Janet Takahashi

Somewhere Over the Rainbow. . .

admin — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 21:22:47 +0000

MOVING DAYS. . . Packing up a studio full of “stuff” (17 years worth of stuff) and movin’ onwards and up. Editing. Evaluating. Sorting. Sifting. What do I need? What will I keep? What will I donate and share? Toss behind, let go, and move on to make room in my life for new adventures and creations of art. As they say, “you have to take your foot off 1st base to get to 2nd, and so forth.” Clear the tables, “Leap and the net will appear”(another saying scribbled in my journal). This has been my summer; more light, longer days and knowing that “somewhere over the rainbow” I know that by getting rid of these things, I will have more room in my life for more _______ (fill in the blank).
We are always moving somewhere, this is life’s journey.

Pen and Ink drawing done with a Namiki fountain pen, extra-fine needlepoint, super-flex nib, black ink.
Fountain pen nib re-ground by Greg at www.gregminuskin.com (the best!)

Come join me in Northern California, near Mount Shasta, for an Exciting, new Workshop

admin — Sun, 02 May 2010 22:30:29 +0000

McCLOUD, MT. SHASTA, CALIFORNIA. June 24, 25 and 26, 2010.
A SKETCHBOOK JOURNALING WORKSHOP. You will learn techniques with pen and ink sketches, watercolors used creatively, and building textural layers for journal pages. Learn to incorporate your own writings onto your sketchbook compositions. Lots of tricks with old tools, based on examples, step-by-step exercises.
For more info. contact Claudia Ellis at www.BrownDogGallery.com 307 Pine Street, McCloud, CA
. McCloud, California. elev. 3,291 ft. An historic logging town from the turn of the century, at the skirt of Mt. Shasta, northern California. Always draped with a cascade of glaciers, this mountain (elev.14,161 ft.) provides a most spectacular sight at each minute of nature’s light and forever moving cloud formations. Claudia & Jim Ellis own Brown Dog Gallery in the center of the town’s historic district which displays the art of Claudia and other renown artists. Art and Gifts beautifully handmade and created with such craftsmanship in an interior setting that transforms you to loose all sense of time. Gorgeous old plank floors in a two-story clapboard, tall Victorian windows with a view of the mountain (of course). Workshop upstairs in an refined eclectic art haven that looks down upon a full flower-field garden. Whew!.
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The Shasta Sunset Dinner Train. In my sketchbook from the summer before.
You know, I always like to paint my food. One must paint quickly while the food remains hot! The night moon makes the mountain “glow”.
p.s. the train is for sale.

watercolor paint diary

admin — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 07:19:06 +0000

SOMETIMES I CARRY MY BRUSHES IN A ROLL like this with the brush handles woven thru a grosgrain ribbon that ties the bundle.
The watercolor brushes stay neat and the roll can be tucked upright in the pocket of a tote bag.
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PINK-Y COLOR SWATCH NOTES in a 4″ x 6″ Aquabee Sketch Book. Artists’ quality watercolor names, brands and transparency notes. Beautiful yummy colors, glowing.

GREEN-Y Artists’ grade quality WATERCOLOR SWATCH notes. When they’re side by side, you can compare the nuances; a little more yellow, a little more blue? Swatch notes for a smaller travel paintbox. Portable mini watercolor pans from Daniel Smith can be filled with fresh tube colors and inserted into a travel box. Some colors are irresistible.

A Japanese Happy New Year!

admin — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 06:32:00 +0000

For Japanese, NEW YEAR is one of the most important celebrations of the year, a festive occasion. Traditionally the house must be cleaned of the clutter and dust of the past year to start the New Year afresh. Preparation of food for New Year’s occupies much of the time with traditional dishes symbolic of good health and wealth and giving thanks for the past and expressing hope for a greater, happier new year.
My mother starts the preparations right after Christmas, getting the house ready for New Year’s day. Relatives and friends drop by all day on New Year’s day and feast on all the traditional Japanese foods and an eclectic assortment of other cuisines. Football games on tv play in the background, the fireplace full-on blazing and the house fills with laughter and voices.
MOCHI is a special kind of steamed rice, pounded and shaped into small, round buns. KAGAMI MOCHI, a symbolic Japanese presentation in every home displays a leaf-stemmed mandarin orange atop double stacked mochi rice cakes. It’s overall meaning is one of hope for a brighter and happier New Year. The kelp embellishment is a symbol of joy because the word is found in “yorokobu” (to be glad). The mandarin orange means “generation to generation” and its color symbolizes a prosperous future.

My mother makes a couple of different kinds of sushi as well. MAKI-SUSHI shown here. I paint while she works on the table in front of me. First she puts a beautiful shiny blue-black sheet of seaweed onto a bamboo mat. (I use these kind of mats for storing my paintbrushes). Next hot fluffy rice with a mixture of vinegar & rice wine is spread with a large wooden flat spoon. Then 5 or 7 cooked items of: carrots, shiitake mushrooms, spinach, cooked egg, “kampio”-dried squash, eel, and dried shrimp are layered like a multi-colored ribbon onto the rice. She then rolls the whole kaboodle with the aid of the bamboo mat. Somehow the “food ribbon” is perfectly centered in the rice roll.
Now, the best part is about to happen. Sometimes the sushi logs are wrapped in waxed paper and ready themselves to be cut neatly with a very sharp knife into these perfect “tires”. When one is standing nearby, the “end cuts” don’t make it on to beautiful vintage Japanese china platters. They’re delicious!!!
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Back to the story of the “kagami mochi” (shown above). The origin of the kagami mochi offering is based on Amerasu-omikami’s (sun-goddess) hiding in the cave of Ama-no-Iwato. With the sun-goddess in hiding, the world became dark and prayers for her reappearance were made to a mirror, which symbolized the goddess. The kagami mochi represents the mirror and is a symbol of hope for a bright and happy New Year. So, TO MY DEAR FRIENDS IN ALL THE WORLD, HAPPY NEW YEAR, and loads of PROSPERITY as well.

Winter Jackalopes

admin — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 06:05:33 +0000

Jackalopes from the Southwest Desert pose with winter banner as the brisk north wind whips tumbleweed like giant popcorn balls through the desertscape. I capture the scene with pen and ink. Banner with pinecone motif.

A Christmas Card

admin — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 05:06:52 +0000

A handmade Christmas card for a friend’s sister in the military by special request.
Wishing everyone in our armed forces a safe return and Season’s Best to All!

Autumn leaves

admin — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 22:36:46 +0000

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My mom and I drove to Sacramento to visit Sherry, a very good family friend. Mom did some shopping and returned with packages and a handful of brilliantly colored leaves. Capture them, I must. Sherry working on a Hello Kitty hook rug and mom sorting out strands of embroidery threads on white hole-punched cards, I paint and write. We clink glasses of hot apple cider, eat fresh persimmons and crunch on homemade M&M cookies. The afternoon glows and is forever recorded in my mind and there on the pages.

gifts of the garden

admin — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 05:03:35 +0000

GIFTS OF THE GARDEN: “THE GREATEST GIFT OF THE GARDEN IS THE RESTORATION OF THE FIVE SENSES”. “All the windows of my heart I open to the day”- John Greenleaf Whittier. SIGHT: Absorb the colors in mass, squint and blur the edges, put your eyes close-up to a flower so that if fills up the whole frame of your vision. And then pull away slowly until the flower comes first into focus. Absorb. Close your eyes and

LISTEN. There may be distant chirps from a bird, a whirr of a bumblebee in flight or just peaceful silence. Listen to the sound of moving water or the music rain makes. Crush an herbal leaf and smell the AROMA. Make a memory of all the different flowers, grasses and herbs; sweet, pungent, aromatic, eucalyptus smells. Fingertips FEEL textures of velvet petals. Leaves and branches smooth, grainy, coarse, cool, taking in the quality of each. Allow the pores of your skin to catch a breeze and FEEL the temperature of the sunshine and the shade. And in the end enjoy the fruits of the garden. Pluck a warm ripe tomato and TASTE its sweetness. Nectar from honeysuckle and fruits and vegetables that ripen in each season. “Plants give us oxygen for the lungs and for the soul”– Linda Solegato.
In the end, it’s all a metaphor, this garden. . . IS LIFE.

sketchbook/journaling backpack

admin — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 05:21:38 +0000

Journaling on the Run. . . PACK ONLY THE ESSENTIALS. A sketching pencil (a dark watercolor wash pencil is also water soluble when a wet brush touches it), eraser, pencil sharpener (learn to sharpen with an exacto knife), Niji waterbrush and/or paint brush, micron 01 black pigma marker (it’s waterproof so you can paint over it), your favorite writing pen (mine is a fountain pen), small craft scissor, glue stick, a few watercolor pencils, a small travel watercolor box, a couple sheets of paper towels, and a small container of water in a plastic bottle. Include a few loose sheets of good art paper that can be bound into a book later and keep adding drawings and paintings to blank pages in your sketchbook. Don’t hold back. Date your work. Watch your progression, record your events. Draw what you see and notice how the world opens your eyes to see more. The eye caresses each shape your pencil tracts. Zone in on color and notice how nature puts one color up against another, amazing!

I’ve added a large colorful cloth napkin to my pack. It is there to pick up a water spill, serve as a napkin, or sit upon. It’s the extra barrier between the ground and the ants, and me sketching. A baggie of nuts to munch, water to drink, sunglasses and a visor also help. Grab your bag and go with it everywhere.

Get to know what YOUR essentials are. For nature treks I add binoculars, compass, wildflower and bird identification books.

postscript: You can always have more of your stuff in other bags that are in the car!

Wherever you go … go with all your heart

admin — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 00:29:21 +0000

QUEEN OF HEARTS . . . Feeling, Passionate, Risk-taking, Accepting and Dedicated. Do what you love. Be true to yourself. Go out into the world. Travel light. Know what is essential in this world that moves you, that makes you tick, that motivates you.Pack your tangible essentials in your travel bag (Thoreau light) and know that what is most important is in your heart.

Summer Solstice

admin — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 05:06:25 +0000

Sol+stice derives from a combination of Latin words meaning “sun”+”to stand still.” As the days lengthen, the sun rises higher and higher until it seems to stand still in the sky.

Three days after the solstice marks a Midsummer’s Day. Soft summer grasses dotted with miniature daisies, blue petaled flowers and goldfields wait to be cut. Is it true that on the eve of a midsummer’s night brings a dream? with magic?

Straw hat and sunglasses for painting with and hiking. Looking at the Sun shimmer while lying on the cool grass and looking up through the trees. Strawberries juicy sweet and cold watermelon. Sweet natural water quenches a thirst and the rush of a waterfall crowns the heart of a hike. A wardrobe of shorts and tee-shirts. Longer days of warm light means more time to paint and play. Standing still with eyes closed and feeling the waft of a breeze on a sweated brow. Barefoot in the grass and dining alfresco. The sound of tinkling ice in a glass of lemonade. New starry constellations to tract in the midnight indigo sky. Falling asleep under the fragrance of Midnight Blooming Jasmine and of course Ice Cream. SUMMER . . . Yeaay!

Sun above painted with beeswax resist and brilliant colored Procion Dyes-fiber reactive from Jacquard. Multi suns with a brayer of Liquitex acrylic over rubber stamps on Japanese paper. Lettering hand lettered with watercolor.

the street where I live

admin — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 05:14:12 +0000

. . . looks a lot like this: My art studio with big sliding doors, spacious airy skylights above stream in morning light. Little shoppes abound with art wares, quills, sealing wax and books. A Chocolatier shoppe with a balcony overlooking the bay has down-backed pillows covered in colorful cotton chintz for snuggling against while savoring chocolate drinks in big "Alice" mugs. The book shoppe is sculpted in books with poetry lettered on the walls. My horse with buggy waits outside for the moment. There is a bird sanctuary nearby. The town has an annual event where artists from all over the world come and bring their talents together and share selflessly their very best and play for a week straight. We take turns sleeping. The food is magnificent, too. Conversation and color and laughter has no boundaries.

I silkscreened this onto Stonehenge paper. Artwork drawn with black ink and grids and dots from Letraset press-on sheets. I then shot the artwork on film from which I made the screens. Folded card used as a presentation for my business card.

Do what you love

admin — Tue, 19 May 2009 02:07:42 +0000

I often get asked, “Have you always drawn?” Yes, and my favorite Crayola color was “Bittersweet” and “Cornflower”. I still have my first watercolor paintbox when I was a little girl growing up in rural Houston, Texas. I loved chalk and drawing the solar system. When I was in kindergarten I would sit with Pat Brossman, my next door neighbor in the third grade and watch her practice handwriting exercises. I couldn’t wait to get into the third grade. And I loved handwriting and drawing and painting and bugs. When it rained, I would run out and sit in the rain and fish for crawdads in the ditch, using cheese on a string. The other thing I loved was standing in flowers taller than me; big daisies and towering sweet peas and of course animals.

When you do what you love, and are true to yourself, some things don’t change much. Two of my favorite paint colors are still the same but with different names; burnt sienna and french ultramarine blue. I have painted murals on ceilings, floors and walls. I still like to stand enveloped in flowers and paint what I imagine. I’ll lay on the desert floor to identify a miniscule flower and have binoculars at the ready on a hike. And what do I always have with me? A journal, pen, pencil and paint.

First berries of the season

admin — Thu, 07 May 2009 05:28:44 +0000

The first little ruby red strawberries are the sweetest tasting berries that you can even imagine. They are fragrant — It’s Spring.
I’m teaching “Italic” calligraphy this semester.

Sketch of our 5-tiered strawberry condo from my mom with two green thumbs! Made of a heavy plastic, there is a 3/4″ lip at the top edge of the condo. A PVC pole “shish-ka-bobs” the tiers and keeps them together. Nice to see the berries cascading the tiers.
The snails can’t climb the slippery slope walls.

Stripey, zen teacher

admin — Mon, 04 May 2009 22:10:07 +0000

Full of wisdom. Curious about everything and always living “in the moment”.
See! Hear! Taste! Feel! Smell! Paying attention to every situation can help you develop your idea.
Work from the depth of your being.
Have faith in your ideas and execute a well-thought plan.
What puts a lion in your heart?

Simplify your life.
Listen to your dreams, they are orders from the universe and can infuse your imagination with a great storyline and fanciful drawings.

Surround yourself with the things you love which includes the people in your life.
Get enough sleep.
Make your bed everyday.