What is it Wednesday?

Mitch Lyons Studio

Artist Mitch Lyons has opened his London, PA studio again this year. Ceramics and prints will be on sale through December 8th. Check www.mitchlyons.com for times. 

St Nicholas Day

St. Nicholas Day, December 6th

It was an interest in Byzantine Icons that inspired me to start painting years ago. Here is the very classic image of St. Nicholas; his day is still celebrated in parts of Europe today.

And if you want to track the exploits of our modern St. Nick ( aka Santa Claus) check out www.noradsanta.org.

A Thing of Beauty

The all American image; just how we hope the turkey will look as it arrives at the table.

So many things to be thankful for, but today especially for me is the encouraging word of a friend. I've been disappointed by what a trial it's been over the last year to keep this blog going because of slow internet service and an old spastic computer, and I've been tempted to shut it down. But a friend said, "Oh  no, Alex; keep it going." So watch for more on this blog as I try to give it a new look and maybe a new theme.

Color of the Week

Quote of the Week

"The painter will produce pictures of little merit if he takes the work of others as his standard, but if he will apply himself to learn from the objects of nature he will produce good results."
                                                                                                                 Leonardo Da Vinci

Crazy or Artistic?

I am strongly considering painting my living/dining area black.

Today while at Lowe's I picked up samples of Cracked Pepper & Jet Black in Valspar and Black Magic in Olympic. I want a true black without a hint of another color.

I think that black on the walls will make all the art work pop!

But I'm wondering what to do about window treatments.

Is this idea crazy or artistic? I was told not to make my blog background black. But I did and I like it.

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Clayprinting

I feel I must promote clayprinting every chance I get. And to promote the creator of the clayprinting process, Mitch Lyons. I bumped into Mitch (not literally or personally), but in Paul Scott's book  Painted Clay.  And a likely place to find Mitch, even though he was nestled in the back of the book like a post script,. because clayprinting  actually involves painting clay with clay (got that?)

With the clayprinting process you can produce wonderful monoprints with layers of color and texture. What I particularly like about it is the "surprise factor". Because the colors are applied to a clay slab that is only leather hard the clay almost has a life of it's own. Pigments sink into the clay, colors come up from the clay, and lovely surprises appear on the "canvas".

Check out Mitch's prints & ceramics at www.mitchlyons.com.

Sign Saturday

Quote of the Week

"Art is your personal diary

where you may

color

your thoughts and emotions

on a page."

Unknown 



Wordless Wednesday

Color of the Week

Periwinkle

Webster = a light purplish blue

Prolithic Pablo

I was with a group of art enthusiasts recently as we each tried to recreate The Three Musicians 1921 by Pablo Picasso. During the conversation someone mentioned that during his career Picasso had created 50,000 works of art; 50,000 is that possible? If it is, I'm way behind. I figure if I do one piece of art a day for the next 10 years, the total will be only be 3,650. Now does that info make me want to work harder or to give up and quit?

Color of the Week

        

 

"Don't buy any green bananas." Charles Capps

 

 

 

 

 





Color of the Week

My

    Blue
     
          Door

Slip

Slip. To a ceramic artist like myself it is clay mixed with water to a thick liquid consistency. When building pots it is used to help "glue" pieces together. Now that I am clayprinting, it is the medium I use (with pigment added) to put color on my clay slab.

Slip is an important part of what I do, but the making of slip is not creative or fun. Oh, it's not hard, or necessarily time consuming, just not the fun part of clay printing. So when it comes time to make more I have to talk myself into it, reminding myself- it's not hard, it's not hard. But clean-up is yuk! But always easier in summer because I can go outside and "play" in the hose ( clay is tough on plumbing). But once I have the job done I have several containers ready to make more colors, and I just got three new colors delivered & I'm excited about trying them.

Pedro E. Guerrero

I just discovered photographer Pedro E. Guerrero (but then I always have my eyes & ears open to art related subjects to pass along to my followers). Mr. Guerrero had a wonderful career photographing artists, and  famous ones;  in particular: architect, Frank Lloyd Wright, and sculptors, Louise Nevelson & Alexander Calder. He picked the challenge of photographing the works of three dimensional artists which must require a special eye. He also photographed building interiors for several "home" magazines; these pics are works of art in their own right. He left a legacy of great photos for our enjoyment.

Wordless Wednesday

National Nude Day



Nude Descending a Staircase #2 by Marcel Duchamp 1912



Celebration of Color

Wordless Wednesday

Quote of the Week

"Success awaits at labor's gate." Peggy Lee

Peggy Lee was a working artist. Her quote is a message she reinforced by example.

She was a singer, composer, lyricist, & businesswoman (she even designed her own home decorating line pre-Martha Stewart). She was a contemporary of Elvis, and at one time she had more money in the bank than " the King". Peggy Lee, a talented artist who worked to make her talent pay off.



Wordless Wednesday

van Gogh's Irises



van Gogh's Irises

 I would have to do some research to maybe find out where van Gogh discovered there Irises. But I was struck by the fact that they look like the ones in my backyard. One white among many purple. But like these pictured, mine were very prolific and had taken over the rock garden;  so they had to go. I must have dug up thousands of them (OK, maybe only hundreds).

Wordless Wednesday

Clayprinting Workshop

Clayprinting Workshop

June 19-21 9am-4pm

$300 plus $35 supply fee

I have decide to open my studio several times a year to teach clayprinting.

What is clayprinting? It is making a print on "canvas" from a clay slab.

I will show you how to prepare the slab by puting it in a frame.

 Then pigment is applied, layer after layer of color, line, and shape. 

Because the clay slab is still wet it almost has a life of it's own,

and produces some surprising results.

Contact me for more info.

Quote of the Week

"Make sure that your painting set up is where you can see it, even if you don't touch it for weeks. This way, the setup is ready to use at a moments notice, whenever inspiration strikes, & you won't be able to back out by telling yourself,  'I couldn't get to my painting materials quickly enough' " Aviva Gold

Wordless Wednesday

Strangers in a Strange Land

The art of photography. The MIA, that's the Minneapolis Institute of Art, is featuring an exhibit of great photographs by some of the best photographers. Both Diane Arbus & Gary Winogrand were busy with their craft during the 1960s. Diane's vision was for the unusual subject and she hunted for them. Gary just went to the street to find his material and found great stuff.  Photographs capture the "instant", and it will never be seen that way again.

 

 



OK Mozart

The OK Mozart International Festival starts tomorrow June 9th in Bartlesville.

This festival is mostly music and of course mostly Mozart but other art forms are represented as well.

Featured visual artist for the festival is Brent Learned. Brent is a Native American artist who presents a contemporary vision of Native American life.

Find out all about this festival at www.okmozart.com

Wordless Wednesday

Forever Art

"I Saw the figure 5 in Gold" Charles Demuth

We have been hearing often lately that the USPS is in serious trouble, and yet mail is still delivered six days a week, and they are still producing minature masterpieces like this example from Modern Art in America. I always ask for the latest attractive stamps; they add pizzaz to an envelope.

Wordless Wednesday

Quote of the Week

"America is the country of the art of the future." Marcel Duchamp 1915

Quote of Week

"Your silent tents of green

We deck with fragrant flowers;

Yours has the suffering been,

The memory shall be ours."

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Quote of the Week

" In  visual perceptive a color is almost never seen as it really is - as it physically is. This fact makes color the most relative medium in art." Josef Albers

Wordless Wednesday

Toulouse-Lautrec

As I was in the studio making clayprints a famous printmaker came to mind: Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864-1901). Henri and I have something in common: we both used an "organic" form of printing. Henri used stone as his printing slab (he was a lithographer) and I use clay for my slab, and you can't get more "organic" than stone and dirt. Henri was attracted to the bohemian lifestyle popular in Paris during his short lifetime. The examples of his prints shown here are posters for the stars and shows that made nighttime in Paris so attractive. 

Quote of the Week

"The single most overlooked element in visual design is emptyness." Alexander W. White

Wordless Wednesday

Kurt Schwitters

Actually his entire name is: Kurt Hermann Eduard Karl Julius Schwitters (1887-1948).

Some of his collages are on display at the Tate Britain until May12, but in case you can't get there look online for some examples of his work. Of course collage was a "new" art form when Kurt and Picasso and others were discovering it, but now it is well accepted and actually there has been a recent surge in the popularity of "mixed media" work. Cut and paste; we learned to do it in kindergarten; who knew it would be popular.

Wordless Wednesday

Cubism

Cubism, which you can learn all about on Wikipedia or you can settle for the condensed version here.

Cubism is an early 20th century art movement. Where did all art movements start before Americans got into the thick of things? Why France, of course. And artists : George Braque & Pablo Picasso led the way.

In Cubism the visual presentation of space, volume & mass were achieved by using geometric forms. Above you can spot a good assortment of cylinders, rectangles, triangles, circles, etc.

To me cubism looks like art school assignments. But then these artists were conducting their own personal art school.

Spring Show

The Big show of the BART season..

I delivered my work on Saturday afternoon and there were already 70 pieces checked in. And lots of variety. Something to suit everyone's taste. I'm looking forward to visiting with artists at the reception.

Opening Reception & Awards

April 12, 2013 6-8pm

Wordless Wednesday

Clayprinting



Welcome to my open studio.




The printing process.




Checking the print for a reverse image.




The finished print.




A close inspection.

What a fun day for me. To get such a great response to my open studio was encouraging.
How many came? 29 
Who came? Neighbors, art friends (new & old) and friends that were just interested enough to check it out.
Demos: I had two; one at 2pm & one at 4pm, and I had a crowd for each. Of course the demos were fun for me because I get to play with color and clay. And the purpose was to show the basic procedure of how to get a print. You can see some prints hanging on the wall in the first pic.
I loved seeing old friends and meeting new and sharing this exciting technique.

Before & After



Here is the room the first time I saw it. Faded blue walls & a taupe cabinet.




And here is the after. White walls and white cabinet.

This room only had one small window; it was in the outside door. It need as much light as possible, and natural light is always the best for art. I used as much white in the room as I possibly could, and then had the solar tubes installed over my work table.

Wordless Wednesday

Welcome to my studio

My work table

A corner for supplies & interesting things that make me happy.

It took me awhile to actually stand back and bask in the reality of my finished studio. I had to remind myself that it had drab blue walls when I first saw it, and remind myself that the color was actually paint over wallpaper. How many hours did it take me to scrap that paper off the wall inch by inch? Too many to count.
But now it's time to enjoy & share with others.

The first person arrived at 1:30 pm and I had a few minutes to talk before the rest of the first wave of the crowd arrived. They came in groups; friends bringing friends. By 2 pm most of the 18 chairs were full, and I was ready to start my clayprinting demo.

Sign Saturday

Well could it possibly be true (no pun intended)? Will Alex end the suspense and tell all about her open studio?

The most important thing to report is that I count it as a total success and I'm glad I did it.

There were crowds. There were art prints. There was enthusiastic response. And it all made me feel great!