Category Archives: collage

Building a Portrait

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An Encaustic Collage of Sam Takeuchi

One of the most delightful things that came out of our recent “Encantos” exhibit at the  Taos Ceramic Center was a commission request. Sam Takeuchi, architect and artist from Santa Fe, requested that I create a portrait of him in the same style as the Santo Niño collages in the exhibition (below).

Talk about an intimidating request! Sam is a master of so much – pottery, woodworking, antique Japanese crafts, architecture. I featured a short video of his Santa Fe studio in an earlier post. How would it be possible to capture the essence of a multifaceted person like Sam in an encasutic collage?

The answer, I realized, was not to try to show everything about him. Instead, the portrait had to grow step by step from a few meaningful clues. That’s actually a wonderful way to approach any portrait collage.

But first, I needed a photo of Sam, so he obligingly stood against the gallery wall while a took some pictures with my phone. Sam has a wonderful face – wise and humorous and lived-in.

It’s a good idea to take several versions. Expressions can change the whole feel of the work – see how different smiling Sam and serious Sam appear.

When I got home from Taos and started working on the collage, I realized that I could incorporate bits of the images I had taken at his studio to deepen the meaning. His workspace is filled with beautifully worn wooden tools, carpets, pottery forms, and objects that reflect his deep connection to Japanese craftsmanship and architectural design. Those images gave me a visual vocabulary to work with.

So, if the first step was to choose a photograph of Sam that felt natural and contemplative, the second step was to look closely at the studio photos and ask myself:

What elements here represent Sam’s world?

Wood grain.
Asian Carpets.
Handmade vessels.
Architectural structure.
Quiet, thoughtful spaces.

Those became the first building blocks of the collage. I even made a tear-up collage sheet of some of the assorted details from his studio elements:

Once I had those elements, the process became almost like assembling a small stage set. The background design echoed the textures of his studio. Shapes and lines hinted at architecture.But I also included other “encanto” elements from the Santo Niño collages to connect them back to Sam, like fantasy patterns and icons.

This is that in-between stage before the wax that always makes me stop and pause:

When I started applying the clear wax, the encaustic layers softened the edges so the images felt woven together rather than pasted together.

Sam and I emailed back and forth after this stage – here was the photo that I sent him when I thought the portrait was probably finished:

Encaustic work is notoriously difficult to photograph, but you can see hints of the complexity of the layers of wax and mulberry paper. Sam make some very small final suggestions befroe it was completely finished.

It’s good to share the process with the subject. This is the final piece that was shipped to Santa Fe (and arrived safely – hooray!).

Sam told me he has the perfect place for his new portrait. We’re trading work for payment, which is my favorite kind of arrangement. I loved this project—but this is still how I picture Sam when I think of him: sitting serenely in his studio.

As you can see, the portrait wasn’t just Sam’s face—it was Sam’s environment, his mythology, and the atmosphere of the place he built..

If you’d like to try something similar, here’s a simple approach:

  1. Choose a photograph of the person.
    Something natural and expressive works best.

  2. Collect visual clues about their world.
    Photos of their studio, favorite objects, tools, landscapes, or materials.

  3. Select a few elements that feel essential.
    Not everything—just the things that carry the strongest sense of the person.

  4. Build the collage around those clues.
    Think of it as creating a small visual story rather than a literal portrait.

  5. Don’t be afraid to add touches of myth or magic.

What began as an intimidating commission turned into something much more interesting: a reminder that a portrait doesn’t have to explain a whole life.

Sometimes it only needs a few well-chosen fragments. And when those fragments are right, the person appears almost by magic. I’d love to see what you do with the concept a personal collage portrait.

Two posts, two portraits — From the courageous gaze of Susie King Taylor in the previous post to the thoughtful presence of Sam Takeuchi in his studio, these portraits remind me that a face is never just a face—it is a doorway into a life, a story, and the fragments that help us see it.

Thanks, as always, for reading SHARDS!  ~~Lyn

Collage as Conversation

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Can these images be part of a conversation with each other?

I am so excited to be part of the upcoming Piecework collage exhibition at Gallery Prudencia. The generous response to my collage work in the Taos exhibition reminded me how deeply people connect to layered imagery — how instinctively they lean in when fragments suggest a story without fully explaining it. That experience nudged me back toward collage as a kind of universal language.

For years, I’ve been drawn to “shards” — not as broken pieces, but as clues to something larger that once existed. Collage (particularly encaustic collage) allows those fragments to speak again. A child’s gaze, a bird poised between shadow and light, a torn scrap of handwriting — these become visual syllables in a language built from juxtaposition and pause.

Collage does not declare; it suggests. Returning to collage feels like returning to that essential impulse: to gather fragments, to listen for the conversation between them. Below are three collages that will be in the group show at Prudencia. This small series is called “Conversations.” I love to work in series!

The Secret, Encaustic Collage, 2026

This first collage in the Conversations series is called “The Secret.“

Who is telling the secret to whom?

At first glance, the most literal reading is that the child is whispering to the bird. The dove rests in the hand, close to the mouth — a confidant. Birds have always been messengers, carriers of news between realms. So perhaps the child entrusts the bird with something fragile — a memory, a fear, a wish.

But then the dynamic shifts.

The bird may be whispering to the child. Its beak is near the lips, not the ear. The exchange is intimate but ambiguous. Is the bird delivering news? A prophecy? A truth the child is not yet ready to fully understand?

And then there is us. Perhaps we are holding the bird!

The child’s gaze is direct. Unblinking. The eyes are not turned toward the bird — they look outward. Toward the viewer. Which raises another possibility: the secret is being shared with us. The bird is intermediary, but the child knows we are watching. We become part of the exchange. Isn’t it fun to interpret collage as conversation?

The First Right Answer, encaustic collage, 2026

If The Secret is a whisper shared outward, The First Right Answer, second in the series,  feels inward — almost instructional.

Who is speaking here?

The girl’s gaze is lowered. Unlike the first piece, she is not looking at us. She is listening. Her face tilts toward the bird, but there is no theatrical gesture. The conversation is quiet, concentrated. The moment feels suspended just before comprehension.

The bird, darker and more angular than the dove in The Secret, feels less like a carrier of innocence and more like a voice of discernment. Its beak is pointed, alert. The metallic copper shape cutting across its body suggests signal or transmission — like a tuning fork, a frequency.

So perhaps:

  • The bird is giving the answer.
  • The girl is receiving it.
  • Or the answer is emerging between them.

But the title complicates everything.

“The First Right Answer” implies that there will be others. It acknowledges process. Trial. Error. Learning.

In collage, the direction of the gaze alters the conversation. In The Secret, the child looks outward, implicating the viewer in the exchange. In The First Right Answer, the child looks inward, receiving something only she can recognize. Collage allows these subtle shifts to suggest entirely different kinds of dialogue — confession versus recognition, projection versus intuition.

The Dilemma, encaustic collage, 2026

If The Secret is a whisper and The First Right Answer is a recognition, then The Dilemma is the moment of choice.

And here the child looks directly at us again. But this gaze is different from The Secret. It isn’t confiding. It’s searching. Measuring. Almost asking.

Who is speaking in this piece?

Now there are two birds — a black one and a white one — facing each other. They are positioned below the child, like embodiments of opposing voices. Instinct and restraint. Shadow and light. Risk and safety. Memory and possibility.

Unlike the earlier works, the conversation is no longer between human and bird. It is between birds — while the child observes. Or perhaps the birds are projections of her internal dialogue. The title shifts everything.

“The Dilemma” implies tension without resolution. There is no “right answer” yet. No secret successfully delivered. Only the presence of two equally compelling voices.

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Honestly, I had no notion of these conversations when I started on these pieces, but as I worked, they started talking! I tend to work one piece at a time – this keeps the conversation contained in its own “room.”

So if collage can be a conversation, then it is never finished when I step away from the studio table. It continues in the gallery, in the pause between viewer and image, in the stories people quietly bring with them. What I learned in Taos — and what I hope to experience again at Gallery Prudencia — is that these fragments are not mine alone once they are assembled. They become meeting places.

A bird may carry a secret, or offer the first right answer, or argue both sides of a dilemma — but the meaning settles differently for each person who stands before it. That is the gift of collage. In a world that often feels fractured, perhaps there is something deeply human about gathering the pieces and letting them talk to one another — and to us.

2518 N Main Ave. San Antonio, Texas 7821

The Opening Reception for the Piecework exhibition at Gallery Prudencia will be held on Saturday, March 7, from 2 to 4 pm. You will be able to meet the artists on Saturday, March 28, from 2 to 4 pm., with the Artist Talk beginning at 3 pm.

Come have a conversation about collage with the artists — Kim Collins, Nancy Hall, Mary James, Billy L. Keen, Lyn Belisle (me), Sara McKethan, Tim McMeans, Marcia Roberts, Steven G. Smith, Stefani Job Spears, Sheila Swanson, Cris Thompson, and Bethany Ramey Trombley.

♥Lyn

PS And if you want to play with collage, below are two sheets that you can copy, paste, print out, tear up, combine with other pictures, magazine photos,old book pages, and whatever it takes to create your own collage conversation.(If you can’t see them,click on p.2)

Pages: 1 2

The Rules of an Invented World

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As I am packing the work for the Taos Ceramics Center Exhibition, Encantos, I realize I am packing up an entire intuitive universe. And every invented universe has its own logic — not the kind you can diagram neatly—but a felt logic. A rhythm. A set of silent agreements between the maker and the materials.

Over time, you start to notice what belongs in that universe and what doesn’t. Certain colors feel native – terra cotta and Prussian blue. Certain shapes return like familiar faces – arcs and circles. Certain gestures carry more weight than others – crossed hands.

In the Encantos universe, the rules for the four Santa Niñas encaustic collages are simple and a bit strange:

  • Wax protects.
    Paper remembers.
    Gold listens.
    Heat transforms.
    Layers hold time.

I didn’t write these rules down at the beginning. They revealed themselves by repeatedly showing up. Every time I worked, the materials taught me what they wanted to mean. That’s one of the pleasures of personal myth-making—you don’t invent everything at once. You discover it as you go, the way a traveler learns a landscape by walking through it.

Lyn Belisle Santa Niña de la Luz Silenciosa (Silent Light) (2026)

This is why cosmologies in art don’t have to be planned. They can be grown, like the Encantos universe, with its Santa Niña collages, its Encanto Altars, and its Mendicant Messengers (which I’ll tell you more about next time).

Characters Who Carry Feelings

So once a universe exists, it asks for inhabitants, at least this one did.

The four Santa Niñas are not portraits of people. They are portraits of states of being. Each one holds a feeling that kept showing up in my studio: tenderness, protection, not-knowing, rootedness, inner light. Giving those feelings faces—and names—made them easier to sit with.

  • This is another gift of storytelling in art:
    We can give shape to what has no shape.

Instead of saying “I’m working with vulnerability,” I can say, “This is Santa Niña del Corazón Guardado.” (Guarded Heart)

Instead of “I don’t know what comes next,” I can say, “This is Santa Niña de los Ojos Velados.”(Veiled Eyes)

A character can hold what a sentence cannot.

And once a character exists, you can talk to her. Work with her. Ask what she wants to protect, carry, or reveal. Suddenly, the studio becomes a place of conversation, not just production.

Santa Niña del Corazón Raíz
(Santa Nina of the Rooted Heart)

Materials as Myth

In personal cosmologies, materials are never neutral, they become actors in the story.

  • Wax isn’t just wax—it is shelter, skin, veil, cocoon.
    Mulberry paper isn’t just paper—it is memory, breath, fragility.
    Gold leaf isn’t just decoration—it is listening, blessing, attention.

Every time I melt wax over paper, I am repeating a ritual of care: cover, warm, seal, open again. That repetition is how meaning settles into matter. You don’t have to declare symbolism. If something keeps showing up, it is already symbolic.

Play Is Not Frivolous

One of the common misconceptions artists absorb is that “seriousness” equals “legitimacy”.

But myth is not built through seriousness alone. It is built through play: naming things, trying on stories, letting images talk back, changing your mind, making something just to see what happens.

Play is how children understand the world. It is also how artists do.To make a cosmology for your work is not to pretend you know more than you do. It is to admit that you don’t—and to answer that not-knowing with imagination instead of fear.

  • You are allowed to say:
    “In my world, this means something.”
    Even if no one else agrees.
    Even if you change it later.

Myth-making is not a contract. It is a conversation.

An Invitation

You don’t need saints, or vessels, or wings, or gold.

Your cosmology might be built from kitchens, streets, trees, broken cups, dogs, storms, old photographs, or scraps of handwriting. It might be loud or quiet, humorous or solemn, tidy or chaotic. What matters is not what it looks like—but that it belongs to you.

Ask yourself:

  • What images keep returning?
    What materials feel like home?
    What stories are trying to form without words?
    If your work lived in a world, what kind of world would it be?

You don’t have to explain it to anyone.
You don’t even have to understand it fully yourself.

You just have to keep building it—one symbol, one layer, one small act of making at a time. Keep notes. Pay attention. Show us.

That’s how personal myth is born.

If you want to learn more about the world of the Santa Niñas, your can follow this link.

Fragments, Forms and Layers: Part Three

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Part 3: Layered Images — The Original Language in My Practice

A three-part series on Fragments, Vessels & Layers
(Part Three: Layered Images)

Series Introduction

Recently, the artist and teacher Crystal Marie Neubauer invited me to talk with her online group about my work. It was an honor — Crystal’s influence on my creative life goes back years — but it also presented a surprising challenge. How do you describe an art practice that moves through so many materials and forms? Encaustic, collage, fiber, clay, found objects… I’ve never been a one-medium artist, and trying to explain everything at once felt impossible.

Then I realized that my work isn’t united by medium at all. It’s united by object and intention — by the three forms that keep reappearing no matter what I’m making.
And when I stepped back, those paths became clear:

  • Santos & Shards — guardians, icons, and the stories held in fragments

  • Vessels — boats, bowls, pods, and the metaphor of holding

  • Layered Images — collage, wax, and the  revelations inside translucence

These three paths intertwine across everything I do. And this series grows out of that realization — an invitation to look closely at where my work comes from and how meaning travels across forms.

Today’s final post in this series returns to the oldest language in my practice: layered collage.

Layered Images — The Core and Heart of My Work

Before my Santos emerged, before I began building boats and pods and sheltering forms, I was working in layers — paper, pigment, image, and – more recently – wax. Collage was my first real artistic home on the flat surface, and it remains the place I return to whenever I need to rediscover what I’m trying to say.

If Shards & Santos are about what we mend, and Vessels are about what we hold, then Layered Images are about what we choose to reveal — and what we allow to remain veiled. I’ve always worked in collage and for the last 15 year I’ve concentrated on encaustic layering thanks to my dear friend Michelle Belto who introduced me to the medium.

Why does Wax play so well with collage? Because It behaves Like Memory

Encaustic wax feels like the perfect collaborator because it mirrors the way memory works:

  • luminous in some places

  • fogged or obscured in others

  • layered with traces of earlier thoughts

  • holding what came before, even as new layers are added

Wax isn’t just a sealant or surface — it’s a way of thinking. It slows everything down. It requires heat, patience, and attention. It asks: Are you sure you want this visible? Are you sure you want that hidden?

I don’t use much colored wax at all – I’m not an “encaustic painter,” rather an artist who uses encaustic techniques to tell mixed-media stories. The pale translucency of beeswax is my go-to collage medium of choice.

A Layered Image Is a Conversation

When I work in collage and wax, I’m not composing an image; I’m listening to it. Layer by layer, the piece begins to speak –a scrap of ledger paper peeks through, a synthographic figure emerges or dissolves, an accidental texture becomes the thing the piece needed all along. Even removal becomes part of the conversation. Scraping back a surface to reveal earlier marks often leads me to meanings I didn’t anticipate. Encaustic is not a linear process. It loops. It reveals. It forgets and remembers.
Just like we do.

A Return to Old / A Portal to New

What I love most is that this old, familiar collage path has become a bridge to my newest work with synthographic imagery. The dream-logic of AI images blends beautifully with the ancient, tactile behavior of wax. One creates possibility; the other brings it to earth. If you’ve taken my recent Painting with Fire Lesson, Synthography and Wax, you understand.

The two together create a layered world where fantasy becomes grounded, realism becomes dreamlike, and the viewer is invited inside the luminous in-between

It feels like a collaboration across centuries — digital imagination meeting an art form older than painting itself. These aren’t just surfaces — they are strata.

Inviting You Into the Layers

Even if you don’t work in collage or encaustic, layering is a language almost every artist speaks. It’s about building meaning slowly, letting some things rest beneath the surface, allowing others to shine through.

Layers give us permission to be complex. To hold contradictions. To let time become part of the piece. As an example, here is a new (almost done but not yet – the edges are still taped) series that goes with my Encanto assemblages and will be in the Taos Exhibit in 2026.

I’m creating four layered encaustic collages, 20″x20″, each representing a child saint or Santo Niño. Technically, some are probably female Santas, but gender is not an issue here. Fusion is, fusion of layers and culture.

These Santo Niños inhabit the liminal space where Indigenous cosmologies and European Catholic iconography meet, overlap, and transform one another. The white-painted faces echo ritual marking found across Native traditions, signaling spiritual passage, ancestral presence, and worlds in transition. Their frames and gold-leaf halos recall Spanish devotional art, yet the children themselves do not belong fully to that lineage.

They are hybrid beings—part saint, part spirit-guardian—born of a cultural collision that reshaped the sacred landscape of the Southwest. 

I’ve layered mulberry paper printed with carpet designs and birds than might be found in a European drawing room with white painted synthographic faces of anonymous children to create contradictions and layers of metaphor and storytelling. Here they are so far – they may end up with one more layer of meaning but I’m just not sure:

Santo Niño of the Antlers and the Hidden Path

Santo Niño of the Sacred Heart Seed

Santo Niño of the Two Doves

Santo Niño of the Watching Birds

There is more color in these layered pieces (surprise!), but the printed color is pushed back by the veiling layers of wax, almost as if time-faded. I’m having an amazing time fitting the images to the layers of history and meaning in the whole concept of Encantos and objects of hope and devotion in a world where such things need to be extracted again from our deep sense of humanity.

Whew! That was  lot to talk about!

Here are a few prompts to bring into your own studio:

  • What early layer in your work deserves to resurface?

  • What do you want to soften — not erase — with a new layer?

  • How might your materials become translucent instead of opaque?

  • Is there an image in your practice that wants to hide and reveal itself at the same time?

Closing the Trilogy

With this third post — fragments, vessels, layers — the series comes full circle. Each path has shaped my work in different ways, but together they form a single through-line:

We create meaning from what we mend, what we hold, and what we choose to reveal.

Thank you for walking with me through all three.

Butterfly carrots and pumpkin shepherds

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Words are becoming increasingly important in my recent work, both as design components and as inspirations. I’m honestly not sure why, maybe it’s because I’ve been rediscovering some of my beloved Abstract Expressionist heroes  when I was an undergraduate art student — Larry Rivers and Robert Rauschenberg. Those guys were amazing.

Parts of the Face: French Vocabulary Lesson 1961 Larry Rivers 1923-2002

Robert Rauschenberg, Metropolitan Museum of Art is an offset Lithograph poster made in 1970.

Sometimes the words I’m finding are strange and somewhat obscure, like “hiraeth,” the Welsh word that inspired this series, which is now complete and will be shown at my solo exhibit next Saturday. I’ll post those soon.

Sometimes the words are both inspiration and visual elements. I’ve just completed five “story banners” which will also be shown in the exhibit. These were partially inspired by two of three random words from a vintage child’s stamp set that was a gift from my friend Jean. I talked about those delightful word stamps in an earlier post, and am still discovering ways to use them.

Look at these words that are available in the old stamp set – limited but evocative. Picking any two or three can can conjure stories that blend nostalgia and weirdness and wonder. Try it! Butterfly carrots?? Pumpkin shepherd??

For a narrative artist like me, this is gold! And when these words are combined with synthographic and vintage images in fiber and mixed media, the results are really intriguing.

Here are the five banners. Each one is about 14×24″ with layers of fabric and images and old milagro charms.

Lyn Belisle, Mother Nest, 2024

Lyn Belisle, Seven Horse, 2024

Lyn Belisle, She Know, 2024

Lyn Belisle, We Were Sisters, 2024

Lyn Belisle, Little Tiger, 2024

During this process, I continue to learn that “shards” can be more than just pieces of stuff for assemblage – they can be scraps of fabric and synchronistic words that appear from unusual places. And these “shards”—whether bits of fabric, stray words, or found objects—are fragments of meaning waiting to be woven into something whole.

By embracing them, we give ourselves permission to see beyond the ordinary, to let coincidence and curiosity guide us. In this way, each piece or word becomes part of a larger narrative, inviting us to craft stories that feel both ancient and freshly our own, across any medium we choose. And then it’s up to the viewer to join us in figuring out these stories in a way that speaks to them. What fun!

Thanks for reading!!

Patched up . . .

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I started this blog in its current form back in 2010 and it has become my invaluable journal of where the creative path has taken me. Recently, however, my SHARDS blog site completely crashed and I thought 15 years of entries and over 1000 posts were lost forever. Thanks to George Howard, a smart techie and highly-recommended good guy, we are patched up and running again. Sending you a shout-out, George!

I’m back just in time to share something lovely that Jude Hill wrote this morning –

“So what if I concentrate on story building with loose patches for a while? Language Patches is what I have come to call them.  They are simple and small and maybe you can play along?”

This is so much like what I’m doing with my new workshop, Scrolls and Surface, that I wanted to expand on the idea. The scrolls that I’m assembling as prototypes for the class are nothing more than a collection small “patches” of narrative. They go together in various ways, much like chapters in a book, and because they are small, they can be rearranged.

Here are a few examples – some of these are image transfers on fabric, some are what I call “fusion patches,” and some are handmade or found objects.

The images that I choose incorporate on these “patches” reflect my personal themes: neo-santos, shards, paradoxical connections, lost children, myth and mystery. Your images will be different just as your story is different.

Once you start working this way, creating small components that will ultimately go together as a larger picture, you’ll discover all kids of possibilities and combinations. It’s great composition practice, but more than that, it’s a lesson in how one element affects another.

Assorted combinations of fusion patches and transfers to fabric – are there stories here? Can they be rearranged to tell a different narrative?

It really is so much fun to lose yourself in this task. And it’s equally as much fun to actually create the patches using all kinds of experimental methods. Even when something doesn’t work, it’s a good lesson. Jane Dunnewold makes Citrasolv transfer look so easy – when I first tried it, I got blobs. But at least they were mysterious blobs.

A Mysterious Blob

I’m filming a lot of these experiences for a new online workshop called The Pilgrim’s Scroll: Stories in Paper and Cloth which should be ready in a couple of weeks.  In the meantime, it sure is great to have my blob – er, I mean, BLOG, back!

Thanks, Jude and George and all the people that help us stay connected and inspired!

 

Finding answers in your own work-stash Shards

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It seems fitting to start the new year with a post on the whole idea of Shards.

My work has always been strongly influenced by the idea of “shards” as a metaphor for human communication across time. A shard can be a found fragment of clay, a rusty nail, a scrap of handwriting – any little clue that becomes a “secret handshake” between the maker and the discoverer.

But sometimes the maker and the discoverer are the same person. Have you ever gone through work you’ve done earlier and found the answer to something you are doing right now? Perhaps it was a sketch, or a scrap of dyed fiber, or an unfinished collage. These are your shards, fragments of creations that were waiting for re-discovery to be put to good use in the place they had been waiting for.

Such was the case with this sculptural piece which garnered many comments when I posted it on Facebook.

Child of the Universe. Lyn Belisle 2022

I had completed the main body and really liked it, but there was something in this piece that wanted more. I envisioned him as a pilgrim coming home. He needed to be bringing something with him, but pilgrims bring only what they can carry.

I searched through my own older clay shards for answers and found four pieces that fit perfectly and answered the question of what he is carrying – he is carrying memories on his back.

Child of the Universe, back view

 

The four shards I found in the “shard stash pile” fit so perfectly on the back of the pilgrim that you cannot see them from the front. One piece even has the word “Memory” on it. Who are these people carried in the pilgrim’s memories? We don’t know, but we want to.

All of this reminds us that sometimes our own burdens are not visible to the people we encounter in our face to face dealings. It is only when we take the time to look behind the facade that we can discover and empathize.

It’s amazing to me that when we look to our own work for “shards” in our past stash pile, we often find and answer to a story that is deeper than we could have imagined if we had started out all fresh and new.

Nicholas Wilton had a great quote this morning that inspired this post – it really resonated with me, especially with this earthenware piece I’d just completed.

“Even in the mess we make, there’s hope! Beautiful clues emerge, like certain colors together or how a line relates to a shape, to inform your way forward and keep you progressing. Rather than looking at others’ work, staying immersed and attentive in your art-making will provide the solutions. It’s a self-generating process that comes from within.” – Nicholas Wilton

Now go through your own stash pile this morning for clues from your earlier self that will shape and inform your work!

Three of a zillion stash piles in my studio

 

 

 

 

Provenance

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I’ve been negligent about posting to SHARDS for several reasons. I wanted to change the look of the blog, and work on some website redesign as well.  So I’ve been busy, yes, but that’s no excuse.

Have you ever felt that the longer you go without doing something you should do, the harder it gets to do it? My brothers and I are of the generation that got swats on the bottom from our dad when we were little and did something REALLY bad. Daddy would let us choose the time for our swat, but would tell us that “the longer you wait, the harder it gets.” Sigh. The anticipation was worse than the swat, of course. Sometimes you just have to get it done and move on 🙂

But I digress – today I want to discuss “provenance,” a word that refers to the historical origin of a piece of art, or really any object. As an assemblage artist, provenance is hugely important to me. I believe that an object’s history can be sensed in some weird way, kind of like a shard of clay gives a clue to its history.

I’ve been working lately on a series of wrapped and bundles figures inspired by the Peruvian Chancay Burial dolls. Here’s the Chancay doll on the right and my interpretation is on the left.

Part of my process involves selecting specially-curated objects to wrap into the form. Here is another example:

Below are several little objects I want to wrap into the next figure – two seed pods and a feather.

No one who sees the finished doll will know about the provenance of these objects – they could be just some stuff I picked up anyplace. But the seed pods came from my Pride of Barbados tree which seemed completely dead after the snow disaster this year, but manages to come back gloriously despite the trauma. The feather came from the construction yard at SAY Si where they are building a wonderful new place to share art with the youth in San Antonio who really need it. So all three of these objects have a special “provenance,” a story of rebuilding and renewal.

As I said, no one but me knows about the provenance of these objects, but somehow they carry an aura of their story with them, and that infuses the finished piece with a sense of inexpiable mystery and meaning. You can do this with objects, with paper, with fiber.

When you have a choice in your own work of using something that has a special provenance even though it may not look quite as bright and shiny as something you bought at a craft store, consider the source, and go with what your heart says.

If you look up “provenance” as it relates to collecting art, you’ll find that it refers to the trail of ownership of an art object, or the history that got it from there to here. But every object has a history and a story based on where it is found. As an artist, you can incorporate those stories to give richness to your work.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Painting with Fire

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The title sounds like something my mother would have warned me against, but it’s actually one of the best things that could happened to an artist/teacher!

I’ve been invited to join a group of the Best Encaustic Teachers in the World (yes, they let me in!!) to participate in a year-long learning experience called Painting with Fire.

Click here to visit Painting with Fire Essence of Mulranny .

Would you like to meet these artists and see what their work looks like? It’s pretty awesome – check out the video.

Painting with Fire Online Workshop A Year of Encaustic from Lyn Belisle on Vimeo.

The program was founded by Lora Murphy, an encaustic artist who was born in Ireland and has a school there in County Mayo called Essence of Mulranny. Lora sent out an invitation to us, scattered all over the world, and brought us together to teach this Masterclass. And it’s for beginners, too!

My pals Michelle Belto and Clare O’Neill are teaching in Painting with Fire, as well. I’ve learned so much from both of them. And when you sign up, you can take every single class offered by every single teacher over the course of a year, including mine and Michelle’s and Clare’s. Oooh, and Crystal Neubauer and Trish Seggebruch and Shary Bartlett and so many more of my favorite encaustic aritsts are in this, too!

The class that I am teaching is called MYTH AND MIST: Fusing Image and Imagination in Wax. It’s a combination of all the things I love about encaustic – pale translucent layers, mysterious photos and objects, fragrant beeswax – well, take a look for yourself. Here are some details from one of the first pieces I’ve been working on::

I honestly can’t wait to participate in Painting with Fire. Maybe Lora will invite me to Ireland to teach in person next year!!

I almost hesitate to say this, because I feel like I might jinx it, but there’s this new stirring amongst us creative creatures – a cautious optimism that’s reminding us that spring is coming and we can start reaching out again rather than just hanging on in survival mode.

By the way, The Enso Circle is certainly stirring! Michelle Belto and I have had a number of incredible applicants who want to join us in virtual residency. If you didn’t get a chance to read about it, here’s my last post that will explain it. It’s a program for the long-term, and when you are ready to consider it, we will be around! Applications are still open until February 21st, which is a week from this Sunday. Applicants will be notified of acceptance on February 23rd.

I hope to see you at Painting with Fire — it opens today!! Warm your hands with us at the encaustic griddle!

Click here to visit Painting with Fire Essence of Mulranny .

Take good care, trust the process – ♥

Lyn

 

 

The Story of The Enso Circle

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Creative work is rarely done by a lone genius. Artists, writers, scientists and other professionals often do their most creative work when collaborating within a circle of like-minded friends. Experimenting together and challenging one another, they develop the courage to rebel against the established traditions in their field. Working alone or in pairs, then meeting as a group to discuss their emerging ideas, they forge a new, shared vision that guides their work. When circles work well, the unusual interactions that occur in them draw out creativity in each of the members.

Michael Farrell, Collaborative Circles: Friendship Dynamics and Creative Work (2001)

After six years of hatching, percolating, and polishing this concept, Michelle Belto and I are (at last) introducing you to The Enso Circle, our Invitational Online Artists’ Residency program. When we previewed the new website to several artist friends, here were their reactions:

  • “I just read your note on the class/residency that you and Michelle will be teaching and just wanted to let you know that this sounds truly amazing. Love both of your artwork and this sounds perfect! I have been creating art for over 50 years so I think it’s time I joined your tribe.” Bosha S.
  • “Brilliant idea. Brava!” Jean D.
  • “What a fabulous idea!!! Love this! This is a BRILLIANT venture!” Christine S.

When we began talking about what has ultimately become The Enso Circle, we wanted to create a structured, collaborative community that we ourselves would want to belong to.

This community would offer a supportive space in which to both expand and focus our present art practice, and to offer us a safe place for sharing ideas with like-minded creatives. It would have a starting time and an ending time, and be long enough to be meaningful but short enough to keep the energy going.

We knew from experience that we both need certain guidelines to make this work for us. Among those are:

  • A time-defined goal to motivate us (an art show submission, an article deadline, a workshop design, a group exhibit)
  • Private time to generate or refine a creative concept
  • A concrete plan to reach our goal with focus but flexibility
  • Group time to get feedback on where we are, where we were, and where we are going with our project
  • A collection of resources, always available, that can give us both technical and aesthetic advice and answers
  • Input from mentors outside the community who have expertise and objectivity
  • Small-group opportunities to brainstorm and problem solve the small steps in the process that sometimes get us stuck

Why did we name our community The Enso Circle? Because the Enso is a manifestation of the artist at the moment of creation and the acceptance of our innermost self. It symbolizes strength, elegance, and one-mindedness.

The very imperfections and hand-created contours are exactly what makes the Enso beautiful.

If you want to cut to the chase and learn more right this moment, just click here.

(And here’s what I know that you’re wondering up front . . .the program costs $325, it’s 12-weeks long, only 12 people can be accepted, and yes, it’s absolutely worth it)

But there’s more, and it’s important – and unusual – read on:

The Enso Circle is based on the idea of an Artist’s Residency – a twelve-week commitment that results in a personal body of work, large or small, conceived and completed through goals that you set with the support of the community throughout the process. You do need to apply and have a goal in mind, although that can change over the course of the term.

The Enso Circle is a unique experience for several reasons.

  • It has all the advantages of an in-depth workshop: resources, technique videos, handouts and printables.
  • Like an academic residency, it allows you to select your individual goal and work toward it with peer and mentor support.
  • It has the power of a critique group through frequent informal Zoom meetings and discussions in our private Slack space.
  • It is led by nationally known teacher/artists Michelle Belto and Lyn Belisle, who will model the process by working toward their own goals right along with you during the three-month program.
  • And it culminates in an online exhibition.
  • Lyn and Michelle plan to offer three twelve-week Residency terms throughout the year. The first one will start on March 2nd, 2021.

Here’s an up-close and personal invitation from both of us, via our Zoom recording. Just click on the video image.

VIMEO LINK

We hope you choose to apply to be one of the first twelve residents of The Enso Circle!

HERE’S THE LINK TO THE ENSO CIRCLE CLASSROOM./RESIDENCY WEBSITE WITH ALL THE INFORMATION AND THE APPLICATION FORM FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION

Thanks for reading – you’ll know if it’s right for you, and if it’s not, thanks for learning about our Enso Circle story!

Take good care,

Lyn