Lil' Dragon finished on 6/18/2014!

Lil' Dragon is officially completed as of June 18th, 2014!  I am pleased with how the little fella turned out and hope you like him too.   The finished, trimmed size is 8.278" x 10.803" ...

I'm thinking that I would like to try my hand at another Lil' Dragon ... ;)

$0.99 NibbleFest Time!

NibbleFest is a time honored tradition where artists compete once a month with a maximum of 3 entries in a themed competition, each entry starts with a beginning bid of only $0.99!  There is quite a variety of pieces and wonderful artists.  Many are larger sized pieces of art, and many are smaller; but all begin at just $0.99.  The auctions are staggered with some going for 7 days, some for 5 days and some for as little as 3 days; all auctions are to end on the 27th of the month.  What is nice about this is that every 2 days you get to see new entries.

The theme for November 2013 is "Giraffe" and I have created three little "Baby Giraffe" ACEOs that have recently been listed.

"Baby Giraffe 1"

"Baby Giraffe 2"

"Baby Giraffe 3"

These originals are listed on eBay and are currently up for bid, you are certainly welcome to join in on the bidding!  If you would like to take a gander at all the entries (highly recommended) here is a link that will take you there:  NIBBLEFEST NOVEMBER ART CHALLENGE!

Be prepared to enjoy some terrific pieces of art!

Take care and be happy!

Karen Anne

Finally - A New Post - About Time!

Oh my, I have certainly been neglecting my blog.  A big case of life interrupting my plans!  Oh well, that is what keeps life interesting, the unexpected popping up with new challenges ... some good, some not so good but challenging never the less.

As you make recall, I belong to an artists eBay group and each month they have a Theme Week Contest.  This month's theme is "Native American" and the following are my two ACEO (2.5" x 3.5") entries in the Theme Week contest from the ACEO ~ Art Cards Editions and Originals group on eBay. The contest takes place the first week of each month. To view other listings, by some very talented artists, you can use this link ACEO TW NOV

"Native Girl with Doll"

"NW Coast Girl"

The originals are currently up for bid on eBay and Authorized Open Editions are available on Etsy.

Right now I am in the midst of moving my studio from the dining room to our upstairs area.  My supplies are piling up higher and higher in the dining room and I am in need of more space!  The only problem is, we have been using the upstairs as a "Catch All" these past several years and it is quite packed.  Yesterday I unburied my drafting table and light table.  Today I am geared up to tackle the main room ... ugh!

Take care, be happy ...

Karen Anne Brady

White Wolves - The Colored Pencil Magazine August 2013 Photo Art Challenge

This has been executed on 5.5" x 7.5" Strathmore Toned Gray Paper using primarily colored pencils.  I did use art pens in a few places for delicate details.  I used a white gel pen to outline the wolves when I initially transferred the drawing to good paper.  I should have used a white pencil; the pen left ink marks that interfered with the colored pencil.  I used an Xacto knife to remove most of the ink, but some remained.  I won't be doing that again!

I almost didn't complete this month's challenge because animals are a true challenge to me; but with some gentle nudging and prodding by my eBay Artists Group I was finally coaxed into joining in.  I am glad I did because this piece came out much better than I expected.  Guess I have been listening when people give advise on how to do animal fur ... this time I went for illusion rather than trying to capture every single strand of fur.

Thank you, my friends, for sharing your techniques ... people do listen!

"White Wolves" by Karen Anne Brady

Photo by John Knight

CPM "Lilac Roller" Challenge Entry .....

I have done a bunch of new pieces in the past few weeks but really haven't had much time to sit down and post them in my blog.  So I thought I would take out a few minutes today to share my latest piece with you.

This is my second Colored Pencil Magazine July 2013 Challenge Entry "Lilac Roller".

I went large for this entry ... 4 inches x 6 inches (hey, that's large in comparison to ACEO size of 2.5" x 3.5"! - LOL!).

Anyway, I used my new Aquarelle watercolor pencils for the primary layer followed by Verithin pencils, SoHo pencils, Faber-Castel pencils, a dash of white Gelly Roll pen, and a smidgeon of Prismacolor fine line markers ... all mixed together on a bed of Stonehenge Paper. Hmmmm, kinda sounds like a recipe doesn't it? LOL!

I must say, I am really beginning to like laying down a watercolor (pencil) under coat and then proceeding with the dry pencils. It is a very useful technic for people who are less patient with the cp layering process.

My rendition of the "Lilac Roller"

and the challenge photo

Happy Day everyone!

Karen Anne

PS I didn't like the sky in the entry I posted yesterday for the July 2013 Challenge, so today I worked on it and I am now much happier with the piece ...

Four more "Winter Berry Maidens"

I have just finished four more of my zentangle inspired goddess/fairy type ACEOs.  I seem to be calling them my "Winter Berry Maidens" simply because I have winter berries in each of these recent ACEOs.

Winter berry shrubs have green foliage and berries; in the winter the green leafs drop off the bush leaving only the beautiful red berries on the twigs.  I like adding them to these latest pieces because they seem to add a bit of a magical element.

Here they are in the order they were created:

"Cleopatra"

"Hummingbird Protectress"

"Rainbow Guardian"

"She Who Loves Yellow Flowers"

I have been having fun creating this little maidens and I hope you are enjoying my efforts.

Take care and happy day!

Karen Anne aka IrelandBrady

Strathmore Artist Papers - New Product - Featured Artist ....

I have been keeping a "secret" since early May of this year.  I've just been bursting to share it, but I promised I wouldn't say a word to anyone (except Jim) until it was made public.  Well ... yesterday I saw it advertised at Amazon.com so I figure that is about as public as something can get!

Let's go back to 5/7/2013 when I received an email with the subject line "Zentangle Art for Strathmore".  Well naturally that piqued my curiosity, what artist hasn't heard of or worked on Strathmore paper?!  I opened the email and here is the first part of that message:

"Dear Karen,

My name is S___ S______ and I am with Strathmore Artist Papers (www.strathmoreartist.com).

We are in the process of developing a new product line called “Artist Tiles”, to be used for meditative art, patterning, and “Zentangle” style artwork. As I was doing research, I came some of your artwork and Zentangles. We really love your style and wanted to get in touch with you to see if you’d be interested in having your artwork featured on the packaging of our new product. One of the products we are creating for this line is 4”x4” Artist Tiles in retail packs. The paper used for these tiles would be our 400 Series Watercolor. We thought your style could be a great fit for this product specifically." 

I'll tell you, I was so stunned I nearly fell off my chair ... you could have knocked me over with a hummingbird feather ... Strathmore, contacting me?  Surely this has to be a joke some one is playing on me ... this can't be real, can it?  Well, it sure looked pretty real to me so I thought "OK ... I'll bite ..." and I responded.  They responded back! And with a contract no less!  We came to an agreement, they sent the product for me to work on, I created a piece of Zentangle watercolor artwork, sent it off to Strathmore and sat back a waited.

In the meantime I still kept thinking ... this is the best dream I have EVER had!  The original piece of art was returned and I had been compensated for my time but still it did not seem real, that is until yesterday when I was once again contacted by S.S. at Strathmore.   Then I googled "Strathmore Artist Tiles" and lo and behold .... there it was!  A Strathmore product with my art work on it!

It's NOT a dream, it is real!  Now I can share what I have been keeping a secret for what seems like forever ... the new Strathmore product with the artwork of your's truly on the front!  Ta-da!

And here is the original art piece ....

This day is certainly filled with a LOT of sunshine and Thank You very much Strathmore!

Happy day all!

Big hugs,
Karen Anne aka Ireland Brady