Creating again!

My creative space is up and working again in our fabulous new home.  So much has happened since my last post.  We are all settled in at the new place, I have three paintings out in two different group exhibitions and one in a competition.  We have been on a road trip for a family wedding and I’ve had a little interview uploaded on to You Tube (my 22 seconds of fame!).  And then on my return to blog land I find we have a new home for our creative spaces as well, exciting times!

I’m so happy all of the busy, busy days are over and I can settle back into some sort of normal rhythm.  The painting that is on my work bench has waited so long to come to life and I am really happy with how it is coming along.  Hopefully I will be able to share the finished piece in the next couple of days.   

I’m very happy to be back here in blog land too, I can’t wait to find some time for visiting and catching up on what you have been up to.

Cooking in the studio

Cooking today, but in my creative space, not in the kitchen…

Ingredients

• 1 kg pure bees wax
• 200 gr refined bees wax pellets
• 220 gr damar resin crystals

Method

Mix together all ingredients and melt over low heat stirring constantly until combined (about 30 minutes). 

Ladle mixture into patty cake tins and wait till cool and resolidified.

Pop out of tins and store until next painting day!

My favourite kind of cooking – mixing up encaustic medium.  It feels so good to have a big fresh batch all ready to go.  The possibilities of it are endless; I wonder what paintings this batch will become…

For those of you following my disaster in the studio yesterday, take 2 didn’t go well.  But I will resurrect this piece, take 3 will be the winner – I just know it.

"Entwining"

Detail of “Entwined in the Community” in progress

Encaustic and copper on mounted linen

Today I hope to get the entwining part of my latest work “Entwined in the Community” done.  It will involve lots of carefully, but forcefully find paths through the copper balls for the needle and twine.  

Detail of “Entwined in the Community” in progress

Encaustic and copper on mounted linen

Time consuming and a little frustrating, but oh so satisfying as it the piece is so close to finished…

I wonder if anything simular is happening in other creative spaces across the globe…

Work in Progress...

I’m loving the background I am working on in My Creative Space this week.  I have my fingers crossed that the whole painting goes as smoothly as this stage has, as I have already entered it in a competition!  

 

 The vision in my head is great (it will be a bit like this one), just got to hope I can bring it to life…  I have a bit of time to rework it if it is a flop, so not too much pressure...

Wish me luck.

“Community Connections”

“Community Connections”

Kylie Marie Stevens

encastic on linen

300 x 300mm

2011

Each little circle - a person…

Each little line - a connection…

Each connection - a building block with which strong communities grow…

This piece symbolises the connections and community that I have found online.  Such beautiful and fruitful connections with so much room to grow.

Create some more online connections of your own over here.  

Community Ties

My blogging space may have been quite slack lately, but my creative space is still full steam ahead.  I am madly in love with my latest painting.  It doesn’t always feel like this when I finish a piece, but this is the feeling I am always chasing.  Knowing that it can feel this good is what pushes me along through all of the hard work.

"Community Ties"

Kylie Marie Stevens

encaustic, copper and twine on canvas

450 x 550mm

2011

I am embarking on a new series exploring the concept of “Community", for me the copper balls represent the people within the community that are tied together with the twine that symbolises different strands or groups within our larger communities. 

Community Ties - detail

I’m hoping to do a piece soon on my involvement with the bloggy community, but I haven’t yet come up with a way to represent it.  What does community mean to you?  Do you feel a stronger connection with your physical/locality community or your online community?

I hope you are having a good Creative Space day… Pop on over here to join in the fun.

Blogging Blah’s…..

I anticipated a bit of a slump, post my exhibition, but I thought I had planned cleverly enough to sneak past it…

I made plans to escape on a little camping break soon after the opening and I put off starting my eagerly awaited launch into encaustics until after our return from camping.

And as much as I loved the camping and the encaustics are all that I hoped they would be I am still in a bit of a blogging and inspiration blah.  The rest of life is swimming along just fine and I am still creating… mostly experimenting and learning with the encaustics.  I’m just not feeling those bolts of inspiration.

I’m normally so keen to blog, with my head full of more posts than I have time to share.  But lately I’m just not feeling it, I’m so out of touch in my blog reading and I have been seriously considering just closing down the blog and walking away.

In my heart I know this would be a mistake.  I value the friendships I have made through blogging to much and I know that being part of blogging community brings me inspiration and motivation.

I just need to give myself a kick in the pants and get back into the swing of things.  I know many of you must have been through this sort of thing before.  How did you pull yourself out of it? 

So my creative space is full of doubt…  Perhaps a little blog surfing around creative space land will provide me with the kick start I need???  See you at Kirsty’s.

smitten with wax…

I have never been so challenged by a creative medium, but the beauty and the possibility of encaustics have me oh so smitten.  The smell is divine, the texture is dreamy and I am determined to master this.

I have played with including pastel between layers of wax…

Surfacing

Encaustic, pastel, paper and timber panel

235 x 290mm

I have melted, blown and glazed…

Hazy Days

Encaustic, pastel, paper and timber panel

235 x 290mm

I have embedded twine and stamped texture…

Gentle Lands

Encaustic, twine and timber panel

235 x 290mm

And last night I carved the surface with my lino carving tools…

work in progress

Encaustic, cheesecloth and timber panel

235 x 290mm

The texture for carving is just sublime; I have never carved anything with such ease.  I just want to spend every waking moment in the studio!  

I’ll catch up with all you creative types over at Kirsty’s this afternoon.  I am heading off for a site meeting with the builder now, to decide where all of the power points and plumbing will go.

Hot wax + naked flame = fun and experimentation in the studio……

Did I get your attention???  Sorry nothing kinky going on here!  I’m immersing myself in experimenting with encaustics.  I have fallen in love with this ancient and ethereal medium and I am determined to master it.  

Hopefully by next week I will have something beautiful to share with you, but for now it’s all mess and mistakes!  It’s all so exciting though; don’t you just love the buzz of learning something new?  My head is spinning with possibilities, I just need my skill set to catch up!

I wonder what the other creative types are up to today.

There are a lot of sad, lonely, empty hooks at my place today….

I won’t be creating anything in my creative space today, but I am packing up a bundle of my creations and hanging them for my exhibition…Gee the house is going to seem empty without them. 

Just one more sleep until my opening night’s….  That’s right I am having two opening nights at once.  The regular “in the flesh” one at Drawing Point Gallery and my “online” opening night, they will both open simultaneously (fingers crossed auto posting works its magic for me!). 

So if distance keeps you from coming along….  Join me celebrating this milestone right here in the blogsphere, your invitation with all of the details is right here. I hope you will raise your glass for me from your corner of the globe and leave a comment on the “Online Opening” post to go in the draw for the “lucky door prize”. 

Wish me luck that the hanging goes well, so I can grab a moment to do a little My Creative Space surfing this afternoon….

Itchy, but optimistic…

I am itching to get playing with my paints again.  I haven’t had any Little Guy free time for painting in weeks.  I have one more painting day before the exhibition and before that long awaited day arrives I need to find time to stretch this beautiful linen on to the custom sized stretcher I had made.   I have a good feeling about the painting for this canvas, perhaps it will even end up the star of the show (not to put any pressure on myself or anything!!!!).

There is still lots of work to do before my big day (just 8 days till opening night!), so I shall probably continue to be a bit of a slacker around my Blogtoberfest posting.  But do drop back by tomorrow as I want to share a very special little something I purchased to celebrate and commemorate my solo exhibition milestone…

Its Thursday once again, so you know where we are all headed…Make yourself a cuppa, there is tons of creativity to immerse yourself in! 

Where’s all the art????

While you might imagine the lead up to an art exhibition would mean lots of paint and canvas, there is not actually that much creativity in my space at the moment…..

15 days till opening night and most of the work I am doing includes this diary.  Writing to the press, getting invitations out into the community, collecting paintings and applying for a group exhibition later in the year have occupied me this week.  Along with the excitement at The Dirty….the holes we celebrated earlier in the week are now full of cement and we should soon have poles rising into the air.  

I hope your creative spaces are exciting and abundant today, so that I can pop by and live vicariously through your creativity!

I’ve been a slack blogger lately…..

I’ve immersed myself in exhibition preparations and building our dream house.  These are very exciting times for me and as busy as I am, I do still want to share the experience with you all here in my little space.  

So Blogtoberfest couldn’t have come at a better time for me.  Just what I need, a pledge to blog everyday for October, thankyou so much for hosting Tinniegirl!  Hopefully it will get me back into the swing of things.

Here’s what has been keeping me busy in the studio this week.  A little stunner called “Grace”.  This painting flowed so beautifully from idea to completion – a complete contrast to the struggle I had with Arrival last week.

Grace

Kylie Marie Stevens

oil on canvas

509 x 610mm

2010

Time to pop over and see if Kirsty is still low on fuel….Or if the creative’s from all over will be converging at her place again.  

Sneak peek at “Arrival”…

I had decided I shouldn’t share any new painting photos here or on my facebook page before my exhibition opening.  But I couldn’t help sharing a bit of a look at this beauty!  It was such a fight to get this piece to live up to the magnificent vision in my head.  And to put extra pressure on myself I had already given it the “staring spot” in the Adrift series, so it had to be good….

I pushed through the “ugly stage”, I persisted with the never ending need to clean my brushes as I went, and I gave myself a big pep talk (and just quietly I switched from coffee to port!) and I got through it.  I’m so glad I did, I love it now!  Do you have greater affection for your “hard won” creations or the ones that come really easily?  

This piece holds a lot of symbolism for me, but more about that another day… It’s time to go and check out everyone else’s creative spaces….

Ooohh just remembered Kirsty is having a holiday, so there may not be a “My Creative Space” today.  What a strange Thursday today will be if that is the case!  If you pop by here anyway and have a creative space sort of post happening, make sure you leave me a comment, so I can come check it out… So I don’t go into creative space withdrawals!  

Can you see it?

I’d love to know what, if anything, you see in this little abstract pair.  Shhh if you have been following the conversation over here.  I want to see if anyone else comes up with the same thought! 

I painted the first in the pair as a purely abstract form.  But once the first person mentioned the image they saw, there seems to be no getting away from it!  I must admit I was a little led by this thought as I painted the pair…..

I haven’t named them yet, so if a title jumps out at you, please share.

I’m looking forward to finding a quiet moment this afternoon to sit down with a cuppa and check out all of this week’s creativity.  

New Toy!!!

There is a new toy in My Creative Space today. I can’t use it just yet, I need to do some rummaging at the op shop and order some special materials from the art supply shop, but I am so excited about the plans I have for this little beauty……

Avery

Kylie Marie Stevens

watercolour, pastel and ink on watercolour paper

148 x 210mm

2010

I have been on a roll with my little watercolours this week, Emerson sold almost as soon as he was posted and Avery and Bernard have had a lot of positive feedback. I even listed them in my neglected little Etsy shop, hopefully they find new homes soon.

Bernard

Kylie Marie Stevens

watercolour, pastel and ink on watercolour paper

148 x 210mm

2010

See you all at Kirsty’s!

Arriving

I think I may have arrived at the end of the “Adrift” series with yesterday’s new painting titled “Arriving”.

"Arriving"

Kylie Marie Stevens

40.7 x 50.9cm

oil on canvas

will be available for sale - details soon...

I’ve really enjoyed delving into this series, but almost as soon as this was completed I felt called to move on. I plan on embarking on another series with “Namaste” a painting from a couple of months ago as the starting point.

"Namaste"

Kylie Marie Stevens

90 x 90 cm

oil on canvas

2010

SOLD

What a great place to be in for My Creative Space day, feeling good about the end of one project and excited about embarking on another! I hope your creative space is exciting and positive too. See you at Kirsty’s!

A funny little painting that started life as one thing and turned into another...The Animation!

I have been contemplating ways to try to share a little more of my process with you. I’ve been toying with the thought of videoing myself, but that seemed like a bit of an overwhelming learning curve!!

Then I discovered this nifty program on My Poppet, via Cam’s post the other day.

So I present to you, my very first animation.

You can see I started out with one idea, didn’t like how it was turning out and just let it evolve.

An Evolution

Kylie Marie Stevens

oil on canvas

30 x 33.9 cm

2010

I’m still not sure if this painting really hits the mark….What do you think? Hit or miss?

Time to pop over to the hostess with the mostest for some creative window shopping on My Creative Space day.

Anticipation and Admiration Fill My Creative Space this Week.

I can’t stop admiring Monday’s painting “Approach” the latest in my “Adrift” series.

“Approach”

Kylie Marie Stevens

Oil on canvas

840 x 760mm

2010

I’ve never worked in a series like this before, I am really enjoying it. It is giving me the opportunity to sink right into the style and become comfortable. Do you work in series, or is it all one offs for you? Are you enjoying this “Adrift” series or are you thinking “enough already- move on”?  Do you have a favourite?

I am anticipating painting a monochromatic piece in yellow for the first week of The Creative Colour Challenge . YELLOW, this is really pushing me out of my comfort zone – exactly why I signed up!!

So challenges and comfort surround me at the moment, but I am enjoying it all, I hope you are feeling the same way in your creative space. I’m off to Kirsty’s now for my favourite blog hopping day of the week – My Creative Space Day - hooray!

Meet Vinnie

My Creative Space has a new mascot, the adorable, crazy artist, owl, Vinnie. He winged his way here from the Crzylady Shop and has taken up residence in my studio. I have set him the task of attacking “Norbert” my inner critique whenever he raises his ugly head!

Check out the other goodies Tracylea included in my pretty package. You must visit her shop, there are so many adorable little (owl)ies awaiting good homes.

Two packages in two days, I have been spoilt by my friends from across the globe just when I needed it most. I have been in a bit of a slump unable to paint as I nurse my dodgy back and unwrapping these packages has brought a smile to my sooky dial.

I hope your creative space has been more productive. To check out all the goodness happening in creative spaces far and wide pop over to Kootoyoo.