Although I've moved to my house beginning of October I still didn't find the time to unpack all my stuff. Things are slow... Well, I do have more time next year.
Here a "sneek peek" into my new studio. It's hard to take pictures of it as the room is above the garage with a funny wall right when one enters the room (not shown in this photo). I love it. It's huge, bright and I can overlook both the garden and the front.
One thing that I really love about living in the middle of Europe is the fact that nothing is far. I can be in Austria, Switzerland, Italy, Czech Republic or Luxembourg within two hours by car. Everything else can be reached within two hours by plane. Plus it's really cheap.
So I decided to make best use of it and go at least twice a year for a short trip to some place I haven't been before.
As DH had a flight from Calgary to Manchester I thought we could meet there. So this was the first weekend trip. Three-year-old went to his grandparent's place, doggy and cat came to grandpa no. 2.
And I can tell you it was worth it. We had a slight problem with DH being stuck in Calgary for 16 hours longer than expected but I had a nice relaxing flight. I even got some edible food which DH didn't on his longhaul flight. :-)
We strolled around downtown, had nice breakfasts, went into pubs ( I love pubs!) and did some shopping.
We definitely will do this again in the near future.
There are some doll artists I'm just in awe of. Georg Stuart is one of them.
Every now and then I visit his website and wonder if I will be that perfect after 50+ years of making dolls ;-) As I'm only making dolls for 3 years I still have ... ok, maybe that's not quite possible.
Anyhow, to speed things up, I bought his DVD on how he make's his figures. I'm especially interested in his armature technique. As soon as I have the right equipment and a place where I can work I will report on my progress ... or the lack of it.
If you would like to have a look at his figures go to http://www.galleryhistoricalfigures.com/index.html
Labels: art doll
Yesterday I've been to an exhibit called "Koerperwelten/bodyworlds". I don't know how well known it is in the world but here in Germany - where it actually comes from - there is a lot of controversy going on about it. It's a display of preserved bodies or bodyparts, human and animals.
I was thinking quite a while about whether or not to go. It was somewhat disconcerting to see these bodies thinking they were once breathing living humans. But it was their wish to be seen like that. And for me it was absolutely interesting to see a body like that. All these different views of a body.
I can really recommend going there ...
The picture is not from the exhibit it is from one of my sculpture's. I intend to make a cold bronze casting with it.
Ok ! So it started as the perfect day. Mom did take little monster aka nearly three-year-old.
It's been a perfect end-of-summer day. Sun is shining. Me and doggy are going for a walk in the woods.
After that I decided to start sculpting again. I started with something easy to test my new oven. Boots that I have seen in one of the medieval festivals this summer. Fine. Results ok.
Then I got brave and started a new face. Took me three hours. I was pretty happy about the result.
Maybe I should have supervised my oven. How about making a scene titled "little horror show"? Does anyone need this thing? LOL.
" And as she so stood, and had not one single thing left, suddenly some stars from heaven fell down, and they were nothing else but hard smooth pieces of money, and although she had just given her little shirt away, she had a new one which was of the very finest linen."
by Gebrueder Grimm, The Starmoney
One of my favourite fairytales since I have been a little child. Now that I have a little boy with whom I can share my love of books and stories it is of new interest to me ...
I know that she isn't very well done and I still need a lot of practice. Nevertheless I loved making her and the props.
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Labels: 1:12th scale
Oh dear ... exactly a month has passed since my last blog entry. I can't believe it. Time is flying by. I don't have any time to do some sculpting or needle felting or anything creative. And believe me ... I'm pretty frustrated about that. On the other hand things are going smoothly now. We found the perfect house for us. The most important feature for me: a bright and airy studio with 40 sqm (400 sft). :-)
Possession date is Oct. 1st. Until then I have to be patient..
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Labels: misc.
... arrived today. I've been browsing the internet for hours to find a decent, big and not to expensive oven. I haven't used it yet but I think this one is perfect. My old one was really small and concave. So, whenever I had a full body sculpted doll with legs or arms going in different directions I had problems with burns. This won't happen here. Only forgot to buy a oven thermometer (very important!).
I hope I can soon make some heads or other project between renovating our house and being to tired because of 2-year-old. Oh, how I look forward to September and kindergarten.
As this actually should be a blog about my "poppets" I've thought I would add a picture of one of my older dolls, the medicine man's apprentice. I made this one last year. The rhino is made with air drying clay. The doll is polymer clay.
More information can be found here ://cwpoppets.net/medicineman.htm
The Landshut Wedding is re-enacted every four years. The wedding took place in 1475, one of my favourite times. I'm lucky to live nearby and so I was watching it this year. When I see all these costumes my head is so full of ideas I could immediately start making dolls. I couldn't take a lot of good pictures as it was really crowded but, hey, I can come back in four years. ;-)
Labels: misc.
"Costumes and Trim" is Adele Sciortino's creative costuming quaterly newsletter. This edition has my doll "Venetian Carnival" in it's Gallery section. You can sign up and get a copy of Costumes and Trims for free at www.costumesandtrim.com. Adele's wonderful dolls can be seen at www.adelesciortino.com.
Labels: misc.
