Creepy Cactuses

This weekend my mom and I went to Sedona for a retreat. We went to a lovely resort high up in the Sedona hills. I took particular interest in the cactuses on grounds. 

WARNING: there are spider photos in here!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BLOG!

I started this blog a year ago! I can't believe it. I'm not necessarily sure how often people look at it or what kind of reach it has (besides my mom). But, it has given me a way to archive my art and incentive to create! In celebration, I'm going to post my favorite posts from each month. Enjoy! And thank you for giving me your time!

From July where I started crazily painting these watercolor bodies

Flagstaff flowers in August

September and my first oil painting

Warm New York October and a Lower East Side excursion

November brought us this puppy

I started experimenting with manual photography in the winter months

And then, in March, I started painting them

In April there was Argentina, and these mouths

In May, I left the lovely New York City

And then Arizona inspired these funky oils

Doodle: Floral Thank Yous

I decided to just make a huge batch of thank you notes to have on stock. Here they are!

A Flaggy Adventure

Yesterday I went on a little hike with Dylan. I brought my camera and found that everything was kind of in the same palette. I think it's lovely.

Goodbye New York City

This city has been quite the adventure. Cliche, yes, but absolutely true. I am moving back to Arizona (for the time being) and I'm going to figure out my life from there. New York is draining and painful and the good hardly outweighs the bad at most times. But, I heard that you hate New York until you leave and then you can't wait to get back. Who knows? For now though, here is my farewell to this city that has seen me grow up (and perhaps pushed me to grow up even faster than normal). As LCD Soundsystem said, New York I love you, but you're bringing me down.

To see all of my New York posts click here or on the link to the right. This post has a compliation of my favorite photos from the past four years. 

UPDATE: I wrote this post before I had moved out of my apartment and was feeling a bit bitter. Leaving has been very difficult and I think I will always be a New Yorker at heart. I'll just have to bring the city everywhere I go.

Until next time!

Sassy Greetings

I saw this lovely Julia Child quote about cake and just felt compelled to paint cake. I already had my oils out and I was taking a break from painting. From this random moment, I just went nuts! 

I painted fifteen little greeting card type things. All of which are sassy, all of which are dainty and nice. I want to start selling them on etsy-- I think I could make some money!

Chile

After a 19 hour long bus ride we arrived in Santiago! When we were in Chile we were all over the place in a superspeed 48 hour adventure. We went to Isla Negra, Pablo Neruda's beach house, explored the city of Santiago, and went to a vineyard.

Chile was stunning. It was drastically different from Argentina (culturally, language, dogs). Santiago was not my cup of tea but the street art was amazing. And that vineyard and organic wine definitely made Chile even better.

Bariloche, Patagonia

South America has an amazing landscape that spans from the windy, cobblestone streets of Buenos Aires, to the amazingly, radiant Patagonia. We went to Bariloche (the northern most point of Patagonia) for 3 days. It was perfect. There is no way to capture the magic of this area but here are some of my favorite images.

Buenos Aires (Part I)

The past 10 days I have been in South America visiting my sister who is studying abroad in Buenos Aires, Argentina. It was an amazing trip. The landscape and culture are like nothing else.

My next few posts are going to be dedicated to this trip. I don't really know the best way to organize everything since I took over 700 photos! But I suppose I'll do it by each leg of the trip.

We started in Buenos Aires so these are my photos from that first bit. We went to the Cemetario Recoletta, La Boca, and Palermo Soho. 

Funky Prints

The more I print the more I end up making totally funky mistakes (these ended up cool though, right?). These are some of the best (most comical, bizarre, terrible?)-- if nothing else they are fun to put up on my walls.

Still Life in Watercolor

A few weekends ago I hosted a still life program at my residence hall with a few friends. It was so lovely buying the flowers and produce-- I had a hard time keeping on track because I kept getting carried away!

This is the final piece I painted. Watercolor is definitely my strong suit. I'm pretty sure I'll do my MFA portfolio in all watercolor.

Recap of September

A wee bit late, but here are some of my favorite posts from September. I can't believe it's already October!

My roommate Cassie when we were playing with shadows on our roof back when it was nice and cold.

A work in progress painting of some lovely flowers I saw at the High Line.  

Some abstraction work that I've started doing in my free time. I think I could incorporate these into my portfolio thesis.

Some rad doors in the ghost town Jerome, Arizona.

And, finally my copy painting. I think I did Georgia justice.