Experimental Collaboration

 Interaction with fellow Albuquerque artists

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Experimental Collaboration  and Interaction with fellow Albuquerque artists

Begun in the Spring of 2007, we (Betsy Greenlee, Fred Yost, Jaci Fisher, Leila Hall, Jeanine Allen, Elaine Scott, Gaye Garrison and Jeff Potter) were inspired by previous artist/ writer collaborations, most notably the "Scribes Eight" and we strive to explore artistic genres we generally have not thought about attempting.  Abstract art came to mind and we chose to meet every six weeks and share our individual efforts at "making" abstract art from a commonly agreed "project" scope discussed at the previous meeting.  Herein describes our journey.

Below is a chronological listing of web pages made from our past meetings. 

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Previous - 4-28-07 Art Group meeting

Previous - 6-09-07 Art Group meeting

Previous - 8-26-07 meeting

Current - October & November 2007 Meetings at Studio of Jaci Fisher and Fred Yost

We met on Oct. 14th and again on Nov. 25th.  Between the two meetings, everyone did at least one project, some two. The task was a representational work and it's derivative as a collage.

Oct. 14th projects

Jeff Potter project 10-14-07 

     Jeff's notes (10-14-07):  "I chose to do a 9" x 12" pastel on a "hand-made" blue-tinted watercolor paper using primarily Nupastels.  The subject was a striking erosion pattern on a barren roadside hill in Arizona where some rain storm had washed a funnel of colored soil down to contrast with a lower layer.  The resulting pastel was colorful but otherwise typical for me.  Seeing the strong horizontal banding I began the second work by hand-tearing paper, either more of the blue watercolor paper or white paper and pasted various layers .  Then I used oil pastels to and additional layers of paper in constructing and coloring the collage.  The Stage 3 was done by scanning Stage 2 and applying in PhotoShop a serigraph filter and adding additional color zones"

Jeff Potter Image-1

Jeff Potter Stage 2                                                                                             Jeff Potter Stage 3

Nov. 25th projects

   Fred Yost Project 11-25-07  Pedernal
The original painting of this exercise was an oil on linen executed in an Ann Templeton workshop at Ghost Ranch. It was done in an impressionistic manner. The assignment was to prepare a collage version of the same scene. In this example I used leather for the cottonwood trees and several commercial handmade papers to build up the rocky hillside and newspaper to shape the Pedernal. My own handmade paper was used in the clouds. Acrylic colors were brushed on and this was followed by sparse application of pastel to complete the painting.

   
        Fred Yost Image 1                                                                        Fred Yost Image 2

Jaci Fisher Project 11-25-07

Leila Hall  project Nov 25th 2007

 Leila Hall "Amsterdam Café" - pastel

 Leila Hall "Cafe collage" -- silk and oil cloth

                                                     Betsy Greenlee  project 11-25-07
     Betsy's Notes (11-25-07)  "they are rice paper collages with watercolor under painting and pastel on top"

      B. Greenlee Image 1                

                                B. Greenlee Image 2

Jeff Potter Project 11-25-07

Jeff's notes (11-25-07):  "Although I couldn't attend the meeting, I did complete an interesting 2nd collage. I chose to do a  9" x 6" pastel on a "Ersta" sand paper using a variety of colors and types of dry pastels.  The scene in Grand Staircase Escalante NM is one of my favorite areas.  The resulting pastel was by far my best use of a more dynamic color range, driven by the stunning reality of the scene. The almost storybook pattern of color areas was what intrigued me as a collage.  Using watercolor paper that I first painted with areas of pigment, and subsequently then used for material via mostly hand-tearing paper.   The collage strikes me as an exciting way to describe the layers of rock,  yet fashion more design elements in as well"

Jeff Potter Image-1

                           Jeff Potter Image-2

Elaine Scott Project 11-25-07  Elaine's Notes "I am fascinated by New Mexico landscapes that include such wonderful shapes and shadows.  So, my original painting incorporated some of those shapes and shadows from a photo I took at Tent Rocks.  I am still learning oil pastels which I have tried on several types of paper. For this project I used Masonite prepared with gesso as my working surface and used only my finger to blend to keep myself from being too detailed. 

Elaine Scott Image-1

For the more abstract collage I also used Masonite prepared with gesso but this time I did not use any paint but tore strips of brightly colored paper and used pieces of thin flagstone to represent the rocks. It was an experiment that was fun but not what I had envisioned."

Elaine Scott Image -2

7. Our next assignment is a triptych, similar to what we have been doing. Next meeting is Jan.13, 2008.

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