Perhaps New Acrylics?

I had to clean up my studio and put away my encaustic supplies so that there will be room in my studio for my monthly painting group.  I can't work on my encaustic painting when the group is here, so I will be working on acrylic painting.  I am going to try to take this opportunity to get started on some new acrylic paintings.  My plan is to not get out the encaustic supplies until I have completed a few acrylics.  I have not been able to tear myself away from the encaustics for the last three months, and I do not want to give up the acrylics completely.  So, we shall see what happens next.

I don't have any new acrylics to post, so I will post the last one I completed.  What should I name it?

The Continuing Saga of Encaustic Painting

No matter how I try, I have let another month go by without writing.  I guess I am just too busy painting!  Mostly I am still trying to learn to paint with encaustic.  It is a steep learning curve for me, and I need to try some new techniques.  I am wearing out the techniques that I have more or less mastered.

This one is 6x6 and is simply a piece of paper that I made and encaustic medium.  I should make some more of this paper, as I really like it.

This is one of my favorites though it is very simple.  It is 5x7 and is an encaustic monoprint.  I need to do some more of these, as this was my only successful one!

This was a monoprint that I adhered to a board and then added more encaustic over it.  I did a couple of these, but it was a difficult technique to complete successfully.  I kept tearing the paper.  I like the look though, so will keep at it.

That's it for now.  I hope I will be back with something new to show you in less than a month the next time.

Edmonds Art Studio Tour 2013

The Eighth Annual Edmonds Art Studio Tour is this weekend.  I can hardly believe that we started this so long ago.  Nor can I believe that it is this weekend.  I have just barely managed to get ready in time, and I am usually very good about doing a little at a time over a few weeks.  Not this year.

This year I will be showing my long legged people, abstract landscapes and encaustics.  A few of the paintings you will see if you come this weekend are below.  I also have a few encaustic cubes that have resulted from all of my recent experimenting with encaustic painting.

Still Immersed in Encaustic

Well, I am still heavily into encaustics.  I haven't painted with acrylic for a couple of months.  I guess I needed to expand a bit.  I am very frustrated learning this new medium, but I am also having fun, so I guess I will continue.  There is a steep learning curve, and I am having to do a lot of reading.  The best sources I have found are Patricia Seggebruch's books and Daniella Woolf's first book.  I have been experimenting with a lot of the ideas from the books and some are coming out better than others?  What I really need is a workshop, preferably a five day one.  I haven't found anything I am interested in before the first of the year.  Daniella Woolf will be having one in early 2014, but I don't have a date yet.  Patricia's Encausticamp is not until next July, and I can't wait that long.

Here are some of the pieces that I like the best from all my experimenting.  As you can see, I am into black, white and red right now.

More Encaustics

I am still buried in encaustics, trying to remember what I learned 8 years ago with Trish Seggebruch and experimenting with new ideas.  I am primarily making messes and scraping the wax off to reuse!  However, I am keeping some of them.  Here are a couple of the ones that did not get scraped.

The third face down does not still have a glop of wax on the eye!

Encaustic Painting

Recently I spent an afternoon with Tracy Felix at ARTspot playing with encaustic.  I have not painted with encaustic for about eight years and swore I would not get involved with it again.  I love the look of encaustic, but it is expensive to work with and can be toxic if you are not careful about temperature and ventilation.  You also use a torch!  Since I know myself well, and know that I am a very careless artist, I chose to just not use encaustic.  Now, however, I am hooked again.  So far I am keeping the window open, watching the temperature carefully and not using fire!  Below are a few of the pieces I have created.  I am really only experimenting at this point as I have much to learn. 

Burridge Workshop

I spent four days at Bob Burridge's studio in June, and had a great time as usual.  These studio workshops only have 7 artists rather than three times that, which can be the case at some of Bob's other workshops.  I have been attending Bob's workshops for I think 13 years, but it might be more than that.  I find him inspiring and I love to watch him paint.  I was not really prepared this year to work on a particular body of work, which I should have been.  I had been so busy playing with encaustic and paper clay that I had not given it much thought.  Therefore, my work in the workshop was everything from non-objective abstract to abstract landscapes to figurative.  I am posting a couple of them below.