art by sarada

Ladies and gentlemen, the Poe toaster

2012-01-20T19:51:00.006-05:00

Yesterday (Jan. 19) was Edgar Allan Poe's birthday and I noticed in the news that the legendary "Poe toaster" did not make an appearance in Baltimore. For decades, a mysterious figure has placed three roses on Poe's grave, made a toast and left a half empty bottle of cognac at the site on the great writer's birthday. This is the third year, according to news reports, that he did not show up. Perhaps it was because it was only meant to continue until Poe's 200th birthday (which was in 2009). The world may never know.

A lifelong fan of Poe myself, I can remember taking down our very, very old copies of his complete works from a shelf almost too high to reach, as a little girl, and reading "The Pit and the Pendulum." I don't know why, but that story really appealed to me. Maybe it was all those Saturday afternoons watching Hammer horror films and Vincent Price movies on Channel 48 with my dad, but I'm sure that we saw quite a few Poe adaptions over the years. At any rate, I always wind up going back to him, and there's nothing better than reading Poe on a dark and rainy night when the lights go out.

And as a general fan of mysterious figures and cemeteries, I am sorry to hear that there may not be any more Poe toasts of that nature. I painted my little tribute, above, to the humorous double meaning of the name, but it's meant with great love. I hear "Poe toaster" and, well, that's the first image that comes to mind (maybe it's since I don't drink, but love breakfast foods). I added in the three roses and half-empty bottle as a nod to the real toaster.

And really, wouldn't you want great horror writers' images on all of your kitchen appliances? A big nod to one of my friends who suggested a "Bram Stoker's spatula" or a "chopping Bloch" to continue that idea, though I haven't done any paintings in that vein yet. :)

Valentine Witches revisited

2012-01-19T23:26:00.005-05:00

About 10 years ago, maybe nine, I did the painting above on 16 x 20 stretched canvas -- the photo above is not high res but you can tell what it looked like though the colors are muted because of the lighting. I really love that "winter sky" palette -- the pinkish cold tint as the sun sets, and all of the pastel ice cream shades that I associate with it. As much as I love dark and gothic colors, I also like these shades. And for some reason I really, really love "Candyland" images of heart and stripes all among the snow. So, whatever your thoughts are about Valentine's Day, that whole set of images really appeals to me.

And most of all it's an excuse to paint fancy dresses! My witch paintings are always little fantasies of dresses I want to wear. And yes I do wind up making a lot of dresses like that. Stripes and hearts -- and bustles, and bodices, oh my! I haven't made any like that in awhile since my size has been fluctuating the past couple of years but I will always have a strong longing to wear bustles, petticoats and bell sleeves.

For instance, this Simplicity Pattern for Alice in Wonderland and the Queen of Hearts really embodies what I want out of a dress! I have this pattern, so we'll see what happens.

Since I wanted to recapture this image now that I can get a high-res scan of it, I did a 9 x 12 version of the same approximate image. Now you can see how bold and bright the colors should be, though I had to cluster the main parts of the image in the middle. I also wanted to be able to make prints of the image so I wanted something easier to make into an 8 x 10.

This painting is available on Etsy right now.

The snowy season won't be around long though (and admittedly I am writing from a place where it was 73 degrees and I was out in short sleeves today) so my tube of white paint will get a break soon. Even though I was in no danger of seeing "the white stuff" this winter I can enjoy its aesthetic a lot more when I don't have to shovel it. But bare trees and blankets of white on the forest floor will always be beautiful!

Psychedelic Sunday

2012-01-15T14:57:00.011-05:00

Maybe it's my proximity to the fantastic Menil Collection lately, a museum in Houston with a fantastic surrealism room, but I've been in a very surreal mood so far this year. It's really my favorite art movement -- that and the Symbolists, and the Pre-Raphaelites, but it's the one that I think stretches the furthest back and the deepest for me.

And on the other hand, I watched Yellow Submarine the other day, a lifetime favorite, but which I haven't seen in awhile. Stir in a healthy helping of going through a Bonzo Dog Doo-dah Band phase this week and you've got an interesting cocktail of images and ideas and weirdness to be swirling around right now.

So with that, I give you some recent paintings. "Lucy the Snail in Dessertland", above, was inspired by a little character that I saw several times in the background in Yellow Submarine, which was a snail with a colorful shell -- but I mistook the shell for a cupcake! I thought that was a nice idea though so I gave this snail a cupcake shell back.

I thought I'd take that idea a step further and make another mollusc into a dessert treat. I admit this is a little odd. I took what I think is an auger sea shell, the long pointy ones that look a bit like an ice cream cone, and made it into an ice cream cone animal underwater.

01.16 - edited to add one more painting, I might put him in a separate post too but I did him last night after completing this entry. It was kind of impossible to resist once I started doing molluscs with desserts. This one doesn't have a dessert as part of his structure though, he's just carrying the ice cream around, but I had to do it once the idea occurred to me!

On an unrelated note, I also completed a painting I've been wanting to do for awhile. My ghost bottles print has an extremely well-viewed and liked item and I took the idea of ghosts in bottles and transported them into lava lamps for this piece, "Spectrum of Psychedelic Spectres." The original ix 6 x 12 inches but I also made a print that is 8 x 10 inches on photo paper, and it has a wide border at the top and bottom to make up for the strange size.

Here is the painting (above)...

And here (again, above) is the print.

Some of the other things I've been messing around with are the surreal alien landscape paintings I did about three years ago (in January) and working on presenting them as prints. I don't think I ever gave this piece below a more complicated name than "Alien Moon" but it's one of my favorites. I kept the original but I have prints of this now available.

And finally, on the psychedelic theme, I uncovered this painting I did in 2010 and decided to bring it out to share, with some of the flora and fauna of the warmer climate that I am currently enjoying, with flowers known as firewheels (or Indian blanket flower) and passion flowers, as well as my little friends the lizards. I wound up calling it "Sunset in the Magic Garden" (below):

I am working on something for Valentine's Day right now and a few other odds and ends I need to scan or write up a little something about but it's a busy time for art right now -- and enjoying the nice weather and lack of snow, and later sunsets!

Fundraising for a friend

2012-01-06T19:30:00.004-05:00

A friend of mine is facing some expensive veterinary surgery for her beautiful black cat, and I thought I'd chip in by donating all proceeds (before shipping cost) from the sale of prints of my black cat painting "Guardian of Pumpkin Woods." I also sold the original and have donated the proceeds from that painting. The prints are 5 x 7 and are $8 each, plus $2 shipping in the US or $4 shipping elsewhere. I have some in stock right now and can ship next business day after purchase - I will continue to donate proceeds from this print to her fund as long as there is a need.

The original was inspired by my own black cat, Voudoun, and I have two more black cats in my life as well, so they are pretty near and dear to my heart, as are all cats! My white cat Shizuka is the love of my life as well, even though she gets fur all over all my black clothing. :)

I have a few other 5 x 7 prints back in stock too, and most of my prints can be custom ordered in other sizes depending on the size of the original (if the original was 5 x 7 for instance, a print that is 8 x 10 will look like it's been blown up too large, so check individual listings).

New art for the new year!

2012-01-05T21:47:00.007-05:00

I didn't manage to get one of those "end of year" things going this year but I do have a "first of the new year" to share -- immersed as I am in surreal and psychedelic things lately I feel like doing some circus inspired art despite the fact that I have never been to a circus or particularly interested in them. But the images are stuck in my brain, so what can I do but obey! This is "Hydrangea" so-named because her three-headed snake is something like a hydra...and I like hydrangeas, the flowers. She seems very pretty, innocent and flower-like.

I don't think I've done a lot along these lines in the past (circus themes) -- here is the most prominent, "Night Circus in the Pine Barrens," still available on etsy:

I have several two-headed woman paintings that I will have to repaint in order to offer them as prints (the originals were done and sold before I had access to high-resolution scanning that would allow for print-making):

'Lili et Rosa" was something I painted about 10 years ago, maybe 9...I think I would definitely like to do a new version of this so I can offer her as a print.

And continuing that theme, another painting which I unfortunately didn't record the name for so I will have to come up with a new one!

Finally, one that I do have a print available for, since I think she has kind of circus or carnival atmosphere to her...

So that's where things are at right now. I'm watching a lot of colorful arty movies and reading some surrealist books so that should be fueling some more things in the months to come...and I am in no danger of seeing any snow right now so I guess I am well out of the winter art mindset already!

Dark side of the holidays

2011-12-03T19:02:00.007-05:00

I'm delighted to now be a member of the Etsy Dark Team - still dotting a few i's as I update all my pages to reflect that, but I thought I'd celebrate by posting a few "dark" items of gothic sensibility that I haven't shared in awhile. Above, "Mistress of the Purple Tower" was the first painting that I did in 2010 or the last in 2009 -- I remember working on it right on New Year's Eve into the morning.

For a sampling of the kind of things the team offers, just type EtsyDarkTeam in the search field in Etsy, visit the Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/EtsyDarkTeam or the blog page at http://etsydarkteam.blogspot.com/.

"She felt bad for the beetle and wished to release it from its glass prison" is the overlong title for this little painting, which I did in 2008 when I started doing small paintings to illustrate little images that seemed like they belonged in old gothic stories. Women with candles, ghosts wandering through towers, and all the other things that have come to dominate my recent doodles. I wanted to give them names that sounded like sentences from a strange story.

"The pomegranate seeds glistened like blood" is another in this little series -- a ghost haunted by the blood red fruit of the pomegranate in a cold tower. As a side note, this has very wintry colors to my mind -- the ice blues and the berry blood red.

"Alone Again" is a 9 x 12 painted in very early 2009 to reflect the cold and distant feeling of winter. I like that feeling in winter actually -- in January, when the holidays are over and there's nothing but a dismal grey sky, grey trees and maybe snow, depending on where you are. I would always take a vacation week at that time of year just to be alone and read and paint. This is a nice little reflection of that feeling.

My coupon code HOLIDAY20 good for 20% off is still active as of this writing, Dec. 3, and I will leave it active at least for a little while longer, in the spirit of things...because why not!

Handmade for the Holidays

2011-11-25T20:30:00.010-05:00

Candy Cane Witch makes me want to eat the gingerbread house I have in the other room! Well here we are, the big weekend, the weekend in which I will probably not venture out of the house/woods because I don't like crowds and I don't need anything they sell in the mall. Because like many people, I would rather give and receive something that is made by myself, by a person I know or an artisan or craftsperson who cares about their work, than something produced en masse. These gifts don't have to be expensive, and thanks to the Internet, you can get a gift from far away from a like-minded Maker-of-Things, without having to leave the house. That's what the Handmade for the Holidays idea is all about.

I won't be able to spend any money myself this holiday season, but I do have a variety of original art and prints available in my Etsy shop if anyone would like to give the gift of art this year, some with a winter theme, many with a year-round appeal if you like fantasy, gothic, fairytale and psychedelic art. See my Winter Art Round-Up post for a winter-focused list, or just browse my shop. The prints are all of a size you can easily get a pre-made frame for, and much of the original art is also a standard size.

For the people close to me, I will be making gifts this year, either artwork or knit/crocheted items. Last year I was able to give something to many people I know, because I spend my free time at home knitting instead of grappling for position in an overcrowded store.

Here is a selection of some of the handmade items that some of my friends and online acquaintances offer. Art, music, fiction, scented goodies, graphic arts, handspun fiber and much more. And I included some interesting blogs and podcasts that friends of mine are involved with as well. I will keep adding to this as more friends make suggestions to me, and I will link back to this post.

Art:

Bethy Williams Interdimensional Art

http://www.artfire.com/ext/shop/studio/bethywilliams

Photography:

Deirdre Ryan Photography (New Jersey area)

http://www.deirdreryan.com
http://blog.deirdreryan.com

Music:

Dark Holler Arts
(including the band I am in, Stone Breath, and friends)
http://www.darkhollerarts.com/

Lycia
http://www.lyciummusic.com

Mike Hamel and the Amber Lamps:
http://reverbnation.com/mikehamel

Korperschwache
http://www.korperschwache.com/

Lettering and Letterpress:

Word Illusions (custom ambigrams):
http://www.tiffanyharvey.com

Presse Dufour (design and letterpress)
http://www.etsy.com/shop/pressedufour

Fiction:

Hyacinthe Raven (her new book is "Dial 999")
http://www.realityasylumbooks.com/

Tara VanFlower ("Violent Violet")
Ebook:
http://amzn.com/B003YCPG1O
Paperback:
http://www.cafepress.com/tara_vanflower.460011264

Fiber Arts (art yarn):

Three Ravens:
http://www.threeravens.net

Terry Had a Little Lamb:
http://www.etsy.com/shop/terryhadalittlelamb

Perfumery and Bath:

13 Gypsies Perfumery:
http://www.artfire.com/ext/shop/studio/13GypsiesPerfumery

Sideshow Soap Co.
http://www.etsy.com/shop/SideshowSoapCo

Conjure Oils
http://www.conjureoils.com

Possets Perfumes
http://www.possets.com

Jewelry and Accessories:

Od Peacock Jewelry:
http://www.etsy.com/shop/odpeacock

Peach Fuzz Jewelry:
http://www.etsy.com/shop/PeachFuzzAccessories

And I also wanted to promote some friends' work on the internet, in blog and podcast form, here are some projects that some friends of mine are involved with:

Painted Lady Finger (nail polish and beauty products blog):
http://www.paintedladyfingers.com

Pre-Recorded Late Night (free improv comedy podcast)
http://pre-recorded.com/

Miss Gender: A Transgender Woman Tells Her Story
http://missgender.com/

Thanks for looking, and happy holidays!

Winter art round-up

2011-11-03T14:29:00.009-04:00

Everyone already seems ready to start in on the holiday season in the first days of November, and since mail order can take time, I'm not going to wait any longer to launch my own winter art for the season! I'll continue to post new things as they become available, since I have a lot of painting planned. I will link back to this post whenever I post new winter art though, since it's nice to have it all in one place. I love painting snow for some reason -- that color scheme really appeals to me and I love the magical worlds that can be created with snow and ice as the themes. I hope to offer some more child-friendly art with snowy witch themes, maybe some winter animals like owls and penguins, and some gothic graveyard in the snow art as well, as the season progresses.

Commissions for the holidays can be accepted at least through the end of this month, looking at my schedule so far...I'll post a note if I get too busy to take on new ones but for now, I'm good to go!

Above, "Haunted by Snow Ghosts" is the newest original painting I have in my shop with a winter/snow theme. It is 7 x 9 inches which is a nice size for gift giving. Ghosts aren't just for Halloween, I think they are wonderful in winter too!

"Snowflake Witch" is an original 9 x 12 painting currently available. I have previously painted a very similar image but I wanted to create a new one so that I can offer her again, and also have new high resolution images available for future print-making. Right now if anyone wants a print, contact me and I can make one up in 5 x 7 or 8 x 10; they will be added to my regular shop stock in the future.

"Shards of Color" is another original currently available in 9 x 12 with snow, ice and pastel colors - great for kids or adults, a gentle but surreal little piece.

"Snow Snail" is another surreal snow painting, and the newest print I've added from a relatively recent painting (I sold the original about two years ago I think). A faceless figure is led through a snowy landscape by a strange snail. I have a 5 x 7 in stock but since the original was 8 x 10 I can make that size upon request as well.

"Snow Cauldron," also in stock as an 8 x 10.

"Candy Cane Path" has a childlike feel and would fit nicely in a kid's room or for a witch-loving adult.

"Valentine Witch" doesn't have to wait until February, she's a winter witch who just happens to have some hears on her wings and dress. :)

I'll post more as I do them, and probably continue with winter art well past the holidays if the mood strikes me...it's hard to stop once I get started!

Little tiny canvases and movie-inspired art

2011-10-29T21:15:00.007-04:00

A local art store was having a special on wee tiny 2 x 3 canvases so I have loaded up on them and am obsessed with the idea of making "quadtychs" -- like a triptych, I guess, but there are four paintings in each. This is my first one but there will be more -- basically each will show a continuous scene, but in four parts. They can be displayed side by side continuously, like so:

Or framed individually, or arranged as a square, or whatever! I am very thrilled by them anyway . :P More are planned!

I keep uncovering more and more images that I needed to either update or post anew -- for instance I had some paintings on ArtFire, but I closed that shop for now and I never moved the art back to my Etsy shop. I'm in the process of doing that but in the spirit of Halloween here are a couple that I put up with sort of horror themes.

"She Kills With Colors" has a title inspired by giallo movies, though the image suggests sort of a devil woman who hypnotized her victims with psychedelics. Doesn't it? If it was a movie ~I'D~ want to see it, that's for sure.

And "The Devil Wants a Wife" is inspired by things like pulp horror book/magazine covers or movie posters, from anywhere in the mid-20th century. I've always wanted to do lots of things along those lines but I keep getting sidetracked...

While we're at it I also was able to update the image for this piece, which I had previously photographed but the scan gives it a much more clear and crisp appearance on a computer monitor. This was inspired by the Jean Rollin film "Fascination" which features a cloaked woman with a scythe, but I wouldn't suggest searching for the film if you're at work or in another environment where naked ladies might not be good to have on your screen, because Jean Rollin films are full of them.

And with that we are one day closer to actual Halloween, which is different from the one that I celebrate which is pretty much continuous, though I still never go to parties. :P

Halloweekend!

2011-10-28T15:38:00.011-04:00

"A lantern lit the shadows" - now available as a 5 x 7 photo print.

Ok yes I am not the first person to use the phrase "Halloweekend," I admit. :P

I have a pile of new art waiting to scan and post, that is very much along Halloween lines but of course I am posting it just right around the big day itself. No matter! I pretty much observe Halloween all year long -- it just dropped to 57 degrees in Texas today and I hear it is supposed to be snowing this weekend up north where my mom, cats and turtles are hopefully putting on sweaters.

I can't wait to share some of my new work, which ranges from cute to grimly gothic, and some completely unrelated somewhat abstract things, and a little sci fi, but I've been going through my winter art box and finding a few treats to put back in my shop for the season as well.

In the meantime I thought I would gather all of my monochrome ghost paintings/prints here in one spot for fun and for reference in case anyone wanted to see them. Up top is a new print of a painting that sold a little while back -- I wasn't sure how the dark colors would reproduce in a print but I think it worked out just fine! Right below are a couple of more recent pieces still available as originals:

Now, below here is a ghost I painted several years ago who is still available -- again, I think watching too much Dark Shadows inspired it. I also did a commission recently for a variation on this image, of the goddess Hekate, which I will post just below it with some of her symbols around her. It was a joy to create this image and I am grateful to the person who wanted it, for entrusting me with it!

And now, the Hekate variation:

Finally, my most popular piece, the original sold three years ago to a friend and I didn't think it would reproduce as a print because there's so much dark coloring, but another friend asked for a print so I made one and it looked great! Now it has more views, hearts and treasuries than anything else I have on Etsy, and whenever one sells I list another. The original was 8 x 10 so I probably won't offer prints larger than that, but right now I still have a 5 x 7 up for sale.

So there is some grim and occasionally cute dark gothic ghostly stuff for you -- I keep this stuff available all year of course, but for some reason people seem to be more interested in it in October...

What does this have to do with Halloween!

2011-10-27T14:18:00.003-04:00

I've been busy with some commissions lately but somewhere in there I was completely distracted from my usual haunted activities by thinking about really, really colorful things. With only a few days until Halloween I should be talking about my usual ghosts and haunted houses, but I wanted to share this before any more time passed, just because! And anyway I think something strange with stripes and a devil face in it is kind of seasonal too...At any rate, this painting was inspired by listening to electronic music and thinking about early 80s video games, the ones where you are trying to build things with pipes, for instance -- but things went haywire and some flowers crept in.

Where I am right now the leaves don't change and there's not a crisp note of autumn in the air quite yet (maybe late a night, when the armadillos come out) but I am still in a fall frame of mind, watching Dark Shadows at night and various movies with the words "vampire" and "Dracula" in them.

Nothing new, of course -- recent viewings include the favorite La Vampire Nue, a couple versions of Dracula; Dracula AD 1972 and other Hammer offerings. And my reading for the moment is still Salem's Lot, which I started several weeks ago in a strange fit of not reading something from the 19th century! But I'll be back there soon!

More haunted art coming soon, into the winter months...because Christmas was always a time for telling ghost stories in Victorian times!...

A few more ghosts...

2011-10-15T20:34:00.004-04:00

I have been loading up on ghost/haunted house movies lately, as that has been my favorite motif at Halloween time for some years lately. Ever since I read "The Haunting of Hill House" by Shirley Jackson and the Mammoth Book of Haunted House Stories, that has been chief among my obsessions.

I love walls with brocade wallpaper, candelabras, oval portraits, mysterious bookshelves and of course what lurks beyond locked doors and in basements. Normally this time of year I'd also be watching Dark Shadows so that will have to start up soon too.

A few movies that have been watched lately: The House on Haunted Hill, The Legend of Hell House, Thirteen Ghosts, to name a few. Another, Burnt Offerings, was made a little later and didn't quite hit the marks we were looking for, but it had some interesting atmosphere as well. "Thirteen Ghosts" particularly inspired me with an idea for something I plan to paint very soon...

Right now I am also offering up a repainted version of a ghost painting I did about 9 years ago, "Ghost Sisters of the Tower." I've done at least one other repaint of it since then but I wanted to make sure to have a nice fresh version of it that I can take scans from, and of course the painting itself is available -- I love my blue and purple ghost girls!

I'm taking a break from 19th century literature to read Salem's Lot by Stephen King as well, but my movie choices are likely to stay firmly rooted around the 60s/early 70s...which is about as modern as I get.

The Curse of the Lost Print of the Ruby Skull

2011-10-07T14:20:00.006-04:00

When I was getting prints made up a while ago I didn't put all of them out for sale immediately and I just realized this one has not been listed! I loved doing this painting -- I did it twice, as I had a commission for it once as well -- and I am happy to be able to offer a print now.

In addition to loving '70s craft books I also love pulp adventure stories from the first half of the 20th century. You know, the kind of things with titles like Spicy Mystery Stories - here's a site with a selection of them, though some of the art may be not-suitable-for-all-audiences, if you know what I mean. And also, many are public domain, so here is one of my faves:

There's also a thick, heavy and somewhat affordable book out called the Big Book of Adventure Stories that collects some choice tales from the past century. Fine literature is it not, necessarily, but it's a bloody good time. Sheena, Queen of the Jungle; Tarzan; The Scarlet Pimpernel; Conan the Barbarian and many more are in its pages.

I tend to read the turn of the century stories by people like H. Rider Haggard, which are admittedly antiquated by today's standards, but display a kind of creativity and curiosity about unexplored regions of the world that we just don't have today, since you can pretty much see the whole thing on Google Maps.

Finally, I love terrible movies, like Night of the Sorcerers, which is also not-for-all-audiences, but includes vampire women running around in slow motion in leopard skin bikinis. I still harbor some vague notion of making such an outfit for myself for Halloween. :P

I will probably do some more things inspired by this kind of crazy stuff, but I like it best when the ladies are in charge, and not being menaced by goons.

New painting of my purple fairy

2011-10-05T16:20:00.004-04:00

I've been working for some time on doing new paintings of some of the favorite images from my gallery, where I've collected some of the paintings I've sold over the last ten years. Above is "Dark Lanterns," which I have painted on several occasions, but until this new version I haven't been able to take a high-res scan of it.

Here's the gallery with my older works in it:

http://www.artbysarada.com

The scans that I made before the paintings were sold in 2001-2003, were not really of a quality that I could make prints from. So although I've had many requests for prints or other reproductions of them, I couldn't offer them.

I have a few things in my Etsy shop as "photographs/prints" but I really want to add to that and offer more things in the future. I didn't have much interest from a Cafepress shop, though it still exists:

http://www.artbysarada.com/cafe.html

But I would like to be able to offer my own reproductions of things in various forms, some day. Maybe little necklaces, in addition to things like postcards, notecards and the current photographic prints.

So far, the fairy painting above, and these two below, are the repaints I've done for Halloween, so I will be able to do more with these images in the future. I've also done several for winter.

As always, if anyone sees anything in my gallery (above) that you think would make a good offering as a print, please let me know and I'll put it on my list for consideration!

My love of '70s craft books

2011-09-30T14:02:00.006-04:00

It's Katamari Damacy! In the living room! And it's about to roll over that lady!

My pictures here today are from "The Great Granny Crochet" book by the American School of Needlework, 1979. As a child, I thrived (throve?) on 1960s and 1970s craft books that had lingered on shelves into the early 80s. I would go from front to back, exploring every craft within. Papier mache elephant pencil holder? Done. Painted a rock to look like a bug? Many times.

The look of those books had something really unique to it -- the avocado green, mustard yellow, that kind of bronzy pumpkiny orange, and of course the most disagreeable shades of brown imaginable. There was lighting that never quite illuminated the subject. Worst of all were the photos of food, of course. There is an entire blog and several books devoted to the subject of horrifying food art from cookbooks of the past. I have my own collection of those kind of cookbooks, because I am enchanted by the wibbly, wobbly, gelatinous horror of the endless "jello molds full of hot dogs" that apparently passed as food in the decade of my birth.

There are four pictures of this kid and a can of soda in this book. See, teens used to be so well behaved!

I've worn some pretty strange outfits in my time but I think this is probably the most daring fashion feat I have ever seen perpetrated.

Start making one of these cuddly robots now and it might be finished before the real robots become super-intelligent and start to take over!

Anyway, you get the idea! Most of my '70s craft books are lodged at the bottom of many boxes of books I have stored away right now but I am inspired to keep finding and scanning my favorites. Except to find some of them in your Christmas stocking this year if I know you! And I'll have to make the stocking too of course.

Happy autumn!

2011-09-22T22:28:00.004-04:00

It was humid enough to warrant air conditioning but it's officially fall! Us redheads born in the autumn months are inordinately fond of fall. Here is some fall art to look at while I get some more projects finished! I'm working on multiple art and sewing commissions and making some Fair Isle socks for myself, for fun. These images are all still available on Etsy, with prints available of the woodpecker painting as well.

And soon, the October horror movies will begin...

But for now, some trees, which are still in their green glory last time I looked, but it's nice to think of what awaits in a few weeks!

Three new pieces of surreal, dark and ghostly art

2011-09-08T20:36:00.005-04:00

Autumn makes me paint, so I have a few new pieces to throw at the Internet this week. First here's an 8 x 10 on stretched canvas called "Glass Worm of the Rainbow Caverns." It sounds like the name of an old D&D/AD&D module and maybe this does look a little like it could be the cover art for one...at any rate, it's my nightmare landscape of the moment. I like things that are both dark and colorful at the same time, with colors emerging from a mostly grey landscape. This is also kind of influenced by cleaning out the basement lately after flooding. No, I didn't see anything living down there, but the subconscious mind does strange things sometimes.

"The one that didn't get away" is a little 5 x 7 ghost bottle, a wispy little sheet ghost held in by a cork while other spirits frolic in the distance.

"The Haunted Orchard" is another little surreal dream world for Halloween and autumn enjoyment. It's also 5 x 7. I read an Algernon Blackwood story that took place in an orchard and it suggested this image, though I can't recall the details of the story since I've read about 20 ghost stories in the last week and they are all blending together!

I'm running out of dark paint, better get some more. :P

In the spirit

2011-09-06T14:04:00.002-04:00

I've noticed that the cable channel TCM has been running horror movies already this year -- some zombie movies, and the Blob is scheduled to be on tonight (one of my favorites!!). I think that's the only TV channel I could be persuaded to watch on a regular basis right now aside from the shows about ghosts and slobs and people who eat drywall, which I find very interesting as an armchair psychologist.

At any rate, if I were to turn on the TV right now I am informed that Forbidden Planet would be on, but I am enjoying the fact that it's rainy and quiet outside so I'm not likely to interrupt that.

And in the spirit of things, I have a lot of new ghostly art for the season, including this repaint -- I originally painted this image two years ago and gave it to a friend after displaying it in my online shop for a little while. But I thought I would do a new version and offer it again for interested parties. It's small and easy to frame, and it just couldn't be more autumnal!

I may or may not have given it the same name, the second time around. I have a habit of renaming things constantly.

For now, I am going to go investigate the possibility of learning how to knit gloves with fingers, since that's one of the only things i didn't learn to knit in the past year -- and today's sudden dip in temperature has me thinking that might be a useful skill to have.

The rest of the Halloween prints!

2011-09-03T14:00:00.003-04:00

I will likely have more before the season is over but I've listed all the Halloween art prints that I have in stock - and of course as soon as one sells I will relist. Although these are 5 x 7 and are listed one at a time I can get multiple copies made, in matte or glossy, and well as 8 x 10s on demand.

I am reading "The Mammoth Book of Victorian and Edwardian Ghost Stories" right now -- I know I read most of it before and many of the stories are in other collections, but they are still seeming very fresh and new to me so I guess it's been awhile since I read some of them. Included are the classic "Schalken the Painter" by J. Sheridan Le Fanu and my favorite thus far is "The Lost Room" by Fitz-James O'Brien, because it has elements of both surrealism and decadent literature in its dreamlike narrative.

I've also recently watched a lot of older horror movies so I was glad to find I still had a scan of this painting below, inspired not by any particular film but by the idea of silent or classic black and white horror movies.

The Silent Grave

Tower of the Zombie Girl

The painting above was simply titled "Zombie Girl" on my art gallery website but I added "tower" to spruce it up. :)

The Haunted Windmill

And finally, a ghost bride and a haunted windmill. I am rather fond of this one as well.

These paintings are all from a few years ago. I don't have the specific dates but I think it may have been 2004 because I remember painting them at my first apartment. The originals are sold but I enjoy repainting images and I'm happy to finally be able to offer prints of these, which are done on matte photo paper through a service that I use.

That's all for now - I think Labor Day is the unofficial start of fall, and it certainly feels like it with cooling air and rustling leaves.

Some more Halloween prints

2011-09-01T13:21:00.006-04:00

I've recovered some more of the original scans of paintings I did a few years ago and I am offering prints of them! There's one of them, right above here...

When I started selling art online about 10 years ago the scanner that I had access to was fairly low-res but the big problem was that the computer where they were stored was old, and there was no way to move the images elsewhere...they were too big for a floppy disc, and there was no cd-burning capability. I'm sure there are other ways to deal with that, so hopefully I can retrieve them some day, but in the meantime I have at least been able to recover images that I DID get high-res scans of, and I can now offer them as prints.

And for fun, I've been repainting some of those 2001-2003 paintings that I did as well, so I can capture them with the latest in last year's technology. :P

Here's one of my black and white/monochrome "silent film" paintings from a few years ago, this one is Silent Laboratory. I have one more of these images coming soon to my shop in print form too.

And this one has been offered before but now I have matte prints of it with borders. Very autumnal don't you think?

That's the shameless plug for today. Just want to let people know that there's Halloween art out there if they need it! It's a public service!

Widget?

2011-08-29T21:56:00.008-04:00

I'm trying out this widget (look to the right) from Craftcult, which shows a slideshow of items in my Etsy store and lets you see the prices, feedback, hearts, and other stuff. I thought it was pretty useful, let me know if you see if and have an opinion either way!

As I mentioned before, I will close my Artfire store until further notice around Sept. 19, since they only have Pro accounts and since my online sales activity is fairly sporadic and not a fulltime pursuit, I don't want to have a monthly charge at this point in time if I can't devote a lot of time to promoting it. I am going to keep working on making my Etsy offerings better and more diverse.

That reminds me, I have some UFO and alien themed things up right now -- the second in a series of UFO/Alien/Conspiracy theory paintings that I meant to get cracking on a long time ago, and I relisted some ACEOs that I haven't had in the shop in awhile.

First here is a new 6 x 8 inch painting with a bug-like lizard alien, Saturn and stonehenge that will make you look crazy for buying it and me crazy for painting it. Who can resist!!

Since everyone loves ghost bottles, I did a couple of ghost bottle ACEOs a couple years ago too but I didn't quite get around to selling them. These were hand-cut art paper, and although it looks like watercolor it was watered down acrylic paint.

More UFO abduction...

And more!...

Anyway I did these a couple of years ago but I had them tucked away for awhile and they are ready for sale again!

After the hurricane

2011-08-28T17:20:00.006-04:00

Back up in New Jersey in time to help out with hurricane preparations, I was plastering patches on the wall where water was getting in, in the basement, until late last night to try to minimize damage. As it turns out very little water got in down there except, of course, in the room where my things are being stored. Fortunately they were all up on shelves or tables, or in plastic tubs, so the puddle of water that leaked into that room did not damage anything of interest or value.

And today, giant mushrooms were already growing in the back yard!

We didn't even lose power, though I had prepared tons of raw veggie food items and a lot of non-perishables, in case we did, since we don't have any non-electric cooking devices - not even a camping stove.

Yesterday I did a small painting to pass some time, based on the popularity of this print in my shop I thought I'd start doing some small ghost bottle paintings. Here is the first, "Elixir of Arminta." I need to get more small canvases, but when I do, expect more...

Also, here is a scan of the painting that I repainted last week, since I didn't have a scanner at my disposal when I finished it. I think the scan shows the colors much better than the photo did, since they are very vivid and bold here. The photo shows the colors in natural sunlight, but the scan more accurately represents how it looks indoors I think.

New art and old but new

2011-08-21T20:20:00.005-04:00

I have been meaning for awhile to do some more paintings inspired by '60s science fiction book covers, science textbooks and the like - I love that retro look for "sciency" things that especially in science fiction is only based on the most loose and psychedelic misunderstanding of how "sciency" things work.

I don't know how many I will do but here is the first in the latest batch, it's called "Drifting through the cellular sea" and is available on Etsy.

I have also done a repaint of one of my most popular designs. First painted in 2001 or 2002, I'm not sure which, "Black Lantern Spell" is an image I have done several times, including one large painting that was about three by four feet in size. This time the painting is 9 x 12 inches, suitable for easy framing on flat canvas board.

I'm always willing to do repaints of images that are in my gallery at http://www.artbysarada.com in a variety of sizes at set prices, but here's one that is all done and ready to go. I hope that from my new repaints I may also be able to offer prints, since the original 2002 designs were done at a time that I did not have access to the resources to do so.

That's all for now - lots more to come soon.

Halloween sales!

2011-08-19T20:44:00.004-04:00

Mid-August is when Halloween starts to seriously kick into gear, since the decorations are up for sale in stores, and people are getting ready to stock up on Halloween goodies before they get too distracted by back-to-school shenanigans. So I'm going to try to put more of my classic Halloween art in my Etsy shop, as I'm doing new versions of old favorites. Please visit my Facebook fan page and "like" it for a new coupon code!

Around Sept. 18 I won't have an ArtFire shop any more -- I had a pro account and went back to a basic account, but those no longer exist, so once my current month's subscription runs out I am not going to renew and will just focus on Etsy.

In the meantime I have a 10% off storewide sale on ArtFire, so check it out by clicking the owl painting above! I mostly have prints available there and a few paintings not available elsewhere. The sales prices will be live, no need for a coupon code. If there's enough interest I might be able to keep the shop around longer.

That's all for now, going to get back to working on some crisp, cool autumn art from a 107-degree day in Texas!

Ghosts and flowers

2011-07-09T12:31:00.005-04:00

"Haunted by Flowers" by Sarada 2011 (on Etsy)

Other than knowing I wanted to paint a ghost flitting through a hallway I wasn't sure what I wanted to do with this painting, but when it was almost done I imagined flowers streaming by her and now I can't imagine it any other way. I am really very happy with this -- although I've been inspired by gothic and ghost story type literature of the 19th and 18th century recently, this doesn't point to any one particular story -- it's just a general ghostly image inspired by writers like J. Sheridan Le Fanu, Wilkie Collins, E.F. Benson, M.R. James and other wonderful writers.

Right now incidentally I am reading a book on my nook from the 18th century, which was one of my 600 or so public domain works I've downloaded from manybooks.net, archive.org or gutenberg.org, and this one is called The Haunted Priory by Stephen Cullen. It is also available as new, reprinted book from Zittaw Press. Despite the fact that the letter "s" is rendered as an "f" throughout the text, it is a very enjoyable read, and I will buy the reprint just as soon as I have some money, to add to my teetering pile of gothic novels.

Most of these books were originally published in 2, 3 or 4 volumes, so the versions that are made available through archives are usually incomplete. Only a few seem to be up in complete form for free -- The Mysterious Freebooter by Francis Lathom, The Haunted Palace by Mrs. Yorke, for instance -- though those are also available reprinted in shiny new wonderful copies from Zittaw and Valancourt Books.

Some other good places to find old horror by the way are Munseys and Horrormasters. I also like a lot of other pulp fiction from pre-1920s that they have on sites like Munseys and Manybooks.

I recently got a couple of books from Amazon thanks to the miracle of credit card reward point -- The Necromancer by George W.M. Reynolds, and Bungay Castle by Elizabeth Bonhote -- so my library mania continues, despite not having any money or space to put anything!

And finally, why does auto-save never work on Blogger? This is seriously beginning to make me crazy.

The Moonstone, and Dreams

2011-07-07T20:52:00.005-04:00

"The Moonstone (I)" (2011) by Sarada

As usual my pledge to post more often falls by the wayside. I was posting recently about some sewing creations, and before that some of my lace knitting, and all of that is still sitting around waiting to be photographed or blogged about but in the meantime I was sitting outside last week reading "The Rose and the Key" by J. Sheridan le Fanu and I became possessed of the desire to paint some imagery from the novels that I love.

I read mostly 1790s-1920s, i.e. gothic novels, Victorian ghost stories, sci-fi and supernatural fiction, and just literature in general from that time period. Wilkie Collins is one of my favorites, and this summer I read "The Woman in White", as I read "The Moonstone" last year.

The above painting is the first Moonstone-inspired piece -- not any particular scene in the book really, just an impression in general I have of the idea of someone feeling like she is pursued for her mysterious amulet...

"The Spectrum of Dreams" (2011) by Sarada

I didn't think long and hard about a title for this one and I'm afraid it sounds a bit like a '90s Rush album as far as the title goes, but I wanted to express the idea of colors, and of a dreamlike atmosphere, so....now that I think about it, it reminds me more of the title of a 1960s or early speculative fiction book that I'd buy for the cover. At any rate, any excuse to unite dark horror and a bit of psychedelicness is fine by me!

Party dresses

2011-06-13T21:54:00.004-04:00

Thanks for the comments on my last post about sewing -- since I'm on a roll, here is the latest item that I made, which was Vintage Vogue pattern #1172. It requires a lot of fabric -- 7 yards, mostly for the skirt -- so I had to go somewhere that I could get cheap fabric because I can't afford to spend $70 on a dress for myself! So this was about $4 or $5 a yard -- still adds up to a lot, by my standards, but it is a wonderful pattern. Great for dress twirling!!

As a side note I miss The Rag Shop. Their tables of $2 and $4/yard fabric were essential for me for the things I made for myself. I feel as though sewing used to be something that us poor people did because we couldn't afford to buy clothes, but now it seems to be more a boutique craft that people do because they want to create beautiful heirloom quilts or special occasion dresses. Which are wonderful things, to be sure, but sometimes I just need to whip up some $2/yard dresses to get me through the summer when I realize that I no longer fit into all the dresses that I bought last year. :/ Since I usually buy clothing at thrift stores or on sale, I can't imagine spending $50 on fabric for just one item of clothing -- but I keep an eye out for sales and I have a large hoard of fabric I got over the years that I am still chipping away at.

Anyway, complaining aside, I tend to favor patterns that use just a couple yards of fabric so I can stretch my fabric stash out a bit. Usually when I see a pattern that I like, I buy two yards of it, without even knowing what I'm going to do with it...just so I have it around.

What I really want right now is this book The Party Dress Book, since I love the idea of dressing up, and my own little innocent idea of what a party should be. (No alcohol, lots of confetti, sweets and home-baked goods, and some fun games, maybe a bit of croquet on the lawn). So, whenever I upgrade to a better sewing machine, that is what I shall do.

Where does the time go?

2011-06-11T00:05:00.002-04:00

The plan to update here regularly is not going as smoothly as I had hoped since I seem to have a tremendous time remembering to log in, getting photos uploaded and -- well, sitting in front of a computer is not something I like to do these days.

The procession of shawls continues but I also wanted to take a little time to make some clothing this past week, because I have realized what is flattering for me and I am determined to replace all of the things that make me look ridiculous, with things that look nice. Just because I like a dress on a hanger doesn't mean that I should wear it. At any rate, when I buy patterns, I can at least keep adjusting them until they fit, which is what I've been doing, to make sure they are nice and long, but cool for the summer without being tight. I am mostly making things like this, where you have a strappy bodice and a skirt that kind of swoops out and is roomy. (Below, Simplicity 2175)

I realize though that I don't really sew properly. My late grandmother was something of a seamstress (she excelled in pretty much every art and craft, and was always doing at least one of them) and I learned from her, but it wasn't necessarily the way they teach you in pattern directions. We just cut out the pieces, glance at the directions to see what order they go together in, and get to it.

For instance, here is a list of steps or terms that I have not always followed or understood in printed patterns.

* Pre-wash fabric. Not when I'm sewing for myself. Since I either handwash, or cold wash/cool dry my clothing, I don't worry about things shrinking too much and I've never had a problem with it after making hundreds of outfits. I like fresh-from-the-store fabric and like to just get to work on it right away. Also, I have never had a washing machine on the premises before, so it was very impractical. If I am sewing for someone else I pre-wash it though.

* Nap. After a lifetime of sewing, my attitude toward the word "nap" was to take one, at that point in the directions. I finally looked up what it meant. Ohhhhh, THAT nap. Like pile. Like what velvet and velour do. And apparently it also refers to one-way designs. Okay, now I know what nap is and I can deal with that. For years I just kind of breezed over that term thinking "Oh yeah, sure, I'm...sure my fabric probably doesn't have nap because those layouts require more fabric..."

* Interfacing. Can't stand it. Maybe it's because I generally use fabrics that are fine without it, or that I'm not interested in making things for myself that have cuffs or collars or buttons. I have made things with it and honestly haven't noticed a difference. But most of what I want to wear wouldn't call for it anyway, so I will continue to keep my distance from interfacing.

* Transfer markings and symbols to fabric. Nope. Not since seventh grade Home Ec class have i ever done that. When I tried, it left permanent stains on the fabric, and I can pretty much eyeball those anyway, or put in pins where it is relevant.

* Hems - I fold and press, then fold and press, then stitch. Most pattern directions have these crazy instructions for steaming and hand-stitching and they have never made a bit of sense to me. Especially since I like things where the bottom hem is going to be like 200 inches around., and hand sewing that is a bit daunting.

So those are a few of the things in printed patterns that I don't necessarily follow by the book. The other thing I would like to be able to do, but can't, is to have an overlock stitch to finish seams but I will have to get another machine some day for that. As it is I usually zigzag the edges. If I get back to making things to sell it will be when I have the overlock option most likely.

One more thing I made recently --

Simplicity 2609, above.

This required an extraordinary amount of fabric, but I used some that came in a clearance package of quilting fabric from AC Moore and fleshed it out with (the darker bands) some from my stash, including two yards of Halloween fabric in the second tier from bottom. Gathering the 280 inch ruffle on the bottom and fitting it to the one above (which was only slightly less wide) was very time consuming, but worth it!

All of my sewing shortcuts are not things I would do if I was sewing for someone else, or for sale -- these are just little confessions about what I do when it's just for me. Because I am not picky. I guess I am also curious if anyone else feels the way I do about some of the things you're supposed to do in sewing that don't seem to make a big difference in wearability.

another shortcut to more mushrooms

2011-05-23T20:00:00.008-04:00

Nothing quite compares to the summer two years ago, but it's been raining so much in the Mushroom Woods (which is what I call a particular county park, because I see so many varieties there) that I knew they had to be popping up this year, maybe even a little ahead of schedule.

My posts back in 2009, like the original Shortcut to Mushrooms post, show an interesting array of groovy fungus that grew up in the damp earth that year. I even took a variety of photos of them that I offer prints of, like this one.

This year they haven't gone completely wild yet but I will take a break from shawls for a moment to show a few things that I saw today on a rainy woods walk.

I love these red-capped fellows. This one is just peeking up, looking around to see if anyone is there.

These wee yellow ones were much brighter in person but I do what I can when the light is dim to try to capture it.

Just some regular ol' brown mushrooms but still cute enough for a hobbit!

Oh and as a side note, I love tulip trees but they are so tall that you can almost never actually see the "tulips" until they fall to the ground and are squashed. So I was happy to find a low-hanging branch with some of the flowers intact on it. So strange and waxy and almost tropical looking!

How I came to love lace

2011-05-21T14:22:00.009-04:00

Looking back over the last few months of spotty blog posts I've done here I see that I haven't chronicled a lot of my progress as I went from just knowing the knit and purl stitches, to being an obsessive lace knitter, so I thought I'd play catch up a little.

Along the way I learned entrelac, sock knitting, and cable knitting and learned basic shawl construction. I've seen on Ravelry that a lot of people are doing 11 shawls for 2011 and many did 10 shawls for 2010 so I was surprised when I counted and realized I think I've already done nine shawls this year! O_O Many of them are quite small though. One of the first that I did was the famous Citron. I used Noro Sekku, and although it was a bit of a headache (cobweb weight yarn with 500+ stitches on the needles at the end) it was gorgeous and is one of my joys.

See those stitches? They are tiny. I think being snowed in way the only way I did the whole thing in a week!

I also made a Multnomah shawl, but I didn't take a good photo of it at the time so I will wait till I can get that one in direct sunlight. I used Crazy Zauberball in "Tropical Fish," a crazy rainbow colorway, for that one.

Around that time, in February or March, I began to realize that what I really love are lace patterns. I get this tingly feeling in my brain when I look at them. I love intricate, complicated patterns especially. I made a sweater (I still have to stitch the pieces together but the knitting is done) with an elaborate lace pattern and realized: All you have to do, is follow the directions. It's like a computer program or a recipe. The information goes into your eyes and out your hands, and then you have something beautiful. The process of blocking items -- soaking them and pinning them out to dry -- makes the design set in a beautiful way. I adore lace. Utterly. Especially in heavier-than-lace yarns. I am pretty much expecting this will form most of my projects in the future, because it's what excites me the most.

A simple pattern that was easy to memorize was the Morning Frost wrap, which I did in Stitch Nation's Bamboo Ewe, the Beach Glass colorway. I really love it for reasons I can't completely explain, it just scratches the "blue" part of my brain just right.

And another I did in that brand of yarn, the Mercury colorway, was the Summer Flies shawl. This is such a wonderful pattern! It only took about 4 days, and I remember knitting it while I was anxious about the horrible situation in Japan this March, unable to concentrate on anything else. As for the shawl, though, it only takes a couple of skeins of this yarn and it changes pattern every couple dozen rows so it is always interesting.

Embarrassingly, I still have a lot more to post, but I will leave these for here now and upload more tomorrow. I do want to have shawls in every color I would wear, so I can have something to put over summer sundresses when freezing cold air conditioning does battle with the heat.

I still have a lot to learn, in lace. I haven't done "nupps" or attached beads and I haven't tackled Estonian lace. I prefer fingering, sport and even worsted weight yarns, though I like laceweight and cobweb well enough. This is where the whole "art" part of knitting takes hold of me and where I realize that it has a lot more potential for me than being able to make hats and scarves for the winter.

Mystery yarn and lots of rain

2011-05-20T16:52:00.007-04:00

It has rained nonstop for a week in New Jersey, where I have been during that time, after not seeing rain for quite awhile. Here on the tree stumps in her back yard, mushrooms are going crazy. Alongside this broken stone bird head it looks like we planned it, to look rustic. But we didn't, we just haven't been keeping up with the yard. I was hoping to get some outdoor work done up here, cleaning out the shed and organizing my possessions that are stored therein.

After a mostly dry season last year I am starved for mushrooms to photograph! The strangest thing in the back yard though was the fact that all of my boxes in her wooden shed seemed to be full of Rose of Sharon seeds. The things grow like weeds in the yard, but there weren't any IN the shed. There weren't any ABOVE the shed. How on earth did the seed pods manage to worm their way into my shoes, boxes and any sort of containment device, in the shed? It is a mystery to me. More on mysteries in a moment.

Now, on to blue things. Isn't it interesting when you can see the moon during the daytime?

Last week I got some mill-end yarn at AC Moore, a bag of five skeins of this stuff. Here's where the mystery is...I can usually identify any mill-end yarn because I spend an irrational amount of time in yarn stores and I know what brands usually wind up in the mill-end bin. I even recognized that they had Hobby Lobby I Love This Yarn! there, which was surprising since they don't even have Hobby Lobby around here. Which is a store that I love, because how can you not?

So here is the mystery yarn. Help identifying it would be greatly appreciated! Each skein is pretty hefty, and I've test knitting enough to know it's probably fingering weight. Using #4 needles I got about nine rows to the inch, and 29 stitches on the needle made it 4 inches wide. So that is 29 sts x 36 rows = a 4-inch square. But that was unblocked, stretched slightly.

The mill-end bags say it could contain anything from acrylic to nylon to wool, and I think that judging by the way it feels and knits up -- and sticks to itself I'm untangling it -- it must be at least part wool. I couldn't get it to "spit join" when I tried to felt it by rubbing the ends together wet, but to be fair I've never been able to get 100% wool to do that either.

Oh pretty skeins, what are you? How much of you is there? If this is fingering weight, then these are about the size of a ball of Noro sock yarn, which would mean there could be 300 or even 400 or more yards per ball.

So to test it out I am knitting the Out of My Head Shawlette -- or at least starting it, we'll see how it goes -- which uses less than 400 yards. So it won't take long and will be a good test of how the colors stripe out and if it blocks. If I can wet block it successfully to make the lace pattern set neatly, then I will be pretty sure it has wool content and I can make a larger, more complicated piece out of the rest. And I will know if I have 2000 yards of the stuff!

For the sake of posting...

2011-05-18T16:55:00.012-04:00

Just when I was thinking that it has been awhile since I posted here, because I am trying to stay away from computers these days, I sat down to try to post something and the computer froze up, kind of making my own point for me.

My little internet art shops are still active -- I am just in a non-horn-tooting mood and have been so for awhile. I am mainly interested in reading, and making things for friends/charity/myself, and being outdoors since spring started (which was in late February for me this year!).

Oh and that photo up at the top? It's from a pattern book I got called Ocean Breezes, which are all -- well, ocean themed scarves and shawls. I really love how it looks, and the ribbon kind of makes it. While I wait for some tie-dyed silk ribbon to arrive I used some cheap stuff from the craft store which actually...might look better than the expensive stuff, now that I think about it.

And I even dusted off the sewing machine (literally -- it was very dusty) to try to make a couple of dresses while at my mom's recently. I cut out this space dress on the right a long time ago and finally made it. Then I found some amazing jellyfish fabric and made the same dress with that. My love of jellyfish is also represented in things like this painting here.

Anyway, here are the dresses.

And here I am at an arboretum outside Houston.

My love of palm trees is well documented, but I still never stop being thrilled by them. If it doesn't grow in New Jersey, it is exciting to me.

A yellow-crested night heron. Pretty groovy!

Some kinda lizard!
Aren't my captions just incredibly informative and helpful?

And, um, that's a butterfly.

So there, consider yourselves up to date -- I'm making baby hats for a hospital all week so I will get back to that now, and whenever the computer lets me post something again I'll be back!

Happy spring!

2011-03-21T18:20:00.004-04:00

It's been awhile since I posted -- lots of new knitting crafts to share but on the business end of things, I have spring sales at my Etsy and Artfire shops.

On Etsy, I have a new free shipping coupon code. The code is MEOWMEOW and you can enter that at checkout.

On Artfire, I have a 10% off sale going on.

Art will be flowing again soon, with the spring thaw -- I spent the entire winter knitting/crocheting since it seemed to be the only way to keep warm!

I'll be back on the blog wagon soon too so thanks for everyone who is still looking for following. :)

Cold cold cold

2011-01-23T21:47:00.007-05:00

It's been a month since I last updated, and I've spent most of the intervening time knitting and crocheting -- I will have new art projects soon as well but for some reason yarn is capturing my attention at the moment. I've amassed a large stash, made gifts for most people that I know, and now I'm starting on some self-centered projects since the holidays are in the past!

Due to the fact that there are only, what, 15 minutes of natural light per day in the winter, and it's too cold to go outside, I have not been taking pictures and therefore haven't wanted to clutter up the blog world with some bad quality, low light photos, but I can't stand it anymore, I have to share what I've been up to!

Knitting was my main interest for the past month, but this week it's all about crochet thanks to a book called Twinkie Chan's Crochet Goodies for Fashion Foodies. I saw this book in Barnes and Noble and thought "hm, that's cute!" and then went home...and was haunted by memories of the wonderful scarves all day until I couldn't stand it anymore and had to order it!! I also ordered the book Vampire Knits because I loved the groovy gothic look of the pieces in it.

After getting my books in the mail I immediately made a cupcake scarf, using Red Velvet cupcakes as my inspiration, and I am thinking about doing a cupcake hat in different colors. Well, not just thinking -- I already started it, and it's blue. :P And I made one segment each for a Pear Scarf and a Toast Scarf. I have to add the core and other details to the first pear, and I plan to do toast in varying shades of brown for variety.

While starting a pear for the Pear Scarf, I realized that I usually do my crochet in the front loop only. And, well, it does look significantly different when you go through both loops. Hmm. See, this is what happens when you do both loops (left) versus front loop only (right). Okay, so that means when I go back to finish my Afghan Blocks that I will have to keep doing it my old way (front loop) to make sure the size stays consistent. How is it that I never thought about this before?

Among the other things I've been working on are some of the projects from Knitty, via Ravelry. I made the Carnaby skirt, the Citron shawl and I'm working on a Lanesplitter skirt. I'll be posting pictures of all of these...and if anyone is on Ravelry reading this, friend me, I'm Sarada there!

December knits

2010-12-18T12:46:00.006-05:00

I have been too busy to post lately, not with arts and crafts unfortunately but with other kinds of work! But I've been destressing at night with knitting. Oddly, I had recently decided that crocheting is more of a natural fit for me in terms of it being really intuitive and less frustrating. But here I am knitting instead! Most of what I have made this autumn and winter have been gifts, so I haven't been posting pictures until the gifts are all distributed. A couple of items, I forgot to photograph before I sent them out, alas. But I have plenty of things I made for myself too!

Above, is a portion of the entrelac scarf I'm making with this Tutorial. I'm using Bernat Mosaic yarn in the "Medusa" colorway. I had some problems with the yarn coming apart when I pulled it too tight, in some of the "in between" colors where black is mixed in with red or yellow. But I was able to rejoin it. Entrelac looks a little intimidating and the word sounds a little ominous, but it really wasn't very hard. As with all knitting things, just paying attention and counting seem to be the most important things.

The scarf is still a work in progress but I made the "Foliage" hat from Knitty as well recently in just about two days. It again required a lot of attention and counting because every row is different than the one before it, except for the ribbing. But it is a pattern, and once you learn to look to see "what part of the leaf am I in now" you can stay on track. I like circular needles. I was afraid of them but now I am not! This comes out a little large, as people had said on Ravelry, but I like a big roomy hat to pull down when it's cold. I could seriously make these ALL DAY in every color but I don't know that I need that many.

Here is a little flapper hat, it is a basic simple crochet stitch -- it's listed as the Amelia hat on ravelry. Very quick and simple to make, except that I started by making a different one -- Claire, I think -- and the pattern just stopped making sense to me at one point. Crochet instructions are easy to follow but it seemed as though it was impossible to repeat the pattern in the stitches the way they were listed so I decided to just go for something quick and easy to use my Manos del Uruguay yarn.

This is finished now, but here is a photo from the WIP phase -- the Drop Stitch Scarf in Bernat Mosaic "Psychedelic" yarn. Absolutely wonderful yarn and a perfect pattern to show it off with. I would make these all day too! I bought five more skeins of Psychedelic yarn on sale because I love it so much, but only one was the same dye lot as this one and there is a noticeable difference -- the yellow in this dye lot is SO BRIGHT. The others are much more muted. I will use them, of course, but for something where super bright yellow is not needed.

I'm still working on my Carnaby skirt, and I have a couple more gifts to make -- plus I still have my afghan squares and crochet flowers waiting for me to make more to finish up those projects. I think I like the fast ones the best. What on earth am i going to do with all these knitted goods?

ArtFire sale extended, new items

2010-12-01T18:36:00.006-05:00

I'm extending my 25% off sale at my ArtFire sale through the week, which includes lots of art and a couple of knit/crocheted items. The autumn tree painting you see above, and the crocheted fingerless gloves below, are among the items that are for sale at a considerable discount.
Adorned with a red flower and a little robin. I definitely prefer crocheting, I've decided, after fighting with dropped stitches on a different project this week that was knit...but I will continue to do both. I think everyone who does this stuff has one method that they prefer, so I'd have to say that crocheting appears to be my preference.

I visited Woolbearers in Mount Holly, NJ today and got some beautiful yarn, including this below, a variety called Cornucopia in the color Provence. It made me think of something regal -- like a queen in a palace overlooking a cloudy cliff at the edge of the sea. I have no idea what I'd do with it but I have to have some.

And continuing my fixation on rainbows, some beautiful rainbow yarn...I wish I had an endless supply, everything I owned would be made of it! Another thing I prefer about yarn crafts to sewing, is that you don't need to plug anything in -- you don't need a machine. I hand sewed garments for years, but it was very time consuming, and the end results weren't quite as neat as I'd like them to be. Knitting and crocheting seem to come out very neatly. And you don't have all these little pins falling all over the place too. Oh I still sew, don't worry -- I am going to set up a machine in a permanent spot and use it whenever inspiration strikes me, but the rat-a-tat of the machine is something you can't do in bed at night or in a waiting room. Wouldn't it be interesting if you DID do it in a waiting room though?

Cyber Monday sale at ArtFire

2010-11-29T13:14:00.003-05:00

I'm not usually the sales/promotion type but I like that ArtFire has a "sale" function so here we go! My shop is 25% off today and...well maybe longer, we'll see. I have prints and original paintings for sale but I'm also adding a few knit/crocheted items. For instance, this pair of fingerless crocheted gloves. I started with a star pattern that I liked, made a band of single crochet and finished with a shell pattern to make a unique, bohemian little eclectic design with this multi-colored yarn. I am very happy with them! They are super cheap with this sale, too, and they are one of a kind.

I'll try to have some more items up today but I have imported a couple of Etsy items over to ArtFire for the time being to give special deals on them as well. Check back to see what i have in stock!

Chunky yarn and granny squares

2010-11-27T17:58:00.004-05:00

Among the many gifts I've been making lately (which I'm still not posting pics of, ha!) I managed to make something out of some fantastic chunky yarn I got, with a simple knit stitch that shows off the interesting textures. This is my first knit item that I'm putting up for sale, it's on ArtFire. I like ArtFire a lot, you can put stuff on the site on your Amazon wish list and you can purchase without having an account on the site itself. I know that the arts and crafts sites are overflowing with knit and crocheted items but I'm going to be pretty picky about the things I offer -- it's going to be all things I'd want to keep for myself if I needed this many scarves and things!

Meanwhile, I am working on two or three paintings that will also be gifts, so I also can't share pictures of them yet!! Oh my goodness! It's going to be such a relief after Dec. 25 when I can finally share these things. I did crochet seven squares for my afghan though which I talked about here. I didn't finish my flower scarf yet though, I got sidetracked. It's hard to make things for myself when there's so much else to do. But I am very devoted to my afghan project!

Here's a pile of unfinished squares...

And a slight close-up. I was very happy to be able to follow the instructions and actually make these happen, having never done anything like them before. The instructions for doing a "cluster" were confusing...as long as you have 5 loops on your hook at the end of each go-around you're good, but the instructions just say "pull through all loops on hook" without specifying how many. Well it's five. So there you go!

Accidental art

2010-11-24T17:26:00.008-05:00

I had a positively bizarre experience the other day when I walked into a park where I frequently take walks, and came in through an entrance I haven't used in awhile. I started to see burned book pages strewn around a paved area where there were a couple of benches on the mulch. There were several scorched books and many fragments of pages all over the area, and the pages were from two or three different sources. I don't know the story behind why all this was there, but the page fragments had fallen in a way that begged to be photographed. I have a folder of more than a dozen of these over at Flickr, but I also chose three to put on deviantART and make them available as prints in a variety of sizes. Two of them are visible here -- one titled "Ecstasy," above, and "If You Meet the Buddha," below. A third, "A Hell of a Cat" is visible in Flickr. A bad word is dimly visible in the background on that one so I put a mature content warning on it just as a safety measure so the internet doesn't yell at me!

Below, here is another that I like a lot, I called it "Eels Swam In." I just titled these with whatever words jumped out at me on each page.

And here is a large portion of one of the burnt books. I'm curious to find out what the story behind this is but I somehow doubt I'll find out.

Knitting vs. crochet

2010-11-20T21:42:00.008-05:00

After making fifty zillion things for other people for fun, I am doing a little something for myself, i.e. making as many colorful flowers as possible (or 16, whichever comes first) to create a rainbow flower scarf. I am going to use that gorgeous green yarn I got the other day to make a hat (with another flower on it) to go along with it. Hooray!

I don't draw much of a distinction between knitting and crochet normally -- I just call it all "knitting" if it involves yarn, but there's obviously a huge difference. I just figure out what project I want to do first and then think "Oh, I don't know how to do that" and go ahead and figure out what I need to know. For instance, flowers happen to be crochet items usually. But other things I've wanted to do came with knitting instructions so I learned what I needed to know to make them. If I could only do one though it would probably be crochet. For one thing, look what I needed to knit a hat:

A set of circular needles and a set of double-pointed needles, neither of which I particularly knew how to use. I figured it out and it wasn't hard, but it still gets a bit messy at times. When you have 100 stitches on your needles you have the possibility of dropping all of them. Whereas with crochet...

You just need this. And there's just one loop on it generally, so that's all you are at risk for dropping. And it's small! And it won't poke holes in your purse! But that doesn't mean I don't like knitting...I just never thought about the differences before I have been heavily engrossed in both this month.

Here is the beginning of the monster hat project I began a week or so ago. You can see that at this point I had moved to double pointed needles and was learning how to pick up stitches to add something to it. I did the teeth "wrong" technically, but they look the same as if I had done them "right" and they are just as sturdy. But the directions to pick up stitches just didn't make sense until I had done a few of them...

See, it all worked out in the end! I also had to learn how to do an I-cord. So for this project I learned three major new things as well as a half a dozen new stitches I hadn't used before. So that's how I do things...if I want to do it badly enough I just assume I can do it, and plunge into it.

Below, is a picture of something in a book I desperately want to make for myself -- sorry about the glare from the camera, I didn't have a scanner -- but I really love this color combination and I want to learn to make squares. I guess I'll finish the flowers first!

Knitting adventures

2010-11-19T16:30:00.005-05:00

I did a little knitting and crocheting when I was a child but didn't pick it up again until two years ago, and since then I've just done a little during the months of October to January usually -- I get sidetracked by other things for the rest of the year -- but the madness is upon me again. So far I had really only done knitting and purling, though I started trying to use double-pointed needles to make socks, but lost my place and moved on. This year though something has clicked into place. In the last two weeks I've done a ton of things -- completed gifts for seven people (plus tiny little extra things to throw in with them) as well as several things for myself, which when I think about it is complete madness. I guess I haven't been doing anything else!

Pictured above is my first attempt to use circular needles. Although it called for a 40" circular I realized later they meant the Magic Loop, and the 32" I got was about as big a size as could accommodate it. What I'm trying to make is this:

The Brainmonster hat

I also don't know how to pick up stitches or do half a dozen other things, but the only way to do stuff is just to bloody well do it!

I also learned a new stitch -- which took a couple of tries to get right, but I think looks really nice, for this Nook/Kindle cozy which I can show a picture of even though it's a gift, because my friend already knows she's getting it! ;) This pattern is on Ravelry though you have to be logged in to see it.

It is surprising to learn that these two colors are actually the same -- the Cinder color from Loops & Threads at Michael's, in the Chelsea striped roving variety. It changes from one to the other throughout the skein -- I like both on their own so I think it would look lovely in anything. I might make myself a Nook cozy with that. I don't know why, I just think they need a cozy!
Doesn't EVERYTHING need a cozy??

And finally, from Pins and Needles yarn store in Princeton, I got a couple of skeins of really nice yarn -- the colorful one is by Punta Yarns, and the other by Manos del Uruguay. I usually just buy Vanna White and Red Heart yarn as I learn how to do stuff -- or the Michael's brand, Loops and Threads, so this is all very exciting, I assure you! It's too nice to use! But I will use it...just like fabric, I can't resist...

Red leaves in photo and paint

2010-11-18T01:41:00.002-05:00

This is another in my experiments with taking photos and painting from them. Which is something that I guess most people probably do but I have this tendency to say "But wouldn't it look better with a unicorn stuck in the middle of it?" and shun realism. Well this still isn't attempting to be realistic, but when I look at the thumbnails on my computer they look pretty similar. Trying to get all of the details of how the leaves overlap would probably overload my brain so I am going more for the impression of leaves and light than a photo realistic rendition...

Oh yes and the painting is for sale on Etsy.

You may remember this photo from several days ago, but here it is again!

I have one more canvas in this size so now I'll have to find something else to paint tomorrow...

Meanwhile, I'm learning how to knit on circular needles and it's going swimmingly!

Mysterious blue creatures of the deep

2010-11-16T18:55:00.008-05:00

Since I'm in denial about winter, rather than do some snow/winter art as I often do in November, I am doing some nature art with some frosty hues and blue tints! Here are a duo of jellyfish that i painted from photos that I took in the aquarium at the Houston Zoo. Taking pictures through glass with a non-professional camera of course is challenging at best but I think it worked out. This painting is now for sale on Etsy.

You can see the photos that I worked from below:

I usually don't work from photos, but just go straight to the imagination, even though I really enjoy having a reference photo...most of the things i want to paint don't exist in the real world so that's a bit challenging!

Lighting is (well, almost) everything when it comes to photography, isn't it, because I took some pictures with the "museum" setting of the rocks and crystals at the Houston Museum of Natural Science and even though I wasn't doing anything but pushing a button, some of the pictures turned out quite lovely. If this was in a catalog I'd want to buy it!

still hanging on...

2010-11-14T19:23:00.013-05:00

This is the kind of picture that I assume people take when they want to create a peaceful fall feeling. Or maybe it just looks lonely, I'm not sure! At any rate, the leaves are extremely vivid and colorful despite being mid-November -- usually they have all blown off the trees by now. I would normally be posting new art here but I have been knitting/crocheting instead for the past week and I can't share my work since it is mostly gifts, and I don't want to post photos until I have given them!
It was in the 60's today which is unusual for this time of year, and a few dragonflies were buzzing around, well past the time of year I think I usually see them.

The frogs were still awake too! Curses on the leaf that cuts the picture in half though, argh!

A popular question has always been -- what colour leaves are your favourites? I think the bright yellow-orange ones are mine but I pretty much like all of them, let's face it.

Especially flame-red and orange against a darker pine green background. Goodness gracious!

The standard "I am a deer and I am looking at you from the path right before I bolt away" pose.

Ahh la lune! In the blue sky! That means one week until the full moon which means...hmm, the perfume web sites I have traditionally bought perfume from, will be posting their monthly updates. Yes, this is how I tell time.

Autumn leaves

2010-11-10T21:17:00.008-05:00

I didn't miss all of the leaves this year...

You know, I'm no photographer (though my dad was an excellent one and my mom is handy with a camera as well) but I find that if you use the 16:9 setting your pictures suddenly look really classy and important! These looked pretty drab in the regular view, but the ol' widescreen makes it look rather impressive I think, even on my cheap camera.

Ah! How pretty! This is at one of my favorite little parks.

You can also see my other great photographic trick in the second to last one: "hold the camera at a slight angle" - ooh ahh, instant art!

Autumn yarn cravings

2010-11-05T20:58:00.009-04:00

Every year for the past couple of years around October the yarn starts to call me. After a month (October) in Texas, where the temperatures were usually around 90 and the leaves do not turn quite as noticeably, if at all -- I am in New Jersey in November and catching a glimpse of golden leaves here and there. And the cold temperatures mean...the yarn is coming back out.

I had not knit or crocheted since I was about 12, but two years ago I relearned the basics and made a 12-foot-long Dr. Who scarf (below). Since it's 12 feet long the only way I could photograph it was to drape it over my curtains.

Well that was knitting, but I am equally fond of crocheting -- in the past I made some little animals and things, amigurumi, but I don't seem to have the knack for it this year. I do appear to be able to make scarves with a double crochet all of a sudden though. I am not trying to post a how-to or anything, but I must say that the patterns that Lion Brand puts out with Vanna's Choice yarn, have the best instructions. I've never had a problem following them. Here's a photo from one of their $5 pattern books that caught my eye because I like the idea of sunny hues in the winter:

And here are my inexpert, unmanicured fingers attempts to do a double crochet for the first time. Since taking this picture this afternoon I'm all the way up to the dark, brick red yarn. This is a 2-day project if you have nothing better to do with your time!

I love this rainbow yarn though, I keep buying skeins of the larger one and forgetting what I've done with them, so I bought more today. I'm not sure what to do with it. The smaller piece, called Mardi Gras, makes me think "wrist warmers!" because those are easy and a nice way to display something colorful.

So....back to the hook!

Gothic horror for Halloween

2010-10-23T18:56:00.008-04:00

"The Crypt of the Blue Woman," on ArtFire.

"Terror in the Crimson Castle" on etsy.

Normally at this time of year I'd be taking pictures of changing leaves at the parks that I frequent, and bundling up as the temperatures drop. This year however I am in Texas as Halloween approaches, though it has not changed my haunted Halloween feeling one bit! Instead of watching the geese fly south and the animals curl up for their winter naps, I have been watching armadillos amble about at night when I'm lucky enough to spy one -- and watching nutria gnash their orange teeth. The leaves aren't really turning, but there are palm trees, and I love the way they tower over everything -- I've always had a place in my heart for palm trees since they can't grow where I usually reside.

One thing I've been doing a lot of though this month is watching horror movies, and reading ghost stories. My devotion to these things (and a growing love for 1960s gothic mystery/romance book covers as I've detailed previously) has yielded quite a few new paintings. One of my newest, above, is on Etsy right now. I am also stocking my new Pro Artfire shop -- I've had a storefront there for awhile but as of this month I have a "pro" account. This means more to me than it does to you. For me it means lots of bells and whistles! For you it means I will hopefully have a more attractive and navigable shop full of neato things to peruse. And some original art not available anywhere else.

The first painting listed above, "The Crypt of the Blue Woman," is a 3 x 5 painting and ships for free. The second, "Terror in the Crimson Castle," ix 7 x 9 and is on Etsy. I like trying these different canvas sizes because they all suggest different angles and subject matter. I have a 6 x 12 I'm working on, and some square canvases as well. The art supply stores here are fantastic! I expect to be on the gothic horror thing for quite some time as I am in no danger of running out of inspirational material.

Painting and nail polish giveaway!

2010-10-02T20:42:00.006-04:00

My good friend over at Painted Lady Fingers, a nail polish blog, is having a giveaway which features a painting I did of a witch gathering bottles of nail polish from an autumn tree (a nail polish tree -- surely you've heard of them??) in a Halloween setting.

For details on how to enter please visit the contest post, but you'll get five BB Couture Infamous Lovers polishes from Overall Beauty, and four Chez-Delaney nail stamping plates, also including fall and Halloween designs, in addition to the original painting.

Please visit and enter, it is a great package of goodies and if you don't wear nail polish yourself perhaps you know someone who would enjoy them as a gift! :) The painting is an original, it's 6 x 8 inches and you will be the only person on the block with a painting of a nail polish tree, I am quite sure!

Automata and steam men

2010-09-18T17:02:00.007-04:00

I had prints made of a few more paintings I did over the past couple of years -- including this one above, "Clockwork Witch." With a tiny dash of Tik-Tok from the Oz books, and a few clockwork gears scattered throughout to give it an industrial fairytale feel, I was thinking about this image recently and wanted to share it. Although it doesn't have any obvious Halloween elements, I remember painting it a couple days before Halloween while watching a marathon of one of those shows about the world's most haunted places.

I'm not quite sure how my train of thought brought me to this place but I have thinking about 19th century automata and steam-powered creations lately -- independently of the whole interest that has arisen around the concept of 'steampunk' these past few years/decades. Early science fiction, adventure novels and speculative fiction that project future technology are an interest for me, particularly the stranger bits, like the mid-1800s stories of "The Steam Man of the Prairies". (see below) That image, along with Tik Tok, inspired my little robot guy above.

One of my personal favorite tales of the automata variety is Villier de l'Isle-Adam's "L'Eve Future" (The Future Eve) (1886) which posits a world in which Thomas Edison creates a bejeweled female android, who develops emotions and sentience -- but I won't give away anything else, it's quite a beautifully written story and now fairly easily accessible in an English translation. I read the version in "The Decadent Reader" but there's a translation under the title "Tomorrow's Eve" as well. (I receive no benefit whatsoever from linking to Amazon, by all means seek out copies wherever you choose, etexts are likely available as well! But yes that's my review from 2001 on the Decadent Reader page, ha!)

This also brings to mind the apocryphal tale of 17th century philosopher Rene Descartes, whom legend would have you believe created a clockwork girl to replace his daughter who died at the age of 5 of scarlet fever (or so various internet sources tell me). This site has some interesting quoted passages on the legend -- basically, the unlikely story goes, that he created a mechanical doll in her image which traveled everywhere with him -- and which was ultimately thrown overboard by a sea captain horrified by the strange robot. A book that I have not read but which sounds interesting, "Edison's Eve: A Magical History of the Quest for Mechanical Life" by Gaby Wood, includes a long sample passage about that very legend. Funny how I got through a minor in Philosophy in school without ever coming across that most interesting little bit of fancy!

Since my literary interests are mostly gathered in the pre-1930s era (with a few exceptions being made for 1960s and 70s speculative fiction and a few other odds and ends) I'll also mention a familiar name, Jules Verne, for his "Steam House" novel (1880) which I was drawn to for its steam-powered mechanical elephant as a mode of transportation. How about that, huh?

So the year now is 2010....where's my robot?

Looking for input

2010-09-14T23:33:00.004-04:00

I pose this question of friends once a year but I have yet to really get going on the project so I'll ask again! What paintings from my web site, http://www.artbysarada.com, that I did in the earlier part of the decade, do you think would make nice prints or might otherwise be reproducible (on a mug, a tote, whatever!)?

You can see what I already have along those lines in the Cafepress store if you go to my page for that here:

http://www.artbysarada.com/cafe.html

I really like the Cafepress stuff but I'd like to ultimately be able to offer that kind of thing directly, rather than going through an outside site.

The painting you see above, "Halloween Cauldron," I still have an original of and I can make prints of that on demand -- same with this one below, "The Crone's Secret."

However, you see, the problem with me making prints of older work is that I do not have high definition scans of the paintings that I did back in 2000-2003, so once I sold the originals I couldn't really reproduce them. I can however paint new versions of these favorite images. Here are two I am working on right now:

"Black Lantern Spell"

"Dark Lanterns" - I've painted versions of this numerous times!

Two that I'd also like to include are:

"A Magickal Tea Party"

"Alice in the Dark Woods"

So I'm just gauging interest in what some of my older images might be good to resurrect for the purposes of creating prints from new copies of them now that the technology is available. I can't do all of them but it's something that will keep me busy for awhile if it works out!

Gothic heroine deux

2010-09-13T21:35:00.004-04:00

The second of my imaginary gothic romance/mystery novel covers is "Terror on the Cliff." Paintings with a lot of white in them are hard to scan...I may photograph her in daylight to show the colours a bit more vividly. Yes, I managed to use the words "wuthering" and "heights" in the Etsy description, but this also means that the Kate Bush song will go through my head now for another week! I have actually had a craving to read Jane Eyre lately, to be honest, and despite my English literature degree, I have not read Wuthering Heights, but I plan to soon.

ACEO adventures

2010-09-12T15:38:00.005-04:00

In the summer of 2008 I asked the question...what on earth is an ACEO? Well, they are small and fast and fun to do and people seem to like them so I did a few, but the challenges of scanning something tiny (about 2 x 3 inches give or take) and then having to upload a picture that is about 1000 pixels on a side, means that the images get kind of distorted. Now that I have a camera with a semi-reliable macro function I can take pictures of the darn things so they look like something. So I have relisted a few on Etsy (click for the links) and I will list a few more. Will I do more though?....well that depends if I can find the little plastic baseball card sized sheaths that are needed to protect them. Where DID I put those?....the perils of moving....

At any rate, these continue my themes of gothic horror and there are also some ghosts in bottles and a cryptid....UFOs are coming though, once I get those pictures taken....I mean of the ACEOs, not of the actual UFOs, unless tonight turns out to be more interesting of an evening than I had planned!

Return of the scanner

2010-09-11T20:50:00.002-04:00

While I don't have my usual scanner hooked up, I was able for the first time in over three months to scan and upload some stuff right to the in-ter-net like a real actual person in the 21st century! We can thank an unnamed cable company for the fact that I did not have internet for two months even though I was still paying for it, by the way.

As part of my obsession with 1960s psychedelic takes on horror, here is a painting that I did with that in mind. She becomes a bit of a lizard-woman in the shadows. She is on Etsy now and so is the painting that I did in my previous post ... she is over here.

Other than just hawking my wares though I will say that my inspiration recently has been not only my autumnal return to watching Dark Shadows, and an interest in book covers that I might or might not read...but here is some of what I HAVE been reading in the past month:

Algernon Blackwood - The Listener and other Stories
Algernon Blackwood - Incredible Adventures
J. Sheridan Le Fanu - The Haunted Baronet
Wilkie Collins - The Moonstone (reading this now)
H.G. Wells - The Island of Dr. Moreau
Edgar Rice Burroughs - At the Earth's Core
Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton - The Coming Race
H. Rider Haggard - The People of the Mist
Literary Mushrooms (a collection of gothic chapbooks from the 18th century)
The Collected Ghost Stories of EF Benson

those latter two I haven't finished yet since they are collections and rather long, I am working my way through them while i read these shorter works. I plan to concentrate on ghost stories for the fall of course!

Back from the darkness

2010-09-10T22:31:00.003-04:00

It's been over two months since I was able to update this blog so thank you to anyone who still has me on their list! I have not had internet access regularly since early June, except when I was at work (and I quit my job on July 23 to Pursue Other Interests, so I haven't had it there in awhile) or at my mom's house. I have not had my scanner hooked up to anything, since I was in the process of moving for a very long time -- and while I've been doing new art and keeping up with Etsy sales, etc., I haven't been able to update online otherwise. Updates might be a little spotty for awhile still but since the fall season is under way I'd better get cracking with something!

I'm working on some gothic paintings -- gothic in the sense of "women wearing gowns holding candelabras," like the mystery/romance novel covers from the 60s and 70s, or gothic in the original literary sense of the 1790s (Ann Radcliffe & c.). But while I prefer to read the 1790s literature, the artwork of the 1960s novels has captured me -- possibly because of my love of the show "Dark Shadows" -- and I am going to have a lot of flowing white gowns, Victorian mansions and amulets for awhile. Here is the first in this particular series! I will post her on Etsy when I can get a proper scan, this is just a photograph for now. Happy fall! I should also note that while last fall I had tons of photos of the woods and mushrooms, that the incredible lack of rain this summer has made for no mushrooms, and not a lot of greenery -- and the intense heat and the fact that I was moving all of my belongings out of my apartment, meant that I did not take a lot of recreational walks. All of that will change soon though!

Back after a long hiatus

2010-07-05T11:31:00.002-04:00

Thanks to everyone for keeping me on your "follow" list -- I got real busy in March finishing up the angel project and have not had time to keep new art flowing in the intervening months. But I've been working on some pieces for my own amusement and I have even just put one on Etsy. (Click image to visit listing).

I have some other pieces too that I don't have for sale yet since they were just done for my own entertainment but perhaps I will share or even list those, as I need to clear some stuff out of the way and these paintings are stacking up!

Angels and snowdrops

2010-03-12T00:33:00.005-05:00

The angel book illustrations are virtually finished - I only have one more to complete. That's 10 canvases, two sides so there are a total of 20 images, plus some extra stuff for the front, back etc -- whew! Here's one illustrating a moonlight/star/night time theme.

And the accompanying angel.

And just because, here are some snowdrops. The first flowers of spring. They're a little late, because we had so much snow, but as long as we're talking about angels...these have a bit of a hopeful message I think.

Some sketches

2010-03-10T00:59:00.004-05:00

I haven't had much time to do personal paintings or new Etsy paintings lately, so whenever I have a spare moment I do a couple of sketches. They're tending to be more female figure sort of things lately. The bottom one, I didn't mean to look as fairy-like as it does...I just sort of wanted tendrils extending from her. But it does look like wings. Oh well!

Etsy front page!

2010-03-06T00:45:00.003-05:00

As far as I know this is the first time I am featured on the Etsy front page!

It is for my Unicorn UFO print, which is actually set to expire in just a couple of days so I'm really excited and amazed they found it! The other items that are set to expire in a day are also picking up hearts like crazy right now. Thanks Etsy! I have to admit I've been too busy to even try to promote lately!

A couple more

2010-03-03T01:14:00.003-05:00

I am sick right now but here is a little sneak preview of some of the things I am working on for the book we are doing right now...I won't give away too much but this is the kind of theme as far as colors and subject matter.

The 100 inches of snow we've had this year might have something to do with this subject matter coming to mind easily.

Anyway, like I said...sick. So, that's all for now!

a few sketches

2010-02-26T00:39:00.007-05:00

Nothing terribly surprising here, give me a pencil and you get a cat eventually.

Or some kind of a flower thing

Or sort of sci fi towers.

It's what happens.

I don't know what else to say about it!

Just a sample

2010-02-22T23:24:00.005-05:00

Over the next couple weeks I'll be finishing up quite a lot of illustrations for a project of illustrating a children's book about angels. There will be 10 canvases I'm painting for the inside (not counting the cover, back, etc.) and each canvas has two sides, so there are 20 individual images. I'm done with three canvases now and hope to complete three more by March 1 so I will be almost done for our March 15 deadline. They are fun to do, with similar color palettes and themes -- it's really quite a wonderful idea! It wasn't my idea, but I am happy to be illustrating it. :)

This is why I haven't had a chance to post other new art lately, because I've been very involved with this, but I have other stuff brewing as well...and with winter on the way out, the great outdoors beckon soon!...

A change of pace

2010-02-16T00:15:00.005-05:00

I usually just do colorful things but I do have a long history of doodling in notebooks to fall back on when I don't want to make a big colorful mess. I'm trying to do more of this in between other projects. Above is with a soft, thick sort of pencil lead. Cheap ones, of course. Lots of smudges.

I like things that are hiding or veiled, and this started out as a batwing kind of thing like the one in the background on the top sketch. I could do these all day. When I don't have colors, I tend to go with line weirdness and textures, since they kind of seem like colors to me. Certain types of shading or cross hatching...sort of look like colors to me...sort of a synaesthesia thing I guess.
This one is the crowd pleaser. A bird or a butterfly or a fish or a peacock. Aren't we all of those things sometimes?

Just a sneak peek

2010-01-28T00:40:00.008-05:00

This is just a rough beginning for something that will be on a page in the new book I am illustrating, "Angels at my Side." It will be a lovely little book for children. The artwork will be lighter than most of my work, with pastel shades and gentle images. It will be out this spring! It will be great for Mother's Day, we think, with a special poem for mothers and lovely springlike imagery and colors. I hope everyone enjoys it! I enjoy the chance to try some different colors and images, but I've always had a few angels in my paintings.

This was a large-ish painting based on an image I saw in an old, old book.

One of my earliest paintings was an angel holding a little dragon.

I'm sure there are more but that's all I can find for now!

More psychedelic visions

2010-01-26T02:00:00.003-05:00

I'm going to be very busy for the next few weeks working on a new illustration project that I am very excited about, and before I embark on that here is one more painting of rainbows and strangeness that I did in my down time. Sort of some Eve/Lillith associations here but really I just wanted to do something colorful. In the cold dark winter months where everything is beautifully monochrome, I still do crave color. I am starting to anticipate the return of colorful things emerging from the earth.

Anyway, that is all for today...will be unveiling some of my new illustration work soon!

Winter surrealism

2010-01-21T00:09:00.005-05:00

"A Scarlet Wish" is based vaguely on an image in my mind when I hear a song by that title by the Legendary Pink Dots. This was just a quick little monochrome (mostly) thing. I'm going to pretend this has some applicability to Valentine's Day (applicability - is that even a word?) because of the red ribbons. I will let you decide if it fits or not...but I present it nonetheless!

Valentines on the horizon!

2010-01-16T00:36:00.003-05:00

It's been quite a year so far with a lot of family illnesses and trips to the hospital for minor things, after that big pre-Christmas snow storm, but things are hopefully getting back to normal now. And here we are already looking at hearts and shamrocks everywhere in the stores! I really love the white and red and hearts on snow sort of imagery associated with Valentine's Day, even though I've never been into the holiday (I'm much too cranky for things like that).

But because I love snow and hearts, I have a lot of Valentiney art in the vaults! Here's a print of one of them that I have in my Etsy shop. I still have a lot more snowy winter art as well! It's been a good couple of weeks, the Eve Hallows book that I illustrated (By Freda Roberts and Eva Rice) now available on amazon.com, Barnes and Noble online, powells.com and other sites! And we are starting work on another book for which I am the illustrator. More on that as it develops!

Happy 2010 now that I can finally start enjoying it!

Eve Hallows book now available!

2010-01-07T02:20:00.004-05:00

This is the culmination of the project I worked for the past six months or so, illustrating this lovely new modern Halloween tale :

Eve Hallows is a whimsical tale of courage, benevolence, and hope. Good witch Eve desires to use her gifts to bring healing and joy to the children of the world. Accompanied by her two enchanted stooges, Niles, the aviate broom and Oliver, the sassy pumpkin, she visits the homebound Kyle and his friends on 'All Hallows Eve' teaching them the lesson that charity brings more magic and opportunity in ones life. Written by Freda Roberts and Eva Rice, Eve Hallows is the first in the many to follow. Published by Mirror/ Page of Wonder Publishing.

Eve Hallows on Amazon

Eve Hallows on Barnes and Noble

You don't have to wait until Halloween to enjoy it! There's full color art on each page. If you do purchase a copy we'd love if you'd write a review on the site from which you ordered it!

Paisley Alchemist

2010-01-04T23:14:00.003-05:00

Here is the second in my paisley sorcery series. Series? I didn't mean for it to be a series, but the paisleys keep coming out of things. In this piece, a potion wizard is preparing a concoction in a cosmic landscape, from which flow monochrome paisley forms into a green sky. Strange sigils glow amidst fire hued orbs. I don't know if I'll have more like this but it seemed like a good idea for the moment!

Oh I had something else I was going to write a post about too but I wrote about this instead. I'll get to the other one tomorrow!

New year, new art

2010-01-03T23:04:00.004-05:00

My inspiration for the beginning of 2010 is late 1960s/early 1970s psychedelic horror movies that I've been watching lately. Most of them are not nearly as psychedelic as the movie title, the opening credits, the amazing weird soundtrack noises or the promotional materials would have you believe, but they still create an interesting atmosphere.

Blue/green/red color palettes, ominous dark trees and towers, long hair, long dresses, knife-wielding women, and weird pointless squiggly loopy things and colorful blobs. That's where it's at. I just gave these the first titles that leapt into my mind. In this case, it's "Paisley Priestess" and "Mistress of the Purple Tower" for these...ahh but there are many other things I could have called them. Well here they are for your review. Thanks for looking!

2009 in paint

2009-12-31T01:39:00.017-05:00

After a couple of years of being pretty quiet, 2009 was a very busy year for me -- starting with January, when I spent about a week just doing paintings for myself, like the one you see above, with a psychedelic surreal science fiction feel. I really enjoyed these and kept most of them for myself. But it got me into the habit, so over the year I did dozens more...including a wonderful project for the Eve Hallows book which is now available!

I did a lot more work on my Etsy shop, http://sarada.etsy.com, and I have something like 80 items for sale right now including original art and prints -- which I also figured out how to get together for selling purposes this year.

I took tons of photos of mushrooms in the woods...started this blog...wow, it was a pretty busy year! And I am happy to have found many like-minded artists and craftspeople along the way.

As usual I did a lot of Halloween art...

A lot of crazy colorful stuff...

Some gothic haunted art inspired by my reading of 19th century ghost stories...

And just cute stuff with owls and cats in it. :P

Anyway, thank you if you have been looking at my little blog here, and here are a few more images from throughout the year just to sort of sum up what kind of a year it's been for me! Here's to much more fun stuff in 2010!

Meanwhile, back in the world of weird

2009-12-23T02:13:00.006-05:00

Right, so here's another post with no holiday content whatsoever! I don't know why I feel apologetic about that, but I just do! We were snowed in this weekend but rather than share snow art with you all, I will delve deeper into the cosmic weird. That thing above, that's what I imagined when I was stuck in traffic on the way home from work during the busy holiday shopping season when all of the roads were already jammed but the bad weather made it worse. I couldn't think of a title so I wound up calling it Brain Tree. Wow, don't hurt yourself coming up with names there, lady! It is 9 x 12.

This one is 6 x 8 and apparently I titled it : Shards of the Swirling Sun because i like alliteration.

And this doesn't have a link because I didn't put it up for sale but that doesn't mean you can't look at it. This was based on some images from a weird, long dream I had. Suffice to say that weird sea creatures and mushrooms were in it and that's enough for me to go on. I might put it up for sale but for the moment I am too amused by it myself!

So happy Psychedelic Christmas I guess! Ha!

Artist feature: theenchantedgypsy

2009-12-18T00:22:00.004-05:00

It's been awhile since I was able to put together a feature on one of my fellow artists who sell on Etsy, but I really really love the work of my friend Denise, aka theenchantedgypsy. Her work ranges from altered art: little tins arranged as shrines to haunted, gothic figures, or coffins adorned with tributes to art, aesthetics, beauty, literature and decadence. She also has many collages in holiday and decorative themes, and curio cabinet assemblages ranging from the whimsical to the dark. You can see a few examples above, and look here for some more!

Alice in Wonderland curio cabinet

The Gargoyle's Apothecary

Edgar Allen Poe in a coffin

Altered witch tin

I love the way her work combines found objects with an aesthetic appeal, along such a diverse array of themes. Please visit her blog at http://www.theenchantedgypsy.blogspot.com/ and her Etsy shop at http://www.etsy.com/shop/theenchantedgypsy

Here is what she says about herself!

I am a mixed media artist who specializes in art using repurposed items. I feel good about recycling and helping Mama Earth while creating something cool at the same time. The majority of my art is in painting, collage art, assemblage art and spirit dolls. I have always had a proclivity toward the bohemian lifestyle and consider myself a gypsy and free spirit at heart. I love creating and must do something to satisfy my artistic muse every day. I am a wife, sister, daughter, aunt and dog mama and I love all things that are four-legged, winged and aquatic. I love to go barefoot...I only wear shoes when I have to.

Please support my kindred spirit, a creative and talented artist whose work I hope you will love as much as I do!

Snowflake Witch repaint

2009-12-16T00:38:00.005-05:00

I'm going through a long process of repainting a lot of my older paintings that are in my gallery, at http://www.artbysarada.com, this year into next year. Of course, I realize that with Christmas a week away it might have been a good idea to have this one up for sale a little earlier in the month but that's just the way things go sometimes!

I did a lot of these winter witches a few years ago and it's become something of a ritual for me right after Thanksgiving to get back into painting them. Of course, I think winter is lovely all year round, not just at Christmas/Yule/etc. time. She will be available as a print soon, but I have several other winter witch prints available now as well. Maybe people are finishing up their winter holiday shopping by now, but they will be available after the holidays as well!

Candy Cane Path - 5 x 7 print
Snow Cauldron - 5 x 7 print
Snow Cauldron - 8 x 10 print
Valentine Witch - 5 x 7 print

Into the cavern

2009-12-10T01:33:00.002-05:00

Oh goodness gracious but time does fly. I have a million half finished posted that I need to post here, but headaches, work and other obligations keep me from completing them. So for the moment I am just saying hello. How are you, readers? I've been looking at everyone else's blog but haven't been tending to my own.

I am still really into doing these figure paintings, with the ambiguous featureless forms. I never get tired of them! They are always floating around, drifting or reaching out for things. Ahh, they are a fun bunch. The colors in this one are inspired by malachite, that glorious black-green rock that I love so much, and a sort of periwinkle bluebell blue. That is a tribute to the bluebells that I love so much in May and can't wait to see blossom again, many months from now.

If you can tell, I am not thinking much about the upcoming holidays, though I wish everyone a happy one. I usually celebrate holidays "when I get around to it," which is rarely on the actual date, and almost never with store bought gifts. But whatever works! It always sneaks up too fast on me, personally!

Happy winter, everyone!

The last mushrooms of fall

2009-12-03T23:53:00.007-05:00

I took pictures of the last mushrooms of the year, on Thanksgiving, but I did not get a chance to post until just now!

It was unusually warm on that day, probably around 60 degrees which is very warm for late November here. I didn't expect there to still be mushrooms growing in the woods, but there they were...not the vivid shades of July, no bright reds or sulfurous yellow, no garish blues and purple or strange mossy greens.

Though a few still spring strange and corpsy, smooth waxy curves of flesh protruding from the cold bark of trees.

There's a flourish of strange orange-yellow color among the rotting leaves though.

And the flaky purple fungi creeping up this log, looks rather like oyster shells.

See how big they are in comparison to my green glittery nails!

Winter blues

2009-11-30T00:43:00.003-05:00

Still have a few posts backed up that I need to make! I have been busy though and need to catch up a little...with the coming of winter I get really into blue colors. The painting on top is another in my series of surreal alien landscape paintings, mainly with ice/water themes. I always have figures without facial features in these, though I usually leave the gender ambiguous and I think this one is more clearly female.

Speaking of water, the painting below might look at first like waves or hills in a watery background. But it is actually meant to represent a reclining female form -- and the secret symbolism here is that this is how i feel when I'm trying to get out of bed in the morning...forever drawn back into the watery depths of sleep.

This brief post brought to you by my realization that it's Sunday night and I won't have time to make one for awhile!

a feast for the eyes

2009-11-19T02:06:00.007-05:00

It's been awhile since my last post (well, about a week, but that's a long time in this hectic fast moving world) but I've been busy...and I have some features to share on some artist friends that I'm excited about...but while i am preparing all of that, i thought i'd break my silence with a couple of psychedelic paintings that i've completed recently.

I didn't really have a title for the one above so she is Astral Peacock Empress, apparently.
She combines some of my favorite imagery, but I tried to use some things that don't pop up quite so often in my paintings...a strange tentacle mollusk creature...a lizard...a hydra...weird flamingo bird skull type thing...but most of all I love RAINBOWS, and peacocks, and candelabras border on an obsession with me!

This one is sort of the idea of the "gateway to the unconscious," where there is a door separately the rational and irrational parts of the mind. It just takes a key to crack it open and all the weirdness starts spilling out -- the stuff of dreams and nightmares; masks and ghosts and rainbow paisleys, bubbles of ideas, and squiggles of thought; odd little bugs of confusion and delirium. I think I called it "The Key to Dreams," but I'm not much for naming things, ha!

Happy Thanksgiving to those who (like me) are in the US. We just go to an Indian restaurant so it's a pretty mellow affair. :)

Can't get me out of the woods

2009-11-15T19:28:00.006-05:00

It was unusually warm today, around 70, which means that once everything else was under control there was time to check out the woods department. Most of the trees are bare except for some yellow maple leaves. The 'timer' on my camera isnt' really working anymore, can you tell?

After a summer of nonstop mushroom photography (I say that as someone who is not a professional photographer, mind you, just a random weirdo with a barely-functional cheap digital camera) I was happy to still be able to find a few of the little guys, peeping out from beneath rotting leaves. Lots of critters came out today -- lots of bright green leaf bugs and spidery friends.

Bright green moss is so beautiful! It was the only spot of green in the forest (other than those bugs) but it's so lovely.

Spider ahead!...
This guy was actually huge, for New Jersey -- we're not known for our enormous spiders, but he was as big as I've seen them. This was the only picture that came out clear though! After some research I think he's a pretty normal garden spider, but I've never seen a bright neon orange one before. Looking up spiders online, it looks like he might be an orange marbled orb spider (or some combination of words thereof) but I say that as a wild guess. The Clueness Naturalist strikes again.

Bought some more canvases on sale today, so it's back to my indoor activities now!

Alice in Squaresville

2009-11-14T22:50:00.002-05:00

I really love square canvas --- why has rectangular always been the norm? The round canvases I've been seeing in stores lately are tempting as well but so intimidating -- instead of seeing things through a rectangular lens I have to start thinking about round, organic shapes.

This 8 x 8 square inspired me to revisit a favorite topic -- Alice and tea. And cake. And because my husband loves badgers, I threw one of those in too. And because badgers makes me think of mushrooms...there you go. How's that for a short blog post? Oh well, it's Saturday night!

Thank you to Kathryn Lantz for tagging me in the One Lovely Blog award -- I shall post my post about that in the very near future!

books books books

2009-11-12T01:42:00.006-05:00

About three years ago I realized that some of the books I had most wanted to read in the world, were starting to pop up on Amazon. 18th century gothic novels and chapbooks -- late 19th/20th century supernatural mysteries -- things that haven't seen the light of day again in decades. Not only that, but this time they were affordable! I have the unfortunate combination of a deep love of obscurity in the realms of literature, film and music, and absolutely no cash with which to fund said obsessions.

Valancourt Books and Zittaw Press were the main sources of my undoing -- I have ordered several dozen books from these fine publishing houses and I go on mad sprees several times a year when, armed with an Amazon coupon or gift card, I add another five to the pile. Above and below are a selection of some that I have accumulated, but I admit I haven't even gotten around to reading all of them so far, I just want to make sure that I have them before they disappear.

One of the things that most excited me was the forthcoming/ongoing publication of all of the "Horrid Novels" described in Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey. I'm not actually an Austen fan, other than that particular book, because it's a parody of the 18th century gothic novel. My absolute favorite parody of the gothic novel, "The Heroine" by Eaton Stannard-Barrett, has been my holy grail of books for some dozen or so years, since I took an old copy out on interlibrary loan and had to return it before I finished it. But it's coming out! Eventually! I know it's available as a download for free on the Internet Archive, but I like real books. Hold in the hand books. Touch the smooth glossy cover books.

The Horrid Novels are, incidentally (list copied from wikipedia for ease of typing):

Castle of Wolfenbach (1793) by Eliza Parsons.
Clermont, a Tale (1798) by Regina Maria Roche.
The Mysterious Warning, a German Tale (1796) by Eliza Parsons.
The Necromancer; or, The Tale of the Black Forest (1794) by 'Ludwig Flammenberg' (pseudonym for Carl Friedrich Kahlert; translated by Peter Teuthold).
The Midnight Bell (1798) by Francis Lathom.
Orphan of the Rhine (1798) by Eleanor Sleath.
Horrid Mysteries (1796) by the Marquis de Grosse (translated by P. Will).

I don't really know where to begin with why I love the 18th century gothic novel so much, except that it seems to be the basis for a lot of things that I love that came after it. In a way they are the source of all of the "Scooby Doo" cliches of the genre -- the empty suit of armor in the corridor, the painting with the shifting eyes. The secret passage concealed behind the bookcase. The pirates pretending to be ghosts. Candelabras and dank abandoned castle corridors. Imprisonment in a tower. The identity of the wrongdoers revealed in the final act!

While all of those things can be found in the classics of the genre, like The Mysteries of Udolpho by Ann Radcliffe and The Monk by Matthew Lewis, every one of these relics is interesting to me, even if they all follow similar plot lines. A few of the most exciting books out of the batch to me are:

Literary Mushrooms - a collection of gothic chapbooks from 1800-1835

Phantasmagoriana - the very collection of stories that inspired Lord Byron, the Shelleys, & co., on one infamous dark and stormy night. in its first English translation!

Before the Count - a collection of British vampire tales from 1732-1897, long before vampires were sexy, sparkly or any of the other things that they appear to be now.

So there you go. A buncha books. I've been reading a different series all fall (the Wordsworth series of Mystery and Supernatural books) but I'll be getting back into these piles as we advance into the dark winter...

A winter witch and a robot angel

2009-11-10T23:05:00.007-05:00

I have been swamped lately so it's going to be another day of "hey look what I did" instead of musings on other topics, for the moment. I'm thrilled to have some more 5 x 7 prints available, including the painting above. I did this originally many years ago but just did an updated new version of the painting so I could create prints from it. "Snow Cauldron" is my favorite winter witch painting from my little humble collection.

This on the other hand is a new painting, "The Archangel of Robots". I was inspired by a line of dialogue from the film "Who Are You, Polly Maggoo," a 1966 satire in French by the director William Klein. It is an artsy spoof of the fashion industry but it is a visually amazing film in itself. The film opens with models showing off fashions crafted rather ridiculously from sheets of metal. My painting however has nothing to do with any of this, it was just taken from that one phrase that appeared on the screen in subtitles, to my infinite delight.

Oh yes and the Unicorn/UFO painting I mention in my previous post is now available as a print!

I beg your indulgence for my shamless self promotion in my recent posts. When things cool off in my daytime schedule I will have a chance to post about some other adventures!

Repainting the past

2009-11-07T17:01:00.008-05:00

This is a tree that I like to read under. I remember reading Dune....many books of ghost stories...Unfortunately I missed the chance to read under autumn foliage in this particular park this year because it was just gone in an instant -- one day it was all green, then there was a cold weekend and then everything blew off the trees. Alas! But I have a vague memory of what fall is supposed to look like. I did this little painting in an evening recently and somehow resisted the temptation to put any creatures or characters in it.

This is one of the things I found in my vaults recently that I made some prints from. They'll be up for sale in a few days...I remember it took days for me to figure out what the UFO should be beaming up and finally I realized -- duh, obviously, a unicorn! This is the kind of thing that I'm guessing sane people don't generally think about.

I'm knee deep in repainting a bunch of things that I originally did around 2000-2002. The limitations of technology (specifically, the kind that I was stuck with at the time) left me unable to get high quality scans or pictures of them before I sold them so I've never been able to do anything with them in terms of reproductions. So I'm repainting a bunch of them, with what I hope is possibly a little more detail than I originally painted them in, and getting nice crisp scans.

But before I get those together...I still have some recent stuff that I'm finishing up and uploading. Click to see the full painting this is from! There is a glass turtle off to the right hand side of the painting that I'm quite delighted with.

I'm a little preoccupied tonight in thinking about weird movies I'd like to see or find on dvd so my coherent post will have to come in a day or so! I'm going to go look through my old video tapes now for something weird and inspiring to watch!

At the edge of the universe...

2009-11-06T01:58:00.003-05:00

I have a post about books in the works and some more features to do on artists whose work I enjoy...but first a little something from the vaults. I did this painting two years ago (I thought it was one year ago but then I remembered that 2007 also existed) basically for myself but I'm kind of knee-deep in art around here so I put it up on Etsy today, as I flail around looking for attention.

"The Black Tower at the Edge of the Universe" brings together a lot of things that I love -- a glistening dark tower carved from onyx or ebony, rising from a precipice that falls off onto a chaotic cosmic swirl, with a rainbow waterfall cascading into the abyss. Psychedelic streams of color and a dark, apocalyptic theme in an impossible world. Anyway, that's what I'm into!

Meanwhile I experimented with putting a "Retweet" button at the top of the page and just putting one post on each page, to keep things neat and tidy. I'm very much in the learning process here of how to use Blogger so any advice or tips are always appreciated, if something isn't working or looks confusing or cluttered. I mean, the entire internet looks cluttered, really, these days. I'm leaving the pumpkin background for now, I'm always all about the pumpkins!

Notebooks found in the trunk

2009-11-01T23:29:00.014-05:00

I was just cleaning out the trunk of an old vehicle that we have had for a long time and am getting ready to put out to pasture, sell for parts, etc. Deep in the trunk, I found an old reporters' notebook I used when covering municipal meetings. Throughout my life, whether it's high school, college, or the so-called real world, I've always doodled in notebooks. I pay perfect attention to whatever is going on, but I absolutely MUST doodle if I have a pen in hand. But hey, even with high school notebooks full of weird doodles and very little actual note taking I still had a 4.0, so there! Above, you can see that alongside some drawings of a magical candyland and a frilly ballgown, I've written "tinker with TDR section , set up methodology for contributions to centralized recreation." Sounds exciting, no?

This is a segment of one of the paintings that grew out of these doodles -- a lot of snow and candy witches.

I think this was the doodle that led directly to that painting actually.

This is my personal favorite. A peacock made of spirals with the words "traffic signal" under it. That is my attempt to make the mundane world exciting I guess!

"Police cars at low cost - advertising on cars" - alongside a woman in a fancy hat and frilly dress, of course.

A candycane witch with hearts all over her dress, and "land development ordinance ... historic pesticide residue."
And here's where I just gave up on note taking completely and went to Candyland! Maybe this was before they even got started at the meeting.

I usually saved the notebooks with the good doodles in them, so I might uncover more.

Meanwhile I finished listed some prints over on Etsy, so I have a whole bunch there now with more to come!

And again I say, Happy Halloween!

2009-10-31T19:45:00.008-04:00

Happy Halloween again, this time on the actual day of course!! It's windy and rainy here in New Jersey and unseasonably warm (72 today) and humid. Kind of weird when you're expecting a crisp clear autumn day but it was nice not to be freezing! It's mellow here, just watching old Simpsons Halloween specieals, the obligatory viewing of Night of the Living Dead as we flip through the channels, and some Dark Shadows for me later.

I wanted to share one of the trailers we have up on YouTube for the children's book I am illustrating! There are several trailers up now and I will share more in the upcoming days and weeks! Above you can see one of the illustrations I've done. There will be more than a dozen in total. The book will be coming out in 2010! Visit http://www.evehallows.com for more information! And if you missed the link above, Click Here to see one of the trailers.

I also wanted to say a big Happy Birthday to my lifelong like-a-sister-to-me friend Deirdre who you can visit over at Blackbird's Learning to Fly blog and you can also visit her at http://www.facebook.com/dryanphotography, and also on Facebook here.

And you most definitely want to visit her Artfire page at http://www.artfire.com/users/blackbird72 to look for holiday gifts this year!!

In other linky news, the EtsyNJ blog page has one of my crypt ghost paintings on today's entry and some other cute stuff too!

I think that about covers it for the big Halloween link round-up. I've got a lot more TV to watch now! ;P And I have a vague desire to start a NaNoWriMo novel though I have NO IDEAS whatsoever and no time either! But it's a tradition for me to at least start one on Halloween night every year and let it fizzle out by my birthday (Nov. 8)

Happy Halloween!

2009-10-30T23:29:00.011-04:00

I know that since at least 50% of the art I do is Halloween themed that I should probably have something to say around Halloween itself! I pretty much think about pumpkins and witch hats all year long so it just seems perfectly normal that they should be everywhere this week! But since I'm not a party-going type, the actual day of Halloween is basically just an excuse for me to be myself. I usually wear one of my more fabulous dresses that I've made out of Halloween fabric or which looks particularly wonderfully haunted, and I just sort of enjoy the fact that for one day everything looks like it does inside my head!

Since my camera isn't much for taking pictures in low light, I am not absolutely sure if I'll be able to take neighborhood decoration pics tomorrow so in the mean time I am posting some of my more little-seen paintings from the past decade! These are ones that I have not featured on my Web site or which I have not done repaints or prints of to my recollection. Some of them, like the one above and below, were too large to scan. They have long since gone on to new homes!

This one above was a 16 x 20 and I remember wanting to do a painting with all of my favorite 'characters' in it from my first couple of years of selling art online. A little blonde witch, a pumpkin man from early 1900s postcards, a pumpkin man and a black cat were my favorite characters, along with little wide-eyed wisps of ghosts.

This one had some vague memories of Dark Shadows associated with it, even though I hadn't seen it for 20 years when I did this!

That little white cat on the jack o'lantern is my cat Shizuka of course!

Anyway there's a few visuals for you on the best day of the year! More Halloween goodies coming tomorrow!

Halloween around the house

2009-10-27T20:58:00.006-04:00

I realize that Halloween has truly -- sneaked? snuck? -- up on me this year because I've barely taken any autumn leaf pictures (too rainy on days that I have time) and I haven't gone anywhere or done anything relating to the season. I just listed this painting on Etsy, which probably has a Halloween association of some sort since it's got an owl and groovy night stuff in it, but then again it's kind of an all-purpose fantasy painting.

But, you know, having Halloween stuff in the house all year long I kind of lose track of when the actual holiday is. My Halloween stuff is messy and unorganized, but it's always there!

I do love my horror dolls by Bastet2329.

The Halloween curtains are always up of course.

Anyway, that's just a few clicks around my messy abode, where piles of books and records/CDs are pretty much on every available surface. I don't put much of my own art on the wall because that would mean I'd have to frame it!

Yay 50 followers!

2009-10-24T23:01:00.008-04:00

I just noticed that I hit 50 followers here, not counting those who have subscribed via email. Thank you to everyone who is looking! I read through the postings on my blogroll every day, and I am trying to comment whenever I can, so your views are very much appreciated.

Halloween is only a week away and I am completely at a loss for what to do about it. I tend to have a little Halloween in every day of the year, so the actual day is intimidating. I usually don't do anything special, I'm afraid!

Looking back through some old photos though I found these -- photos of the large 3 x 4 foot paintings that I did about five or six years ago, around this time of year. They are the largest paintings I have ever done - versions of a couple of things from my web gallery, http://www.artbysarada.com, with a few extra details thrown in. Shipping was the most difficult part of the whole thing, because they were too large for the USPS. I remember taking them to the UPS store, where they had to ship them in bicycle boxes and I think it was around $150 to ship them just a few states away. I would love to do something large again but I would probably have to have someone come to pick them up if they were any larger!

I did get my new batch of 5 x 7 prints this week, so I'm slowly getting around to listing them. This Halloween owl playing with a clutch of sugar skulls, was a favorite painting when I did it three years ago, so I wanted to make prints of this one for sure...

And in the meantime a psychedelic autumn owl wound up happening as well. This is just listed as an original right now, but like anything that I have a high-res scan image of, I can make a print from it.

That's about it for now...hopefully I'll have time to do something festive this week!

Obligatory autumn foliage, plus new art

2009-10-22T23:52:00.005-04:00

There haven't been a lot of opportunities for autumn leaf viewing yet this year because as soon as they started to turn, the temperatures plummeted. Today though was the most perfect weather imaginable! It's horrifyingly nice! And it might be the one and only perfect autumn day we get...

The bright daylight kind of makes my hair look about five shades lighter than it actually is, so don't let this fool you. What am I looking so intently at? The timer on my camera, since I'm not sure if it's about to go off or not. There is no squirrel crashing the photo, unfortunately! Also, I normally don't wear pants. I mean, I wear skirts. Pants are an anomaly, but I got used to wearing them in the woods to keep the ticks off this spring and summer. I still was constantly picking ticks off of me though!!

Completely unrelated, my recent viewing of Dark Shadows on DVD led me to think about some of my favorite obsessions -- hallways full of doors, candelabras, you know the routine. I watched Dark Shadows when I was a kid, of course, in reruns in the 80s, and one of the enduring images for me was Angelique's dream curse, where each dreamer is presented with a hallway of doors. Behind each door is a rather unconvincing horror. But it still made an impression on me! I don't quite know what the story is behind these mysterious figures but I like the ambiguity they suggest. What is behind these doors? What power does that jewel hold?

I have a ton of new matte 5 x7 prints of new and old paintings to list on Etsy in the upcoming days. My older scans, which were smaller files than the ones I save now, look absolutely great in the 5 x 7 size if I do say so myself! I'll be listing them over on http://sarada.etsy.com daily.

Feels like winter...

2009-10-18T21:25:00.002-04:00

(the painting above is not on my web site but it will be one of the pieces I'll have available as a print within a week, if all goes as planned).

The leaves are still mostly green but we're on day five of grey winter coldness, around here. Normally I'd be out enjoying the leaves, but the cold snap has me staying in and thinking about the months ahead.

I just placed an order for a handful of matte 5 x 7 prints of some of my older paintings as well as a few new ones. These will have a 1/4 inch border around the edge. I should have them by the end of the week and if I'm happy with them I'll order up some more and make them a regular offering in my Etsy shop.

Meanwhile I am going back through some of my older pieces of which I only have small images saved. When I did them, in the early 2000s, I was using a scanner with a lower resolution and I didn't have a lot of disk space to be saving giant files all the time, so I don't have a way to reproduce those old paintings now since they have long since sold. So, my plan is to re-paint some of my favorites, and have them on hand as permanent originals from which new prints and other items can be made.

If anyone would like to visit my art gallery at http://www.artbysarada.com and suggest any paintings from any of the categories, to offer as prints, please let me know! I will be starting by doing some winter witch art, for the upcoming months, and a few other favorites of mine. I am particularly fond of some of the patchwork witches on the Halloween page, and some of the pieces on the first Gothic page so I will be doing those along with the winter witches to start. I'll be offering 5 x 7 matte prints at first but I will also offer some 8 x 10s if it seems like something people want. I'm open to suggestions! I prefer matte but if glossy is something people want I'd do that as well.

Halloween rain

2009-10-16T02:43:00.001-04:00

I hate to sound like a broken record, but I can't get over how COLD it has been lately. It is going to be in the low to mid 40s and raining for around five days in a row, and we're completely unprepared for it since this usually doesn't happen until November, here in New Jersey. October usually hangs around the 60s and the 50s for most of the month. I think?

In that spirit, here is a painting I did last year in the summertime, of dark clouds and thunderstorms, with the peering eyes of a dark haired young woman who wears skull barrettes with orange bows in her hair. I have her up on Etsy for the Halloween season. I thought it was a particularly appropriate sentiment for a rainy Halloween season though. It's raining out all of my autumn woods walking, and pumpkin patch picking and everything!

It does mean more time to spend indoors watching Dark Shadows though, and learning how to crochet amigurumi. I'm almost done my first piece which is a hippo, so if he's presentable I'll share him soon. Looks like they only take a day or so to do (well not a whole day, obviously...but this one took an episode of Fringe and couple of episodes of the BBC comedy Peep Shows to almost complete).

Ghosts in the woods

2009-10-14T23:55:00.004-04:00

I haven't had much time this week for anything so I am just going to post and run, to share some autumn ghosts while the leaves are still on the trees. It got so cold so fast that I can't even remember where the sweaters are this year. Hopefully the leaves won't all be blown away before I can go and look at them.

They say there are more ghost sightings in October than any other month. It certainly feels like ghost weather. I expect to see something in every window of every empty house, and behind every tree in the forest at dusk.

Absurdly nice October day

2009-10-11T19:11:00.009-04:00

First, a very big thank you to http://www.jewelrybytarabiz.blogspot.com/ for featuring me on her blog today! She has a wonderful blog with regular features on artists and crafters, and her etsy shop is full of positively amazing stuff!!

It was almost comically pleasant outside today -- the kind of day where you pretty much have to just cancel everything and spend the entire day outside. The leaves aren't really in their autumn colors yet, though some that turned early were already blown off. But the rest are still mostly summer green, though starting to brown around the edges. In the woods there is already a thick carpet of gold beech and birch leaves.

Mushroom hunting is a little more difficult because of the thickening layer of leaves on the forest floor. The Psychedelic Slug painting in this post has been marked down temporarily to mark the end of the forest mushroom season. (and again, I note, I never pick mushrooms, I only photograph them...do not disturb your fungi friends!)

Above, you see some growing on a log at Bowman's Hill Wildflower Preserve last week. Below, from Clayton Park this week. Just out of frame there was a fuzzy white and black caterpillar inching along. Some internet research suggests they were destined to become Hickory Tussock Moths. I saw several in the forest in the same vicinity. They kept wanting to crawl onto the path that is often traveled by bikes so I moved them back off the trail. Reading up on them I see that some people can have bad allergic reactions to handling them. I did not have a reaction, but I just let them crawl onto a finger and quickly moved them out of the line of the path...but I should try to remember that bright white and black marked things with spines jutting out of them, might just be trying to send a "do not touch" message.

It's funny, because I had just been reading the horror story "Couching at the Door" by D.K. Broster, which deals with someone who is haunted by something long and furry that resembles a feather boa or caterpillar. So seeing furry caterpillars everywhere was in keeping with my mindset -- rather like the time I read "The Willows" while traipsing through a swampy area with willows growing everywhere. Ahhhh, atmosphere!

Artist feature: Timothy Renner

2009-10-10T20:24:00.011-04:00

Above: "The Benefactor"

The featured artist today, Timothy Renner, also happens to be one of my best friends, for the past 10+ years, and I'm featuring his artwork because it -- along with his music -- is what brought us together in friendship and creative partnership. The image you see above is the cover art for the new vinyl LP being released by our band, Stone Breath, this fall -- "The Shepherdess and the Bone White Bird." As mentioned on the label Web site, The LP will come with a lyric booklet containing psychedelic illuminations for each song by Timothy. Many know him for his black and white, pen and ink illustrations, but he has added bright bursts of hypnotic color to his detailed, visionary artwork for this project.

Natural imagery of skulls erupting from dark blossoms, or blazing within a storm of rainbow fire; sacred images of the Shepherdess, amidst falling leaves or globes of light, are among the inspired pieces in this series.

The quiet, intricate world of his art drew me in before I even heard the music, back in the mid-1990s. Trees, leaves, hands, eyes, sheets of paper fluttering in the wind; the moon, rabbits, moths and birds - infused with what was obviously a complex personal mythology drawing on many sources in religion, art and literature, rooted in a deep love and appreciation for the natural world. Like his music, it had a personal quality that affected me immediately and I felt as though I was finally picking up the strands of a conversation begun centuries before. It affected me enough that I reached out to contact the artist as soon as I gathered the nerve, and we've been working together ever since on musical projects -- Stone Breath, The Spectral Light and Moonshine Firefly Snakeoil Jamboree, Breathe Stone, Crow Tongue and others in between, with many other talented musicians. (I don't count myself among the talented, musically, but they let me sing with them anyway!)

"The Vision of the Face in the Well"

Some of the original artwork used in the booklet for this CD is available for sale at the label Web site, Dark Holler Arts, on this page. The original cover artwork is still available, as are several other pieces -- each comes along with a copy of the LP and some other goodies as well. And, of course, the LP itself is available for $20 and includes a cd-r of all of the tracks -- the link for that purchase is at the very bottom of the page I linked to above.

To see the full catalog of titles available in the music catalog, visit the main page.

"The Shepherdess of the Fiery Wheels"

Illuminated letter from lyrics booklet, letter "I"

To hear music from the new album, or from some of the older releases, please visit the Myspace page at http://www.myspace.com/StoneBreath.

There is also a newly launched fan page for the band over at Facebook.

I can't really do justice to my friend's work in a single blog post so I hope to share more of his pen and ink work later this year. Please visit the sites, take a listen and enjoy!

Forest of eyes

2009-10-09T14:06:00.005-04:00

Walking through the early autumn woods near twilight, the colors of the sky and trees strike me with their beauty. In the fall the world seems full of rainbows. The colors in the trees bleed from crimson to tangerine, gold, lime green and soft olive. The shadows stretch purple across the cooling earth. This year many of the trees were blown bare by brisk October winds before they even changed into their autumn outfits.

Although the eyes in these trees may appear sinister I don't think of them as being baleful beings -- trees are alive, even in the colder months, and whatever earthy intelligence they possess continues to watch over the woods even in the winter. Dark guardians of silent secrets.

More artist features coming soon, I just wanted to post a little something about this while it was on my mind.

Redheads

2009-10-07T23:16:00.005-04:00

I am working on a post about a favorite artist who is also a best friend, but while I am doing that here is a painting I began quite some time ago but only recently got around to scanning. She's on Etsy now. Since I'm a redhead I have an affinity for woodpeckers, but this isn't a self portrait. Though I DID make a corset kind of like that once.

This spring I saw so many amazing birds in my woods walks (before mushrooms took center stage) -- everything from hummingbirds to bald eagles. The most breathtaking of all, though, was an enormous pileated woodpecker. If only I could have taken a picture! The woodpecker you see above is not a pileated though -- I decided to paint an ivory-billed woodpecker, which is thought to be extinct. They look very similar to the pileated (which has a black bill). I hold out some hope that the ivory-billed will be found to still exist -- I've read some encouraging things but it still seems unlikely. Then again there was a time last year where I was convinced I was seeing passenger pigeons everywhere I went, even though I know they are long gone. On a positive note though I did really see bald eagles this year, just in regular old central New Jersey. In Princeton and further south, where I live, I know there are nesting pairs but had never seen them before here.

Artist feature: jojosart

2009-10-05T22:33:00.006-04:00

Above, "Restless Night" by Joe La Fargue

"RIP 1994" by Joe La Fargue.

Yesterday I featured SingASongofSixpence, who has many lovely original pen and ink drawings in her shop -- I love black and white, pen and ink art, possibly because I don't do a lot of it myself. I need the forgiving amorphousness of paint since I do not have a steady hand! I really admire the way a talented pen and ink artist can imbue their work with color just by the textures, shapes and forms with which they populate their paper.

Jojosart.etsy.com is full of inspired, visionary art with figures that suggest themes like life, death, time, dreams, freedom and madness. Above are several examples, included here with his permission. Another piece this week features ghostly forms with clock faces; others include angelic and dream figures, trees, night imagery, butterflies and anthropomorphic flowers.

He describes his inspiration in his profile: "I'm a self taught artist born and raised near some cotton fields in mississippi. I can remember finding an old tattered notebook on the school bus when i was just a little boy. It was full of all this cool fantasy art. It sparked my imagination and lit a fire in me that i still can't quench."

He offers prints of his work and I look forward to seeing many more. Please check out his shop!

I'm in a treasury this week!

2009-10-05T12:49:00.005-04:00

Just a quick note that my Scarlet Woman painting is in an Etsy treasury this week. It's a nice selection of autumn hued items, so take a look!

http://www.etsy.com/treasury_list.php?room_id=85943

Featured artist: SingASongOfSixpence

2009-10-04T21:53:00.003-04:00

As promised, here is the first in a series of features I'm doing on artists that I admire -- starting with some pen and ink/black & white art by artists I have found on Etsy.

SingASongOfSixpence.etsy.com has a beautiful selection of drawings and some paintings, with crisp, captivating surreal imagery. She mixes fairy tales, mythology, and history with a sense for the subtle and silent, and I find her work enchanting.

Objects hover in mid-air or float into space, with snake women, sirens, balloons, and birds among the themes in the artist's personal mythology. Here is what she says in her Etsy profile about her subject matter:

"Blackbirds, skeleton keys, buttons, and feathers...these are the things I like, and these are the things that weave their way into my art. There's something very old-fashioned about them, and I certainly love everything old-fashioned. Although I'm only 21, I've got an old soul. The aesthetics of the past inspire me...Ancient Roman, Medieval, Georgian, Victorian, and so on and so on. My work represents a harmonious marriage between art and history...my two great passions."

I heartily encourage everyone to keep an eye on this gifted artist and to enter her unique universe. She is featured on several other places on the web included this gallery in Ottawa.

Although I've selected several black and white images to share here with her permission, her colour paintings are also magnificent, with bright, bold hues, like this spectrum of apples.

Or this painting titled Goblin Market.

Enjoy! Another feature will be coming tomorrow.

Under the microscope

2009-10-04T00:15:00.004-04:00

Thank you to everyone who has added me here recently. If I am not already following your blog please let me know so I can read you as well!

Oh! The painting I posted about this afternoon sold within about 10 minutes, so since I promised more science, sci fi or surreal art in the near future I will get right on with it, and move into my artist features tomorrow!

First, I will say that it was an excellent mushroom day today but I did not have my camera with me. I took some cell phone pictures though which I will send to myself soon and post. One that was a vibrant bright purple was my favorite find of the day. As always though I only look and take pictures, I'd never dislodge from from its loamy home! October is just amazing, the trees are still mostly green but the forest floor is covered in yellowing leaves and there seems to always be a faint scent of smoke in the air.

This little painting above is inspired by a couple of lines in a short story I was reading while having some nice Assam tea in a little tea shop by myself.

"A microscope was, on his eighth birthday, presented to him by an affluent uncle. The uncle showed him how to surprise the secrets of a drop of pond water, which - limpid to the eye, confessed under the microscope to a whole cosmogony of strenuous and undesirable careers."

- from E. Nesbit, "The Five Senses"