Age Is Just A Number

........Or, so they say. To me it is since I have never, nor do I now, act my age. How am I supposed to act? Personally, I don't feel that one has to grow old, it's all a state of mind and my mind is only five.

  But, I digress and that is not really what this blog post is about.

  Once upon a time, and by that I mean a LONG, long time ago, years no less, I had responded to an ad regarding a working art studio that was in my town in California. It was run by a woman, my age who was a fairly well known, accomplished fine artist. She offered classes in this studio as well as discounted use of the studio, including art privileges  in exchange for helping out with students and general work around the place.

                                                                      So....................

  I was working at the time in a scrapbooking/stamping store and I asked my boss if I could have Thursdays off to attend this studio, which she graciously agreed to, thanks Penny! you know who you are. Anywho, I would go, once a week bringing my own art project with me to work on in-between helping out with students, etc.

  It was there that I fell in love with one of my now, favorite mediums, Pastel. At the time, I was primarily working in watercolor and oil. One afternoon, the artist called me into a back room off the main floor and motioned to a large wooden chest that was sitting on a table. The chest itself was beautiful, polished maple. She told me to go ahead and open it. I did and inside this chest were brand-spanking-new, sticks of every color pastel you could possibly think of, hundreds of them. You know that feeling you get when you open a brand new box of crayons? well......multiply that by a hundred and that's the feeling that hit me. And what happened next changed me as an artist.

  She told me to grab some paper and start creating something with her pastels. She had not used them yet, they were all lined up like little, colorful soldiers in uniform, each in their own little slot in the chest. I felt bad and told her that I couldn't, that she should be the first to use them, not me. She told me that her boyfriend had bought them for her and that they had cost over $1,000.00. That didn't help me at all, it made me feel even worse, but my curiosity got the better of me and I REALLY wanted to try them.

  Not having any decent paper with me, I tore off a large piece of newsprint that was on a big roll hanging from the wall. I tried to come up with something right there, on the spot to draw and thought why not draw my new puppy Riley,  (RIP baby.)   So my very first pastel painting ever was this one............

  As you can tell, this photo came up on my phone the other day, which is what reminded me of my time at this studio and how I was introduced to pastel. The second that I layed down that first swatch of pastel, I was hopelessly hooked. There are some who call this medium chalk, but it isn't. It is inherently quite different from chalk. Pastel is almost pure pigment with just a bit of binder added to it. whereas chalk, is predominately binder and very little pigment.

  Although, I have never been able to afford a beautiful, large maple chest of pastel sticks, I do have my own collection of pastels which includes pastel sticks, half sticks,  pastel pencils and PanPastels. I even have my own, much smaller wooden chest of pastel half sticks which was also quite pricey....

  PanPastels and pastel pencils...............................

  Thanks for patiently reading along as I went back in time. Hopefully soon, I will have some current pastel work to show y'all up on my new website  PencilsandPaint , which I am still "tweaking"and also right here on my blog. Until then, keep following me on Facebook as I show all my artsy progress. Have a great week!

Strange Indeed

Hey y'all.............I'm looking forward to a great Memorial weekend and I hope yours is great too. Take time out, from all the fun and festivities, to remember our men and women in the military and the sacrifices they have made so we CAN enjoy our freedoms and our weekend with our families and friends.

  If you are wondering what's strange, this critter is..............

  Say "hello" to Mr. Armadillo. He kinda reminds me of a mammalian roly poly bug. This is the first drawing in my new series of animals native to Texas. In the four and a half years I have lived in Texas, I have yet to see one of these creatures. My hubby informed me that he has seen a couple of deceased ones on the highway as he drives to work, Poor things, their built in armor is no match for a motor vehicle. In fact, they are run over so often here in the south, that they have been given the nickname of "Hillbilly speed bumps".

  Here in Texas, we have the Nine Banded Armadillo but there are over 20 different varieties, the rest are all native to Latin America. Armadillo is a Spanish word, meaning little armored one. Their lifespan is twelve to fifteen years and they can be very destructive to farms and crops as well as your own personal garden patch.

   Some of the drawings in this series will be graphite and some will be done in colored pencil. There are so many animals to choose from in this great state so,  who knows at this point, how large this series will be. Of course, I will still be working on portraits and paintings and I will still be accepting commissions. Be sure to check out my website too at  Pencils N Paint

  I will keep this blog post short and sweet since I have so much I need to get to today, pretty much like every day! nothing new about that. Keep your eyes peeled for updates on this new drawing series and I have,started working on a new portrait of someone too,  which will be posted soon. Bye for now.

 

A New Family Member And Of Course, More Art Stuff

Good morning and Happy Monday!........

  I know that I have been a little MIA but I am still around, Iv'e just been really busy.

  First off......I would like to introduce the newest member of our family. This is Scout, my new grand dog.  He is a seven month old, PomChi and is just as sweet and cute as can be. Congrats to my daughter as she has wanted a tiny dog for a while now and boy, is this guy tiny! I don't even think he is two pounds and he is full grown. I had the opportunity to dog sit him last night and he was so well behaved, even though he was a bit overwhelmed by all the newness of his environment and he got along famously with Sadie, the cat and the chickens. Welcome to the family Scout.

Moving on to "art" news.........My new website is up and running! I still have some work to do so there will still be some additions and some changes along the way but at least it is published and visible now. My current pricing and policies for commissions is also posted there and as of right now, I am available for commissions. If you have any questions, feel free to contact me anytime. Please make sure to check it out and subscribe so you can get news of new posts. here is the link...........PencilsNPaint

I did start a new portrait drawing last night and managed to get the rough sketch done. Since I recently did this drawing of Lucille Ball...........

I decided that I would go ahead and draw her co-star, William Frawley. I see a lot of drawings of her and Desi but I haven't seen any of Fred Mertz, Williams character on I Love Lucy. I will be working on him today. I may still draw Desi and of course Vivian Vance, (Ethel), but since I work rather spontaneously, I never know exactly what I am going to do from one moment to the next. Here is the rough sketch so far.......

And speaking of what I would like to do.............. I have been thinking, (which can be dangerous), about doing a series. Gave it a lot of thought in fact and I think I will do a series of graphite drawings as well as colored pencil drawings of animals that are indigenous to Texas. In fact, I think I will start that today as well. There are a lot of creatures to choose from. Starting with critters from the gulf of Texas all the way up to the Oklahoma border north, New Mexico on the west and Louisiana on the east. That's a lot of ground to cover.

I better go get a move on.......I have lots to do......First it's breakfast time! catch y'all later.

Stop The Train.....I Need To Get Off.

There are just some mornings where my brain is racing like a high speed engine and this is one of those mornings.

  Hello people!  It's another week and there is no shortage of things to do around here. I didn't put up a blog post on Friday AND.....I haven't done my daily sketches for two days now. Yep......two days in a row, no sketches. I have been that busy with other things. Not to mention that I DO sometimes need to take a break.

  Down time is hard for me. I have a tendency to fidget. I also have a tendency to really immerse myself in my projects. I hit the ground running and I can be unstoppable. Sometimes, it does take a train to hit me.


  In fact, I will just go ahead and officially announce that my daily sketches are probably going to be a bit more sporadic from here on. Not to worry though, I will never stop sketching, it's what I do, I will just slow down some. Maybe two or three per week and they will still be numbered and go towards my goal of 365, quick, little sketches.

  The reason?........I need to concentrate on my main work and less on what to sketch every day. I have commissions to work on, personal work and the business end of things to do as well, (I'm desperately trying to get a website up and running),  and I'm not being as efficient as I would like with those. So yeah. Other than that everything is going well.

  Come this October, I will in fact be doing a month long art project that I am really excited about. It is a project that is shared with other artists all over the world.  I will post more info about all that later when it gets closer in.

  I am also learning this new digital medium. I have joined in a couple discussions on-line recently that pertain to the idea that digital art, is not really art. I'm having a hard time with that concept. I'm finding that digitally manipulated images are just as complicated and require just as much skill as traditional art does. Now, keep in mind, I'm still very new at this medium, it's only been a week but, I don't see much difference.

  I did this.........It's my first one......by hand, the only difference was that my drawing came up on my monitor screen and not on a piece of paper. It's a bit shakily drawn as it had quite a different feel to it and takes getting used to but, it was drawn, by me, not the computer, none the less.

I used a stylus, that looks and behaves just like a pen, you can see it below and I STILL needed to be able to draw, manually, by hand.

To me...........that's art in every sense of the word. Granted, there are other forms of digitally created art such as photo manipulation which is more like creating a collage by taking bits and pieces of photos and combining those to create a new image. I like that approach too and it has it's place as well. It's all art people. And you know what's really cool about digital art? There is no waste. No wasted paint, no wasted paper, no wasted lead, I have re-painted and messed around with that same Cardinal drawing above for days now and changed it up a dozen times over and it hasn't cost me any supplies. I can play with this same image forever.   If I don't like what Iv'e done.....I just hit the "undo" button. Can't do that with traditional art. And there is no buying art supplies either with digital.  Although, I happen to like collecting art supplies. I'm a pack rat and unashamed of it when it comes to art supplies.

  That's whats going on in my studio. Oh........and yes, I am still giving away an original piece of art. Very soon. Again, I will announce that as well. I am going to go grab something to eat and then get busy. Later everyone!

 

What Have I Gotten Myself Into?

Good morning, happy Tuesday y'all. Hope everyone had a great Mother's day weekend!

  I did. My Mother's Day was really nice thanks to my wonderful family. My daughter whipped up a terrific brunch and then I joined her as she got her nails done so we had some mother/daughter bonding time, just the two of us.

  Of course, I miss my other daughter, my son, my son-in-law, my daughter-in-law and my grandson. They are out in California but I did get to speak to all of them and I hope to see them soon.

  I missed posting yesterday. I got a little busy and side-tracked, new art supplies will do that to me. My hubby bought me a digital tablet for Mother's day. I have wanted one for awhile now but kinda vacillated on it, back and fourth, not knowing if I should invest. Finally, I thought to myself, "why not", you only live once.......supposedly.

  So, I got the Wacom Intuos Pen And Touch in the small size. There is a definite "learning curve" to using one of these. The tablet itself I haven't had a problem getting used to, I think because I have done so much blind contour drawing, I was able to adapt quickly to drawing on the tablet without looking at it and only looking up at the monitor screen. It's kind of a brain, eye, hand coordination thing. From what I have been told, That is the hardest thing for most people to master using a tablet in the beginning. It was a non-issue for me.

  What was and is still an issue for me, is learning the software. The tablet comes bundled with Corel Painter Essentials software. Basically, it's the mini version of Corel Painter. Geez....It's involved! I have so much to learn. Opacities, transparencies, layers, filters, my brain hurts already.  I played with it yesterday and it took me 20 minutes to find the eraser brush and then 20 more minutes to figure out how to use it. I am giving myself at least a month to wrap my head around this thing before I can actually create more than a stick figure with it. Hey, it's okay though.....It keeps me off the streets.

  The small tablet is nice too as it can easily fit on my extremely, tiny desk that has hardly any real estate left that isn't already taken up by monitors. It fits nicely on the pull out keyboard shelf underneath. And I don't find that the small size inhibits my drawing and panting ability in any way.

  I won't be giving up traditional art for digital. I wanted a tablet for just enhancing and manipulating my own traditional drawings and paintings. It sure is fun though! and I don't ever want to stop learning new techniques. As you can see below, I can already create words with it! Yay!!! I'll master it, eventually.

 Wish me luck and I will be sure to keep y'all posted on my progress. I might even be able to have a drawing posted in a few days. It's off I go to look up some online tutorials for this thing. Have a great day!

I Have A Confession To Make

yep............I admit it............

  I found this photo the other day on Facebook. It's not new, it's been around before. In fact, I have posted it before a couple years ago on my own Facebook feed. It just makes me chuckle every time I see it and that's where my confession comes in.

  That little girl, hanging upside down on the bar was me. Seriously. My time line is a bit askew as I was shuffled around a lot as a small child but if I can recall, My grandmother enrolled me in a ballet class when I was probably three or four. If that's the case, and she is the one who took me, I must have been in Chicago still at the time, I'm not sure and I was too young to really have a concept of place and time or, to even care for that matter. All I know is that I hated it from the jump!

  I really hated it. I did not want to be there. Because of that, I think I only lasted for maybe three or four lessons and then, I confess.......the teacher actually kicked me out. Yes.... I flunked ballet class at the tender age of three or four.

  Can't blame the teacher. In fact, I sincerely apologize. I don't remember what it was I did or didn't do as was most likely the case, I do feel sorry for that poor teacher however. I am positive that I didn't cooperate. I'm sure she did the best she could.

  So, every time I see this photo, that memory comes flooding back. I don't regret having been kicked out but, I bet it embarrassed the heck out of my grandmother. Obviously, I was not meant to be a dancer, I was meant to be a visual artist, plain and simple.

  My weirdness didn't end there. I have been weird all my life. When asked what I wanted to be when I grew up by my teachers, my answer was, I want to be a forest ranger. Really, no kidding, that's what I truly wanted to be. Not a mommy, or a nurse, or a secretary but, a forest ranger. I wanted to spend my day in the middle of a forest, up in one of those tall lookout towers with a pair of binoculars. I was also a major tomboy. Growing up, skateboards, climbing trees, jumping off roofs and fist fights were the norm for me. And that was in a time when it wasn't considered favorable for a girl to act that way.

  And I'm still weird to this day. If you tell me to go right, I will go left. That's just me. So you heard it here, or rather read it, my confession. I must say that after all this time, I embrace my weirdness and I'm willing to hang onto it.

 Enough about all that. Time to get busy in the studio. I spent all day yesterday doing "techie" stuff, didn't get any art made except for my quick, daily sketch, trying to get ready for my new toy that I will reveal next week sometime. It is art related, of course and I am hoping to branch out artistically with it. Till then..........Everyone have a great Mother's Day weekend.

Getting Some New Toys!

I was going to put a blog post up yesterday as I usually do post on Monday but, I knew that I had an Amazon package coming today so,  I wanted to wait till it arrived then I could share it with y'all.

  It might not be too exciting but I gotta tell you, a decent pencil sharpener, to an artist, is a Godsend. I go through pencil sharpeners like crazy and I find most of them to be not so good. They will sharpen okay the first few times but then they get gummed up, dull and are pretty much useless.

  Most of the time, I use a box cutter to sharpen my pencils. It actually works well but it is time consuming, messy and.......a lot of the time, at least for clumsy me, dangerous. I keep spare band-aids in the studio just in case.

  It is especially crucial to get a sharpener that works well on colored pencils. I use two types of colored pencils in my work, an oil based pencil and a wax based one. The wax based colored pencils have a very soft core which leaves them prone to breaking. They have to be very gently sharpened.

  So, I ordered this...............Gosh, I love Amazon Prime.

First.............The box has to pass inspection.................Thank you Sadie...Good dog.
 

  This is the Mitshubishi KH-20 pencil sharpener. It is a manuel sharpener, not electric, which I feel just eats up your pencils. It reminds me, albeit it's a little different, of the old fashioned Bulldog sharpeners from when I was a kid. It's a tad expensive at $23.00 and some change but I think It's well worth it.

 

  It has a stabilizer system that holds the pencil in place so it sharpens evenly without you having to hold the pencil yourself, no wobbling. And it has an orange adjuster button in the back that regulates how sharp or how rounded the point of the pencil becomes according to your preference.

After trying this sharpener, I feel I have gotten the sharpest point ever with any sharpener I have ever used. You can see how sharp it is here..............

So I would say that so far, this sharpener gets my vote. And not just for artists but for anyone who is sick and tired of their old dull sharpeners. Yay!

As for another new toy that is making it's way into my studio.....I DO have something coming that is very exciting! It is going to "raise the bar" as far as my art work goes. It is something that my wonderful hubby bought me for this coming Mothers Day. I'm not gonna say what it is just yet but I will show y'all soon. That's it for now. I am going to go spend the afternoon sharpening pencils.