Playtime is not just for paintings...

...because when I get in the studio, time can involve bookish things as well.  This green book from the rainbow series was finally finished this week entirely due to the push from a journal playdate this past Friday.

Here are the back and front covers, followed by an even greener interior (if that's possible):

Now I have to tell you that the word of the day on Friday's play date was CROOKED...and you can see in the photos that I took it to heart, ran with it and scored half a dozen touchdowns.  As always, I'm slightly square-challenged when it comes to photos (oh, and also rectangular- and straight-on challenged), and have displayed that to the max here.  😃  I will point out that I wasn't the only one.  ☺

I hope you've managed your middle 'G' this week - greatness, gentility, gratitude, genius, grace or whatever word's your fancy. Catch me up on your doings in the comment section below, please...and add a link if you like. 

What a great event...

week this past one has been, with two openings for the Call & Response event that started for the organizers over a year ago.

Alison Masters and Gary Deatheridge have done an amazing job, with over 50 participating artists, and dozens of artworks from all disciplines.  For an explanation of the show's concept, do see the end of this post...it's wordy, and comprehensive.

Eileen Gidman, Laura Leeder and I decided to collaborate on a board book since we were so taken by the totality of the initial show that introduced the concept.  We each chose four of the pieces or ideas presented at the initial 'Call', selected some of my Gelli prints or painted papers and tore into it.

These photos are from the play day we had:

Eileen hard at play

Ditto for Laura

Fun and Games

The finished book was surprisingly (to me) cohesive, and definitely a tribute to the 'Call' we heard on February 27th.  Can you tell who did what?

I also did a piece on my own called Community Ties, as I was so struck by the amazing community of artists, in this larger community we call home, all eager to support each other to create.  It's a wonderful thing to see this kind of connection in a town.

'Community Ties'  14" x 11" mixed media  © Win Dinn

If you've made it this far, I'm SO impressed with your perseverance.  Thanks for listening and taking a look at a very small corner of Call & Response.  For further explanation of the event, please read on, and enjoy.  My apologies for not getting photos of the event for you;  somehow my camera had a desire to stay home both evenings.

Call & Response - the Concept.

'In blues, there is a tradition of call and response where one musician creates a riff, known as the call, and another musician comes back with their own complementary, spontaneous musical riff, known as the response.  This process, or play, pushes each musician to carefully feel and attend to what the other is doing, and to respond by further interpreting and innovating the original riff.  They thus mutually create new music, opening up fresh musical combinations and new possibilities for sonic collaboration.  This call and response model has been applied for this event across a number of artistic forms and disciplines, in order to stimulate new artistic works from local artists.

With merely a month to create work based on the initial two-hour 'call', you could expect incomplete works, new directions, failure, fantasy and collaborations - in other words, something truly unique.'

It's now onwards and upwards as I work towards a show in a near-by city which opens in late August.  It's one being done with my students, which should be entitled Students Teach the Teacher, I think! Happy creating to you until next week.

Christmas is getting closer...

...and while I don't normally create holiday-themed work, I do have a little greenery for you.

I've been working on another circle book (well, two really), and thought you might like a peek at one of them before they go on display at month end.

'Squaring the Circle II' mixed media book  © Win Dinn,  front  6" x 7",  front cover

'Squaring the Circle II' mixed media book  © Win Dinn,  front  6" x 7",  back cover

I do seem to be book-obsessed for the past month or so, from folding and altering to children's board books (Green in the Rainbow Series is in progress), and using my fabulous stash of Gelli prints to make them from scratch.

As Christmas draws ever closer, the play in the studio becomes faster and frenzied.  Here's to all your Christmas creativity projects coming to a successful completion in the next six days!