"Teaching Design"

Magazine Collage

Through my many years of teaching, the most rewarding workshops are the design workshops.  Although it's the hardest workshop that I teach, it's definitely the most rewarding.  I love it when several students write me wonderful letters afterwards about how the light bulb went on and they now understand what makes a good painting. Many of them start winning awards and getting into national shows, where they had never been accepted before. It doesn't matter whether you are a traditional painter or abstract painter, the rules apply to both.   I just finished teaching a 4 day workshop in Lacrosse, WI and the group were very talented in artistic ability, but lacked knowledge for good design.  They were very willing to do the fun exercises that I laid out and several of them stated that they were willing to do 30 minute studies for 30 days, a challenge that I told them I had done.  I loved teaching there and we all had many laughs together.  A great group!  This painting is 5" x 7" and is totally magazine cut outs.  By starting with the largest pieces, you lay in the simple shapes in 3 values.  Then adding opposite colors and blacks complete the design  I loved the students' finished pieces so much!  I use these magazine collages as studies for larger paintings.  I owe all my design skills to John Salminen. Check out his website. 

Another Charcoal Pour Bird Painting!

"Deep in Thought"

Here is the finished painting that I demoed for the workshop last weekend in Bethel, MN.  Below is the painting 3/4 finished.   When I am at this point in a painting, I ask myself many design questions, in order to complete the painting.
 1. Do I have a dominant value?  In order to see that, I take a black and white photo of my painting.  Then I see the values of each color. In this case, the lights and medium values were equal, so I decided to add more aqua collage paper.
2.  Have I linked the center of interest to the sides of the paper?
3.  Repeating the busy shapes within the bird by adding the stripes on the side is a good idea!
4. Cropping the picture so that the bird isn't right in the middle of the painting.
5. Added shadows under the feet.
6. Worked on details of the eyes.
By the way, the aqua colored paper was handmade by painting on deli paper and stenciling layers of different colored paint after the main first layer of paint.  To read more about how to do the charcoal pour, go to Virginia Cobb's book, Discovering the Inner Eye.  I absolutely LOVE this process! 

Monoprint, Patchwork Quilt style

"In Stitches"

This is from my second day teaching the Monoprinting Workshop that is in my home studio.  We learned how to make our beautiful handmade papers into a painting.  Seeing values was the most important lesson of the day.  The students also learned many design tips for better paintings.  My studio looked like a tornado hit it!  But everyone  had lots of fun, and very successful paintings. 

Gelli Print Mania!

"Patience"

I'm still enjoying playing with the gelli prints.  This one was a lesson on patience and being reminded of some important rules to good design.  I added the red collage papers (that were from my used acrylic palette) for a center of interest effect.  Then I took a photo to check out my values. (see photo below) The two big circles were contrasting too much with the values there.  So I subdued them with another printing, and that's why I added the light tan color over them. Lastly, I allowed myself to doodle with a permanent marker. Yesterday, at my critique group, we discussed being true to ourselves.  Figuring out what we really love and making it our own!  I love to doodle, and have always loved the paintings of Gustav Klimt. Yes, I think you'll be seeing much more doodling from me in the future!

More Monoprinting!

"Looped"

 

 

I may never buy another collage paper again!  I can make incredible ones all by myself, with the use of monoprinting and the gelli printing pad.  This painting has four layers. I like starting with a dark color, but am still experimenting as to different results.  My hands are a mess, full of acrylic paint.  Glad I don't spend money on manicures!  Anyway, I really recommend that you all give this a try!  Even the ones that don't turn out make wonderful collage papers. 

My new love, Monoprinting with Gelli printing plate

"I've got my Eye on You"

I'm having an absolute ball, making handmade papers.  This painting is completely covered with collage papers. By using the Gelli brand, gel printing plate, it is made so easy and fun!  I really recommend checking out their website for tutorials on printmaking without a press!  The trick is making the collage papers into a painting.  So, the first thing I do is to make a value study, using only 2 values. (white and medium)  Then I place the papers on the medium value, making sure to repeat the papers in other parts of the painting.  I can see that this painting is a little too complicated for my workshop students, so I will do more that will be a better example for them. (I'm teaching a home studio 3 day workshop next week.)  This painting is available for $295.  It is 11" x 11" image. 

Stencils and Mixed Media

"Morning Meeting"

I'm preparing for my home studio "Painting Birds" workshop, and wanted the last day's lesson to be a very easy one.  So, I decided to emphasize stencils and show them how to do a very easy illusionary painting. BTW, I only used 2 colors in this painting. (quinacridone gold and neutral tint) I will be having a mail order lesson on this process available soon, if you are interested.  It's a fun way to paint!
The image is 11" x 14" and is available for $145.

Warm-ups to kick Artist's Block

This is a "wire drawing" of an eye, done while I was up at the North Shore, relaxing.  Whenever I have art blocks, I have 3 or 4 tricks to get myself back into the mood.  One of these involves sketching anything with a pencil.  Then I use an ultrafine marker to connect all the lines, and finally, I add thicker lines with a fine marker.  Before you know it, an hour has passed, and now you'll be ready to paint the moon!  Another trick is to paint color studies, using only 3 colors, and starting with only 4 shapes.This color study started with a blue square surrounded by yellow.  In the middle of the blue square was a yellow olive shape with a red center.  Do you see them? I used manganese blue, cadmium yellow, and red rose deep.  At the very end, I allowed myself a mixture of alizarin crimson and winsor green for the black colors. Now you have 2 tricks to keep that mean old artist's block at bay!  Good luck!

Wire Drawings with my family

Karen's drawing

Janine's drawing

Nancy's drawing

I just returned from a trip to Spearfish, SD to visit my parents.  My sister, Nancy, and niece, Janine, were also there visiting.  One evening, I taught them how to do a wire drawing of a sewing machine.  The plan is for Nancy to use one of the drawings for her new business card.  Her business is Functional Art.  Check it out!  Great texture art for the home! To do a wire drawing, you must scribble, then do a contour drawing, and then link all the pieces.  Kind of hard to explain without a visual.  Someday I may do a video on it.  Sorry I haven't posted for awhile.  I'll catch up in the coming days, OK?  It's been a very busy spell for me!

Crazy Lady Paintings

"Sending you a Big Hug"

This is one of my latest crazy lady paintings. If you look closely, along her neck there's a message. It probably looks like hair at first, right?  :)   I just finished teaching a 2 day workshop in Watertown, SD at Jennifer Stone's beautiful new studio.  What a great time we had!  So many laughs and new friendships were made!  I had 19 students, and they all did a fabulous job at creating very imaginative crazy ladies of their own!  Below is a collage of their paintings.  (Remember, I made this on www.PicMonkey.com)  It's a great site to make collection photos.