The Grandeur of the Forest Floor: Making a tree stump

     Early in the design process for "Search For The Sugar Puff Hollow" I came across an inspiring image from an old set of science booklets.  The picture (below) was so dreamy and mysterious I wanted to capture elements of it for my book.  It portrayed a grandeur of the forest floor that I hadn't seen before.

I went about figuring out how to make an almost life-sized tree stump.  I didn't want it to be heavy so I needed a structure that was extremely light weight.  This was before I had a soda stream and I was going through a lot of Perrier bottles (and feeling guilty about it).  I love finding ways to recycle plastic bottles and I had begun to save the bottles just in case I could use them for the book.  SO I hot-glued all my perrier bottles together and and made them into the tree stump structure.



After that I covered it with tinfoil and papier mache to create the exposed roots and the top of the stump.  But what to cover it with?
     I had been using yarn to cover some of my trees and really wanted a special yarn to cover the stump since it was a close-up of a tree.  I had found a few sources on Etsy.com for coiled yarn.  My favorite was a shop called faroeviking in Ottawa.  I contacted Heidi who spun and died all of her yarns and she made me 2 skeins of custom dyed and coiled yarn.  You can read more about Heidi here.  It really turned out beautifully.






A One Night Only Exhibit


On Saturday, November 5th some dear friends, Solomon Behnke and Paul Fly, are having a one night only exhibit of their artwork.  The show will take place at West Light Studios in Downtown Nashville and will be part of the monthly art crawl route in Nashville, Tennessee.  The exhibit will start at 6:30 PM and run until 10 PM.  Westlight studios is across from The Standard Restaurant on 162 Rosa Parks Blvd.

Paul Fly creates sculptures that seem born from fairytales yet so realistic it might disturb the viewer.  Scenes seem to flicker before one’s eyes like one is looking through a spyglass onto an ancient story reminiscent of childhood.  He blends humor with a dark esthetic to create images and sculptures that flow playfully through the mind. http://www.paulfly.com/








The fluid work of Solomon Behnke encourages one to reflect on one’s own mortality.
He explores the themes of infinity and life through landscapes of stone and texture.   Many of Behnke’s pieces inspire the viewer to search carefully for images that may emerge from the many winding lines he evokes from his imagination.  http://www.solomonbehnke.com/