Friday, January 6, 2017

Winds of Change

Turning over a new leaf this year. I have closed the physical studio and gallery in Brasstown, it will reopen with a new owner as LG Art and Designs Bouteque in March and will carry my work. I will also still be teaching alcohol ink classes during the spring and summer months. Lisa Visel is the new owner and I think she will do well in that space. I am focusing on teaching and travel. I bought a small travel trailer and will spend some time in New England this summer visiting our new grand baby and teaching. We hope to take S/V Seaotter to he Caribbean in November or December. I am teaching 3 classes this year at the Folk School and will be doing some day classes in both Murphy and Brasstown. I am also looking for teaching opportunities and will be developing a web site and on line classes for those that can't take a live class from me. I am currently trying to figure out the rather steep learning curve of making videos, editing them and figuring out how to sell them on line. More will be revealed in the next month.

Monday, August 8, 2016

Where has the summer gone?


River's Rim Studio has been busy all summer teaching classes and painting new pieces. 
I recently started to experiment with encaustics as well as continuing teaching alcohol inks and
Watercolors. I also remodeled the studio to give us more classroom space.. 
I am planning on monthly newsletters as well as more blog posts. 

Stay Tunes... More will be revealed!


Tuesday, April 29, 2014


How To Save A Disaster

Another Approach to Painting with Alcohol Inks 



        I was painting on a 6x6 tile using pretty traditional Alcohol ink techniques of dropping the ink and maneuvering it with a small brush and a straw and ended up really liking the basic design of lights and darks that I had achieved. Thinking I needed to go to another level in the painting I tried a misting technique to bring more " light" into the painting. Unfortunately I over misted and began to lose the entire painting, not sure what I could do I grabbed a piece of archival matte photographic paper and pressed it down on the tile like you would do if making a mono print ..I was intrigued by the result of what I had when I lifted the paper.. After studying the painting I grabbed a few of my AI Spectum Noir markers and a white gel pen, added some small details and fell in love with the final result. Voila! A new way of "painting".. I Adore happy accidents!

Friday, April 25, 2014

Drops, Drips, Dots and Doodling with Alcohol Inks



Sometimes it is just fun to play with a medium, I created this painting by choosing three colors , Wild Plum, stream and sunshine yellow, and then putting different size drops of the colors on a piece of paper, spritzing with alcohol, more drops, splattering alcohol, then splattering ink, playing with a small brush loaded with alcohol thinking flowers shapes, picking up the paper and leaning side to side then up and down and generally just seeing what the inks will do. After I let it dry I lifted more flower shapes with alcohol on a small brush and paper towel,  a blender pen and a small Qtip and finally I connected it all with random flower shapes outlined with a gel pen. Happy Flowers! Try it yourself!

"Art is an act of the soul, not the intellect" Julia Cameron




Sunday, April 20, 2014

Another Day, another painting

Went to my studio today and spent some time creating. After planting the flowers I bought Friday, framing two pictures, painting two frames and re-hanging the wall where I sold a painting yesterday I finally sat down to paint. This little gem of a painting is only 4x4 and I plan to double mat it and frame it for Gallery St. Thomas.

Wednesday, April 16, 2014

My Latest Passion

Here are some of my newest paintings


Rose Afternoon  4x4 Alcohol ink on Yupo paper



Green light in the Forest


Spring in the Mountains

Happy Flowers