Open for Artful Business!

Registration for Artful Gathering opened yesterday – yay! That means I can finally tell you about my two new workshops, never taught before on this planet! (They are supposed to be secret until registration opens).

This year’s theme for the Artful Gathering online “summer camp” is celebrating the Southwest, so the first workshop I designed is actually about painting. Even if you don’t consider yourself a painter, this one is super-fun and easy. Called “Southwestern Stripes: Serapes and Sunsets,” it explores how simple stripe techniques in several media can come together to make spectacular artwork. There are over four hours of videos in this class with a ton of projects, including this mixed-media shrine painting on stretched canvas.

Serape Shrine

We start out with a very simple series of color studies in watercolor or gouache to portray the four Sacred Elements of Earth, Sky, Water and fire. Here’s “Sky.” These little paintings are totally fail-proof, honest.

For more about this class, you can take this link.

The second class is perhaps my most favorite of all my Artful Gathering workshops. It’s called Neo-Santos: Creating Personal Spirit Guardians.

It’s kinda like a spirit doll class, but with very different techniques. These small sculptures are created from found objects and collages papers, along with all kinds of charms and construction details.

Here’s an example of the first variation on the Neo-Santo theme:

Santa Colores

I also show you how to construct another variation I call Santa Blanca:

 

Neo-Santos is another 4+ hour class with a ton of ideas, inspirations and techniques.

Once the classes are actually open, you’ll download the videos and then work with me and the other students in the online classroom. If you haven’t done this kind of thing before it’s remarkably easy, plus you get the benefit of seeing everyone else’s work and getting specific feedback from me whenever you need it.

Click here to find out how to register for these classes, and for a bunch of other wonderful classes on Artful Gathering. Hope to see you in class – and if you have questions for me, just send me an email!

Altered paper, enduring magic

Ahhh – the smell of Citrasolv was in the air yesterday afternoon. Brushed onto the pages of National Geographic magazine, it never fails to turn photographs into otherworldly abstract patterns. When strips and scraps of this paper are combined, magic happens!

No matter how many times I teach this workshop, the results are fabulous – fresh, original and intriguing. Here’s a short video of the workshop participants creating their outstanding work in yesterday’s Small Worlds: Abstract Landscapes and Altered Paper gathering (If you can’t see the video, click here):

Lyn Belisle Workshop: Altered Paper Collage from Lyn Belisle on Vimeo.

Each person chose one of his or her works to mat, and here are their favorites:

Wally

Wally

Mackenzie

Mackenzie

Claire

Claire

5

Jan

Pamela

Pamela

3 copy

Linda

I taught a comprehensive version of this class at Artful Gathering several summers ago, and the DVD is available here.

There are also a number of free, online resources on this technique, including this really good one from Cathy Taylor.

This is one of those simple processes that rarely fails and is a lot of fun to put together! Happy Citrasolv sniffing!

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I can’t tell you what I did this weekend —

c5f4e638-93da-49ef-85f1-daae2cc99001–but it was fun!! Actually, here’s a hint from Artful Gathering:

“We are currently in video production for our 2016 online art event. This is an exciting time when our instructors are devoting themselves to creating a very special class to share with you this summer.”

So if you came by the Studio and saw a DO NOT DISTURB sign on the door, you’ll know why you couldn’t come in. I absolutely love developing and designing classes for Artful Gathering, and I spend several days each January and February filming and editing my AG classes.

Yesterday, hard at work filming an Artful Gathering class about . . . . .

Yesterday, hard at work filming an Artful Gathering class about . . . . .

The classes are kept a secret until March first (which is why I can’t tell you about them yet), but you can get involved with Artful Gathering right now and win prizes from Jerry’s ArtaRama. Starting today you can join the AG Hop called “Bring Your Wings” and play along each week, while meeting our 2016 instructors, including me in an upcoming newsletter.

It’s simple – just read the featured instructor’s profile, find the secret word (each one has wings by it – easy) and collect them. I’m doing this myself because i get to see everybody’s portfolios and steal – er, get inspired by – their ideas! Here’s a piece by my pal Riki Schumacher, a featured artist in today’s Hop – I can definitely see a face shard somewhere in some work inspired by this lovely piece – :

riki

 

To register for Artful Gathering, pay up just five bucks and you’ll get a whole bunch of stuff before and after the classes are announced. But you can play the Hop for free, so hop to it.

And if you can’t wait for May, just fork over a few more bucks for my Artful Gathering DVD’s – more in production, thanks to a long weekend of mystery filming. End of commercial, have a lovely day!

dvd

Lesta and Lyn, spooky spots, and Friday Freebie winner

Lesta Frank and I did a repeat of our Surface Design on Paper half-day workshop this past Sunday at the Studio. It’s totally amazing to watch eight creative people take the same concept and make an astonishing assortment of gorgeous one-of-a-kind artisan papers. We used the enhanced paper to cover small Lotus Books, each one a work of art in themselves. Wanna see?

 On Saturday, the day before our workshop, I did some video footage in the Olmos Dam Basin for an upcoming Artful Gathering online class – I can’t tell you much about the class yet, but it involves Spirits! That’s big hint.

DSC00267You can read an interesting article about Olmos Basin, and about author Whitley Streiber, here in the archives of Texas Monthly – kinda spooky. The author said he made contact with strange beings here. But my online class will not be scary, honest (although it may deal with strange beings). Stay tuned for details, and visit Artful Gathering for info about Early Bird Registration for all of their cool classes.

Kantha Cloth Bag with Florentine Shard Face

Kantha Cloth Bag with Florentine Shard Face

Last, but definitely not least, congrats to lucky subscriber #86, Joanne Desmond, who won the Friday Freebie in the random number drawing – Joanne, contact me and I’ll get your freebie to you ASAP.

Have a good day, everyone – and watch out for strange beings.

 

 

 

Friday Freebie in honor of Artful Gathering opening day!!

My very first online classroom for Artful Gathering opens today and I’m excited! Students will have six weeks to learn how to make clay faces and use them in three wonderful projects – and this magnetic pin (second picture below) is one of them. In honor of opening day, I’m giving away a pin kit (also available on Etsy) to a randomly-drawn SHARDS subscriber – the drawing will be on Sunday night.

All of this is a clever nudge to ask you to (1) check out my class and all the other classes on Artful Gathering, and (2) subscribe to my blog if you don’t already (just type your email in the upper right corner of the sidebar and hit “subscribe”). Anyone subscribed by Sunday, including all you dear wonderful current subscribers, will be in the drawing.

Here’s your dilemma – do you pass this post this along to friends and help me get subscribers, thus lessening your chance to win? Heck, yeah! It’s good Karma. Happy Friday, everyone! ♥ ♥ ♥

Your very own kit to make a magnetic art-to-wear pin to clip to a shirt, hat, lampshade . . .:)

Your very own kit to make a magnetic art-to-wear pin to clip to a shirt, hat, lampshade . . .:)

The finished Magnetic Shard Face pin

The finished Magnetic Shard Face pin – too cool!!!

Ooh! Ooh! Look! Artful Gathering . . .

I feel like a happy dog running around in circles, wagging its tail – ooh, ooh! I just found out that my intro video is up on the Artful Gathering online art teaching site! Check it out – the video’s on the front page! Arf! <wag> OK, I’m being insufferable – but still . . .agphoto there’s a lot in it about San Antonio, not just ME 🙂

It’s going to be a fun experience, and working with the other Artful Gathering faculty artists is a trip. Some of them, like Keith Lo Bue, I’ve admired for years, and others I’m just beginning to get to know, but they all do fabulous work. One of my favorites is fellow AG teacher Luthein Thye from Malaysia. Her small constructions reflect her love of fantasy and magic and she’s an amazing craftsman (craftswoman?)luthien-portfolio-poster Watch her video if you get a chance and see the Malaysian village where she finds inspiration.

The Artful Gathering concept was developed by Zinnia Galliher. She’s got that rare combination of artistic talent and organizational vision that makes the AG group so rewarding to work with. Even though registration is still a ways away, I’d better get busy developing my lessons. But do look around the Artful Gathering site – there’s a ton of good stuff to discover.  Yay! Arf! <wag>