Category: Haiku

Art, Haiku, Watercolor

An Exciting Foray Into Watercolor

Guila Greer

About a year ago I signed up for a watercolor class at the local Y – not being an avid watercolor fan especially, but being very eager to take a ‘formal’ class in one of the Fine Arts; to learn art technique and principles from that perspective.

Well, I was not only presented with all kinds of wonderful information, I became fascinated with using this form of paint.  I love the transparency of watercolor and the ability to subtly layer color upon color.   It is so exciting to put down a swipe of color on a wet surface and to coax it gently in the direction you want.  The color has a mind of its own and often does more interesting and exciting things than your original idea.

I’ve worked on various kinds of projects to learn different skills – most of these are still unfinished.  Some will remain unfinished – some I am still working on.  This street scene is probably my favorite completed piece thus far.

Street Scene, Downtown ChicagoWatercolor by Guila Greer, Feb 2013
Street Scene, Downtown Chicago
Watercolor by Guila Greer, Feb 2013
Art, Haiku, Mixed Media, Poetry, Poetry and Photography

Phases of the Moon

Guila Greer
The prompt word for February’s Haiku Art Challenge was “Moon.”  I thought of all the different sayings that we have to describe the moon: some quite descriptive, others turned into common expressions and a few quite fanciful.  So much folklore and romance has evolved from our common experience of viewing this orb in the night sky. called

  Blue Moon, Green Cheese Moon and Harvest Moon
Chameleon moon
many faces to delight
changing yet constant
Phases of the Moon
Phases of the Moon
 
Art Quilt, Fiber Art, Haiku, Life, Poetry, Poetry and Photography

Haiku Art – from February 2011 Faultlines of the Heart

Guila Greer

February has rolled around once more.  This year our Haiku prompt word is ‘moon.’  When I get back to the Valley I’ll work on the challenge, writing my haiku based on the prompt and completing a piece of artwork to represent it.  In the meantime I’m jotting down some ideas – a stream of consciousness series of associations for the word ‘moon’.

Last year the February prompt word was  ‘love.’  With so many new people on board this year I decided to encore the February 2011 haiku and art work. The piece was and is one of my favorites.  My goal for the artwork was to illustrate feelings resulting from the loss of love and the subsequent attempts to hide emotions from others.


Here you have a heart that has been fractured into many pieces along the faultlines that were there all along.  And floating over the pieces of the heart are a tangle of ribbons attempting to hide the tears underneath.
letting go of love
hot salty tears flow freely
bruised battered heart cracks.

All the red “shards” combine to form one complete heart. The pieces have been attached to the background with a lot of heavy quilting. I used heavy cotton plus metallic. The ribbons are hand tacked. Under the ribbons are tear-shaped beads peeking out. I purposefully left the thread tails and frayed edges alone as they are part of the over all feeling that I wanted to generate.

Art, Art Quilt, Art Quilts, Fiber Art, Haiku, Poetry, Poetry and Photography

Challenge for January: Exhilaration – Haiku and Art

Guila Greer
The Haiku Art  prompt word for January was Exhilaration.
The American Heritage Dictionary defines “Exhilaration” as    “The state of being stimulated, refreshed, or elated.”
Sometimes all it takes to experience these feelings is to step outside on a sunny day.
The Haiku
scent of new mown grass
sunbeam caresses my cheek
living…feeling…aaaaah…
For the art work that I was preparing to go with this haiku – I didn’t want to be too structured.  I wanted to indicate an almost childlike feeling of exhilaration with my composition and color choices.
At the same time, as a developing art quilter, I wanted to incorporate a couple of new techniques and see “what if”?
First off I used a “blah” pastel print in lieu of plain muslin as my base. I didn’t mind that it partly “showed through” – just felt it added some interest.
I felt that color was of first importance in this piece – so before doing anything else I painted my background using acrylic paint.  In order to add some texture to the piece I used some Golden Light Molding Paste to parts of the grassy area.    
I quilted the piece extensively with heavy thread. 
Art Quilt, Art Quilts, Fiber Art, Haiku, Journal Size, Poetry, Poetry and Photography, Quilts

Procrastination – Observations: Visual and Poetic

Guila Greer


One of the keys to overcoming any bad habit is to have some understanding of why we do it in the first place. So why don’t we “just do it” a la a Nike commercial and put off some tasks for later? And I’m not just talking about doing the dishes. I’m talking about taking care of tasks that we enjoy as well – could be sewing or gardening or whatever.  

For some it could be some underlying fear of failure or even,  for some others  – fear of success.  Maybe we don’t think that we have the specific skill required or talent needed to complete the task and that we will face ridicule.  Maybe we’re in conflict about the task at hand and aren’t even sure it’s something that we want to do. Maybe we’re overwhelmed by other demands in our lives and can’t give adequate attention to this newer demand. Maybe we don’t have a clear enough image of exactly what it is we want to accomplish.  Maybe the task is boring compared to some other activity that could substitute.  I’m far from qualified to give out any advice here but maybe there’s some food for thought in the above possibilities.
I considered these ideas and wrote the following Haiku:

  Demands, wants, needs, musts
      I want to……….I don’t want to
      Relentless tick – tock

I decided that I would set specific goals for the art work that would accompany this haiku:
1. to complete the work in a set amount of time – time that I alternatively would have spent that evening playing a game online .   I thought that it was not unreasonable to have the main designing and rough assembly done in 45 minutes.  I would do the quilting and finishing the following day.
2.  I have a plastic storage box full of previously fused cotton scraps – some of which are remnants from previous projects.  My challenge was to use ONLY fabrics from that particular box.  Believe me there were plenty to choose from.

The completed piece is approximately 12 inches by 12 inches. 

It demonstrates how focus, definition and time limits overcame procrastination in one dedicated to that art.


Haiku, Photography, Poetry, Poetry and Photography

Three Seasons

Guila Greer

  WELCOME AUTUMN

Suddenly it’s fall

The earth turns on its axis

Some things never change

  WINTER SOLSTICE

The winter solstice

starting now more sun-filled hours

Illuminating

   SPRING

Forest Canopy        

Clefts in rain soaked branches         

Sunbeams bursting through   


		


			
		
	






	
	

		Art Quilt, Haiku, Poetry, Quilts
My Peach Rhapsody
	


	

							

			 Guila Greer		
		
		

			
Just about the time we got the Haiku prompt word for September I was itching to do another fiber/ribbon collage quilt.  The perfect opportunity arose when we were presented with the word “Rhapsody”.


I always think it’s kinda interesting to look at thought processes and how we end up where we end up so I hope you do too.  I immediately discarded the obvious (to me at least that was Rhapsody in Blue) and considered “what have I been rhapsodizing about lately?” Peaches!!  I had brought home some from Costco and every time I had one I was oohing and aahing about how delicious and perfect it was.


AND, just a few days before I had been in the local quilt shop looking at orange and PEACH fabric and carrying on about how gorgeous it was.


Tada!……………….. Peach Rhapsody


And here’s the Haiku


late summer harvest


fruit heavy branches bow low


ripe juicy peaches