Patti Edmon Artist

Invisible Illness Week is coming up - September 5 through 15 and the theme this year is, I Choose to:  I don't always consider my autoimmune arthritis a benefit, particularly when one, or five days have been cancelled due to lack of ability. But there are gifts that come with the burden that are too valuable to bury beneath self-pity. I've learned so much about understanding the need for real priorities, valid choices, insightful empathy, living in the moment and the need to abandon the false ego that really does waste a lot of time. I've lived the better part of the last decade with illness and I choose to call myself an altered artist. Though I've been a writer and photographer nearly all my life I never picked up a paint brush until the expanding need for self-expression gave me an ultimatum: either work to nurture an evolving, explosive passion or, well, go nuts. I say that lightly knowing how fortunate I am to have had that opportunity.  Saturday I was o...

Back in the old days, BC as I call them (before children), I spent hundreds of hours with a medium format camera, black and white film and abundant curiosity. Along with, of course, a fearless approach to people, property and situations with which I had no familiarity. An avid darkroom junkie, those sessions were a lot like the ones I now spend in the studio - great music at the right (loud) volume and totally in the zone - sans the chemicals that are fairly toxic when pregnant or mothering small kids. In the early-90s Photoshop was around but the world wasn't totally digital. I preferred the pursuit, capture and printing of images - test-strip prints, dodging and burning often ten or more prints before achieving the results I'd envisioned. A month or so ago, I began thinking about incorporating my black & white prints and art. The first photo I chose was of an old truck (loved the rust, even then!) with the word "farm" scrawled on the door. It sat on the back...

I was fortunate to be featured on Seth Apter's latest edition of The Pulse . If you haven't been there yet, check out the amazing variety of artists on The Altered Page , now talking about their favorite tools and/or techniques. I could spend entire days wandering around the blogs he has graciously shared over the months - such fabulous art! My favorite part of the creative process is diving into, or on I should say, a white surface and it just so happens I've been working on backgrounds for the past several weeks. I grab as much 'stuff' as I can scavenge in my studio (not difficult!!), like coffee cup wrappers, gift wrap, tape, sewing patterns, corrugated paper, wholey paper (of course - a must on every piece - available at my pal Saluda Jane's Random Arts !) glass bits, punchinella, whatever. Then, along with molding gel and several other textured media, begin the layering process. And layering and layering... then grabbing sponges, bottle caps and a s...

If you haven't discovered wholey paper, you don't know what you're missing! I have been using it in almost every project for the past couple of years, not in it's natural state, as shown above, but painted, distressed, stapled, stamped, grunged, in small pieces or strips, as stems, branches, petals, a fence, a layering element in collage and a million other uses I haven't thought of yet. My spring break trip to Saluda, NC a couple of years ago led me straight to Random Arts, where I spent quite a bit of time with Jane Powell and her pals. Jane recently turned her retail business into a workshop venue but she still maintains a mail order business. I came home with lots of really unique goodies, including a lot of wholey paper, which I've never seen anywhere but her shop (now on Artfire ). She sells it in sheets and huge variety of die cut formations - buildings, birds, people, flourishes and card stock pieces. One afternoon when I didn't have a project on th...

Finally, after two months, my Assemblook  (deMeng terminology:) from the Random Arts workshop is complete. I knew if I didn't finish it I'd put it away and diminish all the time, energy and creative resources I'd spent learning from Michael deMeng, such a fabulous teacher.  Altering a book seemed like a fairly simple task, until I realized that there would be four layers of foam board on each 'page' and that, like the rest of my life, it would be an open book. (It will close - not the huge opening in the left side) but then I'd have to do the cover - ha). After many batches of the uszzzzzhhhh!!, mixing paint to look a bit like verdigris, burnt paper and other tricks of his trade, sticky from adding mica, Wholey Paper and everything else I could get my hands on, I feel a sense of completion. Now, I only wish I could take another workshop.... Left-hand 'page' Click on the Right hand page to view in Flikr Right hand 'page' 

I have only been blogging for a couple of months, but, well, let's just say I'm hooked. I spend quite a bit of time in the Altered Attic (or my bed, just below:) wandering through blog-world. In the mixed-media, altered art world it is gratifying to find bloggers who seem like kindred spirits; through their posts, the comments they leave on my blog, email exchanges, the way their art speaks to me, I feel a sense of greater sense of connection, tapped into that universe of creativity that keeps my world spinning. I saw the Let's Play 20 Questions on Sweet Repeats , the delightful blog of an artist who lives in North Carolina, also where Saluda is located - one of my favorite towns where I've visited twice since spring. The game was part of a swap, but I thought it might be a fun way to tighten those connections, so why don't you play too? I emailed Lucy and she said sure, it's a fun game to play. So, copy and paste into your blog and leave me a comment so I can c...

The greatest thing since sliced bread isn't sliced, in this case it's holes. Wholey Paper is available at Random Arts , in Saluda, NC, where I attended the deMeng assemblage workshop. It's  my new favorite coolest altering tool. Yes, it is paper, but I say tool because it stands up to nearly every finish imaginable, from crackle paint to layers of washes; it can be grunged, painted, sprayed, torn, stamped, embellished, used as a stencil, well, you get the idea. On day one of the workshop I found it was just the solution for the book I started; I needed to disguise the holes in the foam board we layered to create a cavernous niche. One of  many challenges. I stained, stamped and ripped Wholey Paper and  layered along with Mica - also way cool. My book project is far from finished - I haven't touched the left side - or the cover -  but I can't wait to get started. I did stock up on Wholey Paper while in Saluda so I'll have plenty to play with.