Assemblage Workshop with Valerie Mann at Maker Works

Valerie Mann is a marvelous local artist who conducted an asemblage workshop for AAWA at Maker Works.  Here are some pictures from the workshop and the assemblage, mixed media piece I put together.  Maker works is  a 14,000 sq ft facility "filled with tools, for builders, makers, artists and tinkerers". It supports the creative community in Ann Arbor.

Click on this link to read more about Makerworks

Click on this link to read more about Valerie Mann 

front view of my assemblage

top view of my assemblage

The morning of the workshop, I had eaten a bagel for breakfast  and was wearing aqua and  purple. I think that influenced my design : ). Many of the shapes in this assemblage were cut out using a laser cutter.

Touring Maker Works

Val Mann at the workshop

I just took a great art workshop from Jaclyn Wukela. Here is the result, a finished portrait.

Jackie's approach to portraits is much different than my usual way of drawing. I like to start with 'local color' and then add different layers to bring out contrasts. She had us do "sequence layering" starting with black and then layering successively lighter tones over that. At one point this face was entirely orange, but it all worked out in the end. It was a very good workshop and I recommend her classes to anyone who has a chance to attend. I hope to share some of these techniques about achieving a good range of values in skin tones with my Rec and Ed students.

The workshop was put on by the Detroit Chapter of the Colored Pencil Society of America. Don't miss the current show in Dearborn:
Midwest Color 2008 at the Padzieski Art Gallery, in the Ford Community & Performing Arts Center,15801 Michigan Avenue, Dearborn, MI 48126
The exhibition will run through November 1, 2008 and it is really outstanding.