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Snowflake on a Cold Cold River

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posted on Jan, 17 2024 @ 04:42 PM
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All the winter photos I have seen over this season led me to want to see how many of those cold cold mountain and river colors I could work into some of my own art.

Any here who have seen some of my other pieces may recall that I work mainly with symmetric mandalas. For most of my art I place the mandala itself within a frame such as this one here. Some not but mostly.

This frame was originally a photo I took of a fresco on a building. Once I started working on the photo I used a drawing tool called a clone brush. This brush can copy any part of an image and repeat it somewhere else. It's not just a matter of copying but more it is a matter of adjusting the entire frame so that the repeating swoops and swirls fit together before the next set begins.

Once I have tinted an area I can copy it to another layer and then tint that layer accordingly. Then using that clone tool I trace the modified tint to aspects of the original. Around the edge of the frame are little figures and repeated knobs and bumps that are called gadrooning if one were working in carving wood.

The center of this piece, as usual, can be found two major aspects of the mandala. One is an endless labyrinth, a pathway that runs up and down and all the way around the mandala until it reaches the point it began. The other major aspect of this piece is that the labyrinth is run through another pathway. This pathway begins anywhere along the outside of the labyrinth and splits itself into tributaries that continue on until they reach their ends. In this piece those ends can be noticed by the little white balls I have placed at their endings.

The colors here were difficult for me because to keep with the theme of a cold river, everything had to be done in bluish and whiteish while at the same time maintaining the continuity of the labyrinth and mazes. The dark blues could not be two dark as they would lose the paths they defined and not to white as the whites would be overwhelming.

Mostly I work only one eighth of a canvas. Everything must be repeatable, that is it must fit perfectly with an exact copy of itself. Once I finish one eighth, I rotate it and flip it and put them together to make one quarter. Each side must match the other side otherwise it will not all fit. Then one quarter is copied and pasted, rotated and flipped and fit to the first quarter and so on. That part is simple and fast. It takes about two minutes. The first one eighth of the piece usually takes somewhere in the order of fifty to sixty hours.

Sometimes it is only in that final two minutes that I can see if what I wanted to accomplish has been successful. In this case I think it is.



posted on Jan, 17 2024 @ 09:30 PM
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That would make a nice knitted quilt or carpet for under the kitchen table. My wife does knitting and quilting.



posted on Jan, 17 2024 @ 09:45 PM
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a reply to: rickymouse

Indeed. My resolution is high enough to print a clear poster up to five foot square. I know that now they have
weaving machines that all you need to do is insert the program, the image, and it will weave whatever you want from it. Thanks for helping me remember that, i should check out how much it would cost me.



posted on Jan, 17 2024 @ 10:56 PM
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originally posted by: BingoMcGoof
a reply to: rickymouse

Indeed. My resolution is high enough to print a clear poster up to five foot square. I know that now they have
weaving machines that all you need to do is insert the program, the image, and it will weave whatever you want from it. Thanks for helping me remember that, i should check out how much it would cost me.


My knitting machine only knits washcloths, Hats, mitts, and occasionally a quilt. With all the yarn she has in stock, she could have the needles tying knots for ten years. Our cat sits in a box under the light while she knits in her knitting room and the knitting machine takes the car every wednesday to the library and knits and gossips with about three or four other old knitting machines. We get the scoop of what is happening in the area from those old knitting machines...better info than available on the local internet.



posted on Jan, 18 2024 @ 06:04 AM
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a reply to: BingoMcGoof

That's spectacular, T. and your narration of the process is as delicate and intricate as your creation.

As your portfolio groweth, so doth my appreciation for your Art.




posted on Jan, 18 2024 @ 12:04 PM
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a reply to: Encia22

I'm glad this one hung around long enough for you to find it . For my process, you have given me a notion. It might be interesting to take screen shots of the stages as they develop and make a thread demonstrating the growth of a piece. Thing is though, sometimes, the way these work, the conclusion of a piece misses the mark and might not be worth it in the end. But ya never know, truth is, I don't either. We'll just have to see.

Thanks E, always great to hear from you,



posted on Jan, 18 2024 @ 12:27 PM
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a reply to: BingoMcGoof

Cool! Your digital art is really pretty and I like the traditional vibe it has, while still being modern and different. Reminds me of a quilt square, one of the old ones that tell a story. Like in the story, "Everyday Use", by Alice Walker. Read it!

a reply to: rickymouse

hey rickymouse! You should read the story Everyday Use, by Alice Walker, too, if you haven't. It's a classic piece of good American literature. I enjoyed it and it's about holding onto family values amidst changing societal norms and mores and navigating the difficulty of finding one's place as a black person living in America during a time of social and political unrest. Happy New Year!
edit on ❥1/24 by Abhorsen because: (no reason given)



posted on Jan, 18 2024 @ 12:39 PM
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a reply to: BingoMcGoof

I'd love to see your process, good sir or madam. I think that sounds interesting and it'd be cool if you shared it. Thank you for allowing me to bring up American literature. I love how your art sparked conversation. It looks familiar as a quilt and the recognizable nature of your art garners interest and once viewers look closer, they see the avant-garde detail your put into your quilt-esque shape. I think it's a cool color story and composition for this reason. Sucks the viewer in with something immediately recognizable as a familiar shape or thing (ie. quilt) and then revolutionize what the viewer normally expects to see when viewing a quilt.

My only critique is: I'd love to see you make something more psychedelic and surreal with your digital art.

Oh one question: do you use a tablet or pad or computer of some sort? A part of me wants a drawing tablet, but the other part of me doesn't want to pay over a thousand for a meh tablet. I like my macbook pro just fine, but wish I had a touch screen. Oh well. Can't have it all I guess
lol



posted on Jan, 18 2024 @ 01:02 PM
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edit on 1/18/2024 by yeahright because: (no reason given)



posted on Jan, 18 2024 @ 03:14 PM
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a reply to: BingoMcGoof

I like the way you picked up on that fresco with your repeating fragments of a quarter.

3 cheers!



posted on Jan, 18 2024 @ 03:26 PM
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Really nice to look at. Nice work.



posted on Jan, 18 2024 @ 06:17 PM
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a reply to: rickymouse

I was going to say, it reminds me of one of my Great grandmother's doilies. Very nice detail!



posted on Jan, 18 2024 @ 06:56 PM
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a reply to: Abhorsen

I began this type of art in 1980. I had broken my leg and was basically immobile for six months. I could not play with my children so I recalled my old grandfather who had lived with us and drawn us pencil mazes for us to solve when we were kids. He would write our names and draw horses and wind his mazes through them. I figured I could do the same for my kids, which I did.

They soon lost interest but I did not. For the next two years I took out my old compass and ruler and protractor and bought some very fine tiped flow pens. I never was much for free hand but still retained my knowledge of geometry from highschool drafting. Once my led was healed I put them aside and went back to work in my field.

Upon retirement twenty years ago I showed my old work to a woman I met and she said I should get a computer and try working with that as a medium. I did and this is an outgrowth of that period.

I work on my windows computer with an old program called Paint Shop Pro that I first bought in about 2000.

As for something more surreal or psychedelic, Ive tried but as my are is primarily devoted to the concept of labyrinths, I found that i needed to stay within a structured image. Here is one I finished for Thanksgiving last season that may fit that criteria.




posted on Jan, 18 2024 @ 07:01 PM
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a reply to: RiversRainman

It has taught me how to look in corners and ignored places for beauty. At one point I was going to antique shops and taking pictures of interesting lamps and ornate furniture to take home, download and reconstruct into the framework for building my art. In one case I took a picture of the church alter where my son was wed and turned it into a first anniversary gift.

THanks, oh, I have dropped another one above as well. Thanks for your reply.



posted on Jan, 18 2024 @ 07:07 PM
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a reply to: Cantstandya

You know, doing this art has given me a great appreciation for all those people, grannies in particular who filled their lives with their own creations and never got any attention. Now you can find those small treasures in second hand stores for a dime. Sad really when such skill and beauty can go unrecognized by most when some pieces of art that can be done by a famous man can fetch tens of millions at auction.



posted on Jan, 18 2024 @ 08:19 PM
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a reply to: Abhorsen

Hi there, weren't you Rukia or something like that before? You haven't got your original account back going yet?

I just found the short story, it is pretty good. It sounds like some people in the Copper Country used to talk like back in the late sixties....Except it was mom....not mamma. Pretty good and simple story, not very long which is what I like. I graduated from highschool the year that story was written. I'm guessing that you mentioned this because of the part of quilts.



posted on Jan, 19 2024 @ 02:35 AM
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edit on 1/19/2024 by yeahright because: (no reason given)



posted on Jan, 19 2024 @ 08:40 AM
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a reply to: BingoMcGoof

aye that would make an excellent rug for the jam room
i could stare at that for hours under the influence as well haha

great work , do you have an instagram ?



posted on Jan, 19 2024 @ 01:52 PM
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Cognitohazard.
hard on my eyes.

the big X I think it look more like a snow
flake if you have the arrow point inwards.
thats just me. and you are making me go blind!
going to look at the others now.
Cognitohazard.




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