Fall Light

 

 

Acrylic on recycled cotton/poly twill

4" x 6"

I've been watching David Hockney on YouTube videos and also, here.  I am so inspired by his studious, disciplined and eager approach to his work.  At 70, he was painting en plein air in the English countryside on a daily basis; often at 5:00 a.m. and through all kinds of weather in every season. (If you click on the first link, be sure to click on "Larger View" beneath the painting so that you can see the same scene in all four seasons.) He wanted to find out what it was like to be painting in the midst of the landscape rather than painting from a photograph of a scene that he had found by looking through the aperture of a camera.  More specfically, he wanted to know how the "seeing" of the scene would differ.  During one year, he literally painted 350 paintings while out of doors!  And talk about sketchbooks -- he definitely fills them.  But he has the confidence to "sketch" directly on their pages with paintbrushes rather than pencils; a practice he also employs on his canvases. 

 Watching these videos was the perfect transition from a busy work week to a weekend that absolutely MUST include putting some paint on canvas! 

Have a great weekend!!

:)

Out of Africa...And My Imgination

 

 

 Acrylic on paper

7" x 11"

Acrylic painted on repurposed chef's coat placket

So, the small painting and the painted fabric are my creations.  And these wonderful vintage wooden  pieces are machine and hand carved --- not by me, of course.  Visit Robyn Gordon's blog, Art Propelled, to see the truly beautiful totems that she carves.

Here comes the weekend! 

In the Works -- Relief and Screen Prints on Fabric

Mixed media on fabric

4" x 6"

The above is something I did a few years back. I painted the placket of a chef's coat (reclaimed from a barrel of scraps destined for the dump at a local industrial rag manufacturer), printed it with a paper stencil, added small fabric scraps and bits of paper I had previously painted and printed, and machine stitched it with gold thread.

Below, are a couple of textiles in the works. The first one was screen printed on wonderfully deep green linen purchased at a garage sale, using a paper stencil. (Trust me, the scanner did not do it justice!) I've begun to add a red running stitch to it which is barely visible, but if you click on the image, you can see the stitches and also get a sense of the structure of the fabric which includes a black warp thread and alternating dark green and natural linen weft threads. The central image is approximately 6" x 6" and the surrounding square is about 8" x 8" (too large for the scanner).

The second one was block printed on inexpensive muslin. I used this same block in some of the prints on paper that I posted a few weeks ago.

Oh -- a question: I've been using the older version of the editing program and just recently discovered a newer version exists. Has anyone had experience switching from the old to the new? I'm a bit reluctant to make the switch fearing it will get the best of me and my blog!