Susie Monday

Artist, maker, teacher, author, head cook and bottlewasher.

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The art I make is the result of a life-long love of pattern, texture and color. How I teach is a skill honed by experience (I started teaching creative arts to younger kids when I was 12). After earning a B.A. in Studio Arts from Trinity University, I helped lead an internationally recognized educational foundation, designed curriculum exhibits for schools and other institutions, wrote and edited for a major daily newspaper, opened the San Antonio Children's Museum and then, a dozen years ago, took the scary but essential (for me) leap to become a fulltime artist and art teacher.

About This Blog

This weblog is about the maker's life. The teacher's path. The stitching and dyeing and printing of the craft of art cloth and art quilt. The stumbling around and the soaring, the way the words and the pictures come together. Poetry on the page and in the piecing of bright scraps together. The inner work and the outer journeys to and from. Practicalities and flights of fancy and fearful grandeur, trivial pursuits and tactile amusements. Expect new postings two or three times a week, unless you hear otherwise. 

To reach me, leave a comment after a post, OR email me at susiemonday@gmail.com 

 

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    Monday
    Mar192007

    Art in Elgin

     Scan for Elgin2.jpg

    Here's a short heads-up. My art quilts arrived safely in Elgin for the TX Originals exhibit. If you are anywhere near Elgin (A bit outside of Austin, TX) on Saturday, March 24, I hope you will stop in to see the show. Texas Original artists will display ceramics, fiber art, jewelry, wood, sculpture, furniture, treenware, quilts and metal art.

    The exhibit will be celebrated with live music, food and beverages at a reception at Kingfisher Fine Art and Music, 116 Depot Street, Elgin, Texas.  E Flat Porch Band will play until 6.pm. but the other festivities will be from 4 to 8.  The exhibit remains on display until Saturday, April 14.

    For more information about the Texas Originals program, the artists and the event, click the link on the right hand sidebar.

     

    Tuesday
    Mar132007

    Continuous, Continual

    Altar.jpgHow do you work in a series? Or do you? Why or why not? And what makes it a series?

    I see some individual works of art -- in many different media -- that intrigue and interest me, make me want a continuing conversation with that artist. But then, I look further, and I can't get a hold of what is going on. I can't find the path and I want more than one stepping stone for the journey. I strongly believe that commiting to one (or a few) clear paths is an important decision toward having one's work taken seriously out there in the broader art world.

    And yet I know the challenge of working and reworking a theme or image or technique with the fear that someone will say, "Hasn't she done that already?"  or even worse, being bored with it myself or doubting my loyalty to a theme or direction that is played out.

    My solution recently (say the last couple of years) has been to work in several series simultaneously -- each of which has its own direction, but has some distinction, some major differing factor, from other work. So far it works for me, though I'm not sure how it works for "marketing."   Some of what I do is about the medium itself: I still want to do some art cloth for art cloth's sake -- yardage that isn't about being cut up and used for anything, fabric that exists as form enough. Right now I am continuing to make my wooden frame shaped altares, each house shaped, but I still dip back and forth on subject matter. I have one series of smaller pieces that include photographic images of the Hill Country (the Borderlands series) and I still continue to explore the image of feminine sacred icons. And now, my mermaids are really taking flight (and falls).

     But what about you? How do you work in a series?

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    Tuesday
    Mar132007

    Linking up

    I'm following the advice of Alyson Stanfield's Art Biz newsletter and linking up to a number of "blog crawlers" so that this site has more visibility. Why do I care? I am an artist, and I am a self-employed business woman. I like the creative side of this work, and I even like learning more about the business side of things. The web is such an ever-evolving sphere out/in/over there. In the world without storefronts (or maybe it's a storefront on every laptop) it's fascinating to me to find the maps that make it work.

    Technorati Profile
    Sunday
    Mar112007

    INDIE Arts

    El Cielo Studio this morning was "on-location" when producer and mixed media artist Karen Landey arrived to interview me for the July issue of iNDiE Arts, the DVD magazine that features live interviews, studio visits, on-line galleries and other on-location video of artists and their work. The project, now heading toward issue number 4, is  a wonderful way to share information and to find out more about the work, techniques and approaches of other visual artists. I'll be sure to let EVERYONE know when my interview is published, but meanwhile, I encourage everyone to look into this interesting DVD product. Back issues are available, and I plan to order the two I haven't seen soon -- and to subscribe to the future issues.

    Log into an intro  and some short previews of interview from iNDie Arts on YouTube here.

    Or check out the iNDie Arts web site here

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