Gloria J Zucaro's "Valentine Memories"

Hello Paint Party Friday Friends,
I admit to not getting any projects finished!  But I have been working for weeks on Cold Wax & Oil Paintings.  They take many layers and need to set up or dry before adding too many more layers in one day, so I usually have a week in between.
So today I am showing some Valentines I have done in years past.  I hope you had a wonderful Valentines Day.  Gloria

6 x 6 Oil painting over old painting.

4 x 6 greeting card zentangle

4 x 6 greeting card zentangle 2

24 x 12 canvas with Scripto marker and Oil Paint

Gloria J Zucaro's "Fifth Project with Jimmy Leslie"

Today's video was about all the different ways to use our acrylic mediums and paints.  Jimmy Leslie also suggested using supplies that are lying around the house and yard for applying our mediums or for adding 3-D elements to our collage work.  So I used the mediums I had to do to my two pieces.  I tried making skins with my acrylic paints plus Airbrush Flow Medium.  It takes practice!  How to spread the paint on a surface, how thick if you want transparency, and how to remove it in more than a zillion small pieces when it dries!  I had thought to make fairly large pieces so that I could cut it into strips to weave together, thereby changing the colors.  For example, Jimmy showed a hanging piece that had the three primaries of red, yellow, blue.  When they were woven together the yellow and blue made green, etc. But alas!  My paint was applied to thinly, and totally shredded when I tried to remove it from the palette.  I decided to glue it onto a clear plastic card cover.  I did overlap some shreds and for at night when there is not window light behind it, I added some opaque paint in drips, and dashes here and there.

  

Examples of skins using either Credit card, knife or brayer to apply to palette paper.

On the window, you can see through the lighter colors

Flat on the table to see how it will look at night on the window

For my other part of this project, I painted over an old painting with 2 coats of Black Gesso.  Then I used my Flexible Modeling Paste to Stencil some large snowflakes along the top edge.  I added a Stencil of a bird using Ceramic Stucco and a dried twig.  I used Heavy Gel Medium to cement down the twig.  Then I had to let everything dry.  Next I added some Handmade collage paper along the bottom edge.  I used SILKS paints to color the stucco on the bird and splattered with white Fluid Acrylic paint.  I wondered about adding more, or changing the bird to look more like a Cardinal, but decided I liked it as it is.

Now on to the next CJS 2017 Project!

Gloria J Zucaro's "Mission San Xavier del Bac"

I finally finished my Mission Church that my friend Judy G. and I went to visit a couple of times when we went to Tuscan for plein air painting workshops. The Mission is being cleaned and repaired so this is not the usual front view of San Xavier del Bac. We walked around the sides and back and got some gorgeous sunlight hitting the Mission. In my painting you can see some of the tarps on the left side.

 

Oil on Canvas  

11' x 14"

Here is my original block-in below.  

I left some of the warm under-painting peeking through.

Last Sunday I my daughter Lucy and I attended another collage workshop given by Karen Sako at the Mainstreet Art Center in Lake Zurich, IL.  I wasn't really "feeling it" that day for some reason, so my efforts came out with very dark and very light areas instead of a nice mix of values.  This time I did three landscapes from the same reference(believe it or not!) and one bird on a 6" square board.

This one reminds me of Disney!

Lots of layers of paper and pastel and paint and ink!  

But just too darn dark!

I like this one the best.  I like the colors and the stamping and tangling.

These next drawings are from a live model session at the Elk Grove Library with the Artist Association of Elk Grove Village.  They were 1, 2, 5, and 20 minute poses.  I notice that I got darker and darker!

Thanks for looking.  I am sharing this with Paint Party Friday, although I am two days late!  Have a good week,         

                                                                     Gloria

Gloria J Zucaro's "Intuitive Painting"

Well, I wouldn't call this a success, but at least it is a start.  I am trying to learn about intuitive painting.  I have seen beautiful work by many artists who "see shapes" and and are able to bring them out of a background in such a way, it looks mystical. 

My process was to layer some warm acrylic colors and spray them with water to get them to mix.  After that layer dried, I added some blues, greens and purples and sprayed those.  I didn't like that layer at all so immediately sprayed some red, yellow and orange ink on top to warm it up again.  When that dried I searched for the "shapes".  I came up with some very cliche shapes!  A puppy, bunny, bird, angel, butterfly and what I call a "Hippo Bird"   He is probably the most interesting!  I traced them in with a pencil, then painted and decorated them.  I added "Try Something New" in glitter alphabet letters, and "Be Brave"

 in black pencil.  I added a little white pen around a few things.  It was an "experience"!  Oh well, maybe next time!

The final painting in all it's glory below!!

I am linking to Community Thrive and Paint Party Friday.

Gloria J Zucaro's "ATC's Theme Glasses"

I had a lot of fun with this month's theme.  I used catalogs, old story books and magazine ads for the basic background pictures.  Then I added gesso, paint, glitter, line drawings, and of course the glasses!   Here are a few of the 21 cards I made.  There were fewer than usual artists present, so I only traded 5.  That means more for you to trade with me if you would like! :>)

Gloria J Zucaro's "The Tree,The House & Me"

Another busy and productive week to share with my friends at Paint Party Friday.  Today I finished my entry for the Trees Exhibit sponsored by the Artists Association of Elk Grove and the Elk Grove Village Library.  The exhibit runs from March 9, 2013 until April 27, 2013.  There will be an opening reception to meet the artists and enjoy an evening of art and fine food.  I will let you know the reception date as soon as it is announced.  My original oil painting is on a 30"H by 15"W stretched canvas.  I have titled it "The Tree, The House  & Me".

Next I am happy to show off the newly released book by Lynn Cohen.  Lynn spent a year at her favorite lunch spot drawing the people she saw there enjoying lunch with their friends, and relaxing at Tacos Jalisco run by the Ubillus family .  The Ubillus' have become quite the celebrities!  Congratulations, Lynn, on your first publication.  I am really enjoying looking at all your art work and reading the captions.

The Front Cover

In the Middle

Next is my first day of 10 minutes( per day) work on my journal for "30 Days in your journal".  I am enjoying seeing all the possibilities that Julie Fei-Fan Balzer has to offer.  I just started last night, so will do my next 10 minute project later tonight.  I started by using a journal page covered with paint from my Gelli Plate and stencils made by Jessica Sporn.  I added the date and time, and picked my title for this page, and did a little journaling off in one corner.

The next two pictures are of two Artists Trading Cards I made while at our January meeting last Saturday.  The Theme was fabric.  I had made a dozen fabric cards beforehand, but we always do some while at the meeting.  I didn't get a very good picture of the first one, which was fabric and lettering applied with fusible web.  Then I highlighted with Gel pens and sewed on a sequin and bead.

I had time left over so made this ATC tangled for a general trade.  My new friend, Cathy, an experienced ATC card maker traded with me for one of her lovely cards.

I also joined a group of artists who will be creating for Jessica Brogans "Inspirational Card Deck Swap: February 2013" which you can read about and possible join by going here.

Have a creative week, and be sure to stop by Paint Party Friday to see what everyone has been doing this week.

Gloria J Zucaro's "In A Nest Of Leaves"

8"H x 8"W Original Oil on Raymar Canvas Panel

$55.00 Framed in Floater 
To Purchase- PayPal Through Daily Paintworks

This is my little bird figurine from my sister-in-law.  He is sweetly seated in a little pile of leaves. I again use orange and aqua as my choices for a crisp Fall day.  

Gloria J Zucaro's "A Bird on the Bod is Worth?!"

7"H x 5"W Pastel on board

$65.00 unframed/$10.00 S&H

Framing Options tab at top of blog page

The inspiration for this painting is from a photograph of a statue in Florence, Italy taken by Lee A Brown and offered for the April challenge on his website called "A Day Not Wasted".  I am hoping that even though I just posted, that this got in just under the wire! My artist friend Judy and her husband just got back from Arizona.  Judy is a pastel and watercolor artist. So when she is in town I try to do at least one pastel painting a week. We will be joining Bonnie Paruch for a "Flowers and Gardens of Door County" workshop in August at The Clearing Folk School. It is a great week of all day painting, and eating fabulous home cooked meals with 18 painters,18 woodworkers, and 18 poets!  We have a party on Friday night to show and tell all our works accomplished for that week.  

Gloria J Zucaro's "Chocolate Birdsong"

8"H x 8"W Original Oil Painting on heavy textured under painting.

To see more detail click on photo to enlarge.

$50.00 unframed Email Me or go to Ebay.

The Daily Paintworks challenge for this week is to paint your sweet Valentine treats before you eat them!  Of course this meant that I had to go buy some fancy chocolates to paint, and while I was there at this really neat store that features all the seasonal holidays with food and home decorations, I had to buy this cute little bird and the pink plate, too!  Yippee!  Now I can eat them..or maybe I should wait until tomorrow?! (2/14)

Gloria J Zucaro's "Journal Page 5, All of Them Make me Laugh!"

The latest ideas flowing in from "Fall Fearless and Fly" are about people who you admire, colors you love and people or things that make you laugh.  I copied the prompts below from Artists in Blogland site.  Hosted by the team of Jessica Sporn & Carolyn Dube

Headline Prompt:  Lifelong Fan:  What or who have you consistently valued or looked up to in your life?  What lessons have you learned from people you admire?

Color Prompt:  Your favorite color now or from childhood or both!

Quote Prompt: "Among those whom I like or admire, I can find no common denominator; but among those whom I love, I can:  all of them make me laugh."  W.H.Auden

This weeks guest host is Marcia Beckett who did a wonderful journal page to share with us.

Well, it is hard to look up to  young children and small animals when they are smaller than you are!  But they are the ones I love the best.  They are pure, and in awe of all the wonderful things in the world, they are closer to their "real" selves, not "tamed' yet.  They show all their emotions easily, and love fully.  All of them make me laugh or bring a smile to my face.  I love all the birds, squirrels, rabbits, and chipmunks and smile when  I see them cavorting outside my windows.

This is the full page view.  I used Silks Acrylic Glaze paints, patterned tissue paper, Elmer's Glue, Twinkling H20's, glitter glue, cutouts from catalogues, a bird stamp, white gel marker, black Sakura ink pen.  Below I show the dimensional views with sparkly glitter from the right and left sides.

 

 From the right

From the left

Gloria J Zucaro's "Worry Bird"

3.5" Square Original Design In Watercolor and Ink

SOLD

The Daily Paintworks Challenge this week was offered by Jo Mackenzie with the prompt of "emotion".  I can definitely relate to the fact that however old your children are, you never cease to worry about them, right from the time of their cracking out of their shells and coming into this world!

Gloria J Zucaro's "Thirsty Bird"

16"H x 8"W Oil on Canvas panel.

$135.00 Framed

S&H to Your ZIP

To Purchase, email me at gloria@gloriajzucaro.com

 This faucet with it's beautiful rust and corrosion was from a photograph that I chose from Frankie's Johnson's selections at the workshop at The Clearing.  We picked either the faucet or an old barn door to paint for studying texture, and then added our own items to complete the scene.  The little bird that I placed under the faucet is a gift from my sister-in-law whose beautiful package I painted in "The Present" challenge on the Daily Paintworks site.