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The calendars have arrived and they look FANTASTIC!!!! Can't wait for all you pre-order folks to get them. I'll be getting them into the mail to you this weekend!
I ordered a few extra so if you're still interested in purchasing one, you can do so here!
I'm thrilled to be participating in SPACE Art Center's Handmade Holiday Boutique this year alongside some wonderful artists. Paintings, ceramics, prints, jewelry, and more will be available at the pop-up boutique which runs from Saturday, November 15 through Sunday, January 4. I will have marbled notecards, journals, wrapping paper, scarves, and artwork for sale.
Other participating artists include: Cynthia Thiel, Julie Bagish, Joe Carrion, Tyn Atol, Tom Lamb, Susie White, Paul Murray, Rebecca Tager, Brenda Holzke, Janine Brown, Sally Monk, Jeanie Joe, Titia Estes.
~ Join us for the Opening Reception on Saturday, November 15 from 3 p.m. - 6 p.m. ~
Handmade Holiday Boutique SPACE Arts Center November 15 - January 4 1506 Mission Street, South Pasadena
Accent pillows using my marbled fabric made by the talented Jeanie Joe! Yep, it's happening.
Just a reminder that you can pre-order my 2015 "Lessons from the Studio" calendar for just $16 (plus shipping) through tomorrow, Sunday, November 2. After that, the price goes up to $19 (plus shipping)! Visit my shop or send an email to Cheers "at" BarbSkoog "dot" com.
Calendar Details:
For more information and images, check out my previous post.
The incredibly talented seamstress Jeanie Joe and I are working on some new purse and clutch designs for my marble-ous marbled fabrics! A big sale is around the corner...stay tuned for some exciting announcements!
Don't know what it is about having a pet in the studio but everything is so much brighter, anything seems possible, and the fear of failure completely dissipates. Love it when she shares my space with me.
I have to thank my wonderful marbling friend Sue Cole who turned me on to Golden's High Flow acrylics. Though there are a few tricks to working with them (they spread like mad...don't work with them in a tank smaller than 20x25), they work straight out of the bottle, no thinning necessary. I especially loved the florescents, as seen here in these overmarbled wood panels. I marbled a traditional bouquet pattern in regular paints over a stone pattern in the High Flow acrylics.
Just another fun adventure in Marble Land.
Well, almost here.
I have a copy of my press-check calendar and it looks fantastic! I wasn't going to do a calendar this year (I got so busy with the eCourse filming project) but then as I started looking back through my work and my notes, I got inspired! Wow, I have a lot of great pieces I have yet to share and the calendar is a fun way to do that.
Last year, I had to re-print the calendars two times due to demand. So this year I'm taking a new approach: pre-orders! And at a special price! If you order by Sunday, November 2, you can get my calendar for $16 (+ shipping and tax, where applicable). That's the same price as last year! After November 2, the price goes up to $19 (+ shipping and tax, where applicable).
This year's calendar is another great one. I know I say this every year...but I think this one is my best yet. I swoon over each image which is accompanied by words of wisdom and lessons learned from my extensive time in the studio. This calendar is a true reflection of my hands and my heart!
Calendar Details:
To pre-order at the special price, head on over to my store (if you want to pay by credit card through PayPal) or send an email (if you want to pay by check or cash) to Cheers “at” BarbSkoog “dot” com. Calendars will be mailed out around Thanksgiving time (or sooner if the shipment arrives earlier than that!).
Below are images included in this year’s calendar (the images will not have my website address plastered all over them). To see my “Lessons from the Studio,” you’ll just have to buy it!
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You may have noticed I was pretty quiet this summer. That's because I was busy working on my latest marbling adventure...creating and shooting a marbling eCourse! For all of you who want to learn how to marble but have been unable to find a marbling class or teacher in your area, now you can take a class online! There will be three segments ~ an intro to paper marbling, advanced techniques, and marbling on fabric. Stay tuned...more details to follow!
I love it when I mix new color combinations together and they surprise me. Colors I wouldn't expect to go well with one another as I stare at them in their jars and then they come together on the bath and BAM! Beauty.
Joke is on me today. I tried to photograph some of my marbled scarves but the wind wasn't going to let me...so I took some video of them instead. http://youtu.be/WSi47XXberI
http://youtu.be/LHRKxLkEpsI
I spent some time yesterday marbling on new fabrics to see which ones take color well ~ here I've got linen, cotton duck, hemp, and denim. These have to cure for a week before their final wash and rinse and that's when the true color-hold test happens! http://youtu.be/637TA8d4klI
For those of you not following me on Facebook or Instagram, here's a little update on the summer collaboration the talented painter/illustrator/designer Liz Kalloch and I are embarking upon. We've been spending time in each other's studios...or Google Chatting or texting when we can't be together...to develop this series where she's adding her flowers and "patchwork" designs to my marbled pieces. Here are some details of works in progress:
I cannot wait to reveal the full pieces to you! They are so stunning...they blow me away every time I look at them (which is all the time!).
These are on paper...but we also have another series in progress that is on wood panel! Stay tuned for more on that!
I've been applying some of the whacky techniques I learned in the alternative marbling workshop I took a few months ago to paper (we worked with fabric in the workshop) and am loving the results. You have to work really fast when using these particular dispersants together or you lose the magical special effects. This piece is an overmarble and I'm posting a close up of it so you can really see "The Bloom" around the edges.
The Bloom is my favorite technique I learned in the workshop ~ and the particular formula was developed/discovered by a combination of our teacher and another student in the class. And this is another reason I love marbling so much...it is an equalizer. Master marblers can be schooled by beginning marblers just as easily as the other way around!
Wanted to share with you some photos from the class "Alternative Marbling: Building a Personal Methodology and Vocabulary" that I took with the fabulous fabric artist Elin Noble. We marbled mostly on methyl cellulose (a first for me!) and used a variety of dispersants to create some really funky and fun effects. It was a week-long intensive where we got to experiment and play in the tank...and I'm thrilled with the results! I still prefer to use carageenan as my bath for all of my fine-art marbling, especially on paper and wood. Carrageenan gives you those crisp, clean lines that make marbling so wonderfully beautiful (and stunning). The edges on a methyl cellulose (MC) bath are a little more fuzzy. But MC is perfectly fine for most fabric projects since the fabric's weave tends to be larger than paper, making crisp lines appear fuzzy anyway. The other advantage to MC is that once it is made, it lasts up to four months, compared to just the four- to seven-day lifespan of carageenan. So I will now have MC on hand for those spur-of-the-moment marbling itches!
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