I’m kicking off this new blog idea—Feature Friday. It seems that I have less to blog about these days because I have been slowing down, mosaically speaking. I’ve been pursuing a couple of other interests, doing a bit of volunteering, and just generally trying to more fully inhabit regular old daily life. I am certainly still working and hopefully have a number of mosaics still in me, but I’m working at a much more relaxed pace these days.
Additionally, I’ve been working on a very large mosaic since September and have not done much else in the mosaic realm. I did not even publish my quarterly newsletter for fall for lack of things to say.
In recent months, I have been interested in apps that allow me to stage my mosaics in nicely appointed settings. I have always loved being able to see work in situ as it helps me get a better idea of the work’s dimensions, as well as its presence. There are a lot of such apps out there and I found the search a little overwhelming. But my interest remained.
Then, one day, I saw a fellow artist post some lovely in situ images of her work in which I suspected she was using some kind of app. So, I asked her about it and she recommended Artrooms—shout-out here to Anne Marie Price. I purchased the app for $3.99 for the first month, but I doubt I will continue with a subscription. Working with this app has helped me to further refine my own requirements and I am working on some possible other ways of achieving them.
However, the app is pretty good and very easy to use. I felt that the available rooms/settings were a good backdrop for a lot of my works. Of course, depending on your own work, you may find the settings not suitable for your works or taste. The settings are overall fairly spacious and contemporary, which require larger works or collections of smaller works. My only real complaint is that the app does not offer any small wall space options for smaller works. I will be pursuing other options to accommodate my smaller pieces.
Still, I am pretty happy with my results and I feel it does offer another dimension to the display of my art, and to the visual assessment of mosaics in spaces. I will be—intend to be—sharing a different artwork each time in my Feature Friday blog posts. I can’t commit to every week, but I will try for that. The works I will be featuring are not necessarily new or available works, although some will be. I have enjoyed seeing my own art in these rooms and I wanted to share them with you. I feel that it is very important to show how our art can fit, can speak, in actual spaces.
The first feature, shown above, is a mosaic titled Self Portrait. I blogged about this mosaic and its history back when I was working on it, so I’ll not go into detail here. If you are interested, you can peruse my Self Portrait posts.
In my next Friday Feature, I will talk a bit about the Artrooms app itself and my experience using it. For now, I’ve blathered on long enough.