I got an email from Cape Resorts in Cape May yesterday. They've got summer juice specials and a tomato summer sandwich menu and needed some illustrations. I love doing still lifes, and more and more I love the illustration piece of my job, so this was a welcome assignment. I hit the produce section of the grocery yesterday and took the day today to just focus in and do a series of quick watercolors, rotating the produce in and out of the various compositions. Here's what my work table looked like. 
I wasn't really planning to do them all today, but I've been working pretty obsessively ever since getting home from England last week (despite the utter absence of proof of that here....). I've been working on prints from my watercolors, and it made sense to just take a day to do this project, get it out of the way (since it was rolling along nicely) and be able to get back to the prints tomorrow with minimal interruption. If the work wasn't flowing I would have taken more time over it. I hit streaks where I work and think about work at all hours, and then I take some time between streaks to recharge. That's the beauty of being self employed. Ideally the productive streaks line up with projects and shows. Having a fallow period with deadlines looming is pretty nerve wracking, but I've gotten better at focusing in and staying on track with projects over the last few years. I ended up doing six small (6x8") still lifes today. Here are the rest. Tomorrow I'll get back to England, artistically anyway.     
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In previous years, I've done a series of prints to mark the season of Lent, but last year I read a quote from N.T. Wright talking about how we observe Lent for 40 days but only celebrate Easter for one. This year I decided to do a series for the season of Easter instead. I carved the trumpet for the first print on my recent road trip, and, knowing I had a pretty quick turnaround after coming home, I also took my travel printing kit to be able to proof it and really have it ready to print when I got back. I found a train style make up case at the second hand mecca of Unclaimed Baggage in Alabama a few years ago, and it's the perfect size for my basic printing equipment. 
When I got home I was ready to print the final image on the good paper in colored ink. 
Then I set the wood type, using a metal frame called a chase. This means I can pick it up and move it around instead of having be stuck in my proof press, making me unable to print anything else until I disassemble the type. For smaller projects I can use a chase. For the bigger ones, I put larger type right in the bed of the press. This project is about 10x11", using my smallest wood type, so a chase is just right. 
Finally I printed the type on top of the trumpet image. 
And here's a sneak peek at week two of Easter. I couldn't resist a banjo, of course. 
I'm doing one print a month for the First Presbyterian Church in Holley, NY. They are my longest running church patrons, and I love working with their minister Tom Gardner. For much of this year, I will create an "I am" statement for each month. This fall we'll continue the harvest series I began for them last year. I'm playing with the positive/negative lettering for this series, which requires a fair amount of concentration, but thankfully I didn't make such a mistake on this one that I had to start over, like I did with the first one. Perhaps I'm getting into a groove with it.
I did forget that my proof press was full of type from another project, so I had to do the first proof the old fashioned way, by rubbing on the back of the paper with a flat wooden spoon. I did about three years' worth of prints like that, and it's a good reminder how fortunate I am to have a press now. 
 First Presbyterian Church in Holley, NY, is commissioning me to do another series of liturgical prints. I'm going to do a series of "I am" statements from John for their spring bulletins. I started drawing the first one free hand, but using one of my type books as a guide for the lettering.  Then I got it transferred onto the block, outlined the letters with an exacto knife (to try to keep the edges sharp and keep me from cutting on through a line), and started carving. Things were going along great on the left, but then I started listening too hard to the Sunday morning puzzle on NPR and got distracted. The A in BREAD was supposed to be dark, to show up in the white of the bread, and I cut right into the letter. These positive/negative ones are especially tricky brainteasers for me. And that was in spite of the shading I did to try to keep myself straight.
Fortunately I wasn't too far along, so I started over, kept it straight, and managed to finish the print. Below is the first proof. I cleaned up the letters and edges a bit before pulling the final version at the top of the post.  
I did this sketch just before dinner on my last evening in Cape May. It seems a good Christmas Eve one to share. I hope everyone has a marvelous Winter Wonderland kind of holiday with loved ones, wherever you are.
I met professional photographer Jackie Kane while I was up in Cape May. Since I'm working up there on my own largely (though the staff there always make me very welcome), it's fun to get to meet and talk to fun and interesting people. I met a couple of artists this time (I'm talking about you, Doug!), and it's always neat to talk shop. An added bonus was Jackie turning her talents to take shots of me while I was working. (The full set of them is on her site here.) She found me on the coldest day I actually did work outside (middle 30's), so I'm embarrassed about the hat situation. I need my broad floppy hat instead of my cuter winter hat to give me shade while I work, so I had a stocking wool hat on underneath it. Sigh. A fashion plate I am not. But it's kind of fun to get to see my set up through someone else's eyes.
Here's my favorite one. It really embodies the act of creation to me. 
You can see lots more of Jackie's work here. She's got a great eye and gets that beautiful light I never manage to achieve in my photographs. Her Ferris wheel at night series is super cool.
Cape Resorts, the hotel group I do illustrations for in Cape May, NJ, has a holiday slide show of my watercolors going across the top of their website. It is such fun to see my work being used. I'm just about to head back up there, too, and paint their Christmas festivities for a second year in a row. It's a busy week, with the MBG Paris show a week ago (and still up till New Year's), my home show this past Sunday, and my upcoming departure Thursday morning. The home show was great fun. I loved having so many friends come through, and I made some new ones as well, which is always lovely. The show wound down the last half hour when my friend and touring musician Andy Cohen showed up with his guitar. I got out my bass, and we played a little music before our respective evening engagements. A perfect way to end a fun day. And now I'm gearing up to go back to a place I've really come to love. I just hope the snow is all gone by Thursday.... More screen shots from the Cape Resorts website: 
First Presbyterian Church in Holley, NY, commissioned me to do a series of three harvest prints for this fall. The texts were taken from the hymnal, and the preacher Tom Gardner talked me through the fall season of abundance up there, and what would be ripe when. This is the third and final print. You can see it from the original drawing (above) through the proofing process (below) and in its finished state. 
Finished print: 
Here are the first two prints in the series:
While I had the ink going, I decided I'd do some printing for the upcoming shows and Christmas season. I spent the afternoon printing all three harvest prints plus three new Paris prints. I filled up my drying rack. 
After several hours of printing, on my feet and back and forth between rooms, I decided I'd earned a little back porch banjo-playing time. It's lovely weather here in Memphis for the late fall. It always makes me happy when it's warm enough to sit outside happily. 
I spent much of the day running note cards for WKNO fm, our local NPR station. I had fun getting the slightly battered, large wooden type out for the project. 
Here's a short video of the press operating. I had to hold it myself, so it's a bird's eye view from the printer. It's also a little slower (not too much) than my usual press speed, since I was trying to handle the camera as well. Final results. 
I finally got the second harvest print finished carving and scanned in. I seem to work best with a deadline, and this is due for the month of October. First Presbyterian in Holley, NY commissioned a set of three for their fall bulletin covers, and the minister there chose a whole list of hymn lines with the harvest theme for me to choose from. I'm moving a little slowly around here. I spent more time dancing and playing music this weekend than making art, but it was lovely to have a real break, and I got to learn the Mazurka! Now I'm kicking it into high gear, getting ready for another trip to Cape May starting on Wednesday, and then the Pink Palace Crafts Fair the following weekend. Here's the first harvest print in case you missed it earlier. I'm still tinkering with what I want to do for November. 
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Martha Kelly is an artist and illustrator who lives and works in Memphis, Tennessee.
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