Come out this weekend!

I will have work in the W7 Collective sale this weekend. It will be the first opportunity to see/buy my new photo block collection.

I am very excited about these pieces. I took the photos within about the last year, and I had processed some of them, but having this show to prepare for led to me finishing out the set.

The photos are mounted on high quality plywood board prepped for hanging. They have a beautiful surface achieved by a hand-brushed varnish that gives the photography a layer of surface protection and ultra-violet protection. I will definitely be taking photos of them at the sale, because I didn't have time to before I dropped them off. I will have both photos and pastel paintings at W7. Come out to St. Paul this Thursday, Friday, or Saturday - details below!

New Presentation Method

I have now claimed another area of our house for studio space. This new setup shares our extra bedroom along with the excercise stuff.


I got a lovely vintage laminate table that is the perfect size to hold some supplies and some pieces to work on. (That's my drop-cloth underneath.) I've been working on a new photo product, and testing out methods and surfaces. I do believe I've found the one I like, and I plan to debut it in December (details in an upcoming post).

...testing in progress...


The end product will be ready to hang. I love the way this display method is clean and modern! Let me know what you think.

Pompeii

Awesome wedding video

Check out this awesome "cinema-style flip book" of a wedding shoot by Aves Photographic Design from Fort Worth, Texas. It is too cute... especially when the weimaraner joins them!

Click here

Meetup with Maria Thomas, Etsy CEO

Well, I said I would come back with a post about the meetup at Nye's Polonaise Thursday evening. I had a great time. I met many people from the HandmadeMN team that I've never seen in person before. Maria talked with all of us very honestly about how things work at Etsy, and specifically in regard to our questions. She was very personable and it was nice to see that she took our concerns seriously. For more on the evening, click here to view Corrin of Athena's Little Owl's report on the HandmadeMN blog.

Etsy videos

Etsy held a contest for videos promoting Etsy. I thought this one by Estellelle was too cute. It won 2nd runner up.

**Sorry, I had to remove this video, because it was forwarding my blog to Etsy.**

Around town

Last Friday, I went to the St. Paul art crawl with a couple friends. It is always fun to go around visiting the artists' studios, and finding some great art. Our favorite artist discovery was Mary Barrett. She had a large printmaking studio filled with many landscapes, primarily woodblock, but also intaglio, collage, and pigment paintings. Mary was very willing to talk with us at length about her work. She used to teach printmaking at UW River Falls. I'm sure she inspired many students!

Tomorrow, I'm going to go to a meet and greet with the CEO of Etsy! She's in town, and there's going to be an event over at Nye's. I'm very excited... will report back this weekend.

Welcome to MN Maria!

My new plants

Finally, time for my garden post... to share my newly planted perennials, and hopes for them all to come back strong and healthy in the spring. Unfortunately, my garden joy is tempered by a bout of very early snow :( We had near a half inch when we woke up Saturday morning. It melted off, and today it snowed for about 8 hrs or more straight. Much of that has melted as well, but more snow is predicted Wed. through Fri. It is really hard to enjoy your fall when there is already snow!

Here are some pics, possibly with the right name under them, and a few more names without pics.First off, in this little garden we made under the birch tree...

Meadow buttercup

Centurea Montana

Forget me nots

Valerian (Red Valerian?)

Lambs ear (which I have a tendency to call elephant ear!)
Also, daisies, and probably a couple other things.

Over by the mailbox I planted peonies and a trumpet vine. In front of the house are a purple coneflower and black-eyed susans.

Under the bay window we have hostas along with red and yellow creeping sedum.

And in the corner of the walkway, a Nishiki willow bush- very similar to the Flamingo willows we had at our last place and loved. The leaves change colors depending on how long they've been out of the bud. It is very interesting to watch.
Then on to the back yard. The perennials in the back are along the fence, to the right of the evergreen in this picture. I had to put a short fence around them, because my dog Toby thought I was making a obstacle course for him to roll his ball in, and Sasha thought I was making a bed for her.
Black-eyed Susan

Columbine (Honeysuckle)

Gooseneck Loosestrife

False Dragonhead - this one had a few flowers still on it, and the bees found it within minutes of being planted. They were just small enough to climb down inside each flower and suck out the nectar.

Monarda (Bee Balm), also Joe Pye Weed, Veronica, Liatris, Queen Anne's Lace

Many of these plants I had never heard of until the day I bought them. I am very excited to have plants ready to go for next summer already.

Additionally, we planted apple and plum trees, a couple maples, a weeping willow, raspberries and blueberries. If everything works out, we should have lots of exciting things going on in our yard next summer!

New treasury

I finally caught the treasury when it was open. I had a great selection of abstract art in my poster sketch, but yesterday, I went to check on the items, since I saw the treasury would open after not too long, and they were all blank. So instead I made another circus themed treasury, and I'll have to collect the art ones again for next time. To visit this treasury, click here.

Front page!

It turns out you can miss a lot when you are crazy busy. I was checking in on my google analytics today for my Etsy shops, and I saw a huge spike in views from September 21. I went over to Craft Cult, and searched through the front page treasuries from that day, and wah lah! My pastel piece The Thicket made it on the front page!
Thanks StudioElan!

(I was also an alternate in this front page treasury October 4. It's been an exciting week for me!)

Treasuries!

What a treat when I logged in to Etsy today... Two of my shops are featured in treasuries simultaneously! First up is a pine cone treasury by CaitlinSainio featuring a photograph from TholeImagery.etsy.com. Click here to visit this treasury.


Next up is a national parks treasury by dayinthepark, featuring one of my Yellowstone drawings from SarahThole.etsy.com. Click here to visit this treasury.

busy busy...

Wow, the month of September has been so busy for me. In addition to my day job, I helped photograph a wedding, have been working on processing those photos, had a family event, hosted a large event, babysat several times, and did a lot of landscaping at our new house! I'm pretty exhausted. I hope October is slower. I want to share some photos of the perennials I planted, but they'll have to wait another week, until I'm done with these wedding photos.

September here was exceptionally warm and dry the first few weeks. It was lovely. Today, the weather changed. It was cool, really windy, with rain coming and going, alternating with patches of sun. The wind was so strong, we were afraid our birch tree was going to go right over.

I hope everyone else is having a lovely fall!

Treasury

FuriousDreams has included me in a treasury with some other great artists on Etsy! Click here to visit and get a closer look!

Getting back to work

Well, we've been settling in at our house here. It's wonderful. We spend a lot of time out in the yard playing with our dogs. We finally have a big enough, fenced yard so they can actually run! When we have time to relax, it's a really great place, and we are thrilled with it.

Last Thursday, I drove to work, and due to a major accident on my route in, I was delayed over a half hour. Then, on my way home, I went to pick up a lovely sewing table I found on craigslist, and then my car wouldn't start. I couldn't get a hold of anyone I thought likely to rescue me, so I quickly hiked over about a mile to where I was most likely to be able to catch a bus downtown. That bus got me downtown with about 5 seconds to spare to catch the last bus of the night out to our new place. I narrowly missed having a long night on the town. Luckily, the car only needed a new battery, so we got it working again.

That was enough stress for my week though, and I decided that the weekend would consist of de-stressing. We barbecued both days, which was lovely, and I worked a lot on my digital art, which felt wonderful.

Here is another in-progress update of my digital painting I plan to hang in our new living room. Now that I've had a bit of a break from working on any of this stuff, and I'm doing it again, I feel really comfortable and natural at it. I feel like I really know how to manipulate my colors, shadows, filters, etc. to get what I want. It feels great! I've also been working on a digital wedding portrait as a gift, which I am super excited about.

And lastly, here is another in-progress piece I haven't shown yet. It's a bit of a different style. It's an architectural piece from San Remo, Italy. I've had the drawing part of it done for a while, but couldn't decide if it was sufficient as-is, or if I should add some color, so I figured I might as well add the color to try it out. I'm doing the color in a light, sketchy style. The beauty of digital is that you can always go back if you do your layers right! Please feel free to let me know what you think of these pieces.

Settling in

Well, we are all moved in at the new place. It's fantastic!

The unpacking is done. The organizing is almost there. Tonight, I sorted out my art supplies for ease of use in the office. Hopefully tomorrow I will be able to use them. Unfortunately, I am still having issues accessing the internet from my own computer. Hopefully we will get that sorted out soon. My etsy shops are open again, please visit :)

I got a treasury on Etsy tonight. Click here to visit. The photo-uploader isn't working right now. I'll add an image of it tomorrow if it lets me.

Moving

We will be moving to our new house next Friday. We have been packing up for several weeks. Our current home is a quite full of boxes and stuff! It made me a little sad to pack up my art supplies, since it means I won't be able to use them for a little while (whether or not I would have used them any way.) I tried to take the opportunity to thin them out though. I have such a hard time getting rid of art supplies- I always have so many ideas of something I want to do "sometime". I toughed up and gave away my oil and acrylic paints, as well as several random arts and crafts items.

I hope that by reducing the variety of creative implements I have, I will increase my use of them. I really would like to get some gouache paints again, and I figured it would be easier to justify buying them if I didn't have a bunch of other unused paints sitting around. After I gave those paints away though, I realized I have several canvases that I started painting but remain unfinished (see my almost first ever blog post). I will have to figure out if I should keep those too or not- only a couple are in close to finished condition. I will have to think about it for a little bit- I could maybe do some mixed media work over them if I felt like it, but most of my remaining supplies need to go on paper.

I went through a period last year where I was feeling like I should do more work on canvas. I was thinking how great it would be to not worry about framing for every piece. I thought I could use our garage for a studio, but it ended up not working very well at all. I have since come to terms with the fact that without my own large studio dedicated to painting, I am unlikely to get very far with canvas at this time. Also, I am very much more familiar with paper, as I have been working on it for so much longer, and paper can be a very beautiful thing.

I will now be putting my Etsy shops in vacation mode until a few days after our move is complete. I look forward to getting my stock listed in them again.. after we get our network set up again so I can actually access the internet from my own computer (I haven't been able to for several months). Well, I probably won't be posting here again, until after the move, but all this packing is making me and my puppies very tired :)

Treasury

I just got a treasury spot on Etsy. Click here to get a closer view at any of these beautiful photographs.

Work in Progress

Here is an image of a work in progress- a large-scale digital landscape painting. When printed out at full size, this will be 20x36". This is the first digital piece that I've attempted on this big of a scale. My husband and I are buying our first house this summer, and I hope this turns out well, so I can showcase it on our new livingroom wall!

Etsy Treasury

Thanks to RozzyToz for including one of my photos in this treasury, with so many other beautiful items.Click here to visit and look closer at any of the included items. Click here to visit RozzyToz's Etsy shop and view her lovely beaded jewelry and appetizer picks.

Puppy Love

I just started taking a socialization class with one of my dogs, Toby (the wonderful model for this portrait). I am really enjoying the class so far, and Toby is responding really well. Anyway, it inspired me to post some great dog art I found on Etsy.

This boxer by Chet Phillips of ChetArt.etsy.com even looks quite a bit like Toby :) I love the way it reminds me of a woodblock print even though it is digital art.

I also found these fantastic paper mache dog sculptures by Papier Dog at PapierDog.etsy.com - I love the way she uses color in her sculptures.

Cleo

Olive

Both these artists have many other items in their stores, so follow the links to see more!

*images used by permission*

To Italy

I just want to post a short note of empathy for those affected by the earthquake in Italy. My heart goes out to you.

Time flys by

Well, once again it's been a while since I've posted. I spent some time working with my husband and my friend, updating the webpage for our photography business, Thole Imagery. Its all together now, and we have a studio to shoot in, which is great! We are located in south Minneapolis, so it is convenient for most people in the Twin Cities metro area. We are also offering several new services this year, such as the old-fashioned hand colored look. Look for this service available for your own photos in the Thole Imagery Etsy shop next week!I also offer my digital portrait paintings through Thole Imagery as well- if you don't have a good picture to work from, come have a portrait session first!

I'm starting to add more things to my sarahthole.etsy.com shop also... I finally added the layered drawings that I blogged about here months ago! It's about time! I have tons more art ready to be listed. I have a ton of little abstract pieces I was hoping to frame first, but I might have to work on getting images of lots of them this weekend.

A Snippet

I've been working a normal 9-5ish job for about 6 weeks now. I haven't made nearly as much progress with my art as I was before that time. I also haven't been keeping up with my online sites very well, like this blog, and my Etsy shops. I feel like getting back to it and accomplishing something, but I don't feel like being on my computer as much either. I am working on cleaning out my home office/studio, and I think today I will work on a couple of drawings. Lets hope I'm able to accomplish something.

Today, we stopped by the Walker and visited the Multiples Mall: A Bookish Fair. It was great to see a lot of people there. We stopped by the booth of my friends from the Good Minnesotan and picked up some of their comics. They are very original, with great artwork. Find out more about them at goodminnesotan.blogspot.com

More on repeating patterns

After I did my last post on pattern making, my friend Benjamin sent me another method of accomplishing the same thing.

The great thing about this method, is you don't have to cut your sheet of paper. I found when I did the drawing of my dog, that my cuts weren't perfectly straight, and it affected things a little. The downfall of this method is that you may find it challenging to draw/paint on a rolled surface. Both methods can help you understand the process of how to create a repeating pattern so that you can apply it to different materials and processes though. I think I will be doing most of my pattern design on the computer, but I found it helped me understand the process to first work with paper.

Thanks for sending that tutorial, Benjamin!

Etsy Treasury

Fell Painter, of fellpainter.etsy.com has made a wonderful treasury of paintings (including one of mine) check it out at http://www.etsy.com/treasury_list.php?room_id=38522

Pattern Design

The next direction I plan to take Nikasha Designs, in addition to the digital portraits, is pattern design. I've looked at a few tutorials on using Illustrator and Photoshop to assist the pattern-making process, and I made a sample pattern tonight. I'm quite happy with the ease of use for making the pattern. I think I'll be able to do what I've envisioned in my head.

What I did here tonight, is make some quick sketches of my boy Niko. I cut the paper in half each way, and reversed the sides, essentially separating it into quadrants and taping back into a whole. After the paper is taped back together again, I drew him again, filling the new middle of the paper, so that my pattern wouldn't look like a bunch of squares lined up.

After completing the drawing, I scanned him into my computer, and used live-trace in Adobe Illustrator to turn him into a vector drawing. This was a new tool for me, but it is really cool. I brought the vectorized drawing back into Photoshop, and added colors behind it.

In Photoshop, I defined my image as a pattern, then created a larger workspace, and filled it with my pattern. All in all, it was a pretty cool process. I think it will be simpler with a fully computer-created pattern, but I am happy with my first result. Here it is:

Museum Visit

The Minneapolis Institute of Arts and The Walker co-hosted an exhibit this winter on the architect Eero Saarinen. I really wanted to attend it, because of my love of mid-century modern design, and the fact that Saarinen and I both have Finnish roots. For some reason, I thought the exhibit ended mid-December. Yesterday, however, I found out it was still up until today, so I got to see it after all. Architecturally, Saarinen designed a variety of types of buildings, from colleges to corporate campuses to homes to churches. He also designed furniture- chairs and tables, including his famous womb chair. He was also the designer of the Gateway Arch in St. Louis. Surprisingly, he managed to do so many big projects before the age of 51, as he died an early death as a result of a brain tumor.



While at the Walker, I also looked in on the Text/Messages exhibit. It is an exhibit of books by artists. For me, there were a few treats- books that I enjoyed much more, however, I have been unable to find images of them online. This exhibit is up until April, so if you are in the Minneapolis area, you have time to see it for yourself. My favorite pieces from the exhibit were by the Belgian artist Mark Luyten. They were pages out of a book, on which he made suddle abstract ink and watercolor paintings. It seems that this is a great diversion from the art he is best known for. There was also a version of Alice and Wonderland, which was illustrated by Salvador Dali. There was a book about artists, in which the majority of the text had been sewn over, leaving selected passages uncovered to result in a new text and meaning by the american artist Jen Bervin. My final favorite was by Sarah Sze, an american artist known for her delicate, elaborate sculptures of mundane materials. It was a typical legal pad, in which the pages had been strategically separated and geometric portions cut out, so that the resulting piece resembled architecture.

Happy New Year

Well, I took a holiday break without mentioning it, but I hope everyone is enjoying the new year. Here are my puppies wishing you happy holidays.