Whitty Gallery 100 SQUARE Feet of Art November 3 – Dec 31 2023

 

I will be showing one of my small acrylic pieces at the

The Whitty Gallery 100 SQUARE Feet of Art 

A show for the holiday season, with all square artwork! 

 

SHOW DATES:  November 3 – Dec 31

SHOW OPENING AND RECEPTION: Friday November 3rd  5:30 - 8pm

30 Ash St. Hollis NH  

 

 

https://www.hollisartspace.com/galleryshow

Travel Watercolor Painting Kits and Supplies

I've always been a little obsessed with kits, travel, and the ultimate packing list. Combined with my love of drawing walking in the woods I've decided to put together a little snapshot of some travel paint-kits.

Over the years I have owned a few travel kits:

An oil pochade box that my mother got me one year for Christmas. Still one of my most memorable Christmas gifts. Never really got as much use out of this as I would of liked due to that I do not really paint in oils much and it is a bit too much to carry on a hike or a quick outing. I did use it for a summer plain air collage class and it was very useful for driving to a location and just walking a short distance from the car.

My second "go to" painting kit is a mini kit I put together for a super light weight, cary-on only travel trip to the Bologna book fair about 15 years ago. We were traveling by train and were carrying all we brought in a bag most of the day. It is surprising how heavy even a small bag can get after a day of hiking about the city.

 

 

This kit consisted of my old beat up Winsor and Newton 12 color travel kit , fig.1 a small container of water and a small container of gel medium. I also brought a pencil case and a cardboard tube of a few brushes.When at the book fair there was an amazing pin-board of artists business cards. For some reason I did not have a card on me at the time and this mini-kit came in handy as I drew a little painting to put my info under on the board. :)

Since thenI have acquired a handful of additional travel watercolor kits. 

 

 

TRAVEL WATERCOLOR
KITS I HAVE

 

Fig. 2. Arts to Embers 3d printed 16 color case. I still need to add paints. This case seems very useful, but I may miss the place to store a paintbrush.

Fig. 3. Micro Portable Painter  this is super cute and compact, but I have not added paints yet :( This is a great size to throw in a pencil case or pocket for easy carrying. It has a fold out section to hold water.

 

Fig. 4. Derwent metallic watercolor kit with brush. This kit contains everything needed to do a quick painting (water, brush and paints). I really like the size of this kit and the palette colors are pretty, but not very useful for painting a piece with a "normal range" of colors

I also really like this water brush. It folds down for easy storage and has a smaller brush then most standard water brushes I have come across.

I currently have my eye on a Schmincke watercolor tin with watercolor blocks. I have tested out some of the colors with a dot sheet and really like the Supergradulation colors. However this brand is a bit pricy so I may have to wait and save up for a kit.

 

TRAVEL PAINTING KITS
TO ASSEMBLE

Recently I've had less of a need for a travel kit for quick sketches in the city as my tablet has mostly taken the place of my mini kit. However, I have been spending more time hiking in the woods and hanging out while my husband fishes. This gives me a great opportunity to work un-distracted on longer-term painting projects outside while being surrounded by nature. How fantastic!

This outdoor painting has inspired me to put together some new kits that more specifically fit my needs for the way I currently paint. 

1. Mini watercolor kit for light travel (to fit in a large pocket)

2. Medium lightweight watercolor painting kit for
painting in the woods and hiking (fits in backpack)

3. Acrylic painting kit that I can carry around the house so that when I move from painting in my "office" to painting in front of the tv, or in the dining room everything is together and easy to transport. (small suitcase size)

4. Large kit for painting with oils
not far from the car

 

 

TRAVEL PAINTING
INSPIRATION

I've been looking into a number of travel kits on Etsy and blogs about Pochade boxes and vintage Plain Air kits.

This research has encouraged me to troubleshoot assembling a few travel kits of my own. In my research I came across some beautiful antique cases a great website for inspiration. I love how some of these old kits have images embossed on the water color blocks.

 

Art Sale and a Quick Update

A quick update.

This year I will be participating in the 2023 Townsend, MA art and craft festival.

Saturday, September 16^th, (9AM-4PM)  

Sunday, September 17^th, (10AM-4PM)

The Arts and Crafts Fair is located on historic Town Common in the heart of Townsend, Massachusetts, at the junction of Route 119 and 13. Food and Snacks are available and there are restroom facilities on site. 

A marketplace of quality hand-made merchandise. There will be over sixty vendors, music, raffles, great food, and plenty of fun.

 for more information please visit:

https://townsendhistoricalsociety.org/artsandcraftfair

FPAC Open Studios

Recently I've been spending most of my time doing my day/Graphic design job .... but, this fall I will be showing some new personal/illustration work at the FPAC Fall Open Studios.

FPAC’s Fall and Open Studios events feature the work of member artists, craftspeople, and designers on view in artists’ studios, in galleries, on the streets and in the water around Fort Point. Learn about our established community of makers and its unique place in Boston’s history while enjoying the diverse collection of the community’s creations: painting, sculpture, photography, jewelry, pottery, textiles, fashion, graphics and industrial design, plus music and performance.


Saturday & Sunday, October 19-20, noon – 6:00 pm

https://www.fortpointarts.org/programs/open-studios/ 

2018 Events

Happy New Year!!!!

This year I am super excited that I will be attending the 
ICON 10 Illustration Conference. I've been wanting to attend for so long but either did not have the time or the money. I would say this year I did not really have the money either, but I took the leap and will be saving my pennies for the next few months. I'm super stoked that it is going to be so close this year, the flight is only going to be a few hours from Boston!

A little less crazy-exciting, but still super cool: this year Tom Swift and I will be exhibiting at NEW ZINELAND. This is a super indie, hand-made  zine sale just off of the Central T stop in Cambridge. We will have a bunch of new very limited edition zines and ephemera for this show. I will probably not bring any originals to this show, just paper bits and bobs.

Once again we will be doing the FPAC Spring and Fall open studios. The dates and events are a bit up in the air right now, so keep an eye on their website. If you are looking for larger pieces, originals or oils this is your best opportunity to browse these paintings since I rarely bring my larger pieces to cons and sales.

Hope to see you sometime this year,
and if you can not make it to any of my shows in person you can always visit me @
https://www.etsy.com/shop/jenniferlewisart
 
Apr 22 
NEW ZINELAND
Cambridge, MA 
www.NewZineland.com

May 13 
FPAC SPRING OPEN STUDIOS
Boston, MA 
http://www.fortpointarts.org

Jul 11-14
ICON 10 Illustration Conference
Detroit, MI
http://theillustrationconference.org/

Aug 10 -12
BOSTON COMIC COM
Boston, MA
http://bostoncomiccon.com/

Oct TBA  
FPAC FALL OPEN STUDIOS
Boston, MA 
http://www.fortpointarts.org

A Quick Update

I will mostly be posting my illustration and design images on Instagram: @miorats
This blog will still be a place for my longer posts and more in-depth discussions of my current projects.

-Thank You

Onward to the Future

Freelancing and scheduling my time the end of last Summer went really well. I did forget to fit in times to exercise, but other than that, I made time to relax and I got a decent amount of work done.
Classes started again in the fall, and I thought I could maintain a semblance of my schedule, but that did not work out. I did not have any time to work on tarot cards :(

I have just finished the last class of my Graphic Design program! I will be working the next few months on my graphic design / illustration freelancing schedule and hopefully I will have a big chunk of the deck done by April.

Keep an eye out. I will be posting works in progress.

A Free-lance Life

This is the first month in a while that I have had some time to pursue my own work again and work on my tarot deck. Since I do not have many outside imposed deadlines and set work times I'm trying really hard to create a freelance schedule.  My day job is involving more freelance work, and I have cut back my hours at Starbucks. I have to make an effort to plan time for getting out of the house, exercising and setting a time to stop working and do things to inspire me.

I'm slowly working out how to plan out a day that works for me. In the past I have had a tendency to fill every waking moment I am not at my day job with art stuff, but that was ok because my day job got me out of the house, socializing and moving about.

Jessica Hische's blog has helped me out a lot in the preliminary steps of planning my freelance schedule. Meg Hunt's illustration blog has also been a great resource especially her section on Drawing Drills and the Icon 8 conference. Do any of you have suggestions on how to schedule and organize in a freelance world?

I'm making an August the 18th resolution to plan more time for; sketching, exploring, experimenting, socializing, inspiration and collaborating.

Winter Thaw

This has been one crazy year. I have been focusing a little more on my graphic design work while still keeping up with commissions,  long term assignments and school work. I have not had much time for personal work.

The beginning of August I  finished up a few long term projects. One of my scheduled creations was a  short comic for the Dark Lady anthology. This comic collection is due to be published sometime around Halloween by Hellcat Press. My submission was a short horror story revolving around the spring thaw, rot, collections of curiosities and teeth.  In my searches I came across some amazing old dental supplies, beautifully gruesome charts and diagrams.

 

Found on vintageprintable.com

 

 

My favorite discovery were the amazing dental cabinets and boxes. ( Search for antique dental cabinets )

 Then I found these tooth necklaces (above)  from BoneLust on Etsy.


I do have a bit of a fascination with teeth, I spend a lot of time at the dentist. I think I like sweets too much, wich leads to cavities and lots of dentist visits.

Enjoy the photos and keep an eye out for The Dark lady anthology.

-Jen

Boston Harbor Islands Research

I'm currently working on a fairly large painting (for me) for a show inspired by the Boston Harbor Islands. This show will be curated by the lovely Elizabeth Devlin with the Isles Arts Initiative.
  
 To inspire my paining process I have compiled a lot of  visual research and stumbled across some cool facts, charts, ephemera and data. 

The Boston harbor islands served a wide range of uses through out the years including, city landfills, fortifications, farmland and industrial operations and a home to hermits and outcasts.

With these changes in use, the environment flora and fauna also has changed. In 1635 farmers began to plant non-native plants including orchards. By the end of the 17th century most of the islands were inhabited, cultivated and mostly deforested for firewood. During the 19th century the islands were often being used for recreational purposes, and to beautify their environment an initiative began to reforest the islands. I have found some very nice resources that list a in depth analysis of the current flora of Raccoon island. Here are some scientific illustrations:

The subject of my painting was Raccoon island. Raccoon island is a small island off the coast of Quincy, Ma. At low tide it is possible to walk to it from the mainland. The island was likely used by Native Americans as a seasonal campsite. Later, in the 1600s, colonists grazed sheep on the island at this time it was called "Sun Island." In the 1880s to the 1930s the island was used for recreational camping parties.

A history left behind, I am fascinated by old abandoned buildings and things left behind that tell a story. In this painting I am using a society's left overs, foliage and a little bit of allegory to tell the story of Raccoon Island.

34 at Boston Sculptors Gallery, will be on view July 22nd through August 16th, 2015 with an artist reception on Sunday July 26th from 3-5PM, and a First Friday reception on Friday August 7th 5-8PM.

Processes and sketches

I've been doing a lot of quick work recently, between homework and short-term assignments. Working fast sometimes makes me more productive. I do feel like I have been doing a lot of very different work, but it is all very fun.

This is a sketch for an info-graphic assignment. I like info-graphics, but I had no idea how hard this would be. The trick may be to really pair down your information and say a lot with images not words.
Well class is almost over, then I have my awesome Summer projects to work on.

Vardo the Romani wagon

Recently I've been watching Peaky Blinders, it has rekindled my love for little traveling houses. As a child I remember falling hard for Mr.Toad's little yellow gypsy caravan. At one point I vaguely remember owning a toy

Sylvanian Families gypsy wagon, or I may of looked at the image in the catalog so often that I imagined I owned it. It also could of been a Fabuland caravan. These guys were the cutest!

As I got older my idea of a Caravan faded from the minimal decor of a Lego interior to the intricate patterns bright colors and textures of the gypsy wagons depicted in Carnivale. I often imagine my caravan could double as a painting studio or maybe a traveling art gallery. Below is the lovely art caravan by Marie Meier.

 

http://duodesordre.tumblr.com/

Someday I could imagine having a home with one of these lovely painted wagons in the back yard.

Circa 1902 Hearst Family Estate Gypsy Wagon

There are a few movies I watched in hopes of getting some good caravan imagery. I remember carnival having some great caravans, but most of the scenes were very dimly lit. Carnivale has this great mystical, Twin Peaks feel to it. The characters are all awesome and the imagery is beautifully rich and grungy. They travel in wonderfully restored caravans. If you search you tube you can find a video of one of the un-restored German caravans that they bought for the show. For more beautiful wagons check out http://gypsywaggons.co.uk .

 

This show also sparked my interest in Tarot cards.

Winter Wonders

A big thanks to everyone that made it out to the FPAC fall open studios.
It was great to see all the old faces (and some new ones).
It is always nice to meet other artists and catch-up.
Below are some images from open studios, if you were not able to make it.
 

This year I will be showing my work at the
RISD HOLIDAY SALE – SATURDAY, DECEMBER 13, 2014

I usually do not do any sales around the holidays. I have been using the time to catch up on illustration commissions and take a little break between work and classes. This year Nicole of Honeydew Studio asked me to split a table with her and I figured I could not pass-up the opportunity.

Hopefully I will have some more Life Science wordless card games printed out by then as well as some new business cards and prints.

Made in Fort Point Store

If you live in or are visiting Boston Mass. and have not checked out the Fort Point area, it is definetly worth a visit. The area has changed so much in the past few years. The rent hikes and the development have pushed a lot of the artists out of the neighborhood. There are a lot more restaurants and start-ups in the area now. My favorite new-ish eateries include Flour, Bees-Knees, Tavern Road and Drink.

The artists that are in the neighborhood continue to make Fort Point their own with awesome public art, open studios and the Made in Fort Point store.

The store just recently moved. It is now in a more central location, but just a little hidden. If you are in the area be sure to check it out.

The store sells an array of my prints, and stickers as well as some amazing works by other Fort Point artists. This is a great place to shop for the holidays and support your local crafts-artist.

Above are some of my Krampus Christmas cards.

Retro Future

I've been working on another neat illustration project "Life Science".
If all goes according to planned I hope to be releasing it at the FPAC spring open studios.

• This project is another series of illustrations focused on frogs and robots, but a little more retro-modern in theme. I had an awesome time researching retro-futurism.
  
  • Retro-futurism depicts the influence of the future produced in an earlier era. This aesthetic is characterized by a blend of old-fashioned "retro" styles with futuristic technology. Retro-futurism explores the themes of tension between past and future, and between the alienating and empowering effects of technology. Sort of steampunkish but in this case rather than being based in Victorian times my aesthetic was based in the retro 40's and 50's. (Diesel punk and Atomic Age) The "Atomic Age" is a descriptor typically used to name the period of history following the detonation of the first nuclear  bomb.
  •  
   Modern Mechanix
  

PaleoFuture

 focuses on Utopias and the pasts vision of the future and time capsules

http://www.paleofuture.com/blog/category/1940s 

Why frogs?
With this vision of the future I wanted to counterpoint by depicting the effects of  a consumerist robot-centric society on the environment. Most frogs require suitable habitat in both the land and water environments, they have permeable skin that can easily absorb toxic chemicals. These traits make frogs especially susceptible to environmental disturbances, because of this frogs are considered  indicators of environmental stress.

 

The Life Science wordless story game is now for sale on Etsy.

Krampus Christmas

Happy holidays everyone!

I've been working on some fairly long term projects recently.

This holiday season I will be sending out a little Snail Mail gift envelope of little stickers and such to those of you on my mailing list.

Just add your self to my (E-mail Signup) http://eepurl.com/CZ0Tr with your address before 12/14/2013.
(I will only ship to US mailing addresses)

For my holiday card I've been doing a little bit of research on Krampus.
Here is the finished card:

Krampus is a goatish devily creature from German folklore. Krampus acts as Saint Nicholas's opposite. Insted of rewarding good children with presents he punishes naughty children swatting them with switches and rusty chains before dragging them in baskets to a fiery place below.

Krampus grew to be a part of many familys' Christmas traditions.  In the late 1800's, the invention of color printing and postcards wound up making Krampus a Christmas icon.  German-speaking people around the world took to sending their friends and children postcards that featured the Krampus.  The postcards would often read;  GRUSS VOM KRAMPUS, meaning  Greetings From Krampus.  The message was intended to be a humorous reminder to be good.

Who is Krampus?

 

In these regions it also became fairly common for the young men of the town to dress up and run through the streets. Whenever the first people decided to dress up as Krampus, they would have created a monster defined by whatever easily available materials could be used for a startling effect. In some cases those materials were the horns and pelts of mountain goats, and in others, straw or hay set aside as winter fodder. Today, though some costumes may be produced by mass production, they still imitate the look established by materials regionally available in Alpine valleys.

Their traditional costumes and masks are elaborately handcrafted. Krampusses can usually be encountered on and a few days before December 6

The Truth About Krampus

Atlas Obscura

 

Krampus Run

Europe's Wild Men

National Geographic

Beard of Moss

For the children of the Alps, Krampus isn't purely a figure of terror. No, he's also a sugary treat, factoring into a whole host of traditional chocolates, cookies and breads.

http://www.gragger.at/?s=krampus

http://www.zauner.at/english/backstube

 

Decorations from Salzburg 

The Caked Crusader 

 

Croshame Krampus on Etsy

If you like Krampus, I recommend the movie "Rare Exports"

All the best winter wishes and holiday traditions!

-Jen