Athena Dreams Design

A Book and A Pack of Girls = Gathering

Serendipity, happenstance, fortuitous-ness, stars aligning – all of these were in abundance when we  began gathering that first afternoon for Christine's book release. We (read we to mean a pack of girls) walked past these letters on the sidewalk, left no doubt by someone who was changing the marquee at the movie theatre, but letters left without a sitter, are letters that WILL be rearranged. And so the week of the book release begins.

A few highlights for me:

• gathering with old and new friends to celebrate what Christine has created
• a spontaneous hair cut on Venice Beach
• travelling with a pack of girls at all times for 4 days

• feeling perfectly and beautifully imperfect within a circle of friends
• getting dressed for the Event {with a pack of girls}
• standing at the Event, and feeling really and truly honoured to have contributed to this amazing book, with an amazingly gifted group of women
• a spontaneous and exuberantly prepared late dinner after the Event
• the after party gathering that turns into girls night, with one, very well-adjusted man with a really really good sense of humour in attendance

• going to West Hollywood to a friend's Open Studio and buying The perfect painting for my guy for Christmas (oh and one for me too!)
• coffee every morning at the kitchen table, reviewing the day before and planning the day ahead {with a pack of girls}
• planning the next visits and the next times we'll see each other, and being grateful I'm a girl with friends that fill my life with as much joy and honesty and vision as I can hold.

New Work. New Perspective.

I spent a few weeks this fall working on a few new pieces for artstream's Holiday Equinox show. It felt so good to start AND finish 4 new pieces and be: a) happy with the work and b) inspired to create more.

I know that sounds pretty basic, but the 2 feelings combined can be the most elusive of creatures.

Now, the work that has been lingering in my studio since this summer feels overthought.
Creating these new pieces was all about heart, and soul, and voice, and colour.
It's made me re"think" the pieces started this summer, or should I say UN-think.

I want to go back and un-Think those pieces now.
Now that I say that, I want to go and un-Think quite a few things...

There are a few other artists in the Holiday Equinox show in addition to me, have a look, there's some amazing work.

One More Thankful Day

Thank You to everyone who has ever purchased my work.

Thank you to all of you who have taken the time to tell me what my work has meant to you.

Thank you to all of you who have travelled some part of this life path I am on with me.

Thank you for all the opportunities and for the support I receive from near and far.

This life as an artist and a creator couldn't happen without you – all of you who have touched my life in some way or another.

Thank you = Everything is 20% off in my shop when you use the coupon code JOY20.

Sale ends at the end of today, Monday 28 November.

 

 

create . explore . discover . the afterparty

• Drove through Donner Pass with snow coming down hard, and arrived in Truckee to sunshine and amazing spirits, ready to teach, to create and to explore and discover.
• Got to spend some quality time with our amazing hostess Sarah Stevenson and learned that she is deeper, funnier and a woman with a BIG vision when it comes to both women and the arts.
• Taught two classes. In the first one we created images for our pendants, and in the second we prepped and poured resin to create art pendants. Thank you to all of you who participated, you are all SO very creative and gifted.

 

• In the moment, I was, well, in the moment, and now, of course, wish I had taken my camera out a bit more. But the memories are with me, and will be for a long time.
• Got to reconnect with one of my favourit-est girls in the whole wide world: she is a treasure in my life.
• Met the newest treasure in my life, and now have to figure out how to move Utah just a wee bit closer west. Any thoughts on how to do that?

• If you are making a trip to Tahoe, I highly recommend the site of the Create Explore Discover retreat Cedar House Sport Hotel. They took such good care of us. The rooms! The down quilts! The meals! The land! The smell of piney woods and bread baking in the kitchen! Yup, pretty much Heaven.
• AND further to that, make the trip there next year when Sarah will host the second annual Create Explore Discover retreat.

• Did I say the food was stupendous?
• What a treat this weekend was, all the way, through and through:
  
  • We created.
  • We talked about making it in this world as artists.
  • We laughed.
  • We went deep.
  • We taught.
  • We had poetry written just for us.
  • We shared our experiences.
  • We shared (a very few and an appropriate amount) tears.
  • We created some more. 
  • We learned. 
  • We visualised.
  • We shared bits and pieces of our loves.
  • We went back to create.
  • We laughed more. 
  • We created. 

Perhaps "The Girls" would want to include Creative Girl, Explorer Girl or Discovery Girl in their next line of socks!?!

A huge thank you to Sarah for putting this all together, and giving me my very first art retreat teaching opportunity. Big hugs and hand holds to Marisa and Denice. And more huge thank you's to all of you who arrived for a weekend of creating. Here's to the first of many more create . explore . discover retreats to come.

create . explore . discover

In about 8 days I will be arriving in Lake Tahoe, getting ready to teach at this über-amazing art retreat called create . explore . discover

This is the first year of this event, and I think the first of its kind being held in the Sierra Nevada Mountians–or I should say, the first one I've heard of. Our amazing hostess Sarah Stevenson has put together an intimate, beautifully deep, and crazy fun time for us. I am so incredibly honoured to be a part of it.

Creative sessions will be taught in the mornings by Marisa Haedike, Denice Barlow Brown , Sarah and me! And the afternoons are left open for hiking, communing with the Tahoe area, hanging with friends, soaking in the moments, and whatever else you might want to do.

The setting is Truckee, in the Sierra Nevada Mountains and the location is the Cedar House Sport Hotel in the North Lake Tahoe area. So not only will there be creative and energising classes, we'll be dining on organic food, staying in a certified green hotel and waking up to this incredible mountain setting each morning. This is an all around ideal fall getaway, the location is a 90 minute drive from  Sacramento, California and a 3 hour drive from the San Francisco Bay Area, and you can spend 2 and a half days creating and replenishing your spirit.

So if your inner artist is needing some "me" time, or if you're feeling a need to get messy and play, if you're yearning for a bit of rejuvenation and a boost to your inspiration, this could be the perfect place to find it!

If you've been thinking about this, jump on in, there's still a little time and we'd love to see you there!

A Thankful Sale

As a thank you to all of you who have stopped by to visit, to all of you who have purchased from my shop, and generally supported me in this life as an artist: A Thankful Sale!

From Friday the 26th thru Monday the 29th - Buy 2 or more items and receive 10% off your order when you use the coupon code JOY10.

I will also be offering free gift wrapping for this 4-day sale so let me know on your order if your purchase is for gifting and if you'd like it wrapped.

I hope you all are continuing to celebrate the season of grateful this weekend and having many beautiful moments with all your friends and family and those you love.

September 2010 .:. Biz Goals

I love September. No matter where I am in the world or in my life, I always love September. Perhaps it's the years of starting school at this month, or the slight shift in the light and in the season, that certain September scent in the air... but September always has seemed to me like it's the true beginning of the year, and January, the false new year. Perhaps I could get a petition going to make September 1st new year...

But anyway, here we are in September! Summer holidays are passed, and here we go!

SO, August:

1. Hopefully launch the new site. you can go and see the holding page with the Coming Soon banner at: http://www.lizkallochdesigns.com - not yet finished... ooo, some things are just beyond my ability to control, corral, or otherwise mold to my timeline.
   
2. Restock Etsy shop and send out a new newsletter. - still in process, photos, photos, photos
   
3. Get product ready for the Squam Art Workshops vendor night. - still in process also
   
4. Continue painting. - uh-huh
   
5. Get new pieces finished for RooTs Collaborative. - done
   
6. Start month long yoga intensive. - saved my sanity...
   
7. Get August design deadlines done early in the month and make some time for creating! - quite successfully accomplished
   
8. Remember that time is an elusive and mysterious friend. - indeed!
   

September:

1. Continue with the website, set new goal for the end of this month, and keep it moving.
2. Newsletter for etsy shop
3. Work on developing new products and generate new ideas
4. Marketing... the ever present marketing thing...
5. Attend the September session of Squam, and paint, and dream, and hang with friends . . .
6. Make time to write, everyday. No time limit, just writing.
7. Celebrate having 6 pieces in the Teeny Tiny Art Show at Three Graces Gallery in Portsmouth NH - the show opens on 3 September and is up through the 26th.
8. Walk in the woods and smell that September air.

Welcome September!

 

________________________

IF you are new to The Meetup or would like to play along, here's the scoop:

• Post a list of your business related goals for the current month on the 1st of each month on your blog. {If the 1st falls on a weekend, post on the following Monday.}
• Come back over here and leave a link to your goals blog post in the comments of my current month's goals.
• And then {and this is the most important part, since we are a community} visit all the links in the comments, stop in and say hello, have a conversation, meet and greet and etc.

 

A Little Bit of Teeny Tiny

Paintings for the Teeny Tiny Art Show at Three Graces Gallery

My teeny tiny brushes create colour and pattern, shape and shadow, line and form. They also create a feeling of fullness and completion, joyfulness and calm, problem and solution inside me.

Last week, when I was painting and painting and painting, and in between breathing and walking and remembering to eat dinner, I realised: There are some places, some times, some things that make me feel totally and completely at home inside myself, and painting is one of those things. There are moments when I feel as though I am inhabiting all the space inside this body, all the air passing in and out of my lungs, all the muscles and veins and tendons, and I am well and truly home.

There is so much more I notice when I am truly at "home":

• the sun has moved just slightly in the sky, and no longer streams blindingly in through the front windows as it did a month ago
• turquoise, while still my favourite, seems to have been eclipsed by golden yellows this time around
• there is lots of noise in the quiet
• often times when thinking a thought out to it's very conclusion, I end up with several more things to think about
• people who eat dinner on the patio at the restaurant next door sing happy birthday songs, a lot, and like to mimic operatic voices, and I sing along, softly, from my studio
• gray is almost always so much more than you think it is

And you? When and where do you feel truly at home, all the way to the very core of yourself?

Stephanie Guimond .:. Her Vision of Squam

Photo of Stephanie by Kirsten Michelle
 

A real art show, at a real gallery, and I was invited to submit my work.

My first reaction was giddiness and excitement; my second one was fear and doubt: “Who am I to think anything I make would be good enough? I’m not an artist, I just took workshops with artists.” But I knew this was a good opportunity. Not only the opportunity to display my work, but the opportunity to learn about art shows and framing and the submission process amongst a group of supportive and creative kindred spirits. Besides, initial giddiness is usually a telltale sign that the Universe is sending me something special and that, my friends, is not to be ignored!

What She Seeks by Stephanie Guimond

I had no portfolio and I didn’t know how to paint under pressure, only “real artists” did that. All I did was play with paints at my art table and whatever came up, well, came up. So I looked at the few paintings I’d completed since Squam, painted a few more then chose four I thought were good enough to submit. Then I had to price them.

Pricing my artwork was without a doubt the toughest part of the process where most of my insecurities cropped up. I plugged away at my Excel spreadsheets, did my research and asked for help when I needed it. I am forever grateful to the Squammettes who helped guide me through the process by offering their experience and support right up to the time of submission. Immediately after sending my submission I burst into tears of relief at being done and tears of happiness at being one inch closer to my dream of having my art on display.

Be Free and Soar by Stephanie Guimond 

Despite the fears and the insecurities I muddled through the process because I felt it was the right thing to do and I am so very happy I did. Knowing that fellow creative souls were doing the same thing gave me strength.

When I found out one of my pieces had been accepted I was ecstatic, but the rawest and most satisfying feeling came when I saw that piece on the show’s promotional poster and it didn’t stick out like a sore thumb. I burst into tears again. This time they were tears of pure joy.

 

Imagine my art, at a real art show, at a real gallery.

-Stephanie Guimond

You can find Stephanie at her blog.

* * * * * * *

This is the sixth in a series of essays/interviews/words from an artist that participated in the first A Vision of Squam Art Show that took place in September 2009 at artstream gallery in Rochester, NH. This year the show will be hosted by the Sandwich Artisans Guild gallery. 

For information about the how to submit to the 2010 show, please go here. 
For information on registering for Squam Art Workshops in 2010, visit the SAW site and Elizabeth here.

Jess Greene .:. Her Vision of Squam

Jess at the Vision of Squam Opening 2009 with her piece Tinted Clouds

Submitting work to the first Squam Art Show was the first time I had ever done anything like that. In fact, painting was a relatively new endeavor for me before SAW. Submitting my work for the show was a good goal, a good motivator for getting some pieces done. It was what I needed to push me to complete something. It forced me to look for inspiration and follow the path that I found.

Making a Home by Jess Greene

And then one of the pieces got accepted and it was the best validation I could have received. I was so scared going into this realm of talented people and I just hoped there was enough space for me to carve out a little spot, and there was. I was welcome and it felt awesome. 

Wayonda cabin mates, Squam Art Workshops 2009

When I went to the opening I felt grateful to be part of such a great show with other artists I respected. It felt so good to see my work hanging there. By that time, when the show opened, I already knew I could do more than what I had produced for that show. So the show also helped me push myself to keep painting, keep letting my work evolve, and keep creating so that this year I can have something in the show that really demonstrates my growth, even if its only to myself. 

 
-Jess Greene

You can find Jess at her blog, she and her husband's recycled art site here, (it's very cool, go look!), and her etsy shop here.

* * * * * * *

This is the fifth in a series of essays/interviews/words from an artist that participated in the first A Vision of Squam Art Show that took place in September 2009 at artstream gallery in Rochester, NH. This year the show will be hosted by the Sandwich Artisans Guild gallery. 

For information about the how to submit to the 2010 show, please go here. 
For information on registering for Squam Art Workshops in 2010, visit the SAW site and Elizabeth here.