plush you!

it's official! the knitimals are on their way to the west coast. for those of your knitimals owners on the pacific, don't think i've forgotten you... surely i'd remember you, but this is the first time that they've been in a show over yonder. yes, the other morning i shipped out a big ol' box full of wool, bound for Fancy+Pants in Seattle, home of one of the three sections of the Plush You! 2007 show. I'd asked for opinions and feedback on who should go and in the end, these were the most loved and i couldn't be happier with the group. plus wth zeen's long arms he can cuddle bonnee and baisy if they get nervous in transit. for those of you on the west coast (or if you want to do what i'm doing and hop a $79 SWA flight) the show opens Oct. 12th! the work is supposed to be up on their collective websites too, so i'll keep you posted. wish them luck! (i apologize for the janky photos, but i wanted you to meet them right away) xoxo danamarie

panel #2... all done!

i'll have to re-take and re-post this picture on a day it's not raining. i feel pretty rugged, having spent the last 2 hours of my working day painting in varying strengths of wind and rain. i'm really happy with this panel. i love the sweet little houses formed around the "homeless" characters... little houses formed my charity and love. awwww.... xoxo danamarie

#2 in progress, finished and all

the weather has been brutal. i pulled a muscle in my back. my ladder rungs are bruising my legs. and all the while i'm thinking: "this is great!". the only trouble is, the mural is located on the exterior of a parking garage, on the same block as a bus stop, on a very busy southbound street only a few blocks north of the inner harbor. this is, for all intents and purposes, the most "public" mural i've ever painted. granted, i have painted dozens of murals in schools... and yet, there was a lot less attention and a lot less, let's say, "scrutiny" in those cases. people like to talk to you. and don't get me wrong, i DO like to hear them talk, but when you're on a ladder and its pouring rain and you're wearing noise cancelling ear phones and people are tugging on your pant leg when you don't respond to their shouts... well, in those cases its not so cool. i'm not ungrateful for the attention, i'm not. but imagine you're sitting at your desk and every 2 minutes one of your co-workers comes in and tells you the file you're working on is coming along well. and then every 6 minutes a total stranger comes in to your office and sits down in the chair in front of you and starts poking around on your computer and picking up your roladex and stapling random sheets of paper. then imagine that every 15 minutes one of your clients comes in & wants to know how much money you're making on this particular file, in a week, in a month, in a year. and then every other 15 minutes someone you've never seen before and tells you your work is crap and there should be more files about horses... ok, that might be a stretch for you, but i actually have people complaining to me about the content of the work and, we'll say "requesting" other scenes be put up in its place. and now imagine your desk is outside on a public street and its 100 degrees out. THAT might get you close. and so, its with that little piece of insight that i say, please don't think i'm rude if i can't talk to you for long... i am under a very tight deadline and its very dangerous to try to have conversations with people from atop a ladder in the rain.
oh, and this is where i'm at with panel #2. xoxo danamarie

mural without pictures, and edison!

insider peek: these WILL be the 1st and 2nd panels (immunization and homeless services)... for now they are just pretty solid colored brick walls. and there's edison peeking in!

day 3: finished panel #4 & 5

for those of you with keenly trained eyes you might notice that panel #5 looks a little different now (did you notice?). if we talk often, you probably picked up on it since i was tormented by it for days... the girl used to be in a blue jumper, and it was way too acidic, in my opinion. now she's decked out in orange and lookin' fly! this was a color decision made based on the fact that i had a "substantially too wet to go in the car" roller covered in orange paint. i'm resourceful like that.

gallery walk muse

thanks to everyone--- new fans and old--- who came out last night to see me. i feel like a Beatle! ok, not really but it was really fun. for those of you who missed it, hopefully these photos will suffice for now. *the tray i am working on in that one picture will be up on the website soon (oh the painstaking task of keeping up with technology!) and available for sale. it's really cute. i promise. xoxo danamarie

plates!

for those of you who are getting tired of eating off or paper plates, or have finally decided to go green and scrap the styrofoam, may i suggest you go even GREENER? with these plates! yay! i'm making plates now (well, i'm painting them... you wouldn't want to eat off of what plates i actually MADE would look like).
these plates are up for grabs (as well as custom orders) on the website, so check them out. xoxo danamarie

health department mural... day 2!

well, here it is after 2 days (about 20 hours of work). happy with the progress, less happy with the bruises i've sustained from leaning against the rungs of my ladder.

artist of the month!

come one, come all! come to frederick! i've said it before and i'll say it again... if you haven't been to the muse, in frederick maryland, why are you wasting precious time reading this blog? the muse is this totally amazing little shop featuring great work from all over the country AND this saturday i will be the "artist of the month" for the main street first saturdays gallery walk. that's somethin'! i will be bringing new work to add to whitney's collection of pieces to sell, and doing demonstrations right there before your very eyes. wanna watch me paint? well...

zeen

i'm thinking this little gentleman will be one of the lucky ones going to Plush You! this October. if you're just now meeting him, track back to the beginning of August to see how he was made!