Archives for posts with tag: abstract botanicals

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Suddenly, the signs of spring I have been looking for. Yes, the snow is melting and the days are longer but more importantly, Im feeling the energy that flows when my email starts filling up with show invitations. Today I had my first meeting with the president of the Artists’ Cooperative Gallery of Westerly which I was recently juried into. Their next scheduled show is themed “Views from the Street” so my landscapes will work there.

Meanwhile my daughter, Shelley who is a talented photographer with a studio at a nearby converted velvet mill, has invited me to join her for a pop up show at her studio in two weeks. She has chosen some of my abstract botanials for that.

Finally, I plan to introduce a new series of abstract paintings featuring various sizes of metal washers (no plants) and want to produce enough pieces for a meaningful launch of the series at the spring shows.

That means multi-tasking. This week, these are three of five pieces that are in the middle of the process of soaking up their resin baths. By the time they are cured and ready to show, I hope to have many more of all three series waiting for their resin treatments as well. Somehow I’ll have to make time to produce more plants, but with a good foot or more of snow still on the ground, I’m guessing I have some leeway there.

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I just finished a small custom piece that included a “palm tree” made from simple ferns and sensitive ferns so took the opportunity to take inventory. Fresh out of Mexican Feathergrass but off to Florida in a few weeks where I will hunt and gather them. For ferns I may have to resort to an off-season visit to my favorite nursery. I see Japanese painted ferns in my future.

Meanwhile I received a shiny new photography tent which makes it possible for me to end my long battle with glare when photographing my resin peices. Hopefully this means I’ll be putting more of them into my Etsy shop.

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With Labor Day behind us, we’re heading into the final stretch of the art festival season here in New England.  One day I’ll be free to summer in Florida or other places where the festivals go on all year but for now I’m busying myself getting ready for my last outdoor shows and, after that some great indoor shows at the lovely Briggs Nursery in Attleboro Massachusetts. What a perfect place to show botanical art!

While I seldom use flowers in my pieces, when I do, my favorites are roses and carnations. Here, the tips of the little carnation petals seem to melt into the yellow background while the magenta edged white petals assert their presence. This little piece is only 4″ x 4″  I’m thinking a pair of these might work well as corners of a door frame. Hmm…

Next stop, Fall Festival at Slater Park in Pawtucket, Rhode Island on September 13 and 14.

 

 

 

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Yesterday was a perfect spring day in southern New England, so my husband and I paid a visit to our favorite garden center – The Farmer’s Daughter in South Kingston, Rhode Island. This collection of spiky papyrus, ruffled coleus, scented geranium and abutilon will spend the summer in a great planter on my deck and supply me with terrific foliage for my pressed botanicals. Meanwhile, in the garden, my ferns, miniature ivy, yellow archangel, and fringed bleeding heart have all come to life and are ready for a judicious harvest.

Meanwhile, work continues on my new project – pressed botanicals on acrylic backgrounds. For these I use wood panels as supports, and encase the finished work in two or three coats of two-part resin. This one features a single feathery Japanese maple leaf and awaits its second coat of resin. Out with the gas mask…

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Resin is a wonderful way to preserve and enhance real botanicals, so I decided to try a few pieces on wood panel in order to provide the best possible surface for the ice-smooth resin coating. First, I painted my background on a 5″x 5″ panel. Then, I chose a plain mustard yellow for the 7/8″ sides of the cradle, and mounted my two sweet ivy leaves. Before coating the work with resin, I couldn’t resist adding a tiny ‘droplet’ of water on one of the leaves using more acrylic and a tiny signature brush.