MMSA grid postcards

A recent theme was grids, any way you wanted to interpret them. Love the cards I got back, two very different ways to create a grid. Cool theme, Karen!

This one is from Adrienne in BC Canada. Her grid is quite free form,
made with collaged papers in various sizes and shapes.
I like the bit of red she added with the stamped circles.

This one is from Kaprice (great name!) in nearby Sacramento CA.
It uses my fave color combo of turq and rust, and those black circles
really set it off. A more formal grid on a casual background.

circles, blue, one word

That was the theme for my latest postcard swap with Connie. As always, 

I'm intrigued with the differences between two cards made to the same parameters. We didn't use any techniques in common and our colors aren't particularly similar. Very fun.

Next we're doing 'neutrals'. Stay tuned...

This is the one Connie sent me. Torn, collaged blue papers
with a few punched circles and the single word "graphic'.
The post office kindly added the black smudges in the center. 

I sent this one to her. Scraped paint background with various
white stamped circles and the lettered word 'concentric'.

incoming ATCs

 Stamp heads have taken over! Postcards, ATCs, journal pages - they're everywhere!! Including here, where I received one from Connie and two from an MMSA swap.

Also received a lovely bird themed ATC in a trade with Carolyn (IG name @cfalbro). She does a lot of swaps on Instagram, a thing I had not thought of until I ran across her.

This one is Connie's. She posted a bunch of ATCs on her blog
and the Sun-Maid guy just grabbed me.
I commented how cool I thought he was
and he showed up in the mail a few days later.
Thanks, Connie!

These two are from the MMSA swap - Michele in VA's on top,
Pamela's on the bottom, along with the cute little envelope it came in.
Both of them are great examples of the genre.

A serene bird ATC from Carolyn.
Love the frayed cheesecloth. 

Peggy's purple and green

When Karen announced the purple and green postcard swap, I thought to myself "eh" and didn't make any cards for it. Then she began posting the incoming cards and of course there were several that looked great and so I briefly regretted not entering.

Then what should arrive in the mail but a close cousin to one of the cards I'd admired - a doodled and colored flower card from Peggy, a member of the art journal round robin that wrapped up not long ago. (That I still haven't posted about yet. I'm not sure when I developed such a lazy blogging habit but I think that two weeks I spent at the kitchen table making art and watching the Olympics broke my habit of sitting down at the computer every day. I'm on the puter constantly at work and sometimes when I get home, it's the last thing I feel like doing. I finally cleaned the kitchen table off but then junked it up again with new projects. Thank God we rarely eat at the table.)

Anyway, back to Peggy's lovely card. She used a mint green with the purple and it's so pretty. It makes for a softer feel than grass or lime green. She also used silver, and left lots of white, which gives it a light airy feel. I love intricate doodles, something I rarely have the patience for, so it was a pleasant surprise to receive her card. Thanks, Peggy!

MMSA cats postcard swap

Got my cat cards back. Well, two of them. I sent in 3 and so far two have arrived. Possibly a malcontent sorting machine at the USPS did away with one of them. Wouldn't be the first time.
The bottom three are the ones I sent out, included here because I can't remember if I blogged about them already and am too lazy to go look. Seems like I did cause I think I remember talking about Mabel.

This cool shadowed cat is from Ellen in VA. I never thought to do this before
but I really like the effect and may have to borrow the idea!
Love the colorful cat against the subtle patterned background.
Feels like a spring garden in cat shape.

This hand drawn Siamese is from Joanne in MN.
I love how it perfectly captures the wonky gaze of a cross-eyed Siamese!
She used chalk pastels for the base, then added colored pencils and pen.
I think it's amazing. I have very little drawing skill
so am always pleased to receive hand drawn work.

MMSA zentangles

An upcoming swap at MMSA is zentangles, on a postcard, an ATC, or a traditional zentangle tile of 3.5" square. I chose to use tiles for this one and made three that went off in the mail to Karen this morning.

Karen comments in a recent blog post that they are 'meditative'. I don't find them the least bit so, instead I end up with a cramped hand and a crick in my neck from hunching over the paper to make sure my lines go where I want them to. They're torture. Definitely not my cup of tea, art-wise. So I'm glad they're done and gone!

a few more postcards

I finished up a few more cards yesterday. I tend to work in batches. One evening I'll collage a bunch of backgrounds, then days later find an image that inspires me, then make some more backgrounds, then have a day where I sit down and try to find images that seem to go with backgrounds, etc. So I always have half-done cards laying on the table, waiting for further inspiration to strike or finishing touches to be added.

I like using gelli prints for backgrounds so the first two are from a batch of those. I found the image of the woman painted on brick before I found the postage stamp of the Roman fresco guy. Since they were facing opposite directions, they seemed to go together, even tho they're from vastly different eras in time. Looking at it now, it needs a bit more pen work, maybe some white, to perk it up a bit.

The one with the pens stamp has been laying around for months with only the pens stamped on it. Got that far and got completely stuck on what else to do. Then found 'many pens labored' in a book and glued that on. Then it sat for another couple months until the mail art creed 'send good mail' came to mind and seemed to fit. This one needs more work also.

I made another batch of backgrounds with various book pages on them, and had this picture of a girl ripped from a photo album. I thought about cutting her out from the scruffy edges but then decided I liked her just like that.

And so a few more cards get made, each with its own little story.