Open Studio

My good friend, and fellow artist, Maria Leysens has been opening up her studio once a week for a gathering of artist to work on their individual projects. So far it's only been the two of us but next week we are expecting an addition to our group.

Our weekly sessions have been stimulation. Having company as I work is nice but being able bounce ideas off someone else is Heaven. Maria and I have very different styles and we work in different media. I work in several medias, while Maria is primarily a watercolor painter.

We also create differently. Maria sketches small thumbnail studies of a painting before she begins. On these sketches she works out light and dark values. Then she does a quick practice painting on  inexpensive watercolor paper. The photo above is her work from our studio day. After she finished the painting she went back and made changes to her thumbnail and will do another quick painting before she begins the final work.

I showed up at Maria's studio with a vague idea of what I wanted to make and  a bunch of dyed paper bags and a pair of scissors. Someone gave me a large picture frame and I decide to make a piece of art to fit the frame. This gave my project a size requirement but after that I didn't have a plan. At the end of the day this is what I had.

I'm kind of excited to continue working on this piece today. It also helps that I have a gallery interested in selling my work. Earlier this week I also sold a wall hanging to a friend who has become a collector of my work. Her office walls are filling up with my art. She jokes that her office is my private gallery.

What a good friend!

Here is the wall hanging that sold.

I entered it in an art show a year ago so it may look familiar to some of you.

It's made of paper, mostly brown paper bags that I dyed.

I sewed the paper together like an art quilt then sealed the piece with Glossed Collage Podge.

If you saw it in person you might think it's made of leather.

It is going to be another beautiful day here in PA.

I will be outside soaking up the sun.

Have a great day!