Newton's Arrival

The portrait of Newton finally arrives home......


"Sir Isaac Newton" with Sir Isaac Newton and Kathleen.

I'm a proud Momma

 My son Ty has been published again. Last year he was hired by Time Out Chicago to design an origami cocktail ring from a ten dollar bill for the cover of their issue on cheap deals in the city. Last month they contacted him to do a feature in their kids issue.

Over the last couple years Ty has gotten several jobs designing origami models for ad agencies, so in addition to the article the Time Out editors asked him if he could make two models to coincide with local museum exhibits. You can see the article and photos of some of his origami here.

You can also learn to make an origami flower by watching this video tutorial by my son Ty.

Tweet

On the easel....

Many thanks today to the almighty Sharpie......

On the easel and other things....

Paintings for the bird show are wrapping up. All the fine details are almost complete. I am beginning the framing, labeling and pricing along with a few other goodies. I do plan to have a drawing for one of the paintings. Yes, you have to attend the show to be entered.


"Bald Eagle"
30" x 24" oil on panel


"Peacock"
30" x 18" oil on panel


Sir Issac Newton was shipped home to Colorado yesterday. Kathleen says she will get a photo of him posing with his painting, which would be awesome....I am so proud of this painting. Thanks to her husband Dan for providing a great photograph. So often I get the old Polaroid shot indoors....almost impossible to work from....


"Sir Issac Newton"
20" x 16" oil on panel

Not much painting this week. We have dear friends who are being relocated, so Craig and I have committed to been spending with them weekly until they leave. I did do another study, though. If you have Facebook, I have a few up still available and add weekly. Any subject ideas for these?


"White Peacock"
5" x 5" oil on panel
$75 framed

"Overcoming the Seeds of Doubt" has been sold. I am so honored and humbled when someone spends their hard earned money on one of my paintings. You can read the narrative at the link.


"Overcoming the Seeds of Doubt"
18" x 24, oil on canvas

A teachers work is never done

Over the last couple weeks, I have been preparing a lot of fabric for the workshops I'll be teaching in the next several months.  I have torn yards and yards of white fabric and handdyed a variety of light colors to use in the Tsukineko inks classes and also made tea colored painted fabric for the Tea & Ephemera classes.

The longer I have been teaching I have found that my students have the best class experience when I bring fabric for them to use. There are two primary reasons for this, one is if the fabric needs to be pre-colored with paint or dye as part of the process, there is just not enough time in a 6 hour workshop to accomplish this. The second reason is, there are a variety of different weaves in pfd cottons and for many of the techniques I teach, a smooth, light weight, tight weave fabric, like cotton sheeting, works best and not everyone has access to buying that locally.

For the Tea & Ephemera class, everyone begins with a peice of mottled brown fabric that has been colored with a diluted textile paint solution.

I like to create a variety of browns, reminiscent of tea stained fabric and used tea bags.

To make this fabric, I mix watery solutions of textile paint, this is a great way to use up the remainders of paint left in the jar. I make several browns, one of my favorite colors is made by combining buttercup yellow and purple, it's a gorgeous warm ochre brown.

I crumple peices of dry white pfd cotton fabric and dunk it in the paint solution.

 

 Then I squeeze out the fabric

 

and lay it on the table, partially crumpled, to dry. As it dries the pigment in the paint is drawn to the creases in the fabric.

After it has dried, I iron the fabric to reveal all the beautiful texture.

I've prepared tea fabric for half the classes I am teaching this year, later this week I will do another big batch to finish the rest. Then it's time to prep for the next class...


Tweet

Update...

Last painting for the bird show...


"Peacock" oil on panel, 36" x 18"

And a few studies....


"Swan" oil on panel, 5" x 5", $75 framed


"Cardinal" oil on panel, 5" x 5", SOLD


"Deer Study" oil on panel, 5" x 5"
$200

Chicago Create Retreat registration is open now!

The Create Retreat class info is up on the website and you can register now to take 5 days of fabulous mixed media and artquilt themed classes. The retreat is going to be located in Lisle, Illinois, which is a suburb southwest of Chicago. You can fly into Midway (a smaller airport) or O'Hare, it's about the same distance from either.

I will be teaching two classes: Painting Fabric for Whole Cloth Quilts and Magical Metal Altars.

Painting Fabric for Whole Cloth Quilts (Wed, Aug 24, 6 hours)

Magical Metal Altars (Thur, Aug 25, 6 hours)

Both my classes have pretty small supply lists, which is always good when you are traveling by plane. I will be supplying the paint, fabric and metal, you bring paint brushes, rinse water containers, a paint tray and a few other things for the Altars class. The website shows the supply list for each class. For both classes, I will provide patterns to work from if you want to concentrate on learning new techniques or you can bring your own designs to work with.

There are many wonderful teachers you'll recognize from the pages of Quilting Arts and Cloth Paper Scissors magazines and many teachers from last summer are making a return this year, check out this great class line up.

Last year was a blast, click here, if you want to check out what it was like. I hope to see you there!

Tweet