How much wax is too much?

I pour over art books looking for inspiration, ideas and new techniques. A pile of books holds a permanent position beside my bed and, even though I've seen every page a dozen times, I still keep looking at them until I find a new book to absorb. Sometimes a piece of art sticks in my head and keeps me awake for hours as I plan my own version .

This 18" x 24" painting is one of those. Took me a long time to decide on a name to replace the boring set of letters and numbers assigned by my camera. Last night she became Shadow Woman. The process goes way beyond just normal watercolor, my preferred medium, and involves rice paper, ink, watercolor and lots of wax. It involves giving up control (hard for me) and seeing what happens. It involves a bunch of guessing as I experiment my way through the process.

How much wax is too much?  Two coats. Two hours, scrape, crunch, scrape, crunch, iron, iron, iron.  At last I decide she is beautiful and mysterious and translucent. Held to a sunlit window, she looks like stained glass and smells like honey.

'Round the clock art

Two pieces I created during art class.



This past weekend was a bit of an art marathon. First I made a trip to Floyd for the fun of having lunch with friends, picking up a piece of jewelry being adjusted, and stopping by my favorite art center.  An unexpected benefit came about with the lovely Carly Burke, owner and designer of Mountain Light Jewelry. She and a furniture maker have joined forces to open a wonderful new gallery shop in The Station on the main street and in minutes our conversation came around to the possibility of my artwork being carried in her inventory.  How exciting for us both!

On Saturday and Sunday I took part in a watercolor workshop put on by the Blacksburg Regional Art Association and taught by local artist Carole Davis. At the end of the workshop, I stayed on for an art lecture on decorative arts in Virginia and Tennessee, then went to dinner and by 6 p.m. was in the live model drawing group at Mish Mish, Blacksburg's very nice art supply store. For two hours I sketched the figure of the extremely professional model and by the end of class wondered if my own figure would be able to move well enough to go home.  Exhausted from three such busy days, I expected to be sound asleep minutes after arriving home.

As has become my habit, I picked up an art book from beside my bed and read about watercolor batik over and over, imaging one of my sketches rendered in this manner. Hours later, covers pulled up, lights out, eyes closed, I was still painting in my head.

My art weekend finally ended around 3:30 in the morning.





So long away from the blog

The holidays are over, the decorations are down and packed, the duldrums of January are upon us. What have I done while not blogging for a couple of weeks? The whole Christmas thing which was quiet but nice. A rip-roarin' New Year's Eve on the couch waiting for the ball to fall in Times Square and then falling myself just for a moment or two into slumber just long enough to miss the once-a-year, seconds-long dropping of the ball. Huddled indoors with not one, but two of the three Stieg Larsson trilogy books--The Girl Who Played with Fire and The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo.  I'm holding off on the third book because the first two were so captivating, I hardly moved from start to finish except to turn the pages with great anticipation, to go the potty or, finally forced by starvation, to the kitchen to fix a peanut butter sandwich one hand on the book, elbow on the bread, knife in my teeth.

Through all the days we watched the snow, fed the birds, made new recipes (apple strudel from scratch!) and ventured out reluctantly when cabin fever encroached upon us. A few trips to the swimming pool to work off Christmas calories. A trip to the grocery store to stock up on more of same. Through it all my mind keeps bouncing back to art...what will I paint next? What art book to look at? When's the next drawing session at Mish Mish? Can I do one more re-draw on part of Adrian's face without destroying her forever? Anything to put off the boring other things that nag at me on my desk, in the kitchen, the laundry room, the vacuum cleaner.

A new piece of watercolor paper went down yesterday. It sits with wet background colors wrapping around the frisket and masking applied over my sister's face, my unsuspecting victim for a bit of a funky portrait. I approach the next step with trepidation, but at least it is a step forward into the new year.

P.S. Sunday, Jan. 16, 6-8 p.m., Mish Mish in Blacksburg, live model drawing session, $10 steve.miller@mishmish.com for more info.