Mexican Minimalism

I went to Mexico last Saturday and was blown away by the plethora of color, color, color! Color everywhere. So much. It just made everything so much more exciting & interesting & beautiful, in the most bizarre way. I didn't take a ton of photos, & and all of them were taken from the car, but out of the 20 of them, I was obsessed with how nearly every picture was of a building of an entirely different color, more ridiculous than the last.

And so, here is one of my favorites:

Mexican Minimalism, ladies & gentlemen.

I know, I know, the color isn't too crazy in this picture, but if you want to see the really crazy stuff look at my facebook album "Mexican Color"

Dad's Birthday Card

So my Dad's birthday was November 3rd (& he turned 55!!), but... I was late making him a card, and then I found out he was coming out to visit me (tomorrow), and I decided it was totally okay to put off making it, since I would just give it to him in person.

I spent approximately a billion hours making this. Really though. I'm too embarrassed to tell you how long it took. Except of course I was just reveling in the joy of making it the whole time.

Oh also, I tried to do a design that I normally wouldn't do and so I essentially stole the design from this incredible stationary company (that is too expensive for me) called Welcome to the Look (http://www.welcometoloop.com/doodlespark.html). And really, this card isn't much of a "Father's Birthday Card", but whatev's!

Enjoy.

Oodles of Doodles,

So yes, in fact, this post is dedicated to all of my insane DOODLES (which I am non-stop doing all the freaking time). Most of them end up in my journal, a lot end up on the side of my class notes, a few end up in my sketchbook, and even some end up on Church Bulletins.

So here we go: A few snapshots of some of my latest doodles:

Order & Structure

On a day like today, when I'm writing only about a bajillion paper's, and doing notes x7000... it seems only fitting to share with you an image that is all about order & structure.

Favorite parts of this photo is the diagonal shadows on the building, so fun.

Simple, Simple, Simple.

I'm finally warming up to the idea that simplicity is good. I'm beginning to see the beauty in the simple & really just how absolutely refreshing it is. So this post is a tribute to that: relatively simple photographs I've taken in the past week.

Once Upon A Time...

Once Upon a Time, I went out into nature. In California.

It was ridiculous. And refreshing. And so, so, so early in the morning.

For 4-D design we were required to go out in nature, and create essentially a "natural installation". This whole concept is based off of the work of Andy Goldsworthy (who is this really absurdly fantastic artist).

The thing that I love about creating art in nature, from nature is that:

1. You can't really plan it, you just have to be there, see it for yourself, and impulsively begin to create something
2. You have no clue how long it's going to stay there
3. You have no clue how many people are going to see it or even what they're going to think when they see it
4. I feel like I'm 10 again, barefoot during the summer, making weird structures in the woods.

When we were hiking up this hill in the park I became obsessed with these super intense cracks on the dirt road. Then I saw all these sticks/reeds, and thought about how great it would be to stuff the cracks with them. And so, the idea evolved from there. Soon I was out of control, gathering all kinds of plants, dried branches, flowers, etc.