by Marja-Leena 
I’ve come down with a cold, so I’m not mentally up to clear thinking and writing. Instead here’s a visual treat for the day, another one of some objects that I scanned for fun a while ago. Right now this brings back happy memories of beachcombing and warm sunshine – it’s unseasonably cool, windy and wet here!
If you missed seeing the other scans, have a look here and here.
by Marja-Leena 
It’s Easter Sunday evening here and I now have time to pause and think. Some spring cleaning chores done, this morning we enjoyed the visit of our middle daughter’s family. Babe is five months old today and she keenly watched her big sister gleefully hunt for Easter eggs hidden in potted plants, pillows and bookshelves. (It was raining outside!) We all shared in the goodies, plastic eggs we’d filled with dried fruits and nuts with some sugar-free dark (milk-free) chocolate squares. (Do you think I could find Easter chocolates without milk?! Hey chocolatiers – there’s a whole market of health and allergy conscious parents out there!)
Did anyone notice that this blog and my email were down from Saturday evening until this afternoon? My apologies! Our cable company said they couldn’t get anyone out here until Thursday because of the long weekend. Not happy with this, husband spent the afternoon trying to get our internet service back. He found that the modem, which the cable company figured was broke, was okay. He checked for breaks in the wires in the crawl space under the house. The outside cables from the telephone line to the house also looked okay – these had been replaced a couple of years ago when we switched companies because they were badly chewed up by squirrels!
Well, the problem was in the splitter attached to the outside of the house. Husband switched the internet and television cables – bingo! We have internet again though it’s slow, but no TV, which is not a big loss for us infrequent viewers. We can wait until Thursday.
Tomorrow is the big day at our house. We are hosting a pot luck lunch for the printmakers in the studio and several in the community. It is our opportunity to come together for some social cheer and to wish Tae-Huk Kim, our artist-in-residence many thanks for his friendship and generosity in sharing his knowledge of Japanese woodblock printmaking. Kim, thank you, bon voyage and good luck as you return to Korea!
Dear readers, I hope you are all having a great Easter and Spring weekend (without technical hazzles)!
by Marja-Leena 
Much of my art practice since the later 1980’s has been photo-based. I have often expressed in these pages my desire and need to go on photo expeditions to build up my image library, and the more exotic and archaeologically interesting the better.
In the meantime, it’s amazing what one can find around the places we live and work. For years I’ve eyed the concrete floor in the printmaking studio with its rough textures such as embedded metal rings, cracks from former wall joints, and general rough patches left behind as traces from its previous life as an industrial shop of some kind.
A couple of months ago when I had our older digital camera with me in the studio, on impulse I took a number of photos of the floor markings. I wasn’t entirely happy with the results, though the idea still attracted me. Today, I took in our new camera which I’m still learning to use, and took lots of shots. Hey, most of them are really great, like abstract paintings with textures, some even show the patches of colour from various accidents. These images may well appear in some new prints in the future. It was a good day.
Later: I’ve been doing some housecleaning in the older entries, eliminating a strange diamond shaped icon with a question mark inside it that has peppered itself here and there. I was intrigued to reread this one on creativity, centred on a wonderful post by Beth of Cassandra Pages. It seems to fit in with what I was doing with the camera today, don’t you agree?
by Marja-Leena Saturday morning I had a major shock on opening my blog and finding a commercial page on it and my own contents gone! It’s been hacked and stolen, I think! My email was also down, though the alternates on different servers still worked. My site manager said it seemed my domain had expired, an oversight by the server. It was corrected in a few hours, thankfully, but it was most interesting to note the major dip in my stats, and my own anxiety level which revealed my addictive dependence on my blog! Apologies to readers who might have tried to visit my blog yesterday morning.
Hopefully this event is the last of some technological glitches that have occurred the past few days – things happen in threes, right? On Thursday at the studio, I was preparing to print on the wide-format printer, but there were problems with the newer computer CPU that had been set up to work with the printer. After much time and frustration, the older CPU was put back temporarily while the IT person was going to “fix” the newer one, and I was able to print a couple of proofs.
At home, later that evening, I finally decided to upgrade to Tiger, the latest Mac operating system that has been out for awhile and the rest of the family had already installed months ago on their machines. All seemed well. Friday I decided to do some scanning. As I mentioned before, our scanner is an old model which is connected to an old computer which I access through the network via a piece of software called Apple Remote Desktop. Well, Mac told me it was not installed! Turns out that version is too old for Tiger and I would have to buy a new one – argh! That’s why I hate upgrades!
Anyway, back to Saturday – the rest of the day was blessed. Glorious and much-missed sunshine tempted us out to enjoy spring. The highlights of the day centered around art and a lovely walk around a garden and a lake.
Burnaby Art Gallery is always a favourite place for us because of the lovely old heritage house converted to gallery that features a lot of print shows. This time up we viewed 30 x 30, contemporary small prints from Malaspina Printmakers downstairs, and upstairs were older works from 1977 from Malaspina’s first archives that are in the BAG collection. Interesting to compare the years’ works and an interesting history lesson for me, as a past Malaspina member, is that the workshop originally started right on these grounds at the Burnaby Art Centre (now Shadbolt Centre of the Arts) in 1975.
Afterwards, as always it’s such a pleasant treat to go for a walk on the grounds. We enjoyed the daffodils and spring perennials though it was a little too early for the numerous huge rhododendrons. And there was a very colourful wedding party having photos taken here. My husband managed to capture the scene below before we headed down to the trails by Deer Lake.
Later in the early evening we went to Dundarave Printmakers on Granville Island for the opening of Tomoyo and Taiga’s Made in India exhibition of prints. Beautiful new prints by very prolific artists, mostly etchings by Tomoyo and monotypes by Taiga – do go see these if you’re in the area!
by Marja-Leena 
© Anita Rathje
Warning: the following story is not suitable for young readers or anyone with a sentimental attachment to rodents (or chocolates, for that matter).
[…] I felt inspired to relate the latest in our little Nutcracker battle, which began, appropriately, just after Christmas. The onset of the warm weather must have encouraged a new mouse dynasty to move into the neighbourhood, because we hadn’t been plagued with them for quite a while and thinking them vanquished, I’d forgotten to be vigilant. The first sign that while we were away for Christmas, creatures were, in fact, stirring quite boldly, came when we arrived home on the 27th.
Continue reading Hickory Dickory Dock – it is hilarious!
This is the funniest post coming out of poplar road, which is written by our daughter Anita. She started this blog in the fall of 2004 when she and her partner moved to the interior of BC, far from family and friends. Anita says it is a venue for her to share their new life in a rural community and an opportunity to write creatively in a relaxed way. She combines lots of beautiful photos with her descriptions of their renovation adventures, the definite and changing seasons, the surrounding countryside, and the neighbour’s darling llamas, goats and their babies.
Because her intended audience consists of family and friends, Anita has been shy to let me tell strangers/my readers about her blog but now, with her approval, I’m proud to introduce you to poplar road – ta da! Please visit and say hello! Anita is a wonderful writer with a degree in creative writing from the University of Victoria.
You may recall my post about our visit to poplar road last Thanksgiving. Anita posted some photos of our visit too.
by Marja-Leena i am finding that one way to connect my children together and to myself is to find something very simple to do. today my big girl built a nest out of bedding and was a robin in it, and i sat the babe in the nest, a visiting chickadee. yesterday, reminded of the game by a dear friend with the same aged children, we blew up a lovely pink balloon to bat around and keep up in the air together. the moment we began, the baby burst into delightful laughter!
as a child i loved spinning tops, cats cradle, jump rope. i once spent weeks playing with a piece of silicone which had solidified in its tube; it would bounce in unpredictable ways, almost impossible to catch.
(excerpt from simple pleasures**)
I am very proud to introduce our daughter Elisa’s blog appleturnover**. As a mother of two young ones, she writes in a gentle and thoughtful way about parenting and homelearning, about home, family and community in the environment and culture of the Pacific Northwest. I love reading about how she plays with her little girls and remembers her own childhood, which in turn brings back memories for me too. Coming soon are some stories and games. Elisa is an artist too. Please welcome her with a comment on her blog, especially if you are also a parent (or grandparent!) of young children.
**UPDATE April 13th, 2009: Elisa’s revised blog and website is now here. The starred expired links have been removed.
by Marja-Leena 
I wrote a little while ago about my recent experiments with digital printing on organza. Many of you readers were very interested in reading about my process, so I thought I’d update you on the results of some further experiments. If you missed that post, do go read it first in order for this one to make sense.
1. I mentioned back then that I would try a fresh new can of repositionable adhesive to place the organza on a lighter paper backing. I did this but it still caught in the printer head! Because the paper has to feed around the roller of the inkjet printer, the stress loosens the fabric, so nix for that method!
2. Then I followed up on a suggestion by Michiko to glue the fabric down with water-based Japanese paste. I decided to use mylar (not the inkjet mylar) as the base because this is heavier and stays flat. The organza, being so light, slippery and easily distorted, was difficult to lay down straight but it stuck really well and fed through the printer without problems.
3. I prepared another piece of organza with InkAid, a paint-on coating like we find on coated papers for inkjet printers. This product gave the organza a bit more body and made it easier to handle and glue to the mylar, plus I hoped that it might hold more ink. This went through the printer very well.
4. After allowing the ink to dry overnight on the above two prints (#2 & #3), I took one at a time and placed it into a sink of water to wash out the glue and lift up the organza. The first one without the InkAid lost most of its colour, but the InkAided one held more of the ink and maintained a little more body to the fabric.
CONCLUSION: The process #3 works well. However, in all of the experiments, the amount of ink retained by the organza is very light and I don’t think they are strong enough images for my needs.
Just for fun, I took several of the test prints and sewed them onto two wood dowels. I hung them with the front dowel about an inch away from the back panel which is mounted slightly out from the wall. The space allows one to see through to the layer behind much better than if the fabrics was touching. The wood dowels are bent because they had been standing in the corner of our garage for many years, yet the effect is rather interesting. These were not intended to be actual finished works, but let’s call this grouping a STUDY.
As I said, I still find the prints too weak so I’ve decided to set aside the organza for awhile. Tomorrow I’m going to test out the semi transparent inkjet vellum that has just arrived. I’m still going to try find out about other fabric options, including the just-learned possibility of inkjet ready silk on a roll that a new printmaking faculty person at the art school (Emily Carr Institute) has in her possession!! Interesting possibilities ahead!
by Marja-Leena 
As we’ve been out and about this weekend, husband and I have been trying out a new SLR digital camera that we bought for each other’s February birthdays. Friday night after the opening in Tinseltown (International Village) we walked under the nearby Gate to Chinatown and captured this night shot.
Saturday morning we took our granddaughter to her soccer practise. The photos came out a ghastly orange so I turned this one to black and white and vignette, trying out some of the new iPhoto features. (Later: photo removed because I learned that the soccer association does not permit photos of the children to be posted – sorry!)
This afternoon we went Nordic Walking in the rain along a lovely creekside trail. Tonight we will watch the closing ceremonies of the Olympics in Torino. A good weekend!
by Marja-Leena 
Detail from Silent Messengers: Hoodoos I
Yesterday, while my thoughts were still freshly on international print shows after writing the post about the Krakow Print Triennial 2006, I heard the thud of letters and magazines dropping in through the mail slot. I was most excited to find among the bills and junk mail a letter from India – is it good news or bad?
It is good! I have had my printworks accepted into the SEVENTH BHARAT BHAVAN INTERNATIONAL BIENNIAL OF PRINT – ART 2006 INDIA! I am particularly pleased because this is the first time I’ve entered a competition in India, and because the jury fee was very steep and the mailing not cheap.
The exhibition has already opened on February 13th at the Roopankar Museum of Fine Arts in Bharat Bhavan, Bhopal, India. I think all three pieces that I submitted will be on exhibition there: Silent Messengers: Hoodoos I, Nexus/Blue I and Nexus/Blue II. I am looking forward to receiving the catalogue!
This place sounds interesting. Because they do not have a website, here are a few words from the submission brochure:
Inaugurated by the former prime minister of India Smt. Indira Gandhi on Feb.13, 1982, Bharat Bhavan is a multi-art complex, providing interactive proximity to the verbal, the visual and the performing arts. […] Roopankar is the only museum of fine arts in India which houses both contemporary urban and folk – tribal art. Attached to the museum is a fully equipped printmaking workshop, ceramic workshop, design unit, archival section and facilities for stone carving and bronze casting.
International Print Biennials have been held there since 1989 with distinguished jury invited from around the world.
by Marja-Leena 
Hope you enjoy this, another of my scans, including these flowers.
Meanwhile I am looking forward to a busy happy day tomorrow celebrating my birthday.