My First Giclee Print: Girl and Dragon

Hey everyone!

I couldn't wait to share with you all some exciting news! As you know I have ordered my very first giclee print and I finally picked it up today! There were some complications with the printer (as in it broke) so I had to wait an extra week for them to order a new special printer before it was ready. I'm so happy with the results and so I took some pictures for you :)

Here is me with the unveiling of the amazing print! It's the the first time I've seen it though, since I had to see it at the print shop to confirm, but still, that sounds way more dramatic. In any case, I was still happy to see it again. The owner of the print shop (River City Digital Graphics), Jim commented that he liked the painting and that I did a great job with it :) That was so great to hear, especially since he has been painting for a very long time. He also said that I did a great job with the digital image as it looks as good as if it were scanned (I took a picture with my camera with strategic lighting). That also was amazing to hear; it's always good to get confirmation that you are doing a good job.

Now that I have an archival quality print of this painting, I will be happy to share both with Andi and have him pick which ever one he wants to have. After all, this painting wouldn't have existed without him.

So that was my exciting news for today. That makes two posts in one day! Yowza :) Until next time!

<3 Kara

Factual Friday: Frida Kahlo

Good morning Lured Ones!

Welcome to the first of many Factual Fridays!

Autoretrato en la Frontera entre Mexico y lost Estados, 1993

While reading through my art history book (History of Art from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance, Impressionism and Modern Art, 2008), the description for Frida Kahlo's ((1907-1954) information caught my eye. Among the insight into the beginnings of why she started painting and what her paintings reflect, there was a quote by Andre Betron that described her art as "like a ribbon tied around a bomb" that I found extremely moving.

Although she had no intention of being an artist, a bus accident that left her severely injured and spent over a year in bed to recover, and in her convalescence she began to paint. At this time, her work consisted mainly of self portraits and still life. At age 22 Kahlo married a famous muralist Diego Rivera who was 20 years her senior. Their artistic temperament, infidelities as well as her poor health and inability to bear children resulted in a stormy marriage with divorces and remarriages. Much of Kahlo's work during this period describes the pain she suffered. Not only that, but also the pain of women in general were dominant features in her paintings, expressed in a surreal way and often vibrant with intensity and passion.

In her artistic career Kahlo produced 143 paintings alone, 55 of which are self-portraits. When asked why she painted so many self-portraits, Kahlo replied "because I am so often alone... because I am the subject I know best."

With that said, two of Kahlo's works are featured on this post. For more, please click here: List of selected works. You can also google "Frida Kahlo" and will also find plenty of information and other works. Enjoy!

The Two Fridas, 1939
Oil on canvas, 68 x 68 in. (173 x 173 cm), Museo de Arte Moderno, Mexico City

I hope you liked this first Factual Friday, and if you did, don't forget to share it with those who will also find this interesting. See you on Sunday for a Sunday Surprise!
<3 Kara

Resources:

• History of Art from the Middle Ages to Renaissance, Impressionism and Modern Art, 2008 (ISBN: 978-1-84451-329-1)
• http://www.artchive.com/artchive/K/kahlo.html
• http://www.fridakahlo.com/

Self Portrait on a Lily Pad, 2007

Good day Lured Ones!

Today I want to give some insight into a portrait I did for my high school IB art class in 2007. I showed an image in a previous post about my visit to my old high school, but I did not explain. So here goes!

Around this time I was learning the process of canvas making, and decided to make my own canvas for the self portrait. The dimension requirement was pretty large, so I decided to make it about life-sized. As you can see the small top left image, Ms. Drum was helping me make the canvas, and bottom left you can see how big the canvas is relative to me (I am 5 foot, 1 inch tall). 

 

On the right is my finished painting done in acrylics. The whole concept was that I am sleeping, dreaming on a lily pad on the water. Initially I intended for the water on the lower part of the canvas to have unclear dark images that suggested a nightmare. I had trouble sleeping and often had scary dreams that bore no clear meaning. The fog is suppose to be dense to give a hazy and dream-like mood. 

After I finished, I spent some time observing the painting and I decided that I could have done better around the stomach area. The fabric of the shirt on the stomach is too straight and unreal. Also on the hand, the ring finger is longer than the middle finger, which is highly inaccurate >_< I've always had trouble with hands. Also, it was pretty unfortunate that someone took a pen on my painting on the face area. I had stored it in the supply room, so there was no way to figure out who. That's not too important because if I wanted to spend some time fixing it up, I could cover it.

If I were to fix up this painting, what do you think I should change or do differently? Ideas are very much welcome and appreciated :)

Until next time, I hope your weekend is going fantabulously!

<3

Visiting my old high school's IB Art class

Good afternoon everyone!

September was a busy month and I wasn't able to post as often as I'd like. However, I was doing things that I could blog about all the while - just didn't have time to sit down and gather photos and edit video clips for uploading. Now that I am back and have some time to myself, I can slowly but surely update you on what I've been up to.

Two weeks ago, I visited my high school teacher and she invited me to return the following day during her IB art class and meet the new kids and see what they were working on. This was such a trip down memory lane because they were working on their self portraits and I was at this point in the class years ago. I was able to speak to some students and learn about some ideas and messages behind their pieces. It was very insightful and I felt so honored that one student shared a particularly personal story behind her piece.

The students were great and so was their work. Here are some works done by students in Ms. Drum's IB art class. I will also share the self portrait I painted at the end. So make sure to scroll all the way down, and enjoy!

 

Now here's what I did 5 years ago when I was at this point in the class:

I intended for this post to be about my visit to the class, so I shall give further insight to to this painting in my next post :)

Until next time!

<3 Kara

Dragon Boat Painting

Here's my caption for the piece:

"As an immigrant in the fast paced America, it’s becoming harder and harder to stay connected to the Khmer culture. That’s why it’s so important for Khmers to come together and help each other keep the connection strong. Similar to the dragon boat needing all of it’s paddlers to move together to race for the goal, our culture needs every Khmer to stay dedicated to preserving our culture."

During the 2009 Khmer New Year celebration, I heard an announcement looking for artists to paint something about our Khmer culture because the municipality is having an APA Heritage Month Exhibit from late April to late May, and there was a segment about Khmer and Cambodia. SO! I jumped right to it. Although I got really short notice, I finished it in 3 days, which shows through because there are many things that I could improve on. In any case, I was able to get it in on time, and it was up in the 3rd floor lobby of the Seattle Municipal Tower for about 2 or 3 weeks. I was HAPPY!!!  This is the first time my art has gone up any where outside of school!! I submitted a short bio of myself and the piece and everything! Sadly, I was unable to attend the reception because of class, but my piece on a public exhibit is pretty darn cool! Also, I submitted this piece for a publication in my university called the Matrix. The issue's theme was "Identity & Culture" so I thought this was perfect!

I need to take a moment to say a special thank you to my high school art teacher, Ms. D! She's so amazing! She hasn't been my art teacher since high school (which at the time of this painting was 2 years past), but she was still very willing to help me with my art when I needed it!! Also, thanks to my friends for all the support and encouragement in those 3 stressful days! They had to deal a lot with my crankiness and frustrations.

All in all, this was an exciting piece for me. I was very passionate about dragon boat racing, so the subject matter was very personal. In addition, this was the first time my piece was shown outside of a school environment. However, I do wish I had more time with it to work on hand studies, body proportions, siting poses, etc. Plus, it would be nice if the people on the boat had life jackets! >_<

I hope you enjoyed reading about this painting. Until next time!!

<3 Kara

MLK Backdrop: A Poster from my past :)

Good afternoon Lured Ones!

I hope you all are having a great week, but if not, have no fear for the weekend is here! ... well it's coming!

So it's been a couple days since my last post and I want to keep the goodies coming! I just started on a new project-- a 17"x13" colored pencil piece. I will not be showing updates for this as I go along because it's going to be someone's Christmas gift! I love giving gifts, especially things that I've made, but my problem is being too excited to hide the secret. So we will see how long it takes for me to crack. I will also be starting on two other pieces that are also going to be holiday gifts, so I won't be updating about those either. Or at least I will try my very best not to. If the secret gets out then I guess there's no harm in that, but for now the secret remains!

In the meanwhile, some eye-candy for you all! I am sharing a poster I did back in high school. I was in ASB (student government) and organizations pretty much the whole high school experience, and I was of course the one to make or take part in a lot of posters. During my senior year, I designed and rallied a small team to make sever huge posters for assemblies. The one I am sharing was from a Martin Luther King Jr. assembly. I am not sure on the exact dimensions, but it's even taller than me! I did it with some help from my art teacher and ideas from friends. This was acrylics on butcher paper. Since they were usually gigantic and put up only to be taken down after the event, I didn't have the resources to use actual canvas or panels. So butcher paper was my best friend :)

I hope you like it! More posters to come your way soon! I will be going back to Seattle stay with my baby sister while my parents are out of the country for a month. So I won't have my supplies to paint or anything, but I will be bringing my nice colored pencils that my husband gifted me for Christmas one year. Hopefully, I get some colored pencil stuff done and will be able to share those. Otherwise, I will be sharing older things that I've done in the past. In any case, it's fun to look back.

Have a wonderful weekend, Lured Ones! Until next time...

<3 Kara

Sowthistles and Grasses Speed Painting

Happy Sunday!

For most of you, I'm guessing you have another day off, so hooray for that!
The good news for me today is that internet is back online! Woot! A couple of days without internet and I feel so disconnected. When did I become so attached to the web?

So, with internet available, I am able to share with you the second video for the painting Sowthistles and Grasses. I did mention that I am making a speed painting clip, and it's here! It's about 2 hrs of footage, sped up by a lot of times hehe. I hope you find it enjoyable.

Have a great afternoon!

<3 Kara

Sowthistles and Grasses (oil painting)

It's Friday! And it's Labor day weekend! So I hope yours is off to a good start!

Yesterday I finished a painting and I'm so excited to share it with you all :) It's based from a tutorial painting by Brian Bennett from the book How to Paint by Angela Gair and Ian Sidaway. So this is definitely not an original, but I'm proud of it nonetheless.

The medium is oil paints; this was my first experience with oil paints and it was very interesting. It took me a bit to get use to mixing paints with a medium, and also cleaning up with a lot more care. Furthermore, this tutorial was to practice palette knife painting techniques and that's a challenge in itself. The brushwork was minimal, which meant that I had to suggest certain details based on how I lay paint down with the pallet knife.

To learn more about my experience with this painting, please watch this video below! I am also making a bonus video showing about 2 hours worth of live painting, sped up 16x, and will be available soon! Have a fantabulous weekend!

<3 Kara

Poppies with Courtney

Good afternoon y'all!

It's been a while since my last post, but don't worry, I haven't forgotten! My friend Courtney was visiting from out of town for the last 6 days, so I've been spending lots of time with her; lots of sun and lots of pool time! While she was here we also went to Whimsy Art Studio for a painting class and had a blast! We went for the Poppies session and it was so much fun. You can see the paintings we did above. I love doing these type of wine with painting classes because you don't paint alone. When I'm alone in my own painting space, the way I go about painting is very different than when I'm socializing with others in a class and enjoying a glass of wine (not that I can't enjoy wine in my own painting space). The class and socializing frees me up and I paint more fluidly and freely. I don't have to agonize about the technique I must use to produce the results I'm looking for. In the class, I just follow the instructor's tutorial, relax and let go. It's nice too that I can add my own flare to the painting if I want to :) I've done classes like this 3 times now and I love it! It's a great date or double date night and also girls night!

I've noticed this new trend in painting where people can go to tutorial classes and drink the wine they bring. The first time I had this experience was at Painting with a Twist, and Whimsy Art Studio is the second place I've visited. I have also noticed another location in San Antonio called Vino van Gogh and want to check this place out too. Maybe I'll do a date night with my husband at Vino van Gogh in the near future. This location is the closest to where we live, so it's a lot more convenient. I'm sure there are more studios that offer this painting class where you can bring your own wine, but these are the 3 I know of. If you think this is something you might want to do, I highly recommend looking for one in your area. It's so fun! And if you go with your boy/girl-friend, friend(s), or your spouse, you guys can have matching paintings!

The way these places usually work is they have a calender with different paintings you can do. Each day is a different painting and they rotate each month I think. You sign up and pay for a class for one evening to do one painting.. You can do this alone but usually people sign up in duos or groups. Each class lasts about 2 hours.You may bring wine (or other beer or soda if you prefer for some places) and drink that while you paint. The instructor will walk you through each step of the painting and the whole experience is very relaxing.

At Whimsy Art Studio, I learned that the instructor is an attorney and paints as a hobby. She decided to open up a wine and painting class studio and rocked it. She's only been open for 2 months, but it looks like she's doing great. I was so excited to hear that because I want to earn a law degree but I also want to paint, so there is hope for me yet!

So that's my latest art adventure. I hope you enjoyed reading about it :) Until next time...

<3 Kara

Girl with Dragon - New Painting Complete!

Hey everyone! It's an exciting day because I just finished my first video for Be Lured! Instead of writing about my latest painting, I've decided to talk about it. I was nervous to be on camera because I'm usually the one behind the camera, so yikes! And at the end of the video, I've put together a series of pictures that show the painting as it progresses from beginning to end.

There are a couple people I'd like to mention and give thanks to. First, a big thanks to my friend Andi who drew this picture that I painted! He's a great artist and does beautiful portraits. Also, thanks to my friend Eric (known as Out of the Void) for allowing me to use his songs for background music in this video. He's totally cool and recorded these for me on the spot when I asked him about it! And finally, thanks to my husband for all the encouragement, supplies and helping me record the video.

Without further ado, here's the video. Please let me know if you like this format of presenting my paintings and if there's something else you'd like to see!

Until next time!<3 Kara

Winter Landscape

Hey everyone! Thanks for stopping by.

Today I am sharing a watercolor painting that I did in 2006. This is my first full watercolor project and was very unfamiliar with the medium. I had complications with stretching the paper so it dried kind of funny. Also, being it was my first time doing watercolor, I learned quickly that I have to start light and build up. Otherwise, I will not be able to erase or cover anything up. Furthermore, I had a hard time making the scratches for the bushes on the bottom left corner. It looks alright at a distance, but up close, I feel that I could have done more intentional strokes.

The scene is based on a photograph I took on a snowy trail behind my parents' house in 2005. I took a ton of pictures that day, and many of them were so peaceful and serene. But this one I chose because it's a sight I saw everyday. When you leave or enter the community, you pass by a huge open field that shows this beautiful scene. So this sight brings back memories of tickling my baby sister in the car, or on my way to and from school every morning, or going to see family and friends.

With that said, here is a collage of my progress from the early stages to the finished product.

Again, thanks for reading, and have a wonderful day/afternoon/night!


<3 Kara