The Artistic Biker

Sketches and Musings

  • Art Journal Traveling

    My day job recently took me out of town.  Again.  It’s getting to be sort of a habit with them.  Anyway, I had to leave on a Thursday which forced me to take my show, The Artistic Biker Live!, on the road.  I packed all of my cameras and laptop gear, loaded up some paints in some of those travel TSA kits from The Wal*Mart, and prepared for a night of sheer panic.

    Turns out, aside from leaving my management stranded at a bar so that I could get to the show on time, things went pretty smoothly.  The hotel’s bandwidth wasn’t quite strong enough to handle Ustream, Tweetdeck, Skype, and ICEchat all at the same time so there was considerable lag on the video and on the interview.  Otherwise things couldn’t have gone more smoothly.  I am looking into getting a broadband card for the laptop so maybe that won’t happen again.

    That night, I interviewed Paula Phillips, a.k.a. @Journalartista.  Paula has been a scrap book keeper for many years and has slowly been switching over to art journaling.  Recently, she injured her foot and was housebound for several weeks.  During that time, she really dove in to the YouTube videos and found herself flooded with knowledge, ideas, and inspiration to share.  She began putting out videos, sometimes two a day, on art journaling instruction based on what she was learning and how she was applying that new knowledge.  She has since healed enough to be able to return to work, but she still regularly produces videos and even a weekly Ustream program.   Paula’s years as a scrapbooker have given her a well trained eye for color coordination and composition.  Her pages come together, seemingly without thought, and they usually turn out beautifully.  She uses a lot of “ephemera” as she calls it, as well as stamps and stencils.

    When I interviewed her, I took a cue from her and gathered ephemera from my flight: A SkyMall catalog, a Continental Airlines magazine, and even that Journal Pocket they give everyone (a barf bag).  My flight was at sunrise so the scene I recreated in my journal was of the lady next to me pretending to sleep so she wouldn’t have to interact with strangers.

    You can see the video on The YouTube, or just watch it in the embedded player below:

    Upcoming events on The Artistic Biker Live!:

    26AUG2010 Ricë Freeman-Zachery will be joining us discussing her amazing textile works, sewing, and meeting great people even in West Texico.

    02SEP2010 Bill Flowers, The Snake Artist, is coming for an in studio visit and we will go out sketching in the wild of the Wichita “Mountains”.

  • U-stream and Podcast Update 19AUG2010

    This week I’ll be talking with Juriaan, a freelance artist in Seattle, WA.  ”Jay” and I will be discussing the importance in a strong drawing foundation in ALL of the arts and how to get there in your daily practice.  Also, this week there will be a drawing for membership in Leslie Herger’s Old Skool Drawing Class.  Be sure to check out The Artistic Biker Live! every Thursday 7-9pm U.S. Central time.  http://www.ustream.tv/channel/the-artistic-biker

    Upcoming events on The Artistic Biker Live!:

    19AUG2010 Juriaan The Viking will be joining us to discuss quick drawing techniques that can easily applied anywhere, and life as a professional artist!

    26AUG2010 Ricë Freeman-Zachery will be joining us discussing her amazing textile works, sewing, and meeting great people even in West Texico.

    Podcast Update:

    For the last few weeks I have been struggling trying to pull usable audio out of the ustream broadcast so that I could publish the interviews here as a podcast.  THAT seems to take a lo-oo-ong time.  I will have to figure out another way to do it if I’m going to get all of these recordings online in a more timely manner.  But, after the long wait, here is the interview with the Journal Girl herself: Samantha Kira!

  • Art Journal Doodling

    Hello peoples, and welcome to Monday!  Last week on The Artistic Biker Live!, I interviewed Dawn Sokol, the author of Doodle Diary: Art Journaling for Girls.  We had a lively discussion of the importance in keeping youth interested in the arts and how the marketing people always try to push specific categories.  That’s how this book became a “For Girls” book instead of for everyone.  However, Dawn says she’s not giving up and that she hopes her latest title will seem more inclusive to the guys as well.

    We also talked about how doodling is such a simple and effective way to get ideas down onto paper and to get the creative juices flowing.  While we spoke, I worked on this week’s journal page “Out Of My Head”.

    Dawn is giving away stuff on her blog, http://www.dawndsokol.com, so be sure and head over their to check it out!

    You can see the video for this on The YouTube, or just watch in the embedded player below:

    This week I’ll be talking with Juriaan, a freelance artist in Seattle, WA.  “Jay” and I will be discussing the importance in a strong drawing foundation in ALL of the arts and how to get there in your daily practice.  Also, this week there will be a drawing for membership in Leslie Herger’s Old Skool Drawing Class.  Be sure to check out The Artistic Biker Live! every Thursday 7-9pm U.S. Central time.  http://www.ustream.tv/channel/the-artistic-biker

    Upcoming events on The Artistic Biker Live!:

    19AUG2010 Juriaan The Viking will be joining us to discuss quick drawing techniques that can easily applied anywhere, and life as a professional artist!

    26AUG2010 Ricë Freeman-Zachery will be joining us discussing her amazing textile works, sewing, and meeting great people even in West Texico.

  • Art Journal Gyotaku

    Hello Peoples!  Last week on The Artistic Biker Live! I was supposed to interview Newfoundland’s Jeanette Jobson. A long time contributer to such sites as Wetcanvas.com and drawspace.com, Jeanette has helped many with her online tutorials and workshops.  She has recently received a grant from the Newfoundland and Labrador Arts Council to study the almost lost Japanese art of gyotaku or “Fish Rubbing”.  Gyotaku was originally used by fishermen to keep track of their catch of the day.  There is a rather involved process of desliming the fish, prepping the fish – often times by laying it in a bed of sand to hold it level, and prepping the fish or paper with ink before hand.  Jeanette has been experimenting with all of it and snapping all kinds of pictures to document her trials.  I did not use any live fish in this journal entry based on that technique.  I used some toy rubber fish, some fishing lures, and some Swedish Fish.  I labeled my fish just as if I were documenting them. Up close you will see the labels “Toy Fish”, “Bait” and “Candy”.

    The show was riddled with connectivity issues until I was finally shut down for almost three hours by AT&T.  They tell me it was because my modem went bad, but our cell phones wouldn’t connect to the internet either.  I was able to catch up with Jeanette a week later for an impromptu interview.  We had a lot of fun talking about fish stamping, and she tried to get me to stamp Boy2.  You can see that interview on my U-stream channel, and I will be releasing it as a podcast later this week.

    This week on The Artistic Biker Live! I will be talking with the Phabulous Paula Phillips, better known as @JournalArtista.  A long time scrapbooker, she has recently made a leap into Art Journalling, and with both feet I might add.  The splash she is making is fantastic with almost 1000 YouTube subscribers and over 150 U-stream followers in about three months!  Come join us Thursday night to chat with Paula about her beautiful journal work, her transition from scrapbooking, and her HUGE following!

    Be sure and “Tune In” to The Artistic Biker Live! every Thursday night from 7-9p central!

    http://www.ustream.tv/channel/the-artistic-biker

    Upcoming events on The Artistic Biker Live!:

    12AUG2010 Stencils, Stamps & Bows as we talk with Paula Phillips, better known as Journal Artista

    19AUG2010 Juriaan The Viking will be joining us to discuss quick drawing techniques that can easily applied anywhere, and life as a professional artist!

  • Podcast: Interview with Eveline Hessels

    Here is the extraordinarily beautiful Eveline Hessels (@EvelineTimeless). I interviewed her on my Ustream broadcast, The Artistic Biker Live! Aside from having a stellar smile and sexy British/Dutch accent, Eveline has a rare charm that makes you feel better just knowing of her.  She approaches all art with a childlike abandon and works to show others how to do the same.  On her blog, http://eveline-timeless.blogspot.com, she not only shares all of her cool goings on, but also shares with us her epic fails. This shows everyone that it’s alright to make mistakes and the fear of it shouldn’t stop you trying again.  That is probably the most beautiful thing ever.

    I have been working with Eveline over the last few weeks on The Big Sekrit Project.  The first rule of The Big Sekrit Project has been that we don’t talk about The Big Sekrit Project.  The project involves me, Eveline, Leslie Herger of Artjournaling.ning.com and Comfortable Shoes Studio, Klaire Scattergood – better known as Rhomany of Rhomany’s Rrealm, Connie Hozvicka of Dirty Footprints Studio and Samantha Kira – the Journal Girl!  These are the first five interviews I’ve done on The Artistic Biker Live! and I look forward to doing many, many more, especially if I get to keep speaking with talented people like this.

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    Click HERE for the MP3 version.

    Technical issues have abounded here at the Biker Studio and even in this podcast you will notice I had trouble with the sound.  The issues all came to a head August 29th when after having built up The Big Sekrit Project for six weeks, I lost my internet connection.  That all seems to have settled down now, and I should be able to make the announcement on the show August 5th so be sure and tune in for that and another great interview!

    Be sure and “Tune In” to The Artistic Biker Live! every Thursday night from 7-9p central!

    http://www.ustream.tv/channel/the-artistic-biker

    Upcoming events on The Artistic Biker Live!:

    05AUG2010 We will discuss adding doodles and lettering design elements to your pages and I will speak with Dawn DeVries Sokol author of Doodle Diary: Art Journaling for Girls.

    12AUG2010 Stencils, Stamps & Bows as we talk with Paula Phillips, better known as Journal Artista