The Artist's Eyes by Jenn Lee

Ballerina’s have been dancing across our history since the fifteenth century.  Ballet originated in France and was brought into English in the seventeenth century, but it originally traces back even further to Latin ballare, meaning “to dance”.

The ballerina has transformed as well over the years. Originating as an entertainer, dancing for weddings and special events to metamorphosing into the “pointe work” focal it became in the nineteenth century and still today. Pointe work is the dance technique using the infamous ballet boxed toe shoe that you see in ballet.

The ballerina is an icon in her passion for dance, fierce emotion, strength and undying spirit, unbreakable will and determination and unstoppable, ongoing obsession to gain perfection. The ballerina stands with her head held high with perfect posture, seeming to float across the dance floor with arms and legs moving with the grace of a butterfly. Every movement or motion in perfect synchronization with the music, twirling and jumping with strength hidden behind the graceful choreography of arms and legs in even the slightest of movements. The ballerina is an artist of dance…in this artist’s eyes.

Everything the ballerina stands for and puts into action inspires me, so I decided to create a sculpture in dedication to the art…and the artist.

Our children grow up so fast, but never so fast as the infant stages. I have been reminded of this recently as I have been watching my first Grandchild go from newborn to 4 and a half months old. How quickly they go from sleeping all the time, to interactive and on the move. In a blink they are a year old, then two years old, then off to school and finally adulthood!

Remembering the cute little expressions or funny little habits or ways they acted becomes a blur as time goes by. This made me think, “I would love to capture and freeze in time, a moment in my child/grandchild’s life.” With that in mind, I have painted portraits and taken a million photos but never sculpted a 3 dimensional keepsake.

This inspired me greatly so…I did a search on the internet one day and found this cute little baby portrait as inspiration. It made me think of my children because every one of my children loved playing peek a boo with blankets. This first test sculpture turned out exactly how I envisioned it so I plan on creating sculptures of all my own children soon. You can view the pictures of my first test keepsake sculpture below. Please let me know what you think! Sculpting our children into adulthood is an art of it’s own…in this artist’s eyes.

I have a long distance friend, Mike, that is a passionate photographer of  Ornithology. Living in Florida, he has an endless supply of various birds to photograph. I love to tease him about his ease of finding subjects ready to pose for him, by calling him the modern day Dr. Doolittle.

Every time I get a free moment, I love looking at all the photos he shares via his flickr account. I have been following his work for sometime now, since he found an interest in my photo gallery on flickr over a year ago. If you love animals or more specifically birds of any kind, take a free moment and visit his photo gallery. I promise you won’t be disappointed! In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if you linger for longer than a few moments!

Recently I decided it was time to take his beautiful captures and use them for inspiration in my sculpting. How excited I was to try and bring to life in 3 dimension, one of his fantastic portraits. I will also admit, it was quite challenging to decide which of so many photos…to dedicate my time to!

In the end I chose one of his many Snowy Egret captures to use as my inspiration, every feather was created individually for maximum detail.…below you can view the sculpture. Mike’s photography collection is art in itself as well as worthy of inspiration…in this artist’s eyes.

Base stand is 6.5″x9.5″ diameter, Sculpture stands 7″ in height, Polymer clay sculpture, Blue Stained Glass water, copper reeds, acrylic paints

“Get your motor running, head out on the highway,
Looking for adventure in whatever comes our way.” ~ Steppenwolf

As I sat here this morning looking back on the year past and thinking about the year just begun, these song lyrics just popped into my head…literally. What an inspirational and motivational quote for the new year!

Each year we sit and ponder new years resolutions…health, careers, relationships, changes of all types in an constant quest to make each year better than the year before. Instead of making new years resolutions this year, I decided I wanted a new year motivation/inspiration. I hear people all the time say “I wish I had stuck to my new years resolutions…” or “I broke my new years resolution…”, myself included. Finding your inspiration or motivation is key to meeting goals or expectations. Each goal requires steps to fulfillment.

While you sit there thinking about the goals or plans you want to complete this new year…think first about what inspires motivation for you. Think about what keys help keep your motor running. Then get out on that highway and find your adventures! On your mark…get set…go! Inspiration and motivation is an art…in this artist’s eyes. Happy new year everyone!

When I first started a serious interest in art, I was always going through tons and tons of paper, canvas’s, pencils, paints and supplies. I always had boxes of past artwork stored here and stored there. As the years have gone by and multiple hassles with moving around, I have either given away or tossed many art pieces. This is why I love my tablet PC….

In today’s day and age, we are all about technology and gadgets. I had purchased a ThinkPad X41 Tablet PC awhile back, for it’s portability and tablet technology. Much like a Wacom digital tablet, it utilizes a full screen touch point ability for use with a stylus. There are several reasons I believe that this is a great asset to an artist like myself.

One reason I believe it’s a great asset is because I am primarily an ECO friendly artist. I try to keep my imprint on the environment as little as possible with my use of non toxic materials, recycling and reuse of materials. With using a tablet/touch pad PC, I have the ability to draw, paint or sketch out ideas all digitally. With this technology I do not have to use any paper, paint or other materials. It not only reduces my material usage, it but frees up a huge amount of office storage space as well.

Another reason I think it’s a great asset is its portability. As a business woman, I need to have a portable portfolio. Having the convenience of being able to carry my portfolio with me is great. As well, when I am quoting a commission, being able to sketch out ideas on location or digitally sign contracts on the tablet PC, increases productivity.

Recently I decided to add switching my OS (Operating System) as well. Mind you I know Microsoft is popular, and standard on any PC purchase besides a Mac, but we are not limited to it. This laptop came with XP Tablet version installed. Though it was nice to power it up and go, it was not as speedy as I would like, plus XP is a retiring OS, which means I will have to switch it out in the near future. Knowing this, the newer Microsoft OS’s will not run efficiently on this laptops specs. With those things in consideration as well as input from my good friend Jason of Webfoo, and his knowledge and passion for Linux, I decided to try running Linux on it.

Linux is an Open Source operating system. The impressiveness of the Linux community building/creating a completely free OS is amazing of itself, as well the amount of people in the community that donate so much time and energy adding to, fixing issues and developing of their own free will and time spent.

With the successful installation of Ubuntu Lucid 10.04 on my little tablet PC, I immediately noticed a more than significant increase in speed. This alone was a moment of pride and excitement. Pride because I consider myself a complete beginner in working with Linux and excitement that it installed and was configurable without a hitch.

Not only was I able to install the operating system, the free applications available are amazing. I hear a lot of people talk about the amount of applications they can get on their iPhones and iPads with Apple, but at a cost. Again I reiterate, the free resources available in the Linux community is astounding.

If you consider getting a tablet PC, Ubuntu is definitely something to do a little research on. GIMP is like Photoshop. It has many brushes, actions and tools just like Photoshop, but without any of the cost. It has a wonderful application called MyPaint that definitely competes with Adobe Illustrator as well. From my standpoint, MyPaint has the full range of capabilities you have with drawing or painting on a canvas that mimics real life. Did I mention these too are free? Some things to think about…in this artist’s eyes.