Artiscape: The Demos!

Shortly after my first class concluded, I attended the Artiscape reception, which included a preview of the marketplace (dangerous spot but considerably smaller than the last time I attended). Also on tap was a series of demos. I attended four.

The first was from calligrapher and painter Barbara Close, in whose class I was enrolled the following day.

This was fun, simple and effective. She took copies of a couple of quotes she had elegantly penned. Our task was to use paints and powders to add accents.

I used watercolors -- both "traditional" watercolors and this wonderful pan of metallic watercolors (which I bought at the marketplace.) I also used a bit of the gold powder. This is the final result.

I loved this because it was so darned simple. Of course, part of what makes it looks good is Barbara's lettering, and I won't be able to duplicate that! Still, you get the gist of it!

Patricia Baldwin Seggenbruch showed us some encaustic basics.

I've seen a number of bloggers (but most notably Kristine Campbell) do things with encaustic and it sounded rather complicated.

Certainly a 10 or 15 minute demo is going to cut some things short! But Patricia was an excellent teacher, able to cut a complicated and time consuming process to its essence and deliver some beautiful results.

I have to say that I'm probably not going to take up this amazing art myself -- but I have tremendous respect for it, and it wouldn't surprise me if a piece of someone else's ended up on my wall someday!

The third demo I was was from Jacqueline Sullivan. I was signed up for her class the following day as well and have taken classes from her before. She's an excellent instructor. The topic of this one was "foil painting."

THIS one I must try! Basically, Jacqueline covers a surface with foil (attached with gel medium -- again, more complicated than I'm saying, but enough to give you the idea). It's then textured with a variety of tools.

She then mixes fluid acrylic with GAC 200 and paints.

It sounds simple. But there's more to it than meets the eye! What I can say is that the end result is fabulous!

Finally, Kathleen Wentz (I can't find a website for her; I'll put in a link if I get one) showed us some fun techniques with stamping and inking.

I don't stamp very much and when I do, it's pretty much -- hit the pad, make the impression. So it was good to see how easy some of the techniques were.

And the colorful piece she worked on was fun!

Can you imagine how after seeing a bundle of creativity -- fast creativity -- I was excited for the next workshops? In the next post, we'll go to Barbara Close's "Paper Textures" class.

(New at Chopsticks and String: "Anne Frank in Words and Pictures.")