Experiment

This was an experiment I tried in the kiln yesterday.  They were finally cool enough to take from the kiln this morning and this one was already broken before it came from the mold, but I think it's an interesting idea anyway.

Photos from the exhibit

This little clip gives the background for the art installation.

Photos from hanging the "Whole" exhibit and the display in the front window of the gallery.  The show runs through the end of June, drop by if you can.

Happy Creating,

Carmen Rose

WOW!

This is the coolest thing!  My kickstarter.com project has just passed 50% funding and there are 25 hours to go!  A HUGE thank you going out to:

Kim Scales

Vonda Burke

Clayton

Bekki Fahrer

Tony LaFienza

Dawn Wampler

Joel Wasinger

Jackie Kunkel

Angela Newcomb

& Sara

These dream makers have touched my heart by supporting this project and I have been SO touched by their generous hearts!

And look at this beautiful pair of rainbows from the storm on the 15th.  

I sure had fun taking a break from my work to enjoy these!  I took LOTS of photos that evening!

Have you seen my project yet?  Please surf on over and watch the video.

When I first saw it the rainbow was complete from side to side, then the second rainbow started to shine and the other end of it vanished.  Here's the last photo before it vanished altogether:

And thanks so much!!

Light and Beauty to each of you,

-Carmen Rose

Kickstarter.com Project entitled: "Whole, a broken heart, a vibrant hope."

A "WHOLE" big Thank You!

I'm so pleased to thank Steve Betz and Nikki Ross for being backers #11 and #12 for my kickstarter.com project.  Only 70 hours to go before the project ends.  Yeah, I'm feeling the suspense of whether or not the project will be funded!  LOL!

This display window for the show went up Saturday afternoon. Here are four of my 12x12 art quilts with some art glass.  The top one is "Buttoned" the second is "Set Aside."  The third is "In Pieces" and the forth is one of my personal favorites.  I titled it "Neglect."

It's really fun to have my work in the window, but since these works are so personally expressive it does make me feel a tad vulnerable.

Cloths pins in the branches hold notes that read: "A broken heart" and "A vibrant hope." 

Lower in the window the sign on the ped reads:

* * *

C A R M E N   R O S E

Whole

"An exhibit of art quilts, washed, framed and embelished.

Hand glazed art glass, found, glazed and fired.

An exhibit with a broken heart and a vibrant hope."

* * *

I hope this brings people in the gallery to have a closer look!
My Kickstarter.com project where this exhibit was born.

Still dreaming big dreams,

-Carmen Rose

Thank you!

I'm up to ten backers on my kickstarter.com project!  Only six more days to go to make this dream a reality!  Today I'd like to thank those who have backed the project so far:

you_will_succeed

Dawn Wampler

William Martin

Anthony Vilgiate

Xaver Wilhelmy

Sara Homeyer

Kim Scales

Melissa Chonka

Dawn 

Wendi Dunlap 

You all are my ANGELS!

 I'm working on quilting this one today.  I don't know what it will look like when I'm finished.

 These two before I quilted them...

 Became:  "Set Aside" and...

 Buttoned.  It really makes a difference when I've finished the quilting...

...put them through the laundry and them framed and embellished them. 

As you might imagine, sometimes it's tough just to choose which side is up!

I can't tell you how much I love what I do, and to have others partner with me

in the process is a genuine privilege and honor!

Thanks to those who have pledged to the project!

Would you like to get in on the fun?

My Kickstarter.com Project is here, go check out the video 

that explains the whole thing and then choose what you'd like from the cool pledge options! 

Thank you so much!

-Carmen Rose

Sock Monkey Give Away ~ Tell your friends!

Have you seen my Kickstarter.com project yet?  Only seven days left to pledge.

**You don't pay if the project isn't funded**

Please visit and check out my project!  Help me finish the exhibit the way I planned.  Thank You!!!

* * * * * * * * *

My little sock monkey needs a new home, so it's time to find the lil bugga a family.

I made him ages ago from socks and haven't found the right place for him.

I'm thinkin you can help me with this though...

There are three ways to enter to win this adorable rainbow sock monkey.

1 - "like" my facebook page and comment on my sock monkey announcement.

2 - make a pledge on my kickstarter.com project.

(You pay nothing if the project isn't fully funded.)

3 - leave a comment on this post with an email address so I can contact you if you win.

Of course if you do all three your name goes in the hat three times!  YAY!

I will draw the winning name from a hat on Wednesday, May 18th at 6:00 pm.  

I'll drop you a note and you can provide me with an address so I can mail out the sock monkey to you.

Please tell your friends!

Thanks,

Carmen Rose

The Opening

We had the opening reception Friday evening for the start of the "Whole" exhibit. It will be up May and June and will continue to evolve.

As you can see, it's not complete (see my sketch) but I do like the way it looks.

My artist friends and I put together a colorful table of goodies.  I was so pleased with how it turned out!  I made cupcakes and a lime mint punch.

Trio Jazz joined us, love their sound!

It was a delightful evening.  The live music, candles and flowers were a nice touch.  It was lovely to see my friends and family come out.  We also had a lot of guests through that I didn't know.  It was fun to meet people and enjoy their reaction to my work.

The exhibit is up two months, I still have a chance to complete the vision I set out with.  If you'd like to help me reach that goal, please pledge today at Kickstarter.com.  Just go to the kickstarter.com website and enter "whole" and my sketch should pop right up.  I've heard from one person that their pledge didn't go through. So if you pledged but didn't enter your information on Amazon to pay, and if your name is not on the "backers" tab, then your pledge didn't go through.  There are only these last 10 days left.  Please join with others around the country to make this dream a reality and take home a piece of the whole.  And thank you.

Here's to music, candles, flowers and.... COLOR!  (of course!)

Whole, a broken heart, a vibrant hope.

Happy Creating,

-Carmen Rose

Hurry Up!

The previous display in the gallery came down ahead of schedule and I was scrambling to get SOMETHING up. So... the "Whole" exhibit will begin with just these pieces.

And plus, my lovely camera doesn't always open it's eye all the way and so my friend snapped this cool shot. I love it!

The display isn't at all what I planned, but this part of the exhibit is in place for now until I can get the rest finished. And it's a good thing because it looks so different in a sketch than it does in person. I think I will need to spread it all out a bit more, it is a lot of color in a space that feels smaller than I remember... even though I had the measurements. So I suppose I'll tweak the plan to fit the space a bit better.

In the mean time... there is lots of work to do and I feel like I'm coming down with the plague. So... a bit of rest and hopefully I can get back at it tomorrow.

Only 14 days to go, are you the sort of person who helps make miracles happen? If so, check out my kickstarter.com project. Your pledge would be greatly appreciated.

Happy Creating
-Carmen Rose

Pieces of the "Whole" Exhibit

Once more I have been too busy to blog, so tonight (this morning) I'm playing catch up.  I heard the news online and looked around until I found streaming video online so that I could hear President Obama's address.  The top news story tonight is that Osama Bin Laden has been killed.  And while the story played out I sewed the final details on this collection.  Then I photographed this series of 17 canvases.  I take no pleasure in this man's death, life is sacred.  Death and life, revenge, forgiveness... all are fitting themes tonight as I look forward to putting this art exhibit together.

Each canvas represents a piece of my journey of the last year.  Each one is created with hand dyed fabrics, commercial batiks and in some cases hand marbled fabric and hand dyed white on whites.  I used a variety of methods in getting the color into the fiber.  All pieces are machine pieced and machine quilted.  I then put them through the laundry for the crinkly texture.  Then I frame them on canvas stretchers and embellish them with found objects.

 "Discarded 3"

A gasket I found in the parking lot, a washer from the junk yard and a new washer from Lowe's.

* * *

 "Potential"

An antique skeleton key.

* * *

"Faith in Fire"

An old key, I added enamels to it and fired it in the kiln.  I love how it turned out.

* * *

"Neglect"

Scrabble Tiles.

 * * *

"Set Aside"

 These are little circles of felt with a layer of leather on top.  They are about 1/2 inch thick, give or take.  Pieces like this are used inside pipe organs, these just happened not to fit and were set aside.

* * *

 "Storm Tossed 1"

This old weathered shell has really been through it, 

I love the swirls of color that result from a strange wear pattern.

* * *

 "Hope"

Another antique key, a personal symbol of possibility, hope and opportunity.

* * *

 "Buttoned"

A button.  Nope, it's not old or anything, it's just a button that came with the rest of a package of buttons that I have around here.  Leftovers from some project.

* * *

 "Broken"

A bit of broken china I found on a walk in the woods.  

I was intrigued with it and brought it home.
SOLD

* * *

 "Pieces"

Puzzle pieces.  

* * *

 "Solitary"

I love this old sea shell, it's shaped a bit like an artist's palette.  

 "Thoughtful"

These lovely little shells were a thoughtful gift from a friend who came home from an exotic 

place and brought me these tiny treasures.  

* * *

 "Lost"

An unknown bit that was at one point useful.  I found it in the junk yard.

* * *

 "Possibility"

Another kiln fired key, this one is green.  Love it!

* * *

 "Forgotten"

(Lower left)  This is an earring that I just discovered in my jewelry box.  

I had forgotten I had them. 

* * *

 "Storm Tossed 5"

More sea shells from a trip to the beach.

* * *

"Discarded 2"

A rusty old ring and a washer from the junk yard or somewhere.

* * *
These are some of the 12x12's in the exhibit coming up.  

More photos coming up as I continue to prepare for this exhibit.

I'm really looking forward to seeing my broken and discarded pieces come together in this exhibit.  

I believe the "Whole" will be beautiful.

* * * 

Help me put this exhibit together? 

They are $100 each, shipping included.

* * *
Happy Creating,

-Carmen Rose

More pieces of the Whole

Here's a fun one, I haven't finished the quilting on this one yet but I like it so far.

And what about this one?  Another cheerful little confection!

 Here are some of them on the design wall together:

I've finished up a pair of purple 12x12's.  This pair has hand dyed white on whites, hand marbled fabric, and some commercial batiks.  Machine pieced, machine quilted.

And after they go through the laundry they are nicely crinkled up, then framed on 12x12 canvas stretchers.

And the second one in the pair:

I added some storm tossed pieces to these, the purple in the shells seems to go nicely with the purples in the pair.

A particularly interesting shell for this one:

And a row of five shells for this one:

It's all about the details in this series.  I am having so much fun making these, does it show?

Like these?  Then pledge here.

Happy Creating,

-Carmen Rose

Dragonfly

I wanted to post another of the series before I go and bury myself in the studio again this afternoon.  This one is a 9x9 piece in pink, purple and a sagey green.  The main square is hand marbled fabric and the rest are hand dyed white on white, hand dyeds or commercial batik.  The color is a little off on this first image.

I quilted it and set it through the laundry, framed it up to 9x9 and added a lovely little forgotten dragonfly from my jewelry box.  I'm really enjoying adding an expressive little detail to each quilt.  The dragonfly has a little sparkle and the tail moves. 

My heart goes out to those in storm flattened areas.  I was there after Katrina, I remember what that was like.  Then to see such amazing damage again, it simply blows my mind.  My love to all of you in the South East today, I hope you and yours are safe and sound.

I'm working on this series of quilts for an exhibit called "Whole."  Each quilt has a found object piece included representing different aspects of my life in the last year.  Some pieces have included items from the junk yard, puzzle pieces, scrabble tiles, broken china and now a forgotten dragonfly from my jewelry box.  These bits and pieces are a little unexpected in my work but express my broken and discarded condition as my divorce nears completion. 

I was shaken by images of the storm torn parts of my homeland, as we all are.  Here the power went off and on a few times during the night and a tree nearby was down this morning.  We had no tornadoes in this area, just high winds.  The images of great loss that I saw this morning on the news reverberated with my own losses of the last year.  My home on the golf course, my dogs, my sense of security, my losses were by my own choice, theirs were not.  So as I continue to incorporate broken and discarded images into my work, I'll do so with a prayer for those who lost everything in the storm last night. 

I just updated the Kickstarter.com project with this note

"Dear friends, in light of the brokenness caused by the storms last night, I will be donating 10% of the project total to a disaster relief charity at the successful close of this project.  Please pray with me for peace, protection and provision for our friends in the South-East United States today.  Thank you, -Carmen Rose"

Another piece of the "Whole" exhibit.

I was going to try to spread these out some over the next few days, but I couldn't resist showing more photos today!

Here is one of the 9x9's of the exhibit.  It started with a very drippy piece of hand dyed fabric from ages ago.  I'm really dipping into the stash these days, never know what you'll find in there!

I quilted it up, threw it in the laundry.  When it came out I framed it up and added the little key, and this is how it looks now. 

These silly little elements of this exhibit are SO FUN TO MAKE!  For some reason it looks downright edible to me, I think I'm  hungry for Popsicles and cupcakes now! 

Want it?

A $75 pledge and it's yours.

Kickstart me!

Happy Creating,

-Carmen Rose