Art Journal Complete

Art Journal by Phillip Hoyle 2016

I finished my art journal last week and am pleased with the work in it and its completion. I show here a few more photos of the pages from the journal.

As I worked in it, I realized I wanted to combine artwork with a personal narrative yet without words. I’ll not now write a book about the ideas but simply enjoy the less specific content of visual images rather than word pictures. That’s a push for me.

A personal addition to the journal.
Art Journal by Phillip Hoyle 2016

I feel satisfied with this book without words. It tells a story of my long-time fascination with Native American experience generally and with petroglyphs specifically. Such images have informed much of my artwork for almost forty years.

A word of thanks here for the encouragement of my artist friend Sue. She challenged me to do the project and has cheered me on during my weeks of work. Also, THANKS to my blog readers who have commented. Say more if you will!

The final journal entry of nearly forty images.
Art Journal by Phillip Hoyle 2016

Art Journal with No Words

Art Journal by Phillip Hoyle, 2016. A mixed media experiment and
a personal experiment to see if I can produce a book in which I write
no words. So far, so good!

I am pleased that the project to produce an art journal this year is underway. I've made good progress both in making pages and in coming to understand what I am doing. So without words I arrange my pages paying some attention to what appears next to each other. Someone may wonder just how I made my decisions. I'm not sure I can even explain.

Art Journal by Phillip Hoyle 2016. Of course there are words on the old
map I've used, but they're very hard to read and only indicate the part
of the world from which the petroglyph designs have come.

I am making some personal references through the use of a few photographs, for example including one of a snapshot I took when I was a young teen at a powwow, another one of a family member many years ago.


I hope you as a reader of this blog will get as much kick out of my efforts as I am in doing the project.

Art Journal by Phillip Hoyle 2016. I am having a great time with mixed media
interpretations using prints, monoprints, stamps, and a variety of pens. Each
page measures 5x8". 

Artist Trading Cards Safari

Look carefully as if you are walking through the grasslands of eastern
Africa on safari. You may notice that there is something back in there!
It's a tissue paper skin of a leopard! Keep your eyes open while on
Safari. The grass is drawn with gel pens and  markers.
ATCs by Phillip Hoyle 2016

Last Saturday I traded ATCs at CORE New Art Space in the monthly trade there. The theme Safari intrigued me. I didn’t care to picture high power rifles or over-proud hunters. I opted for something visual, a representation of what one might see in the grass or jungle if one’s safari eyes were properly trained and alert.

I made nine cards with different products. Perhaps they are as varied as the actual grasses of the broad plains of eastern Africa. I also made cards with trees, particularly Acacia and Baobab trees. 

These grasses were made from a commercial handmade green paper with
leaf and twig pieces in it. I drew with pens and cut holes to reveal that
a leopard may be lurking there to surprise you.
ATCs by Phillip Hoyle 2016

Denver, 2016

New Year Art Plans

An art journal is underway already! these pieces are not complete but just
barely started. I'll show the work throughout 2016. I really hope to learn
new things about my art, about mixed media, about the treatment of
traditional designs as I work with this kind of book making.

I’m busy making a list! I’ll check it endlessly during the coming year (if I can find it). Perhaps these are ART RESOLUTIONS. 

Fill my frames. I have lots of completed and almost-completed artwork and many, many frames. Perhaps they can become gifts? I can hang some.

Each time I have an Artist trading Cards theme, complete two sheets of designs. That means 18 cards to trade. That’s a bunch of cards since I go to two monthly trades.

Keep working of flora designs toward a goal of making floral relief prints as well as continuing my mixed-media pieces.

Make monoprints galore in order to develop my own style of gel plate printing.

Draw, draw, draw.

As you can see, the page on the left is only an idea. No glue has
made its way there. On the right is a collage of a relief print on top of a
monoprint. Who knows were these ideas will lead me. I'm looking forward
to the journey in this art journal. The difference between these new books
is that I will write nothing in them, no words, simply artwork without
explanation. Guess you'll suffer some of the explanations if you follow
this blog!

Keep up art journals related to Native American petroglyphs, journals that combine art with writing.

Continue my regular daily journal entries—3 pages each day—general topics.

Write weekly stories for the storytelling group.

Write monthly chapters for longer works, chapters to read at the writers group I attend.

Make a flora drawing trip to Mid-MO. Also to see family there.

Do local plein air drawing outings with artist friends Sue and Jan.

Make watercolor ATCs.

That’s way too many, but one of the things I do effectively is make lists!

Happy New Year to you.

This page is glued but only just begun!
Art journal by Phillip Hoyle 2016

Denver, 2016

Art at Year's End

I worked hard to make fifty Christmas Cards and soon after completing them realized I should have made seventy or a hundred! I learned a lot in the process that combined monoprints with enhancements by Prisma Color and paint. Fun work that next year, I promise myself, I won’t put off so long nor approach my holiday projects in such a conservative manner. Of course I don’t know what I’ll be doing next year although it may include a trip to Mid-Missouri to spend the year-end holiday with my children and grandchildren. Que sera, sera, I sing. 

I was pleased with the cards I made and with the many, many Artist Trading Cards I made at the same time. I’ve kept at that production to make ready for two trades in January. One set is done; the other awaits a real idea! Oh well, that’s the way so much art goes, certainly my own.

I watch January’s approach wondering what cards I will make that first week for the second Saturday trade. I’m sure something will occur to me to make cards I’d be happy to trade! I’m sure you will see some of the next week. Promises… promises…

I’m not much for making New Year’s resolutions and probably will not bother myself to make any now. I do know I’ll make several hundred Artist Trading Cards, will make many mixed media pieces, revisit my petroglyphs in new ways, keep art journals as well as my regular writing journal, write many stories about my life (my weekly challenge for the story telling group I lead), finish the manuscript I’m currently writing about a relationship I had with Rafael Martinez back in 2002, and draw a lot of plants and flowers to use for general cards.

It sounds like a busy year with many new things to discover. I will also give a lot of attention to art printing from lino- and wood-blocks. Wish me well. I wish you a happy new year!

Denver, 2015

Art Deco Artist Trading Cards

Artist Trading Cards by Phillip Hoyle

Artistic style changes thus creating what art historians call periods. Art Deco began in Europe in the 1920s and some years later spread to America. It was the design, architectural, and craft style that can be seen as distinct with its use of geometric designs, metal, inlays, and so forth. The style was widely used in public art works during the Great Depression of the 1930s and extended into the early 40s.

The prompt for last week’s Artist Trading Cards trade was Art Deco. To meet it I searched for ideas online and in books. I settled on letters (the development of new print fonts were big in the period), skyscrapers (think of NYC’s Chrysler Center and the Empire State Building, and the use of ancient motifs in a modern architectural environment (my fancy talk). Anyway the challenge occupied my mind and quite a few hours. I drew, experimented with stamps, made a mess, cleaned it up, and voila, I completed nineteen ATC’s.

Working in this tiny (2 ½ x 3 ½ inch) format is a great way to experiment with technique and to use up leftover scraps of art materials, all those things you just can’t bear to throw away. I figure as long as I can afford glue, I can make these cards for years! And the work area doesn’t have to be large. If I ever end up living in a tiny house, I can keep making these tiny pieces of art!

Have a good art week and a happy holiday.

Denver, 2015

Artist Trading Cards by Phillip Ho

Parades of Lights

Star on Christmas Card monoprints
Phillip Hoyle, 2015

Just over a week ago I watched the Denver Parade of Lights. So today I’m wondering about art and the Parade. My first experience of such a parade was in Tulsa, OK when I was singing on a float with a group of carolers. I’m not sure it was so much art as it was a friendship obligation. Still the event was festive. I don’t know what the overall artistic and affective result of the float was. I was along simply to sing loudly—the great out-of-doors required it!

This year was my first time to attend the Denver Parade. I was there with a group of friends and enjoyed the overall experience that included a brief tour of the Brown Palace atrium with a jazz trio entertaining, children singing along with Jingle Bells and the like, and the children dancing with one another and parents. Our parade evening was off to a cute and festive start. Outdoors we saw the parade’s approach announced by safety lights spinning from golf carts. I wondered if elves could be driving them. Whoever they were, they were clad with reflective jackets. The marching bands were lighted up in special adaptations to their regular outfits—some very cleverly. I realized the invention of portable battery packs and low-watt bulbs made their glittering, moving display magical. Then there was a group of low riders with blue undercarriage lights and the car bodies each covered with as many tiny lights as were added to the huge chandelier in the Brown’s main lobby. These cars came bouncing down the street. Their presence was the most visually stunning effect of the parade.

We heard several bands play beautifully and artistically accompanied by displays of pompoms and flags and huge snowflakes. My favorite band had the least glamorous uniforms but the most enthusiastic delivery of an enthusiastic musical arrangement. I turned to an old band member, a trumpeter, in our group and exclaimed, “They’re the best band with the best arrangement.” He concurred. The other best band was a group of children playing Kazoos. They were on a wonderfully inventive float with moving parts displaying a rising-up-and-down clock tower and followed by a huge balloon of a red-wrapped holiday package adorned with glittery gold ribbon and bow. The old band guy exclaimed, “I love the Kazoo band.” I concurred.

There were more delights and I slipped into critical mode to figure out how some of these displays were better than others, an artistic decision weighing many visual factors along with the affective result among their viewers, an audience that was much more affected than critical. And there I was among them being carried into the past of memories and a present wonderland of sights and sounds. I was moved by the moving displays that combined inventiveness, engineering, precision, stamina, and so many other factors beyond design considerations. There are many things to think about in a work of art!

Denver, 2015

Star monoprint, Phillip Hoyle 2015