Ele Willoughby
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minouette.bsky.social
Ele Willoughby
@minouette.bsky.social
13K followers 4.9K following 10K posts
Artist/marine geophysicist (PhD Physics)
Printmaker
Find/contact me at:
minouette.Etsy.com
minouette.blogspot.ca
Instagram.com/the.minouette
https://cara.app/minouette
I post art, science, #sciart and stuff with typos. She/her, Settler in Tkaronto 🇨🇦
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minouette.bsky.social
Time for more blue orchard mason bees on blueberry flowers!

#linocut #printmaking #pollinators #masonBee #blueberry #nativeBees
My linocut prints on cream coloured washi paper, drying on a tabletop. 6 are visible. Each shows a bunch of white blueberry flowers and leaves printed in pale green with hints of red on buds and a blue orchard mason bees on the lowest flower.
November 15, 2025 at 1:00 PM
minouette.bsky.social
Happy birthday to geologist Charles Lyell (1797-1875) who in his famous ‘Principles of Geology,’ wrote that to avoid some sources of prejudice in understanding #geology would require an Amphibious Being, who could, say, compare processes happening today on land & those happening below 🧵 #histsci 🧪🐡⚒️
My linocut print with text “Lyell’s Amphibious” above and “Being” below of a Victorian anthropomorphic frog-geologist in a gradient of blue at the bottom to brown at the top. The geologist wears a suit with his frog shins and feet bare, waistcoat, bow tie, shirt, jacket and magnifying lens on a ribbon around his neck. His frog limbs and head are green with blue spots. He carries a satchel, pick ax, geological hammer and rock sample and is kneeling down. Behind him is an on- and offshore geological section from Lyell’s book with an onshore volcano at the ocean shore. In the top left corner is a fossil plant in brown and grey. In the top right corner is a fossil ammonite shell in gold and brown.
November 14, 2025 at 12:50 PM
minouette.bsky.social
And here we are: more Selkies!

In Celtic, Norse, Faroese and Icelandic mythology, selkies (also spelled silkies, sylkies, selchies) or
selkie folk, meaning ‘seal folk’ can change from seal to human form by shedding their skin. The legends tell of seal fairies or elves who choose to come ashore 🧵
Several of my 11” x 14” selkie linocuts on cream coloured Japanese washi paper with speckled bark inclusions are laid out on the table to dry. Each print shows a red-headed selkie shedding her seal skin in a rock in the dark blue sea surrounded by grey spotted harbour seals. The light blue sky behind has grey clouds.
November 13, 2025 at 1:35 PM
minouette.bsky.social
Needed some more selkies! This is the background sea and sky layer.
#linocut #printmaking #wip #selkie #folklore #seal
Ten of my 11”x14” linocut prints on cream coloured washi paper with bark inclusions are laid out on a table to dry. They are in their first state, with the sea and sky background printed. The outline of sea faces is unprinted in the dark blue sea below the as-of-yet-unprinted Selkie on a rock and the blue sky.
November 12, 2025 at 1:48 PM
minouette.bsky.social
At the Legion they have placed a net over their hedge covered in crocheted poppies
Low hedge covered in crocheted red and black poppy flowers as big as your hand
November 11, 2025 at 1:54 PM
minouette.bsky.social
Lest we forget

#RemembranceDay #poppy #linocut #printmaking #ArmisticeDay
My linocut poppies print on 9.25” x 12.5” in black in on white Japanese kozo paper with red chine collé blooms shows three large flowers and several buds and pods on black stems.
November 11, 2025 at 1:50 PM
minouette.bsky.social
Happy birthday to Millie Dresselhaus (née Spiewak; 1930 – 2017). 🧪🐡👩🏼‍🔬🎢 #histsci She was a professor of physics and electrical engineering at MIT, known as the Queen of Carbon Science.

In this #linocut I’ve shown her in front of a carbon nanotube. She was recognized for her work on graphite, 🧵
My linocut portrait of Millie Dresselhaus in white sweater, red blazer, and C for carbon necklace, with the structure of a carbon nanotube behind her, in red, silver and black ink.
November 11, 2025 at 1:30 PM
minouette.bsky.social
From Canadian poet Dennis Lee’s marvellous children’s collection ‘Nicholas Knock and Other People”
Image of page from Dennis Lee’s ‘Nicholas Knock and Other People” illustrated by Frank Neufeld with poem and illustration in shades of brown showing a boy in jean jacket and bell-bottoms and boots shooting lightning bolts from his hands. The poem reads: Curse: On a Driver, Who Splashed His New Pants When He Could Have Just as Easily Driven Around the Puddle May your large intestine freeze in a knot like a skate-lace! May manhole covers collapse wherever you go. May garbage strikes pester your street and may you grow eight new Feet and get poison ivy between every toe!
November 10, 2025 at 4:05 PM
minouette.bsky.social
I decided I wanted to include some Canadian folklore again this year for Folktale Week, do I knew that for the prompt night, I wanted to depict New Year’s Eve.

Many Canadians will recognize, especially in Québec, la Chasse-galerie in this block in progress!

#FolktaleWeek2025 #ChasseGalerie
A carved green vinyl Lino block on a green cutting mat shows a night sky with moon and clouds and flying canoe full of paddling voyageurs over rolling countryside with fields and trees covered in snow and a church steeple in the foreground
November 10, 2025 at 12:46 PM
minouette.bsky.social
Snow weighing down the lilac
Snow on lilac and other shrubs and trees in backyard
November 9, 2025 at 8:05 PM
minouette.bsky.social
Happy birthday to #inventor Hedy Lamarr (1914 – 2000) & Hollywood star. 🧪🐡👩🏼‍🔬 #histsci Born Hedwig Keisler in Vienna, she gained fame after her risqué & notorious starring role in Machatý’s ‘33 film Ecstasy. Mandl, 1st of 6 husbands, objected & tried unsuccessfully to buy all copies of film.
My linocut portrait of Hedy Lamarr in indigo, with diagrams from her patent (Fig 4 like a piano roll) and a schematic of how a signal marked “Data”could be encoded with a pseudo-random binary sequence “PBRS” to produce a transmitted signal “Tx” - all in blue.
November 9, 2025 at 2:39 PM
minouette.bsky.social
Of all the minerals in the #OreCup for my art/physics use voting scheme copper wins hands down!

Ok, molybdenum has some applications as catalyst/electrodes/in alloys but copper is the conductor par excellence.

In art we have all of bronze & copper sculpture & many blue/green pigments! Vote copper!
The Burghers of Calais Auguste Rodin French Founder Coubertin Foundry modeled 1884–95, cast 1985 On view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 548 “The Burghers of Calais (1884–95) is Rodin’s best-known public monument. The plaster and bronze casts in this case are small- and large-scale studies from different stages of the commission that Rodin considered independent works. The monument commemorates the heroism of six leading citizens (burghers) of the French city of Calais. In the fourteenth century, at the beginning of the Hundred Years’ War, they offered their lives to the English king in exchange for the lifting of his siege of the city. By portraying their despair and haunted courage in the face of death, Rodin challenged contemporary heroic ideals and made an event from the past seem immediate and real. A full-scale bronze of The Burghers of Calais is on view in the Carroll and Milton Petrie European Sculpture Court (Gallery 548)” Via the Met Buddha Maitreya (Mile) China dated 486 (10th year of Taihe reign) On view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 208 This is the largest early gilt-bronze Chinese sculpture known today. The Buddha’s broad shoulders, powerful physique, and long legs derive from fifth century Indian prototypes that spread to China along the Silk Road, an example of which can be seen directly behind you in the gallery for Indian art. Maitreya is worshiped both as a bodhisattva and as a Buddha, for it is believed that once the current cosmic era has destroyed itself, he will be reborn as the teaching Buddha of the next great era. The identification of this figure as the Buddha Maitreya is based on the dedicatory inscription at the back of the base, which dates the sculpture to 486 and states that it was commissioned in honor of the dowager empress Wenming (442–490), who controlled the Northern Wei dynasty during the last three decades of the fifth century. Period: Northern Wei dynasty (386–534) Date: dated 486 (10th year of Taihe reign) Culture: China Medium: Gilt bronze with traces of pigment; piece-mold cast Dimensions: H. 55 1/4 in. (140.3 cm); W. 24 1/2 in. (62.2 cm); D. 19 1/4 in. (48.9 cm) Classification: Sculpture Credit Line: John Stewart Kennedy Fund, 1926 Object Number: 26.123 Via the Met Cat Statuette intended to contain a mummified cat Ptolemaic Period 332–30 BCE On view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 899 “The cat was the sacred animal of the goddess Bastet, a great and benevolent Egyptian goddess. For the Egyptians, the goddesses Bastet and Sakhmet were two aspects of divine power. Sakhmet, the lioness, represented dangerous, potentially destructive forces. Bastet, the feline of the house, incorporated the benevolent aspects of a deity that could be pacified by rituals. In Bastet's honor, mummified cats, sometimes in impressive bronze or wooden containers, were donated at her temples, of which the most important were located at Bubastis and Saqqara. The mummies were then buried within her temple precincts. This statue was the container for a mummified cat. Clearly this is not an ordinary cat. Its pierced right ear once held a gold ring (now lost), and suspended from its incised necklace is a wedjat-eye pendant. An impression of majesty is created by the cat's erect and dignified pose and the alert expression of the eyes. The sleek muscles and long graceful legs convey a sense of controlled power. Cats were first domesticated by the Egyptians in the Middle Kingdom for their mouse-hunting abilities. By New Kingdom times they had also become household companions. In tomb scenes they frequently appear seated beneath the chairs of their owners or on sporting boats in the Nile marshes, where they flush out birds for their masters.” Via the Met Jan Van Eyck, The Arnolfini Portrait, 1434 (via the National Gallery London) The Arnolfini Portrait (or The Arnolfini Wedding, The Arnolfini Marriage, the Portrait of Giovanni Arnolfini and his Wife, or other titles) is an oil painting on oak panel by the Early Netherlandish painter Jan van Eyck, dated 1434 and now in the National Gallery, London. It is a full-length double portrait, believed to depict the Italian merchant Giovanni di Nicolao Arnolfini and his wife, presumably in their residence at the Flemish city of Bruges. He wears a fur-lined cloak and large black hat. She wears a vivid green gown with blue underdress and white veil. There is a red bed and bench behind them, a small dog and sandals on the floor and a circular convex mirror behind them. The scene is lit by a window and a chandelier hangs above them. Her dress in particular depends on copper pigments
November 9, 2025 at 1:31 PM
minouette.bsky.social
Peacock ore Bornite is very pretty but only gets art/physics points as a source of copper & I’d rather vote for copper itself.

So I am going to vote Molybdenite for physics reasons (source of Re for geochronology, Mo used as a catalyst, battery electrodes, alloys of iron & semiconductors). #OreCup
Bornite rock sample on white background showing deep turquoise and magenta colours via geologyscience.com Molybdenite on quartz Locality : Moly Hill mine, La Motte, Abitibi RCM, Abitibi-Témiscamingue, Québec, Canada Size : 5.5 x 3 x 3 cm) On black background via Wikipedia
November 8, 2025 at 1:01 PM
minouette.bsky.social
I bet people will recognize the beloved fairytale this block will illustrate for #FolktaleWeek2025. This will be for the prompt charm!

#folktaleWeekCharm #linocut #printmaking #illustration #fairytale #wip
My partially carved 8” x 10” Lino block shows a standing polar bear facing forward with one arm around a girl with braids in a dress and a bell between his paws. The block rests on an ink-splattered cutting mat.
November 8, 2025 at 12:51 PM
minouette.bsky.social
I’ll grant Ilmenite a titanium-iron oxide mineral with idealized formula FeTiO3 some arts points for titanium dioxide white paint but it’s no match for copper’s centuries of blue-green pigments, bronze sculpture & direct use through art history! Vote Copper!
#TeamCopper #OreCup #artHist
Piet Mondrian, Broadway Boogie Woogie 1942-43 Medium: Oil
Support: Canvas
Size: 127 x 127 cm Art period: Neo-Plasticism
Museum of Modern Art New York
Painting 73.1943 Quote from the text at the website of the Museum of Modern Art on the painting Piet Mondrian, Broadway Boogie Woogie: “In this painting, his penultimate, Mondrian replaced the black grid that had long governed his canvases with predominantly yellow lines that intersect at points marked by squares of blue and red. These atomized bands of stuttering chromatic pulses, interrupted by light gray, create paths across the canvas suggesting the city’s grid, the movement of traffic, and blinking electric lights, as well as the rhythms of jazz.” Whites are titanium dioxide. Rogier van der Weyden, The Magdalen Reading before 1438 Medium: Oil Support: Mahogany, transferred from another panel Size: 62.2 x 54.4 cm National Gallery London NG654 “Roger van der Weyden’s ‘The Magdalen reading‘ is a fragment from an altar ‘Virgin and Child with Six Saints‘ probably painted for a church in Brussels. The figure behind Mary Magdalene is Saint Joseph and to the left we can see the bare feet and red robe of Saint John the Evangelist. The pigment analysis shows the exquisite painting technique and the usual array of pigments of the Renaissance period.” The Magdalen is seated, reading, on the floor reading in white wimple and green dress made with verdigris from copper. Fayum Mummy Portrait of a Woman ca 2nd century A.D. Medium: Encaustic Support: Wood Size: 34.6 x 11.5 cm Art period: Antiquity National Gallery of Art Object number: 1956.12.1 This portrait employs calcite as a pigment. Via Colourlex The Clenched Left Hand (Study for Hand of Pierre de Wiessant) Auguste Rodin French Founder Cast by Georges Rudier French modeled ca. 1885, cast 1974 Medium: Bronze Dimensions: Overall (wt. confirmed): 18 1/4 × 10 3/8 × 7 5/8 in., 23.1 lb. (46.4 × 26.4 × 19.4 cm, 10.5 kg) Classification: Sculpture-Bronze Credit Line: Gift of Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Foundation, 1984 Object Number: 1984.364.13 Met Museum “To Rodin, hands communicated as forcefully as the human face. His independent sculptures of hands are portraits of emotions. This emphatically modeled, dramatically gesturing hand—that both seeks and draws away, that clenches but cannot grasp—is one of Rodin’s most compelling depictions of powerless despair.”
November 7, 2025 at 2:19 PM
minouette.bsky.social
Happy birthday to #physicist Lise Meitner (1878-1968) who explained #nuclear #fission. 🧪🐡👩🏼‍🔬#histsci She worked with chemists Hahn & Straßmann in 30s Berlin, investigating whether there were any stable elements beyond uranium. They discovered bombarding nucleus of U-235 with neutrons actually 🧵
My linocut print of Lise Meitner holding her glasses in one hand, while leaning on the other, in silver ink. In red ink is a nuclear fission chain reaction shown with a single neutron (white ball with motion lines) emanating from her head towards a nucleus (conglomerate of red proton and white neutron balls) then an arrow to it fissioning (becoming split into two adjacent then two separate halves with extra free neutrons). These neutrons in turn all begin the same process with other nuclei and the chain reaction takes up the left side of the print next to Meitner.
November 7, 2025 at 1:42 PM
minouette.bsky.social
Happy birthday to Marie Skłodowska-Curie (1867 – 1934, Polish-born, naturalized-French #physicist & #chemist at work in her lab. The contents of her lab glassware in my print appropriately glow-in-the-dark! 🧪🐡👩🏼‍🔬 #histsci

Marie Curie was the 1st woman to win a Nobel prize, the only woman to ever win
My linocut print of Marie Curie in teal, holding glassware with radiating straight arrows and wiggly lines (to represent particles and photons respectively) in glow in the dark ink
November 7, 2025 at 12:49 PM
minouette.bsky.social
My mother was a nurse like her mother. I can tell you that of the documents recognizing her as a registered nurse in Canada, the US and England and Wales, that the last one was the fanciest.

Also, my grandfather’s first telephone number was 18. That’s it. It was on his business card.
A document with a fancy black border, orange circular emblem and assorted floral design elements. Text title and on emblem reads “General Nursing Council for England & Wales”
November 6, 2025 at 9:06 PM
minouette.bsky.social
My mother has always complained that I am a packrat. She once said, “You’re like one of those crazy people who hoard newspapers except with books!”

Having cleaned out her house, not only did I find everything travel brochure or greeting card she ever got, but my grandmother’s report card from 1928
Report card shows the crest of the province of Saskatchewan plus text reading: Province of Saskatchewan Department of Education Grade XI High School Examination 2928 This document does not give the holder the authority to teach. This is to certify that…” And “Schedule Requirements to pass: Fifty percent on each paper. The candidate did not write on the subjects cancelled and failed in the subjects where marks are given.”
November 6, 2025 at 8:46 PM
minouette.bsky.social
Working on a print for a folktale well-known across Asia with different names & versions for #folktaleweek2025. This is the story of the magpie bridge which once a year can reunite the lovers, The Weaver Girl and the Cowherd, separated by the great river which is the Milky Way

#linocut #printmaking
My green vinyl Lino block in progress, on a cutting mat. Illustrating the Chinese folktale of The Weaver Girl and the Cowherd, I have begun carving the Cowherd at the bottom right, reaching up towards the weeping Weaver Girl at the top left. There are 6 magpies in flight between them. Drawn in pencil you can see both stand on stylized raining clouds with waves of the river between them.
November 6, 2025 at 2:12 PM
minouette.bsky.social
Lovely peacock ore bornite gets arts points as a source of copper, but so is rare carrollite, which is also a source of cobalt… and cobalt is important for pigments including cobalt violet, cobalt yellow, cobalt titanite green, and of course, cobalt blue.
#OreCup
Carrollite from Kambove, Katanga, Democratic Republic of the Congo (former Zaire). The specimen is 4.3 cm wide with a 1.2 cm carrollite crystal partly covered by pyrite between calcite crystals. Via Wikipedia Colourful sample of bornite, or “peacock ore” with turquoise and magenta colouring against a white background via https://geologyscience.com/gemstone/peacock-ore/ Vincent van Gogh, The Starry Night, 1889 Medium: Oil Support: Canvas Size: 73.7 x 92.1 cm Art period: Post-Impressionism Museum of Modern Art, New York Object number: 472.1941 The very famous painting shows a village at night with a cypress in the foreground and swirling skies with stars and moon glowing in waves of blue. “The brighter blue parts of the sky are painted in cobalt blue, while the darker more intense parts contain artificial ultramarine.” Via ColourLex
November 6, 2025 at 1:42 PM
minouette.bsky.social
Ilmenite a titanium-iron oxide mineral wins the arts vote for titanium dioxide white paint in modern art (like this Klein)

Though Jadarite, only discovered in 2004 gets some physics points as a source of lithium (& use in batteries) & some arts points for boron (used in ceramic & glasses) #OreCup
Franz Klein, Chief, 1950 Medium Oil on canvas Dimensions 58 3/8" x 6' 1 1/2" (148.3 x 186.7 cm) Credit Gift of Mr. and Mrs. David M. Solinger Object number 2.1952 Copyright © 2025 The Franz Kline Estate / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York This abstract work is painted with wide black lines on a white background using titanium white. A white Jadarite specimen on a black background via https://www.mindat.org/min-31570.html
November 5, 2025 at 2:07 PM
minouette.bsky.social
Yama orabi- the mountain shouter is a terrifying Japanese echo yōkai. It mimics people’s yells in the mountain. It looks like a little bird with an exceptionally large head and sharp pointy teeth!

Work in progress for #folktaleweek2025 #folktaleWeekEcho

#wip #linocut #printmaking #folklore
Nine of my 8”x10” prints laid out on a table in a grid to dry. They show a Yama orabi, a mythical bird like creature with an exceptionally large head and sharp pointy teeth hopping off a branch in front of a grey and blue-grey mountain at sunset in a gradient of orange, yellow and green sky.
November 5, 2025 at 1:56 PM
minouette.bsky.social
Molybdenite wins physics vote (source of Re for geochronology, Mo used as a catalyst, battery electrodes, alloys of iron & semiconductors),

But Tetrahedrite gets physics points for being thermoelectric (turn heat into electricity) & some arts points as a historically important ore of copper #OreCup
Molybdenite on quartz Locality : Moly Hill mine, La Motte, Abitibi RCM, Abitibi-Témiscamingue, Québec, Canada Size : 5.5 x 3 x 3 cm via Wikipedia Tetrahedrite, Chalcopyrite, Sphalerite Locality: Casapalca Mine, Casapalca, Huarochiri Province, Lima Department, Peru (Locality at mindat.org) Size: 8.2 x 6.4 x 4.7 cm. A large, very rich specimen of sharp, modified Tetrahedrite crystals from Peru. These crystals, often intergrown or sprinkled with showy brassy Chalcopyrite, measure to .9 cm along the edge. The Tetrahedrites have superb luster and have fascinating modifications on the faces and edges. All rest on massive Sphalerite, and there are several large, intergrown via Wikipedia
November 4, 2025 at 1:46 PM
minouette.bsky.social
Happy birthday to Indian #botanist E.K. Janaki Ammal (1897-1984), here with plants she studied: #sugarcane, #magnolia & eggplant. 🧪🐡👩🏾‍🔬 #histsci

A trailblazer for #womenInSTEM in India, expert in cytogenetics, phytogeography, coauthor Chromosomal Atlas of Plants, 1st Indian woman PhD & early woman 🧵
My linocut portrait of Janaki Ammal on speckled cream coloured washi paper, in purple ink, seated, in a sari and looking over her shoulder. There are mitosis diagrams on her sari. She is surrounded by plants she worked on: sugarcane in green to her left, magnolia with purple-brown branches and white blossoms outlined in silver to her right and a purple eggplant with pink blossom, and green leaves and stem at the bottom.
November 4, 2025 at 12:52 PM