22 Jan

Posted at 21:27h in 365 project, art, artist, instagram, journaling, mary gaspar art, sketch, sketch a day by

So the sketching has continued uninterrupted with a trip thrown in the mix! That may explain the lack of color in this next crop. I didn’t have as much alone time to sit and leisurely draw and didn’t want to cut into visiting with extended family.

We visited my husband’s fam in North Reading, Massachusetts…a quaint suburb of Boston. They are of Portuguese descent, which you may see reflected in some of my sketch choices. Hydrangeas, for instance, grow wild all over the Açores, Portugal (where his folks are from). Also the Biscoitos drawing…his Vavó (grandmother) taught me to make these delicious biscuit/cookies years ago and they have now become a baking tradition in our household.

I originally started this sketch-a-day project to be a journal of sorts. I can look back at that day and say, “Oh I went swimming with my kids,” etc. And while I haven’t, necessarily, been as good at putting the exact date on each sketch (something I plan to remedy), I have been good at A. Doing it! and B. Posting it. You can follow along on instagram by following me at marygasparart! So here is January 12th through January 21st, 2014….

13 Jan

Posted at 16:54h in 365 project, art, art journal, art photos, drawing, mary gaspar art, new years, pen and ink, sketch, sketch a day by

On the 3rd of January I came across my old art bin of derwent graphic pencils, cray-pas, micron pens, prismacolor pencils and charcoal. I was so emotional at the sight. YES! They appeared, as if by magic, knowing that I had started this 365 day project…a sketch for each day of 2014.

Here are some of the sketches for this first week and a half of January 2014.

01 Jan

Posted at 21:04h in 365 project, art, art journal, art photos, journaling, mary gaspar art, marygaspar painting, new years, painting, sketch, sketch a day by

Happy New Year Everyone!

Two resolutions I am making for my Art this year are to do a 365 day project and to keep a daily art journal. My 365 project is to draw a sketch a day. No boundaries here…whatever I want to draw! And if paint, multi media or pastels get involved then so be it and all the better! This project is an exercise in sustaining a daily art habit as well as working on technique and building a portfolio of ideas to draw from-pun intended;)

Day One: The tree outside my window on this winter wonderland of a New Years Day in Chicago.

I have been longing to return to regular journaling for a while now. When I saw this beauty at Anthropologie…I knew I had to have her!

New Year, new beautiful journal to fill! This one will be mostly for art related things but art and life are all kind of rolled up in one for me anyways. Here’s to an inspiring and prolific year of art and expression-whatever that may be for you! What are your resolutions/projects/dreams for 2014?

05 Dec

Posted at 22:03h in acrylic, acrylic painting, Armory Show, art, art with hearts, artist, Bedsidesign, collaboration, Edvard Munch, figurative painting, headphones, instagram, inward facing girl, Madonna, mary gaspar art, marygaspar painting, Modern Art, music, new blog, painting, raincoast creative salon, we are the contributors by
Heart Sounds, 24 x 30, acrylic on canvas, 2013

Back in October I participated in a photo project through instagram, called Foliophoto. The idea was that for every day in October there would be a different word or phrase attributed like “look up”,”coffee” or “selfie”. You would take a picture of what that meant to you and tag it #foliophoto, so that everyone involved be inspired by each other’s different ideas, lives, and aesthetic. It was through this project that I became familiar with Sandra Harris who runs a blog and evening salon series called Raincoast Creative Salon. She started the foliophoto project with another gal, Christie Jones from Bedsidesign. It was just so fun to virtually meet all of these creative types and get to know a little bit about one another’s work!

Sandra then asked me, along with Melanie Biehle who runs Inward Facing Girl, to be one of the inaugural artists for their collaboration…We Are The Contributors. Their idea is brilliant-to create a website for artists and photographers, bloggers and all creative types to connect and collaborate on bi-monthly projects. For the first issue (launched yesterday!) me and 9 other creatives were asked to create a piece of art of our chosen medium (poem, painting, song, even recipe!) based on the inspiration of 3 paintings shown at the 1913 Armory Show in NYC. It is, afterall, the 100th anniversary of the show that created a landscape for modern art. The three pieces were Edvard Munch’s Madonna, Marcel Duchamp’s Nude Descending A Staircase No. 2 and John Marin’s Woolworth Building No. 31. I chose Munch’s Madonna as my inspiration and here’s why.

 

 

Edvard Munch (Norwegian, 1863-1944), Madonna, 1895-1902. Color lithograph on wove, tan, mixed fiber paper, 17 5/16 x 17 ½ in.

I am currently working on a series of paintings that explore the melding of portraiture and abstract geometric shapes. The idea that the energy that surrounds us could be a completely different tangible shape. Munch’s Madonna has a glowing energy around her like a halo of light. I couldn’t help but think of music. I get a lot of my ideas for my paintings while running and listening to music. This series is specifically influenced by electronica music.

I imagine that when the music breaks down into fast electrifying beats, it’s coming apart like an avalanche of rocks off of a mountain or swirling meteors in space. And because Munch’s Madonna is so completely lost in thought I wanted my woman to be lost in sound. The idea for the heart came much later in my process. I didn’t know where I wanted the headphones to lead. And then it just made sense to make it a real heart. Kind of appropriate considering my obsession with adding hearts to my art. Here’s my painting on the Contributor’s site and a little peak into the progression of Heart Sounds…

 

.

She got tattooed at one point…
 Adding the shapes…
And then cleaning them up.
Experimenting with color palette and texture…
And whiting it out.
Implementing the heart…

 

And shocking color

 

 

But decided that they looked like pizza…

 So back to clean bright white.
.

 The completed piece…

Heart Sounds, 24 x 30, acrylic and ink on canvas, 2013.

Check out all of the incredible Artists involved…everyone’s got such a unique take on the original inspiration. You can follow on Twitter with the hashtag #aContributor and on the Facebook page. And request to be involved in a project at We Are The Contributors and collaborate with other creatives!

10 Oct

Posted at 19:39h in acrylic, acrylic painting, art, art photos, art with hearts, artist, etsy, etsy seller, flowers, hearts, mary gaspar art, marygaspar painting, painting, products, society 6 by

Hey everyone! I now have prints, totes, i phone cases, stationary and pillows of my art on Society 6. And right now there is a great promotion going on! Click on the link below to get FREE SHIPPING! Promotion expires October 13, 2013 at Midnight Pacific Time. *Offer excludes Framed Art Prints, Stretched Canvases and Throw Pillows with insert.

http://society6.com/MaryGaspar?promo=a65aa5

12 Sep

Posted at 15:09h in art, art with hearts, artist, painting, street art, travel, Uncategorized by

While traveling this past July through São Miguel, the largest island of the Portuguese Açores, I couldn’t help but notice all of the incredible street art. You can check out my previous post featuring the amazing work by ARM COLLECTIVE  here.

This large scale fish resided right outside the apartment we were staying in Vila Franco do Campo. I loved the bright colors and whimsy of this piece and couldn’t help but be intrigued by the simple symbol and tag of the artist…YVES.


And with my utter appreciation of the universal heart and incorporation of them into my own artwork you can imagine my delight at finding YVES’s art everywhere!


Upon doing some digging, I came to discover that the artist’s full name is Yves Decoster. His work is all over São Miguel. He is a Belgian painter that has been residing in São Miguel for 25 years. Over 200 of his signature heart paintings live on the outside of bars, restaurants, schools and private residences. Yves uses the word “positivism” when describing his work…bringing color and life to the people. 

My husband and I traveled the “old road” through all of the little villages one of our last nights there. Around every turn one of us was shouting, “There’s one!”, “And another!” and “There he is!”

 

It seemed to me that each place we found one of Yves’s paintings was a landmarked memory as if to say, “Love grows here.”Yves Decoster can be contacted at yvesdeco@hotmail.com.