Bits and Pieces

I am so excited because I was able to create a video and post it on YouTube!! I know all you young whippersnappers are wondering what the big deal is all about but for someone my age, I think this is pretty amazing.

I've been busy experimenting with some newer techniques that I've been dying to play with. Over the years I've managed to collect all kinds of ephemera that I thought I could use in my art at some point. Well, I rummaged through bins in my studio closet and came up with interesting "bits and pieces", thus the title for this painting. I discovered that cardboard packing can be made to look like corrogated metal. I love the textural look, and feel, of this painting. After composing the piece and adhering the various materials to the canvas, I added more texture with acrylic gels and molding paste. By applying thin glazes of color and spattering water and/or alcohol, I was able to create interesting effects, always allowing the underpainting to show through.

I hope you'll check out this little video...the first of many, I hope. It was a lot of fun to make and a neat way to showcase a painting.

Visit my website to see my entire portfolio.

Symbolic Intrigue

Symbolic Intrigue

36" x 36" x 1.5"

Acrylic/Mixed-media on Canvas

This is my newest painting. I worked on it for several days, layering glaze over glaze. By adding collage elements, texture, stampings and calligraphy, a theme began to evolve. I don't normally begin a painting with any preconceived idea but one usually develops as I paint - I love when that happens!!

Experimental painting techniques open the door to greater creativity for me. The freedom to explore new ways of doing old things expands my "bag of tricks". Although I have an enormous collection of paint brushes, I've found that painting with natural sponges and even my fingers (wear latex gloves if you decide to do this) gives me greater latitude of control. Acrylic paints can be difficult to work with, but when mixed with various mediums and applied directly to the canvas, one can achieve interesting results.

If you'd like to explore the "unknown", check out two of my favorite resource books on experimental painting techniques. Mary Todd Beam's Celebrate Your Creative Self and Nancy Reyner's Acrylic Revolution are excellent guides to help you discover new tricks and techniques using one of the most versatile painting medium available today- acrylics.

Symbolic Intrigue is for sale on my website.

Petroglyphs

Petroglyphs

24"x36".75"

Acrylic/Mixed-media

I completed this new painting a couple of days ago. The textured surface of the canvas is enhanced with bits of rice paper collage, a skeletanized leaf, stampings, rub-outs and a few other experimental techniques that I made up along the way. The intriguing thing about painting freely and not having any preconceived ideas is that the painting dictates the direction it wants to take rather than me "whipping" it into submission.

Deciding when the painting is finished is sometimes a bit difficult. But, I've learned that there is a certain point when "we" (the painting and me) decide to stop. I deliberately let this painting look a little unfinished because I wanted the rough look of grafitti on a stone wall.

Petroglyph is available on my website.