Archives for category: craft
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »

Where is my brain

June 24, 2015 //
0

sams brain

Ah yes, the Dedes are on the back bench for a little while again. I so wish I could work on my book, but at the moment I am overloaded with work at my part-time place. The foundation course I am teaching on has just finished and all those poor teachers out there know what that means: Heaps of marking, following up slackers and other administrative tasks. Last Friday though we had a wonderful exhibition and it was a brilliant send-off for all the students who have been working together for 18 weeks. One of the last modules I taught was fibre arts and the picture shows the work of Sam Hall. I am confident he is one we will hear more of in the future. He is now off to art school in Oxford and I wish him all the very best for his career. The artwork is a felted brain doused in red wine. The helium balloon smiles at you for a while, but when you come back a few hours later it will lie limp and deflated next to the damaged brain.

Tags , , ,
Categories Art, craft, Exhibition, Fun, Life

Campaign

June 5, 2015 //
0

pledge me

Hurrah, I have done it. The crowdfunding campaign for the Artist’s survival cookbook is finally up and running. If you pledge, you basically pre-order the book but you also can pledge for a Lil’Dede, or the real thing, a Dede! They are not often for sale. Have a look, have a heart, and pledge. :) And if you know someone who might be interested in the book, share! Get the word out! The Dedes and I are grateful for all your support.

 

 

Tags , , , , , ,
Categories Absurd, Art, Book Launch, Books, Comedy, craft, film, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Promotion, recipes, Self-publishing

Dinosaur

April 22, 2015 //
0

dinosaur

The Dedes have a day off today, so I take the chance to introduce this little monster. I know, it has nothing in common with my creations, except being a puppet. Unlike my Dedes, Mama Dinosaur is cute, soft and cuddly. I met her in class today. My students are currently working on a comic strip and it looks like one of them is following in my footsteps. She is hand stitching a series of animal characters to subsequently take photographs and invent a story of their adventure. I am certainly looking forward to the story!

Tags , ,
Categories Absurd, Art, Comedy, craft, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Social Network

Another one tries

November 6, 2014 //
2

little manager

Recently I was asked if I could teach fiber art in the foundation studies at school. I am really excited about the prospect. And I am not the only one. You should have heard the puppets cheering when I  brought home the sewing machine from school one day to refresh my skills. Little Devil decided on the spot that he will be the stylist and ordered a black tie straight away. So he is the new self-appointed manager and he will take charge of all the fashion concerns of the Lil’ Dedes as he is thoroughly convinced, if I’d only made proper dresses for them, they would easily find admirers and could be sold to good homes. Last week he invited my friend Cath for an urgent breakfast meeting and talked her into sharing her table at the Birkenhead market two days before Christmas. Good on him for being so proactive!

But then he wrote out a long wish list of new Lil’Dede characters and dresses I have to make before then. And this is always the crunch point. The Dedes, little or big, are not lacking ideas, it is just that I am always landed with all the work. Though this time I obliged and started making the dresses right away. After all, I have to refresh my skills. It was all in a bit of a rush. The first dress on the list was for  Lil’Walrus. Obviously Little Devil thought this particular chap was in desperate need of sushing up. Just between you and me, that one’s an ugly character. I am not even sure whether it is a walrus or a mole. But Little Devil might have overdone it a bit. He had designed a green robe with a lace collar. Ah, you should have seen the big tears when Lil Walrus came out of the changing room. Little Devil on the other hand was very happy with his choice. I suspect they won’t be the only tears between now and Christmas.

walrus

Categories Absurd, Art, Comedy, craft, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life

How to become an artist?

August 25, 2014 //
2

chech witch

The picture today shows a hand-crafted czech witch, which is on display at the Festival. I have my eyes on her as I see myself in her, but I can’t afford the little cutey. Pity.

This week I will give two talks. One at the gallery about “puppets in today’s world” and the other at school about my artwork. I prepared both talks on Saturday, writing down minutely what I want to say. though I know very well its impossible for me to stick to a script.  As usual I will digress on the day. On the slightest cue from the audience I am off in a tangent. Though I find writing down speeches a brilliant exercise to focus on what I am doing and condense my thoughts into easy to digest sentences. The talk I will deliver to the students will be mainly inspirational and only in the end I will touch on my own pathway. The key message is that in my opinion there are two approaches to be recognised as artist: Either by your work or by your personality. Ultimately you want to be heard in the world of chatter. If you are aiming to be recognised by your work you need to find your style: your voice. If you want to be recognised for who you are you basically have to make noise, be outrageous in one way or another. Of course nothing is as clear-cut… but there is a chance for the quieter ones amongst us.

 

Tags , , , ,
Categories Absurd, Art, craft, Exhibition, Fun, Life, workshop

Meet the Spoon Family

August 3, 2014 //
0

wooden spoons

At the Festival of Performing Objects we are going to have a Kid’s zone in the Gallery and we hope that the little visitors will take to an impromptu play. I bought a packet of googly eyes for $2 at the Salvation Army Shop, and the wooden spoons in the Everything-is-50%- off-sale at the 2-Dollar-Shop. My ethical conscience is cringing at the price, but as I am living on flour and water at the moment, I told it to shut up! For my workshops I usually make a trip to the North Shore Resource Centre to get material. This is a really good volunteer organisation that my friend Cath put me on to. They collect leftovers, recycled or surplus material and you can get a big bag of all sorts of goodies to create puppets (or other artworks) for a dirt cheap price.  The most expensive part of these characters are the squishy noses made from disposable ear plugs. Unfortunately, they only had orange ones in the hardware store.

Anyway, I got carried away embellishing them. The idea was that the wooden spoons should be really simple so that they are easy to clean. Ah well, the handles are still easy to wipe down and that is where you hold them.

 

Tags , , , , ,
Categories Art, Comedy, craft, Exhibition, Fun, Hand Puppets, Promotion, workshop

Packing up

July 31, 2014 //
5

suitcase

Oh dear, this year seems to be the year of best intentions. I am so sorry for having neglected my blog for some time. Though it doesn’t mean the Dedes have been neglected.

You might know I have lost a few of my major sources of income at the end of last year and I have been working hard to secure new income streams. Now six month later everything came to fruition at once and this just means I am rushed off my feet to fulfill all my promises. My book of “101 recipes with flour and water” is still not finished, however, I am using it a lot, but I am stuck on 51 recipes.  My backyard chooks deliver an invaluable addition to my diet too.

Recently I have taken on a part-time teaching job. My first salaried job in 20 odd years. Even though I have been teaching for a long time, it was always on a contract basis. It seems with a salary inevitably come the politics… Something I want to steer clear off as much as possible. Navigating the foul ground takes a lot of energy. Believe me, I feel some good puppet stories coming on….

The Festival of Performing Objects is about to start. This weekend I have to deliver the Dedes I want to show in the exhibition. Every Dede is keen to pack up and go. Some of them will just sit in the Gallery for the month, while others will get action in the stop-motion workshops of the last week. I have to make a decision who is going to do what. I did a lot of work in the early days of the organisation unfortunately with all the changes to my working life poor Kim (the manager of the arts centre) had to bear the brunt of the recent weeks. She did an amazing work luring puppeteers out of the underwood. I am very confident it will be a fantastic exhibition.

It looks like we are getting quite a bit of attention. The first article about the event was published this week.

HM puppets 28_7_14

Tags , , , ,
Categories Art, craft, Exhibition, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Promotion, Stop Motion, workshop

Marionettes

May 17, 2014 //
2

birdy and ghost

Uhuuu, I haven’t posted for a long time. The reason might be that the blog is called Dede puppets and I am currently going astray with other types of puppets. These here are two marionettes who are currently rehearsing for a busking gig we want to perform at the grand opening of puppet festival in August.  You might notice, that I pinched L’artiste’s tunic for the ghosty figure. That seems a bit nasty, eh, as L’artiste clearly needs his tunic for confidence. But I let you in on a secret, he actually has six or seven of them in his wardrobe. So he won’t notice one missing and I just love the material for it’s colourfulness. I am not entire happy with the two characters, but only rehearsal will bring out the flaws. The bird character is too cute for my personal liking, apart from this I don’t know where the design came from. I made it from a picture that was stored in my memory. I must have seen wooden birds of that type long time ago. He would work better if he was wooden, as marionettes rely on gravity. This one is made of dry-felted balls. To weigh his feet down I glued some old coins at the bottom, for good luck. I deemed this appropriate for a busking bird and I tell you what, he tap dances like a pro.

Tags , , , , ,
Categories Absurd, Art, Comedy, craft, Fun

New puppets

April 7, 2014 //
3

2 badi_cup

I was so itching to get back to puppet making and spend all weekend to create puppets for a project that will advocate good nutrition. Here it was important to me, that the puppets could open their mouths, but they also should show their relationship with the Dedes.  In this photograph I photoshopped two images of the same puppet together, to show it with the mouth open and closed. However, here the mouth is propped open with a aluminium tube, which I originally wanted to use. It runs inside the handle. But when the puppet was finished, I discovered, when I shake it in a certain way, the mouth opens and closes without the help of the tube and I only need one hand. So I can work two puppets at once. It is amazing how plans always change.

Tags , , ,
Categories Art, craft, Fun, Hand Puppets

White Elephant

March 26, 2014 //
4

baby elephant

I discovered a new stress-relief activity, or I should say, my friend Cath introduced me to it. She showed me the process of dry felting on Monday. Basically, you stab a pile of raw wool with a special needle. In this process the strands of wool get tangled and compress and you can shape the wool into anything you like by just continuously stabbing and adding more wool. You have to watch your fingers though, the needle is pretty sharp. So no watching TV while doing it. But it does release tension :).

This little elephant is my second sculpture. The first one turned out to be a foal-dog-kid sort of animal. Don’t ask me why my mind was set on creating a “White Elephant”, but I think he turned out well. A vistior to my studio this morning immediately had to hug the little thing. She spotted it straight away, despite my usual mess and the elepnant only being 7cm high.

Tags
Categories Art, craft
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »