Train Riders

8x6 oil on panel

Available at Loretta Goodwin Gallery next week.

I've been hard at work since my weekend getaway. I'm totally refocused on painting now.
It was such a wonderfully relaxing break. No tv, no computers, no phones.... just nature, R&R, hiking and enjoying the company of my sig ots. Its always good to put things in perspective - it was much needed. So I am back and dedicated to painting and keeping myself relatively unplugged still. The computer can certainly eat up lots of time when one plays too much.

I'm pushing my palette a little more this week. Trying to capture dramatic light, trying different scenes, playing with color and lightening up. In other words, having a ball!

Moses Botkin Monthly Challenge

This month I got to choose our challenge and since I have become such a promoter of the "30 minute study/start," I wanted everyone else to try it. Should have been easy for me, but I chose a rather ambitious subject. I'm still processing my workshop and pleased that some of my efforts last week are appearing in my work (painted at the last minute of our deadline of course!) I'm anxious to read what the others thought about using a timer and painting so rapidly. From the looks of it, they did a great job!



The Critique - study
9x12 oil on panel
©2010 Robin Cheers



The Weeper
5x7 oil on canvas
©2010 Suzanne Berry



Thea's Rock
13x13 pastel
©2010 Vicki Ross



Glance Back
12x9 oil on canvas
©2010 Diana Moses Botkin



Last Light
5x6 oil on board
©2010 Aaron Johnson Cordell


This month we welcome a new member too - hello to Sharman Owings!

Red Flag
10x8 oil on masonite
©2010 Sharman Owings

A Week of Art Boot Camp

I've now realized that Kim English's class is like boot camp. I painted so much my wrist is sore and my head was reeling every night making sleep difficult.

It truly was a great experience. First, Belinda Aber of Wimberley Artists Workshops is running a great school and has some really good teachers on her schedule. I'm thrilled that she is so close to Austin. Wimberley is a small but active community with lots of beautiful Hill Country scenery around. And the artists who attended the workshop were such a pleasure to work with!


Dinner out for our group at Cypress Creek Cafe


Table 2

I learned a lot and can't wait to get back to work next week to continue pushing myself. We literally painted 5 minute poses. That means we tried to paint two models and the background in 5 mins. and when the timer went off, we had 10 seconds to wipe our panels while the models assumed new poses. Kim English can capture the scene, on a medium sized canvas, with no trouble. Its amazing. And what an exercise for us! We eventually graduated to 10 and then 20 minute poses by the end of the week. The 20 minute poses seemed much too long! LOL


One of my 5 minute sessions Friday.


Another 5 minute sessions from Friday.



This was from Tuesday (day 1) - since that day I warmed up my palette a lot and managed to get a little farther like adding some background info.

I can see the difference from the start of the workshop in my own work, but I still didn't make the progress our instructor could make in his demos. All of us seemed to hang in there, complaining a little, but working hard.



This is an example of Kim's 5 minute painting Friday.


I'd highly recommend the exercise! It sure beats my 30 minute studies! That might feel like forever to me now.



This painting is now mine! A 12x14 5-minute demo by Kim English.
Priceless.

Workshop Days

I am getting whipped (hopefully into shape) this week.... I've posted a bunch of images from the past several days on Facebook and there used to be a way to share the album publicly.

See if this link allows you to see without logging in or having an account.

it seems to work - to see more images, click on the small "next" text on the upper right of the photos.

Hi! Remember me? The artist who lives here?

What a couple of weeks! I haven't painted much because of too many other parts of life getting out of control. I've taken on too many volunteer things this fall. To sum up - weekly Destination Imagination team meetings (I'm the manager so I've also had/will have training days, etc.), Brownies cookie coordinator (really going to kick in during January !), school field trip, monday modeling sessions coordinator, travel, wedding painting events, husband travel, sick dog, daughter and husband, Halloween was in there somewhere, right? My calendar looks like a splatter painting.

BUT - this week is full art immersion (well, starting tomorrow). I am going to study with Kim English, an artist whom I consider a master. I've heard wonderful things about his classes, about his technique for training artists to work quickly and accurately. Its going to be a challenge - and I can't wait. I hope I can post here and there to share some of the fun with you either on the blog or Facebook. So stay tuned.