Altered Roses

A bit of tweaked photography to share. 

These roses were found in the Western Washington University Rose garden a few weeks ago. Their beauty inspired me... and may become an abstract painting in the near future. :)

Angel - Random Act of Kindness

Angel of Love

Made for a friend of a friend who is stage 4 ovarian cancer. 

Angel of Love is cut out of chipboard covered with a gelli-plate monoprint in blues and purples, with gold tone charms, inks, gel pen, stickles and butterfly wings. 

Creative Energy, and lack thereof

Torn paper sunflower

What does one do when one has no creative energy left?
The last few weeks we've had assorted issues with family illness, and bits of care taking and following up to make sure things are "alright"... because one just does those things for those one loves.
However it has left me tired and having trouble catching back up with myself.
I have all these ideas - things I want to create, and just can't make it happen. There is no energy left for creating, and I feel it's loss.
Another nights sleep; another day of catching back up and perhaps I'll get there.

In other news... Spring has arrived in my garden, evidenced by the lovely yellow dandelions with attending bees....

...and the lovely bleeding hearts, one of my springtime favorites.

Have a wonderful week!

Spring Trees

Spring Trees
Acrylic Painting

Sharing with Paint Party Friday

Owl

Sharing an owl piece I worked on this week, using old ledger paper, handmade paper and an owl from a large decorative paper from Italy. All blended together with natural beeswax. (I love working with beeswax!)

This shows the layers a bit... you can see the ledger paper behind the owl. I "framed" the owl with the handmade paper.

At first I thought I was done. Now I'm thinking it might need something else... the edges seem too sharp. Hmmm... What do you think?

Sharing with Paint Party Friday, hosted by Eva and Kristin. 

Thinking of Spring

Spring Trees Abstract

Quirky Birds

So... our Spark lesson was to do one liners (a whole bunch!) and begin to expand on one of our favorites. These are some I've "expanded". The brown and gray bird is my favorite so far, using my Rembrandt sketch pastels in neutral tones. I haven't used those for some time and had forgotten how much I enjoy playing with them. 

The blue bird uses an Inktense block. I drew first, and then used my water brush. Not too happy with it so far, but it's all a process.  

And the sketched white bird on the black background is acrylic ink applied with the dropper. This was part of using mark making process... and it started getting me to loosen up. 

That is the whole idea... to loosen up and let go of your preconceived ideas of how a drawing should look... and just let it happen. I need to work on that a bit more. Which is one of the reasons I like taking classes with Carla Sonheim. She's fabulous at bringing the inner child who likes to draw out to play. :) 

Sharing today with Paint Party Friday, hosted by Eva and Kristin. 

Charming Gardeners

"Let us be grateful to the people who make us happy. 

They are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom."

Marcel Proust



Sharing this bit of art with

Merry Christmas!

This is an older piece, but is just right for wishing you a Merry Christmas! I hope your holiday was special! 

Altered Sunflower

Playing around with altering photos. Today's guinea pigs are sunflowers 

It's kinda fun to see what one can do to alter/enhance something digitally. 

What are you working on today? 

Full moon memories

Last week just before the full moon we were camping in the dry side of Washington State. The moon was so bright - the night before it was full. We could walk about without requiring a flashlight to see where we were going. 

I've since been playing with drawing/painting moons. Not well, mind you. Just playing around to see what happens. This piece is using water soluble oil pastels. It was too dark for good photos today (darn rain), so this doesn't bring out the color variations. But you get the idea. 

I'll keep playing around, and eventually get the look I want. 

Happy Friday! 

Sunflowers

Artist Trading Cards made using dimensional stickers left over from a challenge demo about a year ago. I came across the stickers while sorting and de-stashing, and decided they would work on the blue torn paper backgrounds. I don't usually use stickers, however these are sunflowers. I just love sunflowers!

I added some stems with Stabilo pencils and water, and edged with a Poster Paint pen. Here's a couple of close ups...

And speaking of sunflowers... these are out in the garden right now.

Happy Friday! 

Postage Stamp Art

I decided to play in a Postage Stamp Art-athon this weekend at atcsforall.com in the hopes that it got my muse activated. An Art-athon is an art marathon where we "hang out" together online and "chat" and sometimes trade art... and I've actually made a few ATCs! 

While I do trade some ATCs, there are a few I like so much, I cannot trade them away. This one in particular will be framed and in my studio. 

The background is an abstract on watercolor paper that I didn't like so I cut it into ATC backgrounds. I adore that bird stamp, it's so lovely! And when I saw this particular background, well, that was that.  

Here are some of my "trade-able" favorites ATCs.

The King is an altered playing card stained with alcohol inks. The others are all paper napkins, vintage text or stamped script, inks, postage stamps and finished with beeswax. Fairly simple, but they made me happy. And it's all about making me happy. :) 

I've collected some pretty awesome stamps over the past few years, specifically to use in my collage art. Fortunately, I have a friend who sells fabulous used postage stamps on Etsy, so I can feed my addiction. Check out LarkroseInspirations if you also love to use old stamps in your work. 

Thanks for stopping by! To my American Friends, have a wonderful 4th of July! 

Untitled

Gesso and Watercolor on Canvas Panel

4 x 5 inches

I'm muse-less these days so posting this small painting from a bit ago. 

I wonder if my muse is going to return sometime soon. 

I miss her. 

Standstill

This is a work in progress - and has been for a bit. I love how the orange flowers turned out, and am hesitant to add to them as I normally would. And I'm not even sure what type of leaves to add. 

So here it sits. I come by and look at it every so often to see if I'm inspired to complete it. Hasn't happened yet.. as you can tell.  :) 

One of these days it will be completed. For now it's at a standstill. 

What are you working on this week?  

Still Life

Still Life by Jason Hogan
8 x 10 Acrylic on Canvas Board 

Sharing an abstract still life painting by my son, Jason. Prints will be available soon in my Etsy Shop

Field of Sunflowers

From the archives:  Field of Sunflowers. 

Mixed Media on Muslin

Since I have not finished a new piece this week, I am sharing one of my older works.
A lot of things were happening this week...sisters gallery opening, birthday party out of town, grand nieces concert... and there just not enough time to be in the studio for some serious art. I missed it.

Sharing with Paint Party Friday, hosted by Eva and Kristin. 

Family Portraits

Working on a project for my auntie, who turns 88 this week. She requested my assistance with creating a collage-type picture of her and her parents. The old photos she sent arrived yesterday afternoon, and I've scanned and photocopied and am working on creating something that will make her happy. 

This background first layer is actually photocopies of her writing, torn up and collaged onto a canvas panel. 

I'd asked about a favorite poem, or quote or song, and she remembered a poem by her sister Rosemary she's had posted for many years. When she unfolded it, she discovered that her copy was sent to her by her brother Patrick, which she'd forgotten. 

Both of these siblings died several years ago. Her note was very sweet and I decided that should make up the background. 

This is my preferred layout - early stages. Grandparents "cropped" to head shots. Auntie (in color) needs to be a bit bigger. 

Tinting of the poem (or printing on darker paper), paint to blend in the edges, and another quote still to be added. The layout is awaiting approval before the good copies of the photos are used and glued down and paints/inks applied. 

Final output will be cards for aunties children, grandchildren and great grandchildren, and the rest of us cousins too. I'm not sure I can make the cards happen before her party on Sunday (it's a 4 1/2 hour drive away), but the master will be ready to display at her party. 

If auntie gives the okay, I'll share the poem soon. It's lovely. :)

Sharing today with Paint Party Friday

Mid Spring - Works in Progress

A gesso-watercolor abstract painting in progress. Blue flowers... my intent was to create pansies, however that may change as I get into the details. This is with the first layer of color on the leaves. More color will go on the leaves, and then I'll start on the details. That part is always scary... what if I muck it up? :)
It felt good to get back to these paintings, I've been ignoring them for a bit but the muse finally wanted to work on them again. Yay! If I keep the momentum, I'll have several done in the next few days. We'll see. It's hard to be in the studio when the sun is shining!

I did start this painting today, outdoors on the deck. Inspired by the Lewisia we have in pots near the table where we were sitting and finishing our (caffeine free) iced tea.

It doesn't look like much, and I've already decided I should have made it taller (rather than square) as the flower stems are much higher in real life. However, this will be an abstract, so I will take poetic license.

And from the garden this lovely day: 

Red Coral Bells

On another note, a finished piece from last summer is now in my Etsy Shop:

Digital Poppy 5x5 print

Sharing today with Paint Party Friday, hosted by Eva and Kristin

Thursday Doldrums... and the result

A bit of the doldrums today... so I spent some time in the studio. No real art-ing done, however I did get some more organizing and cleaning done. My art for the day was making "fun foam" texture stamps for gelliplate pints using shapes I'd cut out some time ago.

The board backings are recycled boxes, and the handles are (crookedly) cut corks. Here's a shot of the backside of one stamp.

These were maiden voyage prints:

Bleh! They did not come out at all how I wanted them to come out, however I can tweak them a bit more. Or cut them up for backgrounds.  :)

Ah well. I'll keep playing with it and perhaps one of these days get it to work I wish it to work.

In the meantime, here's something from my "archives" that makes me happy.

Sharing with Paint Party Friday, hosted by Eva and Kristin