Gabi the painter

Gabi the painter has been hiding.

When Gabi the painter started this blog in 2009 she didn't really know what she was doing, she needed a place to ramble randomly and didn't like Facebook notes, she wanted a place to post fun pictures and be able to write and do funny things with links... And a place to post fun pictures.


(he will ask me to take this down in 3... 2...)

Gabi the painter had recently graduated from college and was fresh with technical skill and art ideas from the classes she'd taken.  She didn't yet feel like an intruder in her parent's home, and wasn't feeling burned out from the ridiculous work that was ahead of her.  And she painted a few times, and posted about it...
And then Gabi the painter, like, died?  You know, shit happens.


👻  But now she's back!  And she's painting.  And drawing.  And she has this new modern thing called "Instagram", with upwards of 500 followers!  Which doesn't seem like a lot but it kind of is.  And is doing commission work, for people who love her work.  Who knew!

And this so-called "art studio" blog kind of returns to it's roots, because I want to paint, and I HAVE NO STUDIO.  Lol.  I'm desperate to go home and have a studio.  But this time, I will actually paint in it, AND melt glass.  Possibly even at the same time!  Who knows.  But I'm back, bitches.

Here's one more pic, because I can.  More on that later.

It's Moo!

It's like a cow's opinion!

JK they're actually the awesome company that does my printing for Pincel de Fuego, and I swear this is not an advertisement for them... I'm just excited about new stickers and plans.  

So... I bought packaging for Cali and put the little round stickers on all the little containers and ran out of stickers.  

I went online to print new stickers and oh man, it was Black Friday!  So I kind of went all out designing new stickers and I decided I was fiiiinally going to try their sticker books with adorably tiiiny stickers too.  

Have you seen my proper website gabiloraine.com?  Well anyway now everything is gathered there, so that's all the information needed for my new stickers!  I kind of wish I'd put the link in the small stickers too, but I kind of made those in a hurry, so next time.  

I ordered from their US store straight to Cali Colombia, and the order arrived SO fast!  Like less than a week.  I didn't have to order to Florida and forward to Panama and pay extra shipping or anything insane like that.  It literally got to my door.  I love Colombia.  Fuck you Panama, I'm never coming back.  JK of course I'll be back in July.

So cute!  I got super excited and started sticking them around right away and made super cute Christmas wrap.

ooooh, shiiiny - I LOVE this paper which I got at Bodegas Ilusión. 

Another thing I got excited about is that now Moo offers a sample pack, which is free and since I was already placing an order, I just added it on.  (It bumped my shipping fee by $0.75... which is not the end of the world)  Basically the sample pack is a pack of the business cards they make in most of the variations possible.  So you can physically appreciate the format, the quality of the paper, glossiness, etc.  And they're beautiful.  

This gave me the bright idea to change the format of the cards I've been using.  If you've seen my work, you've seen my tiny business cards with different pictures of my work on them.  ... well you might have also seen the little fliers I made a couple of years ago.  Anyway..  seeing the sample pack and comparing it side to side with my fliers gave me the idea to make new cards.  

And the next day I basically woke up and knew what I would do, and began sketching.  

See... in the sample pack they included these three cards... which demonstrate the textures they offer, which I haven't used before with the mini cards.  

 

So I took a 6H pencil and hatched in the parts which I'm going to want to be raised gloss...  I'm excited, but I'm not making these until I need them.  Because, economy.  And other reasons.

Fun times!  I really liked their square cards and the sample pack experience in general. 

Glassblowing in Murano?!?!?

This actually happened.

As I wrote previously in the bochinche update, my dear husband Octo was studying in Spain for about 7 months recently.  I was very lucky to be able to visit him over the Christmas break and also to travel.  We went to Venice, Paris, Copenhagen, and of course Barcelona.  We took soooo many pictures and compiled a small Facebook album.  Honestly it was a beautiful trip, like a second honeymoon.
Octo took about a thousand pictures of me in Murano at the glassblowing class I was able to take!  He did so well.  Those pictures I reserved for this blog and didn't touch them until now.

This actually happened.  It's been about 8 months and it's still pretty much surreal to me.

Obviously going to Murano was a dream of mine, but I never expected to be able to take a class.  I just kind of expected to watch demonstrations and get to know the place and maybe purchase some glass.  I only scheduled to be there for 3 nights.

Also, I didn't realize how long a class would be or how much practice I needed to understand each concept. ... One day I'll go and be there for like a month as I should.

Davide Penso was gracious enough to schedule me in for a class on December 21st.

Davide was basically born with a torch in his hands in Murano.  I explained to him that I was an "advanced beginner" and basically learned everything through trial and error.  He described my form as wild but confident enough with the medium that he wouldn't correct me too much.  We went straight to glassblowing.

He demonstrated and explained a few times and basically let me get to work.  Guiding me along the way.

One of the first awesome things he taught me was how to swing and hold the cane to blow.

Blowing was/is extremely challenging for me.  I would blow my lungs out and no bubble would come out.

And I would have to reheat...

Davide would start yelling at me to blow or the glass would get cold.

Sufla sufla sufla!!!    ...Es frío. 

Davide's assistant Corina was also working there with me and she was lovely.

SUFLA!

Es frio. 

You can tell it's really hot when it glows like this.

Then you make the neck with the scissors.

And blow again.

Hours later...  check out all of my attempts on the table..

Davide was also working, and we were having great laughs listening to Will Smith music from like all of his movies...

It was pretty much hilarious.

Here you can see all of the balls I'd made, both good and terrible, broken, etc.  And Davide's store in the background.  If you're ever in Venice, you must check it out.  He's right in front of the Museum's Vaporetto stop.  Also if you click here you can Google Maps it.

Click to enlarge.

Removing from cane on hot fingers...


Yes I actually have my hair down and am wearing like 4 layers of clothing.  These pics are from December 22nd, Davide said I could come again the next day until noon.  I was soooo hooked.  That night I barely slept.

Davide smiling and doing demos.  I love him so much!!

Silver foil.

And... That's it!

Here we are together at the end and Davide is all fancy because he's going to his children's Christmas event afterwards.  His work behind us, is so incredibleee..  He made us a blue glass which we treasure so muchhh.

And here are some pictures of Venice and Murano that I took.

Venice is ridiculously good looking.

Photo in front of the glass museum in Murano.  Can you spot the murder scene?

Just gorgeous.