I have had quite the busy week. I am finally fulfilling a dream of mine. I've been setting up a studio in the extra/laundry room downstairs. This has required moving furniture around, sorting through a myriad of belongings, etc. Right now, the space is an unholy nightmare - boxes and boxes of stuff needing to be unpacked, organized and put away. They are just piled on and around the tables and storage cubes in the area. Plus I have two easels taking up room, too.

It had become quite obvious that in order to make any sense of this mess, I needed a lot more storage containers and perhaps even a plastic cart with drawers or two. So I dedicated my Saturday to visiting thrift shops around town. I needed to do this on the cheap, and quite frankly, I'm not too concerned about getting nice, new, matching things. Yes, it would be nice, but I don't want to be worrying about messing up my pretty new things. With this stuff, I can just concentrate on creating and who cares if it gets splattered with paint and hot glue. :-)

I had a BRILLIANT time! I ended up going to five different thrift shops and I scored some awesome stuff. My very first stop, I scored the plastic three drawer cart I wanted for only $5.25! Turns out Salvation Army (or Sally Ann's as they're now being called) was having a 50% off sale all day. :-) So of course I visited two more of them, along with two others in town.

I found bins and little storage boxes, big stacking drawers and all of this for less than I would have paid for just one new three or four drawer cart. I even found a huge frame with glass that I could use to make a big palette for my paint. I turned it into that palette last night and as soon as my studio is up and running, I'll get to start using it. YES! I will finally have plenty of room to mix up all the paint I need. I've been using a 16x20 palette, but I keep running out of room. Not any more. :-)

So now, all I need is the energy and perseverance to go through all of this junk and get it put away. It feels good to know that I'm getting closer and closer to making this dream a reality.

I love to paint. Especially portraits of women. I like to do fun decorative paintings, such as the flowers and sun that I blogged about earlier, but I'm most passionate about painting women. Even as a child, that was what I preferred to draw. So when I found this newest art blog, I was thrilled. It's called Women Painting Women: Favorite paintings of women by women, with a focus on contemporary, living artists.

It's providing me with much inspiration. Do check it out! I'm being introduced to many new artists through this and hopefully you will, too. :-)

Just wanted to post a picture of the nearly-finished portrait from my class. There's one more, but it's still a work in progress. It's amazing how much I've learned from this class. Loving it!



Plus I've become obsessed with some flower sketches I've been working on and as soon as I finish up this next portrait, I'm going to start experimenting with them. Lots of color - bold and vibrant!

I mentioned sharpie doodles in my last post and thought do a quick post on those. I have recently become obsessed with doing sharpie doodle artist trading cards. They're easy, fun, and let me stretch a bit with the imagination. Plus I can do them while I watch my favorite shows. :-) This is the first batch I did:



This is the second and latest batch that I've finished:



I've got a bunch more that I've started. Fun little things and very addictive. Plus I'll be able to use them for swaps!

I am finally able to log onto the internet! I've missed it. On the other hand, I think it was actually quite helpful. I was freed from the temptation to waste hours and hours of time on the internet and instead, I used many of those hours to do all sorts of creative projects, from artist trading cards to sketches to making my resin covered magnets/pins/pendants/keychains to painting. It's been good!

My Portrait Painting in Oils class has been wonderful. I mean, I am learning SO MUCH from it. I just finished up my first portrait from the class. It's a 20x24 portrait of a model named Holly. And I would post a picture of the portrait but... when I went to my house this afternoon, I remembered to take my camera so I could get a picture, but I forgot to get the memory card from my laptop, which meant I couldn't take a picture. GRRRR! But I will hopefully be posting one in the next day or two.

A week ago I started my second house sitting job for my sis Alicia and her darling kitten Penny. I decided to take three days off work to paint. It was the best decision! Dedicating that time to painting just did wonders for me. But having to go back to work on Thursday? That was hard. It was so painful to tear myself away and go back to the normal routine. One day I'd love to have the painting be my normal routine.

Monday I didn't get any painting done, but I did go to see the movie Slumdog Milllionaire. Loved it. Tuesday and Wednesday I painted, painted, painted! The only painting I'd been doing for a while was the portrait and I needed to take a break from it. So I took some little sharpie doodles I'd been doing and decided to do some fun decorative paintings with acrylic.





They came out pretty good, but I'd like to try them in oils. I do better work with oils. I did do backgrounds on two other canvases and I think I will do both of those in oils. They'll be flowers, too.

I started a new portrait in class on Wednesday. I did the underpainting in sap green and I sketched it out on the canvas. The paint is pretty dry now, so I'll be starting on the actual painting soon. I'm trying hard not to think of the class ending this month. I hate to see it end. This class in particular has been the most helpful. I'll have to keep my eye out for additional courses and in the meantime, keep up the painting.

Linda, the artist teaching the course, recommended a couple of books by a teacher at the Gage Academy of Art in Seattle. That's where Linda took a workshop in portrait painting in January. I received them in the mail Wednesday and have been delving into them. I'm starting with "Classical Drawing Atelier: A Contemporary Guide to Tradional Studio Practice" and then I will continue with "Classical Painting Atelier." They are quite fascinating and the art inside is inspiring me.

I need to focus more on my drawing skills. I've been sketching a lot lately, but it's vague ideas for paintings or my sharpie doodles - like the paintings above. I've always preferred drawing/painting people over landscapes, even as a child, so I need to realy start sharpening my skills by doing more figure drawings. I know of a place or two in town where I could attend some figure drawing sessions, so I'm may try to get my courage up and attend.

I think my experience with them in a previous art class has me scared about it. I felt so inadequate, I was floundering around and doing a crap job with a lot of the assignments and the figure drawings. (It didn't help that partway through the class my life kind of blew up in my face and I was really struggling emotionally. It was BAD.) We had to work with charcoal A LOT in that class. Charcoal and I HATE each other. I despise using it and just can't get the hang of it. Plus I felt like the information presented in the class wasn't always the clearest or complete. But it wasn't all bad and there were times when I was pretty happy with the results. Like this:



This was my favorite of the figure drawings. But honestly? I want to do better. And I know I can. And that blasted fear of doing more figure drawing classes is a sure sign that I really do need to take them. I hate the way that works!

Anyway, it's past 1:30 am and I need to go hit the sack. I have a busy day ahead of me tomorrow. :-)

I am around and I do plan on updating soon! I've just been house-sitting for a couple while they're in England and as my luck would have it, the connection I get with my modemy-thingie is so weak, I can't get online. This is killing me. At least I can check my email and do some surfing on my cell phone. However, typing out a blog entry using my cell phone? Oh heck no! So I've been sneaking what I can at work, only they've cracked down a bit more there and I'm sneaking home when I can.

However, I have been working on my art and I have been taking some pictures. I will be switching over to a different house-sitting job on Friday and I know for sure I will get internet access there. Thank God! So I will be back soon and showing all sorts of pics. Plus I'll finally be uploading some stuff on flickr.

I miss the internet!

I was quite productive today... went shopping with my sis, came home and cooked dinner - chiles en nogada and homemade refried beans - then I finished the value study I did in class and did two more.

The whole exercise was to to learn to look for shapes of values first thing when painting. So we each picked out at least one photo to paint. I picked one for class, then three to take home. We were to do a quick sketch on our canvas - nothing detailed - and just noticed the shapes of the lights and darks. Then we would start with the darkest darks, filling them in, and working our way to the lightest lights. We weren't to try and do anything detailed or blend, etc. Here's what I ended up with:



This was the one I started in class. I got about 2/3 of it done in class and finished it up at home.



This was the second one I did. I don't normally paint men, so it was an interesting change to work on this study.



This was the third one I did and the one that Linda demonstrated in class.



A view of all three.

Next class we will be working with color. It'll be on 20x24 canvases. The studies were done on 8x10 canvas panels. I'm looking forward to seeing what Wednesday brings!

Also on my plate is experimenting with creating resin pendents. I will be doing a number of them at the same time, several of them Frida Kahlo ones. One of those will go to my partner in the Frida handmade jewelry swap. That is, assuming at least one turns out, one will go to my partner. If not, I'll be attempting something else!

I'll also be creating several works of art with my beloved four year old niece tomorrow. She's been begging me to paint with her and since we're having a girl day tomorrow, it's the perfect time. :-) I bought a cheap sketchbook with a plain, flexible cover so that she could decorate the cover herself and have a sketchbook to draw in just like her auntie. :-) I am so looking forwarding to hanging out with my princess tomorrow!