Playing with Gelli Prints

Painting by Vicky Christensen, mixed media on 12 x 16 inch hard-board 

I bought a Gelli Arts gel printing plate and went to town printing random designs on deli paper. I ripped some of the prints into strips and collaged the strips on a piece of Blick hard-board  (see below, in portrait orientation). Then I hit a brick wall - I couldn't decide what to do with it. Today I finally got back to the painting and decided to paint flowers. I glazed on some transparent color to define the petals and followed with translucent glazes in the background. I used Posca paint pens to outline the flowers and add details.

Board after collage, before painting

Blazing Skies

Painting by Vicky Christensen, acrylic on 12 X 16 Blick hardboard panel

I decided to do one more abstract using a negative painting technique. My inspiration was a photo I found in the Wet Canvas reference image library. This is the first time I have painted on a Blick hardboard panel. The panel is 3/8 inch thick and was primed with gesso. The gesso has a slightly textured surface, but the packaging indicates you can sand it lightly to get a smoother surface.

Sale at Blick, There Goes My Monthly Budget

Yesterday was the beginning of the "back to school" sale at the local Blick store. One of those deals where the more you buy, the more you save. In this case, 60% off on stretched canvases if you buy 10. So guess where I was yesterday afternoon. I ended up buying 10 canvases, some acrylic paints, varnish and a brush. All told I spent a little over 200 US dollars. Sometimes you have to spend big bucks to save big bucks.

Here is some irony: when I was looking for classes to take at the beginning of my retirement, I opted out of a quilting class because the list of supplies looked too expensive.

Today I am back to painting with acrylics. I had a lot of fun with the two recent pastel paintings but I don't want to let my recently-developed acrylic painting muscles atrophy. So my plan is to switch back and forth. I started to paint a hibiscus but haven't finished. It's in that awkward phase right now. I hope to finish it tomorrow. Here is a peek:

Notice my wonderful art studio (AKA kitchen) in the background. This is one of those moments when it is a good thing I am not married.

I also got around to framing the two waterfall paintings and I will be hanging them as soon as I find a good spot for them. For pastels of this size I like to frame them without mats. So I use spacers from FrameTek to keep a space between the pastel and the glass.

I'd like to hang them side by side. For now they are just propped up on my fireplace mantel.

Acrylics, Lesson 2

Today I finished the second painting from Varvara Harmon's 'Painting in Acrylic' published by Walter Foster.

Acrylic on Blick canvas sheet, 12 in. by 16 in.

I did better on the trees but I'm still having trouble controlling the liner brush. I am not getting a smooth, crisp line.

I also don't like how the canvas ripples. Next time I might try stapling the sheet to the board rather than taping it. I am using a Grafix Incredible Art Board, which is advertised as a great surface to use for stretching watercolor paper. You are supposed to be able to staple stretched paper to the surface over and over without the board buckling.

I also spent some money today on an "economy" pack of 12 by 16 stretched canvases. From the price I paid, I'm sure they aren't "artist" quality, but I am hoping they will be good enough for practice while I am learning about acrylics.

First Attempts with Acrylics

I am taking a break from pastels to try acrylic painting. I have been following exercises in Lee Hammond's book on painting landscapes. I have been practicing brushstrokes and have painted a few of the simple examples. Today I decided to try the first painting from Varvara Harmon's 'Painting in Acrylic' published by Walter Foster. Here is the finished painting:

This is painted on a Blick canvas sheet. The canvas has rippled a bit, which you might be able to see in the sky. I think next time I will probably try Fredrix canvas sheets, which are sturdier. In any case, I am encouraged by the results and can't wait to try the next lesson.

Artist's Block, Part 2

I am finding that once you spend your hard-earned money on art supplies, you find yourself not wanting to waste them. Unfortunately that leads to another level of artist's block. A good set of pastels can run into hundreds of dollars. Sanded papers and other textured surfaces can be quite expensive. So you find yourself questioning whether a subject is worth the expense of the supplies used to paint it. This is a dilemma if you really like to paint and you want to get better at it. Getting better requires practice, lots of it.

While searching for information about matting and framing pastel paintings (another expense no one tells you about ahead of time) I chanced upon http://www.wetcanvas.com/. Wet Canvas is a great online resource for artists of all skill levels. I won't endeavor to list everything you can find at Wet Canvas. Suffice it to say I got my answers about how to mat and frame and much more. One of the greatest resources is the Wet Canvas reference image library. Members have uploaded a multitude of reference images that can be used as artistic inspiration without paying licensing fees. I wasted no time downloading a number of photos I wanted to paint.

This is the first one that grabbed my eye:

The unanswered question was: can I paint it? I decided to do a couple of trial runs of one apple on Canson Mi Teintes before committing to a full painting. These two pictures were my first attempts with my new set of Blick pastels. I did two trials: one on the textured side of the paper and one on the smooth side.

Blick pastel on textured side of Canson Mi Teintes

Blick pastel on smooth side of Canson Mi Teintes

My first thoughts were:

• I like these pastels!
• I can paint apples!

I was ready to give the full painting a try. But a trip to Hawaii got in my way. I know, what a hardship.

More Supplies

Towards the end of my community ed class in early March it became clear to me that 1) I really enjoyed painting with pastels and 2) I needed to invest in some "soft" pastels. I ended up buying a small set of Sennelier soft pastel half sticks. Sennelier makes very beautiful, rich, soft and smooth pastels (not to be confused with their oil pastels, a completely different beast). I figured the half sticks were the way to go because I could get a feel for them without the additional expense of full sticks.

I also wanted a more complete set of colors, so I also bought a full-stick set of Blick Artists pastels. So-called "soft" pastels actually come in various levels of hardness/softness and generally are classified as hard, medium and soft pastels. The Blick Artists would probably be placed in the medium category. I chose the Blick pastels because 1) they are very reasonably priced compared to other more well known high quality pastels and 2) they were the only ones I could find on the Blick web site that did not have California Prop 65 warnings about potentially harmful, cancer-causing, chemicals. Since I usually use an art barrier cream (Gloves in a Bottle), and I don't eat the pastels, the Prop 65 warning probably shouldn't be that big of a deal. But I figured why not try the Blick pastels and see how they work.

So far I have been very satisfied with the Blick pastels. I have found that some colors (mostly darker) are harder than others, but so far that hasn't been much of a handicap.

Now that I had the pastels I needed to determine what types of pastel support would suit my style (once I figure out what my style is). Through our instructor I found out about the Dakota Pastels web site (http://www.dakotapastels.com/pages/index-sale.aspx). Dakota offers sampler packs of both pastel papers and boards. I put in my orders for both. Now I was ready to go but still didn't know what to paint.