On Wednesday I took collages to the Dearborn Art Council that Anne Gautreau and I made for their Art-in-a-box fundraiser during the Festival of Trees. A request had gone out to local groups and Anne, the President of AAUW asked for ideas. I had suggested that we do a collage with images that echoed the theme of the organization. We were planning on having several ladies help with the project, but in the end it was Anne and I. I provided the design elements and we both worked on our collages together. It is so much fun to work side by side with other creative types! Since I am vintage-wired, of course, I selected vintage images, emphemera, and embellishments. We used the front and back cover of one of an old blue binder like I carried in high school (recently found at an estate sale). An old office paper clip was used to hang them. Yet, as is typical for me, when I went to turn them in I was very very anxious. You never know how your ideas will be received, and given the steampunk and definitely not fine art attitude of our creation, I dreaded how Stella might respond. As it was, she loved them and even asked if I wanted to put some of my vintage art items in the Holiday sale during the Festival of Trees. I was thrilled to say the least. And again, I need to let it sink in that taking a risk can have definite benefits.
Here are our collages. Annes' is on the right, mine's on the left.
Before we left for Petoskey, I also went to our ATC meeting and Took was there. YEAH! She approved my finished prototype for the Art-O-Mat project she's involved in. Again, I was a little leary of whether it would be up to par, but in the end she loved the design. I will be packaging it up and it should be on it's way to North Carolina for final approval before the end of the week. Once final approval is given, my goal is to have the 50 cottage bracelets finished and back to the warehouse by mid-November in time for holiday travelers.
So, on to Petoskey. We had a wonderful 3 day trip, spending 2 nights at the historic Perry Inn in Petoskey. We went to the Applefest in Charlevoix on Friday. What a wonderful fall day. There were a lot of wonderful artists at the fest, but I didn't buy anything. While in the area, we visited Emily's wonderful Victorian Home in Bayview, an art and culture community on the National Historic Register. I sat on her porch and enjoyed the smell of evergreen needles and clutter of fallen leaves from the hill her house sits on. Unfortunately, no one
ever came home (which we knew was the case). We did enjoy snooping and peeking in the windows.
While in Petoskey we saw the Mushroom houses, darling little stone structures with thatched looking cedar roofs that resemble what you'd see in a faerie garden. We shopped the shops along main street and searched out a number of consignment and thrift shops, where I found some great items to work with. On the way up north, we stopped at a church rummage sale (found a wonderful diary from 1933) and an estate sale near Petoskey on the way home. We also stopped in Lowell, intending to have lunch and to stop and see an exhibit where Took had a collage and sculpture on display. Drats, with the rain and other delays, the gallery was closed by the time we found it. Kathleen and I dredged through the rain, walking through the Pipe factory lot, across the tracks to see where the Art Complex was. Kathleen, bless her heart, carried on like a trooper, determined after all we had gone through, we weren't giving up now! As noted, once we found the building, no one was home :(
Oh, and "the hat"? Well, when we arrived in Petoskey on Thursday, I bought a comfortable cotton slouchy hat knowing with the weather report that there would be plenty of rain and wind. When I wore it Saturday I had at least 15 people tell me they liked my hat. It got to the point that it became pretty funny that it drew so much attention. Then in Lowell the next day, I got several compliments again. One lady in line at Goodwill told me she noticed my hat when I was walking on the far side of the store. And a fiber artist at a gallery we stopped in was intriqued with how it was made, so I took it off so she could figure it out and maybe make one for herself and perhaps sell them as well. Whew. Never underestimate the ego-boost of a hat on a bad hair day!
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