Encaustic flowers

5 x 6" encaustic on birch panel
After much experimentation trying to translate my previous flower paintings to encaustics, this is what I've come up with. There's really no controlling wax, which is what I sometimes love and sometimes hate about it. This was a good compromise. I was able to control the wax to some extent and do some drawing in it, which is fun, but there's also some lovely 'mistakes' where the wax blends and does what it will.
They are happy little paintings for Spring, and the best part is they smell fantastic!

Have a good weekend Ms. Petersen

I'm off to the beach for a blistery & possibly snowy weekend. Maybe I'll finally get a
chance to watch my library movies.

I don't have any new art to post before leaving, but after some trial and error, I figured out a method for translating my floral paintings to wax. I have one done so far, but two others in the works, so I'll post them when I get back. I'll also be posting the other paintings I finished in my shop next week.

Oh and the posting title? I live next door to Safeway and so despite it not being my favored grocery store, I seem to find myself there nearly every day and sometimes three times a day when I'm being especially forgetful. Every time, when I punch in my club card number upon checkout, the name 'Amanda Petersen' prints out on my receipt. The checker then looks at the receipt, hands it to me and says 'you saved $2.03 today Ms. Petersen.' I never thought to correct them, why bother? Today I was running out and I forgot something at the checkout stand. I heard someone yell behind me, 'oh wait.. Ms. Petersen!', and I turned around. I guess after 4 years of being called Ms. Petersen, I'm conditioned. Just who is this Amanda Petersen I wonder, and why do I have her club card number?

Self portrait with glasses

I rarely wear my glasses. Only to watch movies with subtitles and to drive at night. I could probably stand to wear them more, but my glasses are a tad large for my face. Since I don't wear them daily, I went for the cheap big chunky black frames. I usually spend too much on designer frames, and well I wanted some heavy duty glasses. The kind you don't lose or break, and that you can't see the edge of when you're wearing them.

I nearly went for a pair of red "Sally Jesse Raphael" frames. I remember when these were all the rage. I didn't wear glasses at the time, but my mom got a pair. I think my sister and I must have pushed for it, but I was so proud that my mom had these cool glasses. Strangely enough, the SJR frames were marked down heavily at Kaiser. I myself am getting too old to accesorize ironically, but surely these must make a comeback. It fits in with the 80s, and well, they are surprisingly flattering.

Painting with gnats

Oil on birch panel 6 x 6"

After painting my imaginary flowers, I moved on to paint some actual flowers in our garden. I sat my stool down to paint a red tulip, but ended up painting the bleeding heart instead. I hope the tulip doesn't mind.
I battled swarms of gnats to paint these. They were out in force. Some met an untimely death in my palette. You'll be happy to know that none are buried in these paintings however.

In other news, I received a lovely email from Etsy seller/blogger Jade Scott, who posted about my Edie prints in her blog.. She makes great jewelry (lurve the necklaces..) and has some fantastic deals in her shop right now. Aside from her own work, she also posts great finds from Etsy. Thanks to her blog, I now see 100 more things I need to own.... sigh.

Spring is here!... or at least it was yesterday

6 x 6" oil on birch panel

Yesterday was gorgeous. In the 70s and perfect for sitting outside and painting. During the week, I had worked on two different 'people with glasses' paintings, but they were looking too forced and weren't working out. I took that as a sign to veer off into some imaginary flowers. These were really fun to paint. I mostly paint from observation, so it was fun to to paint from imagination for a change, and just lay down different shapes. While I did these in oil paint, I think I'll continue the idea with encaustics. More to come... who says that winter time is more productive for people? I get way more accomplished with some sunshine!

Really great music

We went to see The Avett Brothers lastnight. Wow.... If you haven't had a chance to see them live yet, you really should. I couldn't believe the amount of energy they have. It was the best concert I've been to in recent memory. After having not seen any live music in maybe a year, we're on a concert going frenzy this week and seeing Cat Power Sunday night. I've always wanted to see her perform. There really is a lot of fantastic music out right now. I haven't been this excited about new music since high school really. I mean I was a grunge fan in college, but let's face it, most of that music was really awful. I still love Fugazi and Husker Du but I'm just not going to listen to it while I work in the garden.

Back to painting..

Fred Terry Drives his tractor

6 x 6" oil on birch panel

Just in case you though I'd only be painting men in glasses...

Here's fair-goer Aunt Fannie Johnson Smith.

Park Ranger

6 x 6" oil on birch plywood.
I'm posting a photo of this painting, taken with my sad little digital camera, so my apologies for the poor quality. I'll replace it with a scan once I gather a few more paintings to take to Walgreens to scan. I really ought to buy a scanner. I'm just not sure where I'd put it. Living in a small house means surfaces are extremely valuable real estate. If I buy a scanner, where would the printer go? I could move the printer on the file cabinet, but then where would the serger go? and so on...

In other news (can we really call it that?), I can't stop listening to She & Him.

Cowboy Harry Webb

Harry is a sharp dresser, plus he just so happens to wear glasses, thus meeting my new portrait criteria!  

I'm having a lot of fun painting skin tones.  I used to mix primary colors together with white to get this putty tan tone that made everyone look like Barbie.  I'm now onto a better technique of keeping the colors separate so you can see greens, yellows, pinks and blues in the skin tone.  I'm much happier with it.  I'm still painting with the first tubes of oil paint that I bought to experiment with.  It's amazing how much longer they last compared to acrylic paints.  I have every color under the sun in acrylic, but with oils, I've stuck with the primary colors plus a yellow ochre and a raw umber.  This is forcing me to mix more of my own colors and also just keeps life more simple.  Both good things for now.

In other news, it's supposed to reach a balmy 60 degrees today!  

People with glasses.. a series?

6 x 6" oil on birch plywood
Back to what I like to paint best- people with glasses. Not sure why. I've been trying to push myself to do abstracts or more mixed media work. I'd still like to, but what I really enjoy most is painting people wearing glasses. So I'm not going to fight it for a while.