Open Studio by appointment.

 

You're invited!

It's certainly been a different kind of year and we've all had to make changes and adjustment throughout it. I wasn't able to have my annual Open Studio this year so instead I've opened up the studio for some personal shopping by appointment. I haven't done any shows this year but I have still been creating so there is lots to choose from. I've also had a few new supply orders come in so the supply shop is stocked full of creative goodies. 

If you'd like to come by to do some shopping just give me a call or e-mail to make an appointment. All Covid protocols are in place and I ask that you wear a mask while here. If you can't make it here or are not comfortable coming in I am doing porch pick up and some local deliveries. Just give me a shout to let me know what you are in need of. 

I look forward to helping you out with your Christmas shopping. Here are a few pics of the studio and what's available .

Clare can't be here but she has been nice enough to drop off some soap so you can stock up.

All new supplies just in.

As with my usual Open House there is a supply discount table. This year everything on this table is 15% off. A great way to shop for the creative someone in your family.
 

Houses in isolation.

With all that is going on right now and the amount of time we are spending in our homes it only seemed right to have houses/home as the theme for August. I've had some wood houses sitting on my work table for some time now just waiting for inspiration and/or incentive to getting going on them. Of course that's not the only kind of houses I created this month. I love the theme of houses and can't stop thinking of different kinds to do now. I think houses will keep popping up in my studio long after the theme has past. 

This wood block house was nature inspired. I started off with crackle medium for some texture and used Nuvo Expanding Mousse for the mushrooms. It gave me some great dimensional texture. 

More crackle paste on the back with some nature die cuts coloured with embossing powder.

I call this one The Queens House. When I started it I was think maybe along the medieval or Gothic lines. 

It took me a few weeks to finally discover that it was the Queens house and then of course the queen bee had to go on the back. 

You didn't really think I wouldn't do a doodled mushroom house did you. It may get some colours in the future.

 These are a couple of house ATC's for trading. They are still up for grabs if you'd like to do an ATC house trade.

Do you do any house art? I'd love to see it if you do.

Keep Creating!

Wendy

Keeping the creative momentum.

Oh my, time seems to have slipped through my fingers again and now it's almost the end of August and I haven't posted here since June. How does that happen even in this strange time of isolation when I have no classes or creative studio and so much time at home on my own. However it happens I am sorry for not post more here. I won't promise that I will do more but I will do my best to do better. I have the best of intentions and so many ideas to share with you. Well we will see...

The theme for July on Dragonfly Dreamers monthly exploration group was Cards. I had intended to do many different kind of cards but I ended up just doing some affirmation cards and ATC's. They were all done with layers of collage, paints and pens. I start off by doing a full sheet of collage and painting and then I cut them to the size I want before finishing them of with some mark making and doodling the back with an affirmation or quote.

These ATC's all got traded with people from the group.

These affirmation cards are 4.5"x3". I think of the left side as the front and the right side as the back but both are finished pieces on their own. I have quite a collection of these cards now and like to shuffle through them and choose one each day for a daily affirmation.

I hope you are keeping creating.

Wendy

June's inchie a day challenge.

   I hope you are finding some creative outlets during these strange times we are going through. I have been keeping busy creatively and trying some new things. 

   This month I gave myself a tiny challenge. Well, at least tiny in size. I was inspired by Belinda Fireman and her Self Love 365 Project. She did an inchie (that's a one inch square piece of art) each day for a year. I modified mine to try it for a month and my theme was Happy Little Thoughts.

   With just a few days left I thought I'd show you how it's going.

Happy Little Thought

I decide to do it in one of my art journals. This journal has Bristol pages and was great for using pens, markers and colour pencils.

Day 6 Hiding in the jungle

Day 20 Mushroom house.

Day 25 Bumble Bee

Day 8 Mandala

This was a fun project to keep my creative momentum going.

What kind of creative projects have you been doing to keep you going?

Wendy

Journey of a page

   This month on the Dragonfly Dreamers Exploration group page the theme is art journaling.  I have been playing in art journals for 6 or 7 years now. It is probably one of my favourite things to do. There are no rules and it doesn't have to be perfect because it's just for me. I use them to experiment and try new techniques and mediums. I use them to do online class work in. I use them for doodling, drawing...well for just about anything. I have quite a few I'm working in at any given time and I often work in more than one at a time. The sizes vary from small 5"x5" handmade journals to larger 8"x12".  Mostly I like to use ones with heavy watercolour paper but a few have different paper and one is all black.

   

   Often when there is left over paint from other projects or students work, I slap it into a journal page without any thought as to what I will do with it. So my journals have quite a few pages in this ugly stage. Last week I asked people on my social media to choose a page for me to finish. This is the page they chose and it's journey.

This page was probably the nicer of the three to chose from. At this stage it's just left over paint that's been slopped on and a bit added with a stencil. I often don't have an idea when I start a page but for this one I did. I knew I wanted a kind of jungle leafy look and a face peaking out. But first I needed layers.

Since it already had some stenciling started it only seemed natural to keep going with more layers of stencils. This is all done with acrylic paints. It's amazing how fast doing some layers of stencils can bring the page together.

After the stenciling I was drawn to the circles so I accentuated them a bit with pastels and graphite.

At this point I did something that I almost regretted. I took some paint and scraped it across the page here and there. I did not like this as soon as I got it on and this stuff dries fast. I quickly took a paper towel and took some off. It didn't take it all but the effect worked after all. This is the light coloured splotches(technical term) you can see. I could live with it now.

Then it was time for mark making. For this I used pastels, Marabu Art crayons and some graphite. 

And then there are all the details. I spent quite a while, over a few days playing with the rest. For the leaves I used mostly acrylic paint and some Posca paint pens. I used Caran D'ache Neocolor II to do some shading and blending of the background. More marks were added in spaces that needed them.  It was a very fun page to do. 

I hope you enjoyed hearing a bit about the process of a journal page. Are you an art journaler?

Keep Creating!
Wendy

A challenge for challenging times.

   I hope in these challenging time you are finding some peace of mind in creativity. My studio has certainly been my sanctuary in the last month and I'm so grateful for it. 

   I've been playing with a lot of different things and exploring a few new ones. Although I had lots of things to do and play with I decided to give myself a challenge for the month of April. I am doing a sketch/drawing each day and posting on Instagram. Drawing is something that I have been wanting to do more of so I thought this was a good opportunity. 

Day 3 Flutter

Day 4 Nest

Day 5 Lush

Day 6 Breeze

Day 10 Fledgling.

   If you'd like to see more or to join in use #sketchapril2020 on Instagram.

   What creativeness have you been doing to keep you going?

Wendy

Monthly Explorations

   It's been an interesting year so far to say the least. I've been taking some time to reboot and work on some new projects over the winter and just when I am ready to get back to doing some workshops the world has turned upside down. Now it's time to rethink the next  steps to take.
   Being an introvert makes the social distancing an easy thing to do for me. So I'm choosing to take advantage of my extra time alone in the studio to play and catch up on things. I hope you're able to make the best of the situation and give yourself permission to play.

   One of the things that has kept me busy this year is my Monthly Explorations Themes over on my FB group. In January the theme was Doodling, Mark Making and Drawing. What's not to like about that!

8"x5" journal page on Bristol Smooth

9"x11.5" Dylusions journal page.

In February the theme was Stencils. I love my stencils and use them often. There are so many ways to use them. Here are just a few.

Since it was February I had to do a few heart cards. I made my own heart stencil with a heart die I have and then layered other stencils on top of it for the patterns. I used Distress Inks and Oxides for the colours along with some light modeling paste and Finnabair Icing Paste for the texture through stencils.

Multiple layered stencils.

This page was done with a lot of layers of collage material, paints and stencils. The mushrooms were a new stencil I got recently from Stencil Girl. I used Nuvo Expanding Mousse through the stencil. This was an new product for me and I loved the way it puffs up when heated. Once dried I coloured the mushrooms with Finnabair waxes.

9.5"x8" double page in small Dylusions journal.

This is another page done with lots of layers and even more stencils. But here the stencils are used mostly in the background instead of the focal point as the mushrooms were. 

9.5"x8" double page in small Dylusions journal.

  And now in March the theme is Watercolour. This is not a medium that I play with much or know much about so it really is about exploring and learning. 

  I made myself a small book with 5.5"x5.5" watercolour paper pages to do my playing/experimenting in. It is a nice size to try out something new.

   I did a few pages of rocks. They were great for practicing some mixing and layering of colours.

Watercolour rocks.

   These little swatch doodles were inspired by a fun Canadian Artist, Cee Cee's Creations. You can find many of her videos on Youtube. They were very fun to do. I'm sure I will be doing more of them this month. 

Watercolour swatch doodles.

  If you'd like to see more come over and take a look at Dragonfly Dreamers Monthly Exploration Themes. And of course you are always welcome to join the group.

Keep Creating!

Wendy

Starting the year with colours

This years first workshop was a fun group that contacted me to do an Acrylic Pour Swipe workshop for them. It's always nice to have a group of friends in the studio to play. Since they hadn't done any Acrylic Pouring before we did a little exploring with Dirty Pours as well as swipes and waves. They did really well for their first time pouring. 

Aleksandro

Daniel

Diane

Karen

Lara

Shannon

This is a sampling of one of each of their pours that they created in an afternoon. 

Thanks Karen for organizing your friends for a play day here in the studio. Look forward to seeing you again some time.

Happy Creating!

Wendy