Owner: Beth Robinson: Artist Perpetually in Progress URL:http://www.artbybethrobinson.com/journal Join Date: Mon, 21 Aug 2006 08:15:33 -0500 Rating:1 Site Description: I dream about creating complex layered work with paint and paper and stitch. Come with me on my journey as I learn and practice the skills and principles I need to make that art happen. Site statistics:Click here
Sketches at Mohonk Resort 2006-10-21 14:45:37 After Europe I decided to more seriously take a sketchbook with me when I traveled. I had a chance ten days later when my entire office went to an innovation retreat, R&D with marketing, in upstate New York at the Mohonk Resort
. The place was gorgeous and I was able to sneak in some time to climb up a path with some coworkers. We all rested a bit and they pulled out the camera and I pulled out a sketchbook... On the right is a drawing I did from my balcony the next morning. There was mist laying in the valley over the lake and I used the different hardnesses of pencil to attempt to capture that greying out of visibility. I also did a little visual journaling again. We had a cardboard regatta - get the boat made from six pieces of cardboard and two rolls of duct tape across the pool and back with two people on it. It was hilarious and our team won! The drawings are obviously not from life, but they do record details and impressio Read more:Sketches
Stitched Snowflakes 2006-10-20 04:03:31 Remember Snowfall? I completed the stitching on the fabric snowflakes that I will be attaching to the canvas. There are five or six different types of white and off-white threads among them. Each flake also glimmers a little because one of the threads is iridescent. I improvised the patterns as I stitched , using micrographs in Dover's edition of "Snowflakes in Photographs" by W. A. Bentley as inspiration. I used primarily straight stitches with a few variations.
Rediscovering Color - Week 2 2006-10-18 17:39:39 Aaaargh. Beige is beige! I still don't see where Jim got a greenish blue color that he applied to my neighbor's canvas as the first step for the shadow before he started toning it down. Well, I understand the theory behind it, but I just couldn't SEE it. I discovered neutrals last night, which didn't go so well, even though I also made improvement generally.Jim pointed out again that we weren't duplicating the light. We were using the pigment to create the same color relationships in our painting that existed in the still life set-up. He showed how using color to make beige produced a much more striking result than working primarily with the earths. He showed us how working a little bit of a different shade at the background where it touched the bottle could make it pop out or else blend in. And this is the point - to learn the relationships by duplicating them so that you can control where the viewer's attention is drawn. Read more:Color
Future Results from European Inspirations 2006-10-15 13:26:18 I truly enjoyed my trip to Europe, for a number of reasons, and I didn't want to lose what I learned. I spent some hours on the airplane home rewriting my notes from the official business portion of my trip. Then I applied the approach to the artistic inspiration I received. What might I do with it? I hope to follow up on at least a couple of these.This is my last blog entry about my sketchbook and my trip. It was a great exercise and it inspired me to start keeping a more regular travel and event sketchbook and to put a new moleskine in my purse for everyday sights. Read more:Future
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Lace Bits, Wonderful Lace Bits 2006-10-14 13:25:22 The highlight of my trip was receiving this large handful of lace remnants. Over 80% of it is handmade bobbin lace and it is all gorgeous. I had stepped into another lace shop in Bruges to pick up another couple of doilies in different styles. One of the ladies was teaching her helper how to make bobbin lace. The one end was in a little baggie, ready to be sealed up for sale, so I asked if they had more yardage. She brought out a book with samples and I was looking them over, trying to decide how much money to spend, when I figured I better ask how little I could buy. Ten centimeters, was the answer, with fingers held out for illustrations. While I was thinking again she asked me if the ends would work. Ends? The leftovers, the remnants. She ducked into the back room and came back with double handfuls.While I was gleefully looking through the bits she asked me if I would be using them and how. So I showed her my bus Read more:Wonderful
The Markt and the Burg 2006-10-13 13:23:20 The two central squares in Bruges, one for the guilds and one for the government, were about a stones throw apart. Neither had quite the intense wow factor of the Grand Place in Brussels but both were very nice to look at. I was reaching burn out about this time, because the horrid thought of "more buildings, how nice" kind of floated across my brain and I really didn't want to sketch or photograph much of anything, even though I was enjoying it. This was something I hadn't really anticipated when I set my goal for sketching during the trip and it is something I will have to make sure my ambitions accomodate if I should ever get such a chance again.I actually didn't get a very good look at the Burg because there was a security force and bleachers and quite a few people. Apparently a British prince and a Belgian prince were attending a concert and would be coming by in an hour or so. I had dinner at one of the restaurants with tables outs
Rediscovering Color - Week One 2006-10-12 13:23:00 What an incredible first class! I am very much looking forward to the next five weeks. The class is Rediscovering Color
, taught by James Himsworth III and held at Mixed Media, an art store and gallery in Doylestown, PA. Jim is a realist oil painter with an interesting list of education and awards. More importantly, he's a very good teacher. So far I've learned a couple key concepts, been guided on seeing value and color and relating it to what's on my canvas, and picked up a whole bunch of little things just by seeing someone else work and doing it instead of just reading about it. Next time I intend to take my camera so I can take in process shots of these stages. This is a long post, as a lot went on.Jim began by telling us that what he wants us to learn is how to see and paint color relationships so as to develop form on canvas. We cannot paint light. We paint with pigment to create the illusion of light and th
Halloween ATCs 2006-10-10 13:57:18 I took these eight trading cards to a point where they seemed finished, and then pushed a little beyond. I began with backgrounds from the hand-decorated paper swap and a collage sheet from Altered Pages, from which I cut out only the portions that interested me from the larger rectangular images. On each rectangle I adhered at least one other paper element and then the focal image. My apologies for the fuzzy photo, it looked fine on the camera but by the time I'd downloaded it and realized the fuzziness, well, it was far too late. I almost forgot to take it at all! I only remembered about in-progress shots after I'd already painted the one in the lower right.I used my liquid acrylics to paint all eight cards, blending the background into the focal image. I liked the look of that first border and also used that visual technique across the board.At this point I had a dilemma. I really liked the way the cards looke Read more:Halloween
Treasury of Sint Salvador 2006-10-10 02:20:56 Goldwork. Luscious embroidery. Nicely encased in glass so I could get my nose and eyes only a few inches away. I probably spent as much time in this room in the Treasury
of the cathedral as I did in the rest of the cathedral. It cost an extra couple of euros to go through the mini-museum, but it sounded interesting. So I walked by and enjoyed paintings and silver and such until I was captivated by two large cases containing formal ceremonial robes.I'd never been so close to the historical goldwork before, although I had seen recent embroidery in the same style. Much of each design was done in couched gold wrapped thread and the rest in shaded silk embroidery in deep, rich colors. I could tell how the embroidery had been done on a slip and then attached to the garment, even as I'd read about. There were some nice variations on robes, as well as some shoes and pockets and hats.I sat on the floor to take a closer look at a long tapestry th Read more:Salvador
Sint Salvator Cathedral in Bruges 2006-10-08 14:39:35 I've been confusing myself with spelling because I remembered seeing the Dutch language signs of Brugge but was adding on the "s" from the English version of Bruges. I looked it up before I started writing this entry. I was very impressed by my visit to the cathedral of Saint Saviour. It was brick on the outside and perhaps more Romanesque than Gothic in nature, although with some very elegant window tracery. On the inside it was huge and just soared. The side portions were all highly decorated. The choir stalls had beautiful wood tracings in Celtic knots. Many of the pillars were painted in patterns, which was a surprise to me, although the paint had worn off near ground level. Red and yellow were the predominant colors with a little green. The ceilings of the chapels surrounding the sanctuary were also painted in an assortment of patterns. Another unusual feature was the art collection. There were huge paint Read more:Cathedral
New Business Venue - Artwanted.com 2006-10-23 14:06:31 I added something new to my approach today. I signed up for a Premium account at www.Artwanted.com . This gives me the ability to sell prints and products through a portfolio there. At the moment all I have uploaded is "Dragon Scales" and its detail image, but I intend to put up "Lunch in the Studio Again" and "Universal" in the next couple days for certain.I want to use this site to expand my offerings somewhat. I'll probably put up some of my cooler reference photos. Eventually I'll likely have drawings and exercises up as well. Things that would not necessarily work at the prices for original art, but that would make fun prints or interesting images to have on a mug or mousepad or coasters, since Artwanted sells products like Cafe Press does. It's less customizable and there are some products I don't think would go well with some images, but we'll see.I've been researching reproduction prints&nb Read more:Business
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Cretan Landscape - 5"x7" Embroidered Watercolor 2008-03-07 05:54:20 As I considered what to do with the painted sheet I realized that it looked something like a landscape with a red sky. I had used cretan stitch to good effect in a previous landscape and thought it would work well here. I only wanted to use one stitch, since, at least for now, putting in a restriction seems to give me better results. Instead I varied the colors and thicknesses of the silk threads I used. I mostly chose thread colors based on the paint underneath, but deliberately tried to be a little off so the stitching would show up. At the bottom I put in some extra browns to emphasize the earth of the landscape. I also tried to use cooler and lighter colors farther away to get some of the atmospheric perspective that also makes the brain register land Read more:Landscape
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First Stitched Butterfly 2008-02-27 19:40:32 For the bolder, stylized design I wanted to use bold stitches. So I started with cross-stitches in #5 perle silk across the top of the wings. As a size reference, from the tip of one wing to the other is about five inches. Then I continued the primarily one-stitch theme to other portions of the design. The stitches at the outer edges of the lower wings blend in a little more than I would have liked because the colors match more closely than I had originally intended. I thought about redoing them, but decided that the overall result was good.I used the cross-stitches to add pattern and to blur shape. I added a couple of lines as well. I could have just emphasized the lines already there with stitch, but that just isn't what I want. I Read more:First
, Butterfly
First Use of Watercolor Paint in Tubes 2008-02-22 20:26:18 I received tube watercolor paints for Christmas, a small Winsor and Newton Cotman set. The tubes are so TINY compare to what I'm used to with acrylics. So I had to play with them. It really is a different experience from the pans and the crayons. Somehow mixing colors is more natural when squeezing out little dabs of paint than when using pans. I also tried some lifting out of paint, both with brush and paper towel, which are where some of the lighter areas came from. I thought the resulting 9x12 sheet was really pretty neat, but ended up cutting it down to two 5x7 sheets to achieve better compositions. Read more:Watercolor
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Added Watercolor to Butterflies 2008-02-16 08:33:37 My favorite part of watercolor is the way it flows, so I wanted to make use of that effect in adding color to the sketches, but not the same for all of them. For the butterfly wing I wanted the color to spread wildly, so I worked primarily wet in wet from my pan watercolors. I used the pans again, but with less water on the first sketch to get a more overlapping effect.In contrast, I colored within the lines on the purple butterfly using watercolor crayons to make it easier to keep the flow to a minimum. It seemed an appropriate approach to the more stylized design. However, the end results on the purple and the rust butterflies were closer in appearance than I had expected.Next step is, of course, stitching. I started with lines on the first set of Read more:Watercolor
Teal and Pink Stitched Watercolor 2008-02-13 19:06:24 For my simplified version I started with a limited color scheme in watercolor crayons. I loved the flowing effects that I got this time. I'm not sure why, but some of the crayon colors seem to flow more than others when wetted.For stitching I chose a whipped backstitch. I started out with just backstitch but it didn't look right, so I used the same thread to smooth out the lines by whipping. I kept it even simpler by just using floss and floche - a matte thread the same thickness of two strands of floss.I think the composition on the atcs is a little weak, but I'm really happy with how the 5x7 turned out. I think that the little pink circle focal point really makes the piece somehow. The problem is that from even a little distance o Read more:Watercolor
Butterfly Sketches 2008-02-07 08:00:00 I thought I'd spend some more time this year working off of references. The first sketch, to the left, was done directly from a photo in the Wetcanvas! image library. I can see the tentativeness of the lines I made as I tried to reproduce the lines of the reference. Part of the difficulty was that the angle of the photo wasn't directly on the wingspread, but slightly off so that the left wing should be foreshortened a bit, an aspect I didn't capture. The second sketch to the left was an attempt to draw the same butterfly in a freer fashion. Instead it ended up distorted and child-like looking, at least to my eyes. For a third try I decided to use an aid. I sketched out guidelines with a pencil. First, one across the wingspan, then a perpendicular on Read more:Butterfly
, Sketches
First Experiment with Stitched Watercolor Strata 2008-02-04 18:05:53 I made my first attempt at expanding the banded abstracts of the strata I'd been working with on a small scale into stitched works. The watercolor part turned out great, but I didn't like the stitching as much.I used watercolor crayons on a 9x12 sheet and really played with pushing the color around when I added water, so developed some interesting effects. I hadn't been able to get wash effects using crayons before. I just needed more water and time. The result is shown to the left.Then I cut the piece up to create backgrounds for a handful of art cards and a 5x7 picture. I didn't have a plan for stitching for any of them. I just pulled out some silk threads that I had available and improvised. I primarily thought about extending color into oth Read more:Watercolor
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By Special Request 2008-02-03 20:43:44 This is the birth announcement my husband and I sent out, with a picture of our daughter at one week old. We went to Wal-mart and had them printed out using one of the photo kiosks. Alanna is six weeks old now and I think she still looks about the same, just larger. Well, her hair might be a bit wilder, too. It's really crazy after a bath! She's put on a pound and a half and over two inches from her birth measurements and will be outgrowing her newborn size outfits shortly. Read more:Special
A New Year - A New Approach 2008-02-01 08:17:08 If you look around my webpage today you may notice something strange - a great deal of nothing! I removed my galleries, my information pages, even the archives for this blog. Much of it will be back in a different form, but right now I'm starting over.I am taking a different approach to my art, so my blog and website will reflect that.During the last few years I've been on a fantastic journey that began when I realized I didn't need to draw realistically to create art. I've played with mail art, explored techniques, and discovered my preferred media. I've exhibited work in juried shows, marketed my art, and sold a few pieces. But the road took a turn at the end of 2007. I decided I had other goals than making my art a profitable business. Then, my first Read more:New Year
Two 5x7 Paper Collages 2008-03-16 10:11:54 When I've created compositions with strata-like layers I often don't vary the widths of the layers too much. These two collages were created with the intent to push that aspect of the composition a little bit. I love the handmade papers and the variations in texture I can get with them alone, before I even add the stitching.
Overgrowth Journal Page 2008-03-20 14:42:45 I haven't been using many collage images lately because they frustrate me. Part of me feels like my art should all be raw - using only my own images, and part of me recognizes that my best pieces don't use collage images. But they're so much FUN. I love the door and other bits and pieces that I've collected.So when I saw an all-media 9x12 spiral bound journal in Barnes and Noble I thought I had it made. I could use it for a journal of collages and paintings and just practice, have fun, develop ideas, and, yes, use those collage images. So I built up a page and had lots of fun.And then I realized how awkward it was to add stitching to it. Aaargh. So now I have to decide if I should be doing my "journaling" on loose sheets, which I have a di Read more:Journal
Planning a Butterfly Print 2008-03-28 08:19:56 I needed a hand-pulled print for a Spring-themed swap and decided to do a butterfly. I picked an interesting one from a Dover Pictura book and sketched it in the upper left of the grid. I knew that would only give me so much understanding of what would happen when I carved, based on past experience. So then I did the butterfly on the upper right - first shading the entire area in with a 6B pencil and then using a kneaded eraser to remove sections. I knew that I could get a little more detail when I carved the soft block, but I still basically followed the shapes I had set up in the sketch. I stamped the image in the middle right block for a record. The carved block itself and one of the prints for the swap are shown in the second picture. I us Read more:Butterfly
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Speaking of Struggle 2008-03-25 08:52:18 When I decided to shift my perspective away from trying to make a profit from my art as a business, then I had to really look inside and figure out why I was doing it at all. One thing I cherish is the the making of something over which I have total control. I strongly value working collaboratively at my job and love how all the different parts of a business interact, but it's nice to pull into my own little world. Yet I could get that feeling by going back to cross-stitch and other traditional needle arts using other people's patterns. It would certainly be less stressful.A common answer to "why create?" is "self-expression", but that just doesn't really apply. Although my self is in my art, putting it there is not why I create visual art.& Read more:Speaking
Revitalization 2008-04-04 20:50:32 This post should definitely be multiple posts but I just don't care tonight. Phbbbt to the "blogging and readability guidelines".Stitching Feels Good I finally got/made time to do a little stitching last night while watching CSI. This little butterfly is less than an inch square on wool felt and mounted on a collaged card. This was a test piece so you'll see more of it later.I'd actually been contemplating not stitching in future artwork! It just seemed like it would be so much easier to not be trying to think in layers of what had to be done before what and stitching is usually the most time consuming part, too. But sitting down and actually doing a bit of stitching again wiped that idea out. This is right. Combining stitch and
Stamped Background 2008-04-03 05:22:32 I used the butterfly stamp to develop a background for some other swaps. I laid down a set of blue butterflies diagonally on heavy watercolor paper and then laid down a set of purple ones diagonally across them. When I cut it up into smaller rectangles you won't be able to see the butterflies, just the patterning. Next I did a wash with a blue liquid acrylic. I adhered some bits of a light blue mulberry paper and let it dry. Then I added drops of different darker colors and dabbed at them with paper towels, using those to both break up the drop and to spread the color in an uneven pattern to other parts of the paper. I thought it turned out interesting and complex, as planned.
Beginnings of Spring Sketch Page 2008-04-06 12:44:25 The weather was nice yesterday so we all went for a walk; the baby in the stroller, my husband with his nifty new macro lens for his camera, and me with my large sketchbook. I sketched a couple flowers and a couple trees and a bit of the budding of the trees with a basic graphite pencil while we were out. Then, when we returned home I added colored details to some of my sketches and explored some variations on the themes, pulling the key points out of my memory.Trying to sketch the two different trees got very complicated. All those branches going in front of and behind each other and providing fore-shortening challenges when they're coming straight at me. It's easier when there are masses of leaves on them, but not nearly as interesting. Read more:Spring
Stamped Buterfly ATCs 2008-04-09 13:49:06 Two different treatments using the same hand-carved stamp on the complex background that I created earlier.I like the first one better. I collaged a little bit of lace paper to the background, then stamped over it in gold. The butterfly didn't stand out much, so I outlined all the key features in black pen. I still wasn't quite happy, so filled in some of the areas with colored inks. Part of me says - STITCH. Part of me says - But it looks DONE. I'd probably add just a bit of gold metallic along the tops of the wings if I did add stitch.The second one is more fun than the first. First I added some green lines to spice up the background, then stamped in a muted yellow and then added more colors with liquid acrylics. This one is destined for a
More Little Butterflies 2008-04-15 07:36:51 The thick wool felt I used as a stitching base is very easy to stitch through and gives these butterflies a bit of extra dimension. I actually purchased it as a base for needlefelting, but I like it in this application as well. I limited my floss colors to a handful and my bead selection to one mixed bag so I could concentrate more on varying pattern from one butterfly to another. It's interesting to see how much I can pack into a small space. I'm over half way done now...
Taking a Line on a Walk 2008-04-18 20:52:18 This set of doodles is from Exercise 1 in Bert Dodson's Keys to Drawing with Imagination. Four of the fill patterns are from the book and two I came up with on my own. I really enjoyed this pattern making exercise and expect to have fun through the rest of Part 1: Doodling and Noodling, but before I can work on Part 2: Drawing a New Reality I may need to go back to his original book Keys to Drawing and spend more time practicing on this reality.I've not been very good at deliberately following exercises in the past, but I'm going to give it a try as Bert's are laid out so well. The whole book was very interesting to read through and I picked up some good bits even without actually doing the work. A number of the creative exercises could be applie Read more:Taking
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