New Love

Overgrowth
Originally uploaded by m.Lee

Hello, it's me. Marissa. I used to fit pretty nicely in an artistic box and I was comfortable with it. I mean, I may have only done printmaking for the past two years but I did do unconventional printmaking. And I really enjoyed going back and doing it again on Wednesday. It felt fresh again now that I have many other things to feed my artistic spirit.





But today (Thursday), I drew a card from my little inspiration deck that said "do the opposite" and this is what I came up with. Yesterday was all about printmaking and today was all about taking an old not quite good enough but still too cool to rip up and turn into various things print into something new. First I painted the sides and attached the print to the gallery wrapped canvas. Took a break to eat lunch and get some blee love and then I got down to it. Honestly not much thought pre-construction went into this piece. I started by putting some papers down and moving them around, cut a few new ones for it and then went about attaching and sealing everything. Finished off with some Sharpie lines before the final topcoat.

I am pleased. Right now the reproduction is listed in my mLeeRedux shop while I work out a price for the original. I'm pretty attached to the original, but at the same time I want to set it free to a loving home so it will be priced significantly higher than the $10 reproduction, but will be a fair price considering how much time, effort and I think skill went into this piece. Until then it will be sitting above my computer desk away from the sun so I can enjoy. I think on a nice day I am going to go outside and use some UV sealant on all of my collages. Don't want those fumes in here, especially with blee around.



Lost is on tonight. We are going to Tivo it so we can skip the commercials, of course!

Goodnight to some, and good morning to others.

daily themes

theme for the day - Day 1
Originally uploaded by m.Lee

I've started doing these from cards that I wrote and put in an empty drawer. At night I shuffle them up and pick two. Then when I sit down to do some art I keep them in mind. We'll see how it goes. I didn't have much time for art yesterday so all I ended up from these suggestions was this simple sketch, but it was good to get back to my daily sketching.

Today I have:
Change Tools
Read a Page from the Closest Book (that would be Eat, Shoots and Leaves



My birthday ended up better than I thought it would be when I woke up feeling horrible to bad weather early yesterday. Before I knew it the skies had cleared and it was a beautiful spring day for me. And since Jon had the day off we were able to enjoy it together with our daughter. And that is all I need.

We've been in Boston for five years now so I know winter is not over, but I do think it is safe for me to hope that we will have more good days than bad.

Now to show off some recently listed reproductions from my mLeeRedux. I'm working to keep both that and mLee fresh this week.

Giddy!

Mermaids - #18 Collage
Originally uploaded by m.Lee

I am so ridiculously proud of this piece that I am giddy. And I managed to do this with a teething baby. Basically every moment she gave me piece I would work on it a bit more. You can check out the time consuming process here.

You can fine the original in my mLee shop and the reproduction at mLeeRedux. The original is ready to hang, the reproduction is easy to hang.

Jon is sick and I ended up sleeping on the sofa last night because his congestion caused him to snore and that was keeping me up. I don't know how women sleep with husband's who snore! One night was bad enough. So I was on the couch with the dog. Despite this I got a decent rest because I brought my good pillow with me.

Time to wrap up blee for some soothing that beats a teething ring and a shot of baby Tylenol any day. Moby wrap time.

Happy Friday and have a good weekend. I probably won't be back until Monday but you never know. Don't forget that my contest ends tonight! Mail goes out early tomorrow morning for 1PM pickup.

New Shop! mLeeRedux on Etsy

framed reproduction!
Originally uploaded by m.Lee

Wish me luck! My heart is racing from it, I finally opened up a second shop for my reproduction prints. High quality archival prints in various, easy to frame sizes. I am going to stick to selling reproductions of my more expensive pieces and never in the same size as the originals. My 4" x 4" block prints and ACEOs will not be reproduced.

I'm trying to emphasize the whole contrast and connection between the shops with the banner and the avatar.

I wasn't comfortable with my mixed-media collages considering how much work went into them. I still think they are a bargain considering how much of myself I put into them. But I know what it is like out there and want to offer quality alternatives. While I have sold reproductions in my main shop before and fairly successfully I never felt totally comfortable having them side by side plus they would end up getting buried with all my originals, which I list much more frequently. Especially since I don't re-list the same reproduced images over and over again. I don't do limited editions because as a printmaker limited editions are limited for a reason other than inflating the value. But I am not a machine either so while they don't have a number on them they are far from mass produced.

It was a rough day. blee was very high needs and I was very low energy. I didn't end up getting to do anything with the paper cut cup up last night and I still have some orders to ship. I am going to get to packing them up and then trying to at the very least draw something since other than a doodle I have not sketched today.

Have a good night and an even better morning and day.

*muah*

Love you all, thanks for participating in the contest and keep the suggestions/ entries coming!