A Bear To Share - New Card Design

Here's my latest card design. A little DIY greeting card! This could be used for a Birthday. Or let someone special know you Love them. Make your own personalized message, or even create a secret message (write on the backside of what the bear holds). Very simple cutting and gluing required with fun choices for your own design! You get one Bear and lots of options on each card. Available in my Etsy Shop: https://www.etsy.com/shop/GenevieveKeller 

Traditional Artist to the Core

Red Geranium

This is not a judgement call for or against computer generated art. I happen to work traditionally and I'm very happy doing so. I scan my work to clean up the images for prints, but I am a paintbrush, paint, pencil and eraser, kind of artist. Why bring this up? I guess it's the word 'traditional' that seems awkward to me because I don't feel 'traditional'. It's as though computer generated art and illustration has come along and pushed artists like myself aside. We get labeled 'traditional' because our use of media is not electronic. I'm struggling with this concept. I would rather be called something that sounds more alive. 'Original' doesn't work because electronically generated art can be fantastically and 100% original. I'll have to ponder this, or just get over it. 

   Meanwhile, here's a new painting. I've started a series in acrylic on birch wood panels. The series is 'Fabric and Flowers', and this one is 'Red Geranium'. Next up will be Daffodils. These paintings have a lot more detail than my botanical works. Lovely prints of Red Geranium are in my Etsy shop.

My Cut Your Own Tree card was a big hit for the holidays. As a second DIY card (where you cut and assemble) I'm working on a multi-purpose Happy card. It will be good for Happy Birthday, Happy Anniversary, Happy Valentine's Day. Who doesn't want a Happy Bear card? I do!

Christmas Tree Card

This is my latest greeting card!                     Below is a helpful Assembly Guide: 

 

 

 

 

Artist, Business... ARTIST

 

From today's Instagram post: I’m in my studio working on holiday card designs. I couldn’t resist doing Merry Chrysalis. I’ve had a good number of monarchs in my garden this year. Milkweed plants are treated with utmost respect and allowed to grow anywhere without disruption. It’s late summer and my favorite morning glories are creating a symphony right outside my kitchen window - an inspiration to do my dishes!

This has been the longest break I have taken since starting my blog 11 years ago. To be an artist, hopefully making a living doing so, one needs to appear on social media and share one's self - ON A REGULAR BASIS. Ah, but in there is the rub, or contradiction, or perhaps ruin. For me, being an artist means climbing high in a tree (metaphorically speaking) to be alone with my thoughts. Precious or perhaps ridiculous, my vaguely formed ideas are not yet ready to see the light of day - these ideas can not be shared or they will almost always FREEZE into the time and space when they were exposed like a camera flash. (Remember camera flashes?!) Imagine yourself on a path in the woods. If at some point you see a lovely tree and stop to shout to the world 'Look, here is a lovely tree!', you will miss what might be further down that path. This is what social media sharing is for me. Speaking too soon, stopping at the lovely tree, not letting ideas mix in the creative batter and soup of inspiration.  Artist, Businesswoman, it's a tough juggle if you ask me.  

So, dear universe, if you have found this humble blog coming from a little farm in Maine, and IF you were wondering where I went, know that I have kept to myself so that I may freely roam creative paths for the past several months.

My flower gardens had a wonderfully flashy season this summer. My phone is reminding me that it can not take anymore pictures of flowers, I need to deal with that.

This is a card design I created earlier in the summer. It's called 'Strawberry Jamming'. I'll add it to my Etsy Shop today. Happy autumn to you!

New Strawberry Greeting Card Design

This is my most recent greeting card design - strawberries! 

Possible uses: I love/miss you berry much!  I'm berry fond of you!  You're the sweetest!  Thank you berry much! 

Actually, I think it's just a lovely all-occasion blank card with a beautiful strawberry design. Almost a hint to the Art Nouveau style of art.

Strawberries are a significant crop in this area of rural Maine and they're delicious! Strawberry shortcake is a must when the Forth of July arrives. 

(Click the strawberry card to the left and it will take you to my Etsy Shop. Have fun checking out my work!)

This is our new rescue dog. He's kept us on our toes since early December. We're currently working with a very effective trainer in Montville because this innocent looking boy came with a suitcase of issues. Don't be fooled by the zen-like pose above! On the other hand, this picture explains why we love him whole heartedly. Note: I let him on this couch in my studio, but not the nicer furniture in the house. (He now knows the difference.) Originally back in October, he was starving and wandered onto the porch of a house in Georgia. The owners of the house fortunately got him into the canine rescue world and he ultimately made his way north to us. He's maybe 1.25 - 1.75 years old. We named him Renny. Renny wishes you a Happy Spring!