madebymixy – Mixy's Art Blog

17% Quirkfulness

I spent most of a day putting together the little concertina sketchbook that I’m using for the 100 Day Project this year AS WELL AS the Sketchbook Project.

Most every time I’ve taken on these projects, I’ve overclocked myself.

Given that I’ve already missed the deadline for the SBP by 6 months I thought to mash up these two projects.

Let’s see what becomes of it.

Some thoughts on Quirkfulness.

As I cut and glued and trimmed and finagled together the concertina pages, I watched the ebb and flow of acceptance that the stuff I make will inevitably have a wonkiness to it.

Yes, I measured and cut with a ruler. Also Yes, the pages came out a bit skew-whiff.

Yes, I cleaned my brush before I primed the paper, and also Yes, there was still a bit of dark blue paint on it that’s got them a bit streaky already.

Theme established:

It’s all part of the Quirkfulness.

Now, every day as I film and photograph steps in the progress, I remind myself:

Through the ugly stages, the layers i know will get covered up, the point is to carry on.

Quirkfulness is my style, it’s a feature not a bug.

It’s a sketchbook, not rocket surgery.

It’s okay to be okay with this.

Today we reached day 17 and I’m fully in my stride with daily progress, an idea of what the finished piece will look like, and all manner of chaos on and around my desk!

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Hi – I’m Mixy!

I’m a mixed media & textile artist from London, UK.

I love to share what I’m making, and I hope it brings some inspiration to your creative time.

You can see what I’m making on this blog, and in these places too

Insta @mixygregory
MadebyMixy.com

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Summer to Summer

here’s what (almost) a year of doodles looks like, page by page.

Just about a year ago I began this art journal.

It’s a monster of a thing at around 100 pages.

I bought two of these books because I was bewitched by the delightfully bright covers, this one in magenta, another in cherry red.

It took almost a year to doodle my way through this book from cover to cover.

I took a while to get used to the pages.

At first I was at odds with the paper which didn’t take ink and watercolor well.

Gessoing or collaging more ink friendly paper to the pages was bulking it up too much to be manageable.

Over the months I found the best solution was to tear out some pages and recycle them into other projects.

Some of these pages went on to become part of the junk journal I’m using for this year’s 100 day project.

I like the idea that this book seeded a brand new book, allowing ideas to overflow between the two.

Finally I reached the point at which the book felt done, ready to set aside to focus my attention on other things. There’s always an overlap with my art journals – I began playing with the second of these books earlier this year – so maybe we can expect a flip through of that one next spring!

Meanwhile, here’s what (almost) a year of doodles looks like, page by page.

Hi – I’m Mixy!

I’m a mixed media & textile artist from London, UK.

I love to share what I’m making, and I hope it brings some inspiration to your creative time.

You can see what I’m making on this blog, and in these places too

Insta @mixygregory
MadebyMixy.com

Join Me!

Get monthly-ish Studio Musings Newsletter.

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Happy Solstice Sale!

happy solstice! I’m celebrating with a BIG SALE in my Etsy store 🙂

Hi folks! after a pause my Etsy store “Made By Mixy” is now open again. There’s original art, postcards, art cards, stickers & zines. To celebrate the reopening, and the solstice, everything is 40% off all weekend 🙂

Happy Solstice to you all! X

All my regular blogging is over at Mixy.Art.Blog now – so if you’d like to catch up do check out the new site 🙂

Stitching together 100 days

Over the weeks and months these pages changed beyond recognition. This is a snapshot into the evolution.

This week we reached the end of the #100dayproject. Every day for over 3 months I posted my daily doodles to Instagram. Yikes!

Sometimes just photos, but for the most part, I shared little 30 second or so time lapse videos.

This is an art journal I’ve been doodling back and forth through for a long time. Every day I’d find a page that wanted something new, different colors or just had a space to fill. I’d scribble down words that caught my attention in a podcast or song lyrics, I’d sketch and play and add bits of scraps of stuff from my desk.

There are no rules in a book like this, nothing can go *wrong*. It’s all subject to change, it’s all ephemeral.

Over the weeks and months these pages changed beyond recognition. This is a snapshot into the evolution.

Evolving ideas

You can see a full flip through of this book by joining up for my newsletter. I share monthly (-ish) musings from my studio, first looksies at what I’m making, and exclusive discounts in my online sales, but if that’s not your jam you can unsubscribe at any time.

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100 days as dreamscapes

I love to mix my drawings and graphics in with my photography experiments … these are glimpses into the dream scape of my imagination.

In the digital re-imagining of my art that I was telling you about yesterpost, I’m creating one of these collage postcards series entirely from the images in the 100 day project from earlier this year.

I’m finding the journey of a creative practice follows a spiral path, revisiting and reinventing along the way, enriching and inspiring from the past into the future.

These drawings nestle up together in their new arrangements as one edge blends into another.

They contain hidden messages and fragments of found poetry from the words and phrases that wandered through my mind as I drew.

These are glimpses into the dream scape of my imagination. And I’m only just beginning!

If you’re quick you can catch them in my Etsy store …

If you’re super quick you’ll catch the This-Weekend-Only-Sale of 15% off EVERYTHING and catch international shipping before the holidays! Lawks!!

There are currently Two sets of Three Postcards available:
You can find Set 1 here & Set 2 right here

If you’d like regular monthly updates on my latest colorful antics, delivered right to your inbox (all the good stuff I don’t share here on the blog + special discounts on my classes and Etsy things) Hop on my mail-list right here:

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and I’ll send you my ebook A Year full of Color

Your email is utterly safe to me. It will be wrapped up snug and nestled with a ring tailed lemur until the spring arrives.

Digital Dreamscapes

I love to mix my drawings and graphics in with my photography experiments … these are glimpses into the dream scape of my imagination.

You know how I love to find new ways to find new ways.

I love to mix my drawings and graphics in with my photography experiments by way of digital collages.

I’ve been having the most fun doing this lately and new art is emerging as I spiral around in this creative practice.

I was so pleased with the way these designs came out I had some printed up as postcards.

They are gorgeous!

I love how they contain hidden messages and fragments of found poetry as snippets of words and text peep through.

They are glimpses into the dream scape of my imagination. And I’m only just beginning!

If you’re quick you can catch them in my Etsy store …

If you’re super quick you’ll catch the This-Weekend-Only-Sale of 15% off EVERYTHING and catch international shipping before the holidays! Lawks!!

<a href="https://mixygecko.wufoo.com/forms/z1pfxfus0jq7ftl/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Fill out my Wufoo form!</a>

and I’ll send you my ebook A Year full of Color

Your email is utterly safe to me. It will be wrapped up snug and nestled with a hot water bottle until the spring arrives.

A Year Full of Color: Part One (& a gift)

Well hey there lovely friends! Guess what today is? Today is the day I open the doors of my Etsy Shop!

To celebrate it’s 10% of everything (excluding shipping) until the end of January! Use Coupon Code YELLOW10 🙂

As the TWELVTY month of yellow draws to a close the fruit of this color’s makings will be going out into the world! If you like yellow, and you like quirky artsy things made from recycled and vintage materials then I think you’ll love what I have there!

As part of TWELVTY, my year long adventure round the color wheel a month at a time, I’ll be adding what I make in each month to the shop. (so if you’re more greeny-blue, or exclusively purple, or really just about red — there will be a month coming up just for you later in the year)

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I made this little ebook all about color if you share my fascination with color.
It’s all yours when you hop on my newsletter list here.

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(Your email is absolutely safe with me, I’ll just pop by and check up on it time to time, feed it some biscuits, plump up its cushions, that sort of thing.)

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The more I look…

…the more I see.

I was in London all day Saturday. A rainy grey day, the view from our second floor window crossed over a patch of garden to the grey stonework and concrete of the buildings opposite. These short December days barely get light and the wet and wind dulled out any colours.

The only life on view from up here was a solitary grey squirrel scampering along the spindly limbs of the near naked tree-tops.

But amid the gloom was the last remaining brightness of the season: with every gust of wind a few remaining golden yellow leaves danced about, tumbling, sprinkling, shining.

I was transfixed.

My mind is full of color, it is my ‘thing’.

And as I’m focussed on yellow in the prepration of the first chapter of TWELVTY I suppose it’s no wonder I was so captivated. But it made me ask myself if that’s why: would I have noticed so keenly? Would I have seen it in such glory? Would it have held that measure of magic?

I have no control group of me, no comparison, so these questions are unanswerable

But I have come to observe that the more I actively look, the more I absorb, and the richer my life becomes. When there’s so much enjoyment available from the everyday and mundane, life is lusher and days are fuller.

I’m so full of ideas for TWELVTY, I’m almost bursting! so much so I’m waking up in the night and having to write stuff down. I’m literally dreaming about it! It’s filling all the corners of my mind.

The program begins in the new year with shiny bright yellow so I’ve been warming up my drawing-and-painting-in-just-yellow vibes in readiness.

I love to use just one color (I love using ALL THE COLORS!) but one-at-a-time has a really special quality. This is one of the big things that I want to share and explore further with you.