Framed Artwork and New Gallery Representation

Lots of people asked to see my recent landscapes once they had been framed. I get my work professionally framed with a narrow, black wooden frame. If you’re in Whitefish, MT and need some framing done, I highly recommend my framer, FoR Fine Art. They also have a wonderful art gallery in Whitefish and Bigfork, MT and Tucson, AZ.

Here are the two biggest pieces after framing. They are approximately 20″ x 30-32″.

Here’s a couple more that I completed over the winter.

And the last one with it’s new frame. 

I have been working on getting new gallery representation and contacted a couple of places. I heard back from Northwest Handmade in Sandpoint, ID. I took 16 pieces over to them and will be taking them some snow dyed silk scarves when we go back by there in July. Yay, happy dance.

I decided to make a few more 5″ x 7″ pieces to take with me but didn’t get a chance to show them here. These are included in the 16 pieces that went to Sandpoint. If you happen to be in the area, please stop by and visit Northwest Handmade!

The five framed pieces shown at the top of the post weren’t ready when I went to Sandpoint. I picked them up from the framers and the next day, I heard back from 4 Ravens Gallery in Missoula, MT. They were interested in carrying my work too! Wow! Those five landscapes will be on display towards the end of June. Again, if you happen to be in Missoula, MT, please stop by and visit 4 Ravens Gallery.

It is great to have two galleries carrying my artwork but now I have to get busy and make some new pieces to replace any that sell. (I’m being hopeful and thinking positively.)

Feeling Batty

This summer I will be teaching at Olds Fibre Week in Canada. So I have been working on supplies for the classes. Each morning, I make a batt on the drum carder.

drum carder

This first set I am working on is for Felting Cosmic Phone Cases. So the colors are ones that you might think of as night sky.

wool batt

The colors are blues, purples, and mixes of black, grey and cool colors. Then there are contrasting embellishments for planets, stars and constellations.

bin of batts

This is the bin of all the ones I have made so far. I am up to about 18-20.

MINOLTA DIGITAL CAMERA

Here’s an example of the phone case that I’ll be teaching. So if you’re interested in taking any classes, you can start signing up on the Olds website on March 8. I will also be teaching how to felt a cup sleeve/cozie, nuno felting a scarf, felting a cat cave and felting slippers.

 

Quick Update

I worked all day today on the First Quarter Challenge for The Felting and Fiber Studio. I didn’t get finished but you can read more about it on my post tomorrow over at the studio site.

This photo is in the middle of the process. And it’s not finished yet so you’ll have to wait to see the end result.

The other thing I have been busy with is my online screen printing course. This week starts the fun stuff so I am looking forward to seeing the prints that the students create. Have a good weekend!

Gotland Locks Kindle Covers and Screen Printing Samples

I worked all day to finish editing videos and write PDF’s for my upcoming Experimental Screen Printing class. I will be making an announcement over at The Felting and Fiber Studio soon about the dates for the class and all the relevant registration information.

These are a couple of photos of the samples that I made for the class. I really enjoyed making this class as I love the screen printing process. And it makes some really cool looking felt that can then be used for other projects. I made a Christmas present from some of this type of screen printed felt but will have to show it to you after Christmas.

And I sewed up a couple of Kindle covers from the felted Gotland locks that I made a couple of weeks ago. It was pretty tricky sewing them since the felt was so thick and it was difficult to get under the presser foot. I broke one needle but finally made it through. I didn’t have a heavy needle like a jeans needle, that would have worked much better. I’m giving one as a gift and perhaps I will sell the other one. We got more snow here so I’ll be up at the ski hill this weekend taking a few runs. Hope you have a wonderful weekend and a happy holiday season!

A Felted Rock

After I made my felted rocks for the  Land Art Challenge, I got a shipment at work with sprayed foam in it. It is really a mess to unpack things that are surrounded by spray foam. It breaks into pieces and sticks to everything and it can’t be recycled. Usually we just throw it all away. But this time when I saw a larger piece of it, I decided I wanted to see if I could cover it with felt to make a rock. Generally, when I have felted an odd shaped object, I just apply the wool and felt it right to the piece. I thought I would try a different method by using a resist and then fitting the felt to the piece after removing the resist.

Foam for Rock

Here’s my foam “rock” sitting on the resist I used which is on the first layer of wool. I used the wool batts that Louise gave me. I don’t know what kind of wool it is but is felts easily. I went ahead and covered the resist, felted until it was holding together and then removed the resist. I put the foam piece inside and realized I had way too much felt. It didn’t shrink as much as I thought it would and the holes in the foam didn’t take up as much wool as I thought either. So I cut out quite a bit of felt to make it fit.

Felted Rock

Here it is drying. The pins are there to hold everything in place while it dries.

Felted Rock Drying

I will needle felt the cut edges together once it is dried so they should not show much at all. I was pleased with the rock but I think it is easier to just apply the wool over an irregular object and felt directly to the object. But it’s always good to try a different method to see how it works.

Snow in Montana

We’ve had quite a bit of snow here over the last week so I leave you with one of the photos that I took while out walking and admiring the winter beauty.