Annie Beez Art

I have truly fallen in love with painting! Acrylics, watercolors, mixed media of all kinds! 

I am still making dolls, that I believe I will never leave behind. 

But I haven't really picked up a needle in some time.

 I think because I have the daunting task of altering my daughter Chelsea's wedding dress for her wedding in September, plus the alterations on my dress and my other daughter Isabel's, I need to put quilting and embroidery aside for a while.

But I am painting.

And I am loving it!

 If you would like to follow my art journey I have started a new blog just for that.

 Come join me!

AnniebeezArt

Pear-ology

I am taking a workshop from Martha Lever Of Red Door Art Studio called Pear-ology.

 It is all about painting with glazes in watercolor.

 The subject is, of course, pears, and the techniques she teaches are wonderful. 

I love her cute southern manner and her straightforward teaching style.

 I feel really excited to learn some techniques for watercolors. 

I have always, always been drawn to them, and it is exciting to finally be unlocking some of their secrets!

Here are my beginnings:

I still need quite a bit of practice, and I am slowly building up my supplies of paints and I just ordered a new palette from Cheap Joes!

This one is round so you can set it up like a color wheel. It helps visually with mixing colors. Since I am so visual and I can never remember the rules of color mixing I thought, this is the palette for me!

Mermaid painting in progress

Here is my start on the mermaid painting. I am a little bit stalled here. I'm not quite sure where I want to go with it at the moment.

Definitely some more shading on the body and tail, and I think I want the hair to wander out a little more. 

Also definitely more contrast between the figure and the background.

 It is really helpful to take a picture and evaluate-really helps to see the obvious! 

Its a forest for the trees kind of thing! LOL!

Here is a close-up:

Working on a canvas background

This is an 16" by 20" gallery wrapped canvas that I bought at Michaels. This is probably the biggest canvas I have ever attempted to paint. I have a few layers of acrylic colors here, using stencils, a sea sponge and some drippage. Some of it is Golden acrylics and some is Adirondack dabbers. I like the super matte finish of the anirondacks-they are easy to use a variety of mediums over. I think this painting is going to be a mermaid. We'll see!

More art journal pages, and another page from Frolicaholic:

1808 Colonial Pinkeepers for sale

These are the actual models for the cover of my cross stitch chart by the same name. Once their modeling session was over they have been languishing in my model drawer, hoping I would remember them and put them up for adoption to a good home! 

Prices are ridiculously reasonable, bordering on outrageous!

They are available at TDIPT Mercantile this month.

xx

~Annie

I'm taking an online workshop for Art Journaling

It is called 21 Secrets and it is super fun!

 There are 21 different artists who share their techniques with videos and PDF's. The whole workshop costs $59 and is available until the end of 2012. 

I think that's a pretty good value for the $. 

Of course I immediately gravitated to the workshop given by Jane Davenport, as I am totally smitten with her work, and she uses a lot of the supplies I am totally in love with. I have also previously taken a mini-workshop with Jane called Draw Happy-which
I totally loved and found inspirational.

SO,

that is one of the things that has been occupying my time lately, in between plans for my newest doll projects. Here is a little peak at some of the workshop work(play) I have done:

AND,

 On another note, 

thank you so much to all who participated in my poll. It will really help me to get a better idea of the techniques dollmakers would like to learn.

So thanks!

xx

~Annie