250. LEAP #7: Glue-and-Dust Star

Oops. Look at that: this is number 250... I had completely forgotten about it. So, nothing special for this one:

Another Limited Edition Art Piece: paint the square black, apply glue in shape of star, spread dust over it (soapstone remains...), let dry a bit, blow off dust --> finished.

159. Limited Edition Art Piece #2

Right, here is the next one.

It's very green.

Not much else to say about it. :)

P.S.: I just realised that abbreviating "Limited Edition Art Piece" would get me "LEAP".

I think that's an interesting connection.

I'm just not sure what to do with it, yet.

158. Limited Edition Art Piece #1

The fun with "This is not a Book" continues. There's a page with 10 empty squares to be filled with ideas/art of any kind. This is my first: a star made of silvery-white string in a watercolour night sky.

147. Music Monday #4

Oh dear, it looks like last week's music project was too difficult to figure out after all. Well, maybe I'll just post the solution in a comment... :)

For the one today, I'll give a little hint: It's also (rather strongly) related to a movie...

Just a quick sketch and watercolours. - I had originally thought of something very different for today but that would have required a lot more time and I was at home for about 3 hours total today. Maybe next week.

101. Star-Shaped Table Lantern

Yet another table lantern that had me wondering for a long time how it was made. I looked for instructions yesterday, found them, and now here it is:

It turned out a little dark because I coloured the paper in (mostly blue) watercolours. I think oiled paper would be a good option here, too.

I used the (German) instructions from this website and since I was rather in a hurry didn't make any myself.

87. Purple Star Filled with Chocolate

What a mess. My workload just exploded. I spent the past 6 solid hours preparing presentations for university and I'm still far away from the finish line. Time and again I was debating whether I should still make a proper star for decoration purposes today or just resort to some mini project.

But when it's past midnight and you know you're still going to read for two hours or so, honestly, what does it matter? So here's a little 3D-star of two sides glued together, hollow inside - except for a chocolate praline I put inside which is going to be my reward once next week is over and I have finished all of my presentations for this year.

The picture is a little blurred because that thing just wouldn't hold still - and a flash made it look blue...

This was the template, by the way:

P.S.: Beautiful option for a self-made Advent calendar - you just have to make 24 of them...

43. Year of the Stars

In the light of university lectures resuming today after the summer break (for me, that is - there are poor people who already had to start yesterday) , I realised I would soon need a new calendar for next year. Appointments dates and deadlines are going to cumulate over the next few weeks.

I had been on the lookout for a pocket calender for some time already but… well, I got to know myself over the past years so I am aware that this search is rather pointless. So I ended up bying the cheapest one I found of the right fromat and altered it:

Front

Back

Spine

Inside, I added some notable celestial events of next year (t.b.c.).

I seriously considerd redoing it all because I was quite unhappy with the front cover (I felt very clums with the paint brush and the far too thick white paint). But there's this thing about perfectionism, you know... unhealthy and all. I figured I could live with this version. Plus, I would have been very uncomfortable throwing away my first ever nine-pointed star. ;)

P.S.: Concerning its title: I am aware that my personal year of stars will end already in September 2012. However, 1. the larger portion of the project falls into next year, not this year; 2. I will begin next year with lots of stars on my mind; 3. who knows whether I will actually (be able to) stop after the 365th star?; and 4. who cares, anyway? :D

40. Suminagashi

Today, I spent some time looking for other people who are doing yearlong projects or daily challenges. Yes, they are out there, and they are more than just few. :)

One of them has introduced me to a new technique I had never seen nor heard about before: Suminagashi - the Japanese art of marbling. It basically consists of dipping paint brushes with ink into water to create patterns and then place a paper on top of it to absorbe the colour. I was so fascinated I had to try it myself. Here are the results:

Of course, I don't have the original ink that's used for this, so I had to make due with watercolours (regular blue and black ink didn't work at all). Red and yellow definitely worked best while blue was extremely difficult - no idea why.
But it was a lot of fun sitting in front of that large water bowl with my paint brushes. I shall try it again some time soon. :)

18. White Tiger of the West

Today's project is the first to not depict an actual star-shaped 'star'. But it's still very star-related.

At 11:04 this morning (that's 10:04 GMT), the sun crossed the celestial equator into the southern hemisphere. This moment is know as autumnal equinox and marks the beginning of the autumn season in astronomy. So I - being an almost hobby astronomer and currently taking a one year star challenge - decided to pay my tribute to this season in an astronomical kind of way.

In traditional Chinese astronomy, the sky is divided into 28 'lunar mansions' which are again grouped into four symbols: the Azure Dragon of the East, the Black Tortoise of the North, the White Tiger of the West, and the Vermillion Bird of the South. They are all associated with a season as well, and I was quite delighted to find that the one for the upcoming autumn season is the White Tiger! :D

The tiger is a simple aquarelle painting (DIN A3). For the stars I used acrylic paint. (I would have liked to use my Chinese calligraphy set, but I don't have it with me, so I had to make due with a not so very traditional way of painting. It was fun non the less!)

P.S.: The first one to find a well known western constellation among those stars will get a big cyber-hug and a cheer in the next post! ;)

14. Deep Ecology

I'm still filled with thoughts and emotions from the past weekend's workshop. It is not easy to summarise, but for all the people who are still in search of themselves, and for those who feel like there is something going wrong in this world: Take a look at Deep Ecology (Tiefenökologie), you may find it quite interesting.

A beautiful, appreciative way to learn not to forget the world's well-being over onself, and not to forget ones own well-being over the world - and to realise that there isn't much of a difference between the two.

This star is dedicated to all the people who work to reconnect:

Now I had better abandon this view and look at the world from the inside rather than from the outside, seeing that I am inevitably a part of it.

The world is a seamless coat.

"It is impossible to cut into this network, to isolate a portion of it without it becoming frayed and unravelled at all of its edges. All around us, as far as the eye can see, the universe holds together, and only one way of considering it is really possible, that is, to take it as a whole, in one piece." (Pierre Teilhard de Chardin)

P.S.: I am not the first to cut up the world into odd shapes. With this one I had help from a gentleman named Petermann (1865), though already Leonardo da Vinci may have created a star-shaped map in the 1500s. (Further reading: English / Deutsch)