More Portland Pics

Here are some more photos from my Portland trip.  I think it is best not to look at them for a few days and they get better.

This one kind of reminded me of the Mayflower

Thousands of pylons with nothing to do.  They looked like asparagus.

The water was red, white, and blue but I didn't get a decent picture of it.

The Oliver Hazard Perry from Newport, RI

Greetings from Portland Maine

Greetings from Portland Maine!  I am here for the tall ships, lobster and chowder.  If you have never been to Portland, you are in for a pleasant surprise.  It has great eats and art along with many other things to do.  Yesterday I ate a maple bacon donut which was to die for.

We took a cruise to get a closer look at the tall ships but the weather was not all that great.  Anyway, here are a couple of examples of what we saw.

Resin Adventures

Last week was all about art.  In addition to the large image transfer workshop, the jewelry girls at the studio did a little colored resin workshop which turned out to be largely experimental.  Here are some of the things we learned:

1. You have to measure the resin/hardener ratio carefully.  Some of us were better than others and some of the resins we mixed will never dry and remain a goopy mess.

2.  When using a mold, you must use a release agent.  You can get the official stuff but cooking spray is also supposed to work.  I have a red skull that is stuck in the mold so I may have to cut it apart.  I'm also going to try running it under hot water or zapping it in the micro wave for a few seconds.

3.  Wear gloves.  When this stuff gets on your hands, it is very difficult to remove.  Alcohol works and so does WD-40.  I finished up with a little nail polish remover.

4.  This us fun and one idea leads to another. Can't wait to do it again.

New Workshop

I just got back from another workshop at the South Shore Art Center.  This was a three day class on large image transfers and I am pretty excited about it.  This, of course, is a further distraction from my previous workshop which I still have a lot of possibilities from the class  exercises.  Before I forget, here are some pieces that I feel pretty good about from that workshop.  I was too lazy to get my camera from the car so the pictures from the new workshop are on my phone but I have no idea how to get them onto the internet.

This one just needs a mat and I'm sure it will look better in a frame.

This is a trace contour drawing, my version of a Picasso

This kind of reminds me of a cave drawing but it needs more work.

Finished Work

This is a finished piece or should I say a hybrid. I took one of my pieces from the abstract workshop and tore it up.  I then glued the pieces onto a cold wax panel I did a few months ago that just wasn't talking to me.  I then covered it in resin and now I am waiting for it to harden.  This was taken before the resin so the finished results will be a little different.  I like this better already.

Workshop Photos

I thought I would post some pictures of some of the pieces that may have potential from my recent workshop with Dean Nimmer.  All of these were done as 11 x 17 on copy paper which can take a lot of abuse.

The leaves were from a raised stencil using water soluble oil pastel, my favorite thing

This was just acrylic paint, layered and water added

Layered acrylic paint with a collograph print

This was begun by another student and I added the circles and more water