Goals for 2012 - Painting, Art, and Teaching Art

2012 is finally here!  I have a really good feeling about this year and have some personal goals as well as some goals for my students.  I am going to really push myself to participate in as many local art shows as I can.  That means I need to stay creative, try new things with my work, and not lose focus!  I'm already starting on a good note, the first show I'll be participating in has an opening reception on January 13 and will feature 3 of my paintings:

"The Blue Heron." 28x22" Acrylic on Canvas.
Prints will be available in a few days; contact me at http://www.etsy.com/shop/artbyjae if you are interested!











"Carefree." 24x36" Acrylic on Canvas

Prints will be available in a few days; contact me at http://www.etsy.com/shop/artbyjae if you are interested!

"Bell Peppers."  20x20" Acrylic on Canvas.
Prints will be available in a few days; contact me at http://www.etsy.com/shop/artbyjae if you are interested!










I also want to expand my work by creating prints (which I've mentioned in a previous post).  I am in the process of having some paintings scanned so prints will be available of my more popular paintings. 

And my goals for teaching are to give my students more open ended assignments to expand their creativity and really make them think outside of the box.  ESPECIALLY the AP art students  =)

Happy New Year!!

Impasto & Palette Knife

So I have been experimenting lately with palette knife painting after seeing some incredible paintings online that used this technique.  The paintings are so textured and alive!  For my first attempt, I decided to use a photograph of pink flowers I took last year at the park as inspiration and used the palette knife to paint the background.  I mixed my acrylic paints with a heavy acrylic gel medium to give them more weight and texture.  Here is the photograph:

And here is my painting interpretation:

I love how the palette knife helped me to make the background imitate the grass texture, while keeping it somewhat blurry so that the focus is on the flowers.

Obviously I did not paint the flowers using the palette knife, because I wanted them to be more clear and show up more realistically.  They still have a textured feel because of the textured background.

Another palette knife painting I finished this week was inspired by the colors gold and red.  I think those two colors together are beautiful, so I was inspired to paint red tulips on a gold background to imitate dusk, fall, or a sunset (depending on how the viewer interprets it!).  Here is the painting:

I think this is a technique I will teach to my art students this year because it makes them think about how colors are used together and the marks they are making on the painting.  I think it will also help to loosen up my "perfectionist" art students  =)

I'd love to hear some of what you guys have experienced with the palette knife!

Be sure to check out my etsy site for examples of my paintings:  http://www.etsy.com/shop/artbyjae

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