Wonderful day at Main Street Art, Maple Shade, NJ. Two of my old college classmates/friends and I have formed an "open studio" art group for the inspiration and camaraderie of working with other artists.
Two of us have been au plein air (Outdoor to us) painting for a few months. The third is recently returned from her home in Costa Rica (on family business). We had discussed how this open studio might unfold. Robert had the first idea. He thought he might work on what he refers to as his "underdogs" - paintings he began but hadn't completed to his satisfaction. So I brought a Joni Mitchell portrait I had been working on without success.
However, Robert had another intriguing idea. We had both been parted from many of our paintings in the past, some of which we missed. Robert thought it might be a good idea to reprise them. He worked on one of those, and I completed my previously begun and continuing to be unsuccessfully resolved Joni Mitchell painting. The new version makes me very happy. The title is "A River to Skate Away On."
Years ago, I had worked on a dozen intricate and laboriously executed large scale (for me - 36 by 24") colored pencil renderings of favorite buildings that incorporated public clocks in their facades. I polished in many layers of waxy colored pencil to make a kind of shimmering flat color. Sometimes I worked for 3 hours on a square inch with four different pencils to get just exactly the color I wanted. Most of them were lost in a fire. So when we get together again in two weeks, I am going to take Robert's suggestion and reprise those images but in paint this time.
If you are interested in joining us, we have one or two spaces open in our group at $10 a person for the studio time
and I am certain that if more people were interested, Diane could add more blocks of time. It is just wonderful to work with other artists from time to time - a treat we all miss after we leave college and have no more group studio work. You miss the exchange of ideas, the critique help, and the joy of seeing the difference in process and outcome from a different artistic point of view.
You can google Main Street Art for more information. It is located (of course) on Main Street in Maple Shade, New Jersey. It also gives you a first notice of upcoming shows for your work!
We (the members of this first group) have also joined as Members of Main Street Art.
Happy Trails (whether in your mind or in the woods)
Jo Ann
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