Hiking this morning on the NC Botanical Gardens trail, I was reminded again how much inspiration I gather from spending time among the growing things of a forest. The more I let all my senses adjust to the slower speed of the trees and streams, the more I become aware of the incomprehensible variety that surrounds me. I try to…
I have been trying to paint more abstractly and seem to always end up with a horizon line and a landscape based paining. So I had an idea based on something someone said in a class one time. We took a mat frame and found parts of paintings that could be stand alone paintings. So I decided to try this…
There is an interesting new article written in a Cary online rag about one of OCAG's own -- artist Luna Lee Ray, who was recently recognized as the CVA Artist of the month. The column describes her interest in art as a child, her travels to New Mexico and Hawaii, and her move to North Carolina. And it may surprise…
Thought I would share with you what I learned from a recent talk on art collecting that was presented by Sheldon Peck at the Ackland Art Museum. Peck opened with a slide of Toulouse-Lautrec's oil on board of Dr. Jules Emile Paen, a dentist. Dr. Peck is an orthodontist who has amassed a remarkable collection of Flemish and Dutch drawings…
How many times have you walked into a museum or gallery and wanted to reach your hand out and touch the texture you see in front of you? You know that's not allowed. In most cases, anyhow... I encourage my viewers to touch the sculpted surfaces of my paintings. For instance, this painting of a dining scene is more than a…
A fascination with psychology and the process of learning...have been driving forces in my life and in my art. I've been a teacher for much of my life and always a painter. For me, the creative process is similar in both endeavors. As a teacher, I loved discovering how to successfully reach a particular child -- by building up knowledge…
The work of Louise Francke is to be published in the Best of Worldwide Wildlife Artists (Kennedy Publishing in VA.) Here's what she has to say about one particular painting in this series: It is rare that I choose to keep one particular oil painting. This is my favorite! Carlos as Rembrandt's Oriental was the first painting in this series of 30+ works…
Drawing is a form of meditation for me. It helps me concentrate on the details and thus see the whole in a totally different perspective than just through the mind’s memory which lacks the same attentiveness to detail. My life’s works are a sequence of narratives. They quite often relate to my personal experiences... I have drawn and painted pictures…
Once, a friend of mine who was an emerging artist at age fifty-one expressed that she always had a sense of terror when she faced a blank sheet of watercolor paper. The weight of all the years she had desired to paint, but had put off trying, came in full force to haunt her. In a flippant reply I said,…
What it is? Encaustic painting is a process of heating beeswax mixed with damar resin to around 200 degrees. You can add pigment such as oil paint or purchase blocks of wax to which the pigment has been added. The hot wax mix is applied to a sturdy substrate such as a wood panel with a brush, metal tool or…