Home is Where My Heart Is Doodle

I love to doodle with Zig Millineum pens and my Prismacolor colored pencils. It is very relaxing.  I can pick it up to work on it any time outside of the studio.  (I have trouble sitting down with nothing to do with my hands, so I always like to have something nearby to work on.)  This is one that I just finished.  It represents my HeartHomes in the Four Seasons.  I had to include a little Owl and a little Red bird.  I've included two close ups, so you can see the details.   I have the flowers of spring, the yellow and orange leaves of fall, the snowflakes of winter, and the greens of summer. Just an example of how I relax and have fun. Hope you enjoy!

Beth  ♥

Something in Color!

"Dupree"
8x8 inches - Colored Pencil
Beth S. Macre  © 2012

Seems that I am always drawn back to color.  I've worked a lot with pen and ink, especially during 2011, but I just finished a colored pencil drawing of a dog!  It was really nice to use some color for a change.  This is a picture of Dupree.  It is 8x8 inches on Uart paper, using Prismacolors.  It was fun to do.  I'm still doing pen and ink drawings, but its always nice to mix it up a bit and have some variety.  I will definitely be adding more color to my palette this year.
Thanks for looking!

Beth♥ 

Patriotic Baseballs

Study for "Stars, Stripes, & Stitches"

Beth S. Macre © 2008

Prismacolor pencil on Watercolor paper

3 1/2" x 7 1/2"

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Wishing everyone has a happy and safe Fourth of July!

Bowl of Cherries...

“Can I Join the Party?”
Colored pencil on Pastelbord

5" x 7"
Beth S. Macre © 2008

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My latest effort with neocolors and pastelbord is this bowl of cherries that I've been wanting to draw for awhile. I used a white pastelbord, then blocked in the colors with the neocolor II. Then I began to build up the values and finally the highlights. When viewed up close you can see the texture that is achieved with the help of the pastelbord. I am really loving the sanded surfaces.

Dark Colored Paper

This has been a busy week with deadlines and meetings, so I haven't started anything new... again. (I'll be glad when summer vacation gets here!) I have been working with clay at school, so in a week or two I will have a picture of those to show. They have to dry, then get fired, glazed, then fired again.

So I thought I would go back a few years and pull out a colored pencil work showing the steps in progress, on black Stonehenge paper. I love the effect that you can get on black paper, but it is hard to light and to photograph. I've done several pieces on black stonehenge and plan to do more in the future. The trick is to put a good layer of a white underpainting where you want your lightest highlights, before adding your color. On this piece, I think I should have put more white on first. I had to go back and add more white between layers of yellow. The yellow has a greenish tint in the first few layers. After adding more yellow, more shadows, more yellow and more shadows, I went back and burnished to make sure the brightest yellows were solid.

Step One

White underpainting for highlights,

with violet underpainting for darkest values,

and beginning of some yellow layers on bottom flower.

Step Two

Final Layers

"Yellow Lilies"

Beth S. Macre

© 2005

Prismacolors on Black Stonehenge

More Strawberries

“2 Strawberries”

ACEO ~ 2 1/2" x 3 1/2"
Colored pencil on Stonehenge
Beth S. Macre © 2008

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This is the companion piece that I worked on with "One Strawberry" a couple of weeks ago. I was more satisfied with the first strawberry. I'm not sure why, but this one was a struggle for me. I may decide to go back and rework it. Somehow these little ACEO 'studies' seem to challenge me a lot. I want each little one to be successful, when they should only help me with my technique and the 'style' that I find ever so elusive....

Strawberry ATC

"One Strawberry"

2 1/2" x 3 1/2"

Prismacolor on Stonehenge

Beth S. Macre © 2008

This ATC (Artist Trading Card) will be traveling to England to its new home. The latest ATC exchange on ScribbleTalk was announced Sunday. As usual, there are some very nice little works of art on display.

A Pair for the Other Pear

Last month I painted a pear with Neocolor IIs. The Neocolors are pretty new and I've been trying out new ways to shorten the process of getting strong color down quickly. Many colored pencil artists are using these new materials and coming up with beautiful results. I like the results I got with the first pear and decided I wanted a companion piece to go with the first pear. So I started this one a couple of days ago. I am using Ampersand pastel board as a support. This one has a grayish color on the pastel board. Keep in mind, this is only the second painting that I've done with the neocolors, so this is definitely an experiment.

The first picture is the underpainting with the neocolors.

A light layer of neocolors are put on then water is brushed on the make it fluid. The color becomes very bright when water is added!

The second has a couple of layers of Prismacolor added.

The third has more layers of colored pencils.

It's not finished yet. I still need to add more layers, highlights, darken shadows, and a few other little tweaks. I will post the final in a day or two.

The Creative Process

I've been struggling with creative block lately. I want to work on my own project, for a change, so bad that I just cannot seem to decide what to draw! Over the last couple of months I've had some commissions to do, so my time to work on 'whatever' has been limited. So now that I have some time to work on something else, I'm frustrated because I'm stumped as to what to do next. So when I read Cindy's blog about "The Creative Muse", it caught my attention. I spend a lot of time looking for new ideas for my students. My advanced students seem to have problems deciding for themselves also. Today I'm looking for ideas for lesson plans and came across some articles about the creative process and where Artists come up with ideas. I came across Nita Lelands blog about "Blockbusters for Artists". I think this is a good list, but I feel such a time crunch that I don't always take the time for these creative activities. I want to jump right in to 'my next great piece'! HA. But it doesn't work that way! I do have her book "The New Creative Artist" and use it at school with my students. I've even made some lessons from some of her projects. So I just need to take my own advice to my students, and play around with some of her ideas. I know what medium I want to use, Neocolors II and Prismacolors on pastelboard are my new favorites, because of their speed and painterly possibilities. Now for deciding what to paint/draw.
So Cindy suggests creating a list to get ideas. I'm still working on the main idea...The subject! I want to chose a subject that says its ME! Cindy often does Still Life, Nicole Caulfied often does Still Life. Paula does Yarn and other cute illustrations. I just seem to be all over the place! (Maybe a result of teaching art for 25 years.) I've got to focus more on 'my subject'! I've done many architectural pieces, but I'm not sure if that is 'my subject' or if I should pursue more still life or what? So what do you think? If you have any suggestions, please feel free to leave a comment.

Tulips ATC

"3 Tulips"

2 1/2" x 3 1/2"

Prismacolors and Neocolor II

Blue Colourfix

Beth S. Macre © 2007

This is my latest ACEO. I used neocolor II underpainting with prismacolors on top. This is included in the online trade of ATCs at ScribbleTalk. ScribbleTalk is an online community of colored pencil artists (and some others who use other drawing media).

Could be a Tree...

"Tree of Colors"

Prismacolors on Colourfix

A week ago, I posted a small part of this drawing. I'm sure it was probably obviously a part of a tree...and yes I seem to be doing trees alot lately. So here is the whole piece. I finally had time to work on it yesterday. Its not quite finished though. I need to go back and punch up some of the colors in the background. Right now it looks a little more pastel than I wanted. So I'm going to finish this and try to move on to something besides trees. Maybe even do a still life...or a portrait...so much to chose from, so little time!

Old Red Barn Commission

Old Red Barn

Prismacolor Colored Pencil on Stonehenge

Beth S. Macre © 2005

While I am working furiously on my current pen and ink house commission, I will post a colored pencil commission that I did a couple of years ago. The highway is being widened next to this property, so the owners house had to be torn down. The house was located next to where I took this photo. The barn is still there, but the house has been torn down, so the yard has been changed. Although the barn is pretty old, the owners (farmers) have taken really good care of it.