What haven't you been using lately?

Like many of you, I have worked in a number of mediums.

Among them are oil, pastel, water color, charcoal, ink and so on.

I have made jewelry using a variety of materials such as silver, copper, polymer clay and stained glass.

I have done print making doing etchings as well as woodcuts.

I have painted huge wall murals.

Who knows what else I may have done and left out here!

But I have found myself doing a lot of my work in oil over the past few years

and so here you see my water color palette and a few of my many

brushes looking abandoned.

They were until recently when one of my students asked me to teach them

watercolor basics.

Hmmmm, now they are looking very interesting again!

So keep your creative juices flowing by not working only in one medium.

Most of the great masters did this.

I have been reading about Matisse recently and he is a remarkable example of applying

his creative self to many media, even colored paper.

Let me know what you think of this in your own experience!

Prevent Liquin from drying up

I went through a lot of bottles of Liquin

before I figured this out. They would dry

out and I would have to throw them away

without getting my money's worth.

So now I turn the larger bottle upside

down and then there is no air there

to dry out this very useful medium! The

smaller jar that you see is where I put a

small amount to work from. If you look

carefully, you will see that the glass part of

that little jar is lighter in color than the big

bottle. That is stuff that is all dried up

on the sides of the jar. I just pour about

a half inch of Liquin in that jar and with

all these clever tricks, I now get my money's

worth!

I hope you find this helpful.