2012

Here we are at year's end, 2012! So many new things for me in the past year.
Most painfully, some new hardware.

Also I moved studios to my a fabulous new building to share with my sister, all to ourselves! That is truly the realization of a dream.
And you can see it in there, a new (6 yr old) car "Sequin" as Cassie named it!

And finally using objects d'art long collected to collaborate on assemblages with Bran.
Here is our raccoon retablo.

I have so many ideas to come to fuition in 2013 and I eagerly anticipate all the new things in the year to come!
My list of things to look forward to includes:
A healthier body, mind and soul
Massive expansion of creativity and production
Mastering new skills
Drinking more wine

One does want to imbibe on occasion.Happy New YEAR!

Space

Getting things set up at work in a purposeful way, I'm sometimes surprised at how much great stuff I have. It's all waiting to be made into something else, something way better.

Last night I got this set up, at least temporarily.
The feeling of the new space down the hill is so perfect; relaxed, clear, beautiful, conducive to productivity, energetic, it feels right.

There's a window in front that casts a bright half moon across the floor and up the wall in the afternoon.

Here's the window. Roxi slumbers comfortably underneath.

I've been working on jewelry and cleaning, organizing, arranging and settling in this week. Santa's workshop is a merry place indeed.
All I want for Christmas is to be here!

Last Saturday was another open house at the gallery for Clearwater. We made some big changes and I must say it looks gorgeous. This is just one wall and I'm sorry I didn't take pictures of the others, but I was whooped, also this wall has a bunch of my work on it.

My sister and I collaborated on several pieces with objets d'art from our precious personal collection. This is one of my favorite sweet little goat skulls from Mississippi.
"Goat Door Knocker"

This one is from my best friend's personal collection, it is her wedding gift. The skull was actually her's, I snuck it from her place while I was house sitting! It was months ago and I can only assume she hasn't noticed it was missing...I hope!
Once again, I made the silver chamfron and Brandi sculpted the horn from paper mache.
"Unicorn Skull"

Here is really a favorite of mine from Brandi and I. I think the skull was from Brandi's collection and the rest was my own hoarded items and jewelry bits and pieces.
It gives me a feeling of giddy anticipation looking through the convex glass window to the secret inside...

"Cat Retablo" It's a little kitty-hoogitt-boogitty-box!
This was a clock case I found and only loved for the box; the clock itself was gyppy and unremarkable. I cut the window from a circle to an oval to accommodate the little Italian brass frame with bubble glass. I buy and hoard any form of bubble glass I find because I have an affinity for things behind it. But I don't have it just to have, I eventually use it for something special, like this.
We added a crown which was the wick surround from a tiny oil lamp, which you can hardly see here. Affixed to the skull also were a pair of tiny gold wings and a button with a vintage rhinestone set in its center.
I added some gorgeous ruffled ribbon Bran picked up from M&J Trimming in New York to the inside of the window to add an even more Victorian touch. This piece is so much fun!

I think we did an amazing job in a very short time. Brandi took charge of hanging the show in the gallery, which she excelled at and took to like a fish to water.
Our pieces looked fantastic displayed among Thorin Medford's fire paintings. The show was a wonderful opportunity to breathe fresh air into the Clearwater Gallery.
Now, just wait 'til next time...

Studio Movin'

The saga continues!
I have been lucky enough to share a large studio with my sister Brandi for over a year now and we just got luckier. I just moved studios a week ago and the new one is a huge improvement. Plenty of space, ventilation, running water, natural light. We have our own building and can be sequestered more in the way we like. It's just perfect.
Here's a piece I started on since moving in...just playing around with materials.

Roxi is a home girl, but she seems relatively pleased with the new digs. It's no big deal to take her outside and I think she gets less antsy. I know I do. Plus we can open all the windows!

Here's my first creation to break in the new space! It's a beautiful assemblage with silver and wood, metal and bone, hard to see details here. Just me hamming it up.

I used the underside of an antique silver tray. Polishing Mom's silver when I was a kid, I always noticed how gorgeous the patina always is underneath. I'm so taken with the colors and textures. Reminds me of bluing and color case hardening in fine guns. Hard to duplicate.

It's comforting to know that as time flies by, I am making progress. Movin' on up. I look forward to years of productive creativity in this new space. I was looking through my pictures in the computer for this post, sequentially from now on back through the year. It automatically started flipping through them chronologically and just just sat and watched my life flash before my eyes. Really. Birthdays, cars, family, friends, vacations, weddings; a staggering number of snapshots of this year of my life. It just seems to keep speeding up, which causes me to have to enjoy it even more.
I am thrilled to get to take another huge leap forward in this, the very last month of the year. I'm not saving up my resolutions for the New Year!

WATERWORKS Studio!

So much to be thankful for these days. My sister & I are moving into a 3100 sq. ft. studio, with garage doors, climate control, running water, out own bathroom and an enormous electric hoist! We can hardly believe our good fortune.

We signed last week and are moving across the parking lot into our own building this week. We have yet to move the gigantic pain in the butt shelves so right now it all looks like a huge garage sale threw up in there. But it's all coming together.

When I went to look at my old studio over a year ago, I was hoping it would be in this building:

It was actually a separate one behind this one, but now it's mine. Ours. And we have a 3rd studio mate also but there is plenty of room.
I will be able to wheel things outside to spray lacquer or to strip pieces. I have running water in the studio! I could conceivably drive my truck in there to work on it. I'm just itching to cut out & upholster a headliner for the cab and I have a ton of other little things in mind...
December is a crazy month and I really have my work cut out for me just getting set up in here, but o the anticipation for what the new year will bring!
Happy Times!

Aunting

The best thing about being an aunt is passing on lore and tradition and participating in all the childhood rituals. Also creating new ones! And getting to grant the occasional wish or two. It all makes life bigger.

Nobody celebrates birthdays like kids do! They relish the occasion to the fullest.
The part I didn't notice before was how your birth is an enormous milestone in the lives of those who remember it. I remember a clear sequence of events in tandem with the lives and ages of each kid. I took stock in remembering my first niece's birth, 14 years ago. Too much to squeeze in here, but oh my how I love that girl.

I've just had two kid birthdays in a couple weeks, and of course the time of year for all manner of celebration, we've had a ton of fun. I am still riding the wave of the surgery and had to completely stop everything in my life for that but I have been lucky enough to engage in lots of kid time. And really, is there anything better? Why, just this week I taught the girls to take the top off a glass Coke bottle with a BIC lighter and drilled a hole in a coin for Danny so he could put it on a string and try to use it in vending machines (which of course, it won't). As backup, I taught him how to hypnotize someone by swinging it "back and forth, back and forth" in front of their eyes like they do in movies.

I made Danny's present at my workbench with him in the studio one day this week. I love making stuff with them, just like I loved watching and "helping" Mom & Dad make stuff. If I had been around my aunts I would have loved to have been on the inside of their world too.

I got his cake made and took the frosting to decorate there and when I was too tired, the kids had a ball doing it themselves. Everybody wins!

Oddly, I  can believe it was 7 years ago when Danny came along, and what a long strange trip it's been indeed. Time goes by so much faster now. Next thing you know, it'll have slipped away.
You've got to do everything you can to have fun right now.

Halloween 2012 Review

Halloween 2012 starts, as always in the kitchen. In the McKenna family, things are generally executed spontaneously. One out of 3 costumes were acquired in advance this year, Ellie's Sally costume (thanks to Mimi) and Danny & Cassie's were done on the spot!
Danny wanted to be a Mummy this year, and I've got to hand it to him, the kid has a good sense of the classics. Never has he gone as a cartoon character or anything commonery like that. So his Dad ripped up strips of sheet and I hot glued them onto some sacrificial clothes.
Result, adorable Mummy boy!

Trick or treating in historic downtown Concord was ideally whimsical. Gorgeous old houses decked out in full on Halloween regalia. The perfect slice of Americana. The woman who owns this house is an artist and clearly a Tim Burton fan. She made all these Nightmare Before Christmas props herself, and since Ellie was dressed as Sally from the movie, we had to get picture of her in her natural environment. By the way, I am constantly bowled over by how stunningly, exceptionally gorgeous each of these kids are. Can you even stand it?

Above is a picture of the crew before heading out: Cassie-Witch, Ellie_Sally, Zoe-zombie prom queen? Danny-Mummy!
At the end of the night (or so we thought) we found ourselves in my car, parked right in front of Little Robert's Pub, with Brandi on her way from work to meet us. Danny had to pee "really really bad", so we decided to meet inside for food, drinks, merriment and bathrooms.

E As we were walking in, Ellie said "So a zombie, a mummy and Sally walk into a bar..." Cracked me up! It's not a joke, just an observation on questionable aunting. After she lead Danny to the bathroom, she reported back to me that there were kids in the back sorting through their piles of candy; my aunting was indeed acceptable.

After suffering through some...interesting performances on open mic night we were treated to the superfly musical stylings of Melodies Curse, a rockin' jazz band of young super cool musicians. Ellie being a budding musician herself got to see and hear this cool cat play alto sax. It was entirely bad ass.

Pain from my hip was eclipsed by the overall magic of Halloween with the kids. A good time was had by all! The sad part was when I had to retreat to my car during the trick or treating after walking a long way trying to keep up, I do hate to miss any of the festivities. But as I sat in my car, feeling gypped and dejected about my physical state, my pain was eased by the true magic of Halloween happening all around me. Precious little gremlins milling about, everywhere you look, a balm for the soul.
Another precious day and memory made in the lives of my beloved nieces & nephew. A bargain at any cost.

Halloween Nightmares!

Happy Halloween everybody! Now let me tell you the story of The Costume Nightmare.
It was 1981 or so, the Strawberry Shortcake gang was all the rage for little girls like me. There were dolls and a cartoon. I had a Strawberry Shortcake baby doll with a little Cupid's bow mouth, who would blow you 80s chemical strawberry breath kisses when you squeezed her tummy, I was enthralled.
I was a young student at Charlotte Country Day School, and every year they had a Halloween Parade where the little kids could wear their costumes to school and lower classes were marched in line around the entire sprawling campus, which included grades K-12. In other words, you got to show off your Halloween chops to all the kids, even the big ones who were pretty much grown. It was all very exciting.
                             Here I was dressed up for a school play that same year:

I usually stuck to the classics, witch or ghost, but this year I wanted to go as Strawberry Shortcake, or at the very least, her bff Lemon Meringue girl. I reported to Mom my request, and eventually she went to Morris Costumes and brought home my store bought costume in a bag.

I guess everyone wanted to be her that year and I missed the boat, because Mom came home with...... the Strawberry Shortcake gang's nemesis....Evil Blueberry Pie Man!!!

I was horrified! Not only did I not get to be Strawberry Shortcake or any of her cute little friends, or a witch, or a ghost....I had to be the villain! The Villain, can you imagine my horror? Blueberry Pie Man (I thin his actual name is "Purple Pie Man" or some such). What 5 or 6 year old little girl wants to dress up as a man, let alone big mean ugly Blueberry Pie Man, constantly foiling the heroine's merry plans?

I don't remember why this simple conundrum couldn't be resolved to my liking, the short version is I wound up having to parade my Blueberry Pie Man dressed self all over the entire campus, in front of every class, even the 12th graders! I'll never forget the big kids pointing and laughing at me, "HA-ha! Look at Purple Pie Man over there!" Private school kids are so mean! Okay, to be fair all kids are. But that wrapped private school up for Dusti. I was done, I hated it there, and I only had to stay K-2, thank Gods!
Nevermind that it was a vastly superior education. We got to do ceramics in art class, a dedicated room for fine art, when I was in 1st grade, or that I started learning French when I was 5, or even that I got one on one private tutoring when I was convinced I would never learn to read, or that while I was not a stellar student, once I got to public school in 3rd grade I rocketed to the top of the class, a year ahead of my new classmates; I already knew how to write in cursive a full year before CMS students.
Those jerks laughed and pointed at my accidental Halloween costume; the only thing hiding my pain and shame, a plastic villain mask. There's only so much a little girl can take and I stood all I could stand and I couldn't stands-no-more!
So please, for your kid's sake, by God if he or she wants that good damn cartoon costume you let 'em have it!
Priorities y'all.

Halloween Scavenger Hunt

It's that time of year, graveyard scavenger hunt time! My niece Cassie wanted to host a Halloween sleepover and I was called earlier today and asked if I could chip in with some festivities. I've been thinking about doing like an Easter egg hunt, but with Halloween stuff. I love the idea of going around and finding pretty little items hidden where they don't belong.
This is my favorite cemetery for miles around. I got there around 6 PM to plant the goods for the kids to find.

I had a few skull necklaces to stash. I "hid" things on a beginner level of difficulty to find since we would be in the dark and looking with flashlights.

Some of these graves of from Revolutionary War times!

The sun was just setting as I left.

I bought all the plastic glow in the dark skeletons the Dollar Tree had: 3. These guys were so fun to photograph!

Here is Bran with her tribe, there were 4 other kids there, we had a passel! Kids were everywhere and running around, flashlights bobbing up and down, hunting for the treasure and re-hiding and finding it. Cassie and Danny cleaned house the first few times, but I think the fun was in running around with your own flashlight. Kids are so easy to please.

Ellie was so photogenic, as she is all the time. I can not believe what a stunning fashion plate she is! Well, I can. She's been glamorous since she was being born.

A good time was had by all! We are going to do this every year now. I highly recommend this activity! All it takes is some Halloween treasures, any gyppy kind will do (I spent less than $10) and a flashlight for each kid and a great cemetery, the older the better. Next year we will be better prepared, with paper & crayons to make rubbings from the head stones. Just think of all the possibilities!
Happy Halloweening!

October Days

Today I was back into action! Mostly.
I went to the studio this afternoon and stayed for figure drawing. I was working on some earrings, I left for dinner and stopped by this cemetery that I haven't been to yet. Such a treat.

Cemeteries and power cuts are two of my favorite places, and this is two in one!

I assembled these from AR 15 shells. I am a spent shell junkie and I love working them into things. My sweet uncles smuggled these to me from the Farm this dove season.

At figure drawing, I was the only one working in the medium of Crayola! I had to edit the color out for this to show up, but it was a beautiful blue. I actually really enjoyed working in crayon. No mess, nice texture, cheap, colorful. I think I'm treating myself to a box of 64 next week!

I am tired and sore and looking forward to falling asleep with an icepack, but damn I loved it!
Tomorrow I get to bake my niece's 14th birthday cake and I have a masterpiece in the works! All she knows is it will be part pumpkin poundcake, and the rest is top secret. I'm pretty excited about it...

Happy Birthday Dad!

Happy birthday to my awesome Daddy!
Where to begin...
So many things I got from him, my love for the beauty of highways & infrastructure.

He taught me how to draw, fostered and encouraged drawing and all forms of art since before I can even remember.

He taught me to shoot, first recurve bows, then air rifles, from a young age. Here is my nephew Danny, learning from the master at about the same age I was when I started.

He taught me how to use a chisel for the first time when I was in second grade and my bunny "Jeff" died. In one fell swoop he started a lifelong love of woodworking and mourning rituals and monuments when he taught me to make a lap joint wooden cross in the basement (ah, the magical realm of Dad) to put at Jeff's grave.

He also learned me on picking up roadkill and then skin it when we ran across a beautiful red fox when we found one while driving home to The Farm one afternoon. When I picked this one up last spring and brought it home to skin it, it was Dad who's sage tutelage I hearkened back to during the entire process.

I truly feel ill equipped to do justice to the subject of my Dad in writing. If you know me, you're well aware of my deep love and respect for him. He has been so amazing, loving and supportive my whole life, now just as much as when I was little.

Smokejumper, artist, writer, philosopher, outdoorsman, entrepreneur, renaissance man, animal lover, independent thinker, masterful story teller, musician and general bad ass, he is a better Dad than anyone could ever ask for.

There are few things in the world sweeter to me than sharing a tear inducing belly laugh, or a deeply philosophical discussion on spirituality and cosmology with him; either flows just as easily between us as the other.

You know how people always say girls grow up to marry their Dads? Well somebody point me to an equivalent to Dennis Pearson-you can't-they don't makee 'em like that anymore!

Often imitated, never duplicated, my Dad is one of a kind and there aren't enough words to explain why.

Maybe for his birthday next year I will have improved in my writing ability enough to take another crack at it but for now, happy birthday Dad, I love you!