Life with Drawbridge ~ complete

value study

I dropped 'still life' from the title because it just didn't make sense(the boats are moving!) and I'm glad this one is done. It was great fun at first, then became tedious but I'm happy with the results. There's a few things I would do differently if I were to do this again. For example I used the cellophane windows in junk mail envelopes to create the window shield glass. I would change how I glued it all down. In fact I wouldn't glue the cellophane part at all. I could have been a bit more mindful of the order in which I glued the other components down, too. When this was done I had used homemade collage papers, printed images and found paper.

Channeling ~ complete

I finally was able to get a decent photo of this piece finished. The differences are subtle and may not be as noticeable in the image as they are IRL but I'm calling this done. I'm including a quick sketch of my next collage. I'm going to call this 'Still Life with Drawbridge'.

This is a familiar scene in my hometown during the summer months. The bridge goes up every 1/2 hour on the dot so the boat traffic can pass and the vehicle traffic can plan around this. It still creates a huge bottleneck because the main drag is a state highway and traffic can pile up fast.

Channeling ~ WIP

I'm almost done with this latest collage. There's still a little tweaking to be done. It was inspired by the man made channel (aka Pine River) in my own town. It connects Lake Michigan with Round Lake creating a safe harbor for ships and boats. I've taken photos along the way to create a work in progress beginning with the very first sketches. Most of the papers are homemade including blue crystalline paper for my lake water. The rest are magazine pages and a few prints I made from images I found online.

Cards and more Cards

A dear friend has been so sick since the
very beginning of the year.
I thought she could use a laugh.
This silly frog was inspired by a bit of pottery I saw on Pinterest.

I've been a card making fool lately. Here are a few of my latest...two Valentine cards and one Get Well. Card making is #1..a wonderful way to personalize a greeting and #2..a great way to try a new technique, new stencils, new compositions, etc. It's a win, win endeavor.

Oh, Happy Day

Wow, I'm really slow out of the gate this year. Meet Happy, a fella I met online. He looks kinda like I feel right now. Winter weather has not been kind to my lungs lately so I have been doing a little art whenever I felt up to it and I finally completed this basset a few days ago. It's the first all transparent watercolor I've done in awhile.

2018

To all my visitors I wish you good health, far more joy than sorrow and an abundance of creativity in the coming new year.

Merry Christmas to All

I want to wish all my visitors a very Merry Christmas and thank you all for supporting me and my art. Every visit and comment is encouragement to me.

Here Comes Santa Claus

I finally got Santa completed. Actually two were completed, exactly alike. I've posted what I think is the best of the two. What I thought was going to be a quick little portrait turned into much more and I learned a few things along the way not the least of which is how to store my acrylic paint and preserve it after it's been squeezed from the tube. I can't believe I didn't come up with this idea sooner! I'm using a disposable plastic container with lid as my palette which is capable of keeping the paint usable up to 3-4 days. When it's dried out all I have to do is use a plastic palette knife to scrape it away and voila!...I have a nice clean palette for the next project.

Making Cards

Quick update. Every December I struggle to come up with something unique in way of a birthday card for Betsy, my best friend since 4th grade. As luck would have it I stumbled onto a series of whimsical paintings on Pinterest to fit the bill. I took inspiration from these gems to create this bit of fun. I know she's going to love it. I'm also working on a few Christmas cards. I don't send them anymore but to just 2 people and I like to paint them myself. I'll be posting those soon...I hope.