A Crafty Interlude

Along with painting and drawing, my other great hobby is knitting. I love that its neat (no set up or clean up involved) and I can do it while watching TV or just relaxing. I got into knitting after one winter Saba and I were going to take a class at JoAnn Fabrics, and being that it was winter and we live in Albany, that day there was a huge snowfall and the class was cancelled. I was really looking forward to learning this new craft though, and so I resorted to the powers of youtube. 

This one woman named Judy basically showed me the ropes (or the yarns, haha). Her channel on youtube is called Knitting Tips by Judy. If anyone is interested in learning to knit, I would highly recommend her. She has videos of how to do a bunch of different types of stitches, how to knit on different types of needles, how to count rows, etc. 

I've been knitting for a little over two years now. I've made some blankets, scarves, and leg warmers. I'm still working on mastering the art of making 'fingers' for gloves, and decreasing stitches to make hats, but, all in good time. 

So when I first started knitting back in 2010, I got some size 8 needles and multicolored yarn (although I wish I had done this in regular yarn, because you could probably see the stitches better), and I watched a bunch of Judy's videos and knitted a whole bunch of stitches together for practice. I think I'm going to do it again with the more complicated stitches that I can do now, because it's so easy to go back to that piece and remember what a stitch looked like, and I have the patterns for the stitches written down with it. So anyway, this is the first thing I ever made: 

Yes, it looks funky, but it has my first practice stitches for a garter stitch, seed stitch, rib stitch, basket weave, bamboo stitch and purl. 

So then after that came my first actual piece, this blanket that I made with little hearts in it. Still one of my beginning ones, so I was still trying to figure out the basics in this one, but its all a variation of simple knit and purl stitches. This is the pattern for the Heart Blanket.

So now that I had gotten the hang of it, I tried to make a cowl for myself. I cannot remember where I found the knitting pattern for this, and I really wish I had saved it somewhere because I love the way it came out as a cowl. You could do this pattern on circular or straight needles, but I did them on straight because I wanted to gauge exactly how long the cowl would be. 

After that, I had the idea that I wanted to do something with a lace pattern. I really love the way lace looks, but most of the patterns I found were for crochet, which is a craft that is still a complete mystery to me. So I found some really nice large lace patterns in a book that I found from the craft store. If anyone is interested in the pattern for this, I'd be more than happy to send it your way. I believe it's called the 'Lacy Chevron'. I alternated between using a single thread and double thread, just for some variation, which is why the middle section looks a bit thicker. 

I remember when I went to Boston last year with my family, I saw this girl walking down the street with this huge white scarf, and I really loved the way it looked. It was chunky and warm, and I decided I wanted one just like it. I remember searching through stores and not really finding anything, and so I decided, perhaps I should just make one for myself. I pieced together this pattern myself just getting ideas from different stitches that I had seen.   

There are two knit libraries online that I use the most. This one from Knitting on the Net and this one from Knitting Queen. So anyway, I pieced together a couple stitches I liked and knit myself a huge infinity scarf that is extremely chunky and warm. This is me in my cozy scarf. 

And finally, in my knitting ventures. My sister Samira and my Brother-in-law Asad (whom I call Bia and BIL) decided that they wanted some knitted goodies. Bia requested leg warmers and BIL wanted a scarf (which I'm still working on). I had never made leg warmers before, and didn't even know that they made 9-inch circular needles before I started these. So I found this pattern which I thought was really cute and followed it exactly. For future leg warmer making though, I would probably make the top cuff a bit longer so it's easier to turn over boots. This is the site for the Spiral Leg Warmers

As for Asad's scarf, that's still in progress. I'll update that onto here whenever I finish. It's a multicolored scarf with 5 small cables so it knits up pretty slowly, and it has to be about 72 inches long. I am currently at 52 inches, so, it's getting there, slowly but surely. 

So I'm no where near professional level with knitting, It's just a hobby I do for fun, but it's exciting because I get warm and cozy things out of it. :)

Pots, Flowers and Water

I don't know what my fascination is with pots of all sorts. The round ones known in India as "matkas", and vases or "kundas". I really love pots and things coming out of them, largely flowers or water.  It started off with a drawing I did in my 2011-2012 Calendar: 

I really loved this piece, which led me to do a few more drawings with markers on bristol paper, that I have in my "Bristol Drawings" Post:

So far, I had only done pieces with pots using my markers. But then, I decided to transfer the idea into paint. This was the first one that I did in paint. It was the first in this series of paintings that I sold. All of the following paintings are done with acrylics on canvas. 

Bismillah Hir Rahman Nir Raheem
"In the Name of God, Most Beneficent, Most Merciful"
12x24

After completing this one, I decided to create another one similar to it. Instead of this one portraying the water falling out of the pot, it portrays the splash of the water as it hits the ground. This one is currently hanging at my mosque, the Al-Fatemah Islamic Center. 

Allahu
24x36

Upon seeing this painting at my mosque, I had a client ask me to make a few paintings for her new home, and so I created these based on the same theme. 

Fabi-ayyi Ala Rabbikuma Tukazhiban
"Which then of the bounties of your lord will you deny" (55:16)
24x36

MashAllah
'By the Will of God'
24x36

My client has a store in the mall in Albany called Arch, and this painting fit very well with the color scheme of the store so she put it up on the wall. I love the way the light hits the painting in the picture, you can really see the shine from the gold and silver paints. 

I had another client in town request a similar painting, but with a darker gold/black color scheme. This is the result: 

MashAllah
'By the Will of God'
24x36

I think thats pots have some element of mystery to them, and along with that they are so varied that there are an endless amount of ways that they can be used in paintings or drawings. I think that this is something that I'll keep doing for a while. 

Different Painting Styles

I love to paint. I love the way the pain spreads, I love the brush strokes, and I absolutely love the intricate designs that paint can make. These next two paintings are ones that I've done, taking advantage of that intricacy. It's also very inspired by indian-style designs that have many different shapes and colors going at the same time. I also experimented with breaking the space up on a canvas in a geometric way, with some interesting diagonals. Both of these are done with Acrylic paints on canvas

La illaha il Allah Muhammad ur Rasoolullah
'There is no God but God and Muhammad is the Messenger of God'
8x24

Bismillah Hir Rahman Nir Raheem'In the Name of God, Most Beneficent, Most Merciful'
10x10

My artwork is usually very colorful and whimsical, and I like to experiment further with that style, while still maintaining the sophistication of the piece. In this next painting, I combined two painting styles: organic and geometric. The border is very organic and flows from one space to another and is very light and airy. The inner portion of the painting is much more rigid, but I love the effect that it created. The use of the metallic gold paint brought the border, the inner border and the lettering together cohesively. I made this painting for a client, as is now sold. It is done on canvas with Acrylic paint.

Ya Ali Madad'Oh Ali, Come to my Aid'
16x20

I recently tried my hand at glass paintings, after being inspired by some images of moroccan style jars that I thought were really beautiful. So I bought some old glass vases and containers from a flea market near my aunts house in West Virginia, painted them with glass paints and baked them. I had a hard time finding puff paint that would stay on glass and weren't meant to peel off. I ended up ordering some  Jones Tones Puff Paints in gold and silver, and went on my way. This was the end result:

The puff paints were a bit sticky even when they were completely dry, but a layer of modge podge pretty much took care of that. 

So now that I had this paint, I thought I'd see what would happen if I put it on a canvas. I just did a plain, gradient Acrylic color, a calligraphy and a little design. Kept it simple. This one was more popular than I had expected, so it might be something I'll explore again. 

Bismillah Hir Rahman Nir Raheem

"In the Name of God, Most Beneficent, Most Merciful"

12x12

So then for this one, I thought I'd go the opposite direction, and do something a little more modernistic. I had a lot of fun with this one, smudging colors and blending. The color scheme is a little more pastel-ish than I usually do. My friend Saba saw this one and claimed it right away! And it's so perfect for her. If you ever meet her, you can see how it fits her personality so well. Vibrant and spunky mixed with some serious iman (mA!). This is done with Acrylics on canvas.

Allahu Akbar'God is Great'
8x8

Finally, this last one was just a mix of intricate and funky. Since this canvas was so small I just did most of it as a border and layered the paint on pretty thick, so you can see the brush strokes in the center. I found a variation of this calligraphy online and tweaked it a bit to make it my own. This is done with acrylics on canvas. 

Allahu
8x8

Doilies and Water

I have a lot of fun experimenting with new techniques when it comes to my art work. In this post, I'll explain two techniques that I played around with. 

Doilies

My first technique is using a doily in order to help make a design. I thought this would be a great idea to try out, and you can see the result in these two paintings. The Doily helps to create a very intricate base layer of shapes, and then it's easier to just make even more details on top of that to really enhance it. Both these paintings are done with acrylics on canvas. 

16x20

Allahu Akbar

'God is Great'

 This painting I did as a wedding present

 for my sister and brother-in-law:

12x12

Allahu

Water

The second technique I played around with was water. I watered down acrylic paints in small bottles, until the paints were a consistency that I liked, and then I just started to move the paints and colors around on some canvas paper. It was messy, but I really liked the result. It almost looks like graffiti. The colors came out neat because some of the paint colors were thicker than others, so some spread a lot more. The watered down paint takes forever to dry though, and you can't move it until its completely dry, or else all the paint will move around again. 

16x20
Allah

Acrylic on Canvas Paper

Painting for Aliyah

So, while I was working towards my masters for the past, about 2 years, my friend Aliyah who was in the same program as me, basically kept me sane, and made getting a masters so much more fun. She's probably one of the funniest and kindest people you'll ever meet, and so when she requested that she wanted a painting of herself, as a princess, wearing a tiara, in front of a castle, I couldn't refuse! It's been years since I've done a portrait, but I was really motivated with this one. 

The Completed Painting

Aliyah with her painting on her birthday!

Niskayuna Painting

So, I'm from this town on the outskirts of Albany, NY known as Niskayuna, known to all the locals as 'Nisky'. I often get made fun of because Niskayuna means 'Fields of Corn' in some Native American language, I believe. But anyway, I took part in a painting competition in my town this past summer (again, I know this post is very late!)

It was one of the best experiences I've had. I got to paint outside with an absolutely fabulous group of artists from Nisky, and it was completely amazing. We had some adventures along the way too. The first day there was a torrential downpour, and my whole painting space in the Gazebo we were working in was underwater in minutes. 

I know it might not look that bad in the picture, but believe me, this was some serious rain. One of the artists was kind enough to lend me a much needed umbrella. 

This was done with Acrylics on a
16x20 Canvas

So this was my final piece from the Art-Out. The rules were that the painting had to be from something around the Niskayuna Town Circle, which is where the Town Hall is located, so I decided to do the street sign. 

Also, it won first place in the competition! I was very excited, there was so much talent from all the artists who participated.  

So I got my painting as the cover of a Holiday Card sent out by the town supervisor. It was  quite the exciting weekend!

Bristol Drawings

My new favorite drawing paper is Bristol paper. It's very smooth and is great for markers or pen/ink. I did these over the course of a few months. I've been moving back and forth between geometric designs and organic designs, and as always I love color. I made some of these just on my own, and a few by request of a client. 

All of these are done on Bristol paper with Prismacolor markers and in some cases I used black/sepia india ink pens, and some metallic gold and silver pens. 

These are all 9x12 and unfortunately my home scanner is an 81/2 x 11, so some of the images are slightly cut off. 

Allahu:

Allahu Akbar:
God is Great

La Illaha Il Allah Muhammad ur Rasoolullah:

There is no God but God, and Muhammad is the Messenger of God

SubhanAllah:

Glorious is God

Bismillah Hir Rahman Nir Raheem:

In the Name of God, Most Beneficent, Most Merciful

This calligraphy design (above)  was not originally my own.
It is one that I found online and really loved, and so I reproduced it here. 

Eid Cards 2012

So yes, I know this post is very late. It's been a while since my last one, but now that I'm finished with my masters (alhum!) I can focus back on my blog. These are some Eid Cards that I made for this past Eid-ul-Fitr back in August. These are made on bristol paper with Prismacolor markers. 

The ones in Arabic say "Eid Mubarak", which can be roughly translated to "Happy Eid"

Eid-Ul-Fitr is an islamic celebration that takes place after the month of Ramadan where we fast for about 30 days from dawn till dusk to purify your soul. The word 'Eid' can mean a 'Return', so if your Ramadan was successful, you've returned to your original, sinless state. Hence, the celebration!