A Wonderful New Book!

I am so excited to be included as a guest artist in the latest drawing book by Carla Sonheim! I  taught a class called "Pencil Dreams" at Journalfest and was none to nervous to find out that Carla would be in my class. I had a chance to share some of my drawings during the class and Carla was nice enough to ask me to submit for her book. 

I just received my copy and it is total eye candy and animal abandon. There is even photos of my 2 studio muses Max and Willow !

One of her requests was that we do one of her famous "sidewalk crack" drawings. This is my guy Wannabe:

If you look at the sidewalk crack in the book, I saw this shape when I turned it upside down!

I absolutely love her techniques for learning to draw creatively and recently used some of them to teach a kids drawing class for our local Grants Pass Museum of Art. The kids loved shouting out what animal they saw in my paint blobs!

Carla is doing a two-week blog celebration over at her blog: http://carlasonheim.wordpress.com/

where you can find new animal-related art tutorials, art giveaways, new assignments and other chances to win the book from September 23-October 6, 2012.

She is also giving away a signed copy to one lucky person from my blog. Just leave a comment below and I will pick a winner randomly on October 1st. 

If you wish to purchase a copy of the book, you can click on the following links:

from amazon.com

from Barnes & Noble

from QBookshop

from Independent Bookstores

The Art-Is-You Experience

What a wonderful event! A good time was definitely had by all. We were treated to handmade sewn name tags, provided lunches, special shopping and touring trips and a really nice venues to host the classes. 

I was lucky to be able to spend 2 days in Tracy Verdugo's "Sacred Marks" class. I loved her gentle energy and council during the process. Because I am a painter, I had some struggles with trying not to drop into my comfort zone. I did a lot of "deep breathing" and kept telling myself to be present and not rush and I think that my piece, that went from this:

to this:

says a lot about surrendering to the moment. The painting practically painted itself! 

I taught my class "Doll Face" and was treated to a wonderful group of women who were open and enthusiastic. I am forever grateful for all the students who are willing to invest their time and efforts to enroll in my classes. I only wished the class could have been longer than 3 hours and hope they were able to go home with enough inspiration and techniques to continue to play. 

I hope to attend and teach next year and I would not hesitate to recommend the event.

Almost Packed for Art-Is-You

I am almost packed for Art-Is-You in Petaluma. This sneak photo is of some of the vintage goods I am bringing for the Art Trunk Sale on Saturday, September 22 from 6pm to 10pm. I will have plenty of original art and a few of my teddy bears too..... It is amazing to see all the efforts of the past months crammed into duffel bags and plastic bins. There is always the nagging feeling that I am forgetting some critical item, but I will let that go and assume I have everything I need. I am very excited to teach my class "Doll Face" on Friday and am treating myself to 2 days painting with Tracy Verdugo! Now if I can only find my toothbrush.....

The joy of public art....

It was a crazy weekend for me. I painted my first "public art" at my local gallery in Grants Pass, OR. I ambitiously thought I could finish in one session ( I worked from 5:30 to 9:00pm.) Today I returned and I think it is done. It is quite a rush and a bit overwhelming to work with folks watching! Let me know what you think. The Panel is 90"x30".