#Art – Create to Frame

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How to choose department store frames to exhibit your student artwork. If you are doing art school save money. Get savvy. Create to frame!

The goal for this post is for you to try out creating your artwork so that it will easily fit into a standard frame. A frame from a department store. The example here is framing a 12 x 12 painting.

Department store frame with custom mat

I could cry when I think of the amount of expensive custom frames I’ve had made up in my days as an art student. This was all because I created artworks that didn’t look right in standard size frames. For an art student that’s ‘flat out rubbing two sticks together’ framing is a necessity rather than a luxury.

Think neat and tidy.

Think neutral tones so that you can use and reuse the frame/s for various presentations.

Think about something that scrubs up well in your student exhibition. Are you better to have 3 or 4 the same size and colour so that they can be grouped together?

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#Art -Watching Pencil Muddy the Paint

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(with audio) “Every artwork is a potential masterpiece” but you don’t always know what will look good, especially when you are starting out. I never want to set up people for failure so today I am sharing some tips on life drawing when you’re starting out.

Difficulty spells disinterest

My students one year were given a 12 inch square canvas to paint a picture of themselves and something that identifies them. One student showed me her detailed pencil drawing drawn directly onto the canvas.

In my mind all I could see was the frustration she would be setting herself up for. Having to paint such detailed information onto that small canvas. Watching the pencil muddy the paint or the paint beading over the graphite. Watching the paint go in spaces not intended. Alarm bells as difficulty spells disinterest at the early stages of artmaking in my books.

You live and learn as a art teacher. I bet the next lot of students were bored to tears when I advised on keeping it simple and not too detailed.

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#True Story – He fell off a ladder

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Life is precious and unexpected tragedy quashes thoughts of joy.  
It reaffirms that you need to put blissful times in your life. Don’t avoid doing your will. You just don’t know when your time is up. That is this man’s legacy. 

He went to the garage and to get something off the shelf.

“He’s been out there a while” you think to yourself. “I’ll just see what he’s up to”

‘Famous last words’. If you had known what was ahead would you have walked through that garage door so nonchalantly?

He was there on the garage floor.

He died suddenly, not fading away in some manky nursing home. You know those homes. They smell of pee and people walk around with dolls that they think are babies.

There is no note. There is no misadventure. There is just the memory of you nagging him to stop relying on that shelf to reach further up from the step ladder. “It’s dangerous”, you said. 

#Poetry – Tumbling down

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With grinding teeth and sobbing tears my recent hopes, my greatest fears, came tumbling down into a mess. I hate these times I must confess. Cause when your world comes tumbling down there’s no-one there to ease that frown, and so you dwell upon each thing you cannot change…it sure does sting.

You can’t change what has happened and though a scar remains, that scar remains an emblem of life’s struggles and it’s pains. There is no silver lining. Your tears they’ll come to naught. Regardless of the matter nor how you feel distraught. 

So come on there brave soldier, let’s once more bare the load. Take up your pack upon your back, trudge forward on the road. Just remember it’s a journey with blissful times and pain. So focus on the good stuff and stamp them in your brain.

Photo by muhammad nuri on Pexels.com

#Poetry – Why artists paint

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It’s colour, it’s form, it’s shade and technique. It’s the artist personified, original, unique!

We’re all just creative and passionately draw. We’ll draw on your woodwork, your wall or your door. Just give the OK and we’ll be there today, drawing pictures and paintings ’til the day gets away.

Did you want a commission? We can help you with that. We’ll pull out our paints and put on our hat. With berets in place we’ll draw up the plan. We’ll sort out the colours cause you know that we can.

At the end we’ll stand back with arms folded and beam. It’s no longer blank space…it’s an artists dream.

DEE GRANT 2021

#Poetry – Fishing Rod Races

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The fish may not be biting but bored they’ll never be, cause they’re running on the boardwalk right there in front of me. 

Are they fishing rods or horses cause they seem to gallop on, pounding the boardwalk with their playful cheery song.

Boys with cheeky grins, with rods extended out. They run the race, reach the end, and turn themselves about. 

With slower pace these thoroughbreds wander back to fish. They bait their hooks, cast their lines. I know for what they wish!

I was walking along the boardwalk today. It was overcast but I was struck by the playfulness of a few boys that had come down with their dad to fish. Fishing with dad as a kid I know it can be ages before you get even a nibble. Great to see these boys were mixing up their day with this odd race along the boardwalk. It was hilarious!

Photo by Mau00ebl BALLAND on Pexels.com