Golden Artist Colors Conference

Just heading back from the "Golden Gathering" in Florida, where I got a fresh dose of information on Golden products, but so much more!  Re-connecting with colleagues, meeting artists from all over the world, taking workshops and attending super informative talks and demos. Here are a few pix.  I'll put together more posts when I get home, with more links and video. 

Here is me (orange T-shirt, gray hair) in Adria Arch's class on teaching intuitive painting.  She is right up my alley, and gave me some FABULOUS ideas for improving my teaching.  We did some really fun exercises that got us painting immediately, totally engaged in the process, without thinking and agonizing.  She got us to tap into that direct line between intuition and process.  I will be trying these in upcoming workshops.

Here are a few things that came out of one of Adria's exercises.

The venue wasn't too shabby, though it was not this sunny. 

I took a watercolor workshop with Bianka Guna, in which we used Golden's new Qor watercolors.  Yes, that is Q  O  R, Qor, pronounced "core".  So I'll be experimenting with them in my studio and share with you.  The colors are intense and rich, and they work beautifully on many different grounds and substrates.

Here is Bianka.  She is an engaging teacher, very entertaining as well as knowledgeable.

This is one of the collograph plates I made in Shari Pratt's workshop.  I have some better pix, which I'll share in a later post.  We used all kinds of textural materials and many of Golden's texture gels to make printing plates. 

Then we printed using OPEN acrlyics, which have a long long long l o n g drying time. They are great for monoprinting because you can take your time working the paint into/on the plate.

Melanie Matthews

One more person I want to introduce you to (if you don't already know her) is Melanie Matthews.  I attended her slide talk on using Pinterest, and found her to be one of the most generous artists I've met, in terms of sharing information.  Funny, fun, a GREAT presenter.  I would take a workshop with her any day.  Check out her Pinterest Boards and follow her.  OMG, what a wealth of carefully curated images she shares.

Encaustic Conference

Hi Everyone,
I've been away for a few days at the Fifth Annual Encaustic Conference in Provincetown, MA, founded and organized by Joanne Mattera. I saw demonstrations of encaustic monotypes, photographic and other transfer techniques, using masks and stencils, using pigments with shellac and igniting it on the encaustic surface, using handmade paper substrates for encaustic, and more. I was also thrilled to see the work of lots and lots of conference-attendees, who set up displays in their rooms on Sunday morning. Here are a few links to encaustic artists whose work I'd like to share. This is just a sampling. Check out the blog for more info, links, and suppliers.

David A. Clark

Binnie Birstein

Cherie Mittenthal

Cherie was responsible for bringing the conference to Provincetown, and is the executive director of Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill. She is represented by Kobalt Gallery in P'town, which hosted a show of encaustic work in conjunction to the conference.

Linda Womack
Jane Allen Nodine
Nancy Natale
Nancy also has a blog on which she has posted fabulous pictures of the conference.
I could go on and on, but I'll leave you with this. Thanks for visiting!