Friday, September 25, 2009

MosaicGlobe

I am working on putting together a website. I have already done the free site and will probably upgrade after my daughter's wedding. Here is my website address: http://abstractartinroyalpalmbeach.mosaicglobe.com/
Right now I can only put 25 paintings online and I have posted most of them here on this blog. Once I upgrade, I will be able to fix up the site more to my liking and add more paintings. I spend most of my free time painting, so my portfolio keeps growing. I have quite a few paintings that I need to bring to work and scan.

I started working Wednesday night on some paintings using wavy lines. I just had a thought about possibly doing more striped pictures only with wavy lines. Okay...I have to remember that, but back to what I am working on now. I am trying to paint people. No faces. No arms. No legs. Just a basic shape of a person with hair. I used the wavy lines to do hair. My first attempt is a girl in a long dress standing on a raised platform with an arbor around her. The rest of the painting looks like a wall in a room. I thought of someone getting an award or winning a contest. Of course nothing is realistic. It is all part of my abstract world. I guess this would be sort of representational art. You can tell it is a girl. She has long flowing wavy hair. So far I have not added flowers to the arbor, but that will happen tonight. I made the stand red, her hair yellow, and the arbor green. She is wearing an ultramarine violet mixed with white and cyan mixed with white dress. I have taken all my flower colors. I will have to put pink and white flowers on the arbor. The painting is not large, but it will need something added to the area next to her. So far I have no idea of what I might use there. I also did another one using some of the extra paint I had mixed up to paint a woman's head. I did the wavy hair and then I did a wavy top. After I got the top done and looked at the hair...I decided it looked like a woman sitting in a salon getting her hair cut. The hair is kind of wild and the top looks like the drape they put over you to keep the hair off. I am thinking I will add some silver lines behind her to look like a mirror and add some black around her to look like the chair. Hopefully it will all turn out like I am visualizing. The first wavy backgrounds I did are still sitting in my studio (my daughter's old bedroom). I still haven't decided how I am going to use them. They are not in wavy straight lines, but I might use them as a different stripe painting. We will just have to see where the weekend takes me. I will bring the paintings in to scan them so that anyone who might read this blog can see them after this big build up. I hope they don't disappoint.

Well, it is almost time to go home for the weekend. Till next week.

Friday, September 18, 2009

More Paintings




It has been a while since I posted anything on my blog. I have finished a number of pieces so I will be posting them here today. I have to say that I haven't tried anymore gelatin paintings. I don't think the result was exactly what I had hoped for. I have to remember that this was my first time using this process & the process was originally for fabric, so I probably should try it at least one more time. I tried another form of the gelatin painting last weekend, but still, it was not what I wanted. I am going to try an overpainting of the pieces I did last weekend to see if it changes the look.

Last Saturday I went to a small shop in downtown West Palm Beach for an art show. This shop teaches pottery and glasswork as well. They also sometimes have art shows. I exhibited some of my work at this shop two years ago. The shop is also affliated with the art gallery where I exhibited my work earlier this year. When I went down to the shop to see the artwork, the owner of the shop asked if I would be interested in possibly exhibiting my work at their next art show. Of course I said yes. So, she said she would try to contact me next time they had a show & see if I had pieces I wanted to exhibit. Of course I will have something to exhibit. These ladies are very connected to the art scene here in Palm Beach County. I hope to keep a good relationship with them in the coming months and years so that I can continue to show my work.

I am also working on a Blurb "BookSmart" coffee table book of my paintings for my children. Every time I think I have added as many paintings into it as I want, I create something new and like it enough to put in the book. So, the pages continue to grow. I really like the idea of Blurb.com and making your own books. I am really thinking of also doing a book for my daughter after her wedding. I bought cameras for people to take pictures at the wedding. I might include those in the book I do for her. A friend of mine is taking the pictures for the wedding and he is just giving my daughter the memory card. She is going to pick and chose from the pictures to have printed for her own album, but she will have all of the pictures taken to choose from in making the album. I will probably get some of those pictures as well & put them in the book for her as well. It will be a different kind of wedding album.


I added my paintings & they are kind of mixed in with my blog today. I moved them in & around my words.


















































































































Thursday, September 3, 2009

Dictionary of Artists


I had a wonderful thing happen to me after I put my artwork in the Saatchi Online Gallery. A woman saw my work and asked me to submit some of my pieces for possible inclusion in the "International Contemporary Masters 2010". This is a juried program, but unfortunately I am not able at this time to afford the $665 if I was chosen. My daughter is getting married in a month & all our money is going for that. Maybe next year they might ask me again and maybe I will have the money. We will see in 2011. I did though contribute a piece to their Dictionary of Artists. It was only $105. We won't tell my husband. He wouldn't like me spending the money for it, but this gets my work & information out to anyone who buys the dictionary. I think that is worth the investment. It was hard deciding which piece I wanted to put in the dictionary. I sure hope I made the right choice. I put one in that I like. I have liked this piece called Xs & Os since the day I finished it. There was just something about it. Anyway, I was very honored to have been asked to possibly be a part of one project & am part of another.

Friday, August 28, 2009

Gelatin Paintings

I scanned more paintings into my computer this morning. The ones shown here are the paintings that I did with the gelatin. They turned out okay. I have not tried anymore though. Shame on me. I should do a couple more this weekend. I have everything set up...I just have to take the gelatin out of the fridge. Maybe tomorrow since it is again Friday. I did do a couple where I just mashed the two pieces of paper together. Almost like an ink blot only with acrylic paint. The first ones I did turned out good. The 2nd group not so much. I will have to scan the better of the ink blot paintings next week. I can only bring a small group to work at a time to scan. Well, I am done for the day. If anyone reads this blog be sure to comment on my gelatin paintings.







Thursday, August 27, 2009

Saatchi Online Gallery

I have just set up an account at Saatchi Online Gallery. I was able to put 20 of my paintings there. http://http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/yourgallery/artist_profile//112381.html
If there is anyone out there reading this blog...check out my work.

Friday, August 14, 2009

Gelatin Experiment

Well...I tried the gelatin experiment last weekend. It was very very messy. The paintings were done on 12 inch x 15 inch pieces of watercolor paper. I was able to get three paintings out of one color scheme with some differences in each. I had to add a little paint by the last painting, but for the most part I put enough on the gelatin to make the paintings work for a 9 inch x 12 inch painting on each piece of paper. I liked the way the paintings turned out, but they were not exactly what I expected. I am sure that I will need to work with the process more and not just give up after this one time. I just have a problem with instant gratification. I need to learn a little more patience. I will try again this weekend and try for a little more variety in the paint and paintings themselves. I might even try doing them like a lithograph. Put on some color and let that dry before using more colors in different places on the gelatin. The first try was using all the paint on the gelatin at the same time and just pressing the paint around. I meant to bring some paintings in today to scan, but I was rushing to get out of the house this morning and forgot to get them. I will try to bring them in next Friday. It takes a while for the gelatin paintings to dry because the paint can be a little thicker in spots. That is something that I also need to work on...getting a more even looking painting so that the paint doesn't crack. Possibly adding mediums might help as well. Like I said...this is not something that is going to be perfected quickly. I titled the paintings Gelatin 1, 2, and 3. I will for sure have them ready to be scanned next week along with the ones I do this coming weekend.

Friday, August 7, 2009

It's The Weekend Again

Well...not much blogging this week. Nothing really to talk about. An experiment I was going to try last weekend never happened. Maybe this weekend. I need to use the gelatin that I made up before it goes bad just sitting in the fridge.

Tomorrow is 2ND Saturday at my local quilt shop. I love to go and look at all the new books and fabrics.

I spent a lot of my morning on Amazon looking for good children's books. I have 4 surrogate grandchildren and I was looking at books for them. I found a few and ordered them. Amazon is one of my most favorite sites. You can find almost anything there.

I did get some paintings finished last weekend. I haven't brought them in to scan though yet. I have a few more I want to finish before I bring them in.

So...that is it for this week. I feel like I am talking to myself and I guess I really am.