Showing posts with label artwork. Show all posts
Showing posts with label artwork. Show all posts

12.14.2011

Framed Wall Vignette



 My latest project has been putting together all of the frames I'd collected over the past couple of years into a central vignette above the sofa.



It all started with this cardboard deer head we bought on sale through Joss & Main.



[Jager ponders the deer's head looming above him]

First I started with a rough sketch of what I pictured
[in order to explain the thoughts floating in my head to my husband!]

Then I laid my collected items on the floor in different arrangements
until I was completely satisfied with the composition
[confession: These all laid on my studio floor for about two weeks while I mulled over it all] 

My biggest tip for hanging a collection of things on the wall is to:
cut newspaper clippings the size of each item!  I learned this from Young House Love.
I labeled them so I would know which piece went with what frame and taped them to the wall the way I had laid it all out on the floor.

Tools Needed:
hammer, small level, tape measure, scotch or blue tape, pencil, and various-sized nails

By taping newspaper pieces to the wall, you can then draw with a pencil where the nail should go by measuring how far down the hook is on the back of each frame.  Then just nail right through the newspaper and then peel it off the wall!



My plan is to change out the graphics for each season.  Right now I have Christmas-related prints in all of the frames.  I think it would be cool one season to have just bright blocks of solid color in each frame.



 The Close-up Details:


A shadowbox [from Target] I lined with craft paper, and hung an ornament in:





My favorite by far is the kid on the right:
It just cracks me up that as your eye moves across all of the items, you will randomly stop at the strange kid holding presents! ha!

I love finding & creating humor in design!


 And to leave you on a final note:







10.10.2011

A Beautiful Life Celebrated with Art

In honor of our dear friend Karen Bullard, who passed away this week, I'm posting about her involvement in my life and the mosaics she commissioned us to do for her gorgeous home.

This is me, Karen, and her sweet mom Beverly (that passed away not that long ago) on our annual "Girl's Lake Trip" to the Ozarks.  We always looked forward to getting together with some good wine and antique shopping!



Karen & her husband Ed collected beautiful and eclectic art from everywhere they went.  Their home is a perfect and warm representation of how all of the things you love and inspire you can come together in one loving, welcoming, and harmonious blend!

Here is the LARGE abstract mosaic she asked my mom to do for a tall niche in her home: [It also includes broken pieces of hand-painted pottery Karen admired]



The mosaic below was a smaller niche on the landing in their stairwell.  Karen & Ed had recently been to Italy and desired something resembling the Tuscan vineyards.  The label on the wine bottle is an actual label from an extremely expensive bottle of wine their friends brought them one night!



 Karen was a part of so many moments in my life I didn't even realize.  She was at many birthday parties, annual lake trips, family get-togethers, many of my bridal showers, my bachelorette party, and our wedding.

Here she is when her & her sister Kathy surprised me for a bridal shower out at an old antique bed & breakfast!




My grandma Bette, Karen, Kathy, and my mom Vicky 



This is a gorgeous one of her dancing with her husband at our wedding


Vintage photo-booth fun with her sister Kathy, daughter Olivia, and husband Ed



She will be incredibly missed by so many people.  I'm rejoicing she will forever know what it's like to live in complete presence of God from this point on. 

9.13.2011

Family Find

[Barbara Frets Simmons]

Look what I found at my grandma's recently of my Nana in the newspaper from 1985 (I was 1 year old)


Online, I also found her painting on the cover of American Artist Magazine, June 1985:


Barbara Frets Simmons 

Barbara Frets Simmons was voted “Class Artist” when she was a child and she always dreamed of going to art school.  But her father was more practical and insisted that she should get a degree in teaching…art.  After she married and began her family, she designed jewelry at home when her children were young.

By the 1990’s she was into her second career that of a well established painter, concentrating mainly on figures.  Soon she discovered sculpting and after creating several pieces she really liked she applied and was accepted in Loveland, Colorado’s juried exhibition.  She has been exhibiting her work since then. 

She continues her interest in figures – their expressions, attitudes, and gestures - and captures ordinary moments in life that people can instantly relate to.  Barbara Frets Simmons says “In my paintings, I create the environment, whereas in my sculpture, you put them in the environment”. 

 [from Sculpture in the South]


You might remember she painted Matt & my portraits hanging in our hallway:


and the tomatoes in our kitchen:


 She is famous for her beach series, sculptures, and photo-realistic style. 






My dad was so happy when she decided to surprise him with paintings of his beloved English Bulldogs!



The set of paintings of me, my husband, and my brothers that hangs in my parents' home:


Check out some of her work here: