Organized Chaos: An Elementary School Art Room: "Ms. Foy, are you a REAL artist?!"

   If I had a penny for every time I was asked this question, I'd have all the art supplies I could ever desire or imagine.... It's hard for students at a young age to imagine their teacher as anything other than simply their teacher. I hope I am able to utilize this blog not only as documentation of the world of art education, but also as a glimpse into my personal life as an artist.

As an artist, my interest in mediums is vast and has changed over the years....

Middle School : Ceramics
   High School: Black White Photography and Oil Painting
      Freshman Year: Drawing
   Sophomore Year: Painting
   Junior Year: Painting and Printmaking
   Senior Year: Printmaking and Ceramics
                    2010-2011 First Year Teaching: Personal Art Creation on Hold
             2011-2012 Second Year Teaching: Photography and small paintings
     2012-2013 Third Year Teaching: Oil Paintings

I've found over the years my reasons for creating pieces has also changed. I went from creating pieces of subject matter which I thought was ideal and what others would be impressed by to the present where I have begun to focus on creating art which will preserve memories.

Painting: Family

After recently moving my Grandmother to an assisted living home, while cleaning out and sorting through her belongings I began to think about the memories I have from growing up visiting her. Within this series, there are two views of her home. One centers around a rocking chair which she sat in daily, I remember fighting over sitting in it with my sister. In the second, a view through the mirror of her bedroom. I remember playing and exploring with the trinkets and jewelry on the dresser which holds this mirror. The final image is a piano, which upon arrival to her house when she was a kid, fell off the back of the truck and broke into hundreds of pieces. It was glued back together, and worked until this past spring when it was removed from her house. The ironic part of this piano is that it had to be chopped up to get through the doorways. I remember it was always off key, but somehow my Grandmother was able to stand it to listen to my sister and I play.

Sketching: Ireland and Pisa
These two sketches are observational drawings from a semester abroad. The image on the left, is a fast sketch of a statue outside of the Leaning Tower of Pisa. To the right, a drawing from observation with it's original sculpture at the National Gallery in Dublin. The National Gallery became a second home to me as I found sketching there cleared my head or made me less home sick during my trip.

Painting: Hurricane Season
This year a hurricane graciously granted me two days off from teaching, so I took that time to create for myself. I really enjoy palette knife painting, something which I learned to love and appreciate in high school.

Sketches: Abroad Continued
Two more sketches from my time abroad.

Left: View out my apartment in Dublin.

Right: Farmers Market Flowers in Dublin.

Photography: A morning with Abe
Photography became a passion for me in highschool. I was inspired to become an art teacher most in part due to the extraordinary experiences I had in my high school photography class. This is a favorite from a maternity shoot for a co-worker in late summer. It was a hike up those stairs, but well worth the results.

Painting: Still Life
Upper Left: Still Life with oils and palette knife, no pure black paint used, soley mixed from primary/secondaries.
Upper Right: Palette Knife, created in High School.
Lower Right: College Textile Still Life, oil paint

Painting: Sky Color DC
Have you ever read the book Sky Color by Peter H. Reynolds? If not, stop reading this and go get it! It's an amazing story about a young artist who is trying to paint the sky, but has no blue paint. So she watches the sky throughout the days and realizes she doesn't even need blue to paint the sky. It made me look at the sky every day at all different times. I found that the most impressive colors of the sky here in DC, are usually around our National Mall. These are four paintings of four different times of day and the sky colors I saw.

Paint: A Date with Chihuly at Phipps

In college I got a membership to the Botanical Gardens in Pittsburgh simply for the Chihuly installations. Freshman year, Phipps was my hide away and I spent countless hours sketching then coming back to my dorm to paint.

Photography: Family Differences
I'm a city girl at heart or what my late Uncle called a "city slicker". As a kid I loved going to feed the cattle and pick peaches or whatever was ready to harvest on the farm. This photograph from a visit to the family farm just always reminds me of the times spent with him and my cousins.

Painting: The Little Charlie Brown Tree

This piece was a gift to my Mother. Theres a winding road on the Savage Mountains in western Maryland where most of my extended family lives and on it, is this crooked little fir tree. Recently during the hurricane, the top quarter of it came off. So I chose to preserve the memory of this tree for my Mother because every time we pass it, she talks about how cute and unique it is.

Painting: Golden Farm
Another piece with a family connection, this is the farm owned by relatives who live a completely different lifestyle from me. I find this painting clears my head and takes me away from the chaos of the city.

Caution! Do not read while hungry!

Photography has always been a large part of my artistic career and while I don't do anything "professionaly" I find myself being called upon by close friends and family for my "nice camera" as they call it. I recently had the opportunity to photograph some dishes from a new tapas restaurant in downtown Silver Spring, MD called La Malinche. This is a new, family owned restaurant which serves delicious Spanish and Mexican tapas. The bar and restaurant is a wonderful atmosphere with many more than these three dishes, the following are simply a sneak peek...

The Holidays Are Here! Let the crafting begin!

Winter brings the coveted two week break from work which teachers love so much, but also on a rare occassion for my district, snow days. Check out the crafts below I made on my snow day this year!

Felt Holiday Wreath!

This wreath was made with felt, straight pins, and a Styrofoam ring! It was easy! Simply cut the green felt into ovals with pointed ends, arrange them like a flower with 5 petals, and straight pin them into the Styrofoam ring! Repeat this until the ring is covered!

Re-Purposed Old Christmas Bulbs!

This is a simple easy decoration to make, I used old bulbs from my grandmothers house, fine glitter(I found at Marshalls/TJ Maxx, 6 bottles, $5) and modge podge spray or adhesive.

Cover the bulb in modge podge( I taped the gold part which usually screws the light bulb into it's string). Then sprinkle glitter over top. Display in a candy dish or clear vase, bowl, etc. for a great holiday decoration!

Christmas Light Garland!
All you need for this project is scissors, scrap fabric, and a string of christmas lights!

Begin by cutting the fabric into roughly 1inch by 4-5 inch rectangles. Now, simply knot them once around the light cord. I found usually somewhere between 4-6 fabric pieces fits between each light on the cord. Hang. Enjoy!

Photography: Ezra Turns 1!

This adorable little girl turned one over the past week!

It was just over a year ago Monica asked me to photograph the baby shower for this precious little princess! Time really does fly! Monica and Taylor are amazing parents to Ezra and asked me to be there to capture this special celebration.

Enjoy a little peek into Ezra's special day!