Hello all and happy December! This month I pulled a lot of inspiration from vintage Christmas decorations to create Tiny Terra Series 20. I absolutely love old movies (our must-watch holiday films are the original Grinch, White Christmas, and The Year Without a Santa Claus though there are a lot more we try to watch), so the classic, gaudy, Xmas vibes had to show up this year.
When I think of vintage Christmas I think of pastel pink and mint, glitter-encrusted greeting cards, magenta poinsettias, and kitschy ceramic trees full of lights. I want crushing amounts of tinsel, the avocado green shag carpet of my grandmother’s house between my toes, and the smell of German chocolate cake in the air. This collection is full of so much love and nostalgia.
This cream and gold series was the first I made for TTS20. I wanted it to feel like champagne on New Year’s Eve with the tree still up. I had been hoarding these gorgeous off-white flowers and I think this was the perfect use for them. The pills are half-filled with glass micro beads to represent the champagne bubbles.
Candy canes are a motif from last year that I wanted to revisit again, so they were an early design as well. I feel like they scream holidays but are the Christmas version of candy corn because no one really likes peppermint candy canes. I do like them on top of chocolate sometimes, but even so I hit my limit early in the season. The colors here remind me of the amazing, over-saturated colors of White Christmas.
As stated above, I must watch How the Grinch Stole Christmas ever year and these green and pink pieces are my tribute to Whoville. I absolutely love Cindy Lou Who and Max and the hand-drawn, storybook feeling of the old movie.
You can’t have a vintage Christmas without some good old fashioned, tacky red and green decorations. To get these resin Glue Babies the right color I used acrylic paint instead of my normal resin dyes. I wanted the colors to be very specific and super saturated.
Another piece with a very specific inspiration was the one above that has pearls and miniature light bulbs on a cream-colored based. My grandmother had a huge cream colored ceramic tree with lots of little lights. When I was little, I thought that it was one of the most magical things, so I had to make a piece inspired by it. My grandmother was like a mythic figure to me and having bits of her memory in my art is my way of honoring her.
Pearls are another thing that always make me think of my grandmother and this is probably my favorite Tiny Terra from Series 20. I love a vintage pink and mint holiday moment, plus the huge faux pearls and the clear ornaments filled with pearls and beads? Pure joy.
I had these huge, blue snowflakes last year but felt like I didn’t use them to their full potential. So I drew in some new elements to give them an icy blue and white winter wonderland to live in. I grew up in Florida, so I only have one memory of snow growing up (yes, it snowed in Florida in 1989 aka the year of the rolling blackouts; it used to get cold here). I think snow is so magical, but I’m also happy I don’t have to drive in it.
I also wanted something completely different in the collection so I made this series of smaller, chocolate-inspired pieces. They look good enough to eat but all the sprinkles, marshmallows, and nonpareils are faux. They make me think of a high-end candy shop and it’s giving me ideas for Valentine’s Day.
I hope you all enjoyed this closer look at Tiny Terra Series 20! Have a beautiful holiday and I will see you again at the end of the month/year.