Stephanie's Studio

A little while back, a good friend gave me a book as a gift called “Giving Voice to Bear.” Bears are my power animal and totems. I shape shift into a bear. My first blog was in the voice of the bear. I wrote about what my inner bear was thinking and what she would have said if she could speak in our language.                                  ("Shapeshifting to Bear" by Stephanie Rose Bird, chalk pastel) I have a very vocal household of animals. Two parrots, one African Grey and one Nanday Conure both vocalize all day long. If you know anything about Nanday Conure’s you know that they have a very high pitched screech that they make when they are feeling joy or are upset. It takes time to learn to read which is which. Meanwhile yours ears are assaulted. They are beautiful birds however, very smart, playful and they talk. Ours says “who is it” when anyone comes to the front door and it sounds ve...

Journaling can take many forms. I find it to be relaxing. It also feels safe. Some other art forms can seem formidable. There is the huge expanse of a freshly gessoed stark white stretched canvas or even a large sheet of 24" x 36" of paper. However, within the small book-like, intimacy of a journal,the confined spaces make artmaking more approachable. Shown above this text, is a cover of an altered book I did that incorporates sewing, collage, handmade paper, paint, papyrus and found objects such as screening. This piece is quite fragile. the fragility is part of it's visual statement. This is the other side of the same altered book. I re-purposed and upcycled an old book cover, book pages, jeans, paper scraps and then added the sewing and collage pieces. The aging is from natural inks, such as walnut ink with some tea staining as well. Then a few years ago, inspired by one of my students at the School of the Art Institute, I decided to fill an entire hardbou...

  As Mother Day approaches, I reminisce about the ways my mother led me to belly dance. I still have a photograph of her in the 1950's decked out in an Egyptian costume with her sister friends.   Her belly is bare, the belly that was to become my home for nine months.   She is wearing a veil; she and her multi-hued friends look happy, peaceful, sensual and satisfied.   It is so telling, the ways our mothers can shape us—teaching things about accepting our self, in relation to others. Unlike my mother’s Egyptian influenced form, I was inspired to learn American Tribal Style (ATS) inspired by Carolena of Fat Chance Belly Dance . ATS is about feminine ascension, spirituality, strengthening from the core.  ATS has taken me back to the beginning, to a personal epoch of inner genesis. This genesis enabled the reestablishment of what I love best about the dance—spiritual engagement with music, nature, the self and most importantly, others.  I feel my wo...

                                                             (Female Mask - Igbo People) I have been working with mask making the last few weeks. They are simple, self-drying clay masks.  Now that one of them is ready for some paint I have started to look it at more as a symbol. Today, when I looked at it though I realized it was quite grotesque and well, in a word hideous. But in all its ugliness, that is what masks can be for us.  The beauty is that a mask can be whatever we want it to be and used for a diverse array of purposes.                                                              (Okuyi Mask - Punu People) What happens when we peel away the ...