Artist Trading Cards

Sometimes I just plain old run out of gas.  The previous day we had a really serious family matter, my car died, and one or more of my students, after my deliberate instructions to the contrary, went in to the place where I teach and got latex paint all over the carpet. Latex.  That means house paint.  That means permanent. On blonde carpet. Not my blonde carpet.

It turned out fine, and we are blessed; hubby to the rescue fixed my car, professional services to the rescue to clean the carpet (mostly)...

Anyway, it was a pretty stressful day, and left me wandering around our house the following day tired and listless, unable to get any serious work done.

It's times like these I pull out my Artist Trading Cards (ATCs).  Sometimes we just need to be fed.  And these feed me.  ATCs have specific guidelines such as size and contact information, etc.  One of those guidelines is that they can only be traded.  Generally you make a small series of similar cards to trade and keep one in that series.  Here are some of mine - some I made and some I received in trades.

Let's see - bottom right - the surprised girl on crazy warm background - mine.  Actually it's a drawing of one of my students.  I love complicated backgrounds.  They can make even a simple drawing pop.

Underneath that is an iPhone box onto which I laid down some embossed metal and paint.  It's now an ATC receptacle. Many artists keep their cards in baseball card-type pages, but I like to handle mine.  I just put them in baseball card sleeves.

The pretty blues and greens abstract is one of my Art 2 student's.  I think she's 13. I taught them ATCs this year and they LOVED it!  It got to the point that they wanted to do it over and over.  I'm having them trade on their own this summer without me.

The metal embossed card next to that one is one of mine.  The theme was 'Wild West.'  What could be more wild than the back of a cowboy?  Just sayin'.  It's reflective, and a little hard to see in this photo, but nice to touch and easy to see in person.

A couple of my favorites by others - the landscape, which was a postal theme.  The blue and green vertical with the Tuscan flavor and the red flowers is one of my ALL TIME favs, done by a friend of mine.

Next to that is a cool starburst pattern of words upon which a face is drawn.  I like it a lot!  She made an envelope for it, underneath.  Good idea.  I can use that.

Love da bunny.

I did an England map theme, which is the red one in the center with the stripes of maps.  Cool textures atop that one too.

Next to it is a phone booth and London theme that I did as well.

Top right is a pretty cool mask I made for a Mask Series trade.  Actually, this is one of my favorites as well, and I keep telling myself I'm going to do a series of paintings like this.

You will also find a spiral made with thread.  Way cool!  This was a one-on-one trade.  I'm definitely not going to try that.  I'd tie myself up.

Cool mushroom card, snail mail trade.  Love.

Last but not least is a Chinese writing theme I did.  I love Chinese characters and know quite a few.  I've studied their origins and how they've evolved through the centuries and it fascinates me.  Anyway, in this series I laid down a complex background, and then swiped over it with a solid paint.  Then I drew in the characters quickly and surely.  Chinese calligraphy is all about HOW you do it, sure and perfect, one stroke, no mistakes.

All these feed me.  Sometimes when I'm in an artistic slump I'll go through them and get all kinds of ideas.  As for me, I'm, well, full of it.  Full of ideas, I mean.  And these just kickstart me.

Sooo.... if you want to do an ATC trade with me, let me know.

I'm going to go make stuff now.