morning gold

Beets
lettuce
ginger
celery
lemon
beet greens
carrots
apple.

And color for the soul.

vermelion cubes

The cubes we ordered finally arrived. Gee, we've lived in this house for 4 years and have that table for maybe 3... and no decent chairs. The ones we had were restored, reused, recycled by me, after I bought each for $1 in a garage sale in... in the woods, like Monroe -- somewhere by Lake Stevens, on my red-neck years. Man, I just now saw how those chairs sucked! OK, not true. I put a LOT of work on them. But they did not make any justice to this table, right? The cubes (or Ottomans in Americano English) made the table actually look smaller, or it gave it correct proportion. I always thought the table was too big, it doesn't look like that anymore. They also match the girth of the couch, low and blocky. It's a different area now. We had dinner on them yesterday. Steve cooked a banquet, totally a coincidence with their date or arrival. A whole chicken, French way. Foodie-goodie!

colorful letter sets and notepads

When I was a little girl I used to collect stationery or "papel de carta" in Portuguese. Oh, we were so addicted all of us on 3rd, 4th, 5th grade... The intermission was all for trading. I and other girls had portfolio folders full with our collections. Any going out with my Mother was a moment to implore for money for a new set of stationery. I'd keep one and the rest was for trading. I loved inspecting my collection, reorganizing, touching them and admiring how everything matched so lovely, the colors, the different envelopes. I was so proud of them. I think that's when I started being fascinated with paper.

Lately, I've been printing letterheads and notepads after each big project I do. In a way they are like by-products of the real projects. You see, after the end of each big printing job (a broadside like the Neruda one for example) there's always a lot of ink left on the press. Specially the C&P -- boy, that press takes ink! It's hard to look at that beautiful inked press and not want to print until all is gone. Being a saver by nature, I started grabbing whatever cut at hand along with letter size paper I had in the shop and look! Aren't they actually pretty decent?

I love printing these because there's no plan beforehand. Improvised as it can be. I'm a big fan of no planning most of the time. No worries, pure fun. I've been doing 100 of each type. The resulting image has that old, distressed quality, because I am not adding more ink, just using what's there. Then I go home and assemble everything by hand, including printing my labels and neatly wrapping them in clear bags. Oh, joy! The Wild Cherry envelopes are gorgeous, the color is so vibrant you want to eat it. And it's actually how these are, you just want to look at them all the time. They are poetic, they are simple.

I sent some as marketing pieces and they were a huge success. Letterheads are already for sale at my Etsy store!

olympics 2016 art

Today, because of the results of the Olympics 2016 winning city, I "unbiasedly" (right...) decided to take a look at their graphic design accomplishments. Through the news I finally got curious about their logos, websites and other Olympic propaganda. So, let's do some very informal critiquing.

Visiting their sites (Madrid, Tokyo, Rio de Janeiro, Chicago), I really liked Madrid's. The big typography and floods of color are attractive to me, and exciting. Tokyo's site is hard to believe. Although I'm a believer that there's a time and place for everything, I think that the clipart-like illustrations were not a good deliberation. Do you see TOKYO in that site? Rio's and Chicago's sites don't really speak to me; not much heart in neither I guess, although they have organization and Chicago's has some interesting effects (and a lovely HUGE image on the home page).

I find that the Madrid mark combined well the city/culture identity (sort of Gaudi-ish) with the meaning of the Olympics (uniting of the world). The typeface is bold and modern (sort of computeresque), but not cold and it says diversity (it seems they used 2 different faces). It was a clever choice the M at the bottom of the hand, which despite of being an overused symbol, it doesn't compromise the integrity of the group. The piece remains balanced and it earnestly represents (specially with the use of the black) that boldness Madrileña.

The Tokyo mark is also very strong, but I think there's room for improvement on the typeface choice, maybe it's too extended, or something is off with the overall placement of elements and it's not the asymmetry. Not sure the red sun had to be in there. But nevertheless, the knot is so iconic! It's a musubi and it represents blessings in times of celebration. I love it.

The Rio logo is cute and friendly, but its concept not as straightforward. Sugar Loaf shapes (city identity) form a heart. Don't know exactly where is the Olympic meaning. Maybe the curves looks like jumps, and the sugar loafs obstacles... Or maybe the heart means all getting together in peace for the Olympics... Don't know exactly. The same way, the Chicago piece has some beautiful gradients and stands well balanced, but feels a bit stiff or even uptight to me. It's not clear the relation to the specific culture or to the Olympics, other than the colors. Maybe the star relates to the athletic heroes?

Read here about what each logo means.

At any rate, it's a lot of material that they have to put together and at the end, might not be enough. The logos are still, all four, beautiful art to look at. I enjoyed them. See you all in Rio in 7 years?

clothing tags

I got lucky and got to print two tags for two fashion designers recently. For Rusty Nail, I also designed the logomark, which with such an inspiring name (the designer is inspired by all things rusted, especially small nails and other small objects) wasn't difficult.

For my friend Claudia, who is always producing all sorts of gorgeous things out of fabric, I hand-cut a linoleum block with the most charming sewing machine. All text was handset on the three languages she speaks (handmade is written in English, German and Portuguese). I went all the way with cherry-colored eyelets that matched my pure magenta block print. The orange and magenta are inspired on a colorful summer dress Claudia made me.

For both tags, I used plantable paper made out of natural fiber and wild flower seeds from Porridge Papers. What a delightful project! Both ladies LOVED their tags.

a girl on the bridge

This was my submission for the Bridges Art Show, the first full size exhibit of Em Space Book Arts Center in Portland.

The girl illustration is a hand cut linocut. Typography set by hand, monotype. I used both my presses for this; typography was printed on the C&P 12x18 and the linocut on my peerless 8x12. The recycled paper was generously donated by Warren Wilkins.

Description:
"A girl is on a bridge between two worlds. The worlds exist in a general sense as her past and her future and the bridge is built from elements for which the girl feels love or distain. But it is ambiguous to the viewer which elements elicit which feeling. It is possibly ambiguous for the girl, as well. She cannot let go of the past that she believes she may want to return to. Nor is she able to cross the bridge and join the future – already her present."

Words in Portuguese are: mother, beach, sun, Maceió (a city), carnival, music, heat, poverty, sea, aunts, parties, sensuality, samba, sandals & bikinis, pain.

50 copies, 12.5" x 9.5".

rainbow chard

Steve planted seeds of rainbow chard about two months ago and look at yard now what we. I juice it often, the colors are beautiful!