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| Today was quite an interesting (and fun) day. This was the day we held a mini-encaustics workshop for anyone who wanted to join in. Lee began our session by giving a little history of encaustics and demonstrated how to get started. We painted "small" today, mostly on heavy card stock cut into 2" x 3" or 3" x 5" pieces. Because we were working with melted wax crayons, we were careful to contain any dripping wax onto a metal cookie sheet (or aluminum covered surface). |
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| As you can see, we had a full house this morning. Sixteen artists came out this morning for the workshop. |
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| After we watched Lee's demonstration, everyone was ready to dive in. At first the room was very quiet as we all began to work. It didn't take long before we were having fun, and the noise level went up as we compared our creations and talked. |
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| The following photos will show a sampling of everyone's efforts. You'll be able to get a sense of the variety of effects that can be attained by using a dark colored surface to melt the wax onto (colors "pop" more against a dark surface) versus a white surface. Also, notice the effects when scratches are made into the still-warm, liquid wax. |
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| Dave used a different method for the encaustics he created. Instead of melting crayons onto the foot plate of a hot craft iron, he utilized a hot plate to melt encaustics wax, then painted the melted wax onto his metal surface. He then pressed a sheet of rice paper into the melted wax, creating a mono- print effect. |
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| Here he used a gold foil paper for his mono-print. The photo does not do it justice, I'm afraid. However, I think you'll agree that his result was quite unique. |
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| This time Dave used a silver foil paper. It really was vibrant. Hopefully, you can get a sense of some of the reflective qualities when using the foil papers. |
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| Barb split her art time between an encaustic project and beginning a watercolors painting. |
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| Jim continued working with his watercolor painting, started last week. If you check last week's blog posting, you'll be able to see how his artwork is progressing. Thank you everyone for coming out today. Creating with encaustics meant bringing supplies that we don't usually bring for our regular artwork. Thank you, Lee, for bringing lots of extra supplies so that everyone could try a variety of materials. I think everyone who experimented with the encaustics today will agree that it added a little "spice" to our art time. Next Wednesday, May 18th, please bring along whatever art medium you would like to paint with for our time at the Rec Center. |
