Heads Up

These heads were made from Maureen Carlson's molds, they were loads of fun to paint! I used alcohol inks and metallic acrylics. I'll probably use them and all the matching beads in many necklaces.

A New Painting

What could be more interesting than some squirrel watching? These guys sit here a lot and watch the show in the backyard. 

Shout 1

24x18

I've been working with my acrylics, I've painted over a number of things, and I feel like I can't possibly turn out paintings like I do drawings. They are always going to look like they came from two different people. Here's my new one, and tomorrow I'll get back to my self portrait in colored pencils. Acrylics lend themselves to experimentation, and I've been observing what effects I get by glazing different color combinations. This looks luminous in person. I'd love to hear what you think about this piece. Please leave a comment. Thanks.

More on the Acrylic Painting

The above work is another collage I tried today, not finished. I was liking it until I added too much white to a glaze, so I 'll have to try something different with it. Just an experiment, anyway.

I had the best surprise today! When I looked at my blog, I noticed I had several new followers. Well, that made me happy, because it's kind of like making new friends. They are people who are saying they like my work, they like reading my blog. Well...one of the new people was my son, Adam. So that made my day. :-)

It doesn't look like it , but I spent hours on the airport painting. It's bigger than I'm used to, about 13x18. Even though portraits are my favorite to do, I'm having a terrible time with the man's face, the man with his leg crossed, I guess you could say the main man. In addition to acrylics, I'm using gel pens. I tried some colored pencil, but the watercolor paper is not a friendly surface. But the gel pens work well, even on top of the paint. It's hard to tell, but the girl's jeans are crosshatched with a white gel pen.

A few weeks ago I started looking at pictures of seeds and pods and I made some sketches from them. Then I started this, which is 16x20. The background is gold acrylic, and I'm using some copper, too. I'm kind of stalled on it, but I'm certain I'll stick with the metallics and some oranges and turquoise, which is departing from the actual seed and pod appearances. They were just a jumping off point.

 
So, all in all, I feel pleased that I've been able to branch out and try new things. I can always go back to strictly colored pencil if I need to. Of course, I'm about to begin an entry for the CPSA annual juried exhibit, which is in Atlanta, where my sons live. I hope my work will make it in. Keep your fingers crossed for me.

One Big Painting

I worked on this most of the day, except for going to the bank and getting my hair cut.  I think another three hours should do it. What do you think? I really put in more time on this than I usually do. After two or three hours I usually get tired and have to quit, but not today. Saturday I spent about five hours in the emergency room because of a mixup with my family doctor. Everything is ok now, I just had a little bug that was making me feel exhausted. After three days of meds I feel like a new person. So tomorrow I'll charge into my studio and let the cleaning lady have the rest of the house....and she's coming at 8 am. Yikes! Sorry, I'm rambling. So this painting is way out of my comfort zone, painting alone is still a challenge for me. But this thing is huge by my usual standards. It's 24x18. I had to paint the top sideways because I couldn't reach that high.