Music Monday - She Loves You, Yeah, Yeah Yeah

Happy Monday all!

In honour of the Beatles tracks now being available on iTunes, and because Kim Klassen's She Loves You, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah texture is so awesome, here is our theme for this week. Now if you love the Kim Klassen texture that I used on this image, and want to incorporate it into your creation, you can download it from her site for $2.50 here. If you are smart, while you are there you will sign up for her FREE TEXTURE FRIDAY list, and she will send you a download link once a week for a new texture, which is how I got this one. Such a talented and generous woman she is!

However, obviously you do not need to use that to contribute a piece to the challenge. As usual, it is open to all art forms, and you can use the lyrics directly in the piece or just use them as inspiration. Since I am trying to grow this challenge, I would love it if you would grab the Music Moday button at the bottom of this page and paste in onto your site with a link back to An Artful Endeavor. If you happen to do that, please let me know so I can enter you into a giveaway contest for a free art print of today's image.

And speaking of contests, Angelica has won the Christmas ornaments contest from last week. Angelica, please e-mail me your mailing address to sonicjoy[at]shaw.ca

Hope you have a fabulous day!

Joyelle

Music Monday - Winter Wonderland

Hello Blogland!

I had a fantastic time last night at the Anmore Craft Fair, and I will have photos for you on Wednesday. But for now, it is Music Monday! And I'm sorry if you are not in the holiday spirit yet, but after two weekends of craft fairs, I am fully in the mood! So since it snowed a few days ago, and I needed an excuse to post this picture, this week's theme is Winter Wonderland!

If you have a Winter Wonderland photo, collage, painting, or song to share, please post a link to it in the comments section, and I will display all your works on Sunday.

Have a beautiful day!

Joyelle

Music Monday - Be My Habit

Welcome to the Music Monday art challenge! One song lyric, all art styles, all good.

This week's challenge theme is taken from Robert Wilson's song (and the title of his second album) Be My Habit. Rob is an amazing local singer-songwriter whom I have had the pleasure of hosting at my house for a private concert (if you have never attended a house concert, it is really the best way to hear singer-songwriters perform!) He is not only disgustingly talented, but a really nice guy.

Now personally, the one habit that I cannot live without is chocolate. I took this picture at the West Coast Chocolate Festival High Tea this year. What a great day! Eight girlfriends and two hours of eating, to the point that none of us could eat the cupcakes that were the last course! This week's theme over at Spring is how you are generous with yourself, and this definetly fits the bill. I believe in good chocolate. I don't eat junk chocolate, because life is just to short. So here it is, from Rubens chocolate, my habit:

If you would like to share your interpretations of this lyric, please post a link to your creation in the comments section by Saturday night, and come Sunday I'll post all the works.

In other news, I attended the Festive Nest Christmas Craft show on Sunday, and I will have some photos for you on Wednesday. This was a gorgeous event, held in a barn filled with beautiful antique white-painted furniture and featuring some stunning artworks! My only regret is that I couldn't spend more time looking at everything (I had my son in tow, and was terrified he would break something!)

In the meantime, to get you all in the Christmas Spirit, I will share an image from Koralee at  Bluebird Notes, who was the one who turned me on to the Festive Nest sale.

How beautiful is that?

On that note, take a moment to find something beautiful and place it on your mantel today.

Joyelle

Music Monday - Slate

Good morning all!

So here we are with another episode of music inspired art! Here is my cityscape inspired by Peter Katz lyrics:

The sky is one of Kim Klassen's new textures, peeling paint, with a lens flare effect added. The cityscape is a photo I took close to my house, and then masked and applied a neon glow filter to.

A reminder to check out Peter's music, and if you are in Vancouver on Thursday night, come out to see him perform live at the Railway Club. I am super excited to be joining him on a song during his set! Show starts at 9:30pm.

And if you would like to join me in the Music Monday Challenge, please post a link to your art in the comments section by Saturday night!

So for next week I would like to introduce you to another amazing Canadian singer-songwriter, Robert Wilson. This time I wanted to use a song title, so the theme is Be My Habit. Click on the link to listen to the song, and then I can't wait to hear the results!

Coming up on Wednesday I have some special downloadable treats for you! I wanted to say thank you to everyone who has dropped by. I love all your comments, it really makes my day!

Until then, have a beautiful, inspired day!

Joyelle

Music Monday - Fearless

Welcome again to Music Monday! Today's theme comes from the Matthew Good song Fearless:

she is the trick of my trade
she is the thing that can't be made
she is gold and nothing less
and she is fearless

Such a great lyric! Here is how my little fairy interpretted it (you may need to enlarge the image):

For those of you who would like to join the Music Monday challenge, please post a link to your image in the comments thread by Saturday night, and on Sunday I'll display all your works!

For next week we will be using lyrics from a Peter Katz song titled Slate:

Walking ashen through the smoke

Coughing up the last of hope

A city surfaced silent and exposed

I thought that lyric was so evocative! Peter is a fantastic Canadian singer-songwriter, and a really nice guy. I am going to be singing on one of his tunes at his show November 11 at the Railway Club in Vancouver. So excited for that show!

Today I also wanted to share a site I just discovered called Willowing & Friends. This is an amazing artists commuinty, and right now they are offering a FREE online art course on shading faces and creating textured backgrounds in mixed media. I started watch the first video today and it is fantastic! Also, visit Willowing & Friends creator Tam's site to check out her incredible art, like this piece:

Ok, so that's all for today. I'll have more for Wednesday, I hope! I'm planning to do an image for the Three Muses Showtime challenge, but we will see if I have time.

Have a lovely day!

Joyelle

Music Monday - Forbidden Love

Hello Blogland!

I am sitting in my pjs drinking a cup of cinnamon coffee and eating a square of dark chocolate. The day is off to a good start! I am so excited to share this image with you. This week's Music Monday theme is from a song title: Forbidden Love by Madonna. I managed to catch this crow picture last week, and I was so excited, because I knew exactly what fairy image would go perfectly with it. This fairy's wings are actually a photography of one of the pairs in my collection. As usual, I have used some amazing Kim Klassen textures. My favourite is the Lyrical texture, which borders the piece.

For those of you who would like to join the Music Monday challenge, please post a link to your image in the comments thread by Saturday night, and on Sunday I'll display all your works! Courtesy of the lovely women at Collage Obsession, here are instructions about how to link to your image:

Copy and paste this simple code into the comments box:

<a href="link">text to click on</a>

First replace the link with the permanent link to your work (leave the apostrophes). Next replace text to click on with your own message.

Here is a sample: <a href="http://collageobsessionchallenge.blogspot.com/">my first entry.</a>

I can't wait to see your interpretations of Forbidden Love!

Next week's Music Monday will feature lyrics by Matthew Good:

she is the trick of my trade
she is the thing that can't be made
she is gold and nothing less
and she is fearless

Later on this week, I have another fairy to share for the Three Muses "Hats" challenge.

A call out to those more experienced bloggers out there: I have been playing around with customizing the look of my blog, and for now have settled on plain white until I can do something better. Any advice on sites that could help me learn the ins and outs of designing my own blog template would be greatly appreciated! I am a little intimidated by the sheets of code I have seen.

Hope you have a hot drink in hand and good music playing in your ear! Oh, and speaking of good music, I found the most amazing YouTube video by a band called Atomic Tom. Click on the link and I guarantee it will bring a smile to your face!

Have a beautiful day,

Joyelle

Music Monday - Autumn Leaves

This week's Music Monday challenge comes from the classic jazz standard, Autumn Leaves

But I miss you most of all, my darling
When autumn leaves start to fall

I chose these lyrics for a couple of reasons. We are coming up on Halloween, which most people associate with witches, candies, and ghosts. But the origins of this holiday are actually deeply spiritual, and are about honoring and remembering our ancestors and others that have passed on.

For me personally, it is the three year anniversary of the death of Grandma Elaine, who passed away on October 27, 2007. This holiday is always a sad reminder of her loss. So this image is all about grandma Elaine. Her sewing is stitched into the fabric of this image, a reminder of the baby blanket for my son her death left unfinished. The central ghost image is a dead flower, which was in her garden on the first anniversary of her death. The third ghost image is a shot of the clouds over Fanny Bay, also taken one year after her death. And of course, the first ghost image is Elaine herself. Still miss you Elaine.

For those of you who would like to join the Music Monday challenge, please post a link to your image in the comments thread by Saturday night, and on Sunday I'll display all your works! Courtesy of the lovely women at Collage Obsession, here are instructions about how to link to your image:

Here is a very simple instruction how you can add a link to your comment. You don't have to use this, but it makes your link easy to use. Only thing you need, is this simple code:

<a href="link">text to click on</a>

First replace the link with the permanent link to your work (leave the apostrophes). Next replace text to click on with your own message.

Here is a sample: <a href="http://collageobsessionchallenge.blogspot.com/">my first entry.</a>

And a sneak peak for next week, the theme comes from a song title, courtesy of Madonna: Forbidden Love.

Have a beautiful day!

Joyelle

Music Monday - Lost in Beauty

I am so excited to show you what I have been working on! I had a scary moment this morning when my Macbook crashed while making last minute adjustments, but all is well now!

So today's song lyric comes from One Republic's song Come Home:

I get lost in the beauty of everything I see
The world ain't half as bad as they paint it to be

I am looking forward to seeing other interpretations of this lyric! Please add your comment to this post with a link to your image and on Sunday I'll post all your images here.

So for next week we are going with a classic jazz standard, Autumn Leaves.

I miss you most of all, my darling
when autumn leaves start to fall

I figured it's appropriate for the season :)

I have been working on a vintage image for the Three Muses challenge this week, which I will be posting on Wednesday. It uses the wings from this image as well. Just for those who are interested, I created the wings by taking a butterfly by Vinnie Pierce, erasing the body, then turning it into a mask, and filling the shape with a maple leaf photo I had taken. If you look closely you can see the veins of the leaf. Neat, huh?

Ok, so that's it for today. Have a beautiful day!

Joyelle

Music Monday

Hello all,

I am very excited about this image today, I feel like it represents a vision of where I want my digital art to be going. Today's song lyric collage was created in Lightroom, Illustrator and Photoshop, and utilizes my favourite Kim Klassen texture, Extreme Grunge. Just after I had finished creating it, I saw that the Three Muses Challenge this week is all about music, so I am very excited to submit this piece to their site.

I had mentioned a few weeks ago how my son (at 3 years old) has chosen The Scar That Never Heals by Jeremy Fisher as his favourite song. Now, every time we get in the car he asks us to put on "his" song. So I have heard this song about a million times now, and this lyric was so fantastic, I kept thinking "what would that look like?"

Love Jeremy Fisher! He has a new album coming out on October 26 and he is coming back to Vancouver for a show on November 17. Weee!

In other music news, I had a really productive session with Rick last week, and have posted some works in progress on my Myspace site for you to check out. Listen to Just a Memory and a new version of Notice Me.

Lastly, I have been thinking about these cool art challenges abounding in blogland, and how my weekly Music Monday is my own art challenge to myself, so I was thinking I would open it up and see if anyone else wants to join me. I'll post the lyric now, and then next Monday after I post the art piece, if you want to add your interpretation in the comments that would be great! Any art style welcome, you can use the text in the piece or not, whatever you feel inspired to do.

The lyric for next week comes from the One Republic song Come Home off their album Dreaming Out Loud. I have been listening to this song a lot lately, and I love this line:

I get lost in the beauty of everything I see
The world ain't half as bad as they paint it to be


Isn't that gorgeous? It perfectly expresses what I am trying to achieve both in my life and with this blog. Choosing to focus on what is good and beautiful in this world, instead of listening to the haters and doomsayers.

Look to the light, all.

Joyelle

Music Monday!

So here is the evolution of a piece in progress. I'm feeling stuck with where this one is going next, so I think I am going to shelf it for a few weeks and hope something comes to me while I am working on another project. Continuing with my music theme, this is Hush Little Baby.




I drew my shape onto watercolour paper then collaged photos on.





I podged letters onto canvas: at this stage it would make a great piece for a child's room!



I painted white, then beige over the letters and podged on some tissue paper and the title, then more paint and Golden's Gloss Gel Medium.

 So that's Hush Little Baby. It really sums up where I am at right now, as my little boy is growing up and I am holding on tight to these remaining moments of early childhood. I find myself getting teary at random moments in the day, and at night I sneak into his room to watch him sleep, trying to memorize how he looks, breathing in his scent. It's such a bittersweet time.

In other news, I just got Kim Klassen's Photoshop Cookbook, and I'm hoping to have some time to play with it this week. Hopefully I will have something to show by Friday.

Have a beautiful day!

Joyelle

Music Monday - Jar of Hearts

Welcome back to another edition of Music Monday! This week I share a collage piece featuring a very popular song right now. I am a huge fan of So You Think You Can Dance. Along with many other people, I fell in love with Christina Perri's song Jar of Hearts when it was featured on the show. The lyrics and music were so haunting, and so resonated with me in a way I cannot describe. When I finished this piece last night (actually this morning at 1am), I showed it to my husband and he said it was disturbing. I said that was exactly what I was going for! So here are the lyrics, and today's collage:

So who do you think you are?
Running 'round leaving scars
Collecting your jar of hearts
And tearing love apart
You're gonna catch a cold
From all the ice inside your soul
So who do you think you are?
Who do you think you are?

Check out Christina's website and watch the amazing video they made for the song - it is beautiful!

Happy Monday!

Joyelle

Music Monday!

Welcome to my new weekly music feature, Music Monday! I'll be featuring my mixed media series that I am working on, which is inspired by song lyrics, as well as sharing some of my favourite songs and artists.

But first up, I have to mention my exciting review by Tom Harrison of the Province, who attended the show I did last week: "Joyelle Brandt was engaging and confident on a smokey rendition of James Taylor's "Steamroller Blues." That just made my day!

OK, now on to the art. Here Comes the Sun is the second in the series:

And song lyrics this week are by Jeremy Fisher. I chose this song because my three year old son fell in love with it this week. Now every time we get in the car, he asks me to play this song, LOUD! It's the first time he has fallen in love with a song, so I am a proud musician mama right now, that he has chosen a Canadian singer-songwriter. Here is the first verse of The Scar That Never Heals:

She's my polyrhythm

Carryin my heart like a beat


So fast I can't keep up


My prayers sing the melody
 
I think I might have to make a collage out of those lyrics...
 
It's a rainy Monday here, so I hope wherever you are, you are curled up with a good cup of coffee and a good song playing in your ear.
 
Joyelle