A Collection of New Colors, and New Designs

From Oct 12-14, 2012, I will be exhibiting at the Westchester Fine Crafts Show at the County Center in White Plains, NY. November 8-11, 2012, I'll be showing at the Philadelphia Museum of Art's Craft Show as one the 195 artists selected from more than 1,300 applicants. This year a group of artists from England and Ireland have been invited to exhibit (and sell) with us. I hope to see many of you!

My First Ever Studio Sale (until the 1st of Sept)

Eight of my older baskets are looking for homes by September 1st. As incentive, each of these is now 35% off of the original online price. They are in gallery-ready condition, and all but the hairy basket have been renewed with the application of encaustic medium. (If you're on Facebook you can click here for the individual photos.) For more details or how to buy one of these baskets, please email me at kari@karilonning.com  

Here are the specifics:
1. Inspired by Terra Cotta $1560 (was $2400)  24.5" x 17"
2. Spinning Double, double wall $1300 (was $2000)  4" x 12"
3. Salmon Feathers is sold (it was $625)  12.25" x 12"

4. Talk of Furniture  $1660 (was $2400)  21" x 12"
5. Here She Stands  $3120 (was $4800)  22.5" x 12" x 10.5"
6. Taking Flight, Montana Tapestry  $1560 (was $2400)  22.5" x 12"

7. Emerging from Chaos  $2600 (was $4000)  22.5" x 20.5" x 16.5" 
8. Encaustic Doughnut, double wall  $1560 (was $2400)  3.75" x 10.5"
9. Pumpkin Seagrass Ropes  $1040 (was $1600)  19" x 12.5"

I'm working on a new post but I'll put this up now rather than delay even longer ... As many of you know I'd rather weave and edit photos, but there is so much to tell you about. It's an exciting time.

Excited and Inspired, and Working Like Crazy

This winter into spring I've been weaving, photographing, learning about iPhone apps (and applying for a grant to study this phenomenon), so passionately that I've had to force myself to stop doing one or the other things in order to eat and sleep! I've been so excited about color and patterns in the baskets that I've been designing new pieces before I finish the ones I'm working on. (I still plan to write about the square, double-wall I mentioned in the last post ... but that will have to wait.)

I'll be exhibiting in Craft Boston next week, March 23-25 and then at the Smithsonian Craft Show in Washington, DC April 19-22. My website has been updated with all the new pieces. I still want to add encaustic to a few of the flat woven baskets. The encaustic makes the baskets stronger, protects them from moisture (and maybe light over time) and adds a slightly richer quality to the dyed and natural colors. I expect to use more of this technique in the future. 

Here's a peak into the encaustic studio (aka the greenhouse) and a few of the pieces I'm working on. There's a closer photo showing the frying pan (don't know what else to call it) with the molten wax/resin and brushes here.

The garden is starting to explode with flowers and photography potential. The flower photos above are close-up shots of a few of my hellebores. (You can see more on my gardening blog.) It's taking me longer and longer to walk down the driveway to get the mail. I get distracted by seeing what has just bloomed or by wanting to clear out just one more small bed ... I really need a clone, or TWO, to help me do all the things spinning around in my head. 

Beginning 2012 with A New Way of Seeing

Usually I think of myself as a basketmaker and 3-dimensional artist, but now I'm looking at the world with the eyes of a painter/photographer. Everything I look at, I see with infinite graphic potential. I see patterns, color combinations, studies in light and shadow, and I also imagine how I can enhance and/or distort them. For the last few months I have been overtaken by a serious infatuation with photo apps. My favorites are Paper Camera and Instagram. These and other applications on the iPhone's camera, have changed the way I look at the world around me. (I've posted a few Paper Camera photos on my Facebook page, but I'll talk more about that in a future blog post.)

.

Yesterday, after pouring espresso into my steamed milk, I looked at it, and I found a DUCK in my latte! (The point here is that I'm noticing more, and looking at things with new eyes.)

.

This morning, I saw this reflection in my living room window. (Everything appears double, ie. the vertical bars and the two houses ... because of the storm window. The backround greenery is the arborvitae out back. The houses are little sculptures in the reflected window.) This photo, although cropped and darkened a bit, was not otherwise altered. The exciting and remarkable point to this photo is that I've been trying to create images like this with the photo apps. This morning though, nature and circumstances created it and I just showed up at the right time and caught it with the camera.

.

I'm not sure what I'm going to do with all the new photo inspiration, but I'll never get bored.

.

And ... I still want to write about the square, double-walled basket I made ... (another post waiting to be written soon).

.