Everything Else – Page 2 – Becka Rahn, artist

An unexpected delight: Origami in the Garden at MN Landscape Arboretum

A few weeks ago I spent an evening at the Bakken Museum as a guest artist. The theme was “art in the garden” and it was held on their rooftop patio. For a project, I suggested that I teach people to fold origami butterflies to go with the garden theme. By happy chance, Minneapolis St Paul Magazine was a sponsor of the event and sent along a case of magazines for us to recycle and make art with. It was a perfect match for my project.

I brought some of my fabrics along that feature origami and recycled paper so I could talk about how I use origami in my art.

At least three different people at the event asked me if I had seen the “giant origami” at the MN Landscape Arboretum. I hadn’t heard anything about giant origami, nobody could really tell me anything more about it, and after that night I sort of forgot about it. The Arboretum is about 45 minutes from my house and mostly off my radar. By chance, yesterday afternoon the concert band that my husband plays with had scheduled to play a concert at the Landscape Arboretum. I almost always go along to listen to his concerts and I remembered the “giant origami” conversations. I thought it might be a little something to look at while the band was warming up.

All I can say is WOW. I am so glad I got there and got to see this exhibition. It was stunning. It is called Origami in the Garden and is a collaboration […]

beckarahn2018-07-01T23:25:06+00:00Everything Else, Gallery Exhibitions, Out & About|1 Comment

Art-O-Mat Love

When I was teaching this week at the conference center in St Cloud, MN, I was delighted to run across an Art-O-Mat. I had read about them and my friend Cedar had sent me photos of one she saw on her travels. You may remember my love for tiny museums from previous posts.

What is an Art-O-Mat? A repurposed cigarette vending machine that now vends ART! How cool is that?

Each slot is now filled with boxes that each contain an original piece of art from an artist. This one had all kinds of media including paintings, photos, ceramics, zentangle, and wax seals. You get a little hint at what is inside the box by a 2 inch label by each pull knob.

I decided that I needed to get two Art-O-Mat boxes, so I picked a collage artist and one that was labeled porcelain buttons.

I opened the porcelain buttons first from Art by Rhonda. I am sad to say that it looks like Art by Rhonda no longer has an active website. But I love the porcelain piece that was in the box. A fish!

From Kathryn Coneway, I got a paper collage of trees. There is a tiny bit of information about this artist at the link, but I can’t figure out where she is located. (The website is lacking in some basic information.)

A couple of mysteries, for sure. I love that my two pieces of art color coordinate so beautifully: black, yellow and turquoise. A […]

beckarahn2018-06-15T15:39:57+00:00Everything Else, Gallery Exhibitions|1 Comment

Making Paper Mosaics: A video demo

At my last fabric design class, I chatted with my students about how I make paper mosaic designs. I like to design fabrics using original art like paper collage or drawings or paintings. They were very curious to see the originals that my fabrics had started out as, so I thought it would be fun to make a video demo to show the process from paper to fabric.

Here are a few other mosaic designs I have done. All are made from recycled magazines or other patterned papers.

beckarahn2018-05-25T10:14:07+00:00Everything Else, Gallery Exhibitions, Spoonflower & Fabric Design, Tutorials|2 Comments

A weekend learning to design fabric with Spoonflower

These fantastic ladies spent the weekend with me learning to design fabric with Spoonflower using Adobe Illustrator. I made them work hard. Illustrator is not intuitive and it isn’t easy, so I admire them so much for their great attitudes the whole weekend long. These are the designs they created the very first day, inspired by Ed Emberley drawing books. How many of you have heard of Ed Emberley? He was my favorite artist when I was a kid and I don’t think anyone in my class had heard of him. So it was very fun to make that introduction.

If you want to learn more about the fabric design classes I teach, check out my online classes and master class pages.

beckarahn2018-05-08T09:46:52+00:00Everything Else|Comments Off

You win some, you lose some. Why feedback matters.

You might not know this, but I designed three sets of iMessage Stickers that are available in the Apple App Store. My husband is a software developer and when Apple introduced “Stickers” we thought it would be a fun way to collaborate on something. So he wrote the code and I made the art. I did a set of sewing themed stickers, a set of knitting themed stickers and a set of black cat stickers.

What are iMessage Stickers? Well, that’s part of my story. They are like big emoji but they are only available in iMessage on Apple devices. (Believe me we tried to figure out how to make them work for Android or in Facebook, but they just don’t all play nice.) But if you have an iPhone or an iPad, you can use them in messages. My mom and sisters and I send them back and forth all the time.

The problem is that Apple implemented them in kind of a dumb way. They are hard to find in the iMessage app and if someone doesn’t show you, I don’t think you’d even know they were there. And although when you go to the App store to purchase one, it looks exactly like a regular app, it doesn’t work the same way at all. Instead of installing on your phone with an icon like you expect it to, Stickers get installed inside iMessage. So you download it and it looks like nothing happened. And then you have to go in to some place in your phone settings and activate it before you can use it. It’s all doable, but you are never going to […]

beckarahn2018-04-09T22:46:41+00:00An Artist's Life, Everything Else|2 Comments

Where you can find me: Holiday 2017 Events

Minneapolis Craft’za

Sunday November 19 I will be at the 5th Annual Craft’za show at the Grainbelt Building in NE Minneapolis. This is my second time there, although I have done the sister show Craftstravaganza for a number of years. This year is the first time it will be 2 days and I will be there on SUNDAY. You can see a little sneak peek of my work on the local Fox9 station on Sunday morning. Four artists did a little demo & interview which will be airing on Sunday morning. (If you have found me here from Fox9, hello!) Find me at booth #58. November 19 • 10 – 4

Bakken Winter Market

On November 25 & 26, I will be at the Bakken Museum for their Winter Market. I have made some special Bakken inspired pieces from art I made with them back when they were a partner on my State Arts Board grant. Have Thanksgiving visitors? Come visit the museum and shop with local artists. Fun! November 25 & 26 • 10 – 3:30

Crafts at Canteen

A tiny little show with 10 awesome artists hosted in a coffee shop that specializes in toast. This quirky show is new for me and should be lots of fun. Just one evening. December 8 • 6 – 10 pm

beckarahn2017-11-18T07:56:56+00:00Everything Else, Out & About|Comments Off