You are currently browsing dbshaw’s articles.
(Submitted by Jill Berry and posted by D. Shaw)
301 North Baldwin Ave.
Arcadia, CA 91007
Registration: Call 626.821.4624 or email Jill Berry.
Understanding and Practicing Proportion & Perspective in Graphite
January 16, 23, 30 | Oak Room
3 Wednesdays, 9:30 am – 2:00 pm (12 hours of class)
$165 / $181 non-member
Materials for class : 14″ X 17″ Strathmore Drawing Pad, series 400, medium surface (no sketch or recycled paper), Drafting Pencil with holder and Sharpener, 2H, HB and 2B leads, Kneaded Erase, Staedtler Mars White Plastic Eraser Stick, Erasing shield, Drafting Brush, Mars Drafting Dots (masking tape,)14” x 17” Medium Weight Tracing Paper, Portable Task Lite ( Ott-Lite). (Vis a Vis wet erase fine point marker, 1 Clip, 8″ X 10″ Plexi and 2 – 8″ X 10″ format supplied by instructor for $10.00)
Using Basic Shapes with Natural Forms in Graphite
(Sphere, Cylinder and Cone)
February 6, 20, 27 | Oak Room
3 Wednesdays, 9:30 am — 2 pm (12 hours of class)
$165 / $181 non-member
Botanical Illustration: Flowers in Continuous Tone in Graphite
March 5 (Palm Room), March 12 (Bamboo Room), March 19 & 26 (Oak Room)
4 Wednesdays, 9:30 am – 1:00 pm (12 hours of class)
$165 / $181 non-member
Introduction to Colored Pencil Techniques in Botanical Illustration
April 2, 9 (Bamboo Room), 23, 30 (Oak Room)
4 Wednesdays, 9:30-1:00 pm (12 hours)
$165 / $181 non-member
Plant Families in Colored Pencil
May 7, 14, 21, 28 (Oak Room)
4 Wednesdays, 9:30-1:00 pm (12 hours)
$165 / $181 non-member
by Margaret Best
Even the most experienced botanical artist needs inspiration from time to time. One of the best ways to find this renewed connection is to seek a change from your setting of solitary painting and to mingle with other artists. So besides BAGSC meetings, where do you find this opportunity? The answer is participation in exhibitions and workshops.
In the last quarter of 2007, I had a dizzy schedule of exhibitions (two in the USA and one in Canada) and came out of these intense few months very uplifted from meeting so many wonderful artists, appreciating amazing work and eager to try new things. I cannot believe that any artist that attended the 12th International exhibition at the Hunt Institute of Botanical Documentation at the ASBA conference last year did not leave with the same rush of enthusiasm that I felt to paint with every possible second available.
But… Thanksgiving and Christmas followed with all the usual family gatherings, crazy shopping trips (next year will be internet buying all the way) and long hours in the kitchen putting on the spread. Fortunately, being on a creative “high” between traveling to exhibitions and conferences, helped me put my new GET GOING class together that I will be teaching at the Santa Barbara Gardens on 26 and 27 January.
Laurie Hannah, a BAGSC member approached me at a class I was teaching at the Huntington Botanical Gardens two years ago to consider coming to the area again to offer a workshop. Who needs a second invitation to travel to such a magnificent setting and to be amongst botanical art enthusiasts?
I have designed the GET GOING workshop to cover the essentials that beginners need to know about the genre in order to find a positive path to follow for progress. At the same time I am offering new inspiration to more experienced artists that need to GET GOING… AGAIN with a renewed vigour. As I am both a professionally trained teacher and a practicing botanical artist, my goal is to help other artists identify areas in their skill sets that require a practical focus in order to advance.
In the class I will be referring to two excellent books that address specific technical skill development and serve to inspire. These include:
How to Draw Plants, by Keith West
The Art of Botanical Painting, by Margaret Stevens
If you do not have your own copies of these excellent reference books for botanical artists, you can purchase them from www.artplantaebooks.com.
If you would like to register for this workshop, you can do so online on the Santa Barbara Botanic Gardens’ web site, or by calling (805) 682-4726, ext. 102. You can also contact Leslie Walker, our BAGSC President.
Join us as we tour both venues for the 2008 ASBA Conference. We will begin at the Huntington with a tour of the botanical center to view the classrooms and the exhibit spaces we will be using. We will then travel to the Pasadena Hilton to view the meeting spaces and the hotel in general. Here we will have lunch at Trevo’s restaurant and learn how to use Basecamp, the easy-to-learn and wonderful web-based project management application set up for our use by Deborah Shaw.
Join us and other conference volunteers as we kick off Conference Year 2008!
Schedule and Agenda:
9:30 a.m.
Meet at:
The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens
1151 Oxford Road, San Marino, CA 91108
626-405-2100
Park in public parking area and meet your fellow conference committee members in the drop-off area outside of the botanical center. Tour of the classrooms and exhibit spaces.
11:00 a.m.
Leave Huntington and carpool to Hilton. (Parking at the Hilton is $8/vehicle. Members can leave their cars at the Huntington if they want to avoid parking charges at the Hilton. Please let us know if you would like to be included in the carpool arrangements, or if you would like to be a driver. Tania Marien and Deborah Shaw can each take six members in their cars.)
11:30 a.m.
Meet at
Hilton Pasadena
168 South Los Robles Avenue
Pasadena, California, USA 91101
Tel: 626.577.1000
Fax: 626.584.3148
Tour of the classrooms and banquet hall.
12:30 p.m.
Lunch at the Hilton’s Trevo restaurant. Lunch is in the range of $15 – $18. Demonstration of Basecamp computer program to manage conference planning and tasks.
Please RSVP to Tania Marien at bagscnews@earthlink.net
By Julie Schneider Ljubenkov (posted by D. Shaw)
A note to BAGSC members from the BAGSC Executive Board: Julie has the same email address, phone number and post office address as is listed in the roster. BAGSC is contributing a gift certificate to Target so that Julie and her husband can get things they need. If anyone would like to add to the gift certificate fund, please send checks made out to “The Botanical Artists Guild of Southern California” or “BAGSC” to Deborah Shaw, Treasurer. Please put a reference on the check to Julie and/or the fire. We will also be taking up a collection of art supplies for Julie at the January 19th BAGSC meeting. If you have any extra supplies please bring them to the meeting. Our thoughts and support are with Julie, her family and all of the victims of the fires as they work to put their lives back together.
Some of Julie’s artwork can be viewed on the BAGSC web site, at: http://www.bagsc.org/ljubenkov.html. This BAGSC gallery page has additional links to view Julie’s work on other sites as well.
On the night of October 23 we were asleep. Upon retiring we had felt fairly safe: all the big fires in San Diego County were at least 15 miles away and the wind was not blowing in our direction — plus the wind had died down and it was a beautiful, clear autumn afternoon. We did get a few things ready to evacuate earlier that day, since we thought it would be typical that some nut would try to start a fire here and it would be wise to be ready. We’ve been evacuated twice before in the last 13 years. It is a very tiring experience — like moving — so we didn’t do a complete job getting stuff ready to go because we were very tired. At 3:50 a.m. my husband woke up and opened the window, smelled smoke and saw an orange glow in the eastern sky. The winds had picked up and again were howling. We knew this meant we were probably going to lose our home and that we needed to get out quick. We called our next door neighbors and they had just woken up too.
We threw clothes and prescription drugs in waiting suitcases and made a total of three trips to each of our cars with the stuff we had waiting by the door — mostly stuff to keep us working. My husband is a marine biologist; he grabbed his microscope and some of his most important literature for identifying animals. For me, this was a couple of sketch books; some computer disks; some stuff for teaching which had been packed up already for next week’s classes; some botanical and landscape prints I had packed for an upcoming engagement; plus, our pre-packed fire suitcase with all our important papers and some photographs.
Those trips to the car took ten minutes. Within that time the flames surrounded the house on three sides. There was a large fire funnel tornado on the hill above the house which advanced towards us. Luckily our driveway was only burning on one side, and as we backed into the flames we knew the house would be gone. We filed down the dirt road behind other fleeing neighbors. There were no fire fighters in sight and no evacuation calls.
Our friends, the Marx’s (Wes Marx is author of Frail Ocean) had called us previously wondering how we were fairing with the winds and the fires. At 4:15 a.m. on the way out, unable to reach my husband on his cell phone and wondering if he had actually got out behind me, I pulled over to the side of the road and called them. They let us stay in their downstairs apartment for three weeks and took care of us for the first week, as we were zombie basket cases for a few days. They shopped for us, picked up our prescription drugs, and took us to the relief centers to get us started on the recovery process.
With the help of the insurance company, we are currently renting a small place while our manufactured home gets rebuilt. We hope to be back to our property in May 2008.
People have asked us what we need. Here is our current list. We don’t want anyone to feel compelled to get us anything, but maybe if you have two of something, or you would like to get us something on the list that would be wonderful. We know our insurance will not cover replacing the contents of our home, and we don’t qualify for FEMA or SBA, so we appreciate anything anyone wants to give us.
Here’s our current list:
- Mattress pad, California King
- Pillow liners, king size
- Stepping stool for indoors
- Wire brush (for cleaning up charred and burnt stuff)
- Bottle brush, large and small sizes
- Kitchen serving trays/or for eating (2 to 4)
- Basting kitchen tool
- Bread maker
- Clothes line with wooden clothes pins
- Indoor clothes drier/rack (wooden or metal)
- Letter opener (2)
- Colored folders with pockets for class outlines (10)
- Copy holder for computer typing
- Book ends
- Head sets and microphone for landline phones
- Blank cassette tapes
- Electric pencil sharpener
- River walker shoes, women’s size 7
- Warm down coat – women’s medium size 12
- Warm down coat – men’s XL or XXL
- Women’s cotton socks, dark colors
- Fax machine
- Topo map program of California on CD for a PC computer
- Pictures from magazines or calendars of flowers, landscapes, and animals (for my classes – we use these as image libraries)
I also miss all my 60’s and 70’s rock and roll music:
Elton John, The Beatles, James Taylor, Paul Simon, Gordon Lightfoot, ELO, Supertramp. Right now I can listen to both cassette tapes or CD’s.
Our very efficient and proactive Membership Chair, Joann Leonard sent out her annual email reminder notice for membership dues in early December. (Thank you Joann!)
You should be receiving your quarterly December 2007 issue of the ASBA newsletter soon, which announces a membership dues increase for 2008 of $20.00 for the national portion of the dues, approved at their annual Board meeting in Pittsburgh this past September.
At the BAGSC meeting in October, it was voted to keep our local chapter portion of the dues the same (please see your October BAGSC minutes).
What does this increase mean to you as a member of the Botanical Artists Guild of Southern California? It means that the cost of a dual ASBA/BAGSC membership will be $85 in 2008 ($60 ASBA + $25 BAGSC). Please send a check for $85 to Membership Chairperson, Joann Leonard at her address in the BAGSC roster, in order to continue your participation in two exciting international organizations. (The exceptions are those new members who joined the Guild in November and so have already paid their dues for the coming year.)
International members will pay $100 in 2008 ($75 ASBA + $25 BAGSC).
To the record number of BAGSC members who have responded promptly and early this year (thank you all!), please send your additional $20.00 to Joann. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.
If you have not yet had an opportunity to visit our website, www.bagsc.org please do so. As a member of the Botanical Artists Guild of Southern California you are entitled to your own gallery page where you can exhibit up to three images of your artwork on the website. Guidelines for submission can be found on the website. Just click the link “For Members Only.”
Thank you. We wish the best to you and yours during this season, and look forward to an exciting 2008.
Our BAGSC blog is a success! We’ve had a total of 812 visits. Our best day ever was the first 24 hours of our launch, when we received 234 visits. A warm welcome to those of you who have signed up to be contributors, and we’d like to encourage all of you who are “thinking about it” to join in anytime.
Deborah Shaw
Note: A longer version of this article with detailed instructions has also been posted as a permanent “page” as one of the links across the top of the blog. Please click on the “How to Blog” tab in the upper right.
It’s finally here. The BAGSC Blog now officially replaces our quarterly newsletter. The advantage of our blog is that it allows us to really be a community — our members can comment and discuss articles; contribute stories and reviews; and let other members know about “calls for entries”, galleries, openings, and learning opportunities.
A big thank you to Sasha McMullen for contributing the funds to secure our blog URL address; to Margaret Best for allowing us to use part of a new painting (that hasn’t even been exhibited yet) for the first header; and to Clara Josephs, Arillyn Moran-Lawrence, and Suzanne Kuuskmae for contributing our first articles. An additional thank you goes to all of you for your patience in the time it’s taken for me (Deborah Shaw) to get this out.
How to read the blog:
We already have quite a bit of content posted. Only ten articles show up in the main window at a time. After that, the information is automatically archived by date and by the categories on the left side. Click on each category name to see all of the articles in that category. You can also search by any keywords you remember. The articles will always be in the archives; you’ll be able to go back and find previous information. Please explore the categories to make sure you don’t miss anything. If you click on the images, they’ll open in a new window at a larger size. (They may take a little while if you have a slower connection.)
In the “How to Blog” tab in the upper right corner, you’ll find instructions on how to:
- Keep in touch
- Please comment
- Become a blogger yourself
- Another way to contribute
- Put your artwork in the header
To our members who aren’t connected to cyberspace:
No worries. We’ll periodically print out the blog and mail it to you.
Happy blogging to all!
Co-sponsored by the Santa Barbara Botanic Garden and BAGSC
Saturday and Sunday
January 26th and 27th, 9:00 a.m. – 3:30 p.m.
Whether you are a beginner who is interested in exploring botanical art, or are at a more experienced level, Margaret can help you improve your observational and technical skills to produce a scientifically accurate, yet appealing artwork. This workshop will focus on watercolor. Participants can purchase plants from the Santa Barbara Botanic Garden nursery, or bring a favorite specimen from home. Come and enjoy this great opportunity in the glorious setting of Santa Barbara.
Fee:
$125, members of the Santa Barbara Botanic Garden and/or BAGSC
$145, non-members
For registration, a materials list and further information, please call (805) 682-4726, ext. 102
BAGSC members may also contact Leslie Walker or Deborah Shaw with questions.
BAGSC member Irene Horiuchi was accepted into the Watercolor West XXXIX Annual Juried Exhibition with her painting Silent Watch. The exhibition is in Riverside, through January 26.
Watercolor West XXXIX Annual Juried Exhibition
Riverside Art Museum
December 6, 2007 – January 26, 2008
Monday – Saturday, 10 am – 4 pm
http://www.riversideartmuseum.org
951-684-7111
Directions and general information can be found at: http://www.riversideartmuseum.org/about/index.html
Guest Speaker, Linda Doll
The Watercolor Artist in the Digital Age
Saturday, December 8, 2007
3 pm – 5 pm
Exhibition Opening Reception
Saturday, December 8, 2007
5 pm – 7 pm
Save the Date! Anne-Marie will be at Robinson Gardens February 5 – 8, 2008. Look for more information later.
BAGSC members, Margaret Best and Elaine Searle exhibited at the 12th International Exhibition of Botanical Art & Illustration at the Hunt Institute at Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA. The opening reception of this international exhibit coincided with the 13h Annual Meeting & Conference of the American Society of Botanical Artists (September 27 – 29, 2007). The show is open from 30 September–20 December 2007 and features 111 artworks by 64 artists from 14 countries (Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, China, England, France, Italy, Japan, Scotland, South Africa, Sweden, the United States, and Wales).
Elaine exhibited two paintings: Echeveria laui, and Astrophytum myriostigma var. nudum. Elaine’s web site can be viewed at: http://www.paintbotanical.com/
Margaret’s watercolor painting of Mespilus germanica (English medlar) can be viewed at her web site: http://www.bestbotanical.com/
Information about the exhibition can be viewed on the Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation web site at: http://huntbot.andrew.cmu.edu/HIBD/Exhibitions/Exhibitions.shtml The catalogue for the show can also be purchased from their web site: http://huntbot.andrew.cmu.edu/HIBD/Publications/HI-Pubs/Pub-IE-09.shtml
Margaret also had two paintings in the ASBA show at the Horticultural Society of New York, Tenth Annual International Juried Exhibition, Malus baccata (Siberian Crabapple Blossoms) and Malus baccata (Siberian Crabapple Leaves).
On November 12 – 16, 2007, master colored pencil artist Gary Greene came to the Manhattan Beach Creative Arts Center in Manhattan Beach, California and taught how to paint startlingly realistic flowers with colored pencil. Using simple floral studies, the class studied the colored pencil techniques Gary uses in his floral paintings. A sample of Gary’s work is shown below (click on the image to open an enlargement in a new window):
Participants in the class were enthusiastic. Some comments:
“I really enjoyed Gary Greene’s Colored Pencil Class. I am a rank beginner. He took me through the colored pencil techniques step by step. By the end of the week I felt I was able to turn out a pretty good product using the techniques he taught. He was very encouraging and always helpful. Thank you so much Gary! Your class was a fun, informative, and an all around wonderful experience!” — S. Tanner
“I feel this class was well worth the time as I did learn two interesting new techniques. One was with wax-based color pencils (using Bestine) and the other was with water soluble pencils using water in three different ways. I plan to use both techniques in the future for better effect with certain subjects. Happy coloring!” — R. Hopper
Thanks to Sue Kuuskmae for arranging the class.
Suzanne Kuuskmae
An exhibition at the Creative Arts Center in Manhattan Beach by BAGSC closed Friday, November 16, after a month-long stay. The show got off to a great start at our reception in early October when visitors were treated to the saxophone playing of Ken Gable with refreshments planned by Cristina Baltayian and participating artists. Over 60 paintings were shown by 15 artists. The venue showed our work beautifully in their high ceiling-ed, well-lighted gallery.
During the month of October, free lectures were offered each Saturday. Several were under the auspices of the Botanical Garden, covering gardening with native California plants, container gardening, and water conservation. On October 20, guild members Suzanne Kuuskmae taught a drawing class, and Gloria Whea-Fun Teng taught a Chinese Brush Painting class to over 15 enthusiastic participants.
ASBA, Opening 2009 (Tentative Date)
To increase public awareness of plants that are threatened with extinction here and around the world, the ASBA will be collaborating with the World Conservation Union (IUCN) and the Center for Plant Conservation to produce an exhibition of endangered plants. This juried exhibition will include approximately 45 original artworks in 3 framed sizes: 24” X 18”, 30” X 24”, and 40” X 34”. These sizes can be horizontal or vertical, and the work need not be for sale. “Losing Paradise?” promises to be an exciting project that will build relationships between artists, institutions, conservation organizations, scientists, and horticulturists.
Submission Deadline: May 2008
Additional information can be found at the ASBA website: http://huntbot.andrew.cmu.edu/ASBA/ASBotArtists.html
Clara Josephs
I spent two delightful and enlightening days at Filoli in July taking Catherine Watters’ class on painting roses. Catherine is on the Board of Directors of ASBA and a teacher in the new Botanical Art Certificate Program at Filoli. Her classes sell out fast, so I was glad to get a seat. We began our first day with a tour of the annual exhibit. BAGSC was well represented, both in number and quality. Christina, Nancy B., Akiko, Sue, and Gilly had paintings in the show.
Back upstairs in the class, Catherine demonstrated the correct use of dividers to measure our choice of rose specimens. She circulated constantly throughout the class, making sure every student received their share of attention. By the end of the first day, most students had their composition tea-washed and ready to paint. I was able to complete my simple subject by the end of the second day and was thrilled with all I had learned. Catherine uses a limited palette of (Winsor Newton) Alizarin, Crimson, French Ultra, Winsor Violet, Perm Rose, Neutral Tint, Burnt Umber, Hooker’s Green, and Holbein’s Gamboge Nova. She recommends using those 20 cent plastic round palettes with 10 compartments, keeping each color (greens, reds, yellows) on a separate palette. Color is built slowly, with as many as 10 thin washes. Shadows are a mixture of French Ultramarine and Neutral Tint applied in almost transparent layers. Some intense points of shadow are accented by graphite delicately applied and the sealed with a wash. Catherine’s beautiful green “mother mix” is made from a mix of Hooker’s Green, Gamboge Nova, Burnt Umber, and Neutral Tint. Her acronym for this recipe is “Get Your Botanicals Now (green, yellow, brown, neutral tint).
At the end of our second day we admired the array of beautiful works the class had produced. I was thrilled with how much was accomplished in only 2 days and I’m looking forward to my next opportunity to return to Filoli!
The next day we headed to Alcatraz to see “The Softer Side of the Rock – The Historic Gardens of Alcatraz” exhibit by 18 artists in the Botanical Illustration Program at the San Francisco Botanical Gardens, directed by Mary Harden http://www.sfbotanicalgarden.org/news/pr/alcatraz-art.htm. These 38 paintings, while painted is a somewhat looser style than we are used to, were vibrantly colored and strikingly composed.
BAGSC News 