Yay and Yay! One of My calendars is featured in Holly Becker’s 2011 calendar wrap up
for her hugely popular Decor8 blog.

I am totally excited! It’s a big honor as she received squillions of submissions and the calendars selected are AMAZING! Ooooh! I’m all star struck!

Here is Holly’s intro:

“It’s that time of year, and to keep tradition around here I’m rounding up the best of the best calendars for the coming year just as I have now since 2006. … I want these amazing artists to have their work promoted and their calendars purchased…spread the love people and let’s help these artists sell their calendars for the coming year!”

Click here to read more of Holly’s Decor8 post

You can see and Buy my calendars here ( hint hint!): http://instituteofcute.com.au/

This one is published in the USA by the wonderful Leap Year! Avalon is their upmarket imprint.

In the USA you can get them at lots of stores ( Walgreens, Big Lots, Walmart etc)  and online from calendars.com

i just spent 4 days with my niece for her 5th birthday. She is such a little cutie doll. We painted and drew and hung out with her dollies. It was supercalifragilistic! I am missing her a bundle today…her cute little laugh and demands of “Aunty Jane!” like I was the most important person in the whole world…oh it was heaven on a stick!

And painting with a my 3 year old twin nephews was so liberating! Their sense of colour was so free…no trying to harmonise the pallet, or integrate the background and subject. It got me thinking: Is there a correlation between: The more I learn and cram into my skull; the less room I have to just meander creatively along?

I am thinking back to my earliest photography days and it’s amazing how little technical know-how changed the overall feel of my work! I can see technical improvements in focus and image clarity bought about by equipment upgrades. I can see a refinement of process and less and less reliance on software to perfect a shot. I can see artistic growth bought about by experimentation. What I can’t see is all the books and magazines I read!

I want my work to improve of course, but I don’t want my work to become tight or restricted. I don’t want to just worry about technique and forget the simple joy that creating brings. I flourish under workshop guidance, but I need to be mindful of the teachers I enlist and make sure they are espousing  technique, not their style.

So on my painting journey, I am approaching things a little differently. I have accepted that I am an intuitive creative. I like to experiment on my own. Just start off and see where I go and let my inner 3 year old call the shots! Of course I listen repectfully and politely to advice that is coming from a place of love, but I don’t follow it if it just doesn’t feel ‘right’ to me (for me!).

I won’t allow myself to feel ‘silly’ or ‘wrong footed’ for using my tools in the way that works for me. I am not an art historian, I don’t know all the laws of composition and colour. and I don’t care! There! I said it! I don’t need to know so much! I am just going to ‘do’.

Hoo Boy, I never expected my cute faux-babies (I have furbabies too!)  to have such life lessons to teach me!

x Jane

This is a little vid I made of my Art Journal Laboratory…! I do a lot more in in than just AJing, but it’s what it started out as but has since gone on to become my favourite space in my studio. I have my art supplies all around me. I keep them pretty organised (I just KNOW in my HEART that pencils like to all live with the heads  together and paint loves to sleep in rainbow order).

Part of my creative ritual is to tidy everything before and after I paint/draw/scribble/ponder/write…

Leave a link in the comments to your creative space!

xJane

My latest video is up!

It involves many of my favourite things – mermaids, woodburning and prismacolor pencils…!

I am a dyed in the wool Epson printer user. I have been all my photographic career. There was a brief 1 day experiment with a huge Canon – but, I returned it. I have had a succession of wide format printers and even a 4800 that traveled around the USA with me in an RV as I was on an exhibition tour (it had it’s own bed!)…

And then 3 years ago, at a Fine Art printing workshop with John Paul Caponigro I worked with the Epson Photo R2880. And well…that printer and I fell in love. It was a brief lived affair, passing ships in the night as I had to return to Australia. But as soon as I got back, I ebayed my big printers and replaced them all with the desktop friendly R2880 (Ok! I have a big desk!). No more marching across the room to check on a print 10 times…no more clogged ink heads and curly paper. Just perfect colour, no dramas, no maintenance. Heaven. When I need to print big, I outsource. Easy.

I have used Epson papers pretty solidly. I like the Archival Matte Paper. Great colour and detail and it’s not too expensive. Anyway, I ran out of paper for a print order and had to raid the cupboard. I found a box of Epson Ultrasmooth Fine Art Paper. And the prints were…ummmm…how do you say…PRINTALICIOUS! They made me all hot under the collar and loving in their general direction….

So I thought…I need to test more paper! Broaden my papery horizons…. so I ordered sample packs form Museo, Crane, Moab, and massed my collection of Hahnemuhle, Epson, Canon, Ilford, and HP papers for a shoot out!

I created an image that had strips from the various work I do:

1. High contrast photographic: a sliver of ‘Puff Ball’ with fine line work and an area of dense black. I have a lot of images that are high contrast black and white.

2.A pen sketch -  this image snuck in to the test, as I drew it last night, and just really LOVE it…so decided I am going to print it for my next gallery show -as is. So I need a paper that looks good without any ink on it at all in parts – looking good in the nude!

4. Full colour painting with lots of texture.

5. Pencil drawing with fine detail.

6. Colour photo with subtle colour transitions.

What I discovered is my printer is just the BEST when I look after it -  ie: Don’t feed it mouthfuls that are too big, papers that are too thick (I can change settings and manually feed, but, hello?! I have a life!) and don’t leave it printing on its own for too long (it likes my company, we are in love ok?!!).

Any papers that just didn’t feed comfortably into my printer, were left out of the test. Spoon feeding a printer gets very tiresome…. I can go from happy Jane to freaky, no-lips, bug-eyed Jane in nano seconds when that paper path light starts flashing…it just irritates me faster than anything else on earth…grrrrrrrr…see just talking about it makes me boil….

All of the papers I tested were surprisingly fantastic – especially the washi papers by Moab – how do you say yumyumpaper in Japanese? oh yeah – “Moenkopi” and as soon as I become a millionaire, I will use the Unryu and Kozo papers everyday. But for now….

After creating a pig pile of prints, much deliberating and staring at them …drum roll please….THE WINNER IS:

Moab Entrada Rag Natural 300.

It is 100% cotton rag, archival to forever and a day, it has a creamy warmth, not yellow. It has a substantial feel and a tiny bit of texture. Colour was reproduced clear and true. It handled al of my requirements. I didn’t expect to find one paper to rule them all. The Epson R2880 has been making flirty eyes at it all day…

The printer and I really loved Museo Max also, but it isn’t imported into Australia in the size I need….next!

My Epson Enhanced Archival Matt stacked up well and is certainly cheaper, but I love the extra body of the Moab Entrada Rag Natural 300 (I am just going to call it MERN from now on ok? you know what I am talking about!).

I also reconfirmed I like matte papers better. I am just not a gloss/photo/satin/lustre fan. The shine gets in the way of seeing the artwork (too much bling?)

I added the Moab ‘Desert Varnish‘ spray to my order too, which is said to “double the life of the print and protect it against scratches, UV and saliva” …what the?…sometimes I want to kiss my prints, but lick them…that’s just weird…!

and the best thing? I still I have lots of gorgeous paper left over from my tests, and will enjoy creating works on them all!

This was a task I highly recommend – or you can just take my word for it

x

Jane

P.S. What is your favourite paper for fine art printing?

Well, my exciting news for today is my artwork being featured on the main page at Suzi Blu’s website…
I am spontaneously breaking out in happy dances…!

Here she is at Suzi Blu’s!

(click on the image to go to the site)

Materials used:

I used Stewart Gill Porcelain and Vanilla in her flesh tones (LOVE!) and glimmery peach Afterglow (my favourite) in her scales.
In the background I used Colourise Ultramarine, Metamica willow blue (2nd most favourite!), Pearlise Mermaid (of course!), Galactica Ocean and Byzantia Seraphym, Aegean and illuminata …
and a little itty, bitty,weenie bit of Byzantia Seraphym in her eyes.
Yes, I have a weakness for SG Paints… I have Whirlwind and Waternymph and Oyster on my wish list!

I painted my Goldfish Mermaid on wood using the background techniques I learned in the La Sirena mixed media workshop (which is still open for enrolment btw).

Once I finished her, I decided to be brave and beeswax the whole thing and add embellishments. I received a little selection of treasures from my last paint order with Artist Cellar for my Stewart Gill paints (watch my video tour of my studio to see exactly how much I LOVE my SG paints!!). Gilding chips, fresco flakes, shimmery fibers…and a little superfine glitter…

Anyway, I had a real ball, tried lots of new things and am already on to the next mermie! I just love doing on-line workshops. I squeeze all my class ‘homework’ in amongst my usual art practice…I find the workshops and interaction with fellow students very nourishing.

Here are some of the details – this is VERY new for me, so I am pretty excited that I got it feeling cohesive. I am not usually the ‘embellishment’ type…but… I am embracing a new chapter perhaps? Fun, fun, fun!

I just love a good supernatural hybrid, and the maids of the sea have long held my heart in their cold, wet hands. So when the teachalicious Miss Suzi Blu started talking about a whole class dedicated to them, I was immediately on the list! I started drawing them everywhere…and had quite a collection before the class even started…

I have done a few of Suzi Blu’s online classes, and I have recommended them to you before, but this is the first one I have done as it goes ‘live to air’. And there is a difference. Anticipation. It has made the forum very active as the 450+ class members finish the prescribed exercises and paintings, and come back for more…we all circle like sharks, and if there is nothing new to download from Miss Blu ( she is a human after all!) we all chat to each other. Lots and lots of chat. Mostly about art and related to what we are up to. A huge amount about supplies and techniques. How the students fit art and being creative into busy lives. Gentle suggestions and encouragement for the work posted.

And then there are the discussions on the biggest dilemma with Mermaids – whether to show their boobies in all their glory, or to give them a little modesty? So great is the debate that a new word has been coined on the forum for mermie nipples-  ‘Mipples’!

Mipples out for this undersea goddess. I was playing with the dappled effect of the water on her skin.

Underlying all the fun are some very sound artistic principles. Suzi is determined to get her students out of the habit of only using a colour straight from the tube, and mixing. We did some color excercises that really got me thinking about color and creating colour wheels with more understanding than ever before. I have worked with and studied colour all my life…so it’s not as if any new secrets are being revealed, it’s just the way Suzi teaches. By making it fun. I don’t know exactly why I find her classes so valuable, or why they work me for me so well, they just do!

New video classes are posted every 10 days or so, with Live class chats in-between. Students can join anytime, and do the work at their own pace. Student ability/experience ranges from practicing professionals to people who have not drawn or painted since early childhood. We are all on a wonderful La Sirena voyage together.

Here are some of my recent  Mermaid sketches…they will swim into bigger works perhaps…who knows!

The Goldfish mermaid gets a bikini made of her golden scales…

The Kelp mermaid gets a body stocking…

Click here to find out more…