Inspiration and New Designs

As I've said many times. I just love the mail, it's my favorite part of the day. Aside from some letters to answer I had catalogs and this really caught my attention. 

I had been drawing and painting lots of branches and leaves and it hadn't occurred to me to use them on a doormat design.

Besides that, I had a bottle of tan paint that was drying out and needed to be used so this seemed like the perfect project for it.

At that point I decided to cover it with my favorite sort of vines an flowers instead if following the design in the catalog.

I couldn't quite decide which shades of green to use so I had fun and used them all trying out an assortment detail and liner brushes along the way. some worked better than others but I enjoyed them all.

When it dried shiny, I covered it with mat medium to cut down on the gloss and make it easier to photograph.

This is the finished piece. As you can see before I added the mat glaze that I had painted light veining on the dark leaves and dark veining on the light ones to pull the whole design together.

I plan to start this as a doormat like the catalog inspiration but there is no limit  to what sorts of other products I can put it on besides that.

Maybe a tote bag for the farmers market or the grocery store. Maybe even a bag to keep my garden supplies in (especially the catalogs and the seeds).

Maybe even a scarf or a hat to go with that...or socks...or just about anything. The sky is the limit!

Design Experiments, Repeat Patterns

I'll be loading this little painting to my zazzle store to see how it lines up and if it will work as a repeat pattern. If that experiment works I'll be adding a lot of my designs on top of it to make different patterns. I'm excited by the possibilities.

Speaking of repeat patterns, here's a photo of one of my wrapping papers. Not only did I love my design on this background color. I was very impressed with the weight and the quality of the paper it was printed on. Yes it came from my store
 zazzle.com/julia_art

Now I'm following up by learning all that I can on repeat patterns and methods of creating them from internet videos as well.

So far the challenge for me is creating patterns that meet up perfectly at the seams. Don't laugh, it's harder than you think.

Just before Christmas I redesigned my Sunflower tree but wasn't quite happy with it so here I grabbed my markers and drew in a trunk  a pot and a lot more leaves and branches. I'm sure it could have been accomplished on the computer but it felt really good to get back to pen and paper again.

I also revisited this painting and made some changes.

 I'm liking it much better now that I have reshaped some of the flowers.

I looked back over my old posts and it had been since November 4th before I made these changes so it does help to live with a painting for a while before you decide whether it is really finished or not. It pays not to rush into drastic changes and helps you avoid mistakes.

Still Inspired By My Garden's Lilies

In my 53 years as an artist this is the very first time I've tried painting lilies in gouache. All I can say I that I can't imagine why I waited so long. The paint just glides on and mixes so easily that It's by far one of my favorite types of paints so far.

 Instead of starting with a canvas and just painting the flower like the photo I thought I'd design a dala horse with them instead which gives me a project for my dala horse blog and a new design for merchandise in my dala horse store on  zazzle.

The main benefit of working in this way is that it gives my subscribers a new project to try or read about and it gives my customers on zazzle another fun design to use on things.

Even better than that is not cluttering up my house with a bunch of unsold, unwanted paintings that will end up in a dumpster when I'm gone.

At least for myself I feel that I've found the perfect balance in life.

Here's what the project page looked like when I finished it but instead of just letting it sit in my sketchbook I decided to put it to work and see what else I could do with it.

I started by cutting the images apart.

Next I cut each of the images out.

And then the fun began as I mounted them on cards and added more drawing to them.

I used markers to draw leaves where I was going to attach the photo and a few more where I attached the horse to pull the whole design together.

Here's the envelope I made for it.

...and the 2 of them together.

You may remember this small gouache painting that I did recently on a watercolor card. well, as a bit of a joke to a friend I wrote this on the inside of the card:
"Poor horsey, lost between art and craft"

It struck me funny because I'd been showing my paintings in various art shows and public buildings for for many years but after I designed a painted chair for a national magazine about 20 years ago I found "I'd fallen through the cracks" as the old saying goes. The galleries didn't want me because I was a "crafter" and the craft people didn't want me because they said "she's too artistic".

This mean't several years in poverty and obscurity until I decided that I don't care what people call me or my work, I just need to keep creating things.

Other envelope designs for the project.

I couldn't resist adding a lily to this old painting too.

Here's a card I made with a photo of the painting. Drawings were added to it and the envelope with markers.

I've been happier, been able to make almost anything I've needed to use, wear or barter with for other things I wanted.

Now, my childhood dream of seeing my designs in peoples homes around the world has come true as I've been working with zazzle for the last few years putting my paintings an drawings on any sort of product you imagine. I'm still not making much money but I really love what I do and hope that someday it will actually begin to put food on the table and pay my bills. In the meantime it's fun to check and see what part of the world bought something and loves my designs.

Back Indoors Again

Look who's back to keep me company outside the studio window.

I'm clearing some of the paper clutter by cutting up old, failed watercolors and turning them into new greeting cards that I can write letters on.

It's a great creativity exercise and often sparks great ideas.

  I dashed off these sunflowers inside of one to sort out my detail brushes and get some practice painting leaves.

This little marker doodle is inside the right hand page. Every bit of practice helps.