Saturday, October 7, 2023

Post 411: What are the PWAS Members Working On?

What are the PWAS Members Working On?

The Prince William Art Society (PWAS) is a group of artists and art lovers located in Prince William County, Woodbridge, Virginia. The group has been meeting and creating art for over 50 years. We have a lot of artists that like to show and share what they do, sometimes what they think about various aspects of art.

Leora LaGraffe

I’ve picked up some water mixable oils (I’m sensitive to solvent fumes) and am trying to learn how to paint with oils so I’m really bad right now but hope to get better with time and practice. I worked primarily in soft pastels but felt the need to try to learn oils.



Otis Stanley

 Acrylic 16x20 Guba, Gullah - word for peanut

Zee Berrios

I started this last month, title: Grateful Company, medium: Acrylic on canvas. size: 48" X 48" (based on a photo by Irving Penn (1967)

Donna Liguria

I’ve started a series of Mini Paintings 3x4 in acrylic of 7 different lighthouses in North Carolina (still in progress) and another of a looking up a tree in the fall (8x8 Acrylic).



 


Author: Donna Liguria
An artist member of PWAS in Woodbridge, VA and Artistry Spin Blog Admin, specializing in acrylic painting. She paints landscapes, seascapes, animals and many subjects. Visit her Website at DonnaLiguriaArt.com, her Donna's Esty site and her Blog at Donna’s Cave Paintings.


Local Art: The Prince William Art Society is a 50+-year-old non-profit art group in PWC for the appreciation of fine art throughout the county and Northern Virginia. Visit us at any of our local art shows and our monthly meetings - held on the 4th Monday of the month at the Tall Oaks Community Center 12298 Cotton Mill Drive, Woodbridge, VA at 7:30pm.

Want to join PWAS? Go to https://www.princewilliamartsociety.com/membership

Have an idea for a blog post? Are you a writer and want to help with the blog? Let me know! Thank you for visiting, and remember to Share, Follow, and Comment!

Tuesday, October 3, 2023

Post 410: Donna's Cave Paintings Blog - by Donna Liguria Art: Post 327: Art Reception at Art at the Mill

 
Art at the Mill is the most outstanding of all the art shows that I have been a part of thus far in my a...
 
 





Author: Donna Liguria
An artist member of PWAS in Woodbridge, VA and Artistry Spin Blog Admin, specializing in acrylic painting. She paints landscapes, seascapes, animals and many subjects. Visit her Website at DonnaLiguriaArt.com, Donna's Etsy site and her Blog at Donna’s Cave Paintings.


Local Art: The Prince William Art Society is a 50+-year-old non-profit art group in PWC for the appreciation of fine art throughout the county and Northern Virginia. Visit us at any of our local art shows and our monthly meetings which are held on the 4th Monday of the month at the Tall Oaks Community Center at 12298 Cotton Mill Drive, Woodbridge, VA at 7:30pm.

Want to join PWAS? Go to https://www.princewilliamartsociety.com/membership

Have an idea for a blog post? Are you a writer and want to help with the blog? Let me know! Thank you for visiting, and remember to Share, Follow, and Comment! 


Post 409: Great Find Video - Artwork Labels

Great Find Video - Artwork Labels

Artwork Labels are an important part of the artist's repertoire of "need to know" in art display. There are labels on the back of the artwork and labels for the front (or viewer) that need to be created - although depending on where you are displaying, the show or gallery may need to create the front label for you.

Photo by Ricardo Viana on Unsplash 

Labeling Your Art

Absolutely, your art label is very important on your artwork. And I can think of a couple of great reasons for having it on your work!

  1. It is nearly always required.
  2. It helps the gallery or art show KNOW which artwork belongs to who. If you are accepted into an art show along with a lot of other artists, a clearly written out label on the back ensures the show hangers know which pieces are which between all the entries, especially when they need to hang their FRONT label to the individual pieces.
  3. It helps verify that the title and price of the piece is the correct price for that particular piece. I have heard a story where a person switched labels for a less expensive piece with the more expensive one.
  4. Depending on how you sign your art, that label is also important, especially if you use only initials, a symbol, or other method. Typically a check when artwork sells is made out to the real name of the artist, potentially making the show inventory and proper labeling more important.

Signature - the importance of signing your artwork on the front and the back clearly identifying you is equally important.

 
 
Art Exhibit Labels - 4 styles for 4 situations with Joel Anderson Art

For More information:

Examples of Artwork Labels

Pointers on Wall Labels for Your Art Exhibition

Also, if you haven't checked it awhile, see the Display Page for how the Prince William Art Society requires artwork to be ready for displaying at our shows and events.


Author: Donna Liguria
An artist member of PWAS in Woodbridge, VA and Artistry Spin Blog Admin, specializing in acrylic painting. She paints landscapes, seascapes, animals and many subjects. Visit her Website at DonnaLiguriaArt.com, Donna's Etsy site and her Blog at Donna’s Cave Paintings.


Local Art: The Prince William Art Society is a 50+-year-old non-profit art group in PWC for the appreciation of fine art throughout the county and Northern Virginia. Visit us at any of our local art shows and our monthly meetings which are held on the 4th Monday of the month at the Tall Oaks Community Center at 12298 Cotton Mill Drive, Woodbridge, VA at 7:30pm.

Want to join PWAS? Go to https://www.princewilliamartsociety.com/membership

Have an idea for a blog post? Are you a writer and want to help with the blog? Let me know! Thank you for visiting, and remember to Share, Follow, and Comment!

Saturday, September 30, 2023

Post 408: Art Show in Lake Ridge Sat Oct 7 10-5

Art Show in Lake Ridge Sat Oct 7 10-5

Come by the Tall Oaks Community Center on Saturday, October 7, 2023 from 10 to 5 for the Prince William Art Society (PWAS) Fall Art Show. On the corner of Cotton Mill and Hedges Run off Old Bridge Road local artists gather twice a year for their annual Spring and Fall art shows. Stop by and see us! Rain or shine.

Art Show by Local Artists

We invite you to come by and enjoy the art - and maybe start some early Christmas shopping for a -one of a kind- original artwork. Various sizes of art, multiple mediums, wide range of pricing and definitely a wide variety of styles. Many of these artists have been showing at local art galleries and art shows all around the area.

Tall Oaks Community Center 12298 Cotton Mill Drive, Woodbridge, VA 

Here are some images from some past Tall Oaks Shows:




 
Mark your calendars and stop in and see us! Art prints will be available as well!


Author: Donna Liguria
An artist member of PWAS in Woodbridge, VA and Artistry Spin Blog Admin, specializing in acrylic painting. She paints landscapes, seascapes, animals and many subjects. Visit her Website at DonnaLiguriaArt.com, her Donna's Esty site and her Blog at Donna’s Cave Paintings.


Local Art: The Prince William Art Society is a 50+-year-old non-profit art group in PWC for the appreciation of fine art throughout the county and Northern Virginia. Visit us at any of our local art shows and our monthly meetings - held on the 4th Monday of the month at the Tall Oaks Community Center 12298 Cotton Mill Drive, Woodbridge, VA at 7:30pm.

Want to join PWAS? Go to https://www.princewilliamartsociety.com/membership

Have an idea for a blog post? Are you a writer and want to help with the blog? Let me know! Thank you for visiting, and remember to Share, Follow, and Comment!

Thursday, September 28, 2023

Post 407: Recap of PWAS Meeting with Pierre Georges

Recap of PWAS Meeting with Pierre Georges

On the fourth Monday of the month, each month, the Prince William Art Society meets at the Tall Oaks Community Center on the corner of Cotton and Hedge Run in Lake Ridge. The meeting this past Monday started with PWAS member Pierre Georges showing and describing his art process - from detailed sketches to final, colorful canvas.

Guest Artist Pierre Georges

See a previous post about Pierre's background https://artistryspin.blogspot.com/2023/09/post-404-pwas-meeting-featuring-pierre.html

And see the pictures below to get an eyeful of this talented artist's work.








Pierre showing his "go-to supplies" and his tips on the process he uses to begin a painting.  Amazingly, he mostly uses only a few basic tools and he loves working on a large scale. He even cuts his paint brushes with scissors to get it to do what he wants the brush to do.







Pierre describing that he posts on the back of his artworks where it was painted.




 After Pierre's wonderful presentation, PWAS had a short snack break and then went over the business side of the meeting.


Author: Donna Liguria
An artist member of PWAS in Woodbridge, VA and Artistry Spin Blog Admin, specializing in acrylic painting. She paints landscapes, seascapes, animals and many subjects. Visit her Website at DonnaLiguriaArt.com, her Donna's Esty site and her Blog at Donna’s Cave Paintings.

Photography/Video Credits: 
Otis Stanley, Ana Quispe and Donna Liguria

Local Art: The Prince William Art Society is a 50+-year-old non-profit art group in PWC for the appreciation of fine art throughout the county and Northern Virginia. Visit us at any of our local art shows and our monthly meetings - held on the 4th Monday of the month at the Tall Oaks Community Center 12298 Cotton Mill Drive, Woodbridge, VA at 7:30pm.

Want to join PWAS? Go to https://www.princewilliamartsociety.com/membership

Have an idea for a blog post? Are you a writer and want to help with the blog? Let me know! Thank you for visiting, and remember to Share, Follow, and Comment!

Saturday, September 23, 2023

Post 406: Art Tips 15 - Computers

Art Tips, Tricks, and More...15

You never know when you might hear an art tip about something that is just the suggestion that will solve an issue for you or help you and your work in some way. This is an ongoing series of tips and I would LOVE to have your suggestions as well!
Photo by sydney Rae on Unsplash

Art Tips, Advice, Suggestions for the NON Computer Savvy

For this art tip session, let's look at some of the basic skills and uses that an artist must have some knowledge of when it comes to the dastardly internet and any machine that's connect to it. 

Although many artists do fine without the computer, perhaps those of a certain age, or because of some job positions a person held, these folks may not have been born with a laptop handed to them. Nonetheless, there are skills, knowledge and truly "must haves" that will help in your artistic goals if you take the time to learn them. Occasionally you even realize how you ever functioned without them.

1. Email. How we stay connected to anyone on the planet that might like your art. I'd dare to say, if nothing else, an artist must have an email account. Yet, I hear it all the time, the complaint of so many emails. But then again, if your art group is sending you emails about important things, reminders or questions -that could also be time sensitive- most would want to know BEFORE the due date, wouldn't you? 
    a. Microsoft Outlook Email - Organize your email to separate personal, art group, art info, etc. into folders and view when you have time, if at all. Up to you.
    b. Manage Inquiries about your art
    c. Send Newsletters to your email list
    d. Network with other artists, art groups
    e. Submitting for a Call to Art or other art shows, exhibits.
    f. Email EtiquetteAVOID Reply ALL emails, unless it is of the utmost importance to EVERYONE getting the email. A simple response in an email of "Thanks" or "Congratulations" is not imperative to the entire 'Reply All' email list. Direct conversations in emails to those who it directly relates to.
    g. Email Spam - if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. There are art scammers out there. The the email sounds weird, don't take ANY steps until you are absolutely certain to whom you are dealing with and make sure payments clear BEFORE your artwork is sent or before any work is put into the inquiry. 
2. Social Media. Manage the Social Media site(s) you are on - especially as you promote who you are, what you do, where you are doing what you do, how you do it, when you are doing it, AND where they can BUY it.
    a. Keywords - if your post is about you and your art, be sure and get the keywords "YOUR NAME" and "ART" in the post at a minimum. The internet is about finding things and you use certain words to find those things. So if someone was looking for you or something related to what you do, USE the right words.
    b. Hashtags - are like keywords except that you put # in front of the phrase and run the words together. #art #acrylicpainting #oilpainting #princewilliamartsociety
    c. Emoticons - no smiley faces for the artist! Use these: 🖼🖌🎨📷 or if you are showing a beach painting you did, add any of the beachy themed emoticons. People click on those too.
    d. Join Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, X (Twitter), YouTube - start with one or two and learn your way around. Just remember, if you are using it as your art business entity, treat it as such.
    e. Different platforms have similar features like Following, Commenting, Liking and Sharing - which DOES mean caring. If you've heard of internet "influencers" these guys are the ones with TONS of 1. Followers, 2. Commentors, 3. Likes, and... 4. Shared content. Hence the importance of helping out your art group, favorite artist friends, etc with taking part in being social. The more of each of these 4 you have, the more it is seen - that's a basic rule here. Click Baby, click.
    g. 5:3:2 Engagement Rule/Brand Building: for every 10 posts on your social media...
  • Curation: 5 content posts from OTHER sources relevant to your audience.
  • Creation: 3 content posts from what YOU created relevant to your audience.
  • Humanization: 2 out of the is the fun content that humanizes our brand. (If you paint cats, NOW is the time for the funny cat videos).
3. Blog. Manage Your Blog that you share your latest creations on, your art events, thoughts, images, progress, etc. Some of this stuff would not necessarily be ON your website, but it should be linked to your website.
    a. Blogger - Artistry Spin uses this platform, free from Google's Blogger
    b. WordPress
    c. How to Start a Blog in 2023 (Not affiliated with this, for info purposes only)
4. Artist Website. Build, manage and/or update your own website. If you are serious about your art, your own website is pretty much necessary. There are some free and low cost options, but as in all things, you get what you pay for.
    a. The internet revolves around fresh content. Stale websites must be updated so get something on your calendar to do periodically.
5. Calendar. Manage your event calendar and to do lists. Even better, sync your devices so you stay up to the minute. From your PC or laptop, to your tablet and smart (butt) phone - sync up the important stuff. There is only one you and I'm sure you want to know when you volunteer or have an event to be at and surely they aren't scheduled at the same time.
    a. Schedule commissions and/or projects
    b. Art shows, events, appearances
6. Design Your Own Marketing Materials, Advertisements, Press Releases 
    a. Many artists plan out their next artwork design.
7. Software and Apps. Use art helpful software like PhotoShop, digital art programs
    a. Photo editing and resizing photographs - some knowledge in photo editing basic skills are quite necessary. Think about those Call for Art requirements.
8. Finances. Manage all of your art business Finances
    a. Point of Sale for your personal sales at your art shows: reports, inventory
    b. Invoicing your Clients
    c. Make deposits, banking management.
    d. Pay your light bill so you can see to paint.
9. Your Art Inventory. Manage your Artist Inventory for everything you have created. Excel is great for this, but there are online apps for it too.
    a. Keep track of what you submitted where and when.
    b. Track any awards, recognition and reviews of note. 
    c. Know what's sold, when it was created, where your art is now.
    e. Save your best inventory images and SAVE TIME! Save your artwork as LASTNAME_FirstInitial- Title of Your Artwork and Save those in a "JURY" file that is ready to go out when you submit your art to art shows. When the art show/gallery is getting the emails in from multiple artists, the image labeled properly positively identifies which file is which, which of your artworks submitted is titled which.
10. Research what I can't get to in person
    a. Add to Favorites, Bookmarks
11. Learning new skills
    a. Yeah, the YouTube rabbit hole. You just wanted a refresher on that one skill and 5 hours later... Managing your computer time to be productive is important too.
12. Shopping for art supplies
    a. Oh no, I'm out of XYZ! Amazon will deliver it tomorrow!!
13. Security. Learn to take regular backups of your computer critical info especially the art info you need to have. In case of total computer failure, you have to have your reference photos, your painting images, art business info stored in more than one location. Play smart. 
    a. Or use external storage.
14. Good old Copy and Paste saves so much time when online.
15. Calls for Art - when you receive a call for art and that call asks for certain things, follow those instructions to the letter, including image formatting. The person receiving the submissions may be asking for pieces of information so that he or she can copy and paste the data received so that formatting is the same for everyone, in the same order.
    a. Every Call for Art is different, making the submission process directions VERY IMPORTANT!
16. Reading this Blog, Commenting, Following and Sharing Artistry Spin - put what you just learned to good use!

If you are not doing at least some of these computer skills on your own, artists will be paying someone to do it for them. It is not overwhelming. Just take things a step at a time and DO rely on our trusty friends, Google, Bing, or your favorite browser to look up what you do not know.

Again, I know not all artists were born with a smartphone attached to their ears. If you have suggestions to add to this list to help out the art group and your community of art friends, please share them.

Art Tips is a series of blog posts with around 12 tips per post. See the rest of the Art Tips Series on this page for more tidbits of advice: https://artistryspin.blogspot.com/p/art.html

Send me YOUR art tips too or drop them in the comments below. AND let me know if you find an art tip here that you LOVE!


Author: Donna Liguria
An artist member of PWAS in Woodbridge, VA and Artistry Spin Blog Admin, specializing in acrylic painting. She paints landscapes, seascapes, animals and many subjects. Visit her Website at DonnaLiguriaArt.com, Donna's Etsy and her Blog at Donna’s Cave Paintings.


Local Art: The Prince William Art Society is a 50+-year-old non-profit art group in PWC for the appreciation of fine art throughout the county and Northern Virginia. Visit us at any of our local art shows and our monthly meetings - held on the 4th Monday of the month at the Tall Oaks Community Center 12298 Cotton Mill Drive, Woodbridge, VA at 7:30pm.

Want to join PWAS? Go to https://www.princewilliamartsociety.com/membership

Have an idea for a blog post? Are you a writer and want to help with the blog? Let me know! Thank you for visiting, and remember to Share, Follow, and Comment!

Wednesday, September 20, 2023

Post 405: Great Find Video - Body of Work

Great Find Video - Body of Work

If someone were to ask you, what is your body of work, how would you answer them? What does the term "body of work" really mean as an artist? Let's take a more in depth view as we grow and develop as artists.

The Exploration of an Idea

Being a member of the Prince William Art Society and then being a part of a local gallery, as well as other area art shows and spaces, I've started seeing and understanding the term "Body of Work" as I watch the different artists on display featuring their art.

We should define the term:

A body of work for an artist can be defined as multiple art pieces that are cohesive in nature.

I believe many artists see it as their entire life's artwork, but in truth, I can see it as being more meaningful than that.

I'm seeing it more as a series of works with a shared theme - in whatever way the artist chooses to run with it.

It could be in the palette - color choices, the size, the subject or more. Or any combination desired.

5 Benefits to Creating a Body of Work for Your Art by Sergio Gomez

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsQWrZOnUJ4 

Collection, a series of work that connect in some fashion. The theme, the idea - the unity - something that brings them all together.

1. Increase focus and direction

2. Develop a unique style

3. Find more opportunities to show opportunities, exhibitions

4. Increase your exploration on that idea (research)

5. Engaging deeper in a more meaningful way with your audience

Why Creating a Body of Work and Style is Important to Your Art Career by Lori Mirabelli

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5M9IQh1Nmic

  • Signature style - your artistic voice unique to you
  • Art Series - 2 to ? A body of work 5 to ? Explore a theme or an idea until they are DONE.
  • Establish your brand and evolving as an artist.

Does this get you thinking more about how you would define your own body of work? What do you think?


Author: Donna Liguria
An artist member of PWAS in Woodbridge, VA and Artistry Spin Blog Admin, specializing in acrylic painting. She paints landscapes, seascapes, animals and many subjects. Visit her Website at DonnaLiguriaArt.com, her Esty site and her Blog at Donna’s Cave Paintings.


Local Art: The Prince William Art Society is a 50+-year-old non-profit art group in PWC for the appreciation of fine art throughout the county and Northern Virginia. Visit us at any of our local art shows and our monthly meetings - held on the 4th Monday of the month at the Tall Oaks Community Center 12298 Cotton Mill Drive, Woodbridge, VA at 7:30pm.

Want to join PWAS? Go to https://www.princewilliamartsociety.com/membership

Have an idea for a blog post? Are you a writer and want to help with the blog? Let me know! Thank you for visiting, and remember to Share, Follow, and Comment!