Trying Something New

The past few weeks I have been creating something a little different in my studio.  I finished a commission piece for a friend and ever since then I have just had a real urge to break away from painting on a canvas and have been turning my attention to using a combination of watercolor, pen and ink and colored pencils.  I love the richness that the colored pencils give some of the areas when I go over it using the watercolor as a base. The end result is a  combination of looseness and yet rich details that neither the watercolor or the pencil has on its own.

I am also stuck on the look of outlining in pen all of the randomness of color and designs that are created by using watercolors for my backgrounds or on the fur.  It creates an abstract effect that I like in the background.  I have no idea if anyone else will actually like this technique, but I'm having a BLAST!

All these pieces will be hanging by Preview Thursday (October 1, 2015) at City of the World Gallery.

Watercolor pieces getting matted and framed

Fun piece to paint of a lions eye

Almost finished with the details on this Red Eyed Tree Frog

What in the World is a Pogonip?

Last week we had a real cold spell in Las Vegas and so I started several winter scenes in my little studio with space heater blasting. They actually called it a "Hard Freeze" because the temperature dropped into the 20's at night and several days the afternoon high didn't even reach the 40's.  The Mojave Desert does get below freezing during the winter but this cold snap was actually nothing compared to the week that our Northern Nevada neighbors experienced.  Shortly after this drop in temperatures, I started noticing beautiful photos of ice crystals taken in the Reno area being posted on Facebook.  The word "Pogonip" was popping up everywhere and so I had to do a little research on this word because I had never seen it before. 

Turns out the word pogonip originates from a Shoshone word and occurs only when the humidity in the air is nearly 100% and the temperature is below freezing.  This causes ice crystals to form in the air, creating an ice fog as it were.  The crystals then cling to everything creating a beautiful encasement around leaves, twigs, branches, grasses and anything else that happens to be around. The world just sparkles because it appears to be dusted in diamonds and crystals.   I was so impressed by the photo taken by Spring Creek, Nevada photographer, Dini Torrence Esplin that I had to get her permission to attempt a rendition in acrylic paint on a canvas and this is the results:

Amazing photograph taken by Dini Esplin

"Pogonip in the Pines"  11 x 14 Acrylic