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I decided to attend this monthly free event in Greenbelt, Maryland known as Artful Afternoon. This month’s free workshop was on making pocket puppets that was presented by a local puppet group known as the Black Cherry Puppet Theater. Basically they had clay heads (in a variety of colors ranging from bright white to fantasy skin colors like blue) mounted on popsicle sticks and you choose your choice of clay head, select a variety of materials (such as yarn, faux fur, cloth, and felt) for things like hair and clothes, and get to work on putting everything together to create your own tiny puppet. Here is what I came up with.
I documented the creation process using my new smartphone camera (which I had only received just a few days earlier). I uploaded the video on TikTok, Clapper, Instagram, and YouTube.
After ruling the United Kingdom for 70 years, Queen Elizabeth II has died today at the age of 96. For everyone who was born after 1952 (myself included), Queen Elizabeth was the only ruling British monarch that we have ever known.
On one of their last albums, Abbey Road, The Beatles recorded this short tribute to the queen called “Her Majesty.” At the time of that album’s release in 1969, Queen Elizabeth had only been on the throne for only 17 years.
I’d like to share a mixed-media piece that I did of the queen back in 2002, when she was celebrating her Golden Jubilee (for her 50-year reign).
Queen Elizabeth
Mixed media (ink and computer graphics)
9 inches x 12 inches (23 cm x 31 cm)
For the technical details on how I created this piece, you can read my original post that I wrote back in 2010. I still have memories of when I entered this piece in the 2002 Greenbelt Labor Day Arts Festival in Greenbelt, Maryland where it won Third Place in the “Best Mixed Media”. At the time I created this piece I wasn’t sure if the queen was going to be around much longer, which was one of the reasons why I decided to honor her Golden Jubilee. But she proved me wrong by living 20 years longer.
The earliest Queen Elizabeth anniversary I was aware of was her Silver Jubilee back in 1977. That was because, in the midst of the pageantry surrounding that momentous anniversary, The Sex Pistols came out with their notorious song “God Save the Queen.”
Queen Elizabeth picked an auspicious year to die because this year was also her Platinum Jubilee, which celebrated the 70th anniversary of her reign. Three months ago there was an official video released where she had tea with Paddington Bear. I’ll just end this post with that video since I feel that it’s the best way of remembering the memory of Queen Elizabeth II. (And that’s not to mention that this video is incredibly cute and funny.)
UPDATE (September 9, 2022): Just a few hours after I wrote my post, I decided to share my old mixed-media piece of Queen Elizabeth on a few social media sites. I even decided to create a short video slideshow of my piece where I paired it with The Beatles’ “Her Majesty” song. You can view it on TikTok, Clapper, Instagram, and YouTube.
Meanwhile I have a Queen Elizabeth story that I forgot to share last night (mainly because I wrote this post while I was half-exhausted). Way back in 2007 I was married to an employee at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. He came home from work one day saying “You’re not going to believe who is visiting Goddard.” When he answered Queen Elizabeth, I was surprised. But, yes, Queen Elizabeth and her husband, Prince Philip, actually paid a visit to Goddard towards the end of their visit to the U.S. to commemorate the 400th anniversary of the Jamestown settlement in Virginia.
I remember that my husband told me that the officials had to hold a lottery in order to determine which employees would actually be there to greet the Queen and Duke of Edinburgh (that’s mainly because that particular NASA campus is large with around 10,000 employees). My husband lost that lottery so he decided to take a half-day off from work on the day that the royal couple arrived because he didn’t want to deal with the more intense-than-usual traffic jams that stemmed from Elizabeth and Philip, their entourage, and the reporters from all of the major news media outlets. (That visit happened in the morning so my husband didn’t report to work until after lunchtime.) Yesterday’s NASA blog post had a photo of Queen Elizabeth greeting the NASA Goddard employees back in 2007.
It turned out that it wasn’t the only time that Queen Elizabeth had showed up in my local area. Back in 1957 she went to her first American football game with Prince Philip when she saw my future alma mater, the University of Maryland, defeat the University of North Carolina at a home game in College Park. Later that same day Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip decided to go to the nearby town of Hyattsville, where they visited their first American grocery store.
Unlike her visit to NASA Goddard, that earlier visit happened before I was born and I only learned about it yesterday when my friends were sharing links to old news stories on Facebook.
Mother’s Day weekend was pretty momentous. The Greenbelt Green Man Festival was held for the first time since 2019. (It was canceled for the last two years due to the Coronavirus pandemic.) Once again it was scheduled for Mother’s Day weekend but, with the weather being the way it was that weekend, maybe the organizers should’ve waited and scheduled it for Father’s Day on the following month (especially since the Green Man is traditionally a male deity).
The first day of the festival was very cold (the temperature didn’t even go above 50 degrees Fahrenheit) and it rained a lot. The awful weather was among the reasons why I chose to go to the indoor Free Comic Book Day event at the nearby Beltway Plaza mall instead of the first day of Green Man.
The day before the festival I submitted this fan art that I did to the Green Man Art Show that was also launched at The New Deal Cafe on the same weekend as the festival and it ran for several weeks afterwards.
In the Field of Sunflowers (Care Bears Fan Art)
Watercolor, gouache, ink, acrylic, water-soluble wax crayons
8 inches x 10 inches
20 cm x 25 cm
You can learn more about the making of this piece right here.
As for Mother’s Day itself, it had stopped raining but the weather was very cool with temperatures being in the high 40’s. I initially went to the Farmers Market since it was the first day of the 2022 season. (The Greenbelt Farmers Market generally runs on Sundays from May-December.)
They had live entertainment at the Farmers Market featuring a singer and an accordion player.
I shot a short video of their performance, which I uploaded on to TikTok, Clapper, and YouTube.
The Farmers Market had a booth known as the Tea Fairy. One of my friends was staffing it (she was helping out the woman who portrayed the Tea Fairy), which was why I took a few shots of that booth.
The Tea Fairy had this deal where you could get a free balloon animal or flower in exchange for a $5 donation. I made the donation and chose a dog as my balloon piece.
Afterwards I walked over to the nearby Greenbelt Green Man Festival. It was sparse compared to previous years with fewer vendors, exhibits, and performers overall. Part of the reason was because it was being held for the first time in three years (since COVID-19 had prompted the cancellation of the last two years) and part of the reason was because the weather was so cold and wet. (The ground was still wet from the previous day’s rain.) The live acts were originally scheduled to perform on an outdoor stage but the performers were moved indoors to the nearby New Deal Cafe because the weather was so incredibly cold. But the empty stage became a play area for some energetic kids.
Other years I’ve seen people wear festive clothes like flower crowns and Renaissance-style clothes. I decided to wear a glitter Minnie Mouse headband that I bought at Walmart with a pair of fairy wings that I purchased from a Spirit of Halloween store a few years ago. I was one of the few people who actually dressed up for this festival because the weather was cold and rainy.
And here’s me with my new balloon dog that I got from the Tea Fairy booth at the nearby Greenbelt Farmers Market.
One of the festival volunteers was urging people to see the live acts in the New Deal Cafe.
Here are some various shots of the festival where you can see the few people milling around wearing heavy clothes due to the cold weather along with just a few of the handcrafted items that were on sale. (I noticed that there were fewer vendors than in previous years.)
The last few photos are of the things I purchased from the Farmers Market and Green Man Festival. They basically consisted of the balloon dog and five bars of handcrafted soaps that I purchased from two different vendors. (At least I won’t have any problems with keeping myself clean for the next few months. LOL!)
Here’s a shot of my balloon dog.
Two of the soap bars came from Mystic Water Soap, which is based in Riverdale Park, Maryland.
The other three bars came from another local vendor known as Root Down Cleansing.
Here’s a silly photo I shot of the balloon dog with my two Disney Nuimos, Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse.
Starting this week you can have the chance to both see and purchase my most recent work in person. Here is my contribution to a special exhibit, which is a tie-in with this weekend’s Greenbelt Green Man Festival.
In the Field of Sunflowers (Care Bears Fan Art)
Watercolor, gouache, ink, acrylic, water-soluble wax crayons
8 inches x 10 inches
20 cm x 25 cm
You can learn more about the making of this piece right here. It is being displayed as part of a special exhibit that is being opened at the New Deal Cafe concurrently with this weekend’s Greenbelt Green Man Festival and will run through the months of May and June. Here is where you can view and even purchase my work:
The New Deal Cafe
113 Centerway (located in Roosevelt Center)
Greenbelt, Maryland 20770
Directions can be found here.
On Valentine’s Day I decided to attend a Sip & Paint event that was being held at The Space. The idea was that we would paint a picture while we sampled various wines, ate nice Valentine-themed snacks, and socialized with each other. I know that there are other Sip & Paint events throughout the Baltimore-Washington, DC area where everyone basically works on the same painting. With this event, we were encouraged to do our own thing.
I admit that I was stumped at first but then I thought about just doing a themed painting where I would focus on the events that were going on in February. Lunar New Year had came and went and I also knew that Mardi Gras was going to happen soon. So I decided to do a painting where I would combine Lunar New Year, Mardi Gras, and Valentine’s Day. I was in one of two scheduled Sip & Paint sessions that day and I was in the early session, which ended before I was able to finish my painting. Here is what it looked like at the end of the session.
I took the painting home where I worked on it some more. I mistakenly thought that Mardi Gras was in February this year. It wasn’t until I was three-quarters of the way finished with the art that I learned that Mardi Gras was actually March 1 this year. By that point I felt too lazy to make a major alteration to the painting so I decided to just leave the Mardi Gras jester riding that tiger. I added some hearts to the painting. As the month went on, I saw that there were more things that were going on. I decided to turn my painting into a mixed-media piece by downloading free clip art from various websites (such as OpenClipArt.org), printing them out, and decoupage them to the painting using Modge Podge. Here is the completed piece.
022022 (February 1-March 2, 2022)
Kimberly Keyes
Mixed-Media (acrylic paint and paper)
I used a lot of symbolism in this painting. The red background symbolizes both Lunar New Year and Valentine’s Day. The four pink hearts represent Valentine’s Day. The jester represents Mardi Gras. The tiger represents Lunar New Year, which proclaimed 2022 as the Year of the Tiger.
As for the paper clip art collage pieces, they represent other events that happened at the same time. I’ll start with the events that happen each year. The graphic featuring a groundhog seeing his shadow represents Groundhog Day (which is on February 2). The Black History Month graphic represents the fact that it happens in February. The graphic featuring George Washington and Abraham Lincoln represents Presidents’ Day, which takes place on the third Monday in February.
Then I included a graphic of an event that took place in February but it only takes place once every few years. I’m referring to this year’s Winter Olympics, which took place in Beijing. I ended up not watching the Olympic games this year (I’ve long grown tired of NBC’s crappy coverage of those games and, based on the usual bad reviews, I don’t feel that I’ve missed much) but I felt that I should provide a reference to that event anyway.
Finally I included two graphics that I called WTF because they marked two very unfortunate events that took place in February. There was a picture of a microscopic image of the Coronavirus that I included because we are still in the middle of a major pandemic and people are still getting sick. (Many places are starting to loosen mask and vaccine mandates despite the fact that the more contagious BA.2 variant is making its way to the United States.)
I had originally planned to consider my art to be finished after I added that Coronavirus graphic but then Russia decided to invade Ukraine just days after the conclusion of the Winter Olympics. So, at the last minute, I added a Ukrainian flag graphic to my piece.
I’m glad that I’m finished with the piece. I’m satisfied with the way it turned out. Last Saturday I took my piece back to The Space just to show it to people since I had started my project there. Everyone who saw it loved what I did.
I also decided to do a short video slideshow of my art, which I uploaded on to TikTok, Clapper, and YouTube.
This year I’m taking part in the 20th anniversary edition of Artomatic. Unlike previous Artomatics, this one will be a virtual event due to the Coronavirus pandemic. Trying to provide a direct link to my Artomatic exhibit is a challenge due to the way the website is designed, which I already griped about in this blog. I decided to write a separate post focusing on what I currently have on display just in case you don’t want to deal with the horrible interface of the official Artomatic website. I’ve included the size and price of each item. Purchasing information will be posted at the bottom of this post.
Desire
Acrylic on canvas
9 inches x 12 inches
23 cm x 30 cm
Price: $125
Robot in the Park
Mixed media (circuit board, rubber superball, tin, plastic 8-ball, string, glass beads, sticker, and acrylic paint on canvas)
5 inches x 5 inches
13 cm x 13 cm
Price: $50
My Little Pony
Acrylic on canvas
10 inches x 10 inches
25 cm x 25 cm
Price: $100
Souseiseki and Suiseiseki from the anime Rozen Maiden
Acrylic on canvas tote bag
15 inches x 10 inches x 5.5 inches
Price: $125
Fashion Show
LEGO Minifig and acrylic paint on canvas
4 inches x 4 inches
10 cm x 10 cm
Price: $10
Unfortunately the Artomatic website has a limit of just five art pieces, which is a far cry from the real-life shows where we were only limited by the amount of space we had in our area so we could fit as much art as the space could hold. I can change the graphics and descriptions so if I don’t get much response to what I have now, I’ll probably swap them in a couple of weeks for other art that I’ve done.
Artomatic will run until August 20, 2020. As for purchases, I am only accepting payments through PayPal. If you live within a five-mile radius of my home, I will provide free contactless delivery to your front door. For addresses further than five miles I will ship Priority Mail with the U.S. Post Office. To begin making a purchase, contact me via email at kimstark61 at gmail dot com.
UPDATE (August 9, 2020): I have received no notices from anyone regarding my work. In an effort to increase interest in my exhibition, I attempted to swap out what I currently have on display with more art only to discover that the Edit button that used to be there has been completely removed. So it looks like what you see in this entry will remain as my official Artomatic exhibition until the show officially closes on August 20, 2020.
UPDATE (August 20, 2020): Today is the last day of the virtual exhibit. I haven’t gotten any sales or attention from what I displayed. I’ll admit that I haven’t attended any of the virtual workshops or other virtual events at this Artomatic mainly because I was busy with other things going on in my life. This year’s virtual Artomatic was not quite the same as being there in person but I gave it my best shot so I’m not going to let it bother me at all. I’ll probably check out some of the prerecorded workshops that took place this year at a later date.
Previous in This Series
A Shot of a Ferris Wheel on the Day Before the Greenbelt Labor Day Festival, August 30, 2018
Last year I attended the opening night of the Greenbelt Labor Day Festival for the first time in my life. While I’ve attended previous festivals, I generally tended to blow off opening night and show up on the first full day of the festival.
This year I wasn’t able to attend opening night, mainly because I was helping out with a special project in Takoma Park where we were aiding a man who was required to do a job interview via a smartphone app. (I wrote a post about it because it was the first time I had ever heard of a job interview being conducted in this way. I have a feeling that doing a job interview via smartphone app is a harbinger of things to come for job seekers in the future.) So I reverted to previous years where I didn’t attend the Greenbelt Labor Day Festival for the first time until Saturday.
This time last year the weather was not only cooler than usual but it rained as well. For the first time ever I wore a hooded sweatshirt and long pants to the festival. This year it was completely the opposite, especially in the morning and early afternoon. The weather was cloudy, in the high 80’s, and the humidity was very thick. Just walking around the festival was a miserable experience and I grew tired pretty quickly.
I took the free shuttle over to the festival grounds where I saw that the Greenbelt City Hall had lowered its flags to half-staff to honor the recent passing of Senator John McCain.
One new thing I noticed this year was the concrete barriers that had chalk art on them.
The Greenbelt Elementary School PTA had its used book sale, which was very popular as people shopped for bargains.
Saturday was Community Day where various local groups and businesses had their information booths where they gave out flyers, brochures, and sometimes free goodies like candy, pens, and pencils.
I shot the Chick-fil-A cow mascot.
The Old Greenbelt Theater had a poster for the movie that it was currently showing, Spike Lee’s BlacKkKlansman.
The Greenbelt Makerspace had its open house where it displayed its computers, robots, and various types of electronics and maker tools.
The carnival midway was lively as people ate food, went on the rides, and played some of the midway games.
After a while the heat and humidity got to me so I ducked inside of the Greenbelt Community Center so I could cool off in the air conditioning. There is an art exhibition highlighting three local artists that’s currently going on until October. I really liked the art on display in that room so much that I took a few pictures. I especially liked the ones by Jim Doran because I found his skeleton and skull art so interesting and whimsical to look at.
The main reason why I was at the festival on Saturday was because I had entered this mixed-media piece in the Greenbelt Labor Day Art show called Robot in the Park.
I wrote a blog post about this piece a few months ago so I suggest clicking on this link if you want to learn about the story and the creative process behind this piece.
I submitted my work to the Greenbelt Labor Day Art Show early on Thursday evening before the festival began. One of the conditions of participating in this show is that I had to sign up for a one-hour volunteer shift sometime during the weekend. I signed up to work on Saturday from 2-3 p.m. so I had plenty of time to eat an early lunch, take the free shuttle to the festival grounds, and walk around a bit. I was even able to view the Greenbelt Labor Day Photography Show and the art show itself before my shift began. I found out that my piece had won a second place ribbon in the mixed-media category, which thrilled me. That ribbon meant that I could attend the award ceremony that was scheduled on Labor Day itself where I would collect my prize and receive public recognition.
So I served my one-hour shift then I decided to walk around the festival some more. I found that the weather had cooled off a little bit so it made walking a bit more pleasant even though the humidity still remained high. I decided to sit at one of the tables outside the Greenbelt Makerspace where I sorted through the photos I had taken so far. At one point an old friend whom I hadn’t seen in a while stopped by and we chatted a bit. At that point the weather turned darker and I saw lightning flashes. It eventually started to rain. Fortunately I was underneath an awning so I could watch the rain while staying dry. At one point the sun came out so there was that unusual phenomenon of raining while it’s sunny at the same time. (When I was a kid, I used to be told that such weather meant that the devil was beating his wife.) When the rain started to taper off into a drizzle, a rainbow suddenly appeared.
By the time the rainbow appeared I was hungry so I walked over to one of the food vendors where I ordered a large cheese crab pretzel. The weather had cooled off considerably and it was pleasant walking outside. The only downside was that it was wet everywhere from the rain so I walked back to the tables under the Greenbelt Makerspace awning and consumed my dinner there. I resumed sorting through the photos I had taken that day until night fell. I walked over to another food booth where I ordered a vanilla ice cream cone with a chocolate dip top and ate that. I also took a few night photos of the festival.
I didn’t stay long because my body had grown tired from walking around the festival in high humidity earlier and it was hard finding a dry place to sit due to the rain. I decided to pick up the next free shuttle bus and head home.
Next in This Series
2018 Greenbelt Labor Day Festival, September 2, 2018
2018 Greenbelt Labor Day Parade, September 3, 2018
2018 Greenbelt Labor Day Festival, September 3, 2018
The Day After the End of the Greenbelt Labor Day Festival, September 4, 2018
For the past couple of years I’ve been taking the Gateway Arts Open Studio Tour and I’ve been blogging about these tours in May, 2016; December, 2016; and May, 2017. For this year’s tour there was some Facebook drama. From what I was told, the people who organized the previous Open Studio Tours had been dragging its feet about organizing a new tour for 2018 so some of the artists who had participated in the previous tours decided to take it upon themselves to organize their own art tour that was scheduled for the day before Mother’s Day. The organizers of the Open Studio Tours realized that they were lax about organizing a tour for this year so they decided to organize an official tour that would coincide with Mount Rainier Day (which is an annual neighborhood celebration) on the following Saturday while putting out promo materials claiming that this year’s walk would be a two consecutive Saturday walk beginning with the one that the artists themselves had organized on the day before Mother’s Day.
So naturally there were accusations of cooption. On top of it some artists questioned the wisdom of scheduling the second Open Studio Tour on the same weekend as Mount Rainier Day because it might draw crowds away from the artist studios who happened to be located in towns north of Mount Rainier (such as Hyattsville and Brentwood). Some artists decided not to participate in the second Saturday’s Open Studio Tour while others decided to participate on both Saturdays.
As for me, I wasn’t able to make it to the first Saturday’s Open Studio Tour because I had opted to attend the Greenbelt Green Man Festival, which was scheduled the same weekend. I was amazed at reading all of the Facebook drama but I ended up going to the Open Studio Tour on the second Saturday mainly because I’ve enjoyed the previous ones. The silver lining to all of this controversy is that, thanks to the artist boycott of the second Saturday tour, it made my decision as to which studios to actually visit much easier.
The only downside is that it had been raining that day. Fortunately it wasn’t raining too heavily so I was able to carry my umbrella, which I used at times. There were also times when there was no rain at all. At least you know why all of the outdoor photos I took that day featured clouds and wet ground.
I also must warn you that there are some images in this post that are definitely NSFW.
I first stopped at the Renaissance Gallery in Hyattsville.
The Renaissance Gallery is located on the lower level of the Renaissance Square Artists Housing, which provides affordable housing for working artists.
Renaissance Gallery features the art of Pepe Piedra, who is a painter.
Pepe Piedra can be seen painting at his easel in the next photograph.
Afterwards I drove south to Brentwood, where I visited the art that was on display at the Brentwood Arts Exchange.
Located on the upper level of the Brentwood Arts Exchange Building is the 39th Street Gallery and Studios, which is a separate gallery/studio that featured even more art, including paintings of the famous artist Frida Kahlo.
Next I drove less than a mile north of the Brentwood Arts Exchange where I went to ezStorage.
ezStorage is a nationwide chain of storage facilities. What makes the Brentwood, Maryland location of ezStorage unique is that it has allowed artists to operate studios on the lower level of the building. Some of the studios were closed that day because some of the artists had opted to boycott the second Saturday of the Open Studio Tour.
There was one studio that closed early due to a family emergency.
There were a couple of available spaces where one can set up his/her own art studio.
There were a couple of ezStorage studios that were opened that day and I was fortunate to be able to see some of the art that was created in that location.
I drove on south until I reached Mount Rainier, where the traffic was clogged because it was also Mount Rainier Day. I managed to find parking a few blocks away from the main action on Route 1 so it was okay.
I was initially surprised to find that ReCreative Spaces was on the list of participants in the Open Studio Tour because I was told that the place had to close down earlier this year because operating it wasn’t sustainable.
I went inside to find two people associated with ReCreative Spaces who told me that the person who was in charge of the place has since moved on but there are new people who are thinking of ways to somehow revive the place. ReCreative Spaces had some art on display but it was all on the lower level. The place was empty of most furniture and there was nothing on the upper level. Only time will tell whether ReCreative Spaces will be revived to its former glory or not. At least the art that was on display that day looked nice.
I went on to the Gateway Media Arts Lab, which had a variety of art on display by local artists.
I saw portraits of famous people like Prince, Tupac Shakur, and Redd Foxx.
I also saw more art based on Frida Kahlo.
I also saw this mixed-media art piece featuring a Barbie doll and the Minions from the Despicable Me movies.
The last place I visited on the Open Studio Tour was at Joe’s Movement Emporium, which has this gorgeous butterfly mural outside its doors.
I didn’t stay long in Joe’s Movement Emporium because it was towards the end of the day and I really needed to use the bathroom. I managed to view the art that was on display in the hallway.
While I was in Mount Rainier I checked out Mount Rainier Day, which is an annual neighborhood celebration. There were activities for children, live performances, and people walking around dressed up as Mickey Mouse and Spider-Man.
One of the lanes that comprise Route 1 was temporarily shut down in order to make room for vendor booths which sold a variety of handcrafted goods and services. That turned into a traffic snarl as the cars had to share one of the lanes for the duration of the festival. But there were a variety of nice stuff available for sale.
The Mount Rainier Public Library was actually giving away free books to anyone who was passing by.
I browsed the tables until I found a copy of Marguerite Henry’s classic book Misty of Chincoteague. I read that book as a child (along with its sequels Sea Star: Orphan of Chincoteague and Stormy, Misty’s Foal) and I loved it. I had also made numerous visits to what the books says is the birthplace of Misty, Assateague Island. (Although the official Misty of Chincoteague site said that the real-life Misty was born in captivity in Chincoteague.) In any case, you can see the Misty of Chincoteague book among the pile of books waiting to be taken away to new homes.
I had a good day walking the Open Studio Tour despite the Facebook drama. Hopefully there will be another Open Studio Tour next year with less online drama than this year.
Robot in the Park
Mixed media (circuit board, rubber superball, tin, plastic 8-ball, string, glass beads, sticker, and acrylic paint on canvas)
5 inches x 5 inches
13 cm x 13 cm
I got the idea for this project when the plug of my cell phone charger literally broke apart. I noticed that there was a tiny circuit board inside of that plug. I began to think of creating a tiny art project utilizing this tiny circuit board that would be similar to my previous Robot Diavolino.
But then I didn’t do anything with that circuit board for a number of months. In the meantime I found a tiny rubber superball on the floor of my home with a smiley face printed on it. I don’t remember how I got that superball because it’s not something I would buy for myself since I had outgrown superballs a long time ago and I don’t have any young children who would play with one. It was way too small to donate to a thrift shop. I thought about throwing it away until I remembered that tiny circuit board and I figured that it would make a perfect head for my circuit board should I ever do anything creative with it. I put the two away in the same box then I forgot about them for a while longer.
I finally got around to making something with that circuit board and superball. What prompted it was that I learned that a local art gallery was having a call to artists and it was looking for art which used recycled materials.
So I finally purchased a small canvas, painted the background with acrylic paint, then assembled the robot itself. For the arms and legs I used glass beads that I had lying around the house. (I used to make jewelry to sell at local shows but I quit doing it because it never really sold well plus many local craft shows were inundated with jewelry tables and there were some craft shows that had a glut of jewelry. I basically threw in the towel because there was just too much competition.) For the hands and feet I used tin that was cut from the sides of an Altoids tin with special metal cutters. As for the 8-ball balloon, I found half of a plastic 8-ball on the floor of a local laundromat (which I sometimes cut through on my way to the shopping mall entrance). It looked like it came from a gumball machine. I pocketed that 8-ball half and used that for the balloon. I had some twine lying around the house, which made a perfectly scaled balloon string. Finally I used a heart-shaped sticker for the robot’s chest, which came from a book of Valentine’s Day-themed stickers that I purchased from a local arts and crafts store for only $1 a few years ago.
I managed to get this project finished just in time for the art gallery’s deadline. (I submitted this piece along with my Robot Diavolino.) I have yet to find out whether it has been accepted or not as of this writing. Regardless of whether it gets into that show or now, I’m pretty happy with how this project turned out.
Sagittarius Dolly 
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