Guest Artist of the Month - February 2010

It has been such a privilege, for me, to offer this Guest Artist feature on my Blog; not to mention fun :).

Some of you may already be familiar with my Guest Artist of the Month for February. But; for those, of you, who are not, please let me introduce you to Caterina Giglio.

Photos, here, are two samples of Caterina's art and the other is a personal photo! I knew she was as lovely as I had imagined.

I love Blogging and this is how I became aware of Caterina and her beautiful artwork. Please treat yourself to some time visiting Caterina's Blog.

She also has a second Blog which is called Dolce Shop where Caterina offers some of her beautiful artwork for sale.

I feel privileged and honored to have Caterina as this month's Guest Artist and here is my interview with her.....enjoy!:

M-Tell us a little bit about yourself and how you began your artistic journey.
C-My last name, Giglio, is Italian and it is pronounced Gee-lee-o, and translated to, lily. Consequently, the lily is my personal symbol and I collect Fleur De Lys. My grandparents were born in Italy and I think my personal style reflects my heritage and my love of beauty. I am primarily a self-taught, mixed medium artist, and I live in a lovely little community in Colorado. I was an Art Education major in school and dropped out, just short of 2 years, to make a living and tend to a family member. The day I turned 50, I made a decision to change careers and get back to my original intended life. I have appreciated each artful day and give thanks for this wonderful life; the creative life.

M-A lot of your art is nature inspired, which is what attracted me to your Blog (linked above). Does nature provide you with most of your inspiration?
C-Nature provides a great deal of inspiration for me. I am an avid gardener and I adore being in the garden, soaking up the beauty around me. I always think it is interesting to see how other artists respond to their enviroment. Nature is just so drop-dead gorgeous, that I cannot help but be inspired. I put the bird songs and the sound of the garden on my Blog to remind me of that beauty. One of my favorite quotes is from Frank Lloyd Wright, "Study nature, love nature, stay close to nature. It will never fail you". I keep it on my inspiration board to remind me to look to the organic way of life. Nature sustains me, and literally feeds my body and soul.

M-Your art seems very personal and your words that accompany your pieces, as well as your photography, really makes for a beautiful marriage. What seems to come first when you create? Your words or the actual art creation?
C-That is such a great question! I generally have an idea for a new body of work or a sense of where I want to go in creating some new project. Often the photograph or drawing or antique ephemera will tell me more about where we are going and I just follow along. These bits of the past tell me stories. I think of it as deep listening. So the words and the creation dovetail.

M-Your Blogs are lovely. You recently opened up a separate Blog (linked above) for selling your art. I was very pleased to view the grand opening of it and wish you much success. Are you finding this more comfortable than selling on Etsy?
C-I have an Etsy account but, I got to thinking that I wanted to create my own shop, not a small space in a huge venue. In my former life, I was a retail manager and training coordinator, so it seemed a natural thing to open a shop of my own. The other reason for opening my second Blog/Shop, is the ability to go into detail about each piece and why I created them, which seems to be of interest to others. I just recently added PayPal so that takes care of credit purchases and the only problem I have is keeping it stocked. That is the kind of problem I always want to have!

M-Please use three words to describe your artistic style.
C-Okay....how about two words? Romantic and historian.

M-Are there a couple of art goals you have for this new year you could share with us?
C-I have several! But I won't give you the whole list. I have been teaching locally for a number of years and now feel that I want to try online classes. I am going to make that a definite accomplishment this year. Another goal I have for this year is to continue to seek publication and to spread my wings a bit by entering different calls. The last goal is to return to painting. I have been slowly moving toward mixing mediums and acrylics and I am ready to jump in with both feet! Thanks so much for this opportunity Marilyn!

M-You are so very welcome Caterina! It was my pleasure......thank YOU!

End of interview.

I'm lovin' Shiva Oil Sticks :)

This is my second painted portrait using Shiva Oil Sticks! I love them! I am finding I have much more control with these vs the acrylic paint. You can actually combine both.

The portrait began as a brand-new drawing I did on Bristol Vellum (smooth side) and my "model" was from one of my favorite images from Paper Whimsy collage sheet.

I'm having a blast!

I visited Blogs, yesterday, to catch up on what you are all creating and I'm really enjoying seeing what you are doing. You all inspire me to reach higher and higher with my own art.

There are a lot of Blog giveaways going on with the One World , One Heart project. It's fantastic and I signed up for a bunch. It's a great project and I'm thinking of joining in, myself, for the next one.

Love to all of you and hope your day is being good to you....................Marilyn xxoo

My First Painted Portrait - woohoo!

The first picture, here, is my very first painted portrait! I used one of my earlier drawings which I've also shown here and turned her into the painted portrait!

Misty suggested we use our earlier sketches for experimenting with the flesh-tone painting and thought this was a brilliant tip. It made me feel a bit freer and I guess I really altered the original drawing didn't I?

I am really happy with this first attempt at painting a portrait. I decided to add a little background to the figure. This was fun!

I see Misty put up another lesson using Shiva oil sticks. I've got to go check it out!

Hope you're not getting tired of these but I really want to share with you what I am doing. This was such a huge step, for me, to take this course and I'm very happy I did. It's really challenging and takes a lot of time. It's teaching me patience :) My housework is suffering as a result but - oh well! That's the way it goes! :)

All be safe, well and get some art time in!

Much love to all! Marilyn xxoo

More practice................

This is another practice drawing using the Stabilo black pencil and titanium white paint. I used a very difficult image as a "model". It is one of my favorite postcards in my collection of a French woman. She's kind of sassy I think :)

But; one of the challenges, I had, is I tried this on canvas paper and it wasn't taking the paint very well so I had to improvise and use some oil pastels and lots of water when adding the paint. I decided to "color" this up a little around the background.

I am pleased, so far, with what I'm doing; I still hope to be able to loosen up more but know that will come with the "3 p's".

Later on, in the day, I'm going to try working on one using Misty's formula for skin tones with more paint. Wish me luck!

I hope you all had a good weekend; it surely went fast. Thinking of all!

Much love - Marilyn xxoo

Lesson #2-Drawing and Painting Portraits

I've been a little quiet the past couple of days and I will definitely get back to everyone's blogs to see what you are all up to.

I've had to take some time to begin Misty Mawn's next lesson that began on Friday. We are now getting into painting portraits. Yikes! It is extremely challenging, for me, and these are my first two attempts. I can see where I need to go out and get the correct paper as the paint was not taking very well to what I have on hand here. The first picture is on a thinner-weight watercolor paper and the second picture is on Illustration board. But; maybe this isn't so bad as this was an exercise and just as well I didn't use really good paper yet. :)

But; I'm not unhappy with the result. I'm giving myself time and it's going to take a lot of practice. This is a very intense course, for me, but I'm so happy I'm challenging myself to do this.

The exercise, we were assigned, is to draw a portrait using a Stabilo pencil then going in with titanium white acrylic paint. The Stabilo pencil reacts like a watercolor pencil.

My "models" for my portraits are from my collection of postcards I have here.

I hope you are all having a good weekend and getting some art time in for yourself.

Well; back to the drawing board :)

Much love always..............................Marilyn xxoo

Last one - I promise :)

This is my last 3/4 portrait drawing and the last graphite drawing I will share. The next post will be over the weekend or early next week, once I've completed an actual painted portrait.

I have to admit, this one is my favorites that I've done so far. I've always been drawn to "vintage" or "antique" postcards, images, photos - love their expressions even though a lot of the older photos of people, do not offer happy expressions. But; I am drawn, to them, more so than the "glams". To me, these older photos offer realism to me; they are more pensive and take me in to try to interpret what they could possibly be thinking; hard lives, perhaps a loss or just reflection on their daily living. I'm also wondering, if years and years ago, women weren't supposed to smile and laugh; they would appear too frivolous??? Perhaps I'm reaching.

Anyway; it's a pleasure to share my Drawing and Portrait journey with all of you. This course has certainly put a whole new spin on creating my art. The possibilities are endless and I know the more I practice, it will lead to a wonderful surprise along the way! Isn't that what life holds for us all? The element of surprise; the ups, downs and not knowing. I don't want to know what's ahead, for me, I really am trying to live in the now; not only with my art but personally.

Gee; see what these vintage/antique images do to me? :)

Have a joyous day and I'm now going to go visit your Blogs to see what you are up to.

Much love always - Marilyn xxoo

Practice, practice, practice :)

Here are some more practice portraits. The first two are 3/4 portraits. One is the original I through in Photoshop which I liked the effect and the other is the original drawing. I took the model from a "glam" magazine I have here and her side hair was braided which was a bit challenging.

The other photo is a 3/4 portrait (a la Misty Mawn); she offers us some of her own images for practice. The other is a side portrait that I drew just on my own and didn't use a model.

I feel pretty good about what I'm doing, so far; although I can start to see I need to loosen up and feel that will come with the "3 P's". :) I think the rest of week I'm going to practice just with single elements like noses, mouths, ears, and eyes. That will help loosen me up :) Or a glass of wine! :)

Friday is the second lesson offering of Misty Mawn's class and it will introduce us to painting portraits! I'm very anxious with this one and have feeling it's going to be very challenging for me. I have a free weekend coming up so the timing is great!

Thank you all for your supporting comments, here, you have no idea how much you all inspire me and give me the wings I need to challenge myself. Even a year ago, I'm not sure I could share these exercises publicly.

Have a safe and happy day! Love always - Marilyn xxoo