Everett brought books for Grandpa to read to him!

 The climber and

  A charmer!

Presents are fun to play with!---I see I posted this on my "art blog", may have to redo it!

New paintings.  The bench was painted at Peggy's this past summer- her Dad's bench.  The gate is from a neighbor a few blocks away that I finally took a photo of to paint.

Some of Monica Dengos work from her workshop.

My books from Monica Dengo's class.  We used various tools, made our own pens similar to Cola pens, wrote with our non dominant hand, tried out different styles and tools, and then put the papers together in book form.  Some used colors but I stuck with black and white, and used watered down sumi ink for the grays.

Envelope samples.  The Mr and Mrs envelope is done in Italic style calligraphy
and the others are Copperplate (script) style.

SKETCH CLASS TODAY--- Peggy's Dad's saw horse which she added a top to it.  Unfinished so far -think it needs the dark brick behind the flowers to make them stand out.  I wasn't going to add the window in the back, but the composition needed it.

These are painted on heavy canvas and my class is next Monday!  I hope to do a few extra ones that I can letter on with a pen as I learned in Lisa Engelbrecht's workshop!

Prayer flags for the Lagrange Art League show.  I used acrylic washes and added layers when they seemed to light.  The triangles are a stencil I cut.  The green one has the strongest color so it seems the most successful.  I will teach a workshop at the Center, the first two Mondays in August where we will make prayer flags.

Tree Collage

This collage is 12 x 12" and done on canvas. The tree transfer came out a little dark on the right side so now I need to decide if it needs more on the right. The light green on the right is tissue paper that we painted and then applied polymer to it. The brown spotted paper is a coffee filter with polymer applied that had coffee added to it-both some of my favorite papers.

New Collages

I took a class at LaGrange with Laura and the collages started with a painted background. This first one is on a wood panel. We applied paint and then put saran wrap on top and mushed it around and lifted it and put it down in another place. This one happened to get some of the dried acrylic paint on it-which are the little flecks.

The dragonfly is on a canvas and about 9 x 9". It was done the same way but I've added the bits of papers to finish it and add interest.

It seemed a little too busy so I added the dark green that kind of grounded it and made the dragonfly stand out as the center of interest. In the photo the green seems a bit brighter than it really is.

The background has some of my gestural

writing papers.

More gestural writing in this one.

Work in three shows

I'm showing collages in three shows coming up.

LaGrange Art League Gallery:
When: May 7th - 31st
Hours: Mon -Sat 10:00 - 4:00
Reception: May 19th 2:00 -4:00

Downers Grove Library Show -The Midwest Collage Society is showing and it's going on now

Mayslake Best of the Best show- All artwork in area art leagues that received an award are included in this show, all media.
Where: Mayslake Peabody Estate
1717 W. 31st St, Oak Brook, IL
Dates: April 17-May 24
Hours: M-Fri, 9 am - 3 pm, Sat -9 am-1 pm
Reception: May 24, 6:30 p.m. - 9 p.m.

Back Soon

We've been so busy with a kitchen remodel so it's taken up all my time. Be back soon...

ATC Cards

We were doing ATC cards in collage class to exchange so I had to come up with a background to use.
I cut up a demo sheet that I had done using folded pen and coke pen with sumi ink and walnut ink. Then used a rust brush marker for a little more color. And the embossed letters add one more element.

Collage with Michigan photos

This has photos that my Dad took when he and friends biked around Lake Michigan as I understand. Some photos say Mackanac Island and have a couple of towns written on the back. I'm not sure what town this is on the left.
Then to finish it off, I transfered a photo of him with his bike over the old script.

Newest Painting

I wasnt' sure which photo was going to show the best color, but it seems like maybe inbetween. Anyway, I tried using bolder colors and especially, tried some dif. techniques like allowing some crawl backs in the paint for texture. I think the tulips got smaller and smaller but still will finish this.

On the left will be a silver syrup pitcher my Mom had when growing up! It's unfortunately melted on the bottom from being put on the stove she says, but has the M monogram on the front.

Newer Collages

This one is fine but the color of the small brownish window still bothers me.

These next two are the "painterly" collages that I did in a workshop. I finally added the green string tissue, and it seems finished now.