Icy Pond Series

These two little 8 x 10 acrylic paintings were done for the upcoming "Winter Wonderful" show at Carrollwood Cultural Center this December.

Icy Pond, Mystic, CT

Icy Pond, Woodstock, CT

Not One. Not Two

Oak Tree       Metalpoint Drawing        Private Collection

I had an email request to use my Oak Tree Drawing in a Blog that had such a lovely message about the "edges of God" and the tiny grey spaces and delicate lines and marks in which we live. I was honored to have this nice sentiment illustrated by my drawing. To read the whole blog post go to this link http://stillinthestorm.wordpress.com/

Corn Wins

Genesis: Corn won an honorable mention at the Florida State Convention Art Show of the National League of American Pen Women. I was very pleased as the competition was very stiff!

Rambutan

Rambutan      Egg Tempera on Gesso Panel     
6 x 8        $450

Fresh Rambutans are much redder than the one I found at my local Publix Market. They are native to Indonesia, Malaysia, Sri Lanka and other parts of Asia and they are being grown in areas of South America. Their name comes from the word "hairy" in Indonesian. The white fleshy fruit is sweet, although only a small morsel of it is in each fruit as they are quite small, perhaps slightly bigger than golf-ball size before the hairs. They are used in jams, jellies, and eaten fresh or in deserts.

Best In Show

My Egg Tempera "Genesis: Pear" was awarded Best in Show in the North Tampa Arts League Member Show called "Debut" at Carrollwood Cultural Center. I was so blown away by this award, and my thanks goes to Robert Hellier of the Tampa Art Museum who judged the show. This is my second Best In Show for one of my Genesis paintings!

Inspiration

Inspiration    Oil on Linen    48 x 30

This painting will be shown for the month of September at Carrollwood Cultural Center, along with 8 other paintings in the "Feeling Series". For more information on this painting click here.





Genesis: Blue Corn

This is number 22 in the Genesis Series of paintings. I wanted to find real Hopi Blue Corn for another painting, but no luck, even from friends in Arizona/New Mexico. Evidently you just can't get the real thing anywhere. I finally bought blue corn (Indian Corn) at Thanksgiving time from my local supermarket. It isn't the same but it is close enough. I especially liked the fact that the corn cob was red, which I would not have known had the kernels not fallen out when I moved the bunch of cobs. It looked awful in the painting I bought it for, so it became one of the Genesis paintings. 

Primary Trilogy

It took a long time to get these three finished. The Red and Yellow paintings were done in 2009 but I only just finished the Blue painting two weeks ago. They will be shown at the upcoming Student/Faculty show at Carrollwood Cultural Center.

TOTAL DISASTER!

After about a week at home touching base with my life and work I decided to apply an egg wash to the painting I did at the workshop. Who knows what happened but the egg wash didn't go on properly, it puddled into thickish spots of brownish yellow goop that didn't bleach out in the sun. I have finished all my ET paintings this way and never had this kind of problem. The more I tried to fix it the worse it became. The painting was ruined. I was devasted!

I thought I'd have to throw it out and begin again, but I decided to experiment, based on Koo's advice that "there are very few problems that can not be fixed in Egg Tempera", so I plunged ahead and sanded off the several coats of gluey egg wash removing some of the background color in the process. There were several bare spots down to the gesso panel showing when I set up to fix the mess.

I spent all day on Sunday working on the painting. I couldn't duplicate the color of the background so I changed to a new color that I had ordered in dispersion form from Natural Pigments, Maya Blue...a lovely grey blue color. I cut new masks and out of acetate this time and could control the sponge a bit better this time. Practice, practice, practice.....she makes it look so easy. After about 20 more paintings I'll have it down.

Anyway, here is the revised painting. Perhaps a bit better? I love it still, but am afraid to seal it off with another egg wash. This one will probably just go under plastic glazing as is. It appears to be a little dark in this blog, but you get the idea.

Celebration of the Egg (Revised)

Back to my life

I drove home yesterday afternoon after another full day of painting and listening to Koo's amazing lectures on Renaissance painters. Her concise lectures made me feel like I had completed one semester of art history in only a few days. It reminded me how much I don't know, or have forgotten. Not to mention the tips and techniques that she uses to create her stunning paintings, as well as a demonstration of how she photographs still life subjects and portraits to achieve that one source light that is key to Renaissance painting. We all crammed into the small office to watch her demonstration, using an ordinary point and shoot camera, and a spiral bulb, giving those rich darks and patterned lights. Some students used her still life photographs for their paintings and they really looked like an old master painting!

I have decided not to work on my painting. The energy and focus is gone. My life is now back to its humdrum routine. I like what I have done here. Sure, it could use many more layers, but it seems pointless to keep reworking it.

Celebration of the Egg          8 x 10           Egg Tempera

Koo Schadler

I am taking a 5 day workshop with the Egg Tempera artist extraordinaire, Koo Schadler. It is organized by The Amelia Island Artist Workshop, run by two ladies who bring renowned artists to this part of the state of Florida, and what a tight ship they run! Koo defies description, as she is a fountain of knowledge about art, Egg Tempera techniques, Renaissance artists, and she shares her vast knowledge in a totally unpretentious, humorous and loving way, and her lectures on various aspects of the craft of creating a painting are amazingly organized and presented so all levels of ability and knowledge can be informed.

Koo's process of creating Egg Tempera paintings cuts through hours of tedious layering, and it is a thrill to me to learn how to hasten my work through using masks, stencils, tracings, sponging and applying scumbles and glazes.

 

Prior to the workshop we each received extensive lists of materials, directions, directives and choices to make about gesso panel sizes and were advised to plan to work on a still life that we photographed at home, brought to work from life, or used one of Koo's photos. This sent me into a couple of weeks of angst about what I was going to paint, eventually deciding on the "Celebration of Egg Tempera" theme, rather than the Easter Bunny droppings that was a possible substitute still life consisting of candy in various forms, wrappers and containers, which I would have probably titled "Candyfest" (which may still make it into a painting at a later time.)

Here is Day 2 with my photograph on the right and the beginning of my Egg Tempera painting on the left

The masks and cutouts are made from photo copies of my scaled to size photo and here they are shown on the right after being applied to the panel by the use of cosmetic sponges....in one day I have achieved about a week's work using my old way!

At the end of Day three I have layered over my base more precise work using various masks as well as applying "fussy brush work" (as Koo calls it), and the form is built up by sponging veils of color glazes, alternating with a scumble of thin white paint. To look at one of Koo's paintings, one could not imagine that it was created with a cosmetic sponge, but here is the proof! 

Thanks Koo, for a wonderful workshop. I have been to a few of them...even given them myself, but none come close to this super organized, well presented, and beautifully taught 5 glorious days of no TV, no cellphone, no hassles, and hours of blessed painting time in a beautiful setting with nine enthusiastic and happy people painting and learning together. What a way to celebrate Easter!

My New Job

Last week I was named Art Curator of the Gallery at Carrollwood Cultural Center. It will be very difficult to follow in the footsteps of my friend, Mary Ellen Bitner, but I will muddle through, I'm sure. Mary Ellen was the driving force behind the whole visual arts program at the Center and her ideas and energy will be missed. I have a few ideas that I will be trying to implement as soon as possible. I'll be working on trying to make a connection between the art viewer and their pocketbooks.

I am so excited to have this opportunity to work in the art world for a change. It could not have come at a better time! It compliments my other work at the Center, teaching classes in painting, digital photography and computers, so I expect to be in Tampa nearly every day.

to view the Center's website: http://www.carrollwoodcenter.org/

Two New Egg Tempera Paintings

Genesis: Pear     6 x 8      Egg Tempera on Gesso Panel

Genesis: Apricot        6 x 8      Egg Tempera on Gesso Panel 

Both of these paintings are available for sale (PayPal) on my website

FIVE TO TRY

Freelance writer, Chris Kuhn, decided to try out 5 new things each  month and then blog about her experiences. One of her "Five to Try" is my Sampling the Media class at Carrollwood Cultural Center, on Wednesday nights from 7:00 to 9:00.

Go here http://en.wordpress.com/tag/five-to-try/ to see a list of her "Five to Try" entries on her blog and see her adventures with Oils, Acrylics, and Watercolors. The entries start on January 10 and go through February 17. If you are thinking a new art adventure is something YOU want to try but can't quite get fired up about it, read Chris's blog entries for a week-by-week review. The next class begins on March 2nd and will run for 6 weeks.