Our Trusty Hero

The HGTV film crew is coming this week, and I have been preparing for them like mad. I've been a little trepidatious about my ability to produce all of the hats in various stages of completion identical enough to please them. I think it will go well, though - looking at this picture of them all arrayed it almost makes sense.



The one totally finished product is referred to as the hero.



One of these finished hats will be up for auction at SFBC's Winterfest event on December third. I'm not sure of the fate of the other four.

Painting Process

People often marvel at the blend between photography and painting in my collage work. I thought I'd give a process view from throughout my day yesterday.












I've been hammering away at this and another painting - they are more commercial work in that I am doing to hang in front of Public as soon as possible. I put a bunch of paintings in Ruby Gallery on Haight street, and then a friend who had been eyeing my San Francisco map painting told me he needed to buy it before someone else did - but now I'm stuck with a sold piece on display! The piece shown above and this one:



are rent pieces. It's hard for me to know when a piece is done, though - after a while even looking at it backwards in a mirror isn't good enough. Normally I would just put it in a closet for a month but I don't have that luxury now. Ah, the fast-paced life of retail! Yet another aspect of my life that, having Gone Freelance, I'm forced to grit my teeth and jump.

I love it.

New Wool

A photo post from the woman who custom-dyes wool for me - everything pictured there is for me! We have been pioneering new ways for me to order specific things from her. Having never met in real life, or even spoken on the phone, it is occasionally hard for us to make each other's meanings clear, so that I can get what I need from her. As I move to ordering larger and larger quantities of wool, it becomes more and more important that I not be surprised when I open my boxes of fresh supplies.

It might temper the joy i take in wrapping them around myself and giggling.

Ask An Artist - Airbrushing vs Inks

My art-school younger brother asked me this question:

Oh and what do you know about using airbrushes? I might look into getting one, because I want to start painting on canvas, but I can never get real fine line, and real solid colors. I think they're pretty expensive, but it might be a worthwile investment, no?

And when I say clean lines and solid colors, I mean along the lines of this.

some random painting

My answer:

You could certainly invest in the equipment - i think for about 2-300 dollars you could get something low-end but serviceable (I'm pulling from memory on that so I could be a little off) but there are two problems with that -
1. low-end tools suck to use and maintain - and they don't last very long
2. you're just starting to paint on canvas at all - you may not like it, you may spend months learning about the way compositions change when they get larger, only to find that your cheapo airbrush is breaking right when you are starting to get good.

my advice? Ink. Ink is underused by a lot of artists, i think. It's amazing stuff. There is nothing blacker than black ink. They make it in tons of colors, too, and with a round brush and a little practice (practice that will be very good for all of your hand-work skills) you can do a lot with very little.

When you go to the art store:
Make sure you are buying waterproof inks. If they are waterproof it will say so on the bottle; if they aren't it may not say anything about it. Speedball makes a decent array of colored inks that are also waterproof and opaque.
You don't need to buy the ridiculously expensive brushes. The one I use for this type of stuff I bought in college for 3 dollars. What you are looking for - round. try a couple different sizes - the graphic work you are looking to do probably means you don't want smaller sizes as much but they are so fun you may want to try it out anyway? try: 0,4,6,8.
So how do you tell what kind of brushes to buy? the array is pretty bewildering. The media you are trying to carry, ink, is thin with a consistency like water. This means that the brushes you want will be lighter, more flexible. The really stiff brushes are needed to carry heavier paints but you are using the lightest of the light. This means you will have maximum control! Asian-style calligraphy brushes are great because they are designed to produce a pretty wide range of marks. You want a brush, basically, that will bend in half with the lower half making sweet love to your canvas, all the while maintaining its shape. Don't be above bringing a water bottle into the store to dip the brushes into, then pushing them around on the shelves to try to gauge how they will act. Watercolor brushes will work really well too.

That's Clever!

I just found out today some really exciting news - when they are in San Francisco in September, the crew of That's Clever, a daily half-hour HGTV show, will be stopping by the studio to film me making a whole new hat design! No idea yet when the segment will air, but filming is in the first two weeks of November.