Where do ideas come from anyway?

People always ask Carol Mullen where her ideas come from. "I can't tell them," she said. "I don't know."

But if you spend a little time with her she will give you a wonderfully useful demonstration of how creativity works.

Her dining room table was covered in fetishes (objects believed to have magic powers, a charm) shaped like little magical people destined for the One World Gallery in Taos, The Weyrich Gallery in Albuquerque, Conley and Friends in Madrid and she will show her work at Cathedral Park in Santa Fe during the last week of September. They look so primitive and different, it's no wonder people ask where they come from.

To show me, she led me up a wooden staircase to her studio loft. She didn't clean up for me, because she wanted me to see how she worked. It was a small room covered in piles, stacks and heaps of stuff. It was a trash heap. It was like stepping into the subconscious mind. It was the chaos that God used to create the world. It was a primordial soup.

The first thing that she could say about ideas is that they're everywhere. "When they come I write them down. I collect them."

Scanning the surface of her studio, she begins to point out the types of things that she collects. Homemade paper, dried leaves, beads from a thrift shop necklace, rusty bottle caps from Molly's Bar were people can take their beers outside to drink, pieces of plumbing, a piece of a watch that looks like a little llama, button collections from estate sales, snapshots and letters, gum boxes and car parts. People find things for her to use. Her husband Jeff goes with her to the car salvage lot where they walk around and pick up stuff. "I call it ephemera on the ground."

When people see her looking for stuff, they sometimes ask Jeff, "Is your wife OK?" She doesn't care. Looking for things is as much fun as putting it together.

In her studio she starts with the paper. "I sit here with the stuff," she said, "and don't think about anything, really. I start adding things and see what happens."

The process is spontaneous, and playful. She trusts her instincts, letting herself put things together in ways that appeal to her. She has stashes of old letters and stashes of old postcards and has plans to put the photo of the crazy looking guy with the misspelled letter about how Dorothy promises to send money to her brother so he can go on killing rats. She wants to pair the photo of the girl in a sexy outrageous outfit with the postcard from the sunday school teacher, inviting her to come back soon. Her collages tell a story.

Before she did collages she knit. She shows me a whole stack of photos of her wearable art, including a vest that Julia Roberts bought. She is so immersed in and comfortable with the creative process that I had to ask: Has she ever been blocked?

She said, "No. Well, once."

When her mother died it took her several months to start working again. She worked through it by making a grief collage that had images of mothers form other cultures, crocheted things, buttons and recipes. She took her time with it, and when she was finished she was able to work again.

Sally Hayden Von Conta's Pastel Awakening

When Sally Hayden Von Conta moved from New York to Santa Fe, she took an audio tape of the rivers; the Chama, the Pecos and the Rio Grande, and did a successful series of abstract paintings based on the sounds of the rivers. But then she went back to New York for a visit, just before the terrorist attacks on 9/11.

She couldn't go back to the studio and do what she had been doing. It was too isolating. She wanted to find a way to get back in touch with the land. So she joined a Plein Air Pastel class with Kathleen Schalock.

Sally wasn't a pastel artist - she was a watercolorist, and at the time she really just wanted to join the class to have some company while she worked. She loves how five or six people can be looking at the same sight, and none of the paintings come out the same. She said, "It's the inner vision that comes out."

After a few sessions where she sat in on the class, painting with her water colors, Kathleen told her, "I don't care if you don't pay me, I don't care if you don't want to be taught. But this is a pastel class, and if you want to stay you have to try pastels."

"It was like eating candy," said Sally, "I was so at home with pastels." The vibrant colors and the texture helped her to finally get the impact that she was looking for in her art.

Once she fell in love with pastels, there was no going back. She and a friend, Janet Shaw Amtmann, travelled to Italy and stayed for three weeks on a working farm in Umbria and painted. She came back with nine finished pieces. She has since gone to Montana and all over New Mexico.

Her work will be displayed at Harry's Roadhouse on Old Las Vegas HWY during the month of November, and her piece received the "Best of Show" award at the Twenty First Annual Fine Arts Show at the Old San Ysidro Church, October 2-10.

Mastering Fundamentals Helped Molly Hyde Find Artistic Freedom

When I visited Molly Hyde in her studio she had just finished a twenty minute exercise to get ready for a painting session she was planning with a friend the next day. She didn't know where she was going, or what the conditions would be like, so she made a chart of the colors that she might encounter. She said, "If you're painting in New Mexico, you have to pain cliff walls, rocks and skies. The skies are so beautiful."

She especially loves the sky over El Dorado, where she lives. Streams of air come over mountains on all sides. The air eddies, and creates storms.

Her goal is to master the fundamental technique, and to have it so ingrained that it comes automatically. That way, when she's on location, she can just paint and not have to struggle.

She learned the importance of classical artistic technique when she lived in Putney Vermont. In 2001 she became acquainted with a group of artists who asked her friend if they could use her big barn as a place to paint. The painters turned out to be led by Richard Schmid, and the group of 11 would later be known as the Putney Painters.

She got her classical art training as a member of the Putney Painters. She painted with them for 4 1/2 years and learned things like color temperature and value.

When she and her husband retired and moved to Santa Fe, she joined a plein air class with Anita Louise West, so she could continue developing the skills that she was learning in Vermont.

Another way she is improving her landscape skills is by studying with Kevin Gorges, concentrating on still life. Painting onions and peppers helps her to paint mountains because it makes her more conscious of value shifts. She always looks at one shape in relation to the shapes around it. She's always comparing one patch of shape to another. With still life she can take her time and concentrate on this.

When you paint outdoors you have to do the same thing, only very quickly. You have three hours to work, maximum. With her still life pieces she has stretched her range of values. She has deeper deeps and lighter lights. She is able to simplify the forms that she sees in nature. She said, "There's so much out there. You have to focus on a few shapes."

After 4 1/2 years, it can still be a struggle to get the New Mexico landscape. "Coming from new England to New Mexico was a challenge to my palette. I was using New England greens, which have a lot of blue in them, instead of New Mexico greens, which have a lot of orange. But a challenge is not necessarily a bad thing. It can be really fun!"

Janice Muir wants to take you to a peaceful place

Growing up in Albuquerque, Janice Muir spent a lot of time watching the clouds with her father. "My dad was a great skywatcher. He loved weather. Loved the outdoors."

So naturally, she loves to paint outside, on location. She is drawn to places of peace, of meditation, or places that just make you smile.

She recently painted at the Grand Canyon, which is a challenge for any artist. She said, "There's something awe inspiring about the Grand Canyon. But how do I transfer the feeling I had while I was there?"

When she teaches Plein Air painting, the first thing that she tells her students to do, and the thing that is hardest for beginners, is to edit. Ask yourself, "What's the most important thing about this place? What makes you happy about this place?"

Things change fast when you're painting on location. Especially the quality of the light. She said, "When you see the light, paint it and leave it."

Janice often uses a journal to take notes on the place. Once the image is down she takes notes on colors and sounds. Anything to help her remember where she was. She takes her time setting up so that she can center. She said, "Take the time to set up your easel. To put out your paints. Listen. Smell. Is it sage? Is it wet earth? What's that sound? Is it slow moving water?"

Once when she painted at Anniversary Trail (one of her favorite places) she heard coyotes across the canyon. Although she didn't paint the coyotes, listening to them while painting added another dimension to her art.

"I have a lot of spiritualism in my painting," she said. "My spiritualism is connected to nature."

The skies look alive and changing in her paintings. She said, "I watch sunsets, being very observant about how light changes. Skies are extremely important to me. It goes back to my childhood. For a long time I didn't want to paint a cloud until I could do it well."

The greatest feedback Janice can ever receive is when someone views one of her paintings and says, "That's a place I'd like to be," or even, "I feel like I've been there." When that happens she feels like she has made the connection.

Aspen Vista

In addition to her landscape and wildlife photography, Corinna Stoeffl has been experimenting with abstract photography. This piece, "Aspen Vista" is an example of the multiple exposure feature of her Nikkon Camera. This was a straight shot, the multiple images were made inside the camera. Nikkon is the only camera that has this feature.

Art gives hope to Lara Sandling-Bennett

15 years ago, after seeing dozens of doctors, Lara Sandling-Bennett was diagnosed with Fibromyalgia. "It's a very depressing syndrome," she said. "I couldn't work anymore. I felt lost because of the pain."

But in 2007 she took steps that would change her life. With the encouragement of friends, she started taking classes at the UNM-Los Alamos, and is working toward earning her studio art degree.

She comes from an artistic family, and has done a lot of arts and crafts in her life. But when she took her first painting class, taught by Patrick Harris, she learned some wonderful things about herself.

The first assignment was to "paint your ideal outdoor space." She did her painting "my secret window," which is now on display along with 15 of her other paintings in building 2 at the UNM-LA campus. She said, "I was shocked and surprised that I had that artistic ability in me."

"While I paint everything goes away. Stress. Pain. With all the other arts and crafts that I've done, I've never had that experience. I call it my Zen Moment. I lose all track of time and everything seems right."

Lara thinks that painting has an especially mediative effect on her because she enjoys working with the colors, and she said, "as I paint, I'm giving someone else a glimpse of how I see the world. I can express all the things that most people take for granted. A beautiful landscape. Or my cat. It just takes everything else away."

She has found the teachers in the UNM-LA art department to be inspirational and supportive. Patrick Harris encouraged her to enter the Impressionism exhibit at the Fuller Art Center and two of her pieces were selected.

She has made other opportunities for herself by following her heart. You can see from her paintings that she has a passion for cats. "One of the cats that I had helped me get through my diagnosis with Fibromyalgia."

To commemorate her special pet she joined the Friends of the Shelter, an organization that makes sure that cats and dogs in the Los Alamos Animal Shelter are being taken care of. The Friends help screen for potential adopters and help the shelter maintain an unwritten no-kill policy. The only animals that are euthanized are are truly beyond medical help.

Because of her involvement with that organization she will be painting two murals for the new shelter, that is scheduled to be completed in November 2009. There will be a social room where people can get to know cats and dogs to see if they connect before deciding to adopt.

"Art has given me hope," she said. "And a chance to show others that there's hope - a chance for a new life no matter what disease you may have."

Corinna Stoeffl explores her the beauty of her backyard

I was raining when I visited Corinna Stoeffl. The road was already slick with mud and I wondered if I would get out, or would a flash flood trap me there. The weather showed me how her Abiquiu home is the perfect place for a landscape and wildlife photographer to live. I wanted to pull over to capture the way the stormy clouds made the red rocks look different from every angle. I wasn't the only one. Greedy photographers walked along the highway, hoping to catch a glimpse from an angle that no one else has seen, or for the clouds to highlight the curves in a new way.

Most of Corinna's photos are taken in Northern New Mexico and Southern Colorado, but she first got serious about taking pictures in the summer of 2004 when she had a chance to go to South Africa. She bought a good camera and made it her goal to take some pictures for herself that she could be proud of.

As it turned out, she took some great pictures, and began to sell her photographs in art fairs the following summer. Photography became her main focus. She joined a mentorship program at the Santa Fe Photographer's Workshop "I didn't want, ten years from now, to look back and wish that I had done something."

She looked out at the threatening weather and said, "Later on I may just get in the car and just shoot."

She usually shoots two or three times a week. There's a big difference between how she approaches her work when she's traveling and when she's at home. When she travels, she looks for things that catch her eye, but there is a sense that it's now or never.

But when she's at home she goes to the same places, over and over again to explore the changes. The creek behind her house is one of her favorite places. She likes to capture how the rocky bed of the creek will become murky when there is a flash flood. She said, when you go to familiar places, "you get to know it and keep discovering new things."

She has a deep connection with nature. In an interview in the Rio Grande Sun, she said, "I tend to see details in nature that are interesting to me and often have difficulty in capturing them to my liking." It is in her visits to familiar places that she can experiment with things to try to make it work, and see what she can change.

One of the hardest lessons that she has learned is: "Never leave home without your camera!"

Every Sunday Corinna sells her work at the Community Fair at the Farmers Market in Santa Fe. She will participate in the 2009 Abiquiu Studio Tour, October 10-12, and she will have a solo show in the Fuller Lodge Portal Gallery March 26th through May 2010.