Arizona in February

Arizona in February

I went to play. It was fabulous!! So, is this what you think Arizona looks like? Me neither! The canal was beautiful and unexpected. I expected desert, and I LOVE desert, we will get to that later.

Art Space/ Textures Gallery in Scottsdale had a fabulous exhibit by a number of European Batik artists; Noel Dyrenforth,Pat Hodson, Andrea Trabitsch, Joachim Blank, Nina Stoupina, Hetty van Boekhout, Greet Bogaerts, Lu Van der Linden, Fritz Donart, and Rita Trefois. An amazing lineup, the exhibit was spectacular. It totally broadened my world about what batik is and what you can do with it. I feel like an infant, with so much to learn! That's a good feeling though, refreshing!

I went to take a 2 day batik workshop from Noel Dyrenforth. It was wonderful. Below are some examples of my work.  First a sampler. I was not that impressed with this piece, but I did learn.

The next is a fish. We traced it from photos Noel supplied and then built up layers of wax and dye. The fabric was super thin (that's why you can see the newsprint under it), but it allowed our piece to dry very quickly so that we could work fast. Great idea! I am not super impressed with my fish either, but once again, I learned a lot.

We also did a Picasso etching (sorry, I don't have a photo to post). I didn't know that you could etch wax....a whole new paradigm of possibilities. Mostly, I was inspired by my classmates; Terri Haugen, Marilyn Salomon, Mary Jane Keys, Katalin Ehling, Bunny Bowen (see photo with Noel below), Joan LaMoure, Vivian Faye. They had been doing batik for years (and we are not talking about stamping found objects either). Their art was fantastic, inspiring, fabulous! A good enough reason alone to take the class!

On my one night off, I went to see the Chihuly exhibit at the Botanical Gardens. You can see a slide show of my best pictures in my sidebar. I took a lot of pictures with my new tiny point and shoot, and by the end of the evening, I even learned how to use the flash, finally!! I was lucky to see some of the exhibit in daylight and in darkness. It was captivating, I never wanted to leave. And the plants were incredible too!