H U B C A P S + B L O G T O U R S

my hubcap, an orange Koi © samos 2014

I have so much news to share this morning! Remember way back when I was painting a hub cap for the Landfill Art Project a couple years ago? Well, last week I received an email from the Museum of the Shenandoah Valley that my hubcap was one of 287 that was selected out of more than 1000 works in the Landfill collection to be on exhibit in the Second Time Around: the Hubcap as Art installation!!! It will be on display from September 7th until March  1, 2015. I am SO excited and hoping that my hubby and I will be able to make the trip this fall. I would LOVE to be there for the member party!

In other exciting news, my friend Kelly of the Happy Shack blog invited me a couple weeks ago to join in on a blog tour! For this one, there are four questions we are asked to answer, so here we go...

What am I working on?

I have been working on some paintings that I've been thinking about for some time. One is a very large abstract that I knew needed just a little something to complete it. After my husband and I returned from our excursion in Oahu this spring, I was inspired to paint koi again. So I moved this large painting from a wall that it was hanging on in the house and brought it back to the easel. It has yet to have any new paint on it, partly because I'm still in the  thought process. I don't like to rush these type of paintings. When I know what I want it to look like, I carefully plan it with sketches to figure out placement and color, and sometimes which technique I want to use. In the process of doing some sketches, I created this...

koi © samos 2014

How does your work differ from others of your genre? 

I work in several mediums and I like to incorporate some sort of abstract flair to whatever I'm working on. When I create my pottery, I try to use bold, bright colors and simple abstract designs. Lately I have become a little "freer" with my brush and playing with a more painterly technique. Painterly is a word, right? 

Why do you create what you do? 

Simply because it makes me happy! I absolutely LOVE losing myself in a work where time, chores, and world problems don't exist. 

How does your process work? 

Well I suppose that depends on what I'm working on at the time. When I'm painting, it changes with each work. If it happens to be a piece  on masonite, I first construct the canvas by building a wooden frame  out of 1x2 strips. Once they are attached to the masonite, I gesso the board and let it dry. If the work is of an animal, I sketch it out in pencil or watercolor before applying acrylic or oils. If the work happens to be a watercolor, sometimes I don't sketch at all, I just start painting. Now if I'm throwing pottery, I like to make sure my studio is cleaned up first before I start working. Then I get into my clay, cut and weigh it, make a ball, and then head to the wheel. It all depends on what I'm working on at the time and what material I'm using. 

I hope you have enjoyed the tour so far. I hope it continues with many more creative souls to meet and follow as you continue this journey. I have asked a few of my very talented art sisters to join us! 

Rene DeAnda is my dear sister that lives in Denver. She is a woman of many talents and is loved by all who knows her. You can see her work and read her thoughts on her blog the Creative Compiler of All Cooperative Components. 

Kelly Thiel is a dear friend and amazing sculptor that lives in Charleston, South Carolina. 
She works full time in her studio creating beautiful clay sculptures, is a mother, wife and lives life to the fullest. You can see her work and learn more about Kelly on her blog. 

Robin Norgren is a dear friend and soul sister who is also a woman of many talents. She is a gifted writer, a mother, military wife, entrepreneur...the list goes on and on. You can read more about Robin and see her creative flair on one of her blogs, Joesy's Art School. 

Landfill Art Project: Koi Hubcap

Yesterday I finally finished my hubcap for the landfill art project. A few months ago, I applied to be part of this project:

*Landfillart is an international effort encompassing one-thousand-forty-one (1,041) artists to claim a piece of rusted metal garbage and create fine art.

The 1,041 pieces of rusted metal are actually old automobile hub caps from the 1930’s through the 1970’s. Each hub cap, after being cleaned and primed, is affectionately called a “metal canvas.” Although most “metal canvases” have been transformed by the artist using oil or acrylic paint, some have been weaved on, glued or screwed or welded to, or made into fine sculpture.

I have found that the fine artists I have worked with on this project do not even flinch when looking at this white round disc of metal canvas. And why should they. Artists from the beginning of time have used cave walls (Lascaux, France and Altamira, Spain,) walls of pyramids (Egyptians,) animal skins (American Indians,) etc… as their canvas. In addition, as a gallery owner for over thirty years, I maintain that artists, generally speaking, are more ecologically in touch and environmentally aware. Perhaps that is the reason forty-one artists readily accepted the challenge and embraced the project.

Although the project is in its infancy (I hope to have it completed by 2012,) it will evolve from a simple idea of taking forty-one old rusted hub caps and creating forty-one pieces of great art. The second phase has already started with the acquisition of one thousand additional (1000) rusted hub caps which will be turned into cleaned and primed “metal canvases. The project will continue with finding one thousand (1000) talented artists who believe in this project.

The third phase will involve publishing a book on the project showcasing all one thousand forty one (1,041) completed “metal canvases.”

The fourth and final phase will involve choosing 200 metal canvases that adequately represent the project and create a traveling show. The book and traveling show will publicly portray the global art community's effort to positively impact the environment through re purposing previous metal waste into great landfillart.

 

*taken from the website of landfillart.org.

 

 

I wanted to do a koi fish to represent me and my art studio: KoiStudios. When I received the hubcap, I cleaned it well with soap and water. Then I applied a couple coats of white gesso. Painting on metal was new to me, so I was taking my sweet time with it. Once the hubcap was completely dry, I sketched the fish out in pencil and then started to paint with watercolors and eventually moving on to acrylic.

 

how I received it in the mail




gessoed

 

big guy © samos 2012



close up © samos



detailed close up © samos