Framing Colored Pencil Without Glass

Today is an art working day, but no new artwork has been worked on. Why? Because I needed to finish off and frame the 2 pieces I just finished and deliver them to the gallery. This blog post will explain what I do to finish off a piece of art, but first I'll have to explain the process and supplies I use.


Most of you know that my still-lifes are framed without glass.  I do this for a couple of reasons:
 1. to make pictures seem more approachable/intimate.
 2. to bypass the perils of framing with mats & glass.


I've tried quite a few surfaces for colored pencil that can be framed without glass, but my favorite is Ampersand Pastelbord which is described as "a clay and gesso coated hardboard panel with a granular marble dust finish comparable to a sanded pastel paper..." It was first recomended by my friend/artist Louise Sackett who thought I was a little nutty trying to make my own sanded board with grit, paint, etc. when Ampersand has a pre-made board. 


Choosing a Color


It comes in grey, green, tan and white. I find the white board unusable for my techniques unfortunately. The grain is quite large on Pastelbord so whatever the color the board is, that color  will show in the "grain" as dots in the finished artwork. The white is just too white when seen in dark areas of the composition, throwing the values of the piece off. I prefer working with one of the colors and choose the color based on what I think will look the best in the grain of the piece. If I have a piece like Tea with Milk  that is mostly cool colors, I'll choose the grey board because the little specks of grey in the grain will influence the overall tone of the piece. 

Pieces like Italian Decadence is a bit harder to choose. The overall tone is warm, but the tan board is light and would lighten the dark areas of the cloth and bottles of oil too much... so I'd be better off using either green or grey board. 


Building Up Your Lights. 


Using colored board is a bit different than using white or beige paper because you have to make sure that your light and medium colored objects look bright enough on that color, especially after varnishing. What I do is build up my lights in the light and medium  areas to make sure they glow.  Since this post is on what I do when I finish a piece, I'll save this explanation for another post. 


Colored Pencils That Can Be Varnished


 Not all colored pencil brands can be varnished. Faber-Castell Polychromos (which I use for all my portraits) can not be varnished. The paint thinner that is in spray varnishes to keep them liquid eats away at the colored pencils, and the oil binder in Polychromos can't withstand it so your drawing literally dissolves away. I've found that Derwent Coloursofts, Prismacolors, and Caran d'Ache Luminance pencils all do well with spray varnish, although you still have to be ready for some colored pencil to dissolve and color changes with the process. 


Using the Prismacolor Colorless Blender to Minimize Dissolving Pencil

Despite these changes in the drawing when you varnish, I still think it is worth doing to stay away from glass. Plus you can anticipate the changes that will happen and minimize the changes or use them for your advantage. One thing that happens when you varnish is a small amount of colored pencil will dissolve, making more of the color of the board show through. That is why I build up my lights in light areas when working on a dark surface.  If there are enough light layers of colored pencil under your color, it will darken less (demonstration in future post). Also if you regularly build up your pencil to burnishing levels it seems to not have as many significant changes. I don't usually burnish however, so I've found that  if I put a layer of Prismacolor's Colorless Blender on my pieces, especially in the lighter areas, the colors stay brighter. Going back through the piece to add the blender pencil takes time, but it also gives you a chance to blend the pencil in some of the grain and soften edges if needed. I've found that adding the blender only on the areas that I don't want to darken is sufficient and actually adding the blender over black or dark areas leaves some light colored wax, so I wouldn't do it. 


After you finish adding colorless blender over your drawing just make sure you remove any colored pencil dust before varnishing (or hair or whatever else has fallen on your artwork) as it will be a permanent fixture to the piece if you leave it there!   


Varnishing, Finally


I use canned spray varnish over my pieces. I once sadly tried a brush on kind and wiped my entire drawing off, so using a spray on varnish ensures the pencil stays in place until it dries. There are matte, semi gloss and gloss versions of the spray and any of them will work, so choose the look you like best. I've used them all, and right now I am enjoying the look of the glossy finish. Today I used Grumbacher's Picture and Oil Painting Varnish in the Gloss finish which I purchased locally at Michael's. You can use other brands; I've even used Krylon's Kamar varnish from Walmart, but you need to make sure it says "Non-Yellowing" and test it first on a scrap drawing. 

When you spray, hold the can at least 8-10 inches away from your piece and only spray a fine mist at a time. If you spray a whole bunch so it pools, more colored pencil will dissolve. After spraying the whole thing in a fine mist, let it dry and do it over again. Repeat until it is evenly coated and the entire surface has a glossy wet sheen. I hold my drawing up to the light and tilt it to see if there are any dull areas that indicate missed spots. That's it, if you have a nice even finish without any exposed colored pencil purchasers of your artwork will have a protected surface that they can then wipe clean with a damp cloth  if need be. 


You might notice that the dark areas of your drawing got a little deeper or that very subtle glazes of colored pencil disappeared with the varnish. The more you varnish your colored pencil work, the more you will be able to anticipate these changes and work them into your design, As a last note... if you are going to photograph your artwork you may want to do that before you varnish so you don't have to work around the glare of the varnish finish. 


Italian Decadence and Tea with Milk are now showing at the Monadnock Fine Art Gallery in downtown Keene, NH. Call 603-352-3201 if you are interested. 

Italian Decadence

Italian Decadence 6" x 18"   Coloursofts & Prismacolors on Pastelbord

You might notice I chose a different reference from the one in the video in the last post. I wanted it to look more decadent so I decided on this set up  where the satin fabric played  a larger role. There are a lot of objects in this piece, but I think it works because of the way like colors/values are grouped together. Please click on the photo to view it larger. 

People often ask how long my drawings take to do, so for this one I tried to figure that out.

Thursday: 4  hours setting up still-life, Photoshopping and drawing line drawing on board.

Friday day: 5 hours drawing (with breaks)

Friday night: 4 hours

Saturday day & night: 8 hours

That adds up to 21 hours for this little piece. Although I have to admit that the cow still-life, which is the same size, took me about 14 hours. The Italian one has more objects that are also more detailed so it took a lot more time. 

Sneak Peak Video

Here's a sneak peak of what I am working on today/tomorrow. I made one of these videos before and I think they give a little glimpse into what goes into composing a still-life. For me, it starts out with an idea, a format, and some objects and usually looks terrible at that beginning stage. Then I find something that works and keep that the same and change things around it until I hopefully get something good. Hope is very important in the process!

I also threw a few images of where this still-life is taking place... in a big mess and a terrible corner of my studio! Its amazing what cropping does!

Still-life with Moo-cow

I bought this cow creamer a while ago, but had trouble fitting its long shape into a still-life. Putting the tipped over cup behind it offered the composition a similar shape which I think makes it work. That same cup with the spoon sticking out of it plus the curving and waving fabric added a lot of movement to the composition which was a lot of fun. That movement almost animates the rest of the objects, which makes it seem like the cow creamer is threatening to walk out of the composition. Which makes me think... if personification is "the attribution of a personal nature or character to inanimate objects" then is this animalification?

I  tried something of a new technique on the background. Since I was using a grey board and I wanted a grey background, I laid down a colored pencil the same color as the board: Dove Grey Coloursoft. This gave me a smooth texture to smudge other greys into by first scribbling them on, then swirling them around with a 1/2 inch bristle brush. I like the effect and it took less time than usual. 

Sorry for the blurry photographs (like usual) and you can click on them to see it larger. 

New Website

My official website has been down for a little while. Here is the story of why it was down and the beginning of a friendship with a new host. If you don't want to hear the whole sordid story scroll down until you see this symbol *. I don't mind.

Basically the trouble started when my host updated itself and stopped working with my old version of Dreamweaver. I loved Dreamweaver and had been using it since the 90's without having to bother my website savvy husband, which I enjoyed greatly. I called and called my host and could get it working again only to lose connectivity the next time I tried to log on. I looked into getting more current software but it is expensive.

So I decided to leave my host and find a new one - one that doesn't require software.

Then it happened.

I cancelled my hosting account with my original company, which we'll call SN. What I didn't know is that I had originally registered my domain name also with SN and when I cancelled my hosting account with them I also lost access to my domain name. & since my account had an email address that was also cancelled when I cancelled my account, I had no way to put in a transfer to a new domain name provider. Sigh. So I called them and had them change my email address so I could get the transfer code.

BUT when you change your email address with your registrar, your account gets flagged by I think Internic and they freeze you from transferring your domain I think for 60 days.

Are you following?

SO I went to that web savvy hubby and he got it up for now.

What I have to do is stay with SN for my domain until those 60 days are up and then transfer. In the meantime my domain with them is set to expire next month... so I'll have to renew it somehow (even though I technically don't have an account) so I can transfer it in March without losing it.

*  So my website IS back up at www.nicolecaulfield.com and also www.nicolecaulfieldfineart.com in case I lose my domain name next month.

Take a look at the new site. I set it up using Google sites which is a completely FREE service. I think its a great way to go for art sites!

& the moral of this story? Don't sign up your domain name at the company that you use for hosting your site!

Revelation

I think I gave the wrong impression in my post after the Thorne show notice from the comments that are stirring in that post. 

Actually not getting in the Thorne is exactly what I needed. 

First,  the idea of the series (that the ballerina girl is in) is just so unbelievably "me" in its weird sense of humor and ties to the past and illustration. The idea behind the series, as I've said before, is a re-imagining of Norman Rockwell's famous covers if they were done today, looking at the weirdness of what we are like now. It is deliberately in a illustration-like style with more "pop" colors than I usually use, partly because this series is based on illustration,but also because it reflects on the consumer/ad centered society we live in.  I plan on touching on issues like technology, roles of wives/husbands in families, etc. I'm kind of thinking of the series as post-pop, or maybe  steam punk fifties, lol. 

 Now onto why I made the comments I did questioning the validity of the series. I was struggling with the feeling of "WHY" when I started the series. I knew I WANTED to do the series and felt it would be fun to explore the psyches of today in a humorous way,  but  just because I really wanted to isn't always a good enough reason to make the drawings, when so much time and money will be put into creating them. The problem I was having was,  I needed to know who my audience was. This is what I was struggling with after finding out that I didn't get in... I needed to know what I should do with the series. Not getting in just made me have to deal with the thoughts I was already having. 

Anyway I've  figured something out.  I have to do this series, whether or not it fits into my current market that I have carved out for myself. I'm going to work on these at the same time as my still-lifes and "Zen" series and eventually will have enough pieces for a show or possibly to put in print.  Maybe this series would do well in a more digital format even... after I get more pieces ready I can explore my options. That doesn't mean I think they have no place in galleries, because I do, it just means they are different than my other work so I will have to figure out where they fit in when I have more of them. 


Anyway I would never stop exploring new ideas, techniques etc, because I know that is how I've gotten to where I am now. I also am not defeated by not getting in the show as I know how shows are judged and understand that it is not a reflection on my validity by not getting in or  by winning... I hope it didn't sound like I was whining, but rather I was doing a necessary self-reflection about the new series, which is such a departure from the work in my current venues. 

Anyway... I have made some progress on my preteen slumber party I've been posting and I did start a still-life today... just the sketch and set up so far though.... my day was cut short by a frenzied daughter who forgot that she was supposed to bring brownies for a bake sale today, so I was baking the first half of the day. Since there isn't much progress to show yet, that is what I will leave you with for today's picture... some behemoth brownies. :-) The recipe is on Bakers unsweetened chocolate boxes and are called cake-like brownies. 

Show at the Peterborough Library - Artwork Update

I just realized I didn't make a blog post about my show at the Peterborough library this month. I have several pieces displayed at the library in downtown Peterborough, NH through the end of January.  January 31st to be exact.

Most of the work is portraiture  but to fill things out I did put in a couple of still-lifes including the two above. I know I said I was going to bring the good luck kitty to the gallery, but I found I needed it to create this display.

I believe the town of Peterborough has dug itself out of the snow if you want to go check it out! <3

Bonus Day... otherwise known as Snow Day!

I know, I only work two days a week so a snow day isn't that big of a deal, but I did sneak in a little work. My husband and kids had a snow day too so it is pretty energetic around the house. I usually spend snow days out in the snow shoveling, snow blowing, sledding etc, but with my injured knee the family had to do that without me, leaving my tasks to filling the crock pot (with butternut squash soup) and readying the hot chocolate.

I also had some bonus time for my drawing. Before you say there isn't much more finished, keep in mind the size of this puppy (and please try to not notice the falling duct tape on the side of my paper). I started the girl in the back's pants and had to go back in and deepen the shadows on the shirt to work with the pants.

This had me thinking about the debate between people who work their picture's "as a whole" and people who work piece by piece like me until they are finished. The thing is... I think we are both really doing the same thing. If you work on all parts as a whole you put in basic color shades in large shapes around the paper then go back in and refine until you get to details. I would imagine as an artist put down those large shapes of color in the first step they may have to adjust a shape/color somewhere else on the page to work together (or maybe that is done in the refining steps).

When you work piece by piece its not that you work each part to conclusion and move to the next... you are always refining the parts you  put down to work with the rest. Just like in this instance where I put in the pants leg and had to deepen the shadows in the shirt.

I just trudged out into the snow to get the mail and found out that I did not get into the Thorne Sagendorph show this year. This is a regional biennial show that is a big deal in my area. At the last one my piece Zen won Best of Show and People's Choice. I was nervous this time about my piece getting in... I entered the ballerina from my Norman Rockwell series. I'm not sure how I feel about that... it does make me question this series... is it not "artistic" enough? Is there a place for humor in the gallery world? Maybe I need to use polychromos like in my Zen piece because it comes out more painterly and less illustration-like? Not sure.....

African Masks

Can you believe after that last post bragging about running  I took my daughter ice skating on Sunday and injured myself. I was skating fast holding hands with my daughter and leaning around her to talk to my friend and my toe pic caught landing me hard on my left knee. Now I have been lying or sitting with my leg propped up and ice on it for all day  or hobbling around. I hope it heals quickly so I don't miss too many days of running, but at the moment I can't bend it without pain.

Anyway I thought I would share some student art! This fall my students and I walked over to Keene State's Thorne Sagendorph Art Gallery to see the African Art exhibit. I took all students K-8th grade. They really enjoyed the exhibit (or so they tell me) and afterwards they made some African inspired paper or paper mache masks. I'll post some pictures below.

The kindergarteners made the paper "body-sized" masks the are above the panels. The rest are made of strip paper mache or paper pulp. These are just a sampling - the display went down the entire hallway.

Happy New Year!

 If you are friends with me on Facebook you know I am good and well, but I've heard a few people have been asking where I've been, which brings me to this blog post. I think we all have to evaluate where we should put our energies or resources  from time to time  and the new year is the perfect time.

Last year I started teaching 2 days a week at an elementary/middle school. It is a demanding 2 days with teaching 5 grades each day (preschool - 8th grade) and different assignments for each grade (sometimes 10 assignments in a week). I thought it was just a 2 day a week job but with the time I put in at home planning, it is at least a 3 day job. It is not a surprise then to hear  I was not as productive with my art last year and since I am still crafting my curriculum and getting things ready for the little ones - this school year as well.

Not only does work cut in to my drawing time, I am also committed to my family and to my health, so the rest of my time is busy as well. My husband and kids are my first priority (yes, even over my art)... which means that their engagements often come before my own. Driving them to see their friends, inviting their friends over, birthdays, sports, crafts, etc. The way I see it, kids don't stay kids very long and I don't want to miss any of it.

The  other commitment I mentioned is the health of me and my family. I started running about 3 - 4 years ago to get healthy and it is a big part of my life now. It surprises me that before I started running I would get winded climbing our small flight of stairs or get tired from even short amounts of time playing outside with the kids. I started running/walking (because I couldn't even run a mile), and now I run almost every day 5 miles a day or more (unless I wake up late). I've run 13 miles in my own private half marathon and just couldn't live without that exercise now.

Healthy eating also sucks up my time. I used to order out often or cook using packaged foods and now I cook dinner most every night from scratch. My husband and I have started eating pescetarian... vegetarian with fish allowed. I try and cook everything from scratch too so we don't have all the preservatives and additives in packaged foods, which means I've gotten good at making breads, and homemade tortillas to supplement the vegetarian diet.

With the new year,  it is time again to reevaluate how I spend my time and set resolutions to spend it the best way I can. This year I would like to focus on making the most of the two days I have alone to make art, as well as attend more art events again in my region and get back to writing more on this blog even if that means sharing more of my students' art or some of the things I do with my family. I have already made myself a little more time by canceling the class I usually teach at MOCO Arts and will have to figure out a way to maximize the rest of my time.  As far as increasing my output on art, I think it would be better to just make the best art I can in those 2 days. That would mean less art again this year, but better art if I am not stressed about how much I put out, so quality over quantity!

I hope it doesn't sound like I am complaining about how my time is spent, I have really been enjoying everything I've been doing, but if I am going to continue this blog I think I may have to rethink the content of it as I have the content of the  rest of my life. There was a time when all I could think about was furthering my art career and about nothing else. My family suffered as did my health... so as with my life, this blog will probably start to have some non-art things included. Maybe I need a new title for my blog to reflect the change - let me know what you think.

 So today not only do I want to share the new drawing I am working on I would also like to share the lowfat baked doughnuts the kids and I made today. mmm http://hubpages.com/hub/Low-Fat-Donuts  They didn't turn out as "doughnutty" as I would have liked, but a healthier take on a weekend treat is a good thing. We dipped some of them in a chocolate glaze, but since the doughnuts are really not that sweet, I thought the cinnamon sugar ones tasted better.

Now for the art!!! This is the second piece of my Norman Rockwell updated series. This one shows two preteen girls in the pj's surrounded by all the tools of a girlie sleepover circa 2011: makeup, hairbrush, popcorn, laptop (facebook), cellphone (texting), etc. I think I may name it something like "Some Things Never Change," but I'm not sure if you can have italics in a title. *Sarcasm*  I hope it shows how integrated social technology is in kids' lives. It is large, like the one with the ballerina soccer girl, measuring 24" x 36". I'm using my fave Fisher 400 paper (which I am almost out of) and Derwent Coloursofts and Prismacolors. Click on them to see them bigger!

& Happy New Year everyone! If you skimmed most of my rambling - I won't hold it against you! ;-)