Mini Paintings

Two new minis are done and ready for their future homes!   

These two minis are 3x3 (inch) 

I love these lil paintings. They are fast to paint, perfect for small spaces like a desk or shelf at work, are very affordable original works of art, and a great way for me to test out designs and colors before using larger canvases and more paint.







* I try my best to have the photos match the original artworks as exactly as possible, but colors may vary from monitor to monitor. *

 ** All images on this website are © by Michelle McSpadden, and may not be copied or used in any way without expressed written permission **

Podcasts or Blog Posts??

Mini Heart Burst 3   3.5 x 5 

My 2nd podcast has just been posted!     !!! YAY !!! 

Click here for the podcast.

I was debating on whether to continue with that method of communication and finally decided that for now, I will do both podcasts and blog posts for Project Love.  For the blog posts, I plan to paste my podcast outline for those who would prefer to read instead of listen.


The 2nd part of the intro for Project LOVE

I wanted to start with a little personal history that I didn't provide in the first podcast and then transition over to a description of Project Love.         TO start, I was born in 1973, in Dallas, TX and have lived in the DFW area all of my life. My mom was an artist and I wanted to be just like her when I was young, so I started taking art classes in school. My dad was artist too...he did architectural drawings in high school and did some sculpture after returning from Viet Nam, but joked that he had to get a real job because I was born. As a kid growing up I would attend church with my grandmothers, but wasn't baptized until I was 24. I have attended a few different churches and currently go to Chase Oaks Church in Plano, TX. As I continue to grow in the faith, I look back over the past 21 years with Jesus and I'm so thankful for every place of worship that I have been blessed to be a part of and the season that I was there. Also, as I grow in the faith, I am amazed by the journey and how we can choose to become closer to Him by saying yes when He asks us to follow Him....to go deeper. When I was a younger Christian and attending numerous studies, reading books, I'm pretty sure I had a puffed up view of myself. Thankfully, now as I get older, I see how much I really didn't know back then, which makes me love God more because of His faithfulness to me and how He continues to love on us and wants us to grow.                                                                                                                                                                                                                       
The word Project and PROject is a Homograph which is a word that is spelled the same but differs in meaning, and/or pronunciation. Project LOVE and PROject Love are a both the same endeavor that I am pushing forward with.  To examine the depth of God's love more deeply and to get that out into the world more.      Project: to propose, contemplate, or plan.  A few synonyms for project...Conceive, contemplate, envision, imagine, vision, visualize, map out, plan, activity, design, program, strategy, task, venture, adventure      PROject: to throw, cast, or impel forward or onward.  A few synonyms for project...Launch, cast, fling, pitch, propel, shoot, send, throw

I have started doing weekly scripture memorization & meditation as it pertains to Project LOVE and PROject Love.  The one I mentioned last week was8/24/19  Proverbs 3: 5-6  Trust in the Lord with all your heart, And lean not on your own understanding;  In all your ways acknowledge Him, And He shall direct your paths.     After chewing on this scripture for several days and asking God to show me how to properly apply it during this season, I received the following revelation:   I can trust in God with all of my heart because He is trustworthy.  As evidenced by His great love, mercy, compassion, forgiveness, etc., He has shown that His character is indeed very good.  His ways can be trusted.  His leading can be trusted.  His words can be trusted.   I can't think like did in the past....when my thinking processes and perspective were dulled by the world and limited because of my spiritual immaturity, doubts, and fears.   I am so thankful that as I acknowledge Him, seek His wisdom and will, I can trust and expect that He will direct me.  And this is an ongoing life process...step by step, day after day, I'm able to be changed by Him and led by Him as I trust in His love for me.

My next scripture to focus on for Project Love is John 3:16    For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.  That scripture has so much to unpack....I'm looking forward to learning. 

As far as how many podcasts I will do per month, I'm still on the fence about that.  As I go through my learning process with God and dive deeper into His love, I want to go slow enough to really savor the experience and not feeled rushed through it in order to produce something.  I want my life to be transformed, so I may park at a particular scripture for study for a while in order to glean all that I can.

* I try my best to have the photos match the original artworks as exactly as possible, but colors may vary from monitor to monitor. *

** All images on this website are © by Michelle McSpadden, and may not be copied or used in any way without expressed written permission **

Brutus Kleetus McSpadden

Brutus Kleetus McSpadden

I thought it was high time to do a special post about my wonderful Studio Assistant Brutus Kleetus McSpadden.  He was born on 3/03/16 in Lewisville, so you know he is a proud Texan just like me.   : )

Brutus is like most cats.  He wants to do whatever he wants, whenever he feels like it.  He likes getting Temptations treats a few times a week, but if I try to give them to him everyday, he won't eat them.   ???    Brutus' favorite food is Instinct Chicken dry kibble with freeze dried chicken bits.....he thinks those are special treats just for him and eats them before the rest of the food.  You can find out more about the food he eats by clicking HERE.

Bru, one of his many nicknames, loves to fetch balls and has since he was a kitten.  I have a little video of him:

Bru loves to sit next to me wherever I may happen to be, so I move his blue chair around so that he can sit next to me at my work table or the computer desk.  Here is a pic of him on top of his perch with the blue chair in front.

He likes to look outside to see the neighbors coming and going.  I don't know if you can see it, but that blue chair is all messed up from his scratching over the years.  He has two scratching posts that he uses, but he still claws up that blue chair.  Cats!!!

Here are a couple of other pics of him:

** All images on this website are © by Michelle McSpadden, and may not be copied, transferred, duplicated or used in any way without expressed written permission **

Getting Personal

I wanted to document a major life change on my website, praying that it might help others.

Here is the text and pics from my 7/19/19 Facebook post:

I just shaved my head. OMG....this is freedom!!

I have wanted to shave off my hair, or what remains of my hair, for the last year and tonight I finally did it. 

If you want the back story.... My hair started thinning during my late 20s. I then adopted a hairstyle that I absolutely hated for over 15 years because I could sorta hide the hairloss...unless I was under a lot of lights. I was diagnosed with hypothyroidism when I was 35 and the hair continued to fall out. Like so many other women with this issue, I have tried pills, lotions, potions, etc., and nothing worked for me. I got to the point where something had to change, so I went to a great wig salon (wild4wigs) about 4 years ago and proceeded to go nuts buying different wigs and feeling like I was regaining what I had lost over the years. I wore the clip on wigs, but eventually got tired of them. I will be 46 in couple of months and the shedding continues...my hair was shoulder length, but looking more patchy than ever....it was depressing, so I took the leap. I shaved that hot mess off of my head. I have some full wigs that you may see me wearing when I'm out and about. One is brown rooted blonde wavy beach getup and another one I refer to as my Marilyn wig.

Life is short....if you need to, shave your head!

** All images on this website are © by Michelle McSpadden, and may not be copied, transferred, duplicated or used in any way without expressed written permission **

Project LOVE

Project LOVE Begins

Project LOVE is a personal deep dive study/exploration into God's love for mankind by examining His works and character and then expressing them, as best as I can, through the written word and the visual symbolism. A special page has been created for Project LOVE and I will be adding content to as this spiritual art journey unfolds.


I've also started a podcast that I'm planning to do once a week....click HERE to listen to the first one.

** All images on this website are © by Michelle McSpadden, and may not be copied, transferred, duplicated or used in any way without expressed written permission **

Cross Pendants

Newbies:

Cross necklaces are unique works of art....wearable art!  

Each cross takes about a month to create for the entire process, so I plan to make the crosses once a year....unless the Lord directs me otherwise.  As of right now, this is my last batch for 2018.  

**** It is recommended that the cross pendants are kept in cool environments, so please don't leave them in your car or any other place that could get extremely hot.  

Update 1/02/19 - cross pendants are no longer available.  Planning to do another large batch of them sometime in the summer of 2019.

Completed Painting: Burst 9 x 12

The Burst painting below is now completed and ready to go to a new forever home.

This painting is all about love bursting forth and has interference and iridescent paints in the top layers that were a little difficult to photograph.  Here is a little closeup of the inner heart portion:

Paperclay Crosses

Three months ago I decided to get out of my creative box a little and start some wearable art.  I have some polymer clay and paperclay, so I experimented with both and found that I liked the air dry paperclay more as it was non-toxic and my acrylic paints didn't scratch off.  Before I knew it, I had a gazillion small paperclay cross pendants all painted up and nowhere to go, so I made bag charms:

I have sold several of the charms and will probably give the rest away as gifts in the upcoming year.

As far as regular painting goes, I do have some studies that I'm working on, but not sure how I want to post them online just yet.  A little video?   Pictures?   Both?   Stay tuned.

8/11/18 Update

I'm back to my old website!!   I can't express how happy and exciting this is for me. 

Last year I had issues with my domain and created another website, but was hoping to be able to get back to this format/site again.  I'm praying that this change back to the old format will help me to do updates more frequently.     😊

Since the old website is down and the last post on here was of the studio reorganzition, I thought I would share what the studio looks like now.

I moved in 2017, so here is the new setup:

My entire living room is now a studio...like I've always wanted it to be.  What you can't see are my book shelves and my computer corner.  My studio manager/assistant, Brutus McSpadden, sneaked into the photo.  When I noticed him up on his perch, I took another pic of him:

Brutus is a big tomcat...he weighs 20 lbs and loves art.  I have woken up several times with paint brushes beside my head that he has brought me during night.  Such a sweet kitty.

Speaking of updates... I have also refreshed the ART tab/page.  I am setup with Square now, so selling is much easier.  😎

Studio update

FINALLY....my studio is thoroughly organized. It sure did take long enough, but now everything is in place and I lived through it!  

I have several pics posted below that were taken in the evening, but I will take a few more this weekend with the blinds open…everything looks better in natural light.

The small easel to the left without a painting on it will be used for oil painting. I have a small table to use for print making in that same area, so I guess it will be the print and oil area. The large easel on the right is the primary work station for acrylic paintings and projects. In the corner, but sorta hidden, are rolls of copper for some small art projects. The white drawer stands beside the easels are full of supplies that correspond to that particular work station.

The black and gray storage cabinet was purchased from Walmart for about $80 and put it together with my friend. That cabinet holds some new canvases, smaller boxes of new supplies, and all of my tool boxes and Dremel are at the bottom.

The painting rack, that the cat loves, is a baby bed that has been turned sideways with mdf boards as shelves. I keep a few new canvases in there, but for the most part it is strictly for finished paintings.....I drape it with old sheets to keep dust off the new works.

Studio woes....

The studio setup is STILL in transition.  It’s been very difficult living in a chaotic environment for the past 8 days or so.  I’m so used to an organized and peaceful home, so I can hardly wait to get things finished up.  

Two things are holding up my progress:

re-organizing my storage drawers & bins 

not having my new storage cabinet set up yet. 

Since I’m creating a new work station with another easel, I’m having to shift some supplies around so that I can be more efficient, but I never imagined that the process would be this crazy.  I was able to get rid of some furniture and that will help to open up the space some. 

Here is a pic of the chaos:

I also got the new business cards in:

updates...

New business cards are on the way.  They are very simple; just my name, email, and website.  I should be getting them in few days, so I will post pics. 

This week has been crazy….  I am reorganizing my studio space once again and living in an art disaster zone.  This time around I’m purposefully going a little more slowly and methodically.  Since I have tweaked things 2 other times this year, I thought it would be best to map out the area to find the best/efficient work flow setup before moving things around.  I also got a large storage cabinet that didn’t come with all of the stuff in the box, so getting that put together has caused a big delay in getting things completed.  Here are a couple of pics of things as they are right now….Art Chaos for sure!

 

Studio pic 

ideas & prep-work

This week I ordered some oil bars and they should be arriving soon.  I have worked in acrylics for the past 20+ years, so I’m looking forward to dabbling in oil paints again.  The plan is to use a few of the larger canvases I have in my inventory for large scale heart paintings…I’m thinking they will be more along the lines of abstractions when completed, but that may change. 

The oil bars are a little different than using traditional oil paint in that the paint isn’t as fluid/soft as it is coming out of a tube and they can be used for drawing applications very easily OR they can be applied traditionally with a brush.  Here is a link to oil bars if you want to get a visual of them: http://www.winsornewton.com/na/shop/oil-colour/oilbar

I originally started off using oil paints in high school, but stopped after 6 years for two specific reasons: 1)  Paint thinners & additives started making me very nauseous and loopy when I used them and  2)  Acrylics seemed to fit the way I painted better, which at that time was in very thin layers.  I’m intending to use the oil bars more like markers and forego additives if I can.  There are “odorless” paint thinners and mediums on the market, but just because you can’t smell the fumes, doesn’t mean they aren’t there. 

This weekend I will be starting to get ready for Christmas by priming crosses that I will paint as gifts for friends and family.  (If they turn out ok.)   I should be able to post pics of the process as I go along.  It’s hard to believe how quickly the year has flown by, huh?

The Heart Series is still in motion, but no pics or videos are ready right now.  I was working on heart word/theme associations yesterday….here’s the list so far: hope, hopeful, hungry, thirsty, satisfied, calm, peaceful, tranquil, nervous, anxious, perplexed, doubtful, hard, gentle, kind, loving, love, soft, bold, brave, sour, bitter, sweet, rough, diseased, fast, slow, lost, courageous, smart, dumb, foolish, silly, beautiful, ugly, plain, exotic, humble, sad, happy, joyful, proud, evil, deceitful, bland, trustful, trusting, true,  cold, cool, caloused, torn, twisted, bound, wounded, hurt, hurting, healed, energized, loving, young, old, sympathetic, expressive, musical, purposeful, honorable, holy, perfect, light, brilliant, pure...

A Funny Realization

I hung out with my aunt over the weekend and as we were scanning chanels for something to watch we came across a Heart concert on MTV.  Without a doubt Heart has been one of my favorite bands for a very long time.  I remember listening to their albums my aunt and uncle had back in the early 80s when I was a little kid.  Several of their songs could easily go along with The Heart Series…as a soundtrack if you will. Hmmm…I may have to explore that more and look into copyright stuff for using their music.     ???

Time for a quick update. Or two…

  

This year has been quite fantastic.  I guess the best way to sum up 2016 for me could be done in one word: CHANGE

I have a new job (8-5) that I absolutely love at Cornerstone Relocation.  The team is awesome.  The office is 1.7 miles from my house.  My former place of employment had a much longer commute and a the work environment was more stressful, so this new job is a huge blessing for me.  I have a new cat named Brutus (Bruty) who was born on 3/03/16.  I got a new car.  My 2006 Lancer decided it was time to start having issues and since I was having the new car itch, I got an Outlander Sport at the end of July.

The studio has been rearranged.  AGAIN.  Earlier this spring I reorganized my art materials and moved things around only to find that I really didn’t like the new setup several months later.   It was a chore to go through everything again and move the supplies around, but I’m much happier with new configuration and hope that the changes will = creative drive/energy as I have a ton of things sketched and several works in progress that need to worked on.  

I’m hoping to get back into the groove with my videos…we’ll see how that goes over the next few weeks.       : )