For the last few months it seems that time has had wings. So much work has been going on that before we realized it, Christmas 2012 came and then a week later, we welcomed in the New Year 2013. I so love the start of a fresh New Year! There’s all the promise of time to finish special projects and to expand our artistic talents a bit further. For me, that expansion has been in working with watercolors. It is a treat to create designs and use the watercolors to capture the essence of what I see in my mind’s eye. The more I learn, the more I am realizing that I have to learn. As a multimedia artist, that allows for me to never find a dull moment in my drawings and paintings.
Leave it to Jerry’s Artarama to have had some great sales running the last week of 2012 and they are having another great sale on many different art supplies now. It started on January 2nd and will end February 10th, 2013. Great staff who are quick to help us find what we need or keep us from getting something we don’t need are worth their weight in gold. A special Hi-Five to Elan, who has been such a great help to me during the last month. If you haven’t already, I’d suggest checking out Jerry’s Artist teaching schedules for at least the next four months. I am eagerly waiting to take Allen Montague’s class “Properly Painting Pet Portraits”, happening on January 26th at Jerry’s, starting at 10:00 AM and ending at 1:00 PM. That day is also special in another way. Our darling grandson, Daniel, will be one year old! He is such a cutie, just packed full of great looks and personality. Mark and I are sure that our three grandchildren are the reasons that we enjoy doing so many things. They each have different artistic interests and help us to see with “young eyes”.
In our world of different types of paint, it is easy to spend quite a bit of money on colors. Experienced teachers will encourage their students to use the best quality of paints that they can afford. I have learned that cheap paints can cause my painting not to look as great as it could. Better quality in my paints allows me to really enjoy applying them to different painting surfaces. There’s a creamy, buttery feel in their application. Quality paints will most often give you one coat coverage and they don’t separate in the tubes or containers as some of the cheaper paints do. One paint brand I really love is Jo Sonja’s acrylics. I had tried them about 20 years ago and they were wonderful to use, especially in an all day class session. Recently, I had a project in which I wanted to use my acrylic paints. I found my 20+ year old box of Jo Sonja paints and mediums. I wasn’t quite sure what I was going to find when I started squeezing them onto my Masterson’s Sta-Wet Palette. As the colors came out of the tubes, they were just as creamy and buttery as I had remembered and performed like I had just used them yesterday. When I had started sorting through paints last year, so many had to be discarded as time had taken its toll. To have the Jo Sonja products last that long, all the while maintaining their integrity and allowing me to use them right out of the tubes is just awesome.
Jo Sonja paints and mediums are manufactured by Chroma Artists’ Paints and Mediums. I can certainly tell you I will be using quite a lot of Chroma Artists’ Paints and Mediums. From what I have learned from their web site, I have only just begun to learn what these painting products are capable of doing. Here’s hoping you get a chance to try their paints and see how you like them. You can check them out at http://www.chromaonline.com .
I had posted on our Facebook page that members of our newsletter group would be getting a surprise in our newsletter, especially for them. When you place an order this month and in February, a special gift will be included with your order. Just our way of saying “Thanks for doing business with us” and we do appreciate you as customers. Be sure to check out our original designed art cards which will be posted this evening. Imagine your card being opened by a loved one and it’s an original hand-painted designed treasure. Envelopes are included with the original art cards. Do use our comments section and let us know what you think.
So, until next month’s newsletter, we at Carter Works Art hope you find this New Year bringing you blessings and smiles.
Sincerely,
Dianna & Mark