Class President Sudafed

Another children's medication and another stereotypical school picture background with Class President Sudafed.

Lil' Miss Children's Tylenol

I've been working on canvas board that I have laying around the studio for a few paintings. I forgot how i prefer to work in watercolors on these things. They just work much better.

OKay here is the low down about the next few paintings. I'm taking a stab at horrible school pictures of childhood and the medicines I had to endure. Lil' Miss Children's Tylenol is sitting on one of fake benches with the horrible fountain background. I really hated children's tylenol in any form, especially the liquids and the chewables, I still shiver from even thinking about the taste of them.

Anyways I have been watching a lot of documentaries about medicated america, and the one that stuck out most recently to me was Generation RX, about over medicating out children with psychiatric drugs. Sooo... now I'm going to make a few paintings of children in bad school pictures as their childhood medications.

My Little Pill Pony Painting

My Little Pill Pony Painting. Acrylic on canvas.

I need to make more of these pieces along with my pill ponies with playsets because I really like these pieces personally. Its hard to find the knock off ponies I like to use for these pieces but I need to look at the bargain barn some more during the week. Oh well off to make more pieces...

Governess Cialis

Coverness Cialis will take care of all your needs while you recover.

Mme Pristique

My newest Pill Doll, Mme Pristique. She's a very high and mighty antidepression drug, she high and mighty that I had a bad reaction to her when I took her once. I've noticed a trend, I see medications, especially the antidepressants as fancy ladies.

Klor-con Self portrait

The first real self portrait I've created as a pill person. This is my self as my Klor-con. I actually cannot go without my potassium pills for more then a day or so my other medication's side effects become very strong and annoying. The background is based upon the backyard at the home I grew up in. We lived on the bottom of a large hill and we had a large yard ourselves. It was a great home but we eventually left it because of a drive by shooting and the area going down hill.

My Little Pill Pony on Canvas Preview

If you knock on my door a unicorn will impale you

Just a quick interjection here but I have to say I am tired of people coming to my door and trying to sell a service to me. Primarily its, "can I mow your yard?" less then two days after we've mowed it. It is truly just as annoying as cult members coming to your door wanting you to drink their kool-aid.

Frick and Frack Paintings

I was thinking about the good and bad of medications and old cartoons from the 1950s. I feel like all I am missing now is a wascally wabbit.

Frick and Frack with strawberries

Two small canvases for two lil pill people I call Frick and Frack.

Sometimes I make other stuff

You've may have already noticed it through my facebook page but I've been making polymer clay jewelry. I like to have other things open to people who like my art so I've made some cute silly things. I quite like making these little things. It helps to break up the days in between paintings.

My Little Pill Pony with playsets

I decided to take the Pill Ponies to another level and give them all playsets they are permanently attached to improve their visibility. They seemed like they were lacking in something and when I went to the craft store the other day I found these round wooden discs and they were perfect bases for the ponies. If you notice closely the tress are actually old prescription bottles and yes those are expired prescriptions on the trees. (Hey candy can grow on the trees in the original, why not pills in my version?) I am quite happy with my pill ponies more then ever and I'm on the hunt for more My Little Ponies to appropriate into Pill Ponies.

Food is my second love

Contents of a toddler's bento box: Strawberries, blueberries, blackberries, rasberries, earth's best whole what blueberry mini waffles, yo-kids mixed berry yogurt tube, Anne's Organics Cheddar Bunnies, banana, Apple-Cinnamon pouch.

I've not talked about how food is a good source of keeping myself stable with my medical conditions. The bento (Box lunch) above is actually my daughter's breakfast with morning and afternoon snacks for daycare (they daycare center provides a decently healthy lunch). I really make sure she eats healthy because my kiddo has a tendency to get sick easily. We've been through ear tubes, several stomach and sinus bugs, and general icky whatnots. I know might seem like a lot but I was told by her teachers that she was bugging for more snacks at school so I had to pack more. Keeping these bento boxes help us eat better at home and keep a steady health diet.

Bargain Adventures

I had an adventurous day going from getting a new tube of paint, finding classic my little ponies (and one of the ponies from the recent happy meals!), eating lunch and stuffing myself at TOPS BBQ, and eerily gawking at the tent revival being set up next door, and back home to start on some new paintings. Now I've got to go think about making some dinner...

The Mighty Collage Box

This is my mighty collage box. I collect all of my medical materials in here. I save all of my old pill bottles CVS bags, and other medical thingies in here. I often can grab something out here and make something that works along my paintings in here.

Klor-Con Self Portrait Painting Sneak Peak

I just wanted to share a quick little painting on wood I'm completing. This one is more of a self portrait with myself as Klor-Con, or potassium pills.

Madame Celexa

I've really liked looking at medication in the way I look classical portraiture from the 18th century on back. I'm raising up medication like the people in the portraits. I've had it in my mind to make a doll in the similar style the Duchess of Codine is painted and keeping with reusing medical equipment the lower half of the body is made with a pill bottle her upper body is stuffed with rubber medical gloves.

My Little Pill Ponies

It isn't obvious I watch a lot of my little ponies with my child? Actually I do blame watching too much of the aforementioned show. I've actually had these fake MLPs sitting around the studio for a week now after buying them at the "bargain barn" section of a local Good Will store. I've thought about taking pieces of wood and making complete "play sets" for these babies, but my intent is to play upon the idea of the "cutie mark" from the show MLP and how it reflects upon the pony's personality. They're all slightly over medicated, but the white pony especially is with the tweaked out look it has. (Its my favorite)

Rumination

Have you ever dealt with Rumination before? I tend to ruminate over a lot of different things especially my body and health. These images are from a book I worked on for teaching art to high school students and the professor made us keep an "idea book". I tend to obsess over thins and the circles are constantly repeated as a way of obsessive thinking, or rumination.

Happy Mother's Day

I hope all of my mommy readers out there are having a wonderful mother's day. I personally don't think you need to have given birth to your child to celebrate this day. I often treated my grandmother just like my mother because she was there the same amount as my actual mother.

This little embroidery sample comes from my 2nd year in fiber arts during my under graduate years. We were using text in our art as a form of communicating them just with imagery and I came up with this funny little piece. I think it should be the name of show about children's medicine one day perhaps...

artist's statement

The Studio

This is my main corner for working in my studio. The other wall is filled with bakers racks holding all of my books, toys, and other oddities. As you can see I'm a bit of a nut for japanese animation. When I'm not making paintings about pill people or my experiences working through coping skills with what is wrong with me then I watch a lot of animated things. I love it. Its my number one release.

The Duchess of Codine Painting

I finished her finally! She's really big...Acrylic on Canvas

Prom Night Painting

24 x 42 inches / Acrylic on Canvas

Sooo.... I ended up painting Prom Night. I did it today while after going on an adventure for canvas at Jo-Ann's. I hate driving out to Jo-Ann's usually since it is a nearly 50 minute drive to the other end of the city but I had a coupon plus my educator's discount which meant major discount for me. I think I'll sketch out the Duchess of Codine tonight (its going to be epic BIG) and I'm super excited about painting it.

Enough jabbering... a painting I will go...a paining I will go.

You are your disease sketches

The Duke and Duchess of Codine

Prom Night

I am so ridiculously excited about these sketches becoming paintings that I must be on a manic high at the moment. I cane up with these sketches today during my therapy group session. I am constantly reminded by media that I'm faced with having to submit to certain pharmaceuticals and let them become me or I can't live a normal life. I'm creating portraits that personifies medications which dehumanizes people to an extent because for example someone like me has to take on these medications of certain parts of my life would not be possible. Yet, at the same time I have to remember it is me to avoid complications with other medications.

 Or something like that.... anyways I cannot wait to paint the Duke and Duchess.

Ugh I'm really disappointed with how washed out these images came out when I scanned this in but its Tommy the Tumor and Friends! I'm really reacting against how we commercialize disease. Have you ever seen medical information geared towards kids? It makes cancer, tumors, and disease look like Disney Land. So yeah... meet Tommy the tumor.

Calling Card

I'm heading out trying to get gallery representation tomorrow at this thing at a local college. This is my new calling card on 4 x 6 inch photopaper. It has been a long time since I tried doing my art thing since I started to teach so I'm a bit rusty at this thing.

The label is appropriated from CVS' prescrition bag which I love because of the graphic nature of the bag and how it relates to my art work.

 CVS you make taking pills hip.