PLEASE VISIT THE NEW BLOG LOCATION: https://blog.balzerdesigns.com/ Read more →

Continuing with the shadow theme, here is a new piece I've been working on called "In Shadow." Immediately recognizable as plants and yet...upon closer examination...they're very unrealistic plants, stems don't seem to connect, leaves emerge from nowhere, and even what's light and dark seems to be randomly assigned. This is the crux of the identity/perception issue my artwork explores. Identity is how I view myself. Perception is how you view me. I'm interested in using my artwork to spark a conversation about that conflict. In a world where we quickly judge others based on appearances, your first narrative about someone... Read more →

Do you recall when I blogged about my visit to the light show at Descanso Gardens in California back in January 2023? I've never stopped thinking about the rainbow shadows that the misty night created. I've been working on some pieces that attempt to capture some of the feelings of those rainbow shadows. (I have photos if I want to share the reality of it!) This piece is called "Night-Time Shadows": It's a 16x20 Monotype Collage. You can see another piece from this series being worked on in this short video from instagram: I am going to be hosting an... Read more →

You may recall that I've been working on a series of pieces (over several years now) that use gardening and plant metaphors as a way to try and capture my experience of motherhood. This is my latest piece in that series. It's called "To Pinch or To Prune." Pinching is a type of pruning that involves removing the top of a plant's main stem to encourage branching and fuller growth. Pruning is a more general term that involves cutting off plant parts with tools like scissors or pruners. In parenthood, there are so many different ideas about how best to... Read more →

The current Book Club selection at My Art Practice is Expressive Printmaking by Mary Dalton. It's a dense book full of really interesting fresh and modern ideas about printmaking. I made a few things from the book and I have plans to try many more -- like I said, it's dense. My favorite thing that I made was this block: It was carved using a variety of tools I don't normally use for stamp carving and I enjoyed that challenge. As Peter F. Drucker said: “If you want something new, you have to stop doing something old.” Monthly members can... Read more →

I've been trying to think about how to describe this piece I made. It's mixed media collage, but it's also a painting. I collaged by adding paper, but I also cut away layers of paper. It's acrylic but also watercolor. It's carefully put together but also wildly free. I named it "Tapestry of Flight" and it's about leaves and birds and that cacophony that swirling winds bring. It was a slow and meditative process to put it together. Days and days and weeks of cutting and adding and painting and cutting. You can see that complexity in these detail photos:... Read more →

I made something cool! (And once I started, I couldn't stop!) These are bowls made from my leftover fabric scraps. Because I do so much hand painting, stamping, screenprinting, etc. with my fabric, I end up with lots of teeny tiny pieces that I don't want to throw away. But they're too small for most sewing projects. So, they go into a big plastic bag. Well, this project is a scrap buster! I plowed through my bag of scraps while making these vessels. And I looove that I get to keep all my little scraps and make them into something... Read more →

Late last year, I worked on a series of six pieces all about my adventures by the Charles River with my young son. I call them "The River Walk Series." They're all 16x20 monotype collages. I'm delighted to share that three have sold thus far. It's always such a delight for me when someone loves my work enough to take it home. Rebekah Joy Plett said it best: "When you buy from an independent artist you are buying more than just a painting or a novel or a song. You are buying hundreds of hours of experimentation and thousands of... Read more →

In this week's artist vlog, I'm sharing a bit about iteration. It's the theme for this cycle at My Art Practice. Iteration is defined as: "A procedure in which repetition of a sequence of operations yields results successively closer to a desired result." It is often called "working in a series." I think of it as working thoughtfully. You make one thing and think about what you like and don't like about it. Then you make another thing, taking that knowledge with you into the new work. Watch the video for more: You can see a bit more in this... Read more →

This week's Adventures in Arting podcast, "Drawing at the Danforth," is packed with practical tips based on my experiences taking a drawing class at the Danforth Art Museum. Listen to the podcast on your favorite podcast site or using the player below: Here are the five big take aways for me -- all of them have to do with purposeful artistic practice: Balancing Excitement and Challenge Maintaining an artistic practice involves striking a balance between tasks that excite and those that challenge -- you can think of it as things that are fun (and easy) vs. things that are hard... Read more →