Life Study - Pam

Pam, Watercolor, 20 x 15

detail, Pam

I'll be out of town until Jan. 4th. I look forward to reading your comments when I return. Thanks for visiting!

Fuju Persimmons

Watercolor, 5 x 7
I'm always happy when I have home grown subjects. These were as delicious to eat as they were to paint!
Happy Holidays to Lee!

PLEASE NOTE: I'll be out of town until Jan. 4th. I look forward to reading your comments when I return. Thanks for visiting!

Watercolor Sketch for Silk Tallit (Prayer Shawl) #2

2nd watercolor sketch for a large Tallit. The sketch is 6 x 10, the tallit will be 43 x 72

Watercolor Sketch for Silk Tallit (Prayer Shawl)

When I am designing a new silk prayer shawl, I will often make a watercolor sketch of the design before hand. This design is for a very large tallit, about 43 x 72. The sketch is about 6 x 10.

Jonna

Watercolor, 16 x 16
Another painting from a model painting day, organized by Kamillia Hardy.

Speaking of Hebrew Calligraphy...

Have you seen my instructional book on Hebrew Calligraphy? Here's a direct link to see it on my web site. The cover is below. If you click on the web site link, you can view a few pages. It's on sale through my web site for the holidays for $15.00 (or email me to purchase).

It's a complete how-to book, with practice pages included in the book. A great gift for the creative Jewish person or Hebrew learner in your life! I also have two gift bags which include my instructional book, a calligraphy pen and pen nib, and a bottle of ink, regular $36.00, now on sale for $32.00. Please email me if you're interested.

Tell Me What You Think!

A few weeks ago I asked those willing to help me test the email subscription services. If you were kind enough to sign up for both the Feedburner and the Feedblitz email subscription to my blog, I'd love to know what you think. Were they both reliable? Do you like one better than the other? If you signed up for just one of them, please let me know if you're getting all the posts, and what you think of the service. Thanks for your help! I appreciate it!

Hillary

(Monkey painted on Eli's Canvas tote bag,
when he was at the age where
that kind of thing was cool)

Calligraphy on Silk

To prepare the silk, so the calligraphy letters won't spread, I apply a layer of Jacquard's No Flow mixed down with some water. Then, I thicken up the silk dye with some Pebeo Soie Thickener. I've got a template underneath the silk for placement of the letters (and so I don't forget any). I use a flat brush, creating thick strokes with a flat stroke, and thin lines with just the edge of the brush.
This Hebrew calligraphy is the traditional blessing said when one adorns a tallit, or Jewish Prayer Shawl: "Blessed are You O Lord, our God, King of the Universe Who has sanctified us with Your commandments and commanded us to wrap ourselves in tsitsit."
The calligraphy in the context of the almost-finished prayer shawl.

Mixed Media Piece

Buddha, Mixed Media, 12 x 9

It's getting too dirty, so I empty out the water soluble silk dyes palette. Wow! It looks so cool, the colors are amazing as they swirl and ooze away. So I grab a piece of canvas paper, and lay it on top of the colors. Voila! Instant beautiful toned ground for a new painting! This painting has been submitted to Karin Jurick's Different Strokes for Different Folks Blog where she posts an image an invites artists to interpret it in any media they choose. When the toned ground dried, I used an acrylic spray to fix it, and then painted over it with water soluble oil paints.

background for Buddha