More Monoprint Fun

Happy daylight savings time...we need the extra hour to come down from post Halloween sugar highs lol.
Every year I swear I'll beat my addiction, but then I have 'just one'....addict that I am, I'm soon  in a sugar haze and vowing never again...until next year :)
All that energy has gone into the studio

one Monoprint done:

 and a painting started.

The St Thomas Elgin Artist's Guild show is just around the corner, opening Friday Nov 8th 7-10pm at the CASO station in 750 Talbot St in St T. Then continuing Saturday 12-8 and Sunday 12-6 2013, be there!

More Colours of Summer

 Colours of Summer #7 isn't telling me it's name, this is actually the third over painting of this one, it's being difficult.

sold

What do you think I should call it?

 The colours are just a bit muted here, the butterfly is an orange sulphur, and the asters purple, I never know if it's the monitor, or me that's a bit off...lol

This second painting is one I started when we were at Restoule this summer, it's actually been done for a while, and it's been at the gallery, I just kept forgetting to photograph it. While landscape isn't really my 'thing' this scene begged to be painted, and I obliged.   I've been working to get some work ready for the St Thomas 'Art Before Christmas Show and Sale' which is early November, and fast coming up!

Onward and Upward

Last weekends STEAG show was wonderful, and I'm pleased to report that as well as sales I garnered a honourable mention award for 'Eden'.

The juror commented she 'loved' my textural effects, which of course is where my art has been going so-yeah!

I've got a couple more paintings at early stages, they'll change a lot as they progress, but this is the beginning.

*Poof* and an art show appears

Well, not quite *poof* there actually was a lot of work involved. 

The 6th annual STEAG Art Show and Sale 'the Art Before Christmas' has fill the CASO Station (750 Talbot St., St Thomas) with art of every kind. Stupendous. Superlative. Sublime. Be there!

Opening tonight (Friday Nov 9th) 7-10, and continuing Saturday 11-5, and Sunday 12-5, 2012.

Morning on the Moon

Oops I seem to have skipped a week, dang I hate it when that happens, time slips into a black hole, and just....disappears. Very Scary.
Of course it just means that we're all so very busy, teaching, making, and hopefully selling art.
The Elgin Colours of Fall Studio Tour was a rip roaring' success, and once it was all over I slept 12 hours straight!  So very unlike me, but I was bagged lol.
The advertising for the St Thomas Elgin Artists' Guild show and sale -Art Before Christmas- is just about done, mark your calendars, Nov, 9/10/11 will be here before you know it!
I've got art to make for it, and I've been trying to keep to my studio hours schedule, but the gotta earn a buck thang keeps getting in the road.  Luckily I do love teaching my Alzheimer's clients, it's all about joy, and with them, joy is a very pure thing.
My friend Philip took a much better photograph of this work ( morning on the moon-which moon? Io maybe ).  I saved it in 'my pictures', but like the last week, it's fallen into a black hole, so you'll have to make do with my poor photography.

On with the show! 5th annual St Thomas Guild show

The St Thomas Elgin Artists Guild's 5th annual 'twas the art before Christmas show opened last night, with the 'Black Birds' , beverages and goodies, and most of all Glorious ART!

The show continues Saturday Nov 19, 11-5pm and Sunday Nov 20, 12-5pm.

Our artists are exhibiting every manner and style of paintings, photographs, sculpture, stained glass and Rose Klein's art jewlery and textiles.

Everyone has worked very hard to make our annual show spectacular.

See you there!

St Thomas Elgin Artists' Guild Show 2010

The opening last night was huge, it was great to see to see so many out for the show. We had wonderful music with vocals by Cara Lee and Jon Jeffery who also plays guitar, beverages from Timmies, and treats supplied by Perfect Bakery (116 Hamilton Rd London-519-432-7931), and of course some of the most fabulous art, by some of this areas best artists.

The show continues Saturday Nov 13, 12-9, and Sunday Nov 14, 12-4.

Let the Christmas shopping ensue!

Mary Louise White is opening tonight (Nov 13) at STEPAC. Mary Louis is not only one of the best artists in North America, but also one of the kindest souls I have every met. When I was just starting to get serious about my art she sat down with me and gave me lots of wonderful advise, that has made important an impact on my art practice.

Speaking of my art practice, I've been working diligently at my commissions list, if you were thinking of having a commissioned piece done for Christmas, I only have a few spots left, so don't delay! Ditto for pARTy bookings!!

St T Guild Show and Gallery News

It's almost here!

The Show in St Thomas 'Art Before Christmas' is less than a week away.

(Friday 6-9, Saturday 12-9, Sunday 12-4, 810 Talbot St, see the side bar for details)

The women who are organizing it, June Anne Reid and Sandra England (also members of the gallery) are doing an amazing job. It's going to pull all the stops!

I haven't been as involved in the organizing of this show as I have been in shows past, which has left me with more time to do marketing etc for the gallery, this was, of course, 'the plan'. Gotta have a plan.

We finished painting the gallery this week, and have the furnishings in. Rose Klein and Vivian Tserotas did an amazing job on the furnishings. The gallery is very sophisticated and contemporary looking. This week Viv and assistants will start hanging the art, and then..........Wednesday November the 17th...........we're open!

OMG

I have butterflies the size of pterodactyls.

Also, Saturday November 13th Mary Louise White, and artist I truly admire, has her opening at the St Thomas Public Art Center 7-9 pm. I Love Mary Louise's work. She's a great inspiration to me.

gallery news & new newsletter in the works

The gallery set up is getting close to completion. Our doors should be open for our 'soft opening' on Nov 17th, with our grand opening Dec 10th. This gives us some time to work any bugs out, and make sure that the set up flows. This is SOOOOO exciting/terrifying!
We will be open Wednesdays through Sundays, closed Mondays and Tuesdays.
The Art Gallery of Lambeth is at 2454 Main St in Lambeth Ontario. We are 9 area artists, and as well as our own work we will have associate artists work on display, and a gift shop of locally made treasures.
Our gallery will have a community focus and so we will offer workshops for both adult and young learners in our teaching room. We also plan on hosting community events like after school art programs, art fairs, and speaking/demonstration programs. When we're not using it we plan on renting the room for small groups to have meetings in.

My partners are:

Vivian Tserotas, textile
Robert Reid, watercolour
Sandra England, contemporary
Rose Klein, textile
Catherine Craig, clay and fiber

Annette Martin, contemporary
Brenda Colley, wild life, all media
June-Anne Reid, contemporary
and of course me, Robin Baratta, contemporary

In addition to this I'm still running my own art business, if you're thinking of a portrait for Christmas, or of hosting a pARTy, I'm booking up fast, so don't delay!

As a part of streamlining my own business I've been migrating my newsletter list to a service, so that it won't come from my personal e:mail account any more but from my web site. If you'd like to sign up just put your info into the sign up box, click on the click here spot on the confirmation e:mail...and Bob's your uncle!

The St Thomas Guild Show 'The Art Before Christmas is fast coming up too. Friday, Nov 12 opening reception 6-9pm, show continues Saturday November 13, 12-9pm, Sunday November 14, 12-4pm. It's at the restored Canadian Southern Railway Station at 810 Talbot St, St Thomas. the art will be superlative as always, but it's worth going just to see what they've done with that magnificent old building.

Pollination/Creation

This piece and six others, will be in the 'Twas the Night Before Christmas, guild show which starts tomorrow night Friday Nov 6th 7-10 pm. and runs Saturday 12-8 pm and Sunday 12- 6 pm. at 18 Princess Ave St Thomas.

This piece celebrates the web of life, and the way species diversification exploded with the evolution of pollination. I've used a couple of new to me techniques here, one is etching into the surface of one layer to expose the layer beneath. I've also dyed cloth and added it to the red background, although it's not very visible in this photo, it gives a cool textural effect on the actual painting which is 24x30 inches.

The gala opening will be a good time, to come and see the effect for your self.

Catherine and I have been taking a course re: business marketing, accounting etc with the small business development office in St T. When we signed up for it along with the training there was a program called Self Employment Benefit. SEB is a federally funded program that has run for 23 years to help get small business's of the ground, the success rate of business's from this program is more than double that of businesses that start without the support. So the Ontario government (only Ontario of all the provinces) has decided to cancel it, but to take the money from the feds and put it into second careers training. Now that sounds O.K. until you realise that about half of the people in my now unfunded SEB class have been through the Second Careers but were unable to find jobs, and decided to start their own business. Add to that the fact that most of them will be hiring others and now we see how foolish the province is being. especially since it costs under 17,000.00 to fund a SEB, but the average SC is between 15,000.00 and 20,000.00, with no one to employ them when their done. As you guessed even though we (Cat and I) had been approved we missed the funding by 1 day, not even a full 24 hours, that funding would have made a huge difference to what shows I could afford to enter, (entering shows cost's often upwards of $15.00 a piece and usually a lot more, most of the bigger ones cost 1,500.00 to 2,000.00), and yes, I'm a bit pissed. However I do believe everything happens for a reason, I just can't see to reason for this one yet.

'Twas the Art Before Christmas

'Twas the art before Christmas is just around the corner. Nov 6,7,8. The St. Thomas Guild always put on a good show, there will be live music and hors d'oeuvres on the opening night, 7-10 pm. with the show continuing Saturday 12-8 pm, and Sunday 12-6 pm.
St T. has the most diverse group of artists, of any group/guild in this region, so you should really check it out.
Port Stanley's first Friday, art walk is also on the 6th, as is the art auction at S.T.E.P.A.C. so it's a busy weekend for art lovers.
Did I say Mother and Child was done.... well the farther alterations will eventually be posted on the 'commissions' page of this site/blog. As I said, acrylics, change as they dry, rats.
For anyone considering a portrait for Christmas, I have just two more pre-Christmas openings, and the time for them is fast disappearing. Remember though, gift certificates are always available, and make a thoughtful gift.
I'm still working on a new piece for the St Thomas show, that I'll' show you next time, it's another piece on pollination. There is so much to say on that subject, that I imagine I'll be 'talking' through my paint about it for a while.
I got this article in my inbox today, about an artist in Michigan who is being taken to court, by a company that has stolen his designs, and is trying to take the copyrights too. That's like a company that makes knock off Gucci's trying to put Gucci out of business so they can have the market to them selves.
Please go to the site and support the artist's fight. If he looses, we could all loose our artist's copy right to our work, which would mean any one could take our work for them selves and then sue us to shut us down, as is happening here.

mother and child done

Done I hope.
After much fiddling around and about 10 hours of banging head against wall.... I'm finally happy with Mom's hand, mostly.
I have to wait for the paint to cure, before I'm sure, but...... here's hoping.
The studio tour was a success. Thank you, to all who helped make it so, and thank you to all of you who came out. I will be putting an accounting on the tour website, just as soon as all of the cheques clear, and the bills come in. It looks like we made approx $149.00 for cancer research. That is just what we collected in fees, after expenses, with the donations the artist's collected added in. The 'attractions' will I hope have put out their jars and I hope they've collected donations too, we'll soon know.
The Relish Elgin Magazine was here, during the tour, in the form of reporter Deborah Bagshaw, and her photographer, sorry I've forgotten his name. They've written a lovely article for their website.
We were blessed with wonderful weather, the only descent weather this fall. What a year it's been, weather wise.
'Twas the Art Before Christmas is fast approaching, just a couple of more weeks... the 'other piece' I'm working on has to be ready for that. I have 6 pieces going into that show, counting the one that's not done, so, back to work!

Mother and Child painting first step

That's a bit of a misnomer, the actual first step is griding out the proportions, then comes this step which is called a grisaille. This is where I fine tune the drawing of the portrait. Since I'm only using umber and sienna I can easily over paint and correct until I'm satisfied. This is the step that takes the most time. So far I have 7 hours into this one, and I've a LONG way to go yet. Have I mentioned that I'm picky?
I've been spending hours getting the studio tour going too, most of the administrative/publicity stuff will be done this week, and then I have 3 weeks to get some work (painting) done, or I'm not going to have any thing to show.
I've also been asked to show my 'At Risk' series at the Pinery Oct 3rd. I'll have more details soon.
First Friday in Port Stanley will continue until December, the St Thomas Elgin Artists' Guild show is just 6 weeks away, and I thought the season was winding down...

Pugs

The St Thomas Show was well attended this past weekend, in spite of bad weather and the competition from the Santa Clause parade. When we booked the train station we didn't know that the date was parade weekend. In a effort to make it work for us (rather than against us) we put a float in the parade, which won the best in... trophy. Congratulations to the float makers, and to everyone who worked so hard to make the show a success. However next year we are going to be more careful of date conflicts.

'In praise of weeds' was in the running for a peers choice award, I was told it was a very close race, maybe next year!

On the easel at the moment is a commission of two pugs, I've promised it for Christmas, and provided all goes well I should be O.K. Yesterday and today I got the under painting done, and I've started glazing in colours.

If you've been following my blog you'll know that glazing means layering very thin transparent colours to give a depth to the painting. Funnily enough this month Kim has been working glazing into his 'lessons'.

I taught myself glazing years ago, kind of as a trial and error thing, and later learned it is an old masters tried and true process. The invention of oil paint is what allowed this technique to evolve, and it is very effective. I'm using acrylic paint but the technique is basically the same.

I've not cropped this photo, so this is also a glimpse of my studio. I know it looks a bit messy, but I've got a lot crammed into a small space, so it is actually very organized. I hate it if I'm 'in the zone' and can't lay my hand on something.

Tomorrow when I get home from work I'll start on the detail layers of the pug painting, for now though I've got to let it dry. TTFN