Artfest 2008

Howdy---

I think I am almost caught up on my sleep from the lack of it at Artfest- For those of you who don't know (well doesn't everyone know???) Artfest is a WONDERFUL art retreat up in Pt. Townsend Washington. Its about a 1 1/2 hour from Seattle. This was my second year I was blessed to go.



I flew in on Tuesday April 1st after work, and stayed with my friend Celeste who I met the previous year at Artfest and her partner Cynthia- thanks ladies! Celeste and I made our merry way to the Ft on that Wednesday.


We checked in, got our goodie bag and went to unpack- we were both in dorm 202, this year I was "crazy" and roomed w/ roomies, last year I had a private room. I was nervous about having roomies as I never have experienced such a thing- one roomie yes, but not 3. They were all wonderful ladies! Hey ladies!!!!





The "opening ceremony" was much much better (in my opinion) than last year. This year they had each teacher come up, introduce themselves and pick a card w/ a pre filled out question on it- like "when you get blocked creatively what do you do to unblock", or "do you create in silence, music, tv" and other question like that- you got to hear from each of them and was a great way to "know" a tad about them.... From there off to the Art asylum room to scroung for good stuff, what is the art asylum room you ask? Its a huge room/building that you can bring your unwanted/unused art supplies to. One persons trash becomes another treasure... Great place to sift Thru stuff....

First day I had "Natures Journal" with LK Ludwig - I had false expectations (nothing to do w/ the course description or the teacher, I guess I didn't pay attention to how much stuff we were going to learn) that I would actually finish my book that day- at first I was a little bumed at the end of the class cause I had a book not totally put together and all these cool things to put in them but not "done"- when I was showing my roomies all the stuff I made I was like LaRose who do you think your kidding..... you made a ton of cool stuff... learned alot of cool tech.-
Now looking back I'm glad I didn't "finish" the book. I will be taking it in another direction that I would have.... LK is the sweetest. I have read her blog and a book of hers and admired her work for a while, now I can put a soul to the face. :) very lovely woman!!!

That night was journaling down at the beach. Me and some of my peops went down and got a spot- they had fun journaling, I mainly watched but did a lil journaling. It was alot of fun- got loud and rambunctious- good stuff. Then we headed home for the "After hour party" as my roomie Nikki called it- Dorm 202 was quite the partying one - I thought last year we were crazy, this year took the cake- each night more and more gals gathered. Bringing stuff to show and tell, stuff to work on, stuff to eat and drink. :)



The second day of classes I took "Black Board Journal" with Bee Shay-

Love love loved it- I got that sense of accomplishment I was needing and totally constructed my book- didn't finish embelsighing it 100%, but that's ok- this was her first time teaching at Artfest and she soooooooooooooooooo did such a great bang up job- she did a great job of keeping us aware of the time and paced us well. This was a super "easy" project, anyone who can follow directions and take some time could do it. Sat with one of my buds Diane, so we yapped the whole time- special lady! :)

If I put your picture on here and you want it off please let me know.

Peace, Love, Heath, and Happiness to you all!

That night was the famous vendor night- ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhh ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh thats all I can say about that- I got some wonderful pieces of art that I will most likely share in a future post...

More partying in 202 that night....

Third day of classes I took "Shivering Fragments" from Lynn Perella- I swear it was like art therapy. we were asked to bring something that meant something to us, I didnt really "get" what we were supposed to bring, but that was my bad for not asking sooner. We gessoed our "canvas" texured it and let it dry- then we gathered in a circle and one by one explained our "fragment"- this was pretty intense. I'm hoping Lynn has some psychology in her background somewhere, some of us may have needed it. We talked for about 1 1/2 hours, different parts, different things, cool stuff all in all. Me being who I am was freaking out a little when we got back from lunch at 12:30 and only had till 4 (she was a sweetie and let us stay till past 5 if need be) and hadnt started to paint or collage yet.... It all worked out in the end. At first I hated what I did, I wished I didnt add more colors to it when I did..... got frusterated, but looking back I think the day and class turned out as it was suposed to... I'm really excited about what I learned and will in alot of ways take the most away from this class. Great lady! :)

That night I went off campus for some yummy grub in town and then hit show and tell. This is wehre you can bring what you made to show. ITs a great way for people to figure out what they want to take the next year. Lots of wonderful beautiful stuff!!!

The party in 202 that night was the biggest and loudest, as it should be seing it was our last night.... I steared away from any talk of it being over as I knew I would get emotional.... I had a few drinks in me so any sad stuff would have put me over the edge.

The next day said goodbyes for now to my friends and drove to Pikes Place for some food and shopping, Celeste went with me and we met up w/ a online friend of mine and her son- such a sweet boy!