Patti Edmon Artist

Thanks to Seth Apter for drawing the art-blog community closer together - again!! He is so amazingly generous; blog world is definitely a better place because of Seth and all his efforts. Here is one of my favorite 'oldies'! deadlines. all the years I worked at our agency we lived by them. we had drop deadlines too. nice language. get it done or drop dead? think about or do little else until the deadline arrives and the project, thing, action is complete and one can resume living. It has been nearly five years since I've lived - and died more than a few times - in that world. other than paying bills on time, washing socks when everyone starts yelling, and stocking the fridge with the basics, I don't have deadlines. doctor's appointments don't count because you all know that passing the hours in a waiting room is enough to kill anyone. I am fairly self-propelled, albeit somewhat tardy on occasion; my daughter says we put the 'pro' in procrastination. cal...

Journal covers, box lids, giant puzzle pieces and, of course, canvas, all fair game when it comes to mixing up the media. I have felt myself growing and stretching, almost on a cellular level, as an artist and it's exhilarating and feels a little frantic at the same time. Frantic because I don't have the hours to produce the ideas that surge through my brain, and exhilarating because, well that should be obvious. I was just visiting Nicole over on Beadwright and wow, I admire her ability to post nearly every day. Especially since she has lupus, an autoimmune nightmare that, like mine, steals her precious time and energy and dumps them into some toxic, useless wasteland. But she doesn't let that stop her from saying hello; I feel like I need to have loads of new work to post but I suppose that isn't the point. The reason I know that is because I have met SO many wonderful, incredible artists who commiserate, support and come back to visit. Bloggers like (Bluebeard and) ...

The Magic Carpet is parked in the garage... jets cooling, waiting for next year. I was so busy this week, I didn't even post the OHOW winners or leave comments on their blogs. I appreciate every blogger who was kind enough to stop by and post during the event. The winners are perfectly suited to their prize, in almost eerie way... #1 The winner of the journal is Elle at Living Creatively Ever After , otherwise known as The Boho Chick. In her comment, Elle said, "Oh my! Love the textures on the journal..." How apropos! #2 The winner of treasure soup is Nicolle at Beadwright . In her comment, Nicolle said, "This is a fantastic giveaway - the second item is perfect for me..." Now, it might appear as though I designed the outcome of this but I promise - I used the same method (random.org) that I saw posted on tons of other blogs. #3 The winner of the tiny altered calendar is Debby at The Gathering Nest whose newest baby bears a remarkable resemblance to Henry, ...

I don't know how so many of you manage to keep up the creative pace during the holidays... maybe you have studios in far better order than mine, are able to work late at night, or maybe painting in your sleep? Perhaps it's an illusion. But during my blog visits I saw a lot of work in progress - journals, paintings and assemblage, digital collage... I had to 'do' Christmas in a two-week period, unable to focus on anything else until I delivered the journals that were commissioned in November. I'm happy to report that someone along the way asked the gallery owner if there were any left... fortunately for me she wants more! And that's a good thing because once I completed the 8th piece I was surprised to find myself in withdrawal. I only had time to make a few gifts, two of them, of course, were journals. The background started out, as usual, gesso and a few layers of gel, some bits of paper and stuff to enhance the texture. I had an idea, albeit vague for the conc...

Hard to believe a week has flown by since the opening of the Dishy Divas show, and a fabulous event it was... wine and hors d'oeuvres, photographers from Skirt Magazine and a great turnout. Jim was proud of me for not being nervous or piling stuffed mushrooms on a plate for ammo; we stayed for half an hour and the kids were hungry so we walked a couple of blocks to a restaurant and enjoyed a family dinner... no adolescent bickering, and the kids did great too! At the opening, I only spent 5 minutes back in the area where my collage and journals were displayed; they are in very good company, surrounded by several of Rodney Hatfield 's paintings - I urge you to click on the link and take a look at his amazing art. Sold and exhibited nationally, we've followed his career for years. I was fortunate (smart:) enough to purchase a small sculpture of his about ten years ago, a Christmas gift (and inspiration) for my talented artist-husband Jim! My mother was disappointed that s...

Who would have thought that two weeks in a row I'd be able to participate in the Inspire Me Thursday challenge . I didn't have a lot of studio time over the summer so photography has been the creative outlet of choice, one of my favorites, I might add. Even though my kids are older (7th and 8th grade) and don't require the kind of hands-on supervision that toddlers do, opportunities were scarce for collage, painting, altering and serious journaling. I didn't mind though, because like my kids, I'm old enough to understand how limited my time with them is; for years I've heard about the dreaded adolescent phase when they won't be caught dead at the mall with me, my opinion will carry as much weight as a grocery list, my witty sense of humor will no longer be funny but a freakish side show, only to be outdone by my lack of style, good taste and tact. Why am I so sure this is imminent? Probably a little media influence, some recall, a bit of reality. Right now I...

Space in the Altered Attic is at a premium, the bins are overflowing  and there's stuff every where I turn, piles, stacks, boxes full of trinkets and other found objects spilling out over the tops of shelves. Spring cleaning? Heck no, but I can hear the birds singing outside the windows, on the days that it's 65 instead of 35 degrees. So, I continue to ignore the obvious, which is the enormous amount of time I'd probably save by getting organized, and use all my 'extra' time to play. Last week I posted a small collage I'd done - a coffee cup filled with flowers, coffee beans, buttons... everything but coffee. And, what's with the birds? I don't know that the two necessarily 'go' together, but I wanted to find some elements I could use to experiment with color, texture and process. Using the same color themes to create different finished pieces, like a magnet made from a recycled puzzle piece and trimmed with beads and charms. I also love altering...

I've been watching Random Notes daily for my Sweet Tweet journal entry, which I mailed at the last possible moment. It popped up, for sure, in my mailbox yesterday - the label fell off!! I had spent almost as much time on the envelope as the page so the postal carrier took pity on me and brought it back for an address. I used this quote on one of the pages I made for the visual journaling workshop I recently completed (over but not abandoned!). And, since the theme was birds and sweet, I thought it fit rather nicely. I think we are all tempted to let a pesty nest start tangling in the do, now and again anyway. My favorite ways to disassemble the sorrow roost in whatever stage I manage to catch it, are making art, wandering through blogland and keeping in touch with people who use their time and talents to create projects like the journal this page will hopefully end up in - if it gets there in time. Jane at Random Arts is one of my all-time favorites... pal, artist, shop owner, bl...

I did this page the other day. It was the end of a long day spent iced in and I was really tired, and in a hurry. But so far, it's my favorite, though I haven't ventured very far from the yellow/gold base color that I've used on most all the pages. There doesn't seem to be any way to predict this process, whether the images will be cohesive, if I'll like the way the pages look... I suppose that is the real beauty of doing this in the first place. To loosen up and let go, freedom from the over-thinking that rules most every area of my life. So, now it's time to start the actual journaling part - writing on these pages? They seem sacrosanct, like doing a collage and then writing all over it. Obviously, after having struggled through this entire reverse process, I still have miles to go. Being a writer, this should be the easiest part. We'll see.

The second week of the Visual Journaling workshop was about adding visual elements to our backgrounds - still without an idea or concept of the finished piece.  This feels like collage to me, though this process is more fluid, less planned. More spontaneous. It certainly is uncovering my difficulty in altering my approach to a project or process.  I started off by sifting through images for elements that looked 'right' together because of color or theme, without giving much thought to how they relate to each other. Then a theme of sorts started to emerge and I felt a bit more comfortable. I haven't begun to think about actually writing on these pages. Aack. All of this work only to mess it up with words? I didn't realize that I had a comfort zone when it came to art, since it's relatively new in my creative career; I can see that my trepidation at stepping outside the box, my rigidity is in place, and that's why I love this workshop. All the time I've been e...

After years of writing in journals, a lifetime actually, I've finally started a visual journal. I'm in good company. Somerset has a publication dedicated to art journaling and there are plenty of books and workshops to help those of us who are trying to convert. I'm taking a workshop that started this week, in fact, taught by the fabulous Pam Carriker. Her background pages look more like art pieces than anything I've ever considered journal.  It has been a fun first week; I've made several background pages and I'm anxious to see what we'll do next. I have to admit, this still feels a bit out of order to me; I've always started with a thought, emotion or situation, in other words, knowing what I wanted to express. I don't sketch, so aside from an occasional quote or clipping, it has been confined to words. My first efforts at keeping an art journal several weeks ago involved staring at a blank page, followed by a search through my 'paper piles...

Jane Powell, proprietress of Random Arts, in Saluda, NC, one of my favorite havens on earth, issued a challenge in September (I think?) that was answered by 75 people! Our assignment: make a 5 x 7 journal page using the ingredients she sent each of us in an envelope. That's all, no further instruction.  That sure didn't help me one bit. I stewed and procrastinated, all normal so far, and then I asked if she'd be posting any early... like an incentive. She saw right through that one and told me to have fun. Well. One day I was looking at the envelope and saw an image stamped on the back: We are Famous, Glamorous Artists. Finally, some inspiration! I cut apart the envelope and went to work. I've not done much art journaling and I still think my page is kinda kooky, but I did have fun.  In November, once she had a whopping stack of envelopes, Jane started posting 5 entries every day on her blog ( Random Notes ). From there they went to the 'tower' in her shop. Once...

I've kept a written journal nearly all my life, dozens, no hundreds, of notebooks -  from the 89-cent spiral bound notebooks (for morning pages) to hard cover books - zillions of letters forming  a record of my life, the better and a lot of the worse parts in detail that I don't think could be any more vivid, even if I had known how to draw. I made money writing, ad copy, articles, public relations and marketing campaigns, technical copy, video scripts.   I made the leap from personal essays to writing short stories and an entire universe opened up. In search of help I wound up with teachers who are among the best in the country, the list of authors they've edited reads like a literary Who's Who; they've taught at Iowa Writer's Workshop, edited Esquire Magazine, published novels... How did I get in that program?? Naively, of course, by responding to a classified ad for editing services in Poets & Writers, sans credentials. It wasn't until after I'd s...