A weekend with Katie Kendrick

As I left for work one morning,

and saw these beauties.

Aren't they gorgeous?

Esmerelda the praying mantis is there for the photo op...

~~~

I left work a little early to drive out to

Valley Ridge Art Studio

Katie Kendrick taught

"Untold Tales- A Big & Tall Book".

It was indeed a Big & Tall book.

Absolutely gorgeous-

highly textured-

thick with pages

full of collage and paint.

Be still my beating heart.....

Here Katie demonstrates the steps in putting the cover together,

creating the surface by

gouging,

texturizing,

painting,

sanding,

painting,

sanding,

glazing....

Katie shows us how she paints her book pages

these are only the beginning stages....

She uses all different weights of papers

it only adds to the interest.

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I was pretty wound up when I got to the farm where I was staying. 

 I baked a sweet potato, sauteed some kale in olive oil dressed it with a little balsamic vinegar, a few walnuts and dried cranberries, a dolop of goat cheese on the potato.  Accompanied by a glass of wine--maybe 2.            

~~~~~

I thought I took scads of pictures...but it wasn't so.

This is how my cover turned out.

I'm really happy with it.

Especially with the layer of encaustic medium over the top.

It is indeed, big & tall...

....and a close-up

Love the wax.

Katie is a most generous teacher,

sharing so many very cool techniques.

I will never look at cardboard the same way.

It seems that so many artists (I was one of them)

got on this "acid free" bandwagon.

Looking around-there are a good many artists

that repurpose anything & everything.

Gluing rusty this to weathered that.

Acid free?--notsomuch

I have seen drawings done by Georgia O'Keefe

drawn on whatever support was available.

Years and years later--they still look great.

I think the aging of the material 

is part the of art.

My perception about cardboard has changed.

It's been overlooked and shunned

because of lignin and acids.

Encase it in acrylic and/or wax,

I think we've got a winner.

Cardboard is readily available

and

it's FREE!

Thank you Katie,

for opening my eyes to cardboard

a very versatile support.