Inspirations

When in a creative rut I look to the people whose art I admire. They inspire me and push me to try do better/more. There are soooo many, but here are just a few I picked at random:


This is NT Candy one of the fabulous mosaic artists on Flickr.

Another one of the people who inspire me:

Carol Shelkin, who also did the amazing mosaic portrait of my Mother for me.

Suzanne Steeves, Lynne - AKA Siriusmosaics , Karen Sasine , Irit Levy and last for the list today Crystal Thomas.

These are just a few of the people who do mosaics, and I can only dream of being in their league. But I love watching their projects! Hope you do, too!

Beautiful Things

Anyone who reads here knows I have Turrets of art, and craft work. I love it ALL!!!

Over on Flickr I have the pleasure of seeing so many beautiful things from people I've come to know through their work. Such talent you would not believe. So I wanted to post a sampling of the treasures I see, and in no particular order.

Beauty in glass, Polymer clay and tile:


Beauty in fabric, thread and needles:



Seeing all the amazing things people create and the talent they posses, is like having a museum of my very own everyday. I love creative souls!

Good Shabbos, and this week's parsha Ki Savo.

I Break Stuff to Make Stuff

Who did that song, "Break up to make up, that's all we do"? That is similar to me and my mosaics. Yeah, I break things so I can simply put them back together again. Silly huh?

Mosaics were first introduced to me on the internet when I was searching for some crafting/art inspiration. The mosaic I came across was a incredible looking, and had such symmetry. Which being the anal perfectionist that I am it appealed to me right away. And no, I do not recall the mosaic. Figures huh?

Now some 2 years later this month I still love seeing, and playing with pieces of pottery, china, glass and other bits. It is like doing a jigsaw puzzle, but there is no box top picture to refer to for answers.

Today I wanted to post a few of my mosaic pieces, and in no particular order here they are.


Blue Flowers ( real creative on the name thing aren't I?), was a swap gift. This was one of my favorites, and it was hard to ship it off.

Shul Cart (there's that name thing again), was a collaboration between me and my dad. He built the cart, and I mosaiced the top. It was very rewarding on many levels.

Flow was my first glass on glass mosaic. It was created for my living room window. I went on to create two lamps for the same room in the same type of design, and colors.

The Sun and Moon mirrors were created for our bedroom. The celestial bodies have many connotations for us personally, and I love looking at them everyday.

So there you have a few of my mosaics. Creating them is something I love so much, but have so little time for lately. But I really have to work on that name thing...

Play Me a Melody

After several weeks of doing nothing creative, I finally finished the mosaic guitar I had started the first of July. It was all done except for the grout, but sat in the bat cave waiting for two weeks.

Grout color is always the most difficult choice for me to make. So I made up my mind I was going to finish it and move on, and try to find my creative energy again. This is the outcome.


The materials used were sheet music, crash/tempered glass, MAC glue, acrylic paint, grout, mirror, Lucite, stained glass and dye. All in all I am pleased with the piece, in particular the technical side of the work, just not sure what to do with it now. Ideas?

This piece made me take a step back and realize I need to take a break form mosaics. Although I love doing them I'm just not sure I am as good at them as I would like. Being a perfectionist that is a hard one. Do I sound whiny? Cause now I'm annoying myself...

On a different note it is Erev Shabbos! And of course I am in the process of getting everything done. So I gotta jet back to work.

This week's parsha is Re'eh.

What is Art?

If you know what the picture is, thank an art teacher.

The girls high school asked me to teach art this year...OY VEY!

So this is taking a lot of recall on my part since I've not been in art school for years! Kind of scary actually.

I'm trying to work out my curriculum, and supplies list to turn into the board. It is a lot tougher than I originally had thought it would be.

The hardest part for me right now is the lesson plans. Trying to create them without having more crafting, than art. I really find myself trying to discern more which is which, and really who decides what is art and what is craft? I'm soooo confused!

Embarking on teaching art (thank goodness it is only 1 day per week), to teenage girls will be not only a challenge, but an extreme joy. I'm looking forward to this probably more than they.