Gifts for You for the Holidays

Hello to all on this sunny, cool November day.
In less than a week I will be bringing many small paintings and drawings to the Red Lotus Gallery in Muskegon, Michigan for the Art Express Holiday Show.  ALL the artwork will be $30 !!!  This is an incredible opportunity for you to buy gifts for others and for yourselves.  Below are a few of the pieces of mine that will be in the show.

 

 

This one just sold,  sorry.

The Art Express Holiday Show runs from Thursday, November 29 thru Saturday, December 29. Red Lotus Gallery hours are 2-6 Thursday and Friday and 10-6 on Saturday.  You can check the Red Lotus Gallery facebook page for more information, too.  www.facebook.com/redlotusgallery 


Here's three of my newest works.  "Mountains in Italy"  (below) has been sold.  The others are still for sale. 

"Mountains in Italy"  pen, acrylic and colored pencil on canvas

"Dragonfly"  colored pencil on plywood, varnished

"This World Belongs to the Crows"  ink and colored pencil on board, varnished

A Day in the Life of Skye

The beginning - it's cloudy and cooler, that's good.  The dogs are all sleeping.  That's even better.

I'd like my artwork to speak for me more than my words.  Here's some stories and scenes from my mind and my life.  From these paintings and others in the blog you can get some idea what's it's like to live with a mind like mine and, thus, what a day in the life of Skye might be like. 

 "Maiden Spell"

 "Future Looking Past"

 "Museum of Dreams"

"Winter Solstice Halo 2012"

"Procession of a Soul"

"Sunset Over the Dunes in Snug Harbor"

Recently I found out that "Skye" is an ancient Celtic word meaning winged expanse or winged isle.  The first people on the Isle of Skye thought it looked like a wing.  It is my real name.  My father, who was a pilot at the time I was born and always loved flying, found the name and gave it to me.  My last name "Gentle" is from my husband.  When his family moved to the US from Santorini, one of the Aeolian Islands, their name was Gentile and they were advised to change it.  Gentle was suggested as it has the same meaning in English that gentile has in Italian. 

Folding Screen Room Dividers!!

Folding Screen and Show News
In Summer 2012, I started a folding screen with a new design.  Both sides of the screen are shown below.  The silhouettes of the leaves are created by taking beech and oak branches, which I found on the ground in the woods, laying them on the surface of the screen, "sanding" pastel dust around the edges of the leaves, then spraying the dust with acrylic polymer.  In between the times of using the leaves I have to keep them in a plastic kiddie pool of water so they don't dry out and curl up.

"Oak and Beech"  72" high, each panel is 22" wide

so far I've used ink, acrylic, watercolor, sand and pastel dust on the framed plywood panels
The darker side has a frame attached around the edges of each panel to keep the plywood straight and to create a space to attach hinges and castors (on the bottom).

On another subject besides screens, I'd like to report that my paintings have been accepted into two September shows - Mi Arts: Statewide Juried Visual Arts Competition, Holland Area Arts Council, 150 East 8th St., Holland, MI
September 7 through October 31  Opening Reception September 7 from 6 - 8pm
and
Collage/Assemblage and Construction Exhibition, Lowell Arts , 149 South Hudson, Lowell, MI
September 11 through October 21   Closing Reception October 21 from 2 - 4pm

 "A Person Through Time"   36" x 42"  mixed media on canvas - Holland show

 "Star Creation in a Small Portion of the Eagle Nebula"  46" x 18"  mixed media on canvas - Holland show
This painting has sold.

"Rise Above the Fray"  30" x 36"  silk, watercolor, colored pencil, oil and acrylic on canvas - Lowell show

I also had a painting accepted into the statewide show at the Muskegon Museum of Art.  That show is over on August 9.  Here's the painting that is in the show:

"Dark Energy Interacting with Visible Light in the Orion Nebula"  27" x 29"  ink, acrylic, oil and colored pencil on plywood
Sold.

Then I'm also in a group show in September at the Gallery Uptown in Grand Haven, Michigan: 

 "Kaleidoscope" - multifaceted artwork by award-winning artists
Jill Jeltema, John Reipma, Bonnie J. Brentz, Paul VanHeest, Liz Learmont and Skye Gentle
September 4 - October 1 with the Opening Reception on Friday, September 7 from 5:30pm - 8pm

Past, older news:

Finally, after more than 20 years, I am again making folding screen room dividers.  Below are two that are finished.

Face

66" to 72" high with 18" wide panels

$2300

The frame is 1" thick mahogany. The face side of the panels is mixed media on silk. The other side is soft blended colors created by an acrylic wash on cotton fabric. The hinges can open to the front or the back.

Waves

72" high with18" wide panels

$2250

The frame of this screen is 3/4" thick white oak. The panels are 1/4" birch plywood with varnished mixed media painted on both the front and the back. The hinges open in one direction so the screen stands in an open zig-zag pattern. 
This screen is in the Synchronicity Art Gallery in Glen Arbor, Michigan.

New Small Paintings

"Veiled"  oil on Italian tile

"Evening Song"  oil on Italian tile

After finishing our bathroom remodeling project, which we did last summer, there was quite a bit of beautiful Italian tile left over.  My husband cut it into 8" x 10" pieces and other sizes and I've been painting and drawing on the beautiful surfaces.  With both oil and painted wax pigment I draw and paint but also rub the colors into the tile all the better to bring out the surface textures and colors of the tile.  "Veiled" has already sold from the Gallery Uptown.  I will have four or more of these tile pieces in the Holiday Show at the Gallery, which runs during the month of December.  Here's a couple more:

 "Warm Light"  oil and varnished wax pigment on Italian tile

"I Will Never Forget"  oil and varnished wax pigment on Italian tile

Then also for the Holiday Show are two sky scenes.  One is a 5"x 7" of a sunset over Lake Michigan in Hoffmaster Park.  The other is an 8" x 10", mostly black and white painting (done with painted graphite, acrylic and oil) of sun shining through clouds.

Then, there's the little angel paintings, also for the Holiday Show.  I have two finished so far.  To create these I drew the angel designs from older pictures I did a long time ago, onto acid-free paper.  I then used blended and painted wax pigment and acrylic.  The paper is then adhered to sealed plywood using acrylic medium.  Then the whole thing is varnished and framed.  So here are the first two:

 "Angel of the Evening"

"Ange du Jardin"

Drawing from my Woods Photos

I finally came up with a way to take my photos of roots and trees and such from my walks in the woods.  I take a portion of the photo and spherize it in Photoshop.  This makes everything look more three dimensional and gives the viewer of the drawing the same feeling of looking into and beyond the darkness of the roots and trees that you get when seeing them in real life.  Here's the first one that I've drawn:

"Womb of the Unknown" - 10" x 8" , varnished wax pigment on plywood.

When I say "varnished wax pigment" it means that I used colored pencils (usually prismacolor art stix) and charcoal pencils in a wax base (Nero Cretacolor).  In between layers I use matte acrylic medium and when the drawing is finished I seal it front and back with an acrylic varnish.  To smooth and blend the colors, lights and darks I use pressure and/or solvent.  It's especially difficult to get a good white so sometimes I use acrylic or water miscible oil paint, sometimes pastel, sometimes lines carved into the wood, paper or canvas and sometimes, as with watercolor paintings, I leave it uncolored.

Daughter's Commission

Here's the middle stage of a fun painting that I've been working on the last couple of days.  It was commissioned by my daughter and her roommates for their new apt.  It's almost done now so I'll have the finished picture up pretty soon. 

 

 Today the 4 Zeebs are finished.  This is my first hanging "scroll" painting.  It has a wood frame across the top and weights along the bottom, inside the hemmed fabric.  It's gessoed and varnished on both sides to keep the fabric from curling on the edges and to seal and better preserve the fabric.  The painting is less heavy and easier to transport than a regular framed canvas.
And here they are: