Stampo-Lampo

Something I recently changed about the flat. The paper lamp below used to look somewhat like this, but smaller before.




Photos by Olga

I easily get bored with things and interiors (actually with lots of other things as well to be honest), but I don't like to buy new stuff especially as it is getting harder to get something really unique. IKEA is very practical - but doesn't everyone have IKEA these days? My Dad mailed me some stamps from our collection - we used to collect them together when I was little - so I stuck them to an old paper lamp we had. Easy peasy :) It actually turned out nice - and now gives that dim warm light to the hall which it was previously lacking.

If interested here is the other lamp I made a while back. Lamps seem to be a great thing to play with.

HomeHomeWorkWork

I haven't recently posted anything much about my home - this is what happens when you travel too much I guess :) But when I come back from my travels I always want to come to a very warm and beautiful place I call home and I like to do all sorts of things to convert it into this cosy, colourful and comfortable place to live in. Below are some of the things I created or added a personal touch to - to make them less boring.

This is a small stool which I decorated using decoupage technique, which looked like this and this before.


Image by Olga


Image by Olga


Image by Olga

I sprayed this clock silver, then added the new background and the round elements to its lower panel and sides.


Image by Olga


Image by Olga

After adding the knobs brought from India to the wooden desk and the chests of drawers they definitely started to look better - slightly more exotic and now they really stand out. I love those Indian knobs - such a simple yet exquisite invention! Here is how the desk drawers looked before.


Image by Olga


Image by Olga


Image by Olga

This simple IKEA tray started to look much better after I covered its bottom with wrapping paper and a layer of transparent acrylic lacquer.


Image by Olga

And the last but not least is the old broken lamp found in the attic... We had to remove all the old cables and replace them with new ones. I was lucky to find a couple of old lampshades in a second hand shop, one of which suited well the recovered lamp.


Image by Olga


Image by Olga


Image by Olga

Giving things the new look and feel is quite easy - sometimes it costs nothing to create an absolutely unique thing for your place. I really have fun doing so :)

Tree Art

Finally the time has come to post about the last tree I painted as a part of the contemporary art tree project I invented and already previously posted about several times.

Images by Olga

The last tree is one of the trees I like best not only because of the concept and colour but also because of what it represents - Pop Art - one of my favourite contemporary art styles. I'm sure Pop Art is one of the most known movements, so I'm not going to go much into the details about it. I can only say that what I like about it is its kitschiness and irony, connection to adverts, comic books and popular mass culture - all the very visual forms of expression!

I also thought it would make sense to put all the rest of the trees already mentioned before together in the same post. So here they come one by one:

Cubism tree from Out Of My Tree post:

Image by Olga

Art Nouveau tree from Art Nouveau Triumphs! post:

Image by Olga

Suprematism tree from Tree time post:

Image by Olga

Futurism tree from Trick or... Tree? post:

Image by Olga

Post-Impressionism tree from Has Anyone Seen A Tree Here?.. post:

Image by Olga

Dada tree from Art Nouveau Triumphs! post:


Image by Olga

Expressionism tree from Has Anyone Seen A Tree Here?.. post:

Image by Olga

Abstract Art tree from Out Of My Tree post:


Image by Olga

Impressionism tree from Trick or... Tree? post:

Image by Olga

Constructivism tree from Tree time post:

Image by Olga

Although I actually painted the trees a while ago I enjoyed the whole process very much as I learned really a huge deal about the mentioned (and not!) movements of contemporary art and I was quite pleased with the results. Definitely with time I discovered (also with some bloggers' help :)) some mistakes I made representing each style - so there are lessons learned and things to work on! I'm very curious about your thoughts and feedback about the trees. Which one is your favourite and which do you like least?

Long Shelf Life

It is amazing how painting a wooden piece of furniture can give it a huge makeover effect. You basically get a totally new piece instead! Sometimes it is not easy to get the courage to start painting as you might be afraid that you can make things even worse. Still I think the result is totally worth the risk! And even if you don't get it right the first time you will definitely do the second - it is very easy to repaint the piece with a totally different colour! Here is my experiment with our old wooden bookshelf I previously didn't quite like (here is the before picture).

Image by Olga

This was my first attempt at it and I think I was lucky to get it right. I covered the shelf with 2 layers of white (on the outside) and red (on the inside) acrylic paint and used a stencil to decorate it. The stencil's shape is my favourite design that is used decoratively as well as symbolically - lily or Fleur-de-lis. You can also find this symbol in this post. The symbol has many meanings, historically used to represent royalty, and in that sense to signify perfection, light, and life (this doesn't have much to do with the shelf itself though.. :))

Image by Olga

I'm quite satisfied with the whole painting experience and with the result - it was great to give the old bookshelf a second life! I like how it both stands out from and matches the red walls of our living room.

Image by Olga

Has Anyone Seen A Tree Here?..

I took a little break from posting about my trees... I needed one. And you probably needed it as well :) But here they are back again - the two new ones for today - and only one more to go - I propose you to guess which movement the last tree is going to represent.

Image by Olga

Expressionists, sought to depict their emotions and responses, which objects and reality arouse in them. They completely gave in to their negative emotions and accomplished their aim through distortion, exaggeration, primitivism, and fantasy - through the vivid, violent, and dynamic application of color. Expressionism is one of the main currents of art in the later 19th and the 20th centuries. One of the most famous works of expressionism is most probably Edvard Munch's The Scream... But here is another very interesting work of Expressionism by Emil Nolde - Masks Still Life.

Image by Google

Today's second tree refers to Post-Impressionism - the art of clear colours and shining light, the art of joy of life and rest from trouble!

Image by Olga

One of the founders of this movement is Henri Matisse. The primary element of post-impressionists' creation is the emotional experience and feeling and the main means - colour, paint and hues! The below work by Matisse is called La Musique.

Image by Google

Почта for Post

Today I started thinking that it's been a good while since I added pictures or posted about any of my works (except for the trees of course!:)) So not to bore you too much with those - here is another card from my collection - and I will repeat myself in confessing that I just love collage technique. If you find it interesting too - more of my cards for you here and here.

Image by Olga

I don't really like how the bottom left white corner looks like, in reality it is a ruffled white paper - unfortunately after the card is scanned - it can't be seen anymore..

Unfortunately there hasn't been too much improvement with my two little pets since yesterday :(... I'm hoping they will start recovering by the next visit to the vet, which is this Friday... They got allergic to something by the look of things - and keep scratching themselves, poor things..

Trick or... Tree?

It is time for yet another 2 trees from my collection (I have only 3 left now... ;)). Today I have decided to go sort of more classic way - if one can call it classic of course. I just think the modern art movements I'm presenting today - and actually the trees themselves - are more conventional than those from the previous post. (Do let me know if you don't agree!)

Image by Olga

With the first tree I tried to portray a lot of movement, which is so characteristic of all the works of Futurism. One of the most interesting futuristic works I'd say is 'Dynamism of a Dog on a Leash' by Giacomo Balla. I think the work is very representative of the art movement itself.

Image by Google

As for the second one - I guess many of you have guessed straight away - yes, this is good old Impressionism with all its amazing history, hundreds of genious paintings, colourful strokes and - well - impressions!

Image by Olga

I could add so many pictures of impressionists works here right now - but I think I would just limit myself to posting one of my absolutely favourite works of Impressionism - The Starry Night by Vincent Van Gogh:

Image by Google

Image by Wikipedia

Roll Your Coaster!

I enjoy remaking things - I often have ideas related to changing the original state of objects and adding to them some personal touches. Whenever I have things which seem to be of no use anymore I like to look for their new purpose and give them a second life. I don't look to buy old and vintage things I would further remake - it would be a hard thing to find around here.. I try to pick from objects within reach, which look dull and boring and also from those, which are difficult to spoil ;) An example would be the lamp I made of a wine bottle from this post). I tried to give a bit of a makeover to some old coasters I had at home (here is how they looked before), so I cut some movie ads of some of the films I like so much - and which looked appealing - and glued them to the coaster surface. I also added some round black'n'white elements to make the coasters look a little more special and covered the coasters with acrylic lacquer to make them heat resistant. So here is the final result - I think it is quite easy to guess which movies these are:

Images by Olga

Tree Time

The time has come for another two trees from my collection! This time I tried to have them more connected to each other by topic - or rather art movement, which they represent. Both of the movements I am presenting today were originated in Russia at the beginning of XX century. First of all let's look at Suprematism - the first movement of pure geometrical abstraction in painting, originated by Kazimir Malevich in about 1913. I enjoyed creating this tree in the similar style as suprematists developed for their paintings.

Image by Olga

Malevich explained that in Suprematism “the appropriate means of representation is always the one which gives fullest possible expression to feeling as such and which ignores the familiar appearance of objects.” I'm pretty sure everyone remembers his 'Black Square' painting.

Another art form is probably a bit less known, but still very interesting - it is Constructivism, which denied 'art for art's sake' concept presented previously by my Dada Tree in favour of art as a practice directed towards social purposes. I'm very curious about your immediate thoughts and reactions on this one:

Image by Olga

Art Nouveau Triumphs!

As promised I'm adding more images of my trees today. As previously mentioned I drew each of them trying to reflect and represent one particular style of modern art. Today's first tree is actually my favourite one :), because it is an Art Nouveau tree, and for me Art Nouveau is something really outstanding and exquisite.

Image by Olga

I found this beautiful collage of Art Nouveau posters and couldn't help adding it to this post:

Image via Google

And here are some images of Art Nouveau decor and furniture, there is a whole section devoted to this in Musée d'Orsay in Paris, so if you like it - this is definitely something for you:

Images by Olga

My second tree for today is a Dada tree.

Image by Olga

Dada - although slightly less known in comparison to previously mentioned Cubism, Abstract Art and Art Nouveau - is a very important movement, because it gave birth or rather developed into Collage and Photomontage. 'Dada Triumphs' is a classic dadaist work by Raoul Hausmann:

Image via Google

More trees to come next week, stay tuned! ;)

Out Of My Tree

A while ago I engaged myself into a project in order to come to understand better and learn more about contemporary and avant-garde art movements. I chose a number of different art styles and tried to use their main techniques and characteristics in order to draw a simple tree. Today I am posting two of 11 works I have in total - the first tree is based on Cubism principles and the second one represents Abstract Art movement.

Images by Olga

I also couldn't stop myself from adding these colourful mosaics - the first inspired by cubism and the second by abstract art. I especially like the paintings-elements by Braque and Łempicka on the first one. By the way, Łempicka is one of my favourite artists - I will be posting more about her soon!



And from the second one - of course the great works of Kandinsky and Joan Miro!

Images via IWantMyOilPainting