Christmas came early! by Carol Nelson

OH MY GOSH! I AM BLOWN AWAY! One of the benefits of being selected for Golden's Artist Educator Program was that, after completing and passing the final exam to be "certified," Golden Artist Colors, Inc. would send me $2500 worth of their products.

The FedEx truck pulled up with two boxes of Golden products today  There are Open Acrylics, High Flow Acrylics, Flourescent High Flow Acrylics, Tube Acrylics, Fluid Acrylics, Interference Acrylics, and Iridescent Acrylics. There are jars of Fiber Paste, several kinds of Molding Paste and Gel Medium, Digital Ground, Pumice Gels, Clear Tar Gel, and many more.

Fortunately, after our week of training last month in New Orleans, I know how to use all this stuff. Golden is such a generous company, and their products, which are MADE IN THE USA, are top notch professional quality. I am so grateful for this wonderful opportunity to share these products with my workshop students.

Golden training in New Orleans

Have you ever wondered what all those jars of medium are in the Golden Paint aisle at your art store are for?  I was familiar with several of them, but there were many more I had not worked with.

I was fortunate to be part of a group of 18 artists from around the country to be chosen for Golden's Artist Educator Program (GAEP).  For a week in New Orleans, we worked making sample boards, banners, charts for almost the entire product line of Golden Artist Paints, Inc.

Our instruction was headed by a fantastic team from Golden, including Patti Brady, author of Rethinking Acrylic, with an encyclopedic knowledge of all things acrylic; and Pat Pirrone, whose job included logistics of shipping supplies, setting up hotel accommodations, picking restaurants, and taking care of the needs of all of us.

We worked with High Flow Acrylics (think ink), Open Acrylics (think slow drying), Fluid Acrylics (my favorite), Heavy Body Acrylics (think thick, luscious paste), Iridescent Paints (think metallic shine), and Interference Paints (think two tone light refractive).

There also were many specialty gel and paste mediums to try, such as crackle paste, fiber paste, molding paste, absorbent ground, course pumice gel, glass bead gel, clear tar gel, and gels of varying consistency.

We explored printing on digital grounds, monoprints, Gelli printing plates,  subtractive painting using the open paints, and painting with all the above mediums added to the paint.  We practiced color mixing and made color charts with modern pigments (think translucent, high chroma), and mineral pigments (think opaque, lower chroma).

We added fluid colors to all the iridescent paints, which I KNOW will end up in my future paintings.  My head is still spinning with possibilities for sharing these fantastic painting compounds in my workshops and incorporating them into my own work.

Here I, home in my studio with some of the training materials we made.

Now that I'm home, I can't wait to get started applying some of my newly acquired knowledge to my painting.  Stay tuned.....

Art of the Carolinas

The website for Art of the Carolinas is now live.  This fabulous event will be held November 7 - 10 in Raleigh, North Carolina.

Choose from over 100 workshops taught by top art instructors from around the country.  I am thrilled to be part of this exciting gathering of artists and art manufacturers.

Look for me in the list of instructors.

Click here to see the workshops I will be giving at this colossal art event.  Notice that both the workshops I will be presenting are sponsored by Golden Artist Colors.  All paints and mediums will be supplied by Golden.

I hope to see many of you in November, but remember, space is limited, so sign up soon!