Elizabeth Reed - Trouvaille (Something lovely found by chance)

Astrid - beautiful inside and out! Charcoal on Fabriano Artistico Those of you that attended the Steven Assael Workshops at the Boca Museum School know of his practice to clip his palette next to his painting for a seamless evaluation of color.  Look at this cool product by David Jon Kassan. The parallel palette comes in two sizes. Check this out! David Jon Kassan Beautiful blended skin tone palette. His technique differs from the full palette of Steven Assael. Different results, both exquisite.  Check out his sketchbook live videos. Be prepared to learn from this man. I just realized he is having a week long workshop in Civita Italy - one week painting from a nude model. I am finishing some of my life drawings and will be posting them on facebook and this blog.  Is anyone interested in small classes at my studio? My ideas are open and limited to up to 5 - 6 students. Cost will depend on demand and model fees. Life drawing with an emphasis on

Lately, I have been working on portraits and figures. Confidence comes from practice. Always looking to push myself into different methods of describing form and feeling.  Cool Artists of the Week Chris Stevens Look how he challenges you with the placement of his images. The use of differing perspectives draws your attention. His experience and technical ability is complemented by great design. Mark Karnes Master of ink washes and draws like a painter. Look carefully at how he manipulates edges and shadows in his drawings. Karnes suggests reality - like a poem. Kathleen Dunphy I am in awe of this huge body of work from life. Dunphy paints from life - outdoors - in all weather.  Strong design and wonderful sense of color. Douglas McDougall Detail with imagination! Elisabetta Tevisan Magic! This is the last week of the term at Boca Museum School. I hope to see you all next term! 

Ink Wash drawing of Rivers ca. 1993 Wonderful book by Robert Henri, "The Art Spirit."  Watch out, life drawing students, we will be practicing memory drawing From Drawing to Painting Composition 101 Self Portraits Fun Fun Fun!!!! you are your best model. Cool Artists of the week Catherine Kehoe You can learn so much by just looking at these paintings. Catherine uses the least amount of detail but knows her value notan. Great compositions and color choices. Very very powerful. She is holding a workshop this summer in Tuscany. Very tempting. Look at her wonderful drawings! Always well designed! Hagit Barkai Emotion. Simple suggestions of form. Look Look Look! James Linkous It is what James leaves out that makes the image more powerful. Life drawing students - think twice, draw once. Katy Stone Contemporary drawing in 3-D. One of my passions. Katy uses dura lar with paint and drawing. Cut outs that utilize light to make shadow part of the drawing

Salvador Dali what gesture!!! Value drawings.  The old masters called the use of value to show form, "Chiaorscuro." Usually low key compositions with intense lighting. (pretty hard to pull off with candles!) Rembrandt Self portrait in a window Kathe Kollwitz Picasso Self Portrait Georges Seurat Georges Seurat Gesture and the use of line as a scaffold Emanuela de Musis at the Academy of Realist Art This gorgeous work is done in the classical method. To my life drawing students, see how they build the "scaffolding." This method of teaching involves one year of intensive drawing from casts. Look how emotional these paintings and drawings have become by not "reporting" all of the facts. They are creating an illusion of reality, not reporting all of the details. Jake Muirhead, Printmaker Most drawing enthusiasts love to make prints, especially etchings or Intaglio. Jake Muirhead's prints ar

Peggy Probably the hardest part of making art is to show your soul.  It has been said that the first 20 seconds of a drawing or painting set the mood for the next 20 hours. Gesture is everything. It is not so much how long a piece might take but when you made it.  Last weekend I went to Art Wynwood and saw  a lot of very marketable  artwork. After leaving, my friend, Susan Megur asked me what piece stuck in my mind. I could not answer that question. What a shame.  Make your art like it is part of your soul. Find what it is about something that you make that moves you. Make it about emotion, politics, color or just plain beauty. Anything that makes you and your viewer move from their comfort zone of visual boredom .  Cool artists of the week: Sybelle Peretti works with transparent glass images. Stops me in my tracks! Lalla Essaydi Anne Marie Busschers from Art Wynwood last weekend Charles Pfahl Susan grossman New session of life drawing and From Dr