must be getting better… but just ended up being shell hats!..that came out of no where.

Monster ATC's

Not the best but Hazel and I both have Covid so not really feeling 100%. Hopefully better ina couple of days!

Theme: Free for All ATCs

Time, I think for a random ‘Free for All’ theme as ATCs.

AMERICANA -- Thoughts on Election Day, November 5, 2024

 $16 billion was spent in the 2024 United States presidential election, the outcome of which will strengthen or undermine the fabric of America.

(This is hot off the press, meaning I JUST glued the letters to a piece of wallpaper I had in my stash and then photographed with my iPhone...We the People sit with bated breath.)

Americana - Nice to meat you!

 

Americana - Dump Trump

 

 

Quote Trump: "I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue 

and shoot somebody and I wouldn't lose voters."

americana: Watergate Sunset by Tricky Dicky Nix & The Reel to Reelaz (1974)