Mother Courage for the Sojourner Truth Gallery Exhibit

My latest project was to design two dolls for an exhibit for Black History Month for the Sojourner Truth Gallery in Sacramento. The concept was to choose two paintings from two African American Artists Charles White and Charles Alston and to recreate a work of art of our own inspired by their work. The exhibit will debut at the Sojourner Truth Gallery, 2251 Florin Rd., Sacramento CA, on February 1st and then reopen at the Brickhouse Art Gallery on February 17th and run until March 16th.

I am a doll artist so I thought it would be interesting to take the subject of a two dimensional painting and recreate it in a three dimensional soft sculpture. It was kind of like working in reverses since most painters paint three dimensional objects and turn them into two dimensional paintings.

I chose Charles White's "Mother Courage" because she makes me think of working women from the past. When I was a little girl I used to see these ladies all waiting at the bus stop ready to leave their own homes to go and take care of someone else's home. My mother got up five days a week and caught the bus rain or shine and went to work. She put in long and hard hours. I was inspired by my mother because she made the decision to change her life so that she didn't have to clean other people's houses and went back to school and got her degree and became a nutritionist.

This is my "three dimensional" interpretation of "Mother Courage".

 
 

Old Fashioned Rag Dolls 2013 Page One

I've been making art dolls for a number of years. This year I challenged myself to try something different and I've been making some old fashioned rag dolls. I went online and found some images of vintage cloth dolls and I decided to create my own updated versions of them.

Cordilia                                                              

     
Cordilia was inspired by cloth dolls from the late 1800's. Antique Black dolls from this period are hard to find today. A lot of them were literally "loved to death" by their owners. She is dressed in an old fashioned dress and apron. The red print fabric used for her dress was very typical for little girls dresses of the period.













Her yarn hair is "plaited" into several braids and tied with
blue ribbons. I hand painted her face using a vintage photo
of a child from that period.

Missy

Missy is a one piece doll and dress combination. She has a flat, bean bag bottom to help her sit.

She also has a hand painted face and plaited yarn hair.

Pancake Dolls, Work in Progress

My latest project for the holidays, a really easy doll called a pancake doll because she's flat and in one piece. I will be teaching this doll workshop in December. I'll show you the finished project tomorrow.

Creativity

 

 

 

I love this quote from Maya Angelou. A few months ago I was doing a show and I had all of my dolls and some of my fabric art pieces displayed and ready to sell. A woman came up to my table and really liked my work. She oohed and ahhed and picked up several of my dolls and had wonderful things to say about them. I thought that she was interested in buying a doll or maybe that she would be a potential customer in the future. She said "Oh no, I can't afford to buy one of your dolls but I hope you won't mind, I want to steal a couple of your ideas". I could have been a little angry, I have to admit that I was definitely a little annoyed. I told her that if she thought she could do it I couldn't stop her. I said that she would be using someone else's creativity instead of finding her own and the work she would be copying would never really be her own. God blesses me with a never ending supply of creative ideas that are all mine and mine to share with the world and  people like her. I could choose to keep my creativity to myself, safely tucked away in my head safe from thieves and copy cats but what would be the point of locking it away? As the quote says "The more you use, the more you have."

 

Negative People

 

 

I saw this poster on  Pinterest. It says so much in just a few words. Recently, I have had a few negative people pass through my life and cast shadows. Negative people effect creativity and your ability to dream and imagine. Even when you have a strong self image and you are well grounded in your beliefs, someone else's dark spirit can slow you down and hold you back. I wanted to share this with you and hope you can take this advice. I certainly am.

Michael

This is Michael he is the third of four of my new large dolls. He stands about 33" tall and he id Verlene's dance partner.

Verlene

This is my second large doll. Her name is Verlene which was my mother's middle name. She's about 32" tall. Her dress is made from real African fabric and she has a fully poseable body. She is a dancer and you can see her with her dance partner Michael in some of the pictures. More about Michael later. 

 

Grandma Reisa

I've been working on something different for the last few weeks. I've been making 22" dolls for a few years now and I decided that I wanted to make something different to display at a show I did yesterday. I enlarged my basic patterns so that I was able to make dolls that were 30 to 34 inches tall.

Grandma Reisa is the first of my large dolls.

Juneteenth 2013 in Davis, California

                                                                                                        Juneteenth 2013 in Davis, California