Colored Pencils and Pen and Ink

Hi, welcome to my blog, and MERRY CHRISTMAS!

I hope everyone is enjoying this wonderful season.  I love this time of year, and I am always sad when it is all over.  Speaking of Christmas, I have completed a couple of Christmas pieces and thought I should post them now rather than in the new year.  I also have some wonderful pieces the girls in our art sessions have completed, and I will be posting them starting in 2013.

This one is called 'Santa Claus' (can't imagine why!!)...it is a coloured pencil project designed by Pat Lentine. This piece looks simple, but it is rather tricky to complete.  With coloured pencils, in most areas you have to'build' the colours by applying several layers of pencil.  Santa's face is a good example of this - I probably applied about 6 layers of pencil in order to create the face.  In the dark areas I used a couple of colours, but in the main part of the face I used 4 or 5 colours.  The fur, beard and mustache were fun to do and not hard at all.  The dark green background certainly makes the bright red and white stand out. 

'Let it Snow'  is a pen and ink with oil rouging piece designed by Mary Owens, and it has been a very popular piece over the last several years.  Since I had never done it, I decided to give it a try.  Pen and ink with oil rouging is a very simple technique - first you apply the pattern using ink, the project is sprayed, and then small amounts of oil paint are 'rouged' onto the piece.  There is no basecoating, no shading and no highlights to be applied.  Your shading is created when you apply the oil paint, and your highlights are simply the background showing through.  Unlike other types of painting, there are not a lot of 'extra' things to learn or supplies to buy.  Once you learn the technique and have the basic supplies, you are good to go.

Over the next few months I will be working on coloured pencil projects - I have 3 or 4 ready to start.  So, when I post my work next time, it will probably be all coloured pencil work.  In the meantime, I will be posting some of the wonderful artwork completed by the girls in my art sessions.  So please check back in a month or so.

Thanks for visiting my blog, and have a wonderful holiday season.

Joan