An Alien City and Its Unlikely Origins. . .

Greetings to you today, Dear Friends of The Tearoom,

I have always been fascinated with worlds which might exist someplace else.  When I was a little girl, I was asked what I wanted to be when I grew up and there was a time when I answered, "An astronaut!"  I was told that girls didn't become astronauts.  I accepted that answer at the time, especially because my grandfather was an amateur astronomer (even built his own telescopes), and even he didn't think there was any reason that girls should be interested in astronomy!  Luckily for me, even though I had plenty of people telling me what I couldn't be, something in my head told me that I could do whatever I wanted to with my mind.  So, I now dabble in whatever interests me and see things through my own vision as much as I want!  I now place no limits on myself as to what interests me and I am certainly more enlightened when it comes to any ridiculous, if not dangerous, limits placed on anyone based on their gender.

(As always, please click on the image to see it larger.)

My collage today is of an alien city, perhaps located near that brightest star you'll see in the sky tonight.

I think the most curious thing about my collage today might not be what is about, but the source of the images I used to make it.

For sometime I have been fascinated by the botanical photographs of Karl Blossfeldt.  He photographed stems of plants, seed pods, blossoms and buds, very closely, with a camera he made himself!  I was able to find many of these images online at The Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam.  They very most generously have made 200,000 of their works of art available online in their RijksStudio and placed them in the public domain.  You can even save collections to use in your artwork or for future reference, as I have (take a peek at my collections here.) After looking at several of the Blossfelt photographs there, the wheels of my imagination began to turn and I began to think of these botanical artifacts as buildings in an alien urban landscape.  To see which botanical images inspired me in this work, take a peek here.  I also used several images from space from their site for the background of my collage.

Thank you, Dear Friends, for taking a trip with me through my imagination once again today!