Patterny

For my recent birthday I asked all my facebook friends to send me a pattern as a present. I hate all the monotony of 50 people just saying Happy Birthday on my wall. It was fun seeing what people sent me. And more fun playing with the images to transform them.

 I mostly worked on abstracting and thresholding the images to get a graphic that I could turn into a silkscreen positive. I'm currently teaching a fabric printmaking course at Fleisher, and it was nice to have some examples to bring in of how to make a positive for photo process.

 I don't know where these will lead, but it feels good to be producing something. The exercises in the creativity books I've been working through the last 2 months keep pointing out my obsession with pattern as a way of imposing my personal order on perceived chaos. Life is messy. Art doesn't have to be.

 I also played with digitally collaging all the images that were gifted to me together. There were 2 waves of offerings resulting in 2 images.

 Do they say more about me and my own aesthetic or about my friends' perception of me? Or my friends' sense of aesthetics? I think of the 2 I prefer the one below... less cluttered, more landscapy.

 Once I got started I couldn't stop. So I played some more with the patterns I'd extracted and superimposed them on some photos that have been waiting for me.

 They are both evocative of winter. Cold and dark and snowy. My body is ready for Spring and flowers, but my eyes do love Winter contrast. In Winter you see the bones of everything.

I've been trying to be more creative and productive. All this digital play is fodder for my needle and thread eventually. I'm spending more time in my studio corner than I had been. I also finally got up the drive to launch my own website. It is a start. Check it out www.marieelcin.com (I so love being really the only person in the world with this name....) Thanks to the people at Heavy Bubble for hosting and making it so easy.