some of my new work - featured this month at the Mindy Solomon Gallery
check out the link below:




http://mindysolomongallery.wordpress.com/2011/09/17/bonnie-marie-smith-featured-in-contradictions/

some spectacular light came down through the open roof hatch and created a very theatrical scene on my studio table.

I first created these two as one piece, but then I cut them apart, so now they can move around each other.  As their placement changes, so does the dynamic and relationship.  To me they look full of secrets they are very good at keeping.

from sketch to almost finished piece

with or without hands?

with or without hole?

I think no to hands, maybe yes to hole

will go walk dog, then decide.

finished and drying in my studio
(making the hair was quite an endeavor)

 Just finished hollowing out the inside of a big sculpture  from underneath - temp in the studio this day well over 100 degrees.  My guess maybe 110-115.  It was a week of continuous HOT.......but finally the heat wave has broken...... Am I ever grateful to the clouds today.

playing with rooftop debris this morning.

 My mother was going to throw this old quilt away - but there are so many beautiful worn bits of vintage fabric.  At some point I want to cut this apart and use the fabrics in some collage - perhaps dress some puppets or paper dolls.  The quilt project.  A good weeks assignment.  I'll keep you posted.

 

"There is a crack, a crack in everything, that's how the light gets in." - Leonard Cohen

 

This quilt was made over 80 yrs ago. It is no longer useful as a blanket, but today it is helping to shade my desk from todays intense heat and light.  It makes a beautiful sort of stained glass effect.

  You never know what might become of your work someday, where it might end up, what it might do.

sketches from the studio bulletin board.

Making progress......now for the hair which will form the triangular shape.  I keep thinking of her as connected to the ocean somehow - the personification of the ocean - not sure how triangles and oceans are connected.

 

The beginnings of a sculpture started.  It will be a female bust.  Its base is in the general shape of a vesica pices and the finished shape will be triangular - I plan to follow the angle of the "golden triangle" of sacred geometry - 51 degrees.  I saw this figure while meditating. 

made a little birdwoman this morning.  can't wait to glaze her yellow.  I like to make my little things sitting on the floor. 

I don't really like chairs actually - I always prefer to work standing or on the floor.  

It is hot in the studio today!  I have to mist myself along with the clay!  

The studio is in the third floor of a very old brick building - no AC, big windows that let in all the afternoon sun until I shut the giant iron shutters - the ones still left hanging that is - some are missing.

thinking of going swimming.

Walking with my dog Louis today in the park I stopped to admire the most beautiful yellow flower.  I loved the color, and as I walked I had a longing to make a sculpture that I could cover in my yellow shiny glaze.  But what could it be?  This image is what arose.  I sketched it in a small notebook (which I always carry) as my dog Lou rolled in the grass. 

a beautiful form that lives on my roof.  Plan to make a mold of the topmost spire.  Lovely.

                    sculpture finished but unfired - resting and drying up on my roof

sculpture in process

 

so today I decided to start the hand eye diaries - a journal to document my creative process - There are two diaries - one for me and one for the rest of the world. Here's a picture of the real diary -( this is where all the really good stuff is .)