Old and New Ventures

*On February 10th, Sisters 7 hung their small window at Met Too Theater in Oakhurst. It's a tiny window and we put work from 7 artists in it, creatively and interestingly. . . .and lovingly. Photos soon. . . .  (I keep putting off the photos because I'm having syncing issues and I can only get them here by emailing them to myself etc. etc. It takes 5 steps instead of 1 and sometimes I don't have time to do it.)

*Yesterday, I took my things down at Ramos Torres Winery in Kingsburg. I love the venue and the people and I'll miss being there but I've been there since November and it's time for them to have a new artist, a photographer this time.

*Yesterday, I took 2 paintings to the Alliance of California Artists show at Arts Visalia. Only 55 paintings were accepted  of the 113 that were entered so I was fortunate in that both of mine were accepted. My favorite of the 2--"Flower Power"--didn't place but "Oversaxed" received a 2nd in Mixed Media. The reception is Friday night March 5th from 6-8 PM. The beautiful gallery is on Oak Street, right across from the Depot Restaurant.

*Today I played a concert with Clovis Community Band--I play oboe and Roy plays French horn--and went out to dinner with my parents. Then I came home to gather paintings for the next show, which starts tomorrow at Planet Java in Piccadilly Square in North Fresno. It's an "earth tone" sort of place so I picked a different group of paintings and we'll see how the hanging goes tomorrow. I will put in the address and the details along with photos after I hang the show tomorrow.

*Another new venture is "Art by Hand" in the Tower District at Van Ness and Bremer. I will include more info about that shortly as well.

*Some of my paintings may soon be featured on amulets (spelling?) made by an east coast artist. I am excited! More news soon, hopefully!

"Flower Power"

Today, I sent off an email attachment of this painting to the California Watercolor Association for their national show. It is held at the Presidio in San Francisco and you have to have a painting accepted 3 times to be considered as a "signature member" of the show. I was lucky enough to have "A-Mazing!" accepted in 2007, the first time that I entered. So, I am trying again with this bold, bright floral. 

It is strictly watercolor--absolutely nothing else but watercolor. It's like I'm enjoying going back to wet into wet, wild and crazy paintings recently.

Keep your fingers crossed that it gets accepted, but if it doesn't I'll try again next year with a different painting.

Winners of One World, One Heart Giveaways

Today being February 15th makes it the day to announce the winners of my OWOH giveaway. I selected 2 numbers using a random number generator and then counted my comments to arrive at the two winners. They are:

Janny (from the Netherlands) to be found at TRICOLORE

KV (from New Mexico, the "Land of Enchantment") to be found at artfulmuse.blogspot.com

So, CONGRATULATIONS to Janny and KV. I will be emailing you now and as soon as I have your mailing information I will send you a set of my "Artist Inspiration Cards" plus 6 greeting cards.

Playing with some new mediums

My potluck critique group meets once a month and each month we paint (create, actually) "to" a different topic. We select topics about once a year and each months' is different. This month the prompt is to "use a medium you haven't used before."

I have so many things I've bought and not yet tried that I'm going to work with some of the Golden and Liquitex mediums that I have on hand. I got some unusual canvases and used a pallette knife to spread the "lightweight" medium on them, in a thin, fairly smooth coat. I read about it before hand and discovered that once it's completely dry, it makes a paper-type surface that you can wet and drop paint and ink onto and it spreads out in an interesting manner, almost like working with watercolors.

So far, I'm having fun experimenting with it wet and dry and with paints, inks, and metallics. When I finish the panels, I want to coat them with gloss medium and self-leveling gel for a different, glossy look than I usually finish with. Fun, so far!