art cards

It's true! I've finally made art cards that I am happy enough with to sell. I have about eight designs available on my "Etsy" page (http://HendersonArt.etsy.com/) and I made only a limited number of them. If I do sell them all in the next short while, I'll make more. Also I will more than likely make some of other paintings, too...

Another update from the studio: I am making several puppets in felts at the moment. Most of them appear to be forming into cats. I love cats! The felt is hand-made. If you look at the above-mentioned Etsy page, you can see them (when they're done!) Unless, of course, they sell before I can post or document them. That does happen sometimes!

Happy Easter!!!

New Workshops in January and Spring Break...

Hi folks! Just a quick word, if you are in the Montreal area you might like to check out my website for just-announced workshops. I have workshops for adults, teens and kids. Here be the link. Hoorah!

Also please note that I offer workshops for groups of adults, kids, birthday parties... anyone who needs a productive and fun, or team-building activity please contact me. I will be studying in the field of Art Therapy soon, and am applying all that I learn to my basic fun workshops, too. Cheers and a happy new year to you all!!!

Another Blog...

I am involved with another blog. This one is a Group effort, and it focusses on Verdant Life In The City. Gardening, art, herbalism, cartoons, a beautiful life, food... and much much more will be a part of this... Fleurbain. I will keep this-here blog for more personal ramblings... will also continue to co-post my art reviews and cartoons here! However, I do reccommend checking Fleurbain.com out, too.

November Single-Day Workshops: Felt in Montreal

Workshops schedule for November:

Make Your Own Felt Wool Scarf, and Felted Soap Loofah
For ages 15 to Adult, the perfect way to make a couple of deluxe Christmas presents!

In this three-hour course, students will create a felt wool scarf, and also a felted soap loofah. The basics of the wet-felting process will be taught.

Choose one day of: Tuesday November 16, 10am - 1pm; Thursday November 18, 6:30pm - 9:30pm; or Saturday November 20, 10am - 1pm. Cost for one of these courses is $40 (materials included) OR $37 each if you take more than one course...



Make Your Own Felt Pouch/Purse, and Felted Soap Loofah
For ages 15 to Adult, A fun three hour session in which we will create a felt wool pouch or purse, suitable for a camera, cellphone, or just to have a nice little purse! We will also make a felted soap loofah for the bath.

Choose one day of: Tuesday November 23, 10am - 1pm; Thursday November 25, 6:30pm - 9:30pm; or Saturday November 27, 10am - 1pm. Cost for one of these courses is $40 (materials included) OR $37 each if you take more than one course (including the Scarf option, above.


These workshops are just three hours, and you will learn skills to make felt obects at home, if you so choose. Please see: (Link to the right of these words!) for more information.

Workshop Schedule...

Hey folks! I am teaching some workshops over the summer, fall, and into the winter. Here is the link to the schedule. There is stuff for kids, adults, and teens too! If you have any requests or ideas please feed me some of that feedback. Thanks everyone!

http://natashahenderson.com/page/workshops

New Studio... Courses Offered Soon!!!

I just went by my soon-to-be-new-studio today. Saw the friendly land-lady again, paid the rest of May's rent... and got the keys!!! I didn't think I'd have access 'til May, but Landlady is nice. Happy happy!

So in the next couple of days, I will be heading over there with tape-measure and papers and pen in hand. Like any time that I start in on a new space (for example, back in 2002 when I bought my home in Courtenay, BC) I like to make a little "dream-map" of what I imagine things could be like there. I want to set this place up well, so that I utilise the space to its best. Shelving, extra lighting... things that will make it all the better.

I will be teaching courses in this space for kids, teens, and adults. The courses will be administered through the Salamander Arts Centre, but people can contact me directly, too. There will be courses in felt-making, painting, and mixed media stuff. The kids' courses will run mostly in the summer, and the teens/adults right through 'til Christmas. When I have the exact dates and times worked out, I'll provide a link to the lists. In the adult courses, we will make things like felt scarves, felt coasters, felt purses, felt beads, felt cat-toys...

The painting course for adults that I will offer is one that I had designed a few years back, and offered in the Comox Valley... however there was never enough interest in it then. I am hoping that in all of Montreal I will find 4-8 people who would like to "Add Depth To Painting"! It will be a fun course, despite the dry name. Depth is a good, good thing!

Anyhow, I must get on to packing things around the home that will be transferred over there, now. Soon I'll get movers to come and haul furniture and etc for me, so I need to get a-boxin' up. I'll also need to shift stuff from my old, shared studio space to home in the next couple of weeks...

Busy, happy, exciting time! Really, living the dream.

To Jog Or Not To Jog... That Is The Question

I have the sniffles. Should I jog? It's a sunny day. Heaven knows that soon enough I'll be looking out onto overlapping blizzards.

I'll jog. I hear that gentle exercise improves the immune system...

Yesterday I spent the day (well, about 8:30 to 2:30) out in St. Lambert, for a professional development day with ArtsSmarts. I'll be guiding an entire elementary school through making a big wall-hanging of some sort. As with ArtsSmarts projects, a lot of the goal is collaboration and process and spontaneity and hand-on problem-solving. So although I have some lesson-plans worked out, the whole project is really by, for, and about the students themselves. I am really, really excited about this!!! I'll teach 106 students how to make felt.

Speaking of felt, tomorrow I will have 20 scarves at a table in Ottawa, for a cool craft fair my friend is in. She offered to take some scarves in an amazing fit of generosity! In the meantime, I am churning out the things in an attempt to re-build my stock. Considering I now am fully self-employed (or freelance, depending on what term you like) it is important to just keep on chugging. And on that note, time to hit the road... jogging!

Brand-New Scarves

I have made, and put up "online for sale" two new scarves... you can find them on my website http://natashahenderson.com/, my Etsy store http://HendersonArt.etsy.com/, my Deviant Art page http://HendersonArt.deviantart.com/, my Facebook page that I think is "Natasha Henderson", my Myspace page, oh so many places. Anyhow, here they are...


One is called "Grape Mixer" and one is called "Toffee Twist". Maybe I'm hungry? Haha.

Sale on Some Of My Scarves... 'til August!

Hey folks, this is just a quick note to let you know that I have chosen a few of my "felt wool scarves" that I make to be sale-priced until August. Then, if any of these little inexpensive pieces of neck-warming love are left behind, they go back to their regular price.

One of the reasons that I'm doing this is because I will soon be approaching shops to sell my scarves in, and I am thinking it would be easiest if I just kept everything at the same price.

So, the less-costly pieces... I've made them even more less costly! To be specific, regularly they are $35 USD, and are now on for $25 USD, plus applicable shipping.

SO! Hope this finds you all well and good and happy and thinking ahead to autumn...

http://HendersonArt.etsy.com/

Whoa Dude

Whoa can be written "whoa" as I just typed in, or "woah". I think my first instinct is correct. I am not going to spell-check it. Ok, ok fine I am... right. My first instinct was right. Whoa! Isn't me. Whoa, I haven't written a blog entry for... a long long time. I have been very busy indeed... all the more reason to write things out, I suppose.

I am planning on going to two Gallery Openings (Vernisages) this week, and also think I'll pop into the Montreal Biennale. I had gone there two years ago (strangely enough) and made a huge report in my blog about it... http://blogs.myspace.com/henderson_painting Check out June 23, 2007. That's the main big ol' report. There are some cutely-written blogs around that time, too... I wasn't working and had only been in Montreal for ten days and thus was floating on a happy, natural high.

I have been continuing making the felt-wool scarves, often with beads. I like them. I am going to try peddling them around town, as well as online. I sell them on my Etsy page, in case you are curious. http://HendersonArt.etsy.com/

I have several new canvasses stretched, and I must polish off the "Ghazal" ones I've been working on for some time. I love them... there is nothing quite so fun as writing poetry with a paint-brush.

OK. That is it for now... I promise (or at least hope to) write more soon. I apologise to any of the folks who used to read this on a regular basis. I like it, I should make the time. Ok. Ta ta now.

Filler?

I am in the midst of writing a blog.

No, no I am not referring to this particular entry your eyes are roving over right now. Nope.

I am referring to a blog entry that I have NOTES for... one for which I would like to put something "decent" together. One in which I babble on and on and hopefully it is terribly interesting. And not interestingly terrible.

In the meantime, I'll stick a couple-er-three "scarf" piccies in this! These are all available for purchase (as of this writing, anyhow) and yes, I know wool scarves are a little out of season... however one day that won't be the case. And I'll have inventory! So here you are:








OK, these scarves are all available on my Etsy page: http://HendersonArt.etsy.com/

Felt Scarves...

The other weekend, a pal taught me (and another pal) how to make felt fabric out of loose wool.

I know there's a term for it, like "roving" or something. Anyhow, loose wool has been washed, dyed, combed, and not spun into yarn yet.

I really enjoyed making this fabric. I have made three more "things" after that initial eve. The first of these is a thick greeny/orangey/blackish short piece of fabric. I had intended for it to be a scarf, but it shrank like crazy. I can use it as a "neck-warmer" or use it as simply fabric to make a little purse or something.

The second piece was a success... a long (perhaps a little too long) white/green/teal gauze-like scarf, with foam numbers encased in it. I think it looks pretty cool.

The third piece was also a success, I do believe. It is a somewhat thicker yet shorter (and still long!) scarf with beads embedded in it. The colours are black, raspberry, and pink. I like it. It's mine.

These are mine, indeed, but my hopes are to find time in my already busy days to make one scarf every day or so. Hopefully I'll increase my speed at it... so far they have taken about three to four hours each, and the process alternates from pain-staking, careful laying of individual fibres... to all-out physical exertion. I would like to sell these objects. That is why I need to:

a)make them different from other stuff out there on the market

and,

b)make more of them more often.

I, of course, am still an artist and cartoonist and illustrator and embroidery-digitizer... but this is a fun and visually rewarding new branch to my work. Photos soon...