Summer Munny Show at LIFT

My two boys-Clive & Gus Van Valentine.
Photo credit: Juana Moore-Overmyer

Clive Emerging
Photo credit: LIFT

Gus Van Valentine
Photo credit: LIFT

Hi ya's! So the Munny Show was last weekend at LIFT in Royal Oak and I had a good time. It was extra fun because it was also the first time I had any type of toys I altered/designed on display, yay! I hope I can be part of another Munny show in the future too. Thanks for looking and I hope you enjoy the rest of your week!~

Anti-Valentine's Day Art

Hey there. I love the above pic I found, haha! Soooo....here's some pics of my anti-Valentine's Day art. Although I DO have a boyfriend and of course I LOVE my friends and family, I find this holiday kinda odd...and pretty much a slap in the face to the people who don't have significant others. IDK why...just how I feel. And it's kinda cheesy...but that's just my opinion. So here's art that was inspired by...um...being not so hardcore for this holiday. >_<



Title: Unhappy Candy Hearts. I took a picture (with a frame) and painted over it with purple metallic acrylic paint. I glued the candy hearts on, then wrote some not-so-happy sayings...not realizing the marker bleeds insanely! So the words came out BIGGER than I wanted but atleast the marker didn't blur the words completely.

Next I dripped the purple paint on each heart...then black and white. Originally didn't want to cover up the hearts that have paint completely on them...there were words written on them too....the paint kinda did what it wanted. OK, this is the only one I'm going to chat about. If you have any questions on my other pieces, just let me know, thanks!







2 piece mixed media: Titles: top-Love in Bloom and bottom-Love Shattered







His name is...Gus Van Valentine. He's a Munny vinyl toy. I love making Munnys now...he's my 3rd one. The other two were a deer/goat creature and a fox...he's actually the FIRST (regular) MUNNY I completed...those other 2 are considered MUNNY "characters"...GUS is a typical Munny. Sorry, it's weird to explain! Just google it if you're curious. Thanks!








Ciao friends~~~

Seasons, Holidays, and Organizing

(love the pic above...
can't say it's mine though!)

Brrrr...it's freezing in Detroit. Hate that. Makes me want to sleep and lounge around all day. It rained a bit over the past couple days...with a lot of the snow going away but now it's getting really REALLY cold again. Ergh, such is life in Michigan!

Something I wanted to share is my inspiration from the seasons and holidays when thinking about my art. I don't know if this is mainly a feeling for mixed media artists or what, but when I start seeing the merchandise out for ex. Valentine's Day (coming up in mid February), I get thinking about what to make...be it with stuff I see in the stores or by simply painting. (OK, that was the longest sentence EVER, sorry!)

Lately, I've made several Valentine's Day (or anti-V Day) pieces. One was a Munny vinyl toy that I named "Tainted Love." (Again, I don't have a way to upload new pics so you'll just have to imagine what they look like.) He's purple, blue, and white with silver glitter and hearts glued on to him.

Another was a painting in a frame that I pretty much destroyed...well, I painted it metallic purple and put up candy hearts on it with my glue gun. They were the slightly larger kind of hearts...so I put my own spin on the "Cutie Pie" sayings with sayings like "Die!" and "Hate U" I have nothing against Valentine's Day really (or any holiday in general)...it's just fun for me to not make it all lovey dovey. :P

Recently, I bought another 3 drawer storage container (this being my 3rd one) to put ONLY my season/holiday stuff in. One drawer for Winter, one for Fall, and the last for both Spring & Summer. I figured I'd atleast TRY to organize things when (for example) I need Xmas-y stuff or fake leaves (for autumn or spring). My other storage containers probably need to get organized too....atleast for me to put LABELS on them like how I did with the season/holiday ones.

Basically my whole art room needs some hardcore organizing...but it's going to be a good amount of work...and like I said at the top, it's COLD...and yeah, I've felt pretty lazy lately. It will get done...maybe I'll say DEFINITELY a thing to do for SPRING CLEANING so it feels like a goal. Woo hoooo! ;)

OK, so back to the holidays. Easter stuff is already out. Wait take that back, St. Patty's stuff is already out! Jeez, it's crazy. I need to work on one holiday at a time (darn you Michaels & other craft stores!!!). Can't start seeing all this stuff or my mind will be all over the place. So yeah, still working on some Valentine's Day stuff.

Hopefully we'll be getting what we need to upload pics soon, because I would like to be able to put my new art in my ArtFire studio. Yup, it's called a studio but it's basically where my art is sold at. Like ETSY but a little different...hope I do some selling there. Right now I only have two things in my shop/studio...one is a custom Munny (Evanthe is her name) and an Alice In Wonderland mixed media piece. But I definitely have more to put in there, it's just a matter of time.

Alright, it's getting late and I blabbed enough for now. Hope you're all doing well and be chatting with you soon.

*Oh and I also made a set-10 cards-of ATCs (artist trading cards) if any other artist would like to swap with me. Beanie McMouse and I will be doing a trade so I'm very excited about that. I'll have to chat more about the ATCs later...they are really fun to make....so hopefully by the next time I blog, I'll be able to show you pics of a few.

Ciao friends!~