First Snow i in new frame style

"First Snow i", 12 x 24" encaustic
$895 beautifully framed

What a blessed lady I am to have a wonderfully supportive and creative husband!! He just finished this gorgeous frame for my new encaustic painting. He designed the frame to be a shadow frame with 1/4" show around the edges, so that none of the image is cut off. It is set back into the frame which will protect the wax from damage due to rough handling. We went through a bit of a learning curve trying to find the correct finish for it, and ended up with a satin black that just makes the painting glow. The painting was done on a standard 2" thick cradled birch panel, which he sawed down to a 1" cradle on his table saw -YES this was risky but he is meticulous so I had no almost no fear. And just in case you thought that was all, with the remaining 1" cradle he made me a new panel!

As I want to be as helpful to other artists as possible, I am including a photo of the back of the frame so maybe you can make one for yourself (or if you have a significant other who is handy).

It is wrapped up for delivery to my gallery in the morning, but you get the idea. He used 1'3" Radiata Pine for the top and then he glued and screwed on a lip of hardboard on the back to screw the painting in. It is all very secure and sits flat to the wall. His next project is to make me a similar frame for the 24x48" version.

Enjoy!
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"Coming Home", encaustic painting by Sharon Lynn Williams

"Coming Home", 12 x 12" encaustic on panel
$450 framed

I just returned from a wonderful trip to Montana to paint with friends for a week. Unfortunately we were plagued with problems: a death in one of the families plus power outages on two days (spells disaster for working in encaustic!) However it was a rich time of bonding, sharing art techniques and sharing our faith. I did this painting first there, and was able to do one more which I will share later, once I am sure it is finished.

If this weekend taught me anything, it is to expect the unexpected, and that LOVE really does hold us all together.
Enjoy!
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new encasutics First Snow i & ii

"First Snow i", 12 x 24" encaustic on cradled panel
$895 beautifully framed

So now that it is winter and it is too cold to paint outside, I am back in my studio working with the wax. I painted this in my friend, Tracy Proctor's beautiful encaustic studio. When I brought it home my hubby said "I REALLY like this -wish it was bigger!" He immediately went out to the lumber store and bought me a 24x48" piece of baltic birch and made a cradle for it so it wouldn't warp while painting. It took me 16 hours, but I just completed it, the largest encaustic painting I have done to date!

"First Snow ii", 24x48" encaustic on cradled panel
$2895 beautifully framed

It is really different working this large. I found I needed to make small containers of a bunch of colour variations so I had enough of each colour to cover a large space. My usual practice is to have one griddle with large containers of a few key colours that I use to mix other colour variations from, as well as a large pot of clear medium and a container of soy wax to clean my brushes in. I use the other griddle as a mixing palette, where I put out small amounts of colours from manufactured or home made wax pigments and then add small amounts of other colours to get a huge range of colour options. In my work I love to have a range of lights, mids and darks of equal value so that I can get colour variation =life. If you click on the large painting image, you can hopefully see what I mean. For example in the snow shadow area there are 5 different values (light to dark) of blue grey. I bought some small stainless steal condiment cups at a local restaurant supplier, so I could have a container of each of those values. Add to those multiple cups of lights including creamy whites, yellows, greens and blues that appear in the sky behind the trees, as well as multiple mid-value cups containing yellows, oranges, reds, blues, greens and violets. But I think all those colour variations is what brings pop and life to the painting, so it is well worth the work. I was thrilled to find some silicone mini-muffin cups at the store, so now I can put the colours that are left over into those, allow them to cool and add the blocks to my collection of colours, rather than having to throw them away.
My son commented that I need to do a series of these, so I think I will take him up on that idea -stay tuned to see more .

Enjoy!
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FLUID ACRYLIC WORKSHOP THIS SATURDAY JAN 16, 2016

FLUID ACRYLIC WORKSHOP WITH SHARON LYNN WILLIAMS
Saturday January 16, 2016 from 10-4pm at Swinton’s Art Supply, 7160 Fisher Street, SE, Calgary 

 Come and join me to learn about the benefits of using fluid acrylics in a watercolour manner. Some of these include the ability to move into translucent and opaque effects, superior glazing ability without the possibility of making mud, and outstanding clarity of colour in the final result, not to mention no glass is required when framing.

Class size is limited to 10 students
Cost: $110 plus GST. Call Swinton’s at 403-258-3500 to register, or contact me at 403 238 4744

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Jane Davies Monoprint Collage Online Workshop Review

In November I signed up to take Jane Davies online workshop called "Monoprint Collage" with two of my students. We decided it would be fun to take the class together and have weekly joint painting sessions in order to spur each other on to greatness finishing well. I thought I would share some of the paintings I made over the 6 week class and some observations I made during the process.

The class began with 2 lessons on making collage papers with the Gelli Plate.  We learned all kinds of techniques to use with the Gelli plate including using stencils, rainbow rolls, manipulating paint, using resists such as string, and multiple layerings. Here are just a few of the papers I made, out of the nearly one hundred we made. You will have to click on the link to see the papers at a larger size. All papers were made on 80# Sulphite Drawing Paper.

In lesson 3 , we made paintings with our collage papers, cut into squares or rectangles. The challenge was to balance the positive and negative spaces, and to use the pattern in a way that would encourage the viewers eye to roam all over the page. Here is an example of 3 of my finished collages.

I was pleased to be able to make a successful composition with only 4 collage pieces!

In lesson 4 we used 'orb' shapes out of our collage papers and the challenge was to paint an interesting background behind them, and add elements (scribble or more collage) to make a finished piece. Here is my favourited of the bunch I made -all 8x8":

In lesson 5, we began by printing directly from the Gelli plate onto our substrate. either before or after adding collage, and playing with opaque and transparent paint layers. So it was print, mask, print, glaze with opaque or transparent paint and then do whatever it took to make a finished work.  These are 3 of the ones I did, all 8x10":

In the last lesson, we began by printing and then adding collage, stenciling, glazing and opaque layering as well as adding linear elements and whatever else we felt led to do. Here are process shots of 4 of the 7 paintings I made.

  

A goal I had at the start of the workshop was to get more minimalistic in my approach, which you can see I failed miserably at. This goes to support my mantra that my body of work is called "Products Of A Busy Mind"!! Jane did a wonderful job of presenting the class, with a PDF of instructions along with 1-2 videos per lesson. The class had a private blog page so that we could post our work, which multiplied the learning seeing what other people did. It was fun to comment and receive comments on each others work, as well as Jane commenting on each of our posts. I learnt so much in the class, and I now know my Gelli plate will not be relegated to making papers for collage only. If you have an opportunity to take an online (or live) class from Jane, I highly recommend it. You can view Jane's great website which contains her wonderful artwork, an amazing blog and tons of free tutorials on her methods.

Enjoy!
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Merry Christmas!

"Cold Call", 8x8" encaustic on board

I know I have been gone for a long time, but I hope to return in the New Year with lots of new paintings, artistic insights and tips, and maybe a video or two if I can get that all figured out. I wanted to tell you how much I appreciate you reading my blog posts and generally being an engaged and generous viewer. You mean the world to me, and I am so fortunate to have you as friends.
I wish you the happiest, healthiest and loving Christmas imaginable.
Blessings my friends!

Enjoy!
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good post on plein air painting

I subscribe to thw wonderful Lori Putnam's blog and guest blogger and the famous daily painter Carol Marine wrote a wonderful post there about the difficulties of the plein air process and how she tried to overcome them. Give it a look here.
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New Encaustics by Sharon Lynn Williams

"Indigo & Rust", 24x24" mixed media encaustic on finished cradled panel
$1250

As you know I have been playing with wax for the last few years, so I wanted to share with you two of my more recent paintings. This one has a piece of collage paper in the bottom that I made. I rusted some metal objects and printed them onto japaneese paper, then I folded the paper into patterns and dipped it into a vat of indigo. The paper was then collaged onto the panel with wax and wax added on top. The middle band is roofing ashphalt, and the top part is wax and pigment stick using a technique I learned from master 'ruster' Pam Nichols. There is also some collage paper on the upper right side.

"Sienna & Rust", 24x24" mixed media encaustic on finished cradled panel
$1250

This is the second piece I made in this series. Another piece of rusted, indigo dyed piece of paper is used in the lower section (this time the rust was from a large old gear). The ashphalt was used on the edges and the upper part was done in the same way as the first piece, and another piece of rusted paper was collaged to the surface. Then I incised the circles and filled them with orange and blue encaustic paint and added metalic copper to the outside ring.
One of the problems of encaustic is trying to get a good photo which shows all the depth in the work, and I think it is impossible. You really need to see these in person to appreciate them!

I am off in the morning for a private 3 day encaustic workshop with a hero of mine, Dale Roberts, in Philadelphia. Dale has several wonderful videos on Youtube that are accessible from his website, so if you are interested in encaustic and how it's done, you should check them out.  After the workshop I am off to the Big Apple with my son Evan for 4 days of art museums and live theatre. I know, poor me!

Enjoy
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Mountain Plein Air by Sharon Lynn Williams

 "Rundle Fall", 12 x 12" plein air oil on panel
$575 beautifully framed

I had the pleasure of painiting at beautiful Vermillion Lakes in Banff National Park last week. This is the iconic and world famous Rundle Mountain.

"Borgeau Fall", 12 x 12" plein air oil on panel
$575 beautifully framed

This is the view at the other end of the lake from Rundle. It was a gloriously warm day and the fall colours were brilliant.

Enjoy!

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Plein Air: Fall in the Mountains, by Sharon Lynn Williams

"Rundle Ridge Fall", 9x12" plein air oil
$495 beautifully framed

I had the pleasure of painting in the mountains of Canmore, AB with two of my best painting buddies this week. The fall colours were astounding and the sky cloudless, which made it easier on the artists.

"Quarry Lake Fall", 12x12" plein air oil
$575 beautifully framed

This was actually the first painting of the day. This is called "Little Sister" because it is the lowest of the Three Sisters, but it is the biggest mass-wise of the three.  No wonder I keep getting them confused!

These are my 'partners in crime': Dee Poisson on the left and Patti Dyment on the right. Both are great painters and make me laugh!

Enjoy!
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