Giveaway at 'Composition as Process' workshop

 In my short and cheap ($40) online workshop next Friday I will be demonstrating this painting, narrating my compositional decisions as I go. One participant will win the painting in this giveaway!

The demo is part of Winslow Art Center's "Technique Takeaway" series. Join me on Friday, August 27, 5:00 - 6:30 pm Eastern, 2:00 - 3:30 Pacific for this workshop. You will get a link to the zoom video afterwards, so even if you can't make it to the real-time demo, you can see it at your convenience.

There will be time for questions and comments too!

 

Burning Bright, acrylic on paper, 18"x24"

Titles

 This was really FUN, to hear (or read) all your fabulous ideas.  It's kind of a window into what YOU see in my work.  I also appreciated those of you who suggested ways of coming up with titles - the free writing, and web sites and poems.  Great suggestions, and I will do that as well.  I chose titles for the four works on paper, as I am bringing them to Edgewater Gallery later this week, framed (took me all afternoon, but they look great). 

Here are the titles I chose. 

Alternative Facts

"Going Around in Circles" (from Cynthia Mc)

"It Could Be Anywhere" (I can't find the source, but I think SOMEONE suggested it)

"Now's The Time" (from Kandis Horton)

So... could Cynthia Mc and Kandis Horton please e-mail me with your shipping address so I can send you a small piece of art work?  Thanks again for all of your participation!!

Titles: a Small Giveaway

Assigning titles to my work is always an adventure.  Occasionally titles just show up, and for these pieces I have some ideas, but I would be interested to hear your suggestions.  These are each 19.5"x25.5" acrylic on paper.  Please comment!  I will assign them numbers for reference:

1

2

3

4

Here is one more that could use a title.  It is 18"x24" on canvas:

5

Thanks for any suggestions you might have.  If I end up using your title suggestion, I will send you a small piece of original art!

A WINNER!

Thanks for all your participation in this giveaway!  And thanks for the complements on my flat files - I passed them on to my father.  The winner of the collage papers is:

Karen in Black Mountain, North Carolina!

Karen, just e-mail me with your mailing address, and I'll get the package off to you.

I was so impressed with the international participation, that I am going to send small envelopes of collage papers to the following:

• Jane Perala from British Columbia
• Annemarie from The Netherlands 
• Melva from Beniarbeig Spain
• Nicky Moore from the wilds of Northumberland, England
• Penny from Back Valley (Australia)
• Tjoeks Reynhardt from an art-deprived South Africa

So... Jane, Annemarie, Melva, Nicky, Penny, and Tjoeks:  Pleas e-mail me with your mailing addresses.  These will be just envelopes with a few collage papers, but I love the idea of spreading them out globally!  Don't worry, Karen, these are not coming from your prize.  Your box is already packed, and I'm including a few Golden paints.

Thanks for all of your comments, and for visiting my blog. 

Studio Organization Giveaway

This is a sort of selfish giveaway, but I needed to make space in my flat files, so I weeded through some painted papers I use for collage, and decided to off-load a heap of them. Use them in your own collage or art journals, or cut them up for gift tags, give them to your kids or grandkids to play with. 

These are my flat files, handmade by my father some years ago.

This is a sampling of the papers included in the giveaway stash.

If you are interested in taking these off my hands and adding to your stash of collage papers, please comment on this post, identify yourself uniquely (for example "Mary from Ohio", rather than just "Mary), and then check the blog on Friday, when I will announce the winner.  I may throw in a few art supplies as well, not sure what yet.  It is the winner's responsibility to contact me with a mailing address.  THANKS!!

A WINNER!

The winner of the 14-pc set of Golden Paints is Gayle from St. John, New Brunswick.  Congratulations!  E-mail me, Gayle, with your mailing address, and I'll get that out to you shortly.

Thanks to ALL of you who commented.  You have given me a lot to think about.  A couple of you expressed interest in an online class in which we work only (or primarily) in black and white.  I'd be interested to hear any more thoughts on that, as I will be developing new classes for 2016.

Here is one more digital collage:

If you would like to print this out, I've formatted it in higher resolution on a ground measuring 8.5"x11".  I suggest you print it on Matte Photo Paper, or "presentation paper".

Download Digital Collage #3 here.

I follow a few Pinterest boards of art in black and white.  Take a look:

Black and White Art
White House / Black Market
Abstract Art: Black and White and Neutral
Black White Gray
Noir et Blanc

Enjoy the eye candy!

More Black and White and a Giveaway

I made a few more papers using stencils with a sponge roller, but also with the GelliArts gel plate.  On these I used Golden Fluid Acrylics (Carbon Black and Titanium White), and also Golden OPEN Acrylics, which have a very long working time (they dry slowly).

Here are a few of the papers I made, using 9"x12" Cheap Drawing Paper:

In this I used a stencil I made myself with Cheap Drawing Paper.

For this I used OPEN acrylic, and made the lines using a Q-tip.

For this one I used a homemade gelatin plate, 8"x8", and then a stencil over it.

 The following two images are digital collages studies.  They don't exist in actual material.  I was fooling around in Photoshop, manipulating the scale of each of my papers as I put them together in these pieces.  As I am investigating the issue of scale, I am wondering if making either digital studies or small paper studies might be useful.  I've never worked from studies, so it's a new process for me.

I am offering a giveaway of the 14-product set of Golden's A - Z Workshop In A Box, to one person, chosen at random from those who comment on this post.  Please say something about working in black and white, and/or something about scale.  I'm interested in your ideas.  Identify yourself uniquely (i.e. "Mary in San Diego" rather than "Mary").  I will post the winner on Thursday, May 28.  It is the responsibility of the winner to get in touch with me.

Winner of the OPEN Acrylics

Jan from  Green Valley, AZ is the winner of our set of OPEN acrylics from Golden (well, the giveaway is from me, but Golden makes these fabulous paints).  Jan needs them because regular acrylics dry much too quickly in Arizona.  Thanks, everybody, for participating.  Jan: e-mail me with your mailing address, and I will send them out next week.

Here are two pieces in process in my studio.  Both are 30"x44", which is WAY big for me.  OPEN acrylics are great for working large as well.

This one is probably finished.  30"x44" on paper

This is a close-up, sort of, of the above.

This one is definitely NOT finished.

Monoprint Collage - and a giveaway

THANKS to all of you who signed up for the online Monoprint Collage.  It is full now - that was quick!!  So, for those of you who would like an in-person intensive monoprint collage experience, I am teaching at North Country Studio Workshops in January.  It is a five-day intensive using the Bennington College art studios, which are full of light and are spacious.  The workshop is limited to twelve participants, and the studio are open 24 hours.  It is a fabulous place to immerse yourself in art and meet lots of other artists (there are thirteen workshops going on simultaneously, so you mingle at meals and evening slide talks).  I studies encaustic with Daniella Woolf at North Country in 2012, and drawing (ink on Yupo, actually) with Leonard Ragouzeos in 2014.  The workshops happen every other year. 

Here is a video I posted before, on using Golden OPEN Acrylics for Monoprinting.  I will give away a set of OPEN acrylics to a randomly selected person who comments on this post.

Here is how you enter:  go to North Country Studio Workshops and look around the site.  In your comment, tell me one or two things that you found there.  Please identify yourself uniquely ("Mary G in Louisiana", not just "Mary", for example).  The winner will be posted on Monday, and it is the winner's responsibility to contact me with a mailing address.

This is the OPEN set I'm offering.

Good luck!  Happy monoprinting.

Celadon Winner!

Our winner, of the celadon paint package is Trish from Duluth.  Congratulations, Trish!  e-mail me with your mailing address, and I'll ship it out.  But the rest of you now know how to mix this color, so you should not lack for gorgeous neutral variations on Celadon.  If you order it from Blick, please ask them to make it available in 8 oz bottles.  AND tell them that the small bottles are hard to squeeze.  The more people who tell them these things, the more likely they are to offer what we want.  In fact, you can CONTACT BLICK and make these suggestions, without placing an order.

The Blick Matte Acrylics are better than cheap craft paint, but not nearly as heavily pigmented as professional grade paints.  However, what I like about them is their consistent opacity.  I generally use the white, black, celadon, and a few other neutrals:  sage blue, warm gray, Nimbus gray, and some of the pale oranges, turquoises, etc.  They are great for good coverage in muted colors.

One of you pointed out that Liquitex makes a similar color called Baltic Green.  I've used that as well; it's gorgeous, but a bit darker and over twice the price as Blick Matte Celadon.

In the above 9"x12" pieces you can see how the celadon makes the red really pop.  This is one of the issues we explore in Balancing Opposites: using muted colors to enhance bright colors.  We also look at busy areas vs. quite areas; soft edges vs. hard edges, and working with complimentary color pairs.  It is a fun way to look at the whole issue of composition.

Thanks for all your comments and participation in this giveaway.  Enjoy all your color mixing adventures!

Mixing Celedon and a GIVEAWAY

[It has been pointed out to me that I have misspelled CELADON.  Whoops!  Very bad manners.  I won't change it in the post or video; just humor me and my misspelling.  (Thanks, Lucie).]

I get asked about this color pretty frequently.  Celedon.  It's a color from Blick Matte Acrylics, and it is only available in 2 oz bottles.  I typically put four to six bottles of it in each Blick order.  I recommend you do the same, so that they might consider offering it in the 8 oz size.  However, you can mix your own, and get some variation and nuance to your taste:

This is the "piece" I made with the leftovers.

This piece obviously relies heavily on this celedon range of color.  This is an example in my Balancing Opposites composition course: balancing large areas with small elements.

This is the GIVEAWAY!!!

I am offering a giveaway that includes:

• 8 oz bottle of Black
• 8 oz bottle of White
• 2 oz bottle of Celedon
• 1 oz (I think) of Golden Open Hansa Yellow.  (The Open acrylics take longer to dry, but mixed with other colors they just extend the working time a bit).

To enter the drawing, just comment on this post, and identify yourself.  I will post a winner on Wedneesday, February 18, and it is the winner's responsibility to contact me with a mailing address.  Good luck!  And have fun mixing your own celedon and other beautiful neutrals.

We Have A Winner

Thank you ALL so much for your kind comments on my guest blog post!  The response was overwhelming, and I wish I had a set of Golden paints for each and every one of you.  But I can give you a couple of downloadable "handouts":

• Working In Series (short article)
• Color and Paint (basic color terms and paint recommendations)

THE WINNER IS... Christine Jermyn in Toronto.  Congratulations, Christine!  E-mail me with a shipping address and I'll get the paints out to you.

Meanwhile, since I can't do a blog post without some kind of image, I'll show you what I'm working on in the studio: a series of "pieces" (really, they are just experiments) exploring all-over atmosphere, color, texture, without strong contrast of any kind.

Well, this one has a bit of contrast, but really soft edges.

I like the really monochrome aspect of this one.

I like these last two, but they stray from my initial intention of being mostly monochrome.  Will keep experimenting. We may do a series like this (with all technique demos) in the Abstract Painting workshop.  But you could try it on your own.

Thanks again for all your terrific comments on my guest post.

Paint Giveaway and Guest Blog Post

As promised, I'm offering another giveaway of a set of Golden Fluid Acrylics.  Just go to my guest post on the Pacific Northwest Art School blog, where you'll see a new video.  Leave a comment on that blog to enter into the drawing, and then check this blog on Thursday, where I will announce the winner.  Meanwhile, here is a little archived video that features Golden Fluid Acrylics.
Note that commenting on THIS blog post will NOT enter you into the drawing.  Go to the Pacific Northwest Art School blog, and comment on my post there.  Good luck!

The Winner of the Golden Fluid Acrylic Set

Is....  Melanie on Salt Spring Island, BC.  Congratulations.  Now, Melanie, YOU have to e-mail me to give me a shipping address.  If I don't hear from you in a few days I will pick someone else, but I hope you do check in to read this. 

To answer some of your questions, for info on High Flow acrylics and Golden Open Acrylics, go to Golden's web site or see my Tutorials page.  For information on acrylic mediums, go to Golden's web site.  For other brands, go to the manufacturers' web sites or see Blick Art Materials' videos.  The Utrecht matte medium does come in smaller sizes than the gallon I use.  Other brands of matte medium tend to be more fluid.

You can gain a lot of information by just playing with your paints.  Ask a specific question, and then answer it yourself by trying it out.  Can I use a hair dryer on acrylic paints?  Try it.  Is this paint opaque?  Try painting over black stripes or a strong color with it.  Can I mix brands?  Can I mix mediums?  What happens if I add loads of glazing medium to my paint?  What happens if I add water?

Ultimately, you gain knowledge of your paints by using them a lot, but the above resources, plus your own time and curiosity, will contribute as well.  Thanks for all your comments!!

Acrylic Paint Basics and a GIVEAWAY

I get a lot of questions about the basic aspects of acrylic paint - fluids vs. heavy body, opacity and transparency, drying time, different brands, and more.  So I made a little video demonstrating some of the differences between fluid acrylics and heavy body acrylics, including some student-grad acrylics, which are sort of in-between.  I also demonstrate a couple of things about opacity.

Read all about Golden Fluid Acrylics here. Watch a video here.

See an informational video about Golden heavy body acrylics here.

Utrecht Artist Acrlyics, owned by Blick Art Materials now

Holbein Acrlyic

All of the above are available at Blick Art Materials and many other art stores.  See my Favorite Materials Page for other suppliers (link in right margin). 

OK, now here is the good part: I have a set of Golden Fluid Acrylics to GIVE AWAY.

This is the set I'm giving away: ten 1-oz bottles of Golden Fluid Acrylics

To qualify for entering in the giveaway (randomly chosen), please comment on this post and make sure you identify yourself uniquely (not just "mary", but "mary in Illinois".  I will post the winner on Monday, and the winner is responsible for contacting me with a mailing address.  This giveaway is not geographically limited.

Next up in this "series" (not sure if it is a series yet) is a video about layering and drying time.  Let me know if there are particular topics you would like me to cover in "Acrylic Paint 101".  Think Basics, not fancy techniques but stuff about the paint itself.

Good luck!

Winner of Extreme Composition Online Class

I wish I could take ALL of you in this class!  Such enthusiastic response.  Thank you for participating.  The winner is .... Lisa Ridolfi.  So, Lisa, it is your job to e-mail me with your info so I can sign you up.  Congratulations. The class is FULL to the brim now, so I am offering it again starting July 22.  Take a look here.

More on studio activities later in the week.  Hope those of you celebrating Thanksgiving on Thursday have a great holiday.  So much to be thankful for!  Thanks to all of YOU who come to my blog and create this great community.

Here is a video I did a little while ago, and just revised a teeny bit.  It's just for fun, nothing that you don't know already:

Another Giveaway: Extreme Composition, January 7

I can't believe it!  We have another anonymous giveaway for a spot in Extreme Composition, which is almost full, just a few spots left.  Starts January 7. So, IF you are interested and available for the class comment on this post and you will be in the drawing.

If you HAVE already signed up for Extreme Composition, and would like to win something, you can choose a spot in Keys to Dynamic Composition or Sketchbook Practice, both starting March 25.  Please let me know if your comment which class you want.

I will do the drawing on Monday, November 24, and it is the winner's responsibility to contact me with an e-mail address.  Good luck!  Here are a few images of student work from Extreme Composition last spring:

 

The images, of course, are responses to specific assignments, but I want to let you enjoy them on their own merit.  Just for fun, here is one of me working in my studio: