Encaustic Kitchen Mixology

When I first read books about encaustic wax painting, they all mentioned that it is economical and advantageous based on your painting needs to make your own encaustic medium from beeswax and damar resin... Right! I figured I would never need to take the time to make my own medium because it would surely be readily available from my local art supply stores... Wrong! In a desperate pinch, I found myself having to work some kitchen magic to make encaustic medium for a class I was teaching. Now I no longer tremble in fear. It's really quite simple!

I grabbed the kitchen supplies from KMart - candy thermometer, 4 quart saucepan (I recommend one with side pouring lip(s)), a small metal strainer, tight woven cloth for straining (like organza) and a cookie sheet or ice tray... preferably a silicon one! I found some great silicon King Cube ice trays at Ace Hardware to help with easily popping out the cooled blocks of medium. SCORE! :)

If you haven't already, grab Linda and William Womack's book, Embracing Encaustic; they have an easy to understand recipe and great pictures to help you along with the making encaustic medium process. The formula simply uses white beeswax and damar resin (not damar varnish!). The resin looks like light colored chunks of amber and is quite hard. I found the Jacquard beeswax at Jerrys Artarama. Sometimes you can find the beeswax and resin at Pearl Paint, and Utrecht as well - look for it in the oil painting area.

Making the encaustic medium in your kitchen is so easy. I usually use 2 pounds (2 bags or 32oz) of white beeswax and 4 ounces of damar resin. I make sure to turn the stove top extractor fan on high, then throw in enough beeswax to cover the bottom of the pan to at least 1/8 of an inch, bring it to 175 degrees F / 80 degrees C on a burner and wait for it to melt - swirl the candy thermometer around in the wax and watch the temp carefully. When all the wax in the bottom of the pan is melted, I add all 4 oz of the damar resin at once and raise the temp to 220 degrees F / 105 degrees C. The resin will begin to sizzle and pop...this is ok! Swirl the resin and small amount of wax around until the resin is liquefied (this could take up to 15 min)  then pour in the rest of the 2 pounds of beeswax. Turn the temperature back down to 175F/80C, put the lid on the pot, and keep an eye on the melting, occasionally stirring with the candy thermometer.

 It can take a half an hour or more for all the wax to melt. When all in the pan is liquefied, use the candy thermometer to swirl together the ingredients. Pour the liquid medium out of the pan, through the fine cloth (like organza) and through the metal strainer into the cookie sheet or ice cube tray. Set aside to cool.

If using a cookie tray, cut the medium in squares with a knife while still warm. After the medium cools, pop out of the blocks of finished medium...if they are difficult to get out, put the tray in the refrigerator or freezer for 5 to 10 minutes, the flip the tray over and bang on the back. All will pop out easily!

Now that I have made encaustic medium several times, I wonder why I ever stressed so much about doing it. Is there something you have avoided doing along your artistic journey that you can try soon in order to overcome your fear? Thanks for sharing the activity you attempted and conquered with me and other readers in the comments below...

HAPPY ARTING!      Tristina

Finished R&F and the Encaustic Art Book!

 The perfect ending to a fantastic workshop visit to R&F Paints...I got to spend the day yesterday learning about ecaustic wax painting from Lisa Pressman and had a whole day to myself today in the workshop focusing on working with encaustic paints. One of the things that Lisa said about working with encaustic is that, "It's all about the heat." So true; I got to experiment with that today using both the butane torch and multi-temp heat gun. Here's the result of what I worked on yesterday and today:

My encaustic wax paint pallet. The wax is heated to about 200 degrees.

The brushes are kept on the hot plate or the bristles go hard in 30 seconds!



 The painting standing up is my finished 'tree bark' work. Others are in progress...

Detail of tree bark work showing black lines and pinholes filled with graphite.

The opaque areas will turn translucent as the wax cools and hardens.

Here's a piece in process. Will finish at home...

 I'm placing a photograph I've roughed up with sandpaper and coated with wax medium onto a large panel.

 Here's my peeling paint and photo painting in progress... Will finish at home.

Detail of painting with photo I took in Antibe, France a few years ago.

 It's so wonderful that R&F has available all the paint colors and tools for working with both oil paint pigment sticks and encaustic wax paints as part of their class/studio fee. I got to play with all the colors I wanted for the past 4 days! I met so many talented and inspiring people at the workshop (Dayna, Ian, Leslie, Serena, Kitty and Irene) as well as the folks who work at R&F (Richard, Pamela, Darren, Laura, Kelly, Kristin, Melissa, Sienna and a few others). I even bought 2 new Encaustic books and 5 DVD's, so will be giving you those reviews as I read/watch them!

 Today I also finished the 'Encaustic Art' book by Lissa Rankin. Loved the last several chapters discussing how different encaustic artists store, pack and ship their paintings as well as a discussion of how to educate galleries about encaustic if they are not familiar with the medium. I even read the last page with a short bio on Lissa and in the very last sentence it gave a web site address for sharing resources, education, how-tos, photos and creative inspiration for encaustic artists: www. EncausticandBeyond.com. This book was great to the very last sentence!!!

Submitted Today to Broward Art Guild Show

Wow! I was up till the wee hours last night finishing several pieces that I took today to submit to the Tri-County Art Show sponsored by the Broward Art Guild. Below are pics of the 5 pieces I submitted and some of the folks helping me to sign my pieces in, Nancy and Marlene.

"Serene Repose"

This is painted in acrylics over a photograph I took in San Francisco. I hand painted and colored the paper on the right. The dot in the middle of Buddha's forehead is a massive sparkly Swarovski crystal. Size 18x24

"Sunset Harbour"

I loved the way my acrylic hand colored paper came out, so I mounted it straight to canvas...very powerful. Size12x14

"Enchanted Forest"

My acrylic paint hand colored paper gave me the impression of light in the late afternoon playing between the trees. The trunks and leaves are textured acrylic. Size 16x20 See the detail below. 

"Mad Balloons"

Here my acrylic hand colored paper was punched out into circles and embedded in layers of encaustic wax. I love how bright and happy this piece is! Size 5x7 on wood panel.

Detail of the sides showing the wax drips is below.

"Daffodillia"

Another encaustic wax painting using a real US postage stamp and my own acrylic hand colored paper. There's lots of texture and depth in this one! Size 8x8 on wood panel.

Side view showing the wax drips is below.

The common thread among the artwork I submitted today is all have my acrylic hand colored paper in them somewhere...I hope at least one of my pieces is accepted for the show!

I have rarely seen encaustic wax paintings in Florida because the extreme heat can melt the wax, therefore encaustic paintings here have to be very carefully kept in cool temperatures and out of direct sunlight. It only takes 160 degrees or more to melt the wax, so no leaving them in the car either!

I have been reading a lot of the "Encaustic Art" book in an effort to have it done before I go up to R&F Paints this coming week to take a 3 day mixed media and oil paint stick workshop in Kingston, NY. R&F is famous for manufacturing a large line of encaustic wax paints and oil/wax paint sticks. I'm going to learn so much there! I'll be sure to share what happens there...

Tristina

Nature as Art

Nature amazes me! Endless possibilities of subjects for drawing are simply outside my window, in books and magazines, under the water, in a blade of grass or limb of a tree...

Today I was inspired by a faint background image from one of my art books that gave the impression of a jellyfish or live sanddollar. I immediately grabbed the corner of a large pad of paper I have handy to draw on and spilled my own impression of a jellyfish out on it with a sharpie. I put the picture away, then read in my 'Encaustic Art' book that I can use pastels when working in wax. I yanked my jellyfish picture out again and grabbed my Pan Pastels to give it a quick color up from my imagination. Here it is:

Notice the loosey goosey drawing of a giraffe in the background (from a National Geographic Traveler magazine) that was done by looking at the giraffe and drawing on the paper without looking at the paper while not lifting the pen at all. This is called blind contour drawing and was an exercise out of the book 'Drawing Lab'. It's a great way to warm up and it's fun to see the results!

I hear all the time people who say, "I can't draw!", or, "I'm not an artist. I could never do what you do." I used to say exactly the same thing (having been a computer geek all my life)!!! Here's my advice - EVERYBODY  CAN  DRAW  AND  MAKE  ART! The way to do it is simply to start by doodling the things you see in nature or around the house. Make your pictures loosey goosey and don't worry for a second if the outcome seems childish or doesn't "look good" to you. There are artists in this world today making big $ on artwork of a childish nature...it strikes a chord with people and reminds them of their limitless childhood imagination; there's something charming and heartfelt about child-like work.

Start today, and leave me a comment or send me a picture of what you do. TristinaElmes@yahoo.com. Happy drawing... :)

Tristina

Encaustic Art HeyDay!

Usually Wednesdays are my studio day. Today, however, I did not go to my studio and stayed home instead playing with my new R&F encaustic paints! Last night I had used R&F's Encaustic Gesso (a much more high solid gesso with much less binder than a typical acrylic gesso) to prepare a bunch of artist's boards for encaustic painting. I just couldn't keep my hands away from them this morning...

I had fun experimenting with the encaustic medium, impasto medium, and colors Azure Blue, Warm Pink, Naples Yellow and Zinc & Titanium Whites, all that I heated in tins from R&F Paints on my pancake griddle. I added to the encaustic paints my own acrylic hand-colored papers, postage stamps and images printed on tissue from my Epson printer. I played around with some of the techniques from Lissa Rankin's book 'Encaustic Art' and found out which worked as stated for me and which didn't! Here are some of the results:

The painting with the flower I call "Daffodillia" and the spatter paint one I call "Taverna".

Daffodillia is made using Patricia Balldwin Seggebruch's amber shellac wet burn method. I'm such a pyro...love to watch the fire coming off the panel and the wax floating around in a random pattern - fascinating.

Taverna reminds me of a Greek tavern where fun and frivolity reign supreme among a close knit community. Think I'm going to have to keep this one in my private collection!

I'll be working on arranging and organizing my home studio over the next few days. It'll feel so good to have a place all set up with my supplies easily at hand and my sewing machine set up and ready for regular use. :)