Kid's Art

Now that I have two kids, I have been spending a lot more time in the world of children's art and design. We have collected dozens of children's picture books, and I find that child geared art and surface design sticks out to me more than ever. I have been playing around with some of my own kid's art lately. This genre is right at home with bright color, which is a perfect fit for me.

New Art

A few new pieces to brighten your day. I have been experimenting with taking elements of my paintings and recreating them into new images in Photoshop. It is so much fun and the possibilities are endless...unfortunately my TIME is not endless! :) 

Apartment Therapy Home Tour

Recently our home was featured on Apartment Therapy! We bought our 1955 fixer about 4 years ago and my husband went to work transforming it not only into a beautiful piece of craftsmanship, but also into the first Passive House in Texas.  Passive House is the most stringent energy efficiency standard in the world, and his company, Equitable Green Group, hopes to build more of this type of building to Texas.

We had a great time doing this photo shoot with local photographer/culture builder Chris Perez. You can see more about him, and the whole shoot, at the Apartment Therapy website.

Blaise House: First Passive House in Texas

Blaise House: Our Moroccan inspired tea room!

Blaise House: Our Dining/Kitchen area with sliding barn doors.

Virtues Art

Recently I began working on a new children's poster series focusing on virtues. The concept is inspired by the Virtues Project, a grassroots initiative to inspire the practice of virtues in everyday life. The idea is that by cultivating virtues, individuals are empowered to live more authentic and meaningful lives, with compassion and integrity.

Misha Maynerick Blaise 2013

The design aesthetic for this series is inspired by an amazing set of vintage illustrations of European countries created by Maurice Labanin in 1959. I really love the little folky details he adds into each of his pieces, and the bright, bold color palette he worked with. 

I am selling these prints individually on Etsy.

Art Prints on Wheatpaste and Greenbox

My art for sale on Wheatpaste (Today is Going to Be Awesome print featured on front page)

...and Greenbox! (2 of my geometric paintings on the front page!)

Prayers for Trayvon Martin

“Until these prejudices are entirely removed from the people of the world, the realm of humanity will not find rest. Nay, rather, discord and bloodshed will be increased day by day, and the foundation of the prosperity of the world of man will be destroyed. Now is the time for the Americans to take up this matter and unite both the white and colored races. Otherwise, hasten ye towards destruction! Hasten ye toward devastation! Indeed, there is a greater danger than only the shedding of blood. It is the destruction of America.”
- Abdu'l-Baha (1912 visit to America)

Etsy Pop-Up Shop at West Elm!

This past weekend I was invited by fashion blogger and show curator Camille Styles to participate in an Etsy Pop-Up Shop at the West Elm here in Austin, TX!  I had heard of these pop-ups happening in other cities and I really wanted to participate in one, so it was a dream come true when I was invited, seemingly out of nowhere, to join! Also, I already have been inspired by West Elm to create some art, so it was a perfect fit. There were some incredibly talented artists and artisans there and I was really psyched to show my art along side of them.

Here is a sample of the artists who were there; you can see the West Elm promo post here:

New Typography Art!

A new piece up at my Etsy shop! This quote is from a poem by Derrick Brown called "A Finger, Two Dots Then Me." I thought it was so beautiful and simple, and for months I have been wanting to create a piece inspired by it! This is what I finally came up with. 

The poem was made into a short film that has won a ton of awards. You can see it here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TcoMiGiDRjg

Misha Blaise Design

Designing for an Album

If you want to listen to one of the most sweet and lovely songs ever written, click this link and select song #4: Aimless Day. This song is by my friend Bahhaj Taherzadeh, who plays under the moniker We/Or/Me. He is one of my favorite musicians and he just launched a kickstarter to raise money for his next album!

If you donate at a certain level, you can get this poster that I designed:

You may notice that Bahhaj has fulfilled his minimum desired funding for this project, but he still needs a couple thousand more bones. I don't think he realized how many people are into his music and would want to support the new album.  The point is, you can still donate!

Bahhaj has asked me to design for him several times over the years. I enjoy designing for musicians: whereas in some situations art stands alone and speaks for itself, album art contributes to the overall mood created by the music.

Bahhaj is drawn to a very simple and almost rustic visual aesthetic (in a cool way). The images are tattered and aged and refer to a familiar, yet distant place and time that one still longs for.  I think it goes well with is music, because a lot of his songs seem to communicate a lonely longing as well.

I enjoy the challenge of designing for him because it is a departure from the bright, vibrant colors and busy compositions that I usually create. Here is a selection of a few of the album covers and posters I have designed for him over the past few years:

Best of luck with the new album, Bahhaj!

Misha Blaise: Spotted on Style Carrot and Oh My!

One of my paintings, "Sabreen's Day" spotted on Style Carrot

And one of my typography art prints spotted on Oh My!

Misha Blaise: Today is Going to be Awesome print

Misha Blaise on PopSugar

Spotted some of my typography art on the PopSugar blog today:

Etsy Editor's Pick

A few days ago one of my typography prints, "Shine on You Crazy Diamond," was featured on the Etsy blog as an editor's pick for  "Inspirational Prints for the New Year."  You can check out the post here!

Design by Misha Blaise

Wear That Art!

Recently I was asked to contribute to the blog at Francesca's Collection; which is boutique that has hundreds of locations around the country.  The idea was to explore the overlap between my artistic aesthetic and some of their very cool clothing.  You can see the designs I came up with below, and the interview they did with me here!

Spotted: Misha Blaise on Apartment Therapy

I just stumbled upon a piece of my art hanging in a home that was recently featured on the Apartment Therapy blog!

You can see the whole shoot here; it is the the home of the owner of an awesome local business, MakeATX, where you can play with LASERS! This image that was featured (below) is called "Night" and is available at my Etsy shop!

"Night" by Misha Maynerick Blaise

East Side Studio Tour 2012: Show is up!

The tour is ON! We will be open Nov 10/11 and Nov 17/18 from 11am-6pm.  3209 Walnut Ave.  Some pics of the art hanging around my house, by me and Anis Mojgani...

Art by Anis Mojgani

Art by Anis Mojgani--detail

Hanging the show, Anis Mojgani

Art by Anis Mojgani

Art by Anis Mojgani

Art in the dining room.

Chickens! Misha Maynerick Blaise

Art by Misha Blaise

Birth Resources

I have been chatting with some of my friends who are pregnant or have new babies, and I thought I would share a bit about my birth story and compile a few of my favorite pregnancy/new baby resources in one place for those who are interested!

Surprisingly, Austin Texas is a veritable hub of midwifery, with several birthing centers and hundreds of independent midwives. I chose to give birth to my first son with no drugs in a midwife center. There was no option for epidural or other pain killers, nor were there any drugs like Pitocin available to speed up the labor. Make no mistake, my labor, like many labors, was long and difficult. I definitely hit a point where I wanted an epidural, but not enough to transfer to a hospital in order to get one. Once I accepted I was going all natural, I got down to business and didn't think of pain killers again. I was amazed by the overwhelming power of labor and the incredible journey of birthing in this way. I definitely felt like a warrior when I finally gave birth to my beautiful son.

I hadn't originally planned to give birth this way. In fact, at the beginning of pregnancy I told my husband that I planned to get an epidural as soon as possible during labor so that I wouldn't have to feel any pain. I hate feeling any physical discomfort, especially cramps, so the idea of feeling cramps x1000 for 24 hours was the last thing I wanted to experience!

We stumbled upon a movie that was available on instant demand on Netflix: A documentary by Ricki Lake called The Business of Being Born. I was tremendously impacted by this movie. There was just so much I didn't know about birth and the birthing "industry". I think this movie is a great starting point for any pregnant woman who wants to be more educated about her childbirth options.

For the birth of my second son, labor went a LOT quicker and I definitely had more of a handle on it, since I knew what to expect. However, I will say my saving grace in my second labor was NITROUS OXIDE (i.e. laughing gas!). The birthing center I was at (Austin Area Birthing Center) had just begun using it. As soon as I started using it, my labor transformed. I progressed very quickly and I completely relaxed into my body. I still felt pain, but I was in a sort of altered "go with the flow" state. As it turns out, generations of women in parts of Europe, all of Australia and Canada have turned to nitrous during labor, but in the US, it is virtually unheard of. As usual, there is a bunch of red tape around it and hospitals have realized that epidurals make them way more money than a tank of nitrous, which costs like $60 and can administered by any trained nurse (i.e.-doesn't require skills of an expensive anesthesiologist). If your hospital or midwife does not have nitrous, you should be sure to express your desire for it and advocate for it--there is no reason why women should not have access to it during childbirth! Here is an excellent article about it in the Atlantic.

Here are some of the books I would recommend for those interested in learning more about birthing options and birthing with a midwife. I am too lazy to write my own reviews, so I'm just cutting and pasting the reviews from other sites :) I think these books are totally inspirational; even if you are planning a hospital birth they remind you of the sacred process you will be a part of. I could not put these books down and I read them each several times, both times I was pregnant!


Misha's Picks 

Lady's Hands, Lion's Heart, A Midwife's Saga By Carol Leonard
Often laugh-out-loud funny and irreverent, occasionally disturbing and deeply sorrowful,Lady's Hands, Lion's Heart is the saga of Ms. Leonard's fated journey as a young midwife. Her story intertwines three threads: Her dedication to the mothers and babies she was groomed to attend; the growing renaissance, despite formidable opposition, of the profession of midwifery in New Hampshire and then in the United States; and finally, a powerful, tragic love story.

Baby Catcher: Chronicles of a Modern Midwife By Peggy Vincent

More than a collection of birth stories, Baby Catcher is a provocative account of the difficulties that midwives face in the United States. With vivid portraits of courage, perseverance, and love, this is an impassioned call to rethink technological hospital births in favor of more individualized and profound experiences in which mothers and fathers take center stage in the timeless drama of birth.

Ina Mays Guide to Childbirth By Ina May Gaskin
This is staple reading. This woman was key in revitalizing the midwifery movement in the U.S.


Born in the USA: How a Broken Maternity System Must Be Fixed to Put Women and Children First by Marsden Wagner.
If you are interested in a very hard core investigation into hospital births you can check this book out. Despite being a wealthy nation, the US has very poor maternal outcomes. The book gives a good review of the stats around American overuse of labor drugs and c-sections, and pretty brutal though and should only be read while pregnant IF you are not prone to freaking out about the risks around birth. I just wanted the facts and this book definitely provides them!

*Starred Review* The outspoken former director of Women's and Children's Health at the World Health Organization believes maternity and perinatal care in the U.S. are seriously flawed. To make the point, he cites recent Centers for Disease Control findings that 28 countries have lower maternity-mortality rates; 41, lower infant-mortality rates. This despite the fact that the U.S. spends twice as much or more per capita on health care than any other industrialized nation. Wagner places responsibility squarely on the shoulders of obstetricians and the lobbying power of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.

This Article by the Atlantic, Using Laughing Gas to Relieve the Pain of Childbirth, is about using laughing gas instead of an epidural during childbirth. I did this for my second birth and it was incredible. The laughing gas totally helped me to relax and let my body take over. I started progressing really quickly after I started using it. The great thing about it is that you are in control--you inhale it when you need it, and as soon as you take the mask off, the effects wear off. 


OTHER CRUCIAL RESOURCES!

Basically, the second after you give birth, your entire focus shifts from the anticipation of labor to survival with a newborn. Namely, your chief concerns will be handing breastfeeding and SLEEP!

Once again, ol' Ina May Gaskin has a must have breastfeeding guide, named appropriately Ina May's Guide to Breastfeeding. You will need it. Just buy it. 

As for sleep, we tried several different books and methods. The one that worked for us and that we still use today when we encounter issues with our older child as well as our baby, is Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Baby by Dr. Marc Weissbluth.  This guy is a bonafide sleep doctor and his recommendations are totally evidence based. He offers several approaches to sleep training and not all involve crying. But, he is quick to say that the method that involves crying (Extinction Method) is extremely effective and works faster than any other approach. And in our experience, he is right. Don't be a hater until you have only slept a few hours a night for weeks on end...you too might want to try it and experience the peace of consolidated sleep! 

As for websites: Besides Babycenter.com which is basically the Amazon of all things pregnancy and baby related, Kellymom.com is a great online site for all things breastfeeding related, and other parenting issues. 

Best of luck and I hope these resources are useful to you!

East Austin Studio Tour 2012

I'm thrilled to be partnering with my long-time bud, Anis Mojgani, for the East Side Studio Tour here in Austin, Texas! Anis is a totally badass poet who travels all over the world performing and has won both national and international slam poetry competitions. This is the debut of his art in Texas.

We will be showing work together at my house, 3209 Walnut Ave., Nov. 10/11 &17/18 from 11am -6pm.  Here is a little more of a sampling of the work we will be showing:

Anis Mojgani

Anis Mojgani

Misha Mayerick Blaise

Misha Maynerick Blaise

Misha Maynerick Blaise

Our home is also the first Passive House in Texas. Along with showing our art, my husband Nick, who built the house, will be available to give tours or answer any questions.

East Side Studio Tour Opening Reception 2012: Austin, Texas

For the second year in a row, we will open our house up for 2 weekends and participate in the East Austin Studio Tour.  Tonight was the opening reception for the show; there was some really excellent work and this year's show looks awesome.

Our home will be open November 10/11 & 17/18  2012 from 11am - 6pm.  Anis Mojgani will also be showing at our place. Stay tuned for an official flyer that I will post here soon.

My piece hanging at the show (Misha Maynerick Blaise)

Misha Maynerick Blaise