An Artful Challenge

It's another exciting day in the world of paper and I can't wait to share it with you.  So far this year has been very eventful with new projects, new friends and new adventures.  I'm always excited and a little nervous when a new year begins because I sometimes feel a lot of pressure in setting new goals, achieving new heights and learning a bunch of new stuff.  And this year has been no different!  With two months into 2017, I have already set myself up for some exciting new adventures.  

One in particular includes a collaborative effort with a fellow collage artist.  She connected with me through Etsy and we immediately hit it off with our mutual respect of the other's talents.  Her name is Bambi and you can view her shop here: https://www.etsy.com/people/mymedievalmind.  She too has a love for paper and is passionate for the Medieval and Victorian eras and does a beautiful representation of them in her pieces.  Bambi reached out on a whim (probably because she could sense my crazy paper obsession) and a friendship blossomed!  Clever one that she is, Bambi proposed a sort of fun, artful challenge that would pit us against each other.  Ok, not in the mortal combat sense, but more of a show and tell kind of way.  

The rules of this challenge are simple: 
1. Come up with a monthly theme. 
2. Create a representation of that theme in each artist's collage style.
3. Share the piece(s) everywhere!

Why is this exciting?  Well as artists, we are always trying to find bits of inspiration.  I myself am very competitive and always loved assignments where I was given an idea and told to run with it - no boundaries, limits or rules!  I loved seeing the other projects and what everyone else's interpretations were for that assignment.  Same case here - I am going to love to see what Bambi comes up with in our theme for each month.  Oh yes, this will be a monthly challenge for us and we can create as many pieces in this "series" theme as we'd like within that 30 day period.  

I am going to post our "Artful Challenge" (as we've dubbed it) on this blog so be sure to keep checking in for progress pics and then the final result of the monthly themed challenge from both artists!  

This month's theme is "Land ESCAPES" which was actually a funny typo from my auto-corrector when I meant to put Landscapes.  However, this was pretty serendipitous because we decided this would be a perfect first idea - taking the concept of Land ESCAPES as places that we love to escape to and enjoy ourselves in the company of the escape's nature.  Living in La Crosse, WI I am constantly struck by this area's beautiful bluffs, breathtaking river views and gorgeous expansive skies.  I know I will have a lot of GREAT ideas to utilize and have already begun drafting my first piece.  I also want to mention that there's no size limit with these creations - that's completely up to the artist! We just wanted to give ourselves a literal idea and then allow our creative juices to take over from there.  Here's a peek at the "drafted" image I came up with and I will post progress pics along the way.  

​I'm inviting Bambi to add some notes and updates with her perspective of the challenge - so you guys can get the full picture and see both of our interpretations along the way!  Saddle up and enjoy this ride folks!