Workshop with Clare O’Neill – transforming photographs with pigment and wax

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I am now the proud owner of one of those Clare O'Neill brought one of her iconic works as a gift for me - I am thrilled! His name is Pasta, and he is a wild mustang - wow!

Clare O’Neill brought one of her iconic works as a gift for me – I am thrilled! His name is Pasta, and he is a wild mustang.

It’s been an exciting two days at the Studio – nationally-acclaimed photographer and photoencaustic artist Clare O’Neill has been sharing her techniques with a very fortunate group of us who wanted to learn how she produces those luminous beeswax-enhanced fine art photographic works.

Clare did not disappoint – one of her great skills is encouraging students to take the techniques she demonstrates and adapt them to their own personal styles. You can see in the video (below) how many different approaches and experimental works came out of the two-day workshop. It was really fascinating to watch the creative paths diverge into wonderfully finished works.

Tomorrow we start the second two-day session – I can’t wait to see how this group of students responds to Clare’s teaching. Stay tuned . . . .

Fire – update, luck and reassurance . . .

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There was a fire at Carousel Court last night that severely damaged the space next door to the Studio, but the Studio itself escaped almost unscathed – hooray! We were alerted by ADT about 11:00 pm, and when we got there, we had to park across the street because 14 emergency units, including firetrucks and many police, filled the parking lot. There was a lot of smoke and noise – scary stuff.

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The fire fighters had to come down through the ceiling of the Studio to do their work, so they took out several ceiling tiles and a lot of insulation, then opened my door from the inside. That set off my alarm system. The fire was under control a little after midnight. The property management people were there immediately and are sending out a team to try to get rid of the smoke smell today. What saved the Studio was the concrete wall between the fire next door and my space – it kept the fire from jumping over. I am so lucky!

Firefighters work at the former CycleHub space next door to Lyn Belisle Studio

Firefighters work at the former CycleHub space next door to Lyn Belisle Studio

Unfortunately, my friends at Shear Image Salon on the other side of the vacant space were not so fortunate. They suffered heavy damage. Please send good thoughts their way.

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Inside Shear Image Salon – they were not as lucky as I was

It will be business as usual after a little bit of clean-up today (there’s a strong smoke smell that the property management will take care of), and Clare O’Neill’s workshop this weekend should not be affected. I am profoundly grateful to the fire fighters who kept everything safe – they even stacked paintings up so they wouldn’t be damaged after they came down into the Studio.

Thanks to everyone who helped keep us safe. I’ll have an exciting story to tell you guys at the next Show and Tell!

 

 

Encaustic excitement and fiber – Maggie Ayers’ mixed media work

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Maggie Ayers – Cocoon, 2008

 

 

 

 

 

 

Clare O’Neill’s visit to my studio is just days away, and I’ve been immersed in encaustic excitement! I just can’t wait to work with her since many mixed-media artists like me are incorporating the seductiveness of beeswax into their work, and Clare’s expertise is impressive – we are so lucky to have her here.

Maggie Ayers, Flourish (detail) 2009

Maggie Ayers, Flourish (detail) 2009

Coincidentally, I just discovered this morning that one of my fiber artist heroes, Maggie Ayers, has also turned to encaustic, and wow! What she’s doing with wax and silk is gorgeous! Maggie Ayers’ work prompted my interest in fiber art about ten years ago – her work is unique and organic.

She’s brought those qualities to wax – you’ll love the new work that she demonstrates in the video below.

Maggie writes, “Central to all my work is the notion of mark making. Whether it is a trailed line of ink from a delightfully scratchy bamboo nib, a rusted metal print on paper or torn reclaimed cloth, or quickly cut scalpel lines on a beeswax and resin ground, these are my working beginnings.” Beautiful.

Maggie Ayers, Small encaustic panel, 2015

The big lesson for me is not just about wax or silk or collage or any particular medium, but about expressing one’s own ideas in many ways. Not everyone who comes to Clare’s workshop this weekend will become a photoencaustic artist, but each of us will experience a new method of communicating through our art as Clare instructs us, and as Maggie Ayers has done. I love it!

Maggie Ayers, small panel, 2015

If you’re a mixed-media artist, and you’re new to encaustics, here’s a great list of resources compiled by Rhonda Raulston that will introduce you to the seductiveness of wax – but be careful – it’s contagious.

Want instant relaxation? Try this . . .

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My theme word for 2016 is BALANCE – I’m gonna try to have time for art and workshops and sketching every day, reading more books, updating the website and keeping track of taxes in advance and writing real letters and relaxing and . . . ARG – I got tense and unbalanced just thinking about it!

So I turned to the all-wise higher power – Google! Lo and behold, I found this great guide to active relaxation that takes two minutes at the most and really works to help refocus and calm down. It’s on the Eastern Washington University site, and when I followed the steps, my whole body de-stressed and lightened up.

Want to try it? Here are the steps (and I’ve also made a printable version for you guys that has two copies – one for you and one for a friend – you can find it here).

Sit or lie in a comfortable place with your spine straight.

You may start with either you right side or your left side (most people prefer to begin with their dominant side).

For each step, hold the position described for 5 seconds and concentrate on the sensation of muscle tension. Then release the position and concentrate on changes in the muscles, noticing the sensation of relaxation.

  1. Foot – point and curl toes, turning foot inward
  2. Calf – pull toes toward head, flexing foot
  3. Thigh – push thigh muscles down, tensing muscles
  4. Repeat for opposite foot, calf, and thigh
  5. Stomach – contract stomach, making it as small and tight as possible
  6. Chest, Shoulders, and Upper Back – pull shoulder blades back and together
  7. Upper Arms – push elbow down
  8. Hand and Forearm – make a tight fist
  9. Repeat for opposite upper arm and hand
  10. Neck and Throat – pull chin toward chest and keep it from touching chest
  11. Jaw – bite hard and pull back corners of mouth
  12. Cheeks and Nose – squint and wrinkle nose
  13. Forehead – lift eyebrows as high as possible

That’s it!! I figure that if your body feels unbalanced, your mind is going to take a hike, too – sometimes just remembering to flex my foot (#2) and push my elbows down (#7) is enough to help me refocus.

OK, print out your relaxation tips and go have a balanced and happy weekend – become one with the serene seashore rock!

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Pegboard studio storage spiff-up

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I love these new pegboard walls that I copied from Lisa Stamper Meyer‘s studio! They have made a huge difference in the storage space by providing hanging places and supply screening. Here is a side view and back view – you can see how well the pegboard walls hide a multitude of stuff!

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And here’s what you need if you, too, want to make a storage wall shelf like these.

A metal shelf, 4’x8’x18″ – I bought mine from Costco – here’s a link. These shelves are on casters so you can roll them around easily if you need to. When I bought them, they were $98 each, very sturdy – I think they hold 1200 pounds.

A sheet of 4×8′ pegboard, primed white. I bought mine from Home Depot. Here’s a link for those. They are a little bit unwieldy to manage but if you have access to a truck, you can just lay them in the back. You will probably need a helper – Mike helped a lot with this project.

A bag of 8″ cable ties – here’s a link. This is the neatest trick. You just thread the cable ties through the pegboard holes and pull them tight to the shelf posts. We used eight ties per shelf, three on the sides (top, middle, bottom) and two in the center to hold them steady.

Lisa even attached brush holder to her pegboards using cable ties – she’s an organizing genius! If you have any questions about this easy project, send me an email.

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Decayed Daguerreotypes and The Public Domain Review

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Portrait of Emma Gillingham Bostwick [between 1851 and 1860], by Mathew Brady’s studio

Part of having some leisure time over the holidays is discovering new Good Stuff, which, of course, I’m passing along to you guys. Look at that wonderful portrait, above – it’s an old daguerreotype that has been naturally distressed over time by scratches, dust, hair, etc, and particularly the rubbing of its glass cover. Isn’t it beautiful?? Artists strive to achieve those distressed effects in wax and paint – age and natural process has done it for us here.

It’s part of a collection from a site called The Public Domain Review: a project of the Open Knowledge Foundation. You can read more about these daguerreotypes and see many more fantastic examples here.

Reading the Public Domain Review’s mission statement makes me smile:

images“In particular, as our name suggests, the focus is on works which have now fallen into the public domain, that vast commons of out-of-copyright material that everyone is free to enjoy, share, and build upon without restriction. Our aim is to promote and celebrate the public domain in all its abundance and variety, and help our readers explore its rich terrain – like a small exhibition gallery at the entrance to an immense network of archives and storage rooms that lie beyond.”

 

The Public Domain Review has unbelievable treasures, and my personal favorites are in the images collections. Here are a few of the non-copyright images I came across in my first visit – it won’t be my last. I hope you have fun with this great resource. I plan to donate to their site (just as soon as I climb out of this rabbit-hole of digital discovery)!

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A holiday wish for you

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Happy holidays, everyone! In the spirit of the Season, I’m giving you a couple of links to fun things

First, if you want to make origami crane ornaments to symbolize the hope for peace in the new year, here’s a link to a video I did a couple of years ago – you’ll just need some square paper and a tiny bit of patience. (I just checked the video and realized that I made it in 2012,  right before I opened the Studio! I was still working from home in the little studio lab – seems so long ago!)

Next, here’s a link to five collage sheets with some of my favorite images from my earlier work – print ’em out, tear ’em up, and play. I’m happy to share these with you guys.

Finally, here’s a recipe that I’ve posted before for a yummy fresh cranberry relish. It’s beautiful to look at, easy to make, and delicious with ham or turkey or just about anything else – even vanilla ice cream!

Thank you for all you do to make the world a kinder and more beautiful place!

 

Easy all-purpose gift tags for you

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Like a lot of families, mine is quite – er, eclectic when it comes to ritual and celebration. We are a motley crew of every spiritual persuasion (or none), so I try to design gift tags and cards for us that reflect that diversity through symbolic neutrality. These little milagro heart tags fit the bill – folk arty but not specifically religious. If you want to use them, too, here’s a link to a sheet of eight tags that you can print out on card stock, fold, cut apart, trim the corners, and punch.

I used some parchment-colored card stock, but you could use any tag-weight paper that will go through your inkjet printer. The punched out gold circle adds a glitzy, industrial touch. Email me if you have any questions, but these tags are sooooo easy to put together. Quick, too!

iPad Pro and the Procreate app – digital discoveries!

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I returned home from Boston with more than just happy memories – I also got an early Christmas present of an iPad Pro! So what makes the iPad Pro special? It’s simple: This is a tablet for artists and creators.This device is a digital designer’s dream – it has a 12.9″ touchscreen with incredible resolution. Lucky me . . . so many artists like my friends Sherrill Kahn and Susie Monday are huge iPad enthusiasts and digital design experts. I’m still a beginner, but ya gotta start somewhere. The image at the top is my first attempt at making a photo collage design on the iPad Pro. I used an app called Procreate

 When I first downloaded Procreate (it costs $6), I was a little disappointed because it just seemed like a drawing pad app, but then I watched some You Tube tutorials and began to see why artists like it so much. You can insert photos, use layers, draw with a zillion different brushes in a zillion different colors.

One of the most fun things Procreate does is to record your actions and export them to a video. Here is a eight-second video showing the steps that went into the finished image. As you can tell, I’m not very experienced with this program yet, but the learning curve is kind of addictive!

First Experiment with IPad Pro and Procreate app using layers and photo imports from Lyn Belisle on Vimeo.

This process won’t replace the kinds of hands-on art I do in the Studio every day, but it’s a great tool for ideas and digital design development. You don’t need an iPad Pro to download Procreate – you can install it on a regular iPad and have a great time playing with it.

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If you really want to get into it with a passion, I highly recommend Susie Monday’s Art on the iPad workshops – the next one starts on January 12th – here’s a link. I love tools that expand our repertoire as artists and creators, and my iPad Pro is definitely a gift of inspiration! Thanks, Boston guys 🙂