Pouring Acrylics

2019 was busy with art classes in my studio for Pouring Acrylics. Not only did everyone want to learn about this new painting technique, it required a lot of demos and thus I acquired an accumulation of paintings on canvas.  Many of these pieces didn’t totally stand “alone” in my opinion as much as I enjoyed the surprise element of how the paints performed. It left a void that didn’t please me. This technique balances between chemistry, color knowledge, and lends to a compulsive experimental painting frenzy which produces liquid colorful “happenings”. Now there is this question; “Is this art?” A bit more than a taped banana to the wall, but perhaps my preferences and appreciations are coming to a new transition.

2020 brings new beginnings and currently I am taking some of these pouring acrylic pieces and making them into something a bit more than a chemical explosion. I am enjoying the backgrounds by enhancing the beautiful color events of the pouring technique. My hope this year going forward is to paint more traditionally in my own work and find my balance in satisfaction.

If you are interested in taking a Pouring Acrylic class in my studio, you may sign up here:

Classes

 

 

“Thins and Skins” Series

In PROCESS

Working on a series of acrylic fun works. Recently enjoying the process of acrylic pours by mixing acrylic paint with Flowtroel giving a “Thin” medium and mixing traditional techniques taking more control of the composition which gives way to a more traditional painterly effect, not just the dirty pour happening.

How many pieces will be determined by the process of working until something else creeps in and take over. Yesterday I took out my Bob Ross brushes to use in a painting and it seems something took over and the piece evolved totally out of my character work as if Bob was there instructing me what to do. I love those brushes but I put them away because the piece was totally not the style for the series I am working on.  Maybe next series Bob!

See new works under “Painting with Acrylics” tab

What’s Happening Today in and out of the Studio

Exciting News

This year 2017 has been exciting for me as I am working part-time as an art instructor for the Friendship Heart Gallery in Lancaster PA. This has not only been a positive for me, achieving a job in the “art-world”, but also, is sparking my own creativity at home in my studio. I enjoy working with the students there and hope I am a blessing in their day as they are mine.

Currently I am working with acrylics in a more liquid form and learning techniques with the amazing process of using acrylic thins and skins and processes for small paintings.  My learning curves have been centered around processes with the goal of  keeping the integrity of the polymer chemistry and insure preservation for lasting artwork.

Also up for this year is a study for website improvement at PCAD. My goal is to create an improved WordPress website, from blog to beautiful.

 

 

Karen Chandler, Artist

Collage

Being an artist certainly has it’s ups and downs especially in the market world. I read that an artist today will spend 30 percent of their time creating and 70 percent marketing. That puts greater hardships on artist who are trying to stay focused in the realm of creating but find that they must spend their time in the marketing world to scrape by to purchase supplies needed and maybe groceries too.  So today with all the online media of sales, websites, galleries, and marketing tricks; the phrase “Starving Artist” remains true. Artists are always going to be overworked, under-creative due to time crunches because they are working paying jobs, and then if artfully successful, someone else usually ends up making the money off their work. So why be an artist? Because it is simply who you are but perhaps not known by your day job. For me, I had to work a day job in the energy industry until I retired and only now can I afford to be a “Starving Artist”.

I like to work with various media and so many avenues of creating. Perhaps I get bored with only one type of media but for whatever reason, I am having recent art experiences in Collage. I just want to work for the enjoyment of creating art by a cleaner and more environmental friendly manner. Paper collage, with paint, and glue are the recent supplies I am using to create images watercolor paper or canvas or wood. Simple, fun and friendly to me. Here are some of these works mostly on canvas, paper and wood.

Karen Chandler

Karen works full-time as an artist.