Dawn flight, Mixed Media Painting

The Art Emporium, Boathouse Gallery and Gift Boutique, is taking shape. We've been accepting art all week and 12 of our 30 artist's have hung their work. We also start the accepting work of our gift boutique artisans tomorrow.

It looks so amazing, I get shivers.

This painting is hanging in the new gallery, originally I had three bees flying in formation, but somehow a single bee made a better statement, so the other two were removed. Sadly that reflects the fate of bees. We have lost so many to colony collapse, mites, viruses, zombie flies, pesticides and so on.

I've mentioned the pollinator patch project before, follow the link, and see what you can do to help.

Art Emporium Update

Closer and closer, everything is painted, and cleaned, we've started placing fixtures.

Baring a major storm we'll be ready for the first wave of art on Wednesday!

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first week in the AE&BG

The AE&BG is starting to take shape. Since Wednesday when we got the keys we've taken down lattice and strapping, patched holes, cleaned, and cleaned some more. Tomorrow we start painting the walls. It's looking more and more like a gallery, and far quicker than we thought it would, though it's been a ton of hard work.

We've had people stop in each day we've been there, wondering if we're open, mid-week, in February none the less!

Our goal is to start intake of work by the 15th, and open the 1st of March, which at the rate we're going, will be no problem at all.

Don't forget the mini show is on at our neighbouring gallery Portside, the opening is on Sunday afternoon, I hope to see you there.

Winters Majesty

Six sleeps 'till we get the keys for the AE&BG, things are revving up, we're ready for take off. Once we get the keys we have a ton of work to do in a very short period of time. Like us on Facebook for updates on our progress.

I met today with Ted McLauchlin of Highlander Gallery/Studios. We were introduced by Philip Schmidt a week or so ago, at the brunch Phil hosted for his Connected Arts venture. Ted is an interesting guy, a non-practicing artist himself, he now works with other artists to help them develop a brand, and to fine tune their marketing and business skills. He had lots of suggestions, some not so comfy like less blog more facebook, and maybe even twitter-that's scary, me...twitter...but I intend to follow his lead.

This is the piece I did for Philip's Connected Arts vision. As I said landscape is not my forte, none the less I'm quite pleased with the result, and I will admit it was a lot of fun.

Don't forget Portside's mini show is on the Month of February, and the opening is Sunday Feb. 5th 1-4

I'm attempting to make the transition to the new newsletter simpler, hence the following post which allows me to create a link I can direct folks to. I know it's gotta be annoying to those of you who follow my blog to get just a link :) forgive please.

link to Mail Chimp

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Mini Shows, Mini Works

February is Mini Show time, and there are a bunch of them out there. The only one I'm planning on entering this year is the one at Portside. A gal could go nuts trying to do 'em all! This little piece is call 'Spring Dawn' and is only 2.5 inches by 3, on terra skin.
I have a connected arts piece to do asap too... I plan to do it before we get the gallery building on February 1, we're gonna be VERY busy getting everything ready so we can open on March 1st, which won't leave a lot of time for painting.
What's connected arts? Glad you asked!

Phillip Schmidt is an amazing explorer/photographer. His photographic work of out of the way, and largely unseen places is breathtaking. He has for several years been putting on a showcase that he calls the 'Connected Arts' where he challenges artists of several disciplines including visual, musical, and literary arts, to interpret one of his photos. His vision being that all of the arts spring from the same well, and are therefore gifts connected in ways most of us don't appreciate. He's working to correct that.

Landscape is not my Forte, and I hope I'm up to the challenge. It's an honor to be asked to participate and I'm certainly going to try.

Identity Transfer and Newsletters

I must be having too much fun, time seems to be going faster and faster. The identity transfer show opening is here already...how did that happen??
Actually the show is already up, and hangs until March 3rd, the opening reception is Saturday 2-4. There's a pretty stellar cast of artist's showing...and me lol.

I've been migrating my newsletter to mailchimp and apparently I confused many people with my request for a confirmation of permission. One of the problems with the old newsletter template is that you can't reply to it, which several people tried to do and of course it bounced. I put please reply in the subject line, and then the e:mail address with the instructions and explanation in the body, which caused all kinds of confusion. I'm very sorry. If you got one of those annoying 'no response' responses please either use this form:








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Or if your reading this on facebook it probably won't work, in which case, e:mail me at robin@expressivebrush.ca

and I can put you on the new list. Again sorry about the confusion.

Painting challenge and pollinator patch project

Belated happy New Year. I hope everyone has had an amazing holiday.

Family is the most precious thing we have and time committed to enjoying each other is the most precious gift of all.

The Creative Catalyst word for Christmas week was present, I didn't do a painting as I was having too much fun with my precious ones which was my present to myself. I did paint, but it was my bathroom not art, and I'm very glad I did. I needed to get it done before we go into high gear Feb. 1 at the Art Emporium, Boathouse Gallery and Gift Boutique (from this point forward the A.E. & B.G. )

This weeks word was commitment, I must confess the only picture that brought to mind was of bacon and eggs. I'm sure you've heard that old saying, 'the difference between involved and committed, the hen was involved, the pig was committed'... Some how that didn't seem like the painting I wanted to do, lol.

So instead I decided to honour my muse, and my commitment to telling tales of pollinators via my work.

Many of you know of my, commitment to environmental issues, the plight of the pollinators being chief amongst them, I was sent a link to the Pollinator Patch Project this morning. This is something I've been working toward in my own garden for sometime, I highly encourage you to too, please check out the link, watch the T.E.D. clip, and add your own Pollinator Patch to the world, even if it's just in a few pots on a deck or balcony. We can make a difference.

This painting is of a Red Spotted Purple Admiral Butterfly flying toward it's host plant - willow. I had more of these in my garden this year than I ever had, and got lots of wonderful photo's as they happily posed for me in my Pollinator Patch.

Painting Challenge #4 Love

Crazy week, means I'm only now getting my painting of the week done. It's been a good crazy, with lots of good stuff happening.
The Art Emporium, Boathouse Gallery is now full, and has a waiting list.
We're still taking submissions for the Gift Boutique, we want to carry all kinds of quality, hand crafted goods by regional artisans there. We can hardly wait for February! You'll be getting regular updates, as time gets closer, and an invitation when we open, it's gonna be awesome!
I also went to an 'Arts Country' meeting, and found out that they used my art for the print ads, cool! AND my painting 'True to Type - Portrait of a Printers Daughter' was accepted in the STEPAC juried 'Identity Transfer' show, I haven't received my invitations to hand out yet, but my friend Candy tells me that they show her submission and mine, it's just amazing, how things all happen at once, just amazing!
Back to the painting... I haven't quite decided what to call it, but it's based on the double wedding ring quilt pattern, and has a free association poem running through it.
'Love is an old dog, young child, new bride, old couple, constant, enduring, rough or smooth, always changing. Love stands the test of time, forever, eternity, steadfast, handfasted, whole hearted, healing and heart rending. Love is holding a grand child for the first time, a parent for the last time, and a heart for all time, watching the years fly by, and the days trickle down, until we are all dust together, and start again. '

Have a Merry Christmas, one full of love.

Holiday Painting Challenge # 3- Joy

The challenge word from Creative Catalyst this week was Joy, I actually was able to do most of this painting on Wednesday, though I've been 'fiddling' with it since to make sure it's just right. At one point I did a lot of portraiture, and it felt good doing it again.

For me Joy is spending time with the people I care about, family and friends really are what it's all about, in my opinion. Having said that, I do have favorites, and no joy is purer than the one brought by my two beautiful grand daughters and their hugs and kisses.

While reading my Professional Artist Magazine this month (favorite art mag) I read Dr. Eric Maisel's article about productive obsessions which really resonated with me. He started by explaining how obsessions are not necessarily negative, "psychology has missed the fact that the brain's ability to obsess can also amount to a real treasure. The brain can productively obsess - and it really wants to. People are happier and more efficient when they productively obsess." Wow "...find yourself trapped in trivialities condemned to impulsiveness, led around by anxiety, and duller and sadder than you need to be. Productively obsessing is an antidote to all that." VERY true "...your brain is an engine meant to perform in that higher gear, it has been waiting for this.."

Do yourself a favor and read the whole article . As I've been known to blather on about, I firmly believe that people NEED to create, and that suppressing, that creative impulse lets to all kinds of trouble, whereas honouring it leads to great JOY.

I must apologize to my newsletter subscribers, the December issue is late, I've been monkeying around with mail chimp, trying to learn the nuances.

The December issue will be the last one sent out by my website, I've not been happy with the newsletter template my website provides. Not only is it cumbersome but there have been several delivery issues, so I'm planning to change over. If you'd like to be on my newsletter list you can subscribe here.

I send it out monthly, it contains area art news, tid bits, and recipes, and judging by the feedback, those who get it, when they get it, enjoy it.

The new service will hopefully mean that it arrives, on time, legible, and once not in duplicate or triplicate. Sign up, and wish me luck :)

Holiday painting challenge 2 "Peace"

The second word of the holiday painting challenge from Creative Catalyst was "Peace".

The image that immediately sprang to my mind was the white dove bearing an olive branch, a classic symbol of peace.

The greatest challenge with this one was designing the silhouette of a dove. I lettered peace on a piece of terra skin (still in love) with gold pigment infused gel medium, by stamp and stencil in various type faces and sizes, then layered on a few contrasting colours, ending with a thin layer of gesso. When the layers were dry I sanded through to the gold gel then cut out the silhouette. The olive leaves came from my terra skin scraps. Everything was assembled on a Payne's grey painted 5x7 canvas.

Hubby says it looks like a Christmas card. Since I actually created it with the intention of adding this design to my printed cards, I guess the design is successful, if a bit of a cop out :)

Holiday Painters Challenge

Kim Harrison likes to say that artists look for problems to solve, and if they can't find one, they create it.
So, true to form, when 'Creative Catalyst', one of the art newsletters I get, posted a challenge called the 'holiday paintout', I took up the gauntlet.

Each Tuesday a word is posted in the newsletter, and we're to create a piece based on it, which is proving to be tough, and this is only the first week!

The word of the week was community, the first painting was a disaster. This (2nd painting) is barely recognisable as my style of work, but here for posterity is my effort.

If you like brain benders, you should take up the challenge too.

STEPAC The gift of art show/sale TONIGHT

Christmas is in the air. The hospitals I work in (art teacher/hort tec) all have their decorations up, the malls and stores are in over drive, and ST Thomas Public Art Centre (STEPAC) is having their annual Gift of Art show and sale. The artist's who regularly contribute to the displays in the gift shop will be setting up tables in the main gallery showing and we hope selling our art, and hand made jewelry etc.

A portion of sales (debit and credit only, cash sales go directly to the artist, without commission) will be going to the gallery to help support ongoing programs like children's art programs, education programs, and special events. So come on out and get those credit/debit cards smokin'.

On with the show! 5th annual St Thomas Guild show

The St Thomas Elgin Artists Guild's 5th annual 'twas the art before Christmas show opened last night, with the 'Black Birds' , beverages and goodies, and most of all Glorious ART!

The show continues Saturday Nov 19, 11-5pm and Sunday Nov 20, 12-5pm.

Our artists are exhibiting every manner and style of paintings, photographs, sculpture, stained glass and Rose Klein's art jewlery and textiles.

Everyone has worked very hard to make our annual show spectacular.

See you there!