Painting Happy with Alena and Leslie

At the beginning of this year, Leslie of {Words of Me Project}, initiated a 52-week creative journey through Alena Hennessy's The Painting Workbook.  We have a Facebook community, called "Paint Happy," where we share our work and encourage one another as we make our way through the prompts in the book.

I'm not sure I would have appreciated Alena's book as much just looking at it on my own.  Working through it as part of this community, however, is helping me to see its value in my development as a painter.  I think I have come to expect a "prompt" to be a very specific assignment, with directions on how to proceed.  What Alena presents are truly prompts, though--a bit of information and a couple of visual suggestions to prompt us to experiment on our own.

And I am truly viewing these as experiments.  I am not trying to produce anything resembling finished works along the way.  I am creating the painted equivalent of a sketchbook--visual note taking about paints and painting.

I am a couple of weeks behind, because my time and energies have been so squarely focused on getting my art on the walls at Seven Stones, but I thought I would show you what I've done so far.

During the first week, we played around with color pairings, experimenting with a very limited palette to produce a simple subject. 

I saw the color combination of grey and green on a side-door advertisement on a car driving out of the Staples parking lot.  How's that for proof that inspiration is everywhere?!  I don't think I would have ever considered putting grey and green together on my own, but I like how they look:

To make this, I used an ancient-of-days cutting system from Creative Memories, and cut my own circle stencils from light cardboard.

I have a great love for circles, so I have a feeling these handmade stencils are going to get a workout.  My sister treated me to a huge set of these BASICS acrylic paint tubes by Liquitex for Christmas, so I have a nice broad palette of color options to play with!

I did some more color pairings, which I cut down to postcard-size.  Not winning any awards here with my results, but I can see this kind of color play as a great warm-up and a way to familiarize myself with all of my new colors.

During the second week, we were challenged to stick to a single color (plus black and white to create shades and tints).  One of the participants in Leslie's group created a portrait painted with a single color, and I really loved the results.  I did the same kind of thing to paint lions and tigers, using reference pictures from 20 Ways to Draw a Cat by Julia Kuo.

I kind of like how a few of these little guys came out!

I also painted an owl, based on a picture in Alena's book:

For the third week, we worked with silhouettes.  In the past, I have enjoyed creating silhouettes from figures in magazines and catalogs.  You can see a how-to post from back in December 2011. 

When I cut the figure out, I can use the leftover cut-out as a stencil for painting.  I used a make-up sponge to apply paint onto a clip-art page from Somerset Studio magazine.  I can definitely see using this as the basis for an art journal page:

I painted around another silhouette on top of some music clip-art, also from Somerset Studio, as another experiment which can be used for art journaling:

Finally, Leslie offered us a twist, and suggested that we doodle within our silhouettes with white, so I drew this tree using a design from Carolyn Scrace's Zen Doodling, and filled it in with doodles using a Sharpie paint pen.

At this point in the year-long challenge, Leslie decided to start jumping around Alena's book, rather than plodding through from beginning to end.  We jumped to the 23rd prompt, about using "found" objects in our work.  Alena mentions beads, marbles, and buttons specifically in her book, and our community members used things like soda cans, napkins, and leaves.  Leslie suggested that we could use items "found" on our art tables, so I emptied a jar I have on mine that contains all kinds  of religious charms and medals.  I created this little ATC, using a phrase cut out of a magazine long ago that introduced a delightful understatement to this charm of the Virgin Mary, adhered to the card with a little orange stitch.

Here I am holding it, for a sense of scale:

As I said before, there is no way that I would have been so diligent about looking through each of Alena's prompts and using them as weekly exercises and painting experiments.  For that reason, I am grateful to Leslie for launching this challenge for 2015.  I'm only a few weeks behind at this point, but Leslie and the other women who are participating never make anyone feel rushed or behind.  Leslie calls our group "Paint Happy," and that is truly what I have been doing!

Art Showing: Seven Stones Cafe

A busy Monday evening at Seven Stones Café in Media, PA

I am always looking for new experiences related to my art-making.  Creating this blog several years ago was one of my first leaps of faith.  From there, I have participated in online classes, swaps, and challenges, as well as attending an art retreat.  I have sold my work at art and craft shows, completed a commissioned paper crafting job, and sold my things in a local gift boutique.  I have also taught summer art classes to children. 

Each of these experiences has taken me outside of my comfort zone into new territory that challenged me both emotionally and artistically. 

Now, I have a new experience to add to the list!


My art on the wall at the café (and my mother enjoying a cup of tea at the corner table)

Last night, I set up the first public showing of my art at the Seven Stones Café in Media, Pennsylvania.  The café features the work of a different artist each month, and I have twenty-three pieces on display for the month of March. 

I have been working over the past month or so to select the pieces for the showing, creating some new works just for this opportunity, as well as framing, pricing, and planning for the arrangement of each piece.  What a treat (and a relief!) to get everything on the wall of the café last night!

My mother came with me, thank goodness, for both moral support and help in getting the frames ready for hanging.


My mother took this photo of me in the process of hanging my art.

It was an interesting challenge to get everything on the wall in the midst of their normal business hours.  The folks at the tables were deep into their conversations, and seemed to take no notice of me hammering nails above their heads!  When I worked right next to an occupied table, everyone was gracious in assuring me that I was no bother. 

The most enchanting view for me came as my mother and I were leaving the café just after 9 p.m.  As we passed the front window, full of condensation in the evening chill, I could see my artwork framed in the window panes and twinkle lights.  I left feeling delighted by this opportunity to share my artwork with a community I love.

Seven Stones Café is in the town of Media, Pennsylvania--"Everybody's Hometown"--where I go to church and teach Sunday School each week, where I enjoy Dining Under the Stars when the weather is warm, and where craft and food fairs line State Street multiple times every year.  Seven Stones has the perfect coffee shop vibe in this great town, and I am honored for my art to be a part of it all!

Frozen Beach Weekend/Giveaway Winners!

I spent this Valentine's weekend at a family retreat with my church in Harvey Cedars, New Jersey.  It's been a COLD weekend to spend at the beach, I'll tell you that.  Despite temperatures well below freezing and a wind that led me to dream of tornadoes last night, some of our youth were crazy enough to take a Polar Bear Plunge. 

With the bayside waters frozen to ice, I'm not even sure how they made it into the water! 


Look at those icicles under the pier!

The weekend color palette outside was basically limited to shades of grey and brown, but inside our retreat center, we enjoyed colorful days of food, fellowship, worship and song, teaching and learning, Bananagrams and CatchPhrase, intergenerational playtime and conversation...our annual retreat never disappoints!

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Now that I am home, I've taken a moment to put all of the names from the commenters on my previous post on slips of paper in order to draw a winner for the first and second prizes.  The winner of Prize Pack #1 is Heather, which is lovely since she mentioned that her daughter would be able to make use of the un-opened packs of sticker letters.  And the winner of Prize Pack #2 is no stranger to winning giveaways on this blog; I'm pretty sure I've drawn Tina's name for at least one giveaway in the past!  So the selection of opened adhesive letters will be heading her way shortly. 

Thank you to those of you who entered the giveaway.  I hope to have some more Craft Closet Clean-Outs and other goodies in the future!