Tag Archives: colorful

March 1, 2021 · 7:33 pm

Art Out With Your HeART Out Has Even More Meaning

Have you had to take a creative breath over the past year? Whether by choice or by necessity? I think by now we all can agree that we are lucky to be able to take a breath whether figuratively or literally at this point.

It was mid-January, 2020, when I first started reading about a possibly dangerous new virus that was spreading halfway across the world. As the weeks progressed and it became apparent this was going to be a life-changing situation I stopped making art. Any art. Nothing. Although I’d stopped blogging a few years earlier I was still being creative and feeding my art spirit in many other ways. I dabbled on YouTube. I taught a few art classes in my community. I made art to donate to various fundraisers and causes. I went to shows at art museums and galleries. All of that stopped. Overnight. My main passion up and left me.

As 2020 progressed I began being creative in other ways unrelated to my art studio. I started a new square-foot garden of vegetables and flowers.

I began cooking and baking from scratch.

New rituals and routines started forming. I made charms of glass beads and bells for my garden gate.

As summer turned to fall and the weather began to drive me back inside with warm cups of foamy lattes (made by me) I noticed I was starting to see my art studio again. It was sunny all day in there even when it was cold outside.

My cold, cold creative heart began to thaw. I started watching some of my old favorites on YouTube and found some new ones to follow. I’ve been dreaming up new projects to use my immense supply of ALL THE THINGS. I’m revisiting techniques that I’ve used in the past and I’m learning new ones. I have started reacquainting myself with my art supplies and my art alter-ego, Katyoparty. She’s the one who signs all the art. So after a good long time it feels really good to say…ART OUT WITH YOUR HEART OUT.

Growing in Art–Part One

Yep that’s a stamp I carved! I’ve actually carved three stamps now–all hearts! Hardly surprising since I’ve rarely met a heart I didn’t love. My first two hearts are about an inch big and did them during a Julie Fei Fan Balzer stamp carving online tutorial. This latest heart was done at the ReMe art retreat on Ocracoke Island in May, 2015. I enjoyed the process and have enjoyed being able to use my own stamp but I haven’t carved any more. I have all the things I need to do more but my creative attention span is short. I’m always on to the next thing. And the next thing. and the next thing.

That may explain why I have an obscene amount of art supplies. When I embrace a new technique or supply I have the habit of buying every color or every tool or every whatever it is. I recently saw a Youtube video by Sarah at MySerenityCrafts from March 4, 2016, where she vlogs about her experience of buying art supplies. I had already decided at the beginning of this year to USE WHAT I HAVE and I’ve been contributing to a huge bag things I am ready to pass along to other artists. Seeing Sarah’s vlog just confirmed my belief that I need to pare down.

But I digress….I’m supposed to be writing about things I’ve branched out into in my art.

I’ve been really stretching my comfort zone and painting and doing more mixed media than ever and making a point of using what I have. Here are a few new things–

This one I used a canvas panel with Silks acrylic paints and Staz-On ink pads for the background. The dragonfly is made of resin. I made it!! I first stenciled the dragonfly using modeling paste and then made a mold of it. I then poured resin and it worked. Yep I’ve been through a major mold-making and casting phase. For awhile there I would slap mold putty on anything that didn’t move for a minute…

One interesting and unexpected (at least to me) occurrance happened when I used a Silks acrylic glaze to stencil the cherry blossom branch in the left background. The original color was a bright pink but when I put a layer of gloss medium over the top of the piece to seal it it caused a major color change to the Silks glaze and also slightly blurred the image. I liked the effect so I’m calling it a happy accident. I haven’t yet tried to recreate the phenomenon again. If any of you have used this technique on purpose I’d love to hear about it.

The piece below that I called “Transform” is on a canvas panel and then mounted on a recycled backing panel from a frameless glass frame. This experiment involved glass bead gel and a gorgeous stencil by Patti Tolley Parrish (available at iStencils.com)–it is called Dangles. I also used some chipboard pieces that echoed the dangle idea but I cannot remember who made them because I had them unwrapped in my stash. I also used acrylic paints, Silks, Gelatos, Izink pigment ink, alcohol inks, and a partridge in a pear tree–lol Maybe I should list the things I didn’t use….

My final share for today is another piece on a canvas panel. This one used stenciled texture paste, embossed deli paper, and wipe off pieces of baby wipes and paper towels. I used lots of bright colors with acrylic paints, acrylic inks, and some paint pens. This piece is posed with Hula Girl my desk mascot and it makes me happy!

Part Two is coming soon! Thanks for visiting today and I love to read comments and have new followers!

ArtOutWithYourHeARTOut

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Filed under Mixed Media Mania, Musings

Tagged as abstract, acrylic ink, acrylic paint, colorful, istencil.com, katyoparty, mixed-media, myserenitycrafts, Patti Tolley Parrish, ReMe Retreat, texture

May 13, 2013 · 1:32 am

A New Beginning–the artful way

This is how I spent some of my time today. I started my first art journal! What a wonderful gift to myself on Mother’s Day. Everything happens in it’s own time and this is a prime example. I’ve been looking at and admiring many artists’ art journals while following a parallel path on my own art journey. Always thinking that I would do some art journaling someday, later, or tomorrow. Right.

Recently while shopping for some other MUST HAVE NOW art supplies I happened across the rack of art journals. I’ve been through this routine before and I’ve looked at probably dozens of art journals without ever purchasing one. Just call me Goldilocks–I wanted one not too big, not too small, the paper had to be not too thick, not too thin, the cover had to be flexible but not flimsy–maybe I should be called Her Royal Highness MS. Goldilocks. In any case this time all journals were 40% off so I began the routine of ~~fondling~~ perusing all the journals. I mean ALL the journals. Spent about 20 minutes before I found IT. THE ONE! The perfect size (7″x10″), the perfect weight and feel of paper (#120 lb), the perfect cover (nondescript and unadorned but not plain). Did I mention it was THE ONE??!! Took it home and…put it on the shelf for a couple of weeks.

I moved it around several times because it kept getting in the way. I picked it up and looked at it several times. The pages were so white and so blank and there were so many of them. I put it back on the table. It seemed no matter where I put the damned thing it kept being in the way of what I was working on. There was no way the Universe was going to let THE ONE get lost in the shuffle. So today on “my” day, Mother’s Day, I opened my new art journal and played. I got all the pretty colors on the page from the feeling in my heart as I reflect on my blessings of true love, sweet family, good friends, good health, and the companionship of a sweet dog.

Art Out With Your HeART Out