Spirit Mountains is the tenth digital painting I’ve derived from the source photograph shown below. I have a feeling there will be more, as I’m going to try and see if I can exhaust the source.

posted by Dennis

Visit Susan and Dennis at Galerie Yggdrasil

We are now being represented by Xanadu Gallery in Scottsdale Az. as well. Here are the links for

Susan

Dennis

The babyvamps have, of course, a pretty good concept of thanksgiving and christmas, and view them with unalloyed disdain. Heather knows christmas as yet another occasion for her mother and minions to have yet another gin-soaked one-percenter soiree’, and Neil and ‘Neckers look forward to it with the giddy combination of enthusiasm and dread that seems to accompany those with extended and interesting families. No one seemed to want to be at their respective homes.  It was due to these differing and somewhat destructive approaches to the season that I acquired a bevy of teens, all using my house as a combination haven and sanctuary that no one seemed in any hurry to leave. Heather and Skosh inquired politely of me if I might, “um, you know, like, kinda wanna have (you ask, no, you ask) Heatherstayforaweekhuh?  overchristmashuh?  c’mon, mom, you know what her mom is like, and…”

It didn’t take much convincing as I did indeed know what Heather’s mother was like.  besides, Heather likes to cook and even more, she likes to eat, and I was delighted at the thought of not having to deal with leftovers for weeks after the event especially since Heather’s mother had offered (with a little prodding on my part) to foot the bill for the comestibles.  A blank check…oh, goodie…

Since I am Wiccan and Dennis is a Buddhist, we don’t really celebrate christmas as such, so we have our little celebration with ivy and holly, candles and dinners and singing and meade, closer to the 21st of December.  We did need to discuss among ourselves what the menu would be since we had so many varied appetites to delight.

Skosh is easy to please since he will eat anything as long as it is wrapped in bologna.  I really need to have a talk with him about that one day very soon.  We have already been through the hysteria that the mention of a turkey brings about in Heather, so that was out before it was even a thought.  I was determined to have a squash and wild rice chowder, and no one seemed averse to that, so that was one menu item down. Cranberry, orange, and pecan relish, cheddar, basil, and sunflower seeds studded in a wheat loaf would work nicely as one member of the bread family.  And rosemary sourdough rolls for those who were not fans of wheat bread, just in case.  Neil and ‘Neckers’ meal will double as table decorations since they delight in the many forms of floral nectar that can be whipped up by nature….also, for some reason, they seem to have a letch for creamy peanut butter watered down liberally with Guinness.  (Don’t ask.)

Naturally, the babyvamps set up a howl for tomato and onion salad with sundried tomato vinaigrette and tomato aspic with catsup sauce.  Aspic, okay….the sauce, no.  Everyone has to sacrifice something for the good of the many.  Heather’s sacrifice came when she expressed her hope for gummi worm souffle’ as a second course. umm….no.  She was a fairly good sport about it and only fluffed her neck feathers once.

The main course was agreed upon as a vegetarian nut loaf that is particularly tasty…I found the recipe in a world war II cookbook and made a few new age alterations.  Skosh breathed a little hopeful steam at the offhand mention of a small ham, so I agreed to bake one for him.  Green salad,  mounds of steamed veggies, smashed garlic yukons with veggie gravy (red ham gravy for Skosh) and a molasses eggnog pumpkin pie.  There would of course be a variety of starters and beverages to be decided upon later and everyone seemed to be delighted with the thought of the feast to come.

As the days went on and more dishes were considered for the feast, I became overwhelmed and stated that I thought we would have more than enough food for a small army.  at that point, Johnathon got a far-away glaze and Mina’s beautiful ruby eyes widened in alarm…she knows him well and recognized that look as an impending  ADVENTURE.    When Jon finally spoke again, it was to suggest that since we would have all that food and there were only going to be nine of us to eat it, why not share it with people who might not have anything at all to eat?  All the folks who have been enduring winter hardships all over the country to protest the greed, graft, theft and arrogance that have made the country and the world so terribly financially skewed?  We are a part of this too…why not do what little we can to help?  It made perfect sense to me…we could feed people, make friends, and add a little bit to this very important movement.  So, as I muttered to myself over various on line recipes and cookbooks,  the plotting began in earnest….our ADVENTURE.

To Skosh’s unalloyed delight, the small ham became a very large ham.  We still didn’t dare to broach the addition of a turkey due to Heather’s delicate constitution and the fact that she is given to hysteria and will fly shrieking to the top of the living room curtains at the mere whisper of the word “turducken”..Poor Heather.  We did have to make the shopping list a great deal larger and Heather was pleased as punch by that, as she mentioned how horrified her mother would be if she, mrs. one percent, knew that her blank check was buying food for the 99%.  “She will be too wrecked for the rest of the year to even notice anyhow”…giggled Heather.  If she could have crowed, she would have, but had to ask Neil to do it for her. (careful what you ask for, Heathie.)

With the menu decided upon, there remained the problem of housing of a sort for the occupiers since most of the tents had been ripped away in the small hours of the morning, shredded and disposed of by those who have been hired “to protect and serve”.  It has become clear in the last months exactly who it is that these bastions of the law are expected to serve.  In any case, we needed something that we could pick up and move at the first sign of ‘legal’ brutality so the hunt for a tent-like structure began.  Skosh looked at me thoughtfully and whispered in Heather’s ear while the babyvamps were consulting one another as to who had noticed what that could be used and where it might be found and from whence procured…Heather and I smiled and pointed to Skosh.  Jon looked at us questioningly as he had never seen Skosh change and the vamps had no idea that their good friend and companion was a shapeshifter.

When the shrieks and howls of glee faded into pleasurable echoes, we went to work on dimensions and shape of the Skosh-to-be.  once the final drawings are completed, all that remains will be the preparation of starters and meals for everyone and hey presto. Ican’t wait to see how the whole thing turns out…until then, happy holidays and solstice blessings to us, every one.

Posted by Susan

Visit Susan and Dennis at Galerie Yggdrasil

We are now being represented by Xanadu Gallery in Scottsdale Az. as well. Here are the links for

Susan

Dennis

Posted by Dennis and Susan who say “Occupy something”

First and most alarming, some few of Susan and my prints began producing colors that varied from what appeared on the monitor screen. There followed a long period of advice seeking, searching discussion threads, prayers, burnt offerings and incantations. Finally the problem was mostly resolved by a nifty device called Spyder3. Then I learned that deep in the Photoshop basement was a menu that allowed me to select differing profiles for the type of paper I was using in the printer, now, these buried settings are in addition to the paper selections I routinely make when producing a print, only why 2 different sets of instructions for paper ? End of problem? Not for long.

Part 2 A serpent appears…

A few days later….”Photoshop is unable to print due to a program error’ (translation, you can’t get there from here”). Back to the help discussion threads where battle was raging over the Albigensian heresy, the trinity, original sin, and how many angels….., you get the idea. The consensus was that yeah, “Photoshop does that a lot, who knows why? you’ve probably got something on there that conflicts with it”

Part 3 I succumb to a great idea….

Since upgrading to  the newer version of Photoshop I’d been planning to move to a more powerful computer. Photoshop  demands massive processing power for some of its functions (meaning the ones I use all the time), so I went looking for a newer more powerful Mac with a larger hard drive and lots of ram. I couldn’d just buy the latest Powermac pro because then I would have to buy an even newer version of Photoshop, as my current version won’t run on the newest machines. (this is called “Lack of backward compatibility”) . I found a Mac g5 with 1.8 ghz. dual processors, 4 GB of ram and a 1,000 GB  (1 terabyte) hard drive. This is a six year old super machine for less than $700.00! And I installed  Photoshop as the sole application running on the new computer. All would assuredly be well.

Part 4 Well not all…….

I love the new Mac. I can work without long breaks waiting for the squirrels to generate enough power to render whatever I’m doing, and I don’t have to listen to the annoying squeaking of their wheel.  Suddenly……. “Photoshop is unable to print due to a program error’ (sound of demented laughter in the background).  So. I’ve developed a workaround. I was using a Photoshop routine called Preview to get a final look  at my work before printing on the  expensive acid free super white paper I use. Photoshop preview uses an apple program also called Preview, and it seems that the 2 previews don’t like each other, (much the way that our Calico cat hates the Tortico member of The Hairy Tapestry). I put Apple Preview in the trash, and Photoshop decided to partner with Apple Quicktime to provide previews. Fingers and toes crossed. Ps. Just got an email from Photoshop; Beatings will continue until morale improves. The new painting ‘way back at the beginning  is called Cave painting #1, I imagined sending the Mac, the printer, and a generator back in time to Lascaux.  I’m off to make a burnt offering to Alan Turing for luck.  Posted by Dennis

Visit Susan and Dennis at Galerie Yggdrasil

We are now being represented by Xanadu Gallery in Scottsdale Az. as well. Here are the links for

Susan

Dennis

The vamps exploded through the front door with the news…the ren faire was two weeks away!  We had to go!   And so the planning began.  Costumes.  We needed costumes.  was I expected to make them? It appeared so, and with much peeping and promises from Heather that her mother would finance the wherewithal to construct the costumes if I would make them,  we were, once again, off and running, and I was sewing for all I was worth.

Heather was to be a wench.  She was extremely excited by this since her girth would be made significantly smaller (she hoped) by a waist cincher corset,  and the vamps and ‘Neckers were delighted by the thought of pirate costumes, and spent a great deal of time leaping about the house waving their arms (and wings) around and shrieking “ARRRRRRGH!”  at what  I considered inappropriate times.  Skosh had decided that his costume would have to be that of a knight. (???)   When I pointed out to him that knights as a rule were supposed to kill dragons, he replied that yes, he knew that, and it was tantamount to a black man moving into a white neighborhood in the 50′s and burning a cross on his own lawn, and what could they do to him?

I guessed at the time that he had a valid point. Little did I know…

It took all of the two weeks to make the costumes and the vamps and ‘Neckers looked amazing…well, at least, the vamps did.  “Neckers, well, he did his best and as they say, attitude is all.  Heather was at her finest in her lovely wench outfit and did, indeed, look a little slimmer in her corset, although she had a tendency to wheeze a little and had to sit down often.  Despite her heft, she is a pretty girl and I was proud of her beauty as she entered the Faire.

We all left the bus with gratitude to the driver and entered the Faire preceded by Heather, who got a lot of positive attention from the large and slightly drunken Faire attendants. Heather was in her element and sailed away to the nearest booth, hand in wing with Mina, both of them delighted with the bright colors, ribbons, and renaissance clothing on offer. The boys went immediately to the booths offering knightly ware, such as knives, swords, chain mail and other death-dealing horrors.  Life was good.

Eventually, they came to the area where food, such a it is, is sold and Heather decided that she was ( no pun intended)  peckish. She wanted to find the booth that sold ye Olde Gummye Bares, and was on the hunt.  Unfortunately for Heather, one of her many bulky admirers told her that she could not be a “real wench” until she had consumed a roast turkey leg.

Oh,no.

Heather, who recognized another bird when she saw it, squeaked and peeped in dismay, burst into tears, and fled to the…umm…arms? of her dearest love, Skosh, who when he sought to comfort her was recognised by the group at large as a (gasp) dragon!  ARRRRRRRR!!!

*Sigh/* It went downhill from there.  Skosh was set upon by a “horde” of fat drunken vikings and had to be kept from breathing fire by his pirate cohorts who threatened the bulky crew by a showing of fang and shouts of “He’ll breathe fyre,, damme, he will! Let him go or we’ll hoist you by yer own petards!” Which of course they wouldn’t under any circumstances,  but the vikings didn’t know that and backed off with mighty threats of ‘Next time, ye varlets.’ All of us, vikings and vamps alike, were shown the door by the leaders, as such, of the ren faire.  We tried.

The upside was, Mina and Heather were able to make many lovely purchases of jewelry and clothing before the fight and Skosh was not required to show his colors in order to defend his lady. So, in the end, all was well.

I doubt that we shall ever be welcome at the Renaissance Faire again, however.  Welladay.

It’s a Bird!!!!                                                    Ink and pastel drawing by Susan Owen

Posted by Susan, who asks you to please visit our on-line shop at Galerie Yggdrasil

Recently my gaze fell upon a sculpture that I assembled in 2005, and never quite finished, and now, looking at it with different eyes I had some new ideas and a bit of time, so I picked it up again. After a few hours work I reached a stopping point, but not I felt a completion. Not knowing what else to do I decided to photograph the piece from different viewpoints. While looking at the pictures I wondered about trying some digital manipulation to play with re-arranging the forms. Well…….one thing led to another.

Wind Dancer by Dennis Kish

Posted by Dennis. Visit our shop at Galerie Yggdrasil

Let’s see if this works…..    II >

Posted by Dennis.    Galerie Yggdrasil  is the name of our Etsy store.

Bishop Oxymoron of the Church of the Faithful Clueless, reads from the book of the prophet Doug. “We no nuthin’ about nuthin’.

But we noes what we likes”

The Oxymoron started out as a print, but because I changed to a newer version of Photoshop which required a newer version of the OS (operating spell) that runs the computer, colors that appeared on the screen no longer appeared on the paper coming out of the printer. After much hair pulling, time, and finally money I sorted everything out, except for Oxymoron. So, I  promoted him to Bishop, gave him his own church, and  recycled him into a painting.

Posted by Dennis

Visit Susan and Dennis at Galerie Yggdrasil home of traditional non-traditional art.

I received a notice from the local association of Artists who paint Rocks Trees and Oceans, oh my !, (ARTO) that the time had come, as it does once a year, for those of us who create “non traditional” art to have the chance to exhibit our work.

So.  I decided in a fit of poor judgement to do a soft sculpture of Skosh to enter as my offering for the year. I planned to take extensive creative license with it, since Skosh, being a shape shifter, is in a more or less constant state of flux.

It was difficult at first to pin him down as he and his friends are generally involved in some teen excitement or other..mall stalking,  beach stalking,  lurking endlessly at the various produce aisles in the area (this for the vegan babyvamps) or closeted in Skosh’s room playing a series of many and varied extremely noisy computer games.  However, when I told him of my plan and begged his cooperation in posing for me for a few hours to get the basics down and promised on my honor that it wouldn’t take long, honestly , Skosh, just a few minutes…or maybe a little more…his vanity won out and he allowed me an hour of his valuable time in the studio.

The work went slowly but well and I ended up with a very satisfactory replica of his highness which I entered in the exhibit.  I refused to let the kids see it before it was in place at the gallery and so they were consumed with curiosity and were very anxious for the day of the show to arrive, nagging and wheedling to be allowed to come along and help me set up.  envisioning chaos, I refused but told them they could in fact go to the exhibit when it opened.  They had no choice but to capitulate, with much grumbling and mutterings of ‘unfair’ and ‘when we get older, she wont be able to mumble mumble fft-hiss.’

The day of the exhibit arrived and the kids were in a high state of excitement and when they saw the sculpture, the air was filled with hoots and catcalls and Skosh was quite overcome, to the point where he had difficulty controlling himself, big surprise.  He decided to relate the tale of how he came to live with me to any and all who would listen, and at one point attached himself to my leg and shifted into my left calf causing me to lurch unpleasantly into a large papier-mache rendering of a werehound, almost upsetting it and from there caroming daintily into something unrecognizable but heavy with spikes and tubing.  This was greeted with more howls of glee and Skosh quite lost any dignity he might have had and shifted again, this time into a small volcano.

We have spoken at length about breathing fire and blanketing the air with dense smoke but I suppose he thought if he were a volcano he could get way clean.  The babyvamps had managed to find the munchies table and were working their way through the stuffed cherry tomatoes, and Heather had lost interest in Skosh’s guerilla play as soon as she realized that there were edibles afoot and was hopping about under the table looking for the odd elusive gummi bear.  About the time the vamps discovered the wine,  it was politely suggested that we might want to make an early exit and, was there something I could possibly do about the smoke emanating from the painting of the..oh, dear..too late…?

It took about 15 minutes to round up my unruly charges and bundle them all into the car.  ‘Neckers and Neil had comported themselves with great aplomb and were feigning contempt for their ‘immature’ companions, while the vamps seemed to be dipping into their cloaks every so often and giggling uncontrollably.  Could they have…no.  not possible. please…no.

When we arrived home I confined Skosh to his room and wondered if I could ever show my face in town again. It was a complete rout….just the way I like it.  Heh – heh.  Thanks to Skosh, my reputation is made.  No p.r. is bad p.r.  Time for a nice calming glass of wine,  a cabernet should do nicely…now where…EMPTY?????    SKOSH!!  YOU ARE SO GROUNDED…..

Posted by Susan.  Visit Susan and Dennis at Galerie Yggdrasil  for lots more “non traditional art”. Who knows, maybe we can get some of our stuff banned! Or something…..

I recently imagined that someday someone might ask me “Why should I buy one of your prints since they are digital and you can make them forever and each one looks like all the others and I want something unique”? As I said no one has ever asked  me that, but by god,  I want to be ready when they do.

I know that some analog print makers destroy or deface their plates, woodblocks, or stones and thereby create an edition that can’t be added to. I thought of doing something dramatic like removing the hard drive from my computer and smashing or burning it- I could even make a video and post it on youtube -  as a piece of performance art. Unfortunately, this idea has too many unintended consequences.

My solution is to take a print, Mask#65, and create a collage/painting mounted on a piece  of material made from ground wood scraps that local contractors call “head cheese” (don’t ask). The result is a piece I call Sunset Vines”

Posted by Dennis

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