Saturday, January 30, 2010

Painted Face!

So artsomniac was digging the old photographs of yesteryear in her university and found this photograph of a facepainting competition she won last year...It was a theme competition, the theme was Change. She did a change in humans, change in seasons metaphor on a single face of Anju.

The design is inspired by the elaborate face paintings done for art forms from kerala like theyyam and kathakali.

A shot while the work was in progress...


face 1, face 2


face 3, face 4

Thursday, January 28, 2010

...



I will never be able to see this again...
A tree...Bits of poetry...
Natraj Pencil.
our handwritings....
But we will have better walls, better pictures...
once upon a time..
Right, MJ?

Tuesday, January 26, 2010

mermaid bottle



Posting pictures of the mermaid bottle, the inspiration for the 'metabottle' in the writing board. The lemon smirnoff bottle was a giveaway from medusa, sometime last year. Inspiration for the mermaid idea was the unique twisted shape of the bottle...unlike the regular smirnoff bottles. Glass Paints and black glass liner were used. Sketching was free hand. Filled blue colour and water inside the bottle to give it a better effect.



Monday, January 25, 2010

purple wave shrug/muff

I have been working on this purple wave shrug/muff for the last two days. Today, it is complete. This muff can be doubled as a shrug as well; a weird shrug for that matter. Pretty, anyways.
Raw materials: 1) The wool material is leftover blanket piece after ria made a shawl from it. 2) purple buttons: general bazaar, button shop, rs 4 each. 3) purple wool, hobby shop, general bazaar.
Method: Ripped both sides of the cloth to get the effect. Did the design in running stitch, the wave design came as a free hand one; placed buttons in 10 different places.
Elika, my knit master was happy to model for me. Thanks eliboo!

The shrug/muff


The details







The button hole.


The single side shrug style.




the muff wrap style



the double side shrug style


The regular muff style

recycled writing board

Artsomniac has collected all the discards which came from the cable work in the uni. After the coffee table post and the coir stool post, here comes the final cable work discard material reworked. A writing board. This simple sketch is a montage of artsomniac's life.

What is life without a recharge? That too, student life = chotaa recharge.


There was a hole in the board when artsomniac found it. Must be designed to suit cable packaging requirements. However, a black sunflower found its way there. The black is Indian Ink with brush.


Train of thoughts....Train no 2724, A P Express which carries bundles of artsomniac's dreams...


Books, which she currently refers to for fun and for research... Tempara and Indian Ink with brush.


Artwork about a previous artwork. Must call this mermaid on a bottle, 'metabottle' or something like that :-) there! artsomniac just dispersed her literature student wisdom!!!!


Finally, a beautified, exaggerated eyed, retro haired, half of a self portrait. She does not think that this looks like her, other than for the stub of a nose part!!!


however, artsomniac really enjoyed doing this today....

Friday, January 22, 2010

song of the day


Roberta Flack

In love with the song, in love with the singer!!!
listen to roberta flack here


Killing me softly with his song

Strumming my pain with his fingers
Singing my life with his words
Killing me softly with his song
Killing me softly with his song
Telling my whole life with his words
Killing me softly with his song

I heard he sang a good song
I heard he had a style
And so I came to see him
To listen for a while
And there he was this young boy
A stranger to my eyes

Strumming my pain with his fingers
Singing my life with his words
Killing me softly with his song
Killing me softly with his song
Telling my whole life with his words
Killing me softly with his song

I felt all flushed with fever
Embarassed by the crowd
I felt he found my letters
And read each one out loud
I prayed that he would finish
But he just kept right on

Strumming my pain with his fingers
Singing my life with his words
Killing me softly with his song
Killing me softly with his song
Telling my whole life with his words
Killing me softly with his song

He sang as if he knew me
In all my dark despair
And then he looked right through me
As if I wasn't there
And he just kept on singing
Singing clear and strong

Strumming my pain with his fingers
Singing my life with his words
Killing me softly with his song
Killing me softly with his song
Telling my whole life with his words
Killing me softly with his song

[Break]

Strumming my pain with his fingers
Singing my life with his words
Killing me softly with his song
Killing me softly with his song
Telling my whole life with his words
Killing me

He was strumming my pain
Yeah, he was singing my life
Killing me softly with his song
Killing me softly with his song
Telling my whole life with his words
Killing me softly
With his song

Thursday, January 21, 2010

Recyle bin decor part II : The coir stool

Artsomniac's interest in recycle furniture has reached a new level with the newest addition to the room, the little coir stool. The raw materials for the coir stool also came from the recent cable work in the hostel. Artsomniac has serious doubts whether she should get a 'recycle goddess' title! what thought!!

However, a detail of the raw material hunt goes like this. Artsomniac sets her eye on the cable bobbin which was found inside the mahalaqa hostel dump yard premises. The cable bobbin was not exactly that near the dirty dustbin, but artsomniac pushed the bobbin a little towards the dustbin to get the desired 'trash to treasure' effect while blogging. Such little stage managements are allowable, right folks? So, the raw material number one is at hand now.

The second step is to remove the sides of the bobbin, so that you have a neat skeleton of a cardboard cylinder.

Now for further raw materials, go on a field trip to the nearby town (Sitaphalmandi in artsomniac's case). Walk until you find a shop where you can find coir. A good friend (thanks annie ;-)) who enjoys paani puri and window shopping might come handy in such situations. Oh this is one time when artsomniac missed kerala other than for food. The quality of the coir in hyderabad is not comparable. However after a long walk, artsomniac and good friend found average quality coir for 2 rs 50 ps per meter in this shop. For this stool, we need atleast 10 meters.


The next step is to carefully wind the coir to the structure we have. It has to be tightly wound to get best results. The design will evolve when you try to save practical problems. So that is the tip for organic designs. Once the winding is done, you can burn the surface using a candle to remove the roughness of the surface. Also, this will give it an antique dark shading. So here, the second furniture project is complete.



better view







This goes really well with the coffee table.





And for all those who wonder about the strength of the furniture, I guarantee, this is quite strong. I have been using it for a week now and it is not showing even the faintest signs of collapse. :-)

Friday, January 08, 2010

thought for the night

You will never know who is claiming your life.

Wednesday, January 06, 2010

flying bottle

One great idea from Artsomniac to people who are looking for dirt cheap home decor. This is a simple green wine bottle and the side feather of a peacock combined together... A series of green bottles in different patterns can be a wonderful theme way to decorate empty spaces in a thematic yet cheap way!


Artsomniac found this feather in the Osmania University campus during one of her morning walks... Artsomniac is waiting for more green bottles in her aqua home where she can keep all the peacock feathers of the past. MJ, are you listening? Take the hint! he he!!!