Paint Brush Dictates Outcome of Works of Art

You can shop at a discount store and buy a dress and even find a "designer" in the clothes rack. It might have been worn once and there you are ready for the perfect evening in the ideal outfit. This is not the case when shopping for a good paint brush. Good paint brushes don't usually find themselves in discount stores. They might get willed to some other artist, but they are precious commodities. Have you been using a cheap brush hoping to find out if you can paint? A cheap brush may look like a paint brush, but it does not act like one. The cheap brush will "lie" to you. Believing it was your skill the painting turned out poorly can happen when the brush sabotages your efforts. I am not advocating you to go out and buy the most expensive brush to get the right results. On the contrary, the less expensive one might work nicely, but the care of the brush can also bring less desirable results in your painting.

In the next few series of my blog, I will give you information on what exactly is a good working brush. Hopefully, I can give you enough information to aid you in your important purchase of the tool of the painting trade. This does not apply to the house painter. I will only be advocating to the fine artist in this blog. Sorry, summer college workers.

The artist brush that I will be helping you to find is for the artist that wants to paint traditional style art. Contemporary art can be helped with this tool, but experimental art that uses other means to apply paint will not care about the brush. Maybe the artist that tried experimental art might have used a poor quality brush which "inspired" the idea to use something else! I have heard of cats painting, or even a summer slug sliding across the canvas in a multitude of slithery pigment (sorry Doug). Skilled artists that take themselves seriously, in a traditional sense, know about brushes.

New Beginnings

It is the time of year to remember a lifetime. Remember the first time you drove a car without an adult watching every move? How about the memory of sleep overs when no one actually slept? Well, remember the time when you got your first invite to "go out"? There are so many memories to linger over and sigh about days gone by so quickly. As a graduating senior those days of memories will now turn into days of making a future for yourself and not look back at what was then. Life will be too full to stop and take the time. So now, it is a good time to take the time and remember.

Plans for tomorrows may stray from what you hope, so with that, plan to be flexible and face change with a smile, because you can't do much about life anyway. Life has a funny way of just happening. Enjoy the journey wherever it may take you and always bring your sense of humor and a smile to share for everyone including yourself and you will be making the kind of memories that you can look on later in your life that you won't regret.

I am proud of all the graduates I know. It is a milestone and it was all uphill from the start. There is no better accomplishment so far in your life and I take off my hat to you! Every step forward from here is self motivated. It is a new beginning to a lifetime of memories. Once you get a vision on your future there is nothing stopping you from being successful.

For me success is not the toys you collect, but success is the people you touch in a positive way along your journey. May you be successful and remember the things that matter most!

June Cheers the Heart!

It is 5:15 am on June 1st and the frogs are taking a rest from the songs in the night. The birds are talking excitedly of the day ahead and I am meditating on my pillow about the bright day that is beginning to spring out from behind the mountain peaks. The alarm will go off in about fifteen minutes and then begins the paced frenzy to get out of the house to begin a new month of adventures. My body is charged from the splash of sunlight that has permeated every cell with renewed energy from the weekend. The day ahead brings fresh experiences ridding the cold gray days of winter behind.

Sketches of beach balls and sea shells in Prisma colored pencils and palm trees swaying in the breeze of an ocean sunset (done in the same medium) come quickly as the day brings hope of warmth and outdoor activities. The class I am helping in has about thirty middle school students. They are finishing their self portraits in colored pencils after the first sketches done in graphite pencil. It is near the end of the school year and the energy is popping and shows in the splendid works of art. The sample drawings of the beach scenes help to show the steps to building up the color.

The countdown is on until the last day of school. That day will pour me into my own portrait work in my own studio! From sun up to sun down, I will be focused on what I have been planning in my mind's eye. It is not about if I can draw my face, but what I will say with the design that tells you about me. If I can capture the feeling of my life in a picture, it will say enough.

With hopes of tomorrows and long days of sunlight, the month of June cheers the heart!