Colored Pencil Demo and a recent workshop.

Last weekend I did a great workshop with members of the Old Dominion Decorative Painters in Richmond.  This is a great bunch of ladies who are accomplished in many differing media and who know how to enjoy a workshop.  What a lunch they put out!  YUM!  We started the Two Day workshop in Colored Pencil on Friday with the basics of CP on paper and finished Saturday with colored pencil on Travertine Stone Tile.  

The Trio of Cherries #3 (5" X 7") is a small little still life I used to teach transferring the image, stroke, blending and burnishing of CP onto Stonehenge paper.  It's a great little piece that combines bright colors, lighting effects with shadow, and enjoying the process with like minded artists.  I worked up a YouTube video for the artists who participated and have attached it below:

                                        

If you can't access the video directly click on the link below.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXgYzxeKkd8

If you stop by YouTube give me a thumbs up so I know to continue making videos.

Here are their cherries, didn't they do great!

One of the best things about doing what you love is being able to share it with others.  Although several of these lovely ladies are current on going students of mine, I met many more new artists and friends.  They were open to learning a new media and two new surfaces.  We colored pencil artists know this is not a fast media but working on stone is faster than on paper.

My Celtic Green Man example on Travertine 8" X 8"tile, and my demoing the piece for the group.  A "green man" is a Celtic symbol of the "Man of the Woods".  I like to think of them as the male version of mother nature.  I like them so much I collect them, so if you visited my home gardens you would see my collection.

My demo piece on Travertine Tile (no it's not a flipped photo I did it this time in reverse)

Travertine only takes about 4-5 light layers.  When you have completed your first pass of all colors on the entire piece and a spray of workable fixative allows for minor tweaks for deepening the color saturation of the CP.  (Adding an additional light layer.)  Prismacolor pencils and their wax based color work well on the travertine.  Blending is accomplished with the pencil layers and stroke, but a paper stump will move things around a bit to blend also. 

Here are a few tips for working on travertine tile: 

1.  It needs to be unglazed, unpolished stone tile.  Look for the terms "Honed and Filled" when looking at tile stores.  Often they have sample tiles for sale, buying a small one will give you a good idea if there is enough tooth.  I used tumbled for the workshop, doing so will lesson the tooth but give you rounded edges on the tile which makes for easier handling.  Keep your hands free of lotion and use a slip sheet to keep hand oils off the tile. (I use tracing paper.)

2.  One always learns from teaching and although I purchased samples and tested them, the heavy cases of 24, I purchased were not the exact same as the samples I bought.  Shock!  So in order for the CP to grip the tile, meant I had to fill some of natures wholes and sand the tile with a wet fine toothed sanding block.  I used sand-less off white grout to fill the wholes.  Nature gives each stone a unique surface and the minerals in the locality give various colors to the stone.  Working on the lightest colored stone will be easiest for working with transparent Cps. 

3.  When your finished 2-3 light sprays of the workable fixative and then 2-3 coats of UV acrylic varnish will seal and protect your tile.  Display it on a table easel for all to enjoy.  It can also be framed in a floater frame.  I'll do an example of this in a future post.  

 NOTE:  This tile can not be used as a trivet for hot pots or dishes as they are not glazed but varnished.  Varnish will melt if a hot pot is placed on it, ruining your artwork.      

 I have plans for other travertine stone pieces, (I'm currently working on a large 18 X 18" tile) so stay tuned for future posts.  And as always is your interested in my doing a workshop for your group contact me here or on my website:  www.gloriacallahan.com  

And as always do something colorful today!

Gloria

Colored Pencil On Travertine Marble - Great new surfaces

                                        Celtic Greenman on Travertine Marble 10 X 10 Tile

This is a post that's been waiting to be written on a piece I accomplished at this years CPSA Convention in Brea, CA this summer.  Elliott Everson conducted this workshop, as a signature member of the CPSA, his work is very appropriate for this surface.  His website is here: www.elliotteverson.com/‎   Take a look at his work and subject matter, it really goes well onto the stone tile he works on and his location.  But since I'm not a fan of snakes, reptiles, and such, I choose to work from a reference of mine that reflected one of my passions.  Green men faces, I have them all around my yard and home, on a wall of my front porch and elsewhere in my garden.  I just love them.  This mythical figure the Green man symbolizes the life that is found in the natural plant world and on earth itself, and has many interesting stories and fables surrounding it.  Being a gardener I can't help to love the simple idea of the green man protecting my garden.  Their faces are as varied as the human faces in our lives.  

I had created this Celtic Greenman originally on a used violin for a fundraiser for the Richmond Symphony several years ago, called "String Art" (see below).  I primed with colorfix pastel primer on the front face of the badly beat up instrument and then applied my color pencil on top.  It was auctioned to raise funds for the symphony so I never had a chance to enjoy it at my home and secretly wanted one of my own.  

  

So it was this image of a stone carving from the Bamburg Cathedral I chose to use as my workshop adventure with travertine marble.  I highly recommend Everett's teaching method on stone, if you ever get to take a workshop from him.  And being an ole decorative painter working on new surfaces intrigues me.  

Working on unsealed, tumbled marble tile was an adventure indeed.  My normal method of working in 20-25 layers on paper or pastelboard wouldn't work here.  Yes, the roughness chews up your pencil a little, so that's similar to pastelboard or sanded paper.  But after a few 3-4 layers of wax based pencil (Prismacolors) you find the pencil sliding on the stone.  Now that would have bothered me but I had just finished working on double frosted mylar for my Jamestown Sea Captain. (See my Aug. entry titled:  Gloria J Callahan, CPSA - Colored Pencil Paintings: Jamestown Sea Captain and my busy summer.   Mylar or Acetate does not take many layers of wax based pencil either.  The one difference is that with the travertine marble can be spray with workable fixative to get a few more layers down. Which worked beautifully on the Celtic Greenman.  

Working with the rough surface was fun to incorporate the dips and crevices into the subject.  This gave me a whole new idea for a series of stone pieces to create.  More to come....... so watch for new work.  Oh, one more thing, you finish and protect your work by spraying with fixative then several light coats of acrylic sealant or varnish.  This of course would not allow you to use the tile for a trivet with hot surfaces as the varnish would be damaged and thus your work.  I'm happy to display it on a counter easel for the art work it is.  And now I have one for my very own.