Tag Archives: natural forms

New designs…

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It came to my attention recently that my site was not terribly friendly for those who are unaccustomed to reading blogs, and that I should make the images of my work more accessible to the attention span of the casual visitor.  So, I spent a little time the other day doing just that.  The home page is now a static gallery of my fractal work, and the blog has its own new page on the menu.  Please have a look at the newly designed site – is there anything that you as a viewer would suggest to improve it?  I am open to suggestion – although there are of course limits to what I can do since I am using a template.

Now, it’s time for me to introduce another fractal that you may not have seen yet.  I’ve exhibited it already but you may have missed it.  This one was difficult to title.  What I saw in it first, changed for me, until I was seeing it a number of different ways.  Perhaps that is why it appeals to me so much.  I decided it deserved a name fitting its ‘behaviour’, one that would allow the viewer to perceive it their own way as well.  So, I called it “Indeterminate”.  This image is a small watermarked version of the digital image used to create the piece of art, as photographing the final art printed on acrylic proves difficult with all the reflections.  If you’d like to tell me what you see in it, I would love to hear – but please do it in a private message using the contact page.  I would like all viewers to see it with fresh eyes uninfluenced by the perceptions of others!

Indeterminate. Fractal Digital Image. Available as an original single edition print on acrylic, 20x20". Lianne Todd. $360

Indeterminate. Fractal Digital Image. Available as an original single edition print on acrylic, 20×20″. Artist Lianne Todd. $375.00

Halls Creek Festival

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September 10 & 11 is the Halls Creek Festival of Creativity in Ingersoll, and I will be participating again!

This festival was good fun last year and I kind of wished I was one of the attendees rather than an exhibitor – lots of learning and creating going on all over the place, and great live music most of the time.

I plan to have some of my fractals there – last year I ONLY brought the fractal metal prints – but I think I will also bring some paintings of fractals this year and some other paintings as well.  I also hope to do some painting while I’m there.

Check out the website for details.

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An Archetypal Image

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I think I have mentioned before how I see many fractals as somewhat archetypal in nature.  We have, in our decorative past, incorporated many motifs that turn out to be quite common in fractal geometry.  The swirls and whorls, the spirals and branches, the radiating patterns… it is like we knew about fractals before we knew about fractals.  But of course we did, didn’t we?  Because fractals are the shapes of nature, and we are a part of nature ourselves, and surrounded by it.  We noticed the regular and irregular natural patterns around us and we appreciated them.  We began to find them beautiful. Then we began to associate them with ideas, and some of them became symbolic.

This particular fractal is one of those ones that seems to be archetypal.  Of course the cross shape, as a symbol, is much more ancient than the Christian religion.  This is more complicated than a simple cross, though.  What other associations does your mind bring to this image?

Symbol. Digital fractal art on metal. Single edition print. 16x16". Lianne Todd

Symbol. Digital fractal art on metal. Single edition print. 16×16″. Artist Lianne Todd. Private Collection.

I hope you’ll come out to my studio this coming weekend during the Oxford Studio Tour to see this piece and more.

New Fractals

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I’m excited to have some new fractal art to show you in a week at the Oxford Studio Tour.

We have thirty-one artists at seventeen locations throughout Oxford County, Ontario, Canada in the heart of the southwestern part of this province.  It will be a fun day trip for anyone in the region – even those coming out from Toronto! (Wouldn’t it be nice to get out of the city for a day or two?)

Here is a preview of one of the fractals.  I have printed it (using Posterjack) on metal, 20×20″ and that is the only print I will do, so it is an original piece.  It is created digitally using the Mandelbulb 3D software.  As I find usual and striking for fractals, it looks very natural. It is pretty obvious what I thought it resembled!  I hope you’ll come and see it.  I think it would make a great piece to gaze at from anywhere in your house, while you consider nature and its mysteries, and it draws you in close, as well – as all fractals do with their self-similarity on smaller and smaller scales.

I call this one Ocean Floor:

Ocean Floor. Digital Fractal Art. Lianne Todd.

Ocean Floor. Digital Fractal Art. Lianne Todd.  This image has now been printed on metal as a single edition. 20×20″. $345.00

 

Oxford Studio Tour coming up!

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It’s April, and that means it is almost time for our annual Oxford Studio Tour here in Oxford County, Ontario.  My studio has been one of the locations for this tour since its inception nine years ago (I also look after the website and some other stuff!).  I will have plenty of work here for visitors to see.   If you’ve never been out on the tour, it is a great way to celebrate spring, which I am hoping is right around the corner… here is a view out my front window yesterday:

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So yeah, we’re not quite there yet.  But the daffodils in my back yard are really trying to bloom.  The ones out front are a little slower but they are hopeful.  Here is a painting I did of the ones out front a few years ago – it’s still available, along with several other watercolours in a variety of styles:

NewGrowthThey’ll get there.

One of the newer fractals that I showed at our recent Artists of Oxford show at Ingersoll Creative Arts Centre, is Diaphanous.  It will be here for the studio tour, along with some other new pieces.  I will even have a couple of Artifact scarves available for purchase.

Diaphanous. Original Digital Art, available printed as single edition on acrylic. 20x20"

Diaphanous. Original Digital Art, available printed as single edition on acrylic. 20×20″

I hope if you live in the region, you’ll grab a friend or three, hop in the car, and make a day of it.  There is a ton of talent to see on this tour, as well as a lot of lovely countryside, and I especially hope you’ll make it out to my location, #6, at the south end of the county.  Here is a google map of the whole tour.

Keep an eye out for our red posters advertising the tour around the region, and our printed brochures designed by artist and graphic designer Rhonda Franks (she’s at location #7 along with Sue Goossens, who is the founder for the tour).  The brochures include descriptions and maps to help guide you around the tour.  If you’d like me to mail you a brochure, please contact me!

Rough Waters

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A little over a month ago, my mind was in turmoil and I spent some time creating this image.  The process of creating is always calming and even though none of the problems turning circles in my head were solved by it, it was a way for me to get through that time.  The piece is called “No Port in Sight”. Since then, things have gradually become better.  The waters have calmed.

No Port in Sight. Digital fractal image. Lianne Todd. Unprinted as yet - only one print will be made. If you wish to own this please contact me to discuss format, size, etc.

No Port in Sight. Digital fractal image. Lianne Todd. Unprinted as yet – only one print will be made. If you wish to own this please contact me to discuss format, size, etc.

Unbeknownst to me, at the same time, another artist, a photographer named Dave Sandford, was capturing the real thing from my favourite beach, Port Stanley!  I hope he won’t mind if I link to his photos here.  I don’t know him but apparently he lives in my “hometown” of London, Ontario.  They are absolutely awesome, would have been difficult to capture, and really exemplify the turbulence and fury our Great Lakes are capable of.  I hope the fractal nature of these is as obvious to you as it it is to me, especially after seeing the image above created entirely using fractal software (Mandelbulb 3D this time – a new (to me) application I’ve been learning to use).

On that note, I’d like to wish you all a Happy New Year – and may you always have a port in sight!

Wearable Fractals!

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I am very excited to share with you a new direction I am taking with my fractal art.  I was approached a couple of weeks ago by VIDA, which is a global partnership of co-creators – artists and designers all over the world, makers in Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka and Latin America, and consumers all over the world.  They are backed by, among others, Google Ventures and Universal Music Group. One of the reasons I accepted their proposal is their socially responsible outlook.  The makers receive a living wage, as well as a basic literacy and math education they wouldn’t ordinarily get.  The artists receive ten percent of all sales from their collection, and nothing is made until it is ordered.

I love the idea of my fractal art being worn!  What a great way to show off the natural beauty of the fractals while increasing my exposure as an artist.  I have chosen, at least as a starting point, to only use either my original watercolour fractals as designs, or digital fractals I haven’t printed on metal or acrylic.  My first pieces are silk square scarves, as they worked well with designs I had already created.  One of them has been designed using the software Mandelbulb 3D.  Click on the image below to visit my VIDA collection and shop online!

VIDApage

November News

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I am very pleased to announce that some of my fractal art will now be available at the Art Gallery of Lambeth!  I grew up in that area so it is really nice to be able to display my art there.

I still have many pieces at my home studio/gallery though, and that’s a good thing, because this weekend is Welcome Back to Otterville, our 19th annual Studio Tour.

For details, please see my previous post. As always, I have a few things left to do before morning so I will keep this short!

You could also visit my other site, liannetodd.wordpress.com, to see a couple of new pieces I will have on display.

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Following the Patterns of Nature

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It is an absolutely beautiful day today in Otterville, full of colour and the patterns of nature, so I plan to spend some time outside.  It was during another beautiful day a few years back, hiking in the woods at Awenda Provincial Park, that I came across many kinds of fungus.  I took a number of photos, and an edited version of one of them ended up as part of this image I am presenting to you today.

On another completely separate occasion, I was creating fractal images and found that, as is often the case, there were distinctly natural and vegetative features recognizable in one.  I saved it, and later on when looking through all of my photos, I noticed how well the features in it mimicked and extrapolated the patterns of growth I had noticed in the fungal photo.  I had even just happened, by whim, to have edited the photo so that its colours matched the ones I had, by chance, used in the fractal creation.

What you see below is a digital collage of the natural and the generated fractal patterns, printed on metal.  Once again nature shows how it is a manifestation of the fractal patterns of the universe.

Following the Patterns. Digital Fractal Art printed on metal, single edition. 16x16". Lianne Todd. $225.00.

Following the Patterns. Digital Fractal Art printed on metal, single edition. 16×16″. Artist Lianne Todd.  SOLD.  Private Collection.

Biological Forms

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Examples of fractals in biology are not difficult to find, and indeed if the universe is fractal, there should be a fractal component to all biological forms.  In the post entitled The Photographs, in which I have captured some natural fractal forms, there are at least five forms which are biological.  In the post entitled Butterflies and Moths, there were several digitally generated fractals which just happened to look biological.  Anyone who has looked up the word fractal has probably been given the example of the fern, or the romanesco, or even the tree.  In fact, people can create extremely realistic looking plants using software that takes advantage of fractal geometry.  Our lungs, and our vascular systems are obviously fractal in nature.  Ever looked at a sea slug?  Beautiful little fractals.

When I create my fractal digital art, and sometimes watercolours, I don’t try to make things that are biological, but I recognize natural forms when I see them and they pop up on their own all the time.  The fact that I’m not making them on purpose somehow speaks to my scientific side, and relates them to evolutionary theory.  I talked about this a little bit in The rose and the creation process as well.

These two pieces are examples which are maybe not as obvious as the butterflies but do remind me of biology just the same.

Cell Division. Lianne Todd. Watercolour on Aquabord. 6x6". $175.00

Cell Division.
Lianne Todd.
Watercolour on Aquabord.
6×6″.
$175.00

Triad. Lianne Todd. Watercolour on Paper. 20x20". $625.00

Triad.
Lianne Todd. Watercolour on Paper.
20×20″.
$650.00