It's October 1st! Happy Freaky Friday! And to celebrate the spooky season, I'll be sharing more of The Bird People Tarot cards I'm working on. Even though the tarot card for the day I was born is The World #21 (everyone has one), I've been feeling more like it really should be The Hermit card. Especially given my propensity to bury myself deep inside the rabbit hole, while the whole world is on fire, making my items. I come up for air here and there to make sure I don't completely lose track of reality, but the making of my things has really been the only thing helping me maintain good mental health and clarity. Speaking of the tarot deck, I've been investigating affordable and feasible ways to get this deck printed as a tangible item to purchase in the future and I've been pleasantly surprised about my choices out there on the internets! I first have to finish the entire deck for that to happen, but I'll keep everyone posted. Until then, please enjoy and I hope this finds you safe and well.

Upright Meanings:
Contemplation
Sanctuary
Self-discovery
Caution
Solitude
Pondering life’s mysteries
Reversed Meanings:
Fear
Wisdom spurned
Self-pity
Confusion
Enforced silence

Upright Meanings:
To seize or usurp
Teamwork
Helpful advice
Negotiations
Success
Reversed Meanings:
Carelessness
Futility
Overconfidence
Misinformation
Stubborness

Title: The Museum Series | Rose-breasted Grosbeak
Year: 2021
Media: Acrylic Paint, Paper Diorama and Collage on Wood Panel
Total Dimension: 6” x 6” (1.5" Cradle)

Rose-breasted Grosbeak currently in progress for today's studio closeup. Painting has been extreme therapy lately. I think working with color is what's really helping. Color and jazz. I've also been adding layers and layers and layers and layers of varnish to the middle bands of color to the pieces that are finished. I really want the shininess of the middle color part of these pieces to contrast with the chalky gesso borders (aka "the walls" of an actual real world museum). The varnish also gives the acrylic paint more depth and hopefully the appearance of an oil painting. The plastic feel of acrylic paint when it dries has always bothered me but it dries quick and works nicely with vintage papers. The varnish I am using is for acrylic paint specifically so I'm hoping for a good archival experience.

Today's (tonight's) song offering was deceivingly difficult. It certainly put me through my vocal paces today, but that's good! I need the challenge! It's certainly not a masterpiece but at least I finished the whole song because there were several times I wanted to give up. But I didn't! That's also something. Recently, I've been in a "throwing things I make away" mood again but I've been fighting that with all my might. It's probably Mercury in Retrograde and yes that's a thing. A very real thing. Please enjoy my version of Smokey Robinson and the Miracles', "Tears of a Clown". I love how the music for this song sounds like a circus. With a symphony attached.

Welcome to another Studio Closeup here at carolkroll.com. Let’s travel to outer space! Why should the billionaires have all the fun? Today is a work in progress that I started a couple weeks ago. I wouldn’t say the underpainting of this piece is quite finished yet. I still have a lot of wrestling to do with it. The diorama inside is cut from a 1964 children's book illustration of space travel. The top and bottom borders are painted with black gesso. That’s right. Black gesso. Until a few years ago, I had no idea black gesso even existed! The black gesso I currently have in my possession is not chalky. And until this week, I had no idea that my new and improved chalky gesso guys ALSO make black (hopefully chalky) gesso. So a bottle of that is currently in my DickBlick shopping cart. In the meantime, I’ll probably experiment with chalky tempera paint on top to tone down the shine of The Universe.

Title: The Museum Series | Okapi
Year: 2021
Media: Acrylic Paint, Paper Diorama and Collage on Wood Panel
Total Dimension: 6” x 6” (1.5" Cradle)

This diorama was made from a stamp of an Okapi. I find these creatures fascinating. They're often referred to as Africa's unicorn and are super secret elusive animals that live by themselves (not in herds) in the African jungle. There's a beautiful life-size Okapi diorama featured at the Milwaukee Public Museum that I can never get enough of when I'm there. This is not the last Okapi piece I plan on making. Film slides of this creature are virtually nonexistent, so imagine my surprise when I located a couple Viewmaster Reels that have Okapi's on them(!) There wasn't enough room to include any of those tiny films inside this piece, but I do have bigger Okapi dioramas planned that will feature them.