Return

We have returned from Colonia. I had to be dragged kicking and screaming to the boat. I was grumpy for a day, being back in the big noisy city. And then. Visitors! My "little" brother Danny is here with the lovely sweet Jessie!! This time, I am the tour guide. Today we will go to the National Museum and Recoleta Cemetery, so I can use up every single bit of memory in my camera. In the meantime, here are a very few little snippets of Colonia, where every corner you take presents another great photo op.







More pictures coming soon....

A little trip will be taken.

We are going to Colonia tomorrow!! I love Colonia. It's quiet, peaceful, right on the water, and full of interesting characters and places. I can't wait to get back, this time almost for a whole week. A few pics from last years all-too-short overnight trip are here.

Assignment Green

This week, students, your free time assignment is to observe a color all around you. Pick your favorite, mine is green.

(click the pic to see interesting textures and details!

weird stuff grows down here!)

Care to join me?

Picking my way through a massive warehouse full of antiques, I spotted this trunk all the way in the very back, way up high on a shelf. It was clearly quite different from the others. I called upon my high school french to translate the mysterious message...

"The Cosmic Trunk
The trunk to travel in time"

Perfect! Just the kind of trunk I need.
I am heading first to Italy during the Renaissance. Hopefully I will pop out and be mistaken for a Medici daughter...
Where (and when) would you go to????

Gracias Señor!

This gentleman showed many people in a busy street on a San Telmo Sunday his pretty, talkative parrot.




He was also showing them how easy it can be to feel happy, I think.

Jardin Botanico

Pretty carp in their most beautiful home-the main greenhouse at the Buenos Aires Botanical Garden-lucky!

Prints

I was a printmaking major in college.
That seems like some kind of shameful confession when written. Anyway I was, and because of that I instantly recognized the talent and skill in these silkscreen prints. I just had to buy all three, because I rarely buy myself original artwork (generally i just beg my auntie Jan for her paintings) and they were actually within my budget.
See Mum and Dad, that tuition did pay off!
Here are the three prints and a few details, because I love details.







These are all the work of artist/graphic designer Sol Linero, who lives here in Argentina. She has a flickr site with some of her work (and a lot of her new dog). There is a print of bathroom objects I am coveting (sounds strange but check it out- it's too cute).
I love the color combos and the "retro-modern-stylized-botanical study" look (with a little bit of Pennsylvania dutch thrown in). Don't you?
There is actually a subtle gold tone metallic color used quite a bit, which was hard for my little ol' camera to capture.
Now, to find a spot to hang them....

Spring...

....needs a little encouragement to really show her face, I think.

Why not honor Spring and wear a flower around your neck?

The dogwood in gold is here.
(Also in silver and antiqued black!)

A Colorful Day

When I taught art, one of the homework assignments I would give to the girls was to observe color all around them. Each week was a different color when they had to document sightings of yellow or encounters with blue. If they could, they would collect and bring in their color interactions (there were always lots of candy wrappers...). The ones who really tried all week to open their eyes to color had great sketchbooks by the end of the assignment.

Yesterday we went back to Tigre. This time we stayed on land and walked around the Fruit Market. We had a lovely lunch right on the river and strolled through the many, many, market stands. Actually, there is no longer a whole lot of fruit selling going on. It has become a market for hand made home goods and interior decoration. There's lots of unfinished furniture, carpets, candles, ceramic and glass, etc. etc. Buying furniture is a little unrealistic for me here, so we just kind of window shopped and snapped pics. There were plenty of distractions for kids, and that's when I remembered the art homework assignment.









An idea: maybe I will post some of my old homework assignments. They were really fun (at least I, being the teacher, thought so....) and can be good creativity boosters...let's see if I can find some.

BA Design Fair

Last weekend we went to the Buenos Aires Design Fair. It was lots of fun seeing so many creative people in one place. There was even live graffiti going on!

(The graffiti demo happened to be very apropos of the movie I went to later that night, "Beautiful Losers", an interesting documentary about young artists in NYC in the early 90s , a good rental I would say...)

There was some kind of "Live the Love" theme going on with the graphic artists....

Some cool lace patterns in leather.

I really liked these necklaces. The focal pieces are made of wrapped up zippers. Remember that grumpy guy with the big neck tattoo from Project Runway? Guess they saw the zippers he used for his winning looks.

This bag-actually three bags in one-was a cute idea, and made from recycled felt, I think.

This lamp/chandelier screams Olympics Opening Ceremony to me. Dad, you now know what you're getting for Father's Day.

This one is more my style.
I love felt and the whole felting thing. I think this jacket is adorable. The chair is fabulous. There are millions of cheap old chairs at the flea market here, so I might have a new project to add to my list....

This was my favorite booth. It was just fun, colorful and energetic.
There were cool prints-I bought three!!-books and journals, pillows, and...
smoking bunny rabbits. OK, smoking is not cool, I will agree. But they sure look tough.
There was a huge crowd at the Design Fair, and so many more great vendors, craftspeople, artists, and designers. It's always inspiring to see people putting their work "out there" and just going for it!

She's No Fool!

Celebrate!

It's Julia's 10th birthday!!
Welcome to the world of double digits!
Julia is my very first niece and I remember well holding her as a baby and massaging her little head-she loved that. Now, she's so big and smart and creative, pretty and a great dancer and funny and so good to her younger sister and brother (she has LOTS of patience). She loves science and knows all about planets, stars, constellations and black holes. She makes a great volcano and is a fabulous reader (I hope you like the Trixie Belden books I sent!!).
I love you Jule! You are so much fun to be with.
Have a great birthday big girl!
kisshugkisshugkisshug,
-(auntie) erin

The four seasons of beautiful Julia: