Featured Artist

Carolina Gronholm
Carolina Gronholm draws what she sees, hears and dreams.  Her work is mainly focused on animals, trees, and swirls.  She gets her inspiration from dreams and her love for mother nature and the animals living in the trees, under the damp earth between the grass roots and in the sky.

In The Woods, drawing in ink and colored digitally, Carolina Gronholm

I love your elegant tree drawings.  Are there places with particularly beautiful trees, which you like to visit in Stockholm (or anywhere) for inspiration?
     We have big trees right outside our window, small parks all over Stockholm and big forests right outside town so the nature is always present here. Actually, Swedish forests covers 53% of the country-this is where my true inspiration comes from.

Trees Of Light, drawing in ink and colored digital, Carolina Gronholm

In additional to drawing and crocheting, you seem to do all sorts of other art-related projects.  Do you have plans for any particular art experimentation this year?

     Right now, I'm working on some mixed media paintings and drawings for a coming exhibition. I'm using inks, watercolors and yarn for this project. There is so much more I would like to try when working with new materials, it feels like my inspiration and creativity is bursting so I always try to channel it into any new art project.             

Sunday Morning Walk, drawing in ink and colored digitally, Carolina Gronholm

Tell us a bit about Sau, your cat, who inspires some of your art making.
     I found her outside in the freezing cold one Easter weekend 6 years ago and she's been with me ever since. She loves tearing paper - especially when the postman comes with letters, she likes acting like a guard cat I guess. Sau is certainly my muse and I love coming up with small amusing stories about her life through drawings. 

Cat On Cushions, drawing in ink, Carolina Gronholm

Many thanks to Carolina for sharing her lovely drawings.  Be sure to check out more of her work at her blog and her Late Night Drawing, her Etsy shop.

What do you think of Carolina's whimsical trees and playful cat stories?

Wedding Invitation

Lake Sunset

It is at this time of the year that I get really anxious for spring to come.  March tends to remain quite cold in Chicago, though it is warm enough to begin riding a bike in moderation.  I am looking forward to warm days when bike riding along the lake path and running at the steps adjacent to Belmont Harbor are a regular part of my life.  Designing this invitation based on a painting I made several weeks was a delightful reminder of the warm days to come.    

The design for this wedding invitation was inspired by the warm yellows and pinks of the sunsets over Lake Michigan. I love the drama of this scene: the most easterly trees bathed in the waning evening light, the other trees casting strong silhouettes against the vibrant sky, and one whimsical cloud floating out of the frame. This would make a charming invitation a weddings being held near the water. This invitation is small format: 4.25"x5.5, with rounded corners.

What are you favorite places to watch the sunset?

Western Avenue Series

Mile 3: 106th Street-98th Street

This painting is a part of my Western Avenue Series, through which I'll be making 24 watercolor paintings, one to document each mile of Western Avenue, in Chicago.  I started this project because while it is not considered to be among the most “beautiful” of Chicago’s streets, Western Avenue is a perfect place to document the humanness of Chicago, the positive and the negative. In the words of Stuart Dybek, "Western, with apologies to State Street, is a great street,  Unlike State, it is a street that goes to the interior, the heart of the city, as it glides and glows through a United Nations of neighborhoods."  Check back next Monday to see a post about the next mile of Western. 

Beverly Glass is a family business in operation since 1958.  I love this old postcard featuring the storefront.  In choosing to paint their storefront at 10430 S. Western Avenue, I was in part drawn to the clean, rather nicely proportioned facade.  It is a well maintained building, and while the architecture is clearly a reflection of the past, it seems that it remains a viable business today.  This seems a fair representation of this portion of Western: many businesses that have survived for decades, the architecture is reflective of a style in vogue during the 1950s and 60s, and their seems to be pride in local, family-run commerce.  I imagine Beverly to be a place where families live for several generations, people run into their neighbors in restaurants and bars, value is placed on tradition and change happens slowly.

What are some of your favorite family businesses that are still operating today?

Other Projects

Pizza
Isn't pizza amazing?  It is seems so simple--cheese melted on a dough combined most primarily of flour, water, and yeast.  Yet, it is so wonderfully delicious.  I really learned to love cooking during the year I lived in rural, West Alabama.  I lived in a town of 2,000, the "Catfish Capital" of Alabama, where fried catfish and barbeque where readily available.  I was left craving many foods I had previously taken for granted, including pizza.     

Chopped onion, celery, and carrot for the Classic Tomato Sauce

Pizza could be purchased at one establishment in the southern hamlet, I called home: the Shell Gas Station.  And, to be honest, during a year spent designing and constructing a $20,000 house, there were long days which ended with the purchase of a gas station pizza.  I was determined though to learn to make really great pizza for myself.

Tomatoes being sauteed with the onions, celery, and carrot for the Classic Tomato Sauce

It wasn't easy to find a recipe for pizza dough, which I found satisfactory.  After trying several recipes, I discovered the pizza dough recipe in Joy of Cooking, which is not too hard to make and rather delicious.  I've been making that recipe ever since.  You can, of course, top the pizza with whatever strikes your fancy.  I'm particularly fond of the potato sage pizza recipe from Joy of Cooking and during a recent pizza adventure decided to top one of the pizzas with the Classic Tomato Sauce I discovered about a month ago.

Boiled Potatoes in preparation for the Potato Sage Pizza

Basic Dough Recipe from Joy of Cooking: All About Vegetarian, Two 12-inch pizzas
Combine in a large mixing bowl or the bowl of a heavy-duty mixer and let stand until the yeast is dissolved, about 5 minutes:
1 package (2 1/4 tsps) active dry yeast
1 1/3 c warm water (105-115 degrees F)
Add:
3 1/2-3 3/4 c all-purpose flour
2 tbsps olive oil
1 tbsp salt
1 tbsp sugar (optional)
Mix by hand or on low speed for about 1 minute to blend all the ingredients.  Knead for about 10 minutes by hand or with the dough hook on low to medium speed until the dough is smooth and elastic.  Transfer the dough to a bowl lightly coated with olive oil and turn it over once to coat with oil.  Cover with plastic wrap and let rise in a warm place until doubled in volume, 1 to 1 1/2 hours.  Preheat the oven to 475 degrees.  Grease and dust 2 baking sheets with cornmeal; or place on a baking stone (if you have one)in the oven and preheat for 45 minutes.  Punch the down and divide it in half.  Roll each piece into a ball and let rest, loosely covered in plastic wrap, for about 10 to 15 minutes.

Pureed Classic Tomato Sauce waiting to top the pizza

Flatten each ball of dough 1 at a time on a lightly floured work surface into a 12-inch round, rolling and stretching the dough.  Place each dough circle on a prepared baking sheet; if using a baking stone, place them on baker's peels dusted with cornmeal.  Lift each edge and pinch it to form a lip.  To prevent the filling from making the crust soggy, brush the top of the dough with:
Olive oil
Use your fingertips to push dents in the surface of the dough (to prevent bubbling) and let rest for about 10 minutes.  Spread in an even layer on each pizza:
Classic Tomato Sauce (optional)
6 oz.  mozzarella cheese shredded  

Potato Sage Pizza ready to eat

For White PIzza with Potato and Sage, follow the instructions above, but forgo the tomato sauce.  According the Joy of Cooking: All About Vegetarian, American labeling laws state that if doesn't have tomato sauce, you can't call it pizza.  This would astonish some Italians, who frequently eat their pizza with just a touch of tomato or even none at all.  Top the pizza with:
8 oz. potatoes, boiled and very thinly sliced while still warm
2 tsp. dried sage
2 tbsps. extra virgin olive oil
salt and pepper to taste
If using a baking stone, slide the pizza off the baker's peel onto the baking stone in the preheated oven.  If making the pizza on a baking sheet, place the pan and pizza in the oven on the bottom rack.  Bake until the crust is golden brown, about 12 minutes.  Remove from the oven, slice, and serve at once.

It is delicious!

Pizza with Classic Tomato Sauce, mozzarella, and basil ready to eat

Check back next Sunday for my favorite pizzarias.
 
Have you experimented with homemade pizza making?

Featured Artist

Bridget Farmer

Bridget Farmer discovered printmaking while taking a weekend course in etching at the Austrailian Print Workshop in Melbourne, in early 2006.  She is a native of Northern Ireland and had previously attained a degrees with First Class Honours in Jewellery and Silversmithing at Edinburgh College of Art.  Later, Bridget pursued an MFA in printmaking at RMIT, Melbourne and she has since been awarded a High Commendation in the Port Jackson Press Graduate Printmaking Award and received a 2008 Australian Print Workshop Collie Print Trust Emerging Printmaker Scholarship.  Birds are a recurring theme in her work.  She describes herself as an observer of the world and her drawings and prints are a way of documenting these observations.

Pied Currawong, Sugar Lift Etching, 12.5 x 33 cm, Bridget Farmer, 2008

Why do you think you found yourself more drawn to etching than your initial artistic pursuits in jewelry making?
    I started out in Jewelery and Silversmithing because I loved working in metal and it seemed the right direction to go in, but I ended up not enjoying the precision of jewelery. I'm a messy worker, loose lines and I like results quickly, otherwise I feel I over work things and they loose the spontaneity.
    A very important part of the degree was our portfolio work. A body of work made up of drawings and experimental mark making. I loved doing the portfolio part of the course but just didn't know how to make it my main work. Printmaking was always suggested to me, but for some reason I was blinkered and only thought of screen printing which I didn't really enjoy.
When I discovered etching I found a medium that encompassed my love of drawing and my love of working with metal. It was perfect for me!

Australian Crows, Etching, 10 x 15.5 cm, Bridget Farmer, 2009

Have you developed favorites among the birds you observe to draw and print?

     I jump around quite a bit with my favorites. It's almost like I have a bird of the month or something! I always love crows and Australian magpies. At the moment it's finches. I've just finished a series of dry point finches, I'd like to do a whole finch flock! When I was living in Australia I made all Australian birds. At the moment I'm living in Northern Ireland for a couple of years and I'm concentrating on birds from here. When I move back to Australia in September I'll probably start on Australian birds again. I am quite influenced by my surroundings.

Robin, Etching, 16.5 x 10.5 cm, Bridget Farmer, 2010

Please share a bit about your Camda Etsy shop project.     
       In 2001 I went to Mongolia and oh my goodness, what a place! I fell in love with it and have been interested in the country and it's people ever since. Last winter I saw a very sad film clip about a recent zdud (extremely harsh winter conditions that happen every so often) that was killing vast numbers of the nomadic herders' livestock and leaving the people without a livelihood, forcing them to abandon their way of life. I discovered a charity based in Cambridge, England, called CAMDA (Cambridge Mongolia Development Appeal).  They raise money to help buy fodder for the livestock and send out vets and vital supplies. I donated money at the time but felt I wanted to do more. So recently I made three new etchings, based on my drawings I did when I was there. I spoke with Bill Munns, one of the organizers of CAMDA, and we decided the best way to raise money from these pieces was to open an Etsy shop and sell online. So they are up and selling well and I now have cards made from the etchings that I'm listing too. I'm also asking other artists and printmakers to donate pieces to this etsy shop, I think it'll be an on going project and hopefully raise lots for CAMDA.

Mongolian Horse II, Etching, 7 x 9 cm, Bridget Farmer, 2011

Sincere thanks to Bridget for sharing her beautiful prints and for her fantastic work with CAMDA.  I hope that does print a whole flock of finches one day!

What do you think of Bridget's prints?

Wedding Invitation

Notre Dame

The campus of the University of Notre Dame is rather a beautiful place with a number of lovely vistas.  The drama of the tree alley looking down Notre Dame Avenue, the beautiful big trees of North Quad, and the views across the two lakes make the campus quite a picturesque place.  

The design for this invitation was based upon what I think is one of the most beautiful locations on the Notre Dame campus. From the far side of St. Mary's Lake, looking back toward campus one can glimpse the Administration Building and the Basilica of Sacred Heart over the trees. This invitation is ideal for couples celebrating their weddings at Notre Dame.

Have you visited Notre Dame?  What are your favorite places on campus?

Western Avenue Series

Mile 3: 106th Street-98th Street
This sketch is a part of my Western Avenue Series, through which I'll be making 24 watercolor paintings, one to document each mile of Western Avenue, in Chicago.  I started this project because while it is not considered to be among the most “beautiful” of Chicago’s streets, Western Avenue is a perfect place to document the humanness of Chicago, the positive and the negative. In the words of Stuart Dybek, "Western, with apologies to State Street, is a great street,  Unlike State, it is a street that goes to the interior, the heart of the city, as it glides and glows through a United Nations of neighborhoods."  Check back next Monday to see the painting completed based on this sketch.

The third mile of Western Avenue had a character rather similar to first two.  I would characterize it primarily as commercial strip, with a bit more pedestrian traffic and density than the first two miles.  There are a lot of old businesses like Beverly Glass and Mirror,  Morand's Liquors, Fox's Beverly Pizza, and Janson's Red Hots.

A review of Janson's notes not only it's 15 foot high sign, which caught my eye as well, but also their pizza puffs and banana shakes, $3 each respectively.  A pizza puff, an item of food with which I was unfamiliar, is it seems a miniaturized version of a pizza, whereby the dough is folded over in a rectangular pattern and is deep fried. The result, crispy on the outside and soft and chewy on the inside. The banana shake is recommend on the basis of the fact that they use real bananas not banana flavoring and they don't skimp on the ice cream!

Have you ever eaten a pizza puff?