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!!!

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. :)

Buddhist Teachings Hold Wax Sacred

While reading 'Encaustic Art' by Lissa Rankin today, I came across this passage that I thought was really neat:

'(Michael) David was delighted to discover that, in Buddhist teachings, wax is a sacred material, "a metaphor for compassion, fragility, and change."'

No wonder I am so drawn to encaustic wax painting right now.....

So Excited About Encaustic Supplies!

Yesterday I received a box of Encaustic Wax painting supplies from R&F Paints!

I know, you must be thinking, 'How do you paint with wax?' I thought the same thing, too, and have had my interest piqued lately with many articles in art & craft magazines / books including this painting medium. What I discovered in the 'Encaustic Art' book that I am currently reading (by Lissa Rankin) is that wax has actually been found preserved as a painting medium in Egyptian Fayum portraits from as far back as the first century BC!

I've also been inspired to use wax in my mixed media paintings lately from watching the DVD 'Encaustic Techniques' by Patricia Baldwin Seggebruch. Hence... this latest R&F Paints order. Some of my "Fossil Bones" series paintings have encaustic medium painted over my own hand-colored papers before glueing/nailing on the petrified bones. I ordered the new encaustic products to take working with the medium to the next level with some of the techniques found on the DVD. I'll let you know how it goes...