I bought this painting from Jennifer Mercede (chaboo artist) for my mom.  She has seen it more than a year ago and wanted it but the painting was already sold.  Something happened and I found out that Jennifer still had the painting.  I thought I would surprise my mom for christmas this year with the walrus she had always wanted.

She lives up in the west hills though and the roads are impassible without chains.  So, I trekked it.  I carried the painting and walked up to her house from SE Portland.  If you saw someone walking through downtown with two walruses under their arm odds are good that it was me.

It looks great in her house.  I put it next to these sumi inked bamboo shelving units I made for her years ago.  She likes to put little trinkets up there and make sculptures.  The quiet monotone quality of my work and the exuberance and bright color of Jennifers work play off each other surprisingly well.  The home feels so much warmer now.

I remember now when I was writing essays to get into grad programs for architecture I wrote about how I wanted to learn how the design of spaces could affect people emotionally.  I wondered why some spaces felt warm and cozy while others felt cold.  Id like to get back to thinking about feeling more in my own work as a designer.

Happy Holidays everyone!

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 25th, 2008 at 2:24 am and is filed under Project Chaboo, tomita designs. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.