Beginning the 2018

I feel it fitting to begin the year with something 

completed today, January 1, 2018

 I received this amazing and detailed puzzle for Christmas

 from a good, long time, friend, Anne Hatch.

 When I first opened it I was appalled with the really tiny sizes 

of the pieces and the unusual shapes they were cut.

 As you can see that mixed in with the odd shapes 

there were recognizable shapes, so I thought.........

this will be easy.... HA!

 Some of these pieces could be 1/4 of an inch to 1/2 inch. 

The women figures were larger usually 2 inches in length.

 So I started and as usual began looking for edge pieces.

There were not enough for the edges of this 

6 by 18 inch finished puzzle.

So I quit looking for edges and went to color.

 Color was fine till I got the plain areas and that 

stumped me for a couple of days

Giving up what I should be doing I 

  finished it today just to begin the New Year.

 I must admit that I enjoyed the challenge but don't 

want to start another anytime soon, 

despite the beauty of this one.

 The title of the picture is Black-Naped Oriole 

and it is by Ando Hiroshima

Here is the signature chop and in the upper picture, the poem.

Happy New Year to everyone.

May you have happy challenges and much success in 2018.

Gravers Lane Gallery trip

Last Friday we drove up to the Chestnut Hill area of Philadelphia.

 The streets are cobblestone and the atmosphere is historic

with unique shops and restaurants.

 This mural on the side of one of the shops drew my attention

while on an early morning walk.

 We had come to Chestnut Hill to attend the reception 

at Gravers Lane Gallery for Barbara Lee Smith.

(www.barbaraleesmith.com)

 In and near the front window of the gallery was work

 by another friend, Joan Dreyer.

 Barbara's work was throughout the gallery with more of the 

beautiful art set apart in a second room.

The Friday night crowd enjoyed her landscapes and 

seasonal, atmospheric hangings on all the walls.

We all enjoyed our stay at the unique Chestnut Hill Hotel 

which had two buildings. The walkway between 

had tables and chairs and flowers blooming everywhere. 

These colorful chairs surrounding a fire pit and a fountain

were toward the rear of the hotel and in front of 

an adjoining Farmer's Market.

It was beautiful weather and a good trip.

Cadmium, colors, art, and travels

Just returned from a trip to Corning, NY where I learned a lot about glass.

First I will connect a bit of this information to my interest in the

 Element, Cadmium.

Next April, a show titled Radical Elements will open. 40 artists 

chose to create a 36 by 22 inch art work based on one single element.

I chose Cadmium.

 We will not be publishing our entire work before the exhibit opens

but can display a detail of the work. Before researching Cadmium

all I knew of the name was from the paint I had been using for years.

The detail you see above uses actual acrylic paint thickly applied 

and flowing from embroidered tubes onto black denim.

 Glass by Frederick Carder at the Carder Gallery, 

part of the Corning Museum

 The lecturer told us that so much Cadmium had been used to 

create this rich red color that it weakens the glass.

Yellow is another color using Cadmium in this bright opaque glass.

There was so much more to see in ancient, historic, and contemporary glass

I could have stayed for a week. 

I did enjoy connecting my element 

of Cadmium to these colorful historic glass pieces.

Barbed Wire now traveling to Scottsdale, AZ

Sometime ago I took this photograph at a friend's farm near Waterford, Virginia.

After viewing the barbed wire fences around the fields 

I sketched this one that seemed to be barely standing among the weeds.

Then I embroidered that sketch in dark gray thread. 

Taken as an image by itself without the weeds and

rusting equipment in the background, 

there is sort of a dignity to the resultant fence.

The completed triptych, BARBED WIRE is 48 by 19 inches wide.

It will soon be at The Wee Gallery of Fine Art 

in the Scottsdale Biennale 2013, 

October 1 to 31.

Ipad Art App Procreate, studies

 In my last blog, I worked with Procreate App, 

but just for simple B & W drawing.

Now I am trying to figure out the many tools available on this App.

From a detail of a bouquet I tried several brushes 

along with the changing and blending colors.

 There are so many sub categories for each tool. Under 'brushes'

the listing includes sketching, inking, painting, airbrushing, textures, and abstract

with more sub categories under each listing as well as size and opacity.

 These are the marks made in the abstract tool which can be 

changed with Dynamics, ie..... speed, 

pressure, jitter, and spacing, besides color, size and opacity.

 Textures as well have the many changeable variations as each brush.

Sub categories under textures are Victorian, wood, cubes, 

diagonal stripes, half tones, grunge, grid, and decimals.

I have to admit that the Victorian texture is my favorite 

and I used it several times.

 Moving a detail of a photo onto a canvas I worked at 

changing much of the image with the various tools.

Under the Sketching tool the sub categories are 

technical pencil, HB pencil, 6B pencil, shading, graphite, 

soft pastel, chalk, and artist crayon. 

 There are so many directions you can go with so many tools

that I feel I have just scratched the surface of this App.

I did use the Victorian texture extensively in this painting, 

changing size, opacity , and color. 

For this teapot of flowers I used the wood texture for the table.

I have decided Procreate needs much more study, 

trial and errors, for me to really be able to make use of

so many tools and their combinations. 

Procreate App and drawing zinnias

 From Dominie's garden are a couple of my favorite flowers, zinnias.

I haven't had much time to do any more than quickly draw them. 

Here, below is a page from my sketchbook using pencil, pen and ink.

After drawing several zinnias in black and white on paper I 

decided to try some of the same views on the iPad. 

Using the Procreate App with its brush tool, I drew these 

images much more quickly than on the paper. 

It was interesting to see these two reproductions and how 

much more contrast the drawings on the iPad appear to

 have on the computer monitor.

I do plan to embroider at least one of these zinnias in

colorful thread.