Friday, February 11, 2011

Seeking a 4th artist

I’m assuming you both got the copy of the invitation to join us email I wrote to Donna Malone in Brisbane, Australia. To recap: she needs until Tuesday to think about it.  That’s OK with me. Is waiting OK with you two?

If she declines, I have others in mind who would also make interesting additions to our group.--Marcia

28 comments:

  1. Hi Marcia,

    Thank you for inviting Donna. I am happy to wait until she has thought the idea over. No need to rush.
    My sketch book has now arrived. Must be careful not to start it back to front as I did with my last Moleskine :)

    Rosie x

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  2. Good tip, Rosie. I'm still waiting for mine.

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  3. Have a look at some of the other groups to see the variety of 'sign in' pages. The molys are usually begun by the owner who does a kind of title page with space for every participant to sign as the book makes its rounds.

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  4. No word from Donna, yet. She said she'd get back to me by yesterday. I sent her an email nudge this morning. I think if I don't hear back from her by tomorrow morning, we'll need to move on. What do you think: try another or go with us 3?

    I received my Japanese moly!! Haven't removed the cellophane wrapper yet. Now that my annual Valentine frenzy is complete, I'm hoping to get going on it this week.

    Also, waiting on my first grandchild to be born any day now!! As a modern (and distant) grandma, I need to figure out how to get video conferencing on my computer.

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  5. Let us know when you have news of the baby :) My son's baby was born 15th September and is doing well. He sends me video clips of baby from his phone.

    I don't mind either way about another member, although thoughts from another country would have been nice.

    By the way, the cellophane is rather hard to remove!

    Rosie

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  6. A gracious & apologetic no from Donna in Australia. Email today to Masha in Russia.

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  7. Masha replied affirmatively!! She has concerns about the one month to draw & mail that's mentioned in Marty's guidelines of February 7. We need to decide if this "requirement" can be loosened. I've read in other moly_x groups that people admit to keeping a sketchbook for many months before sending it along. (Then of course there's the possibility of a sketchbook getting lost in the mail ;-( ) I, for one, think we should give Masha the green light to join us. And accept that this project might take longer & has some risk. It will be part of the story of our group! Her email follows. Please comment so we can have a consensus & reply to Masha ASAP.

    From: Masha Kirikova
    Date: Sat, Feb 19, 2011 at 12:00 AM
    Subject: Re: Are you interested in a sketchbook exchange with 3 other artists?
    To: Marcia Milner-Brage


    Dear Marcia!
    I'm carefully reading terms of your kind invitation. It's so exciting! :)) The only question I have - there is a month period for both drawing&mailing. I'm afraid it's far too short for our post office... Sometimes it takes 3 month for a parcel to come to Russia :( That was the reason why I can't for example study on on-line courses. But there is one little hope - please, write me the names of the participant's cities. It can be so, that I have real people friends there and coul somehow find a possibility to send my part (and receive too) by travelling people, not by mail.
    Eagerly waiting for your answer. This project seems so exciting for me and I would love to join you! :)
    Thank you once again!
    Peace&Love
    Masha

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  8. Hi Marcia,

    I'm very happy to have Masha with us.
    For my part I won't mind a delay. My own contribution might be held up sometimes as we may be away during the summer.

    What a good idea to ask people to deliver the book. For me, convenient places would be,

    St Albans;(Hertfordshire)
    London;
    Manchester/Cheshire area.

    Thanks and best wishes,

    Rosie x

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  9. Great, Rosie!

    I might have a people resource for going the other way--Katie to Masha. My daughter's boyfriend Fedor is from Russia. His grandmother, who is from Moscow like Masha, travels to the US to visit her daughter here in Iowa, maybe once a year. Fedor, who is a graduate student at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, might have some other ideas.

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  10. I am very excited to have Masha join our group! It would be great to be able to have it move among us quickly, but if that's not possible, it's not possible. I do have a friend whose husband is Russian. I can check with her about any traveling she might be doing. I also have a friend who adopted from Russia. It's a long shot but she might be able to put me in contact with other adoptive parents who are traveling to Russia.
    Yes. Welcome to Masha!!!!!
    Katie

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  11. Hi Masha,
    Welcome to the sketch book exchange project,
    Rosie :)

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  12. Dear Rosie, Marcia and Katie!

    I feel so honoured and pleased to be invited to your project! Thank you for this chance to draw with you, it would be very exciting with all those connections between our cultures and different experiences.

    Going to buy a Moleskine book tomorrow (pocket-size am I right?) :)
    Maybe my theme could be 'those who live'. I adore observing animal life in the city (not having an opportunity to go out of it), so would be glad to show a part of Moscow everyday life of all those mammals, birds, insects, living next to us. Please, write what do you think about it, is it a good idea?

    About sending a Moleskine I have no doubts - sooner or later it will come to you (I would also try to draw faster to make the waiting period shorter for you). My fears are about yours coming to me. They (post office) lost 2 very important parcels last year and made a period of receiving other ones extremely long. So, I'm going to ask help from all my friends, who travel abroad. Maybe we would all together find the solution. There is also a little chance I would find a person, who do it for money (yes, because of post problems some people advertise their service), I don't think it would be a problem for them. As far as we would be able to show, that it's a notebook and nothing more :)

    Hope to be a part of your group! :))) I'm very excited!

    And please would you be so kind to make regulations about the material. I thought to use a black marker and pencils or coloured markers. Are we going to use both sides of notebook pages at the end?

    Happy and cheerful Masha from Russia :)

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  13. Dear Masha,

    Thanks for your message and great to meet you.
    Your Flickr photo stream looks wonderful!

    For me your theme sounds excellent and most interesting. I really look foward to your contributions.

    The sketch book is the pocketsized Japanese (accordian) fold type of Moleskine.
    As far as I'm concerned there are no regulations about materials- just whatever works best for you on the Molesline paper.

    I will ask our friends if they are planning to visit Russia sometime (there is some possibility).

    Rosie x

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  14. Masha,
    Rosie is right you can use any media you want. We are supposed to use just one side. Here is a site with examples of earlier molys. http://www.flickriver.com/groups/moly_x/pool/interesting/
    You can also check out what other moly groups have done at
    http://www.blogger.com/profile/06597066968876839355

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  15. Thank you very much Rosie! Nice to meet you too! :)I'm not quite well with Blogger.com yet, but actively use Flickr and Facebook. Just give me some time and I would study how to take part in a B life :)

    Thank you for additional information about Moleskine type. Notebook is in my hands and ready to be used!

    It's great you found my theme tolerable.
    Do you know how should we count pages - one is like a normal Moleskine pocketbook (non-Japanese) one? If yes how many pages should I destroy at once (3-4 as said?)
    When should I start (right now)? :)

    Peace&Love
    Masha

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  16. Masha,
    It is the pocket size Moleskine Japanese Album that is used for the exchange. and a page is one 3" by 5" page as I understand it. Before you start, shall we all do sign in pages?

    Peace
    Katie

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  17. Hi, Katie! :)
    Mine should be agreeable then - it's pocket size Moleskine Japanese album, like this one - http://www.moleskine.com/catalogue/classic/hard_black_cover/japanese_album__pocket.php
    Sure, I'm not starting before everything is clear :)
    Masha

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  18. Masha,“those who live” as your theme is interesting & will be a challenge for me. This is a good thing: I’m willing to give it a go--my interpretation, of course will depend on what comes before (your first entry & then the other’s subsequent entries) and what’s going on in my world when it arrives. A rather exciting part of our process!

    Masha’s name now appears on our moly_x_24! Does anyone know how to add Russia after Masha’s name (to match all other’s country designation)?

    Following up from Katie’s above request about sign in pages: Yes! I like your rough sketch, Katie, using your doll & the branches. I’m not sure what I will do yet, although I appreciate seeing the posted examples.

    Verify my assumption(s), please: if the sign-in page is on the inside of the front cover & the facing page, the one with, “In the case of loss, please return to:...”, then there are 32 pages (each 9 cm wide X 14 cm high). Which means that if each of us does 4 pages , we would go round through our rotation twice. Of course, considering that we’re all artist’s here, people who might tend to play the edges, that if one of us has an image that calls for 3 pages or 3-1/2 pages OR grows to 4-1/2 or 5, I’m assuming this will all be OK.

    Coming back to the sign-in page: With 8 potential sign-ins, I’m thinking about also using the inside of the back cover, which is the outside of that nifty pocket. Hmmm....and then what’s going to go in that back pocket?

    Masha, Getting back to the issue of finding people to hand carry, I have 2 more thoughts, at the moment. 1) If whoever hand carries it into the US could have instructions & the funds to mail it onto to me through the US Postal Service, I think this would be a pretty sure bet. 2) I might have another resources of people in my community who travel to and from Russia. The University of Northern Iowa School of Music, here in Cedar Falls, seems to have a rotating roster of Russian graduate students. I’ll contact my friend Cindi who teaches in that department to see if this might be a viable resource for us.

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  19. Yes that is where the sign in page is. I don't think we have to sign in more than once though. That would reduce the sign in spaces to four. Also yes there are 32 pages. And yes I think we should be flexible. In fact my book is already one page shorter. The paint I used on my sign in page bled through so I cut off the last page and glued it on to the first page to fix my boo boo.

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  20. Katie, This is a good cautionary warning about the nature of the paper in the Moleskines we are using: the paper bleeds through with watercolor & some ink. This probably isn’t much of an issue for us except for the page you had your “booboo” on. Also, I find it tends to repel watercolor. Which is something to accept & work with.

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  21. Dear ladies!
    1. Could you please tell in a few words what is the idea of each theme of yours? I mean not the title, but the meaning. It would be great to deeply feel what it is...
    2. Are all of you agree with my theme? If so I would be very glad to start :)
    3. How should we count a sign in page? There are actually two pages - one with a short Moleskine information and the second one with 'In case of loss, please return...' Can I use both sides for my sign in? What would you prefer to see as a sign in? Maybe there are some regulations...
    Best day to you all!
    Masha

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  22. Hi Masha,

    I have posted a some thoughts about my theme on the blog. I'm using images from my collection of sketch books. The first ones are of musicians and dancers. Each drawing has its own story and I guess are a part of my life.

    I don't know how my theme will move on but am looking forward to seeing what occurs to other people. Perhaps something that has its own tale to tell!

    By the way, your English is excellent. Did you learn at school?

    Rosie

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  23. Masha,
    I started a new post, Unintended Collections: Marcia’s Theme in response to your 1st “Dear Ladies” request. (I’m tickled to be one of your dear ladies, by the way!)

    I”m intrigued by your theme, Those That Live. (See my Febreuary 21st more detailed response.) I thought Rosie had given her nod to it in a previous post. But now I don’t know under what topic. (This method of blogging is a bit confusing, I think). Perhaps Rosie & Katie need to reiterate their acceptance or concern SO YOU CAN GET GOING.

    I NEED TO GET GOING. THIS WEEK HAS BEEN TOTALLY TAKEN OVER BY THE BIRTH OF MY 1ST GRANDCHILD 3 DAYS AGO. NO DRAWING AS A RESULT ON THIS PROJECT OR ANY OTHER. I TRUST I WILL RETURN TO MY OWN ENDEAVORS SHORTLY.

    I’m still thinking about using the inside front cover AND the facing page (even with the danger of it bleeding through) for my sign-in page. Both Rosie & Katie have done their (each unique & wonderful) sign-in pages.

    No regulations besides all of us using the same Japanese Moleskine notebooks, having some kind of sign-in page, & having identification of whose notebook it is. Hope this helps, Masha

    --Marcia

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  24. Hi Masha,

    I have sent you an e-mail as well, to say that your theme sounds good to me. I'm looking forward to following the thread!

    The blogging confuses me but hope you are receivng messages one way or another!

    Rosie x

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  25. Congratulations, Marcia! Such a huge and great joy! :)))

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  26. Thank you Rosie, everything is sort of strange with this blog (I see posts, but not comments), but I will manage it somehow...

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  27. Masha,
    I am so sorry you are having trouble with seeing comments. This is how I do it.

    On the home page at the bottom of each new posting there is a highlighted number after the word comments. I click on that and it brings me to a new page where I see all the comments.

    You can also get to the comments by going to the "Blog Archive" window on the right hand side of the blog. There is a list of posts for each month. When you click on the subject for a post it takes you to the page where posts and their comments are. Does this make any sense?

    I hope this works for you.
    If you still can't see comments let me know.

    Katie

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