Time to get organized

With paintings seemingly coming and going in all directions, I've been working on getting organized. Other than running a 1/2 marathon (very slowly), I spent the weekend photographing, wiring, varnishing, etc.  I have a booth at a show at the Carriage House in Manotick this weekend.  It's kind of an impromptu thing so I hope we get traffic.

In other news, my brand new business cards arrived from Vistaprint today, and they are quite nice.  Just wish I had put my QR code on the back but that's OK.  Oh yes, and I finally put a couple of images on my Imagekind site so I can sell prints more easily.

Here is a recently finished piece.  I think I'll call it "Escape".

Persistent Visitor

My inspiration for this piece was a very persistent oriole that was hanging around the house this summer.  He kept going around to all the wondows and chirping and looking in.

Small Wonders Show Opens

I belong to an art group called "Ottawa Mixed Media Artists" and every year we have a show called Small Wonders where all the pieces are 12"x12" or smaller and are square.  The vernissage was last night at the Britannia Gallery in Ottawa, Ontario. The show looked great!  This image is of one of two paintings in the show and I'm happy to say that it sold.

September Virtual Paintout

This is my contribution to the September Virtual Paintout.  This month's location is New Orleans.  I chose this image to paint because I like to ride my bike(s) but what really struck me as I explored the area using Google Street View was the aftermath of hurricane Katrina.  It was incredible to see the number of people who are still unable to live in their own houses, so instead, they live in trailers in front of their houses.  Entire neighborhoods  have trailers in front of their homes. You can't help but feel for those people. My heart goes out to them.

Here is the link to the location: Hampson at Burdette

Award Winner!

It wasn't very long ago that I posted this painting but the big news is that it won some awards!  Not only was this painting accepted into the Everyday Patterns show at Gallery Perth in Perth, Ontario, but it won an Award of Excellence and the Juror's Choice Award.  Sooo exciting for me!

A Little Something 3-Dimensional

I took a wire sculpture workshop earlier this month with Charles O'Neil but I wanted to see what I could do to incorporate that type of thing into my usual more 2-dimensional work.  This is what I came up with using the back side of a cradled wood painting panel.

Now, what am I going to call this ??????

Tapped Out

This is a photograph on wood panel with encaustic and oil paint.  An engineering company nearby was looking for some art with an industrial feel to it.  This is a small image (8x8) but I plan on creating some larger pieces.

Inspired By Rauschenberg

The composition of this painting was inspired by a small 4x4" collage of my own. The instructor in a class I was taking suggested we take a look at Robert Rauschenberg's art and I was intrigued by his use of small rectangles of colour across some of his paintings and his rough, messy style so I decided to incorporate that idea into this piece.

Sometimes I chastise myself for trying too many different materials and styles of art.  The truth is that I have an addiction to art supplies and playing with new things and it's really hard to settle on one medium.  Apparently that's a no-no from a collector's point of view, but hey, it worked for Rauschenberg.  Nevertheless, I do believe my unique voice is starting to emerge in my art.  When I look at my art there is almost always a merging of organic elements with more rigid shapes.

What's New? My Favourite Art Podcasts

What's new? Well, I've been painting a lot but not blogging much (feel guilty about it too).  I have discovered quite a few bits of information lately that I'd like to share though.

For those of you who don't know, I run and I bike and I have a long commute to my day job.  Rather than listen to music during those activities I listen to my favourite podcasts that I download from iTunes. Here are a few:

My most recent discovery is "Artists Helping Artists" from Blog Talk Radio and hosts Leslie Saeta and Dreama Tolle Perry.  This is an amazing podcast!  It's very focused on the business of art and has a tremendous amount of information. Keep a notebook handy! You can listen to the live show or download from iTunes.

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/artistshelpingartists

This link will list all the art-related shows:
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/art

A few other favourites:

Art & Soul radio on Blog talk Radio.
Artistically Speaking on Blog Talk Radio.

CraftSanity with Jennifer Haywood, although she seems to have stopped podcasting since she started her own magazine. Although her podcast is geared toward knitting and sewing and quilting, I feel like we're kindred spirits in a way. You can still listen to all her older shows.

CraftCast is geared toward jewellery-making but she has interesting interviews.

Recently Sold

Here are a few paintings that I've sold recently.  I did a show at the end of April and it went really well.  It was amazing to see how many paintings I have done in the last year when everything was laid out for the show.

Clarence's View
Mixed Media on cradled wood panel

Impressions I
Encaustic on cradled wood panel