Studio Visitors to Cheer Me!

Nora Waddell and Boni Jaworski

Today I was blessed with visitors to the grotto studio. Nora Waddell, good friend from St. Barnabas Church, our faith community, brought an artist who is a good friend of hers, Boni Jaworski, a long time Deep River resident. Boni is a watercolor artist, among all her other interests, and a member of the Valley Artisans Cooperative here in  Deep  River. Both were fascinated with my press and small collection of type and other art equipment and supplies. It was wonderful to share the studio with them!


As I came back to the studio I was able to add more elements to my Almost a Nun artist's book and to get out one of my wooden bookcovers to begin planing the layout of the page for the manuscript leaf that will be held inside.

Almost a Nun

Wooden folio bookcover

 

Folio Inside

The inside embellishments for Almost  a Nun are coming along slowly-I find that I have more to include than I have space for in the book, so tomorrow will be all about "less is more"!!! I made the wooden bookcover last summer at the cottage. It has brass mini piano hinges and a brass clasp, both from Lee Valley Tools. The inside folio is Arches 300 pound watercolor paper. I coated the wooden cover with 3 coats of tongue oil, let it dry in the sun for a couple of days, and then closed it with the paper inside. I was hoping to have some of the tongue oil seep into the folio for a specific aging effect to the paper and it has worked. I hope tomorrow to add the text and illumination to this folio and finish attaching the folio to the cover. This wooden folio book will end up with it's own marbled paper box for safekeeping.

I spent most of late yesterday afternoon and last night updating my blog/website and my online shop. Pages have been added here for gallery and book arts items as well as information about commission work. It feels wonderful to have my pages here fuller with more representations of my work to share with others.

Having visitors today to the grotto was wonderful. Nora and Boni's energy for my studio, my work, and my creative verve were so inspiring! Being able to share my story with these two wonderful souls helped to bring many ideas to the forefront that have been bubbling just under the surface of my conscious mind these past months. Being able to share creative ideas, information about materials and supplies, and our own life stories was amazing.

It once again reminded me how important it is to share our stories with one another. Reaching into our personal 'story archive' of our world to share both our visual and spiritual vocabularies, enriches the experience of living in community with others. This type of interaction is essential for artists as they tell their story through their work, using their own visual vocabulary, to bring their souls into the world. My own creative verve vibrates and my aura is filled with joy when guests come and listen to my stories, and share their own. My work process, with each breath I take and each stroke I make, incorporates these experiences and helps to bridge the thin-ness between dream and reality, between the path and the journey, between this world and the next, .

All will be well, and all will be well, and with the joy and peace of God, all will be well!

Thanks for reading!