Learn to… Art!

Giveaway Alert – Art Supply Kits!

Jul 22, 2011 Special Bulletins

Anne from Weekend Kits just sent me a quick notice that some of you might be interested in. They are hosting a giveaway that involves two art supply kits, one for drawing and one for painting. All you have to do is visit their giveaway post and leave a comment.

Best of luck!

Tags: giveaway

Inspiration Courtesy of John Lanthier and Dee Siffer

Jul 19, 2011 Special Bulletins

Congrats on the wedding. I love your blog – very interesting and useful reading. I`m an artist and graphics designer myself. Here a link to my website with some of my portraits and paintings if you would like to post it. http://johnlanthierart.com/ I hope one of my compositions could help kickstart your creative process.

A lovely message from John Lanthier, who is currently studying at Concordia. John is a man after my own heart; he does portraiture, still life, surrealism and abstract. Check out his site. My favorite is Enter the Void Part 1 under “other.”

I also got a message from long time reader Dee Siffer, who I’ve had the pleasure of corresponding with before. Below is her portrait of Ronald Reagan. So glad she decided to share this! Beautiful work, Dee.

It’s not too late! Share your work!

Tags: inspiration

Inspiration from April Quast

Jul 19, 2011 Special Bulletins

It’s so much fun to hear back from my readers, especially after being MIA for so long!

Here is a message from April Quast:

Glad you’re back, I enjoy following your blog. I would love to have you share my images on your site if you’re still looking for artists.

Based on movement, dance and yoga, April’s work is truly inspiring. Here are just a few of her dynamic paintings, and make sure you check out her website for even more: 

More inspiration to come! If you have something to share, let me know!

Back in the Saddle

Jul 18, 2011 Special Bulletins

After nearly a four month hiatus from this site, and an even longer one from the studio, I’m ready to jump back in!

The wedding was spectacular, but despite making an effort to keep everything as simple and easy as possible, it still took over my entire life. Blogging went out the window, along with tweeting, painting, cleaning the house and pretty much everything else. But now it’s all over and I can move on!

I’m on summer holidays and now that there’s nothing to occupy my time, I’m feeling that itch. You know the one… it says, “it’s time to create something, anything!” So here I am, upgrading plugins, approving comments, doing damage control with my many neglected friends and followers and getting ready to hit the studio.

I know how annoying it is to follow a blog and have the author disappear off the face of the earth. I apologize. There’s really no excuse. That being said, I’m back! I have some new ideas to implement, based on the survey that I did a few months ago, and I am more open than ever to ideas, suggestions, guest posts, questions, anything!

In the meantime,  I need a little inspiration to kick-start my creativity!

I’d love to see some of your recent projects. Send me a link to your website/blog or just e-mail me a picture and I’ll post it here for everyone’s benefit!

Thanks for sticking with me

Back in Business!

Jan 3, 2011 Special Bulletins

With the start of the New Year comes a new beginning for Learn to… Art!

I have had a wonderful, restful holiday full of friends and family and lots of food. After working feverishly to get all my portraits done before Christmas, I have had a guilt-free week of no art. It’s been a nice break, but I’m starting to feel the itch again!

I have some exciting things lined up for 2011 including more commissions, more classes, and a kickstart to this blog. One thing I’d love is for this site to become more interactive, with more discussions. To facilitate that, here is a poll:

cforms contact form by delicious:days

I would really appreciate you taking the time to answer these questions. It will give me the opportunity to see what people enjoy most and where they’d like to see the blog go.

Regular posts resume on Wednesday. I did a lot of dog drawings this Christmas and in that process, learned A LOT about drawing fur that I would like to share. In the meantime, I leave you with this post about being a “professional” artist. This was the first art-related blog I’ve read in about a month and it was exactly what I needed!