Tuesday's Portrait

Tina II, charcoal, 12 x 14 inches

Just in case you were wondering, last week's class was canceled. Sorry about that - I guess I could have said something, but I was in a funk. This week's model was Tina, which I was happy to hear that someone recognized to be the same model as one of my other drawings. (That always makes you feel good - that a person comes out recognizable!)

Update on my Studio

My husband has been working hard lately...as soon as he gets home from his labor intensive job, he goes and works on my studio! It's looking really nice - and I'm getting excited! Here are the most recent photos:

I'll post better pictures once the sheetrock is complete and we've had a chance to clear things out of the way.

Website Down...

Oh well...this is showing my programming knowledge...as in, I have none! I was fiddling around try to download new stuff for my site. Well, I guess I messed with the home page. You can still get to it - but you have to add the "/index.html" to it. So, if you're interested, go here:

http://www.artbyjanae.com/index.html

I'll try to have it back up soon!

First Drawing in the Studio!

The insulation is almost done on my studio! My husband has been busy trying to get it wired and insulated recently. Sometimes he doesn't even come inside after he gets home from work - he just goes straight to my studio to work. I decided to keep him company tonight, so I brought my work in progress out there while he stapled. This is the first of many more pieces of art to be created in my studio!

The cow portrait came came from a reference photo on the WetCanvas site I frequent. I still need to work on it, change the perspective of the fence post and tweak the values a little bit.

Tuesday's Portrait

I've posted the portrait I did last night from our class. You can always tell who got to the class late...because they're usually delegated to the sides and end up doing the profile portrait!

This model asked for the portrait at the end of class...I told him to come back next week since I wanted to take a photograph of it first.

Carrboro Portrait Class

OK, so I'm not sure if this will work - the picture above should be a slideshow of 7 portraits done from life. (Press Play - I had to make it into a movie). Five of them were from my last portrait class, one was done at home and the other was done at Art&Soul Studios during an opening we had in November... If it doesn't work, I'll try something else. If that doesn't work, then I'm stuck just pasting 7 images in the blog.

Tomorrow starts another session of portrait classes for me - I'm taking them with Herb Slapo at the Carrboro Arts Center. (Not to be confused with the one I'll be teaching in Mebane!) I have a really fun time going there and being with other artists and drawing from life (from a willing subject). Notice the slides above from the last session (if it works) - the first week started with the pencil portrait and I felt extremely rusty. It just wasn't clicking with me. The second week I decided to bring my charcoal and it was so much easier. Maybe it was because I loosened up a bit, maybe it was the medium, maybe both. Or, it could have been the subject. I decided to work with charcoal for the next session, then the next, etc. For me, charcoal tends to force me to stay loose. I should point out that I don't use a charcoal pencil. I use the vine or willow charcoal and tissue to blend. (The charcoal I use looks like the one 2nd from the left in the picture below).
I'll be bringing my charcoal to the next class...but I might bring some pastels too. We'll see!!!

Two Boys - Finished

I finished and framed the pastel painting above. It's never recommended to take a photograph of your work when it's already framed, but I forgot I didn't have the updated image. During my long shift at the gallery yesterday, I took quite a few photographs of the building, and some pieces of mine that are framed.

Art&Soul Classes

Some of you know (and I think I've posted this before somewhere) that I am a member of an art co-op. It's a really great gallery with a mixture of sculpture, pottery, paintings, jewelry, etc. I've enjoyed meeting the other artists and trying to get the gallery in gear for this year.

We are starting to offer classes upstairs and I'm one of the teachers! I'm starting slow, with only one class - a portrait drawing class for beginners. Check out the link for the gallery to see the other classes. (http://www.artandsoulmebane.com/). Hopefully, this will be a success!

Portrait

Leah and Ian, charcoal 11x14- WIP!

I've taken a longer break than planned, so I apologize for that. Somehow, December came in, I blinked, and it's gone. I didn't even post a Merry Christmas, Happy Holiday, Happy New Year to everyone! So...yeah, what I just said.

Now that all of the holidays are over, we get back to work! I've been working on a commission since my last post. This is Ian and Leah, two beautiful children in Connecticut. It's still a Work In Progress, since I still need to smooth things out a bit. Pending the feedback I get, I should have this done this week. (I really need to start taking these photos during the day!)