Eco printing on silk

Eco printing, alpacas and time travel

What? It's December? When did that happen? :-)
I have run through 2 months of combining silk work and portraits and December simply brings a bit of panic into it!

I dug into the eco printing and have had some gorgeous results!

Various kinds of eucalyptus

It takes practice but in the end...the thrill (yes it is) is in not knowing what you'll create!

But knowing that I'm printing Nature's colors exclusively is another appeal to this art form.

I spent 10 days in October at the NC State Fair as the silk artist in the Village of Yesteryear

rose leaves from Seven Sisters

Heirloom roses and pineapple sage

and although it was tiring with daily 12 hour days, I met SO many people who were happy to add a scarf to their handmade collections!
November seems to have dissipated and I don't know where it went to. I do know that I am on a borrowed computer as mine bit the dust (although Best Buy is determined to make it work since it is under warranty) and I had no idea how many of my photos were on the other computer. Luckily I have Carbonite backup but having to make temporary folders to store work is time consuming.

I'll pop some portraits up in my next post...seems odd to mix them with the silk. :-)

Oh and I must add one more image....Bella! The newest member and a future supplier of fiber for adding some roving into some of my silk!

Meet Bella!

DIY studio renovation!

Things are moving along with my "cabin in the woods!"
If you have been following me, you'll know that I have been renovating a 12 x 20 shed and turning it into a second art studio.  It's been taking a few months but bit by bit the big things get done, then the little things :-)

Below are some "in progress" photos of the north end of the building. 

The deck going in.

Here is the plain jane studio in the making.







In the back ground is the large studio-our workhorse location. In this one I have begun to move all the dyes, paints and supplies related to my silk designs













Deck being built.
We  re-purposed a used 6' sliding door for the north end of the studio!

The 6' sliding door going in

 And now, with the deck completed, we can enjoy an beautiful extension of our studio and work on it even as we complete some minor details inside! Hubby has wasted no time...not have our dogs!

Notice the wild roses along our pasture fence add screening and privacy...not that we really need it on our mini-farm but it is perfect for an artist's studio! 
heading out to the office takes on a whole new concept for me when this is one of my offices!

Murals on Kitchen Cabinets

Painting murals is not new to me. From my teens on up, I have painted scenes on walls, doors, commercial window displays and traveling circus trailers. (really!)
Sometime it can go faster than painting the same thing on canvas that same size. Don't ask me why. it just does.
If you have followed my "cabin in the woods" renovation you'll know that my building came with cabinets recycled from a 1950's kitchen. The wood was that hard to find solid "thwunk" type wood found in your grandma's kitchen. And it also meant it came with that dark varnished look so popular once upon a time!
I removed the doors...sanded them, then painted them...more than once, with white primer.

White doors with a mural on panel below it that I painted a few years ago

White walls, white ceilings, white cabinets. Something had to change before I started moving my art supplies into it.

I went to my computer and pulling from my folder of "random traveling photos" that I accumulate for ideas, I thought.....actually I knew what I would do if I went one of two ways-mountains. Or beach. I settled on mountains :-)

Sequence of steps

So I painted in the sky, added the clouds and then started the background. It's a whole lot easier to add the foreground after the background is completed. Otherwise you will try to paint around a tree or around the leaves and it doesn't work.....at this point I tossed the pencil and just started winging it. Take a look :-)

Adding Mountains and tree details

You can see where this is headed as I added the mountains.

At this point I had to decide what to do with the section to the far right. These cabinets are a little over 12 feet long and 4 ft high.

My plan is to add a sink under the shorter cabinets when I eventually get the water running to the studio.


You can just see where I added a white path to the far right.







Here's a closer look at the left side below

Bringing in a middle ground and foreground

A friend sent me some stunning photos of texas bluebonnets and Indian paintbrushes and I had my plan for the right hand side!

See what's been added!

DONE!

So there you have it-a soothing mountain view with birds, flowers....forgot the butterflies but hey I can add them later :-) So be brave-paint a door panel, closet doors, kitchen cabinets or anything else that strikes your fancy! And it you want to take it with you at some later date, just paint it on some lightweight plywood (birch is good) and screw it to the surface.
Go paint!

Wiz kid artist stuns my art class! :-)

Wet into wet painting techniques and the results!

The first class ever using the wet into wet oil painting technique was March 21 at the Vance Granville Community College!   Under the category of Personal Enrichment, 
The 5 intrepid painters created some amazing art.
I brought along my assistant-10 year old Alex who embraced the Bob Ross techniques last year by recording hours of video after his mother took away his Electronic time-what a great move by mom! And then he began to paint!

Alex with a few of his many beautiful paintings!

Children will naturally turn to creativity when the TV, electronic games and cell phones are removed-all to everyone's benefit!

From 12-5, the class stayed in the art zone and we had a great time! We practice wet into wet with acrylics as well but you have to paint faster. It was easy to take a snack break in the middle of the workshop as oil will not dry for days.
I'll let the photos do the talking!

collage of the finished paintings

This class introduced the use of a palette knife, letting wet paint blend into wet to create particular effects...and of course the sky is the limit when it comes to taking what they have learned and use the same techniques on a myriad of subjects!

Next similar class is April 17 from 12-5.

I encourage photographing the steps

Learning to use the palette knife

Laying in the background

Going to the Dogs. My artistic journey!

Going to the dogs...artistically!

After finishing up 2 weekends...long weekends..... of shows, I found myself going to the dogs. On my easel.
I already live with 5 dogs and with a background that once encompassed dog shows, dog training and pet boarding (with a 100 run kennel no less!) I find it as easy to return to a life with dogs as I do with horses :-) 

Our pets occupy a special place in our hearts and it's easy to see why my collectors love to have  portraits of these special families members created. And I have created hundreds...perhaps thousands, over the years! 
At these last two shows I created Jack Russell Terriers and a Corgi puppy. Both are two of the most popular pups at the horse shows although I am seeing more and more mixed breeds-a nod to the efforts of  dog and horse rescue groups that work hard and diligent to place their charges in the best homes possible!   The "Tiny Urls" take you to my Etsy store where you can see these much larger!

All 3 are available as originals, for purchase :-)

http://tinyurl.com/nueldyg

http://tinyurl.com/oznpjqf

http://tinyurl.com/o5m5rcn

Going to the Dogs is a special place I think. When it comes to your canine companions, every day is a good day! And that is a nice place to be :-)

Artsy Duplication

Since I am heading out the door I am unabashedly copying my blog from "MTheresaBrown" so that I can keep you updated! It's just Artsy Duplication!

Art studios, landscaping and chickens...

Finally! Warmer weather! My poor ponies have a sea of dried mud around their run-in shed that will again turn to mush with the upcoming expected rains but MAYBE there will be a week with no rain, snow or mix after that! 

So the renovation on the small studio is drawing to a foreseeable end...at least the walls are painted-white. I cannot bear the thought of anymore interior darkness! Hubby Steve is putting in the work counter...same height as a bar-that could be nice too!


I have been doing some raking and semi-landscaping. What that really means is that there was wire  along the edges of the pasture fence that the pretty vinca flower vines had grown through and covered so I have actually had to use a pick ax, short and long handled pruning clippers to get up...a lot of it. I guess I noticed it but then did nothing about it...just ran the lawnmower around that nice long clump of dark green vines with their purple summer violets.   After I finally spent 2 days yanking, digging and chopping at it all, the wire is up....followed by curious chickens who went to work digging in dirt I had conveniently already "undug" for them.  

We are at a show right now so other than popping up an image of a recently completed and now shipped painting, I am off to make some sales today (always a good thought-heck it's the goal!)


Follow my journey with me and see how I set up the inside of a 12 x 20 studio!

The power of snow

It's very early in the morning and too dark to take outside photos but oh the power that a heavy snowfall invokes! The household is still asleep with the exception of Troop, the Corgi who felt it necessary to go outside at 5 am. Imagine his surprise as he hopped into the 6 plus inches of snow, not quite realizing the bottom step was now invisible, covered by the snow-quite an event for a short legged dog!

There is power in a snow event anywhere I have lived-whether it is 6" or 34", Foremost is the stillness it creates. There is a hush that we don't realize silences our daily lives until we experience the softness that comes with snow-quiet, muffled, still.
A snowfall, first thing in the morning  brings a peace-for me at least and memories of snows gone by - pf my childhood, my children's childhood-fabulous memories that bring back a warm fuzzy feeling of having experienced the power of snow and what it can evoke in the senses, experiences and memory.

Just starting

With hot coffee in hand, a fire in the fireplace, I am waiting for the sunrise to experience the complete visual effect of the snow. The artist in me loves the transformation of the familiar trees, buildings and landscape.  I enjoy the tang in my senses when I step into the cold and t satisfaction that comes as mentally I check all the boxes in my brain in regards to my animals-inside and out-food, water, shelter-check. Not even the chickens are stirring or the wild birds that have congregated in recent weeks at my feeders as the winter ramps up. By the end of February, people have wearied of the cold and snow....but this year winter is not over and only teases us with sunny warm days tossed at random between winter storms and temperatures.

The power of  snow is in the senses, the memories and the seed catalogs that promise and remind us that spring is just around the corner. Be patient and enjoy the stillness today brings.

Silk Play Date

So what happens when you get three women together who like to silk paint? We had a Silk Play Date!  We met recently on a freezing day at one friend's house planning to work with some screen transparencies. But our initial plan of letting the sun do the work was quickly forgotten in the 36 degree outside temperatures. But our friend, a long time silk artist, had a clever, homemade light "box" set up for processing transparencies to print onto our silk :-)

The collage below says it all! The long scarf is one where I had already dyed the background a variety of colors...the closeup shows the screening of the vine design I added as another layer to it. I could get used to play dates!

Spring 2015 ART CAMP for ADULTS!

Grownups Art Camp May 9 from 10-3!

 In our summer camps out here in the country our kids have a blast every summer!  Last summer they got dirty, played outside, played games, ran through water streams from the hoses, created loads and loads of art, loved on the ponies and the dogs, picked blackberries, ran through the secret trails, collected eggs, climbed the trees and in general, just had kid fun.Take a look below!

A few scenes from one of our summer art camps!

But as the parents said, "Why should the kids have all the fun?" Yep-that's what we thought too!
So we decided to have a 1 day "ArtEscape" camp just for the grownups on the Saturday before Mother's Day-May 9 from 10:00-3:00. No one under 21 simply because you can BYOB AND it's your adult summer/spring camp experience! It's only $45.00 per person-dress to mess, bring a sketch pad and a bagged lunch (with your favorite beverage) We supply all the rest! Oh and if you want to BYOB-feel free!
 http://artstudentacademy.com/Grown-Up-Artescapte.html

Our second, little studio will be open and the new deck is perfect for the grownup kind of relaxation...so maybe you don't want to climb a tree, but the trails are fun, the roses will be in bloom and we'll work on several amazing indoor and outdoor art projects! 

http://artstudentacademy.com/Grown-Up-Artescapte.html

Don't miss out!

Making my "Cabin in the Woods" happen!

In less than 3 short weeks, my "cabin in the woods"project-the smaller art studio-has seen a some changes. Once I committed to the idea and stopped waffling, things began to happen!

First, because the only convenient place originally to set the 12 x 20 shed down was at the 

renovations in progress!

.

edge of our dirt/gravel driveway, I knew I had to make another entrance opening.

I also needed more light-a door at the north end or bigger windows!

Bringing in a re-modeler friend who happened to have a spare 6 ft. sliding door, he and his crew made short work of the 10 x 16' deck and door installation!

I hired the neighbor's son to dig the "trench" to lay electrical wire. Our big studio is on a separate meter so it seemed logical to pull power from that. Brent had a lot of help from one of our chickens the afternoon he dug it!

Chickens are fascinated by any "scratching" in the earth.

Digging the trench from the big studio

Our remodeler came out the next day and he and hubby hooked up the power to the small studio and I was in business so to speak! Even the simple ability to turn on lights was inspiring :-)

The changes have been fabulous! Below is from just the day after Christmas when my youngest son and hubby (artist Stephen Filarsky) installed the sheetrock on the ceiling (the hardest part of sheetrocking!) as part of my Christmas present! It's already looking bigger and brighter!

Sheetrocking the ceiling

I'll add a small stoop to the door side-I might just close it off but in the summer I know an amazing crossbreeze can come through there so...still thinking!
In the meantime, my "Cabin in the Woods" is coming to life!

Finding My cabin in the Woods

SO in my last post I talked a bit about my quest. Maybe that's a good word for it.
I spend more and more time thinking about it-a cabin in the woods. 
I'm not sure why that dreaded "If only...." phrase has kept popping up in my mind but it has me daydreaming of a place to relax, unwind, meditate, recharge-every adjective that an artist needs in order to justify her creativity! Silly. I have a studio that is the envy of most artists. We built it 18 years ago from parts of a 1910 home being torn down in the area. It's 24 x 30 feet in size with 10 foot ceilings, beautiful reclaimed pine flooring, the old windows-it is stunning!                                                            

 And I know this! But in reality it is crowded! Oh it started off with SO much space but with 2 working artists that changed quickly
Even the shed we added behind it turned into a storage area. Oh and we have a woodworking shop..the downstairs filled  with tools and the upstairs filled with things we are storing but do not need. (easy with 4 grown kids who move around)

(

At the beginning.......:-)

And we have grown rose clippings from abandoned homesteads and they have grown and matured into a profusion of cascading color enjoyed by painters every spring...so WHY was I searching?

Seven Sisters roses cascading down the tobacco stick fence

Red Seven Sisters brought by mother as a cutting from her family homestead in Mississippi.

What am I looking for?

I lean towards mountain properties- a throwback I am sure of my New England upbringing where we lived in an 18th century farmhouse on 50 acre farm in upstate New York (next to MA and VT) and had unfettered run, on foot, skis and horses, of the mature forests and surrounding streams, farmland and towns. Our freedom included the glorious huge beamed barn with its many outbuildings and the secret hideaways within them all. Ah, such memories!

In my mind, my cabin retreat  has to have a stream, mature trees...and of course-a small cabin.  Again, I recognize this from childhood memories of running through abandoned farm fields and discovering, in the dark recesses of hemlocks and maples that bordered all the forgotten fields, streams that cascaded down rocks into small pools of cold, pristine water.  It was all very magical to a child of ten and I clearly recall the details of discovering Jack in the Pulpits, ripples in the water pools, crawdads under the stones, floating maple leaves and the cool tang of the hemlocks. And other than the delighted sounds of discovery by my twin sister and younger brother, the only other sounds were that of the waterfall.  The sound of gurgling water can quickly transport me to that spot anytime I hear it.

And on a bittersweet, yet telling note, the last family vacation I had with my twin sister was in the  NC mountains. Eileen and I were 28 and I had 3 children, the youngest just 4 months old and a too busy life and business when our parents rented a little summer house for us to have a vacation in for our upcoming 29th birthdays :-).  It sat in a valley with a little stream in front of the house. My 6 and 3 year old played for hours on end at the edge of the shallow gurgling water, building and rebuilding little stone houses. There had been no TV, no phone and we had sat on the front porch at night counting stars and waiting for the shooting ones. With my youngest in a backpack (or my mother staying and watching him) we explored caves, pastures, mountains, abandoned farms. We had bought Audubon books and learned the names of the wildflowers we were  discovering. The children were at that age where everything held wonder and my parents and sister enjoyed sharing all the wonders with them.  Something as simple as watermelon seed spitting contests and watching frogs hop held them in rapture. It was a good summer and even better memories. A year later my twin was gone and all that was left us were the memories.

So I sort of know WHY I am looking....maybe it's that I am searching for a bit of those memories I have just described. The point was I had a sort of an epiphany the other day.

After spending inordinate amounts of time on Craigslist, looking at properties that I could not afford, or cheap ones simply too far away (there IS a practical side to me!) and .....daydreaming, wasting an awful lot of time.... I shook myself clear of it. 

I have a small "cabin". I am on a couple of acres of land. I have mature trees. I have deer and wildlife. I have a stone fountain I bought used 3 years ago and never used....hey. I can MAKE my own cabin in the woods and do it right here!

Bought from a friend whose mother had used it first as a pottery studio, then as storage (of course!) it was simply too good an opportunity to pass up!

So $250.00 moving fee later, the 12 x 20 building is finally deposited between our house, studio and pasture. It isn't very lovely but it was insulated, wired and covered inside with many grungy shelves and a linoleum floor. 

We are on 2.5 acres but the back is heavily wooded and alas...there was no way to get the whole shebang back to the back area.

At first the changes were cosmetic: cleaning the sides, painting the door, replacing the screen door with a vintage door......then I cleaned and painted the grungy insides shelves, thinking of paneling or sheetrock but not getting beyond that.  Amazing what a little paint can do. 
But within a few months we were storing frames and paintings in it, stymied by the cost of running electric to the inside panel.

And then the epiphany happened and I made a decision-yep-just like that-
the frames and artwork can go where they belong-into the 8 x 16 ft cargo trailer used just for that purpose. I'll enlist the help of some friends who can make a few things happen....for starters, I want a sliding door off the other end...this one door opens into the driveway-has to not be a major entrance. 
So I reasoned that if I bought property with a similar building on it, I would be facing the same economic and design challenges anyway so....what the heck!

So now I have my brain in gear...how to heat? Maybe a propane fireplace? Small woodstove? Must think this through but  so many shelves to help move my craft and silk work out of the main studio and into a smaller one.....let's see-add a small deck out the side where the sliding door would be, take that long unused stone waterfall..... are you feeling it now? :-)

What WILL the free range chickens think!?  Stay tuned for what starts to happen next!

Stepping back in Time with Art!

So, I will never be able to afford to buy mountain property and build a cabin. But where I am now is beautiful and has what I need to not only live, bu to produce my art in any form I desire! So I will readjust my mental thinking to the present....and you can follow me :-)

But first, true to my nature, I need to catch up on my artsy journey!

I have been diligent all summer and fall-painting, sewing, creating ....thinking about weeding the garden (which looks really good until August)
Hubby Steve and I spent the month of October getting ready to go back in time (so to speak) at the NC State Fair's Village of Yesteryear. Now he went "back" as a sign painter and I went back in the ancient art of silk painting. We had a grand time! Crowds of people, millions of questions, long hours :-)...and we stayed in our camper on the Fair grounds to save back and forth wear and tear. 

Stephen Filarsky in the Art of Hand Lettered Signs

Part of the fun of any art form that demonstrates to crowds is the response of the public. SIgn painting, once common in every town and city-has been replaced by the Internet era. But with people like Stephen Filarsky, it is alive and well!

Here I am in my booth-Steve to my left

So in a paragraph or so I have caught up with the past 6 months. It is of course never that simple but as I grow older I am discovering that it is OK to see that mountain and not climb directly over it...go around it or find an intelligent way to scale it :-)

And of course health. It is easy to take it for granted when young, but as I watch friends fall by the wayside, I realize that it becomes very precious when you hit your 50's-life span should not be measured in length-it should be measured in YOUR success (not someone else's interpretation)  

So my artsy journey is continuing  with my Cabin in the Woods in my next blog. Follow me!

Waiting for Spring

It has been a long winter for areas unused to long winters. Spring has peeped out enough times to give us hope but then tucks her head back inside and the temperatures plunge (again!)

 Even the art studio struggles to get warm and with propane at record highs, we try to conserve and not have to buy a tank right before spring!

So my solution to the cold, the ice, the snow and the dark days was to create my own spring and I did that by bringing out my silk dues and creating my "Ode to Spring" scarf :-).

SO I have brought my as yet, non-blooming daffodils in my yard to full bloom in my silk piece-a nice place to be while waiting for spring :-)

A Woman and her Beagle shared

  A Woman and her Beagle

 {I'm sharing this from my other blog www.mtheresabrown.blogspot.com simply because it is part of my artsy journey. Portraits are who I am. But art in all it's forms is where I like to be!)

I'm shipping out a pastel portrait this week and I must confess that I love it :-)

Now as you can see, it is of a beautiful woman and her equally charming beagle! Wow-the memories....my very first dog, my buddy, my confidant...was a beagle. I was just 7 years old and she occupied a time in my life that no other dog ever will. At 20, I honestly thought my world was going to end when "Tippy" passed. It was serious grief.

Ah but years later, and many four legged best friends later, I know of course that wasn't true :-). So I totally understood the bond between this woman and her dog!

Her mother commissioned it and sent me a huge pile of photos and ideas! After looking through them, I said what I say to everyone "Got it. Now just leave it up to me to choose!" So she did.:-)

The result is this pastel portrait-about 14 x 18 of Sarah and Bella and it will be the family's treasure for many years to come!

Of course, no one ever says it better than a happy client:

 Theresa....I have just had to retrieve the Kleenex box.....this is absolutely perfect!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  I am blown away....