I’d like to share one thing that's on my 2026 bucket list: to support more publicly and/or privately funded art events. Art saves lives. I believe it.

That typed, put seeing this on your calendar: an exhibition by Judith Christensen, recipient of the Genie Shenk Excellence in Book Arts Award. I LOVE her work.

 

I made a good deal of creative progress over the past year, not the least being ending my social media addiction and turning the time saved into my studio. That also gave me much more time for serving on the San Diego County Arts and Culture Commission, which has been an honor and a blast.

You can sign up to be sent updates by going to the County website:

https://www.sandiegocounty.gov/content/sdc/cao/edga/arts-culture-commission.html

I have 2 solo exhibits next Spring. Nearly all of the art for both is ready to be photographed, because I got the hell off Facebook. (Seriously, I was clearly scrolling way too much with META). More exhibition details next week. Promise.

Please support your local non-profit arts organizations. And if you don't have one, make one happen!

Until next Sunday

Tis the season that finds me daily in my studio and the kitchen. 

Do any of you take pleasure in listening to music while working on a project? My long-time standby has been to put on The Best of Talking Heads or some Kate Bush. Lately I might play Billie Eilish.

I was scrolling for Billie on YouTube and hit the music jackpot of jackpots: Tiny Desk Concerts from NPR. They are FREE, terrific fun, and intimately showcase musicians without Big Studio b.s. A creative’s trifecta. You can check the series out at

https://www.npr.org/series/tiny-desk-concerts/

Below, more art images of my past work. You who saw these already on Facebook, here’s another look. And you who didn’t, I hope you enjoy them.

Until next Sunday.

Three book formats, L>R: folds and figure 8 stitch, accordion book with pockets, classic stab-stitch. I’m all set to teach each of these in 2026. When I have the exact dates, I’ll let you know.

Stone Water Air is on display right now at Front Porch Gallery in Carlsbad, CA until January 8^th. Check it out. Entry and parking are free.

This is a detail from Nimrod’s Tower which will finally get a display of its complete 6-foot-tall installed self for the first time since its one and only showing at the California Center for the Arts Museum before COVID. It will be at the Fallbrook Arts Center during all of May 2026.

I can't remember ever not using recycled, re-used and repurposed materials to create 3-D art. I just didn’t have the ecological context for it until the 60’s when I read Rachel Carson’s books.

Fast forward to now, and I am still motivated by making thoughtful, weird, calming 3-D art from what many would call useless stuff. I’m also very directly mindful of keeping our oceans clean, the landfill not so full, and our air breathable.

This just in: I am to curate the Sustainable Creations Exhibition at the Fallbrook Center for the Arts! I’m so crazy-excited.

The exhibit runs May 2 - June 13       

Interested in entering? You can enter upto 5 works. To do so go to the online entry form at https://www.fallbrookartcenter.org/sustainablecreations

Reduce, reuse, recycle is my lifestyle. May it be yours as well.

Until next Sunday

Back in my old Facebook days, I used to post a pun every day. Really bad ones. Anybody guess that my blog's name is a pun? Days of Books, Book of Days, get it? I told you the puns were bad. 

One of the earliest known Books of Days was also an artist's book, leading me to today's blog topic: what the heck is an artist's book? 

"Artist's book" refers to a work that takes the book structure and goes way outside the box with it. The  art is usually 3-dimensional, might contain several book formats in one art piece and often challenges our idea of what a book “should” be. 

Although an artist’s book can take many forms, from western traditional bound books, to wherever the artist wants to go, many book artists use a few common elements. I lean towards including telling a story or poem in my artist’s books when I use a wild and crazy format, but then go with abstract art when I create a traditional journal style.

Check out some examples of books I’ve made over the years. Then go forth and make your own.

In Freedom’s Work  above, I used a Coptic-stitch journal format. It is on display at Front Porch Gallery in Carlsbad until January 9^th, 2026.

 

Who remembers Pluto? is an Altered Book that began its existence as a Little Golden Book about the Solar System back when Pluto was still considered a planet. It will be on display June 1-July 30, 2026 at the Rancho San County Library.

Spring, 2012  an accordion (sometimes called concertina) paper book with hard covers. I sold this lovely (back in 2012) but I'll be teaching how to make it in 2026, at least twice.

Joker Horse uses the same accordion format as Spring 2012, but no paper at all. The materials are up-cycled metal, cork, electronics. The list goes on. It will be on display May2-June 10, 2026 at the Fallbrook Center for the Arts.

Until next Sunday, take care.

Good Sunday, the second one of my ditching Facebook and moving back to my Days of Books blog.

I love collaborative efforts. And I'll take collaboration wherever I can find it: with another artist, an animal that walks across my still-wet paste paper, a printed book that I have altered. The list goes on. This past weekend one of my grand nieces, also an artist, suggested that she and I could do collaboration sewing that we would mail to each other across the country. I LOVE this kid!

A couple of art seasons ago, I was invited to be in an exhibit of collaborative art, and I could pick my own artist to do the work with me. Enter my friend, fused-glass artist  Jacqueline Bridge  Her glass, my sewing and we have "Kendi". We even wrote him a back story:

"Kendi is a young musician. His family roots reach to the Biafran area of Nigeria. He is well known to music-lovers for his hit call-and-response duet “Calm Down”, with its signature line “and that’s the risk you take”.

Now fast-forward and I am still inspired by the stories of Nigeria. Below is "She wears History on Her Head".  Four strands of her hair end in small artist's books that describe aspects of the country now called Nigeria, from pre-colonialism to the 21st century. 

She is on display at Front Porch Gallery in Carlsbad https://www.frontporchgallery.org/ until January 8th, 2026. Please go check her out. 

Facebook has failed again. 

I'm done with it. Better I go back to blogging and posting art images here. 

A renewed learning curve, but I'm up for it. 

So today's image is REAL. 

Art + Alternative Facts = ???

Oh, my heavens. If that recently coined phrase, "alternative facts" isn't an inherent "Call to Artists", I don't know what is. 

The merger of art with "alternative facts" has a tradition literally going back millennia. 

Remember these guys?

The Terracotta Army from the late 3rd century BCE? Believed to be created under the rule of Qin Shi Huang shows us a boatload of alternative facts, starting with "They will accompany me after my death". Well, who am I to say that's alternative? Maybe they did. (Names of the estimated 700,000 artisans involved in the installation's making are lost to us.)
State-sponsored 20th century propaganda posters, aka alternative facts art, may arguably be among the most significant tools for influencing public opinion in the Soviet Union. They gave rise to the art movements Constructivism, Suprematism and, later, Socialist Realism.

 Artist unknown

Alternative facts of a different nature kicked in when this famous beauty by Klimt, shown restored to her owner, kicked off an international lawsuit over it's provenance. Seems the Austrian's icon, kind of equivelent to France's Eiffel Tower and the Statue of Liberty in the U.S. was obtained through, well, state-sponsored theft by Nazi Germany. Yikes.

 "Alternative Facts, the exhibition" I'm thinking we need it. Who's in?