News from the Front Lines – my weekend at an outdoor Art Festival

I’m home — at last! — this evening after two days meeting with interested art customers at an outdoor Festival in Winter Springs. I try to exhibit in Festivals at least a few times a year for the benefit of meeting people face-to-face, seeing how people react to new works, learning from other artists, and challenging myself with deadlines.

First the bad news: foot traffic was a little light at this show, and my sales were not strong. And, alas, no award ribbon. And I got a bit of a sunburn.

Here’s my booth set-up at Winter Springs Art Festival. I was showing a number of new works for the first time.

But, now for the good news: talking with people about my work is invaluable to me. It’s the best way to understand what questions people have and what interests them. And, as I take time to explain the meaning of the works and the techniques used to create the works, my own understanding of the process deepens. When I am in the studio working, I am immersed in the art. It takes on context and fulfills the whole purpose of creating it when I share it face to face with real people.

 And some funny and unusual things happen at festivals. I had my palm read by a funny old man. I saw a couple with a stroller walking their pet parrot (in a cage in the stroller.) And I was interviewed and filmed by a bearded realtor wearing a kilt — a first for me!

My interview with James Evans the Kilted Realtor

I had great camaraderie with the artists in booths near mine. The informal networking with artists is one of the best things that happens at Festivals.

Finally, I learned again how hard artists work who exhibit at street Festivals regularly. The weekend involves setting up a tent and a display, being “onstage” for two full 8-hour days, breaking down the exhibit and packing up at the end of the weekend, and then a drive home – just to unpack it all again. So, when you have the chance to attend an outdoor Festival, be kind and appreciative to artists who are exhibiting: they work HARD!

Now that I’m back in the studio I look forward to creating new work. I’ll show it to you and talk about it soon.

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Monotype Printing on Rice Paper and Fabric… What a great Sunday morning of printmaking!

All week I’ve had some monotype concepts cooking on the creativity back burner. Today was the day to jump into some spontaneous monotype printing — mostly on rice paper, some on fabrics, and all with acrylic paints. Among the many things I like about printing monotypes is that the results are just about always useful, even when they don’t fulfill the vision with which I begin. I can incorporate rice paper into abstract collaged paper or textile works and art quilts. This freedom means I begin a several-hour printmaking session with a nice feeling of enthusiasm.

Today I am inspired by a grey-yellow-white palette. Two pieces I recently created in fabric for my “Home is What you Remember” series used this palette. It’s not a combination I have focused on much before, but I really enjoy it. Mixing yellow and black yields some wonderful olive tones. Adding the white brings them into a subtle range of celery to gold to cream. And the delicacy of monotype printing lets those colors hold detailed textures.

Another thing I like about hand printmaking: it’s very low tech, but not limiting. It is possible to make work that’s gaudy and un-artful printing by hand. It’s also possible to create work that’s interesting and well executed printing by hand. It’s never really about the method.  The same is true, I believe, regarding oil painting, acrylic painting, quilting or drawing with crayons. It’s not the medium alone that dictates the value or content of the outcome.

This morning I ripped to size 8 sheets of rice paper. I am experimenting with creating more of the overall composition through multiple hits of a sheet on differently inked plates. Acrylics dry so fast! It’s not hard to put a sheet back down for a second hit almost right after printing the first.

At the end of my morning I had created a nice stack of images. Now I think I”ll let these simmer for a few days in the creativity cooker to see what mark-making, collaging, sewing — or something else? — comes next.

And here’s a little gift: I am counting down the days till my solo exhibition at Arts on Douglas. It represents a year of concerted thought and artmaking. To celebrate, I’ve created printable note cards using images of some of the quilts in the exhibit. They are FREE and the download is easy. I hope you enjoy using them. Just click HERE.

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The one artmaking tool I can’t live without

I think color is tricky. Working through the color issues on this quilt-in-progress, I reached (as usual) for my indispensable color wheel.

Some tools are just studio-must-haves. For me, it’s my color wheel. I take no credit at all for its design. The process of creating it was described and assigned to me in 2010 when I was taking an oil painting class at DeLand’s Museum of Art from artist Jennifer Houdeshell.

Building it was tedious. It was time consuming. It was humbling. It was like my mother making me eat peas. I knew it was good for me. I thought it would never be done. But, it’s the only way I learned about color and I return to it again and again.

Despite my wonderful teacher’s best efforts, I just did not take to oil painting. At. All. So I did all the classwork in acrylics. Your color wheel should be created from the kind of paint and the brand name that you use.

If you use a less detailed wheel, or if you use a purchased one and have never mixed your own, I cannot say enough about how much you will learn from this exercise. I use a limited palette of basic acrylic paints for my artmaking: cadmium yellow medium, two blues (cerulean and phthalo deep), two reds (alizarin crimson and cadmium red), burnt umber, raw sienna, black and white. And I mix everything from these. My color wheel provides a roadmap for 228 colors.

My color wheel is 16” diameter on a rigid canvas board. It consists of an inner circle and six concentric rings. I drew the rings with a pencil and compass.  It begins with a twelve-color sliced pie in the middle circle. Everything is built from those base colors.

In the 12-color middle: three primary colors (red-yellow-blue) plus three in-between secondary mixes of the primary and the one next to it.  For red and yellow, for example, in between there are three mixes of orange: mostly-red-with-some-yellow, an orange that’s half-red- half-yellow,  and mostly-yellow-with-some-red.

Concentric circle #1: The hue mixed with white, 3 tints per hue. So, 12 colors x 3 = 36 blocks to create.

Concentric circle #2: The hue mixed with black, 3 shades per hue. Again, 12 hues x 3 shades = 36 blocks.

Concentric circle #3: The hue mixed with its complement, 3 versions. Twelve hues x 3 mixes = 36 blocks.

Concentric circle #4: The hue mixed with its complement plus white, 3 versions. Twelve hues x 3 mixes = 36 blocks. (You will now be in the realm of irresistible colors!)

Concentric circle #5: The hue mixed with raw sienna, 3 mixes per hue. Twelve hues x 3 mixes = 36 blocks.

Concentric circle #6: The hue mixed with raw umber, 3 mixes per hue. Twelve hues x 3 mixes = 36 blocks.

I have especially loved discovering luscious world of greys: yellow-greys, blue-greys, violet greys. Seeing the color relationships is just invaluable.

I love mixing and discovering colors. My teacher – of course – was right. Just like Mom. My favorite vegetable now… peas!

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PS - The quilt in the picture is the one I wrote about in my last post: the collapsed house with the tree growing through. It's progressing. More next time.

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