Finger-Painting on Your iPad, new OLLI class starting April 19. Open House on Sat. Jan. 21st.

WHY PAINT ON THE iPAD?

portability - that’s why it's called mobile digital art

no mess or fumes - that’s the digital part

innovative - join a growing community of iPad artists

insanely fun - that’s the best reason!

Since I got my first iPad two years ago, I have painted on it in my studio, during trips, and at live music performances. I am an active member of iAMDA, the International Association of Mobile Digital Artists, and was invited to give a presentation on live iPad painting at their recent conference in New York City. I have exhibited iPad art as archival digital prints at Stanford’s Schwab Center. You’ll be studying with a pioneer in a brand new digital art form.

I have developed an introductory curriculum of four classes. Such a start will launch an iPad student! I am in the process of developing an intermediate class which I hope to offer in the fall.

Having explored several of the painting apps for the iPad, I’ve come to the conclusion that ArtStudio has a friendly user interface and is at the same time a very rich tool. At $6 or less (it goes on sale now and then) it is an affordable app. It runs on any version of the iPad.

Each class will consist of a demonstration of a specific set of ArtStudio features, followed by individual work on the iPad with guidance from me. This format allows me to the meet the needs of each student in the class. Between classes students are invited to email me their iPad creations and questions.

All that is required to get started is an iPad, the ArtStudio app, and a willingness to try something new. No art or digital art background is required. Professional artists will enjoy adding a mobile digital platform to their toolset.

Four classes, four Thursdays, 6-8 p.m. starting April 19, at the lovely Humboldt Aquatics Center on the Bay next to the Adorni Center in Eureka.

Enroll today! OLLI at HSU , www.humboldt.edu/olli , 826-5880

Painting on the iPad during flights and in airports is fun and makes the time go faster, and amuses your fellow passengers.

Just returned from another airplane trip with three more iPad paintings. Since I got my first iPad last year I have been making "flight scenes" and just realized to my delight that I have a substantial collection. Enough for a show! So here are some of them:

Many include a title. The strange, almost abstract one, is a live de-icing that took place during a very snowy, very late night on Dec. 1 last year in Munich. I remember the plaintive voice of the captain as he came on and said, "there might be an opening in twenty minutes, if we can get the plane de-iced." The twin dragon-like machines sprayed foam and red hot beams at both wings. Great visuals. I felt like Edward Munch at a fire! - They did, we flew and landed in Helsinki at 2 in the morning where snow does not stop anything.

Some of the iPad paintings include passengers sitting near me. I met interesting people who enjoyed seeing the painting develop. The "Cash Refund SAS" is at Arlanda airport near Stockholm. "The Hall of Fame", is the my most recent one from United's Terminal, Gate 76 in SFO.

Devin Phillips at Jimmy Macks': great jazz in Portland, Oregon

We were so lucky! We headed up to Oregon, stopping first at Breitenbush Hot Springs, where we soaked, hiked and ate and met some really cool people. One of them a jazz musician who combines music with farming with his wife on their ten acre sustainable organic Dancing Roots Farm.

Then further north to Portland. Where my husband found himself a sleek new recumbent bike, and zoomed all over the cycling friendly city.

We had heard about Jimmy Macks' the Jazz Club that Down Beat Magazine rated as one of the 100 best in the world! And as luck would have it Devin Phillips,playful,joyful,Coltranesque sax player was performing on Friday Dec.9 with his New Orleans Straight Ahead. Phillips and Andrew Oliver, the fine pianist who led the band too, are both refugees from the Katrina disaster. They have been in Portland for five years and plan to stay. I've been enjoying Phillips' CD Wade in the Water as I think and write about the sweet jazz evening we had. The place was packed. The food was good. No pressure to keep buying drinks. And - I got really into painting the setting and performers on my iPad. They autographed the painting! Thank you very much Devin Phillips, Andrew Oliver, Eric Gruber (hidden in the shadows - sorry1) Mark Diflorio, and lovely singer Michael Angelo.

We wish Portland, with its bike paths, largest independent bookstore in the world - Powell's, good food and sweet jazz scene was closer!

December art at the Morris Graves' Humboldt Artist Gallery

Celebrating the winter solstice I am showing a glacier topped mountain and a Blue Lucia for you to see at the Humboldt Artist Gallery, downstairs at the Morris Graves Museum of Art in Eureka.

The mountain is the famous sugarcane volcano, Snaefellsjoekull on Iceland that Jules Verne used as setting for his fantasy "Journey to the Center of the Earth." I hiked to the foot of the mountain and made four watercolor sketches. It is a three registration oil monotype, 22" x 30".

The other original is a Blue Lucia, Swedish winter solstice celebrant, who is inspired by a photo of my mother at the age of one. She is at the photographer's in her eyelet dress and small boots, standing on a bench made of unbarked birch branches. Adorable!

In the print stand you will find a few Lucia art prints, butterflies, landscapes, and figures. On the counter there are ten Lucia greeting cards. I'll hang new original art each month, as well as fine art prints and a small selection of greeting cards. Once a month I will be in charge of the gallery. I'll post the time on Facebook. Come by and see me! I can show you the art and I'll also give introductions to painting on the iPad. Bring your own iPad if you have one.

Some of the other members of the Humboldt Artist Gallery are Joyce Jonté, Jim Lawry, Frances Kuta, Gary Todoroff, Linnea Tobias, Candy Miller, Julia Bednar and more.

Humboldt Gallery at the Morris Graves, New Art for Novemeber, Ruska - Dusky Moth, Lucias from Dalarna & Cycling Lucias.

The Finns have a succinct word for fall colors: RUSKA - to me it conjures up flaming birches and aspens, as well as the spicy fragrance and crispy sounds of autumnal forests. My Dusky Moth, that you can see during November in the downstairs Humboldt Gallery at the Morris Graves Museum of Art, is a celebration of ruska.

I will also show two of my Cycling Lucias - Look Ma No Hands featured here - a limited series of fine art prints on archival hemp papers. I created these as a friendly wink to my husband and his cycling friends the Latte Warriors. :-) In the art bin you will find art prints on hemp paper of my original series of Lucias - mixed media paintings - these quote from the folkloric Swedish province of Dalarna, home to well known artists Carl Larsson and Anders Zorn. Note the floral "curbits" and the images of painted horses, "dalahäst".

These light-hearted pieces provide me a nostalgic solstice journey to the old country.

I am pleased to be included in the Humboldt Gallery at the Morris Graves as it gives me an exquisite permanent space to show my art here on the North Coast. Be sure to stop by during Arts Alive! on the fist Saturday of each month - from 6 to 9 p.m. The next art walk is on November 5. See you there!

I am about to embark on a new series of Lucia paintings. Follow me on this blog to be the first to see them!

Occupy MOMA? The Modern Museums of Art are my homes in large cities.

When recently in NYC I wanted to go to the Brooklyn bridge and paint the Occupy Wall Street protesters on my mobile art device - iPad - but did not find the time. I am feeling sympathy for the protest. I too worry about the skewed income distribution and the disregard for the public good, and the short sightedness of policies. I've come to the conclusion that only countries in which there is a general agreement to pool resources, in the form of taxes, for the common good, will function well in the long run. And, that the tax collection has to work well too - and not just for middle income salary-earners whose incomes are transparent and easily taxed.

But I find myself unhappy about my beloved MoMA being occupied!

When I was a student in Stockholm I spent as much time as possible at the Modern Museum of Art on Skeppsholmen, enthusiastically participating in all the avant grade activities. Pontus Hulten, who later headed the Centre Pompidou in Paris, was in charge. His mother, renown artist, Siri Derkert embellished one of the new subway stations. I remember walking through Niki de Saint Phalle's She, the arrival of op, and pop and all the other iconoclastic trends - those were exiting days. I seldom miss visiting the SFMOMA when in the City. A couple of years ago I discovered a series of transfer drawings by Paul Klee, which inspired me to pursue this technique used in my Cycling Lucia series.

When in NYC during first weekend of October, I made for MoMA my first day there. Had a lovely, expensive lunch then joined the large crowds checking out de Kooning: A Retrospective, and ended the visit by sitting down and making an homage to de Kooning on my iPad.

Here's an article about the protest at the MoMA. What do you think of this development? Are our large art institutions elitist? Do they exclude people? While a student in Stockholm I had very inexpensive access to all our museums and theaters, including the nose bleed section of the opera. Our beloved Ingmar Bergman had a say in this policy.

Images: "Smiling Cycling Lucia", transfer drawing; "Ripping off de Kooning at the MoMA", iPad painting, both by me; "She" by Niki de Saint Phalle - a walk though sculpture large as a room!

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2 fab JAZZ links: Monterey Jazz Festival, Redwoods Jazz Alliance

I have decided to add links to my favorite jazz sites starting with the The Monterey Jazz Festival. I have a new series of live paintings from this years festival which was the 54th. The link covers this one and shows what's being planned for the 55th in 2012.

I am also linking to our wonderful local Jazz organization: The Redwoods Jazz Alliance. The next performance will be with great drummer Allison Miller's Boom Tic Boom. We have seen her with Dr. Lonnie Smith at the Monterey Jazz festival, and are very much looking forward to having her on our home turf at HSU on Sunday Oct. 30. I hope capture her on my iPad.

Here two live iPad paintings of jazz drummers: Justin Brown with the Ambrose Akinmusire Quintet, (red background) and Michael Formanek's Gerald Cleaver.