Forest Family Portrait III

Forest Family Portrait II

The cut pieces of the panel ready to be painted.

Painting tools:

Reusche Powder pigments

Gum Arabic

Water

Brushes

Wood scraping tools

Glistening lump of mixed paint

The Family photo reference

The painted figures on the light table, unfired.

Forest Family Portrait

In the style of my favorite creation, I have been commissioned to do a family portait in the spirit of "Dancing in the Forest". Above is the Glass Eye design. Glass Eye is a CAD (computer assisted design) program that enables me to draw with my mouse and e-mail the progression of the design to the customer. I started this design Sunday at the Cafe Provence in Brandon, VT after having a yummy quiche brunch. http://www.cafeprovencevt.com/. I was drinking coffee and waiting to start my training at the http://www.brandonartistsguild.org/ Brandon Artists Guild, where I am now a Juried Member. Read more about Brandon on my web site blog, www.karendeets.com/pages/Blog.htm .

The young NJ family is a handsome group with varied skin tones, thus making the tree trunks interesting in the diversity. Details will be painted and fired. I will post the progression.

Mums in the Garden

I have an idea:
If bulldozers continue to carve up the rural countryside and plant housing developments everywhere, why not bulldoze rotting buildings in the cities and farm it!
When I observed several years ago in Trenton an entire block in rubbles, I thought to myself, why not add some top soil and farm this area? But to my surprise, in a short time, the Sovereign Bank Arena appeared.

Recently I became aware of an opportunity to help see a little bit of this idea become a reality. Artworks of Trenton, http://www.artworkstrenton.com/ , is sponsoring a fund raiser for STARS, South Trenton Area Residents Society, http://www.trentonstars.org/ , to start a community urban garden project. There are several locations in Trenton where you can pick up a blank 9" heart to finish anyway you like. They have to be turned in by Feb. 20th, and then on Feb. 27th they will be displayed at Artworks and auctioned off, with bids starting at $5.



My heart is called "Mums in the Garden". There is a young mother standing outside, an old mother in the right window, and a mother cat in the left window, in addition to the obvious chrysanthemums. It is composed of glass pieces with a mosaic technique. Some of the pieces are fuse fired and some are fired again with painted details. Acrylic paint is applied with a palette knife in the sky area.

Through the Camera Lense

This commission offered me the opportunity to further develop technique in painting, especially shading with crosshatching, foliage, and reflections. The tiny monarch butterfly below is a smaller than my thumb nail.

The concept of the piece is to show the perspective of a photographer in seeing detail in a large landscape, further emphasized with the contrast of black and white versus vibrant color.

Hot Stuff in the Kitchen

The top image shows the installed scenes of Allentown, NJ, focusing on the old mill on Main St. where I spent nearly 32 years operating Off the Wall Craft Gallery. To the left is the lake, and to the right is Doctor's Creek in Heritage Park, my new favorite woodland playground.

Each tile was created from Spectrum System 96 glass, and fired to 1450 degrees. Then each piece was painted with vitreous glass paint and fired to 1250 degrees.

The installation is in my own home on S. Main St. This was my first time making and installing tiles and I was quite happy with the results!

Forest Fantasy

This fall I had the opportunity to continue my theme based on my previous piece, "Dancing in the Forest". The finished piece, "Forest Fantasy", measured 21" X 43". I did a lot of painting and experimented with new leaf patterns and bark textures. Water and rocks offered some new effects.