Keren Kroul....

Congratulations on the Minnesota State Arts Board Initiative Grant!  It is well deserved.

 I can't wait to see the work that gets made by Keren this year.  She paints these lovely, large multi panel watercolors that are map like depictions of memory.  Her use of color is really quite lovely.  But I think one of my favorite parts are the negative space shapes.  Please visit her website to see more work, and venues at which you can see it in person.  She is booked out nearly three years!

"Unquiet Mind"

"Gray Matter"

"Gray Matter" detail

"Abstractions/Constructions"

It's a little like Christmas....

I've not been posting, but it is not that there is nothing going on.  Just travel, visits and family taking precedence.  In that time though, I have had the good fortune to spend some of my Minnesota State Arts Grant monies.  I've just barely gotten everything out of the box, and I have yet to figure out where to put it in my studio/dining room.   

I am the proud new owner of a Foredom Flex Shaft Drill.  With the help of a colleague, I first used his drill to make the hole in the back of my dolls, in which I inserted the sleeve.  It was a slick way to making their installation simple....all that needed to happen then was a hole in the wall, a rod inserted into the hole, and the doll and sleeve slid right over the rod.  Thank you so much Robert for teaching me this process!  I am always making these bodies with no idea how to have them live in the world.  

Drilling is all I have used it for.  But I'm excited to learn what else is possible.  There are all sorts of other tools i'm looking forward to exploring...sanding, grinding, polishing.  It's the beginning of my "manipulating a surface" education.  The four dolls I have going now will all be finished with this tool in my studio. Now I have to order a saw for cutting the carbon rod.