Rose wip, a lovely blogger gift and shipping woes

center of a rose, wip, cps on Stonehenge, 18" x 8"

copyright Teresa Mallen

Here is how my rose looks now. I still have petals on the right that don't have any colour yet and I am about half way along in developing values elsewhere. I haven't had much time to work on it as I have been busy getting my painting framed and ready to ship. I also wrote my newsletter last week and I had to prepare for my Beyond the Basics course which I started teaching Saturday. I have great students and I had a wonderful time with them on the weekend. I have also been out of town again cleaning out my parents' house (my on-going summer project). I shall have more studio time this week than last, so I hope to be able to finish this rose image soon.

Here is a picture of my Swiss Chard Mosaic piece now that it has been framed. I thought you might like to see the scale of the work as it is hard to judge things from a compressed image of just the art. I had to frame it in acrylic as it is being shipped to the CPSA International Exhibition. Acrylic is painfully expensive. In fact the acrylic cost more than the shipping fee.

I packed it up and shipped it off last week. It hasn't gone very far. In fact my art is stuck in upper New York state in some sort of governmental limbo land. Prior to shipping, I spent 45 minutes filling out shipping forms and customs documents for the US, and for reentry back into Canada (for this purpose I am both a shipper and an importer). I even knew my International Harmonized Code for a work of fine art (I spent two hours on the internet trying to obtain this info). I didn't use it last year but hey, I figured the more info the better!

The art has cleared customs but I have been informed that it is being held by a Non Customs Government Agency. From what I can find out on-line, it would seem that after clearing customs, my package has to be cleared by the Agency Task Force. I guess they look for bombs and guns. I would think a simple scan of my box would determine that there is just a painting inside. It was to arrive in Atlanta tomorrow but right now my painting seems to have slipped into a black hole. My tracking info shows no new developments. I have one week to get it to the gallery, after that paintings are not accepted. So I sit and fret....

On a happier note, look at what I received in the mail last week.



Fellow blogger, Beth Macre mailed out gifts to those of us who commented on her blog. I am so delighted with my clay magnet. I love the colours and of course my big T. I think I may just convert it from a magnet to a pin so I can wear it! You can also see two cards that have examples of her work. Beth has wonderful clay houses, tiles, and other art available at her etsy shops. To see more of her work and to make a purchase visit www.bmacre.etsy.com and www.hearthomes.etsy.com. Thanks again Beth!

Rose blossom on Pastelbord, WIP

Here is what the rose blossom looks like now...

Unfortunately the photo doesn't capture the essence of the piece. The grainy texture of the Pastelbord is giving the rose a soft, dreamy quality which I like a lot.

I haven't had too much time to work on this piece as I am busy typing up the May newsletter as well as the instructions for the reflections kit. I had to tear myself away from my studio this afternoon as my husband and I had to do an airport run to pick up relatives returning from a trip.

I will post the finished image as soon as I get it done.

Rose blossom on pastelbord, WIP

Ah, the adventures in my studio...

I started a new piece this morning. I had my drawing on a piece of tracing paper and I was ready to transfer the lines to my Pastelbord. I inserted my transfer paper only to have an oops moment. Without thinking, I had inserted a piece of white transfer paper but darn it all, the Pastelbord is white. Just wasn't going to work...okay it was early and I hadn't even brewed coffee yet. Now the real problem sets in - I don't own any graphite transfer paper. I have never needed any. When working on white paper, I am able to use my lightbox to transfer the line drawing but as this is a board, it isn't see-through.

I needed a plan B. I grabbed my Wolff's 2B carbon pencil and I created my own graphite transfer paper. I rubbed the carbon pencil over the back of the tissue paper and voila! Worked like a charm.

About this piece: it is on a 5 x 7 inch panel of white Pastelbord (which has a sanded surface similar to pastel paper). While some of my work is small in size, I don't normally work this small. I purchased a package of four 5 x 7 inch Pastelbord panels so here I am doing a rather small rose blossom. The finished size will be smaller than 5 x 7 as I am saving room around the edge to allow for framing. I have read that people using the white Pastelbord don't like it, especially when compared to working on the other available colours of Pastelbord. So far I am enjoying working on it. The only negative so far, is that I find it harder to keep the areas that I want left white clean (especially when compared to working on Stonehenge paper). .

I like it when the tooth of the paper shows through in a work and I do like the toothy nature of this sanded surface. I am applying the pigment in the old fashioned way in that I am just laying down layers of coloured pencil. In this piece I am not filling the tooth with the use of Neocolors II crayons, watercolour pencils, solvent or colourless blender. My goal is for the the tooth to remain visible. Already I find that this adds to the delicate, soft look of the piece. I am using Prismacolor Lightfast pencils.

This is a fun piece for me as I like working on white objects. This may be a white rose blossom but by the time I am done with it, it will have quite a bit of colour. I 'see' so much colour in white :-) ...for those of you who have taken the Beyond the Basics course with me, remember the white tea cup and cloth project? I have a white peony blossom in the header of this blog. Further evidence that I love to add colour to white!

As you can see from the top photo, I am working at establishing my darker values first. I intend to crop the piece more on the right than the left so keep in mind that compositionally, the image will change.