WAX + BRICOLAGE WORKSHOP II

In many ways the encaustic conference seems very long ago, while in others, it feels like just yesterday. But the fact is that it was nearly a month ago and I've been negligent in posting images from the two post-conference workshops I taught on Wax + Bricolage.

A work by Lenore Tenenblatt

On Thursday, June 7th, we had a full house with ten participants in the workshop at Castle Hill Center for the Arts in Truro, Mass. Everyone got a mystery box with five or six types of items such as spring clips, a necklace, thumbtacks, a plastic scrubby and pearlescent shell pieces. There was also a 9" x 12" cradled panel in the box. The rules were that for the first panel, no additional objects could be added, but materials such as string, wire, oil paint, thread, and so on could also be used. Not all objects from the mystery box had to be used. For encaustic, we had seven colors: Cadmium Red Deep, Alizarin Orange, Cadmium Green Pale, Green Gold, Cobalt Blue, Titanium White, Ivory Black. (By the way, I should say that paint and medium were generously donated to the workshop by R&F Paints, Evans Encaustics and Enkaustikos so that the materials fee could be reduced.)


Here are photos of students with the works they made. Note that for their second panel, an 8" x 8" square, everyone had access to the giant bin of Stuff that I brought or they could use materials that they brought.
Note: click to enlarge the photos so you can get a better look at the works.

Amy Hannum

Connie Bigony

Helen Dannelly

Kathy Cosgrove

Kay Hartung

Lenore Tenenblatt

Lera Cavanaugh

Lisa Zukowski

Maria Lara-Whelpley

Missing from this line up is Gayle Abernathy who participated in both this class and the one on Friday, so her photo is included in the next post.

I thought the work in this class was really great. We had a group critique after the first panels were finished  just before lunch and went back to work recharged. In most cases, the second panel that people made really benefited from studying what had occurred in the first one. It was also surprising that most people found themselves using the same color palette again that they had chosen for the first panel.

As you look at the works below, please note that the object of the workshop was to make works of art rather than a bunch of stuff on a panel. These works are all carefully considered, made with restraint and imagination and have used the found objects to enhance the works rather than dominate them.

Here are some completed works from the class.

Kathy Cosgrove's work 1 - excellent use of materials! That red webby
stuff is the scrubby that she cut apart and the black horizontal lines are pieces
of cord that she cut from the necklace. The spring clips are assembled
in a line that ends in wiry coils.

Kathy Cosgrove work 2 - great color in this one as well as shapes

Helen Dannelly's work 1 - that thin black thread connecting the one red
thumbtack really brings the work alive.

Lera Cavanaugh's work 2 - this was not really bricolage, but a great use of
Barbie artifacts nonetheless.

Connie Bigony's work 2 (I also thought her first piece was quite successful but I
took a blurry photo - sorry!)

Kay Hartung's work 2 - Kay combined maps with dimensional materials but
still retained the feeling of terrain. The heavier black line on top broke through the
dimensional plane and brought a very different feeling to the work.

Lisa Zukowski work 1 (very hard to photo both black and white)

Lisa Zukowski work 2 - Lisa said she was not normally a minimalist, but these
strong works showed that perhaps she should pursue this  approach

Maria Lara-Whelpley's work 2 - I tried to shoot this to show the dimension that Maria got
into this work. The darker soldiers at bottom stood out 3" or so from the panel.

Lenore Tenenblatt's work 2 again - I really loved this piece because I've been dying for
someone to use the little stuffed animals and fuzzy balls I had in my bin.  Lenore's use
of green felt under it all changed the shape of the panel into a quirky setting for  all
that fuzzy stuff on top.

I apologize for leaving out images of work by Amy Hannum and for my too-few-pixels iPhone photos. Thanks to everyone for a great class!