Lady with Roses ~ New Toy ~ Art Blog ~ Acrylic

5" x 7" Acrylic on canvas panel
This was started on our CBC trip to Port Bolivar in September and it has been revamped several times. I put the finishing touches on it on Monday while painting at the Upstairs Gallery. I thought I needed to put a clothed figure on the blog between some nudes and I have added features to this face.
I ask a lot of questions in workshops and just from friends in general. Several times in workshops I've been approached with "Get Nancy to ask. She will" - if someone is a little shy. Yesterday, I wanted to know how Myrna got the images she used for her 1st place winner and she replied with photos of her new toy, the Gorilla Pod. I got on the telephone and found them at Arlington Camera and Best Buy. So thanks, Myrna for sharing the technique but the small Gorilla Pod at Best Buy wouldn't hold up my Panasonic digital (I love this camera for it's anti-shake/image stabilization feature and small size to fit in my purse) as it has the tripod attachment at one end instead of in the middle. I purchased a Platinum Plus by Sunpak, the FlexPod Pro, and it's made for a digital SLR which mine is not but my camera is not listing at the moment. (See the Amazon link on the right for a detailed explanation.) I left it on the couch looking like a big spacey bug ready to pounce on me the next time I made my way to the kitchen. Now I can't wait to get cute (no need for scary Halloween photos) this morning and take some photos and later paint a self portrait series like Myrna or maybe just one small one. And prepare for a very important event tonight. Stay tuned.
Now, Myrna, was that a full size sheet of watercolor paper? What size is the portrait you did today?

Waiting for a victim..

Other blogs where I post:

http://artistfoodnetwork.blogspot.com/

http://canvasbycanvas.blogspot.com/

http://myspace.com/nancystandlee

TO VIEW MORE PAINTINGS OR PURCHASE: Go to Paypal on

http://nancystandlee.blogspot.com/

Well ~ Paint Your Food ~ Laugh Often

Lady Emma ~ Boat Watercolor Painting ~ Port Bolivar, Texas ~ Art Blog

$150.00 unframed
15 x 22 watercolor painting on 300 lb. paper
(It would fit into a matt and standard frame 22x28)
Lady Emma was painted this past week in the Steve Rogers Workshop given by SWA in Fort Worth. The photo was taken during a trip with some CBC members to the Port Bolivar, Galveston area. Older posts will show some slides from other students and some of Steve's work.
I rented an interesting art movie yesterday and watched it last night.
Carla O’Connor mentioned a foreign film, Camille Claudel, about the sculptor, Rodin, and his passionate obsession with art – and with Camille. It is a historically accurate depiction of one of the most important collaborations in the history of modern art. It was a little hard to find but the Hollywood Video on Cooper St. had a copy, for my local readers. It has captions and runs 2 hours and 39 minutes and came out in 1989. I enjoyed the movie but I didn't enjoy reading the captions because you can't multi-task with your eyes glued to the TV. I belong to a collaborative group of 11 local artists, Canvas by Canvas and we are interested in collaborations.
I find this web site is a good place to research movies and plot summaries at the Internet Movie Database. This is where I always get into trouble and it happens at Amazon all the time with the recommendations…If you like this book, movie, then you might like this one… spend more time and money.
I see they recommend Frida and I loved Frida - the movie, her way of dressing, and the paintings. When I was in Puerto Vallarta for a workshop, I bought a beach wrap/sarong/shawl with her huge picture in the center and I do wear it.
Caution: These are not family movies with small children - adult children OK.
This interesting article about the secrets of Mona Lisa was on my Yahoo home page this morning. I know a lot of artists out there who would never want their paintings inspected that closely to really see how many layers it took to reach the final stage. This is not the case with watercolor. In watercolor you usually have to get it right the first time or start over. If you want to read about taking risks with watercolor and pushing the medium to its limits, check out the book, Taking Risks with Watercolour, on my Amazon link. I recommend it if you're ready to move up to the intermediate level. Every page is filled with exciting, colorful examples of Shirley Trevena's work.
Other blogs where I post:
· http://artistfoodnetwork.blogspot.com/
· http://canvasbycanvas.blogspot.com/
· http://myspace.com/nancystandlee
· TO VIEW MORE PAINTINGS OR PURCHASE: Go to Paypal on http://nancystandlee.blogspot.com/
· Eat Well ~ Paint Your Food ~ Laugh Often

CALYPSO JUDGE Series #5 of 10 More BLOG and PING

7.5" x 5.5" image
Acrylic on 140 lb. watercolor paper
The Calypso series #5

This figure reminds me of a judge. What do you see? I have the bright colors, and lots of splatter, and the addition of the black and white squares suggests a checkerboard. It is dramatic when you have your darkest dark up against the lightest light in a painting and it will tend to draw the eye to this area. I don’t want an exact likeness but just an impression that does not bore.
In yesterday’s post, I reported on a ping site. Today I have another site to add to our arsenal and instructions on how to put it on your blog so as to ping several blog directories to possibly cause some indirect traffic to appear at your blog site. My painting buddies at Canvas by Canvas are calling us "Nancy and the Bloggernuts" and these instructions are directed more at the Bloggernuts than anyone else.
Autopinger is a free and convenient service for all bloggers. Just set it and forget it. It relays your blog updates to blog search engines every 30 minutes or you can add a button and ping after you update. Disclaimer! I’ve been blogging about 2 weeks now (a baby blogger trying to find my way in the blogosphere). Please read your directions for your Ping Me button as given on http://autopinger.com/ as the ones given below are only suggestions.

Gadzooks! Batman!...go for it.
Go to: http://autopinger.com/

Register- Sign up is free
You will receive an email notification, follow
instructions
Sign up by clicking
Go to My Account
Add new blog
Type in the url of your blog - ADD
Set ping services (on the left)
All are set automatically
Get the: Quick Ping Button
Copy the html
code generated (scroll down, left click inside the box, control C to copy
(Here I paste it in a Word document in case for some strange reason I lose
it?) Paranoia?
At Blogger Template, add a page, HTML, and paste in the code
(I had a box at the bottom of my page that I’d put in a stat counter (the long
skinny one) So as not to add another box on my page, I used the stat counter box
and pressed enter several times to put some space between the html code and
added the Ping info into the same box.)
Paste into the Blogger template
(Here grab you a glass of iced tea and bring it back to your computer...Be
careful of spills! or some Sweet tea, sometimes known as Southern Table Wine.
View and Ping the PING ME button...Fun! and Watch what
happens in the pop up window…Drink you iced tea and WAIT and WATCH as your site is pinged to death. Autoping will do this automatically every 30 minutes.

(I can’t believe computers all over the world are being pinged every 30 minutes but then I don’t understand electricity either or even how my coffee pot works!) OR and this is the fun part you can press your Ping Me button when you have an update. BLOG and PING!! Scroll all the way down to the bottom of my page and you can see my Ping Me button and yours should look just the same. I hope so. Happy Pinging!