Painting The Woodlands and Galveston Texas

Dear Art Lover,     

      I drove to the Houston area this weekend, about 2-3 hours east of Austin, Texas, where I am hanging my hat for the next 30 days.  I timed my visit to the Italian Consulate so that I could see as many friends along the way as possible.  The first meeting happened on Saturday in The Woodlands, north of Houston.  Pinterest was having an arts and crafts event in the Marriott Hotel… what a space it was!  My friend Nancy Hines was doing an painting demo there.  In ONE hour!  She did an amazing job of it, too!  Check out her work on her site:

http://nancyhines.com/

     Then on Sunday morning, I drove to Missouri City to meet with a model who wanted to work with me.  We decided to drive to the beach in Galveston.  Hahah… I got my TacoCabana fix for lunch.  We worked under the pier since I am not a fan of direct sun and we had too few available hours to wait for the sun to lower her head.  While we were working there, a woman asked me if I had a business card.  She and her daughter had decided they wanted to picnic in the shade under the pier near us and had overheard us talking as we worked. 

     Well, the only things I had brought with me were my tools, an umbrella, and car keys.  So, I wrote my Web site address in the sand in front of her and she photographed it with her phone.  Hahaha… surreal, this world we live in.  I do hope that she looks me up because that is a lovely story about meeting a person!

    Hours later, I dropped my new model friend at his home and drove on into central Houston.  This last image is of me with Lucrecia and one of my photographs on metal.  Her sister Lili will receive this as her reward for the level of support she gave my “Casting Call:  I’m Melting!  Melting!  Into Bronze” art project on Kickstarter this past March.

     And this last image is just a fun one.  Back in Texas and the land that loves hot sauces, made with a variety of hot peppers.  Enjoy… 

Peace,

Kelly

~ Kelly Borsheim, sculptor and painter

http://BorsheimArts.com

Eric Bronze and Granite

Hello everyone!  I just wanted to thank you again for your early support and a couple of you who have even increased your pledges, as well as sharing my posts on Facebook with your friends and followers.

I have just added a new reward, Eric… and he is one of my favorites and a great model to work with. 

Eric: 10" h x 11" w x 8" d, bronze with granite base  

We still have a lot to do to meet the goal… remember with Kickstarter it is all or nothing and I really want to get these waxes cast before I lose them to the Texas heat! 

Here is where we are … every pledge helps momentum.  You know that lots of folks will bid once the goal looks achievable. . you have helped that off to a good start. 

• $3,695 pledged
• 32% funded
• 22 backers
• 5 days to go

Ends the midnight between 1 and 2 April, Texas time.  Thank you,

Kelly

Gardens in Florence Italy

Cari Amici (Dear Friends),

I cannot help loving the Renaissance City, aka Florence, Italy. I do not always know why, but there it is. However, there are a lot of times in which I feel out of kilter and that is when I cannot be near a tree. So much of the greenery in Florence is hidden behind walls. I was once told that an open door in Italia is an invitation. I am not convinced that I believe this, but there are times in which I act as if I do!

Just over a week ago an American sculptor living in Italy came to Florence (Firenze) and asked if we could get together. Tammy Duris had contacted me many years ago in Colorado and recently we ended up spending a fun day together walking around central Florence. While peeking into an open archway near my home, we started speaking with the security guard. I was happy that Tammy asked him if the space was a residenza. He responded, “No, si tratta di una casa." So, then I asked him what was the difference between residenza and a casa (house). He explained that the first was a place for rent, the second a private home.

And then to my utter delight, he told me that he would allow us to go in if we went only into the courtyard straight ahead and did not linger or explore the other areas. So, I was able to see some trees and flowers! And even a sculpture! It was certainly not the prettiest garden space that I have seen, but my point is that so much of Firenze is hidden. So when you see an open door, sometimes you may just get to walk through it!

Just a reminder, this workshop is coming up soon:

"Portrait Painting with Artist Kelly Borsheim" May 17-19, 2013, Sanford, Florida (near Orlando)

Portrait Oil Painting

Cari Amici (Dear Friends),

I was amused recently when one of my close friends, a painter, said (as he has on more than one occasion over the past year) that he thinks that I am a strong enough artist that Angel [Academy of Art here in Florence, Italy] will not beat out of me what is so good about my art. It is funny how some of us have this discussion about the four major classical art schools here in Firenze and how they differ, as well as how they do not. And most of us strive for our own independence.

Educating myself on the work of others is something that I have changed my opinion about over the years. I did not receive the traditional art education and before coming to Firenze, I knew very little about art history. I sometimes choose NOT to see the work, being curious about what kinds of images I would create without much influence of much anyone else. Other times I feel that looking at the work of others helps me hone on my own taste and grow faster. Much in the same way as my picture taking, each time I see an image, I refine my own sense of composition. It is helpful to analyze my emotional response to try to find that elusive quality that makes me FEEL something in one artwork, and feel too little in a similar effort.

I am where I need to be at the moment, despite my impatience. I find when I paint at Angel that I am trying to piece together many different approaches. Here is a small detail image of a portrait of a model Mauro that I am working on at the moment. This image reminds me of my approach with pastels when I do street painting. I have since gone in and refined the shapes in the face. Shapes are the most important thing and I find myself getting lost in them. But here, I am playing with putting the background color into parts of the face. This follows one idea that every part of a painting is a combination of the same colors. Each part simply varies in how those colors are proportioned. Let us see where this path takes me . . .

Art Anniversary Promotion: Get more art for your buck. Hurry, this one-time offer expires on 15 February 2013.

Compatibility Sculpture

Cari Amici (Dear Friends),

Most people do not know how shy I really am because when I was a teenager my mother enrolled me into the organization Toastmasters International that helps people conquer fears of public speaking (and also to learn how to do it well). I remember feeling unworthy of introducing myself to new people as an “artist.” Artists were cool people, I thought, and I am only me.

Well, that is one fear I rarely struggle with these days, since I have embraced who I am wholeheartedly. I am very happy to be celebrating this month my twelve-year anniversary for “taking the plunge” to full-time art. You may share in some of this joy, if you like, by reading my latest art newsletter about my visit to the Guggenheim in Bilbao, Spain, and noting how you may enjoy some of my sculpture (or my friend's -- the amazing Ukrainian-American sculptor Vasily Fedorouk).

Here is a sculpture I did of a couple of models who happened to be married … to each other. My favorite comment from them after our multiple sculpting sessions together was that posing for me was the best quality time they were able to find in their busy lives. I dearly hope they have continued to find more of that after the sculpture was completed! What a rare treat it was to be able to work with a couple of models in such an intimate pose! I hope you like the love in this composition titled “Compatibility.” For views from other angles, please click on the title “Compatibility.” Thank you for your interest!

"Compatibility"

bronze with wood base
9" h x 14" x 11"
limited edition of 12 for bronze
Price List

Also, terra-cotta original sculpture
artist's proof (one-of-a-kind)
11" h x 13" x 9"
by Kelly Borsheim
Price List

Art and the Nude

Cari Amici (Dear Friends),
For the past two years on my New Year’s Eve blog entry, I have shared more erotic art than I usually dish up for you. In the line of thinking similar to that of those living in Pompeii centuries ago, it was my way of wishing you a sensuous, joyful, lush, and prosperous new year.

However, this year I have not had the time to create something along this vein. Sad, really since I believe that art is the safe place in which we can explore all aspects of our humanity. That said, I still want to wish you a thoughtful abundance for the coming year. I hope that you can become more spontaneous (I linked this word because many people misuse it) and express yourself more often.

I recently wrote a little bit about my holiday with friends on Captiva Island, Florida. I stayed in artist Robert Rauschenberg’s former beach house there, owned by his collaborating partner and long-time friend, Darryl Pottorf. In entering the place, I found myself intrigued by a composition in red, black, browns, and white. I had this strange urge to photograph myself nude in front of it. This does not really belong on my “erotic art” posting because I do not know how to explain that I was not thinking sexual thoughts when this idea came to mind. Maybe more like “Nature Girl,” I dunno. That night, I did pose for my timer, but fully clothed, boots and all…

One evening, Darryl walked me over to the painting before we headed back to his place for dinner with more friends. He explained most of the objects or shapes in the composition. This was a painting about Robert Rauschenberg (Bob) and Darryl. Darryl’s art is very personal. It made me wonder if I should lose the thought of taking nude shots with this beautifully sentimental work of art. But the idea persisted and I did not believe that I was thinking anything disrespectful. So one night towards the end of my visit, I woke up just before 3 a.m. and went to work, careful not to disturb the other occupant in the house. I was back in bed by 4 a.m. I hope you enjoy this image, but more: I wish you truly beautiful experiences from each day forward.

Links to the other New Year’s Eve posts:
• New Year’s Eve 2010: “Anthurium”
  
• New Year’s Eve 2009: “Tesoro!”
  

Artist Collecting Art

Collecting Art

Cari Amici (Dear Friends),

Canadian painter and one of the art world’s mentors and avid supporters Robert Genn recently wrote on the topic of laughter in art. I had to laugh … in recognition.

You see, part of the reason that I went to visit my friend Dilya in Chicago was to pick up the sculpture I had been making payments on for a while. I bought one of her late husband Vasily Fedorouk’s ceramic sculptures that you see here.

Dilya was surprised by my choice, thinking that I would want one of Vasily’s stone works. And I do… trust me… I do. I have several of his stone carvings on my wish list, but I explained to her that right now, even with payment plans, I was not just able to afford a work in stone. Also, I have fond memories of this particular work in ceramic. Many years ago, some members of my family and I were visiting Vasily (Dilya was in New York at the time) and we had quite a fun afternoon, including us laughing together about several of Vasily’s more erotic artworks. Fun and playful. And absolutely art. Naturally, I have photos of us all goofing around in Vasily’s home gallery, but I am not ready to unleash those upon the world.

Anton, son and sometimes model for his artist father, took this image of Dilya and me with my new sculpture. [Airport security personnel and I had some good laughs over this piece as well after I was pulled aside for a more thorough check.]


I tend to purchase art that gives me an emotional feel, even at times when it was one that I was not expecting. Another such surprise was Jane Dedecker’s bronze sculpture “Swinging” depicting a child flying at the end of his mother’s arms. Like Norman Rockwell, Jane Dedecker’s family-oriented compositions manage to avoid kitsch and instead seem only charmingly nostalgic. I like her looser style, which means the smaller works. And I love the energy of the sculpture I bought.

The funny thing about me is that many of the artworks (paintings and sculptures) that I have collected were purchased when my bank account was almost empty. When I bought one of my friend Marc Silva’s paintings from his “In-SPIRE-ed” series, I asked the gallery owner if he would “wait to charge my card until after the 14th of the month to save me a month’s finance charge.” The exhibit would not be over by that date anyway. I somehow manage to pay everything off. I have never regretted any of those purchases because I look around my studio and home and I love the works that surround me. And love really is what it is all about, right?

Artist Open Studio Invitation

Cari Amici (Dear Friends),

In case you have not received your invitation via either my art newsletter or on Facebook, please consider this blog posting as your invitation to my upcoming Open Studio:

Artist Kelly Borsheim's
Open Studio

What is happening on the easels and in the stone yard?

Enjoy a short ride to the country outside of Austin and Bastrop, Texas, sip red wine or cider, and take a sneak peek at what is going on in an artist's studio. Kelly will have several works-in-progress (WIPs) on various easels, including paintings and drawings. Also, you can see how far she has gotten on the stone carving of "The Gymnast." This is a figurative sculpture that must be completed by 1 March for an exhibit in San Antonio. [So there may be a bonfire out here if the weather gets too cold to carve in!]

You are Invited -- and Bring Your Friends!

Borsheim Arts Studio
223 Greystone Lane, Unit A, Cedar Creek, Texas 78612
Phone: 512-303-3929

6 & 7 February 2010, Saturday & Sunday
noon - 5:00 p.m. each day

NOTE: In effect now through 28 Feb 2010:

9-year Anniversary Celebration:

January 11 marks the 9th anniversary of when artist Kelly Borsheim sold her beeswax candle business and "took the plunge" to a life as a full-time artist. Here are the ways you can benefit:

• Enjoy a 20% Savings on ALL Giclée orders taken before 28 February 2010! Details: www.borsheimarts.com/giclee.htm
  
• FREE Giclée up to 18" long (up to a $200 value) or 20 FREE notecards with each painting commission received. (Your choice of available images.) Offer expires 28 February 2010. Information about how to commission a work of art, as well as some images of my past commissions, is online at:
  www.borsheimarts.com/commission.htm
  
• FREE shipping and handling on all art purchases (sculpture and 2-dimensional art) arranged from today through 28 February 2010.
  
• Interested in trying out my Layaway Plan? From now until 28 February, enjoy a reduced down payment of only one-third the full price instead of the normal half. As always, no finance charge if payments are made on time. For details, visit: www.borsheimarts.com/pricelist.htm
  

Know before you expand your art collection: Prices for Kelly's original drawings and paintings, as well as sculpture are all posted online - either on the page exhibiting each artwork or on the Price List page:
www.borsheimarts.com/pricelist.htm

THANK YOU for your interest!

Sculptor Vasily Fedorouk

Cari Amici (Dear Friends),

My good friend -- and the best sculptor I know -- Vasily Fedorouk picked me up at the Chicago aeroporto recently and I was able to spend some time with him and his family. I always learn things from him and was excited to see some of his new projects.

While we damn-near polished off a bottle of Armenian Arazat brandy (for whose name my keyboard does not have characters) and looked at images on his computer, the sun came streaming into the dining room window at a blinding angle. When Vasily pulled the curtain across the glass, we were pleased to see the following image cast by the shadows of two of his latest sculptures. The one on the left is a composition in metal. The sculpture silhouette on the right is a beautiful figure that Vasily carved from Turkish marble.





I took these next two images the next morning as Vasily and I went down into his basement, which doubles as a gallery. I love this space and it is so wonderful to have a place to see his works anytime. Vasily is shown here with his companion Era. The other picture is in the back room where he decided to show me some more images of works he did long ago in Ucrania (The Ukraine).

I never tire of seeing these photographs of marble, wood, and granite sculptures, as well as his drawings. He says he does the drawings (especially) for himself, but I cannot help but envision them framed in an exhibition for everyone who loves art to see.


Vasily Fedorouk is truly an amazing, sensitive, and generous artist. If you would like to see more of his artworks, please visit his site: http://vasilyfedorouk.com

Teaching Art in Florence, Italy

Cari Amici,

I mentioned before that I have been working as an assistant for Martinho Correia at the Angel Academy of Art here in Florence, Italy.
Martinho has been teaching a 2-week workshop on Painting Methods of the Great European Academies.


By day, we worked in the studio in the traditional method of learning how to paint by copying great artworks of the past. This teaches an artist so much more than copying a photograph! Martinho is shown here with one of his students. We had a great class – good energy with all of us.

One morning we all met Martinho at the mercato porcellino for a quick coffee or breakfast and then we walked to the Chiesa di Santa Felìcita, between the Ponte Vecchio and the Pitti Palace. I show you here some images I took in the church. The painting on the right is by Antonio Ciseri (1821-1891) titled “Santa Felìcita e il martirio dei Maccabei”. The bodies are fantastic and I like the zig-zagging composition. We also viewed the beautiful colors and figures of the Deposizione by Jacopo Pontormo (1494-1556), a lovely fresco on the right as you enter the church.

Our next stop was the Pitti Palace and her museums. Especially interesting was the section that the Medici family lived in. Martinho is very familiar with so many specific artworks and gave interesting comments on many of them, relating them to our current projects. Unfortunately for me, I missed too many of his art lessons because I tend to linger too long and can never seem to stay with a group for all of the time.



I often kept the studio open daily longer than promised so that we could try to get more painting done, but afterwards, we would meet one another for dinner and later, dancing. Pictured here are Ksenia, Isabelle, Martinho, and me at the salsa club Jaragua. We danced here many nights, but also visited many of the other clubs and aperitivos around Florence. One night at Jaragua, we got to see a performance by more professional dancers.

This 2-week workshop has been a great experience for me. But as much as I love to dance, the “getting-to-bed-at-5-am” routine is starting to wear on me. That said, I would probably make the same choice again because I met such cool people and we learned a lot and danced even more.

Street Painting in Florence, Italy

Cari Amici,
Coming to you not even live (hey, I resemble that remark!) from Florence, Italy . . . Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

It also happens to be Monday, so I have spent my day as an Italian madonnara. I had to share this with you since I am so happy to have access to the Internet again.
So, anyway, I chose to draw a portrait of a Madonna by Sassoferrato in 1640 AD. This first image shows how I got started today. I am not particularly comfortable with my skills with pastels, so while I try to lay out a basic pattern of light and dark shapes, I do not have the layering skills that true pastel artists have mastered.


And thus, you see image # 2 after I have mooshed all of my hatched layers together with my hands. This technique is part of the reason I tend to wear so much chalk color on my face and clothes! Oh, and please let me know if this post had too many images for your taste. I get fascinated by process that I worry sometimes that I am overwhelming others.

I should have gotten the face more in proportion to the original print I had to work from since using a grid is supposed to help the artist. However, I have some bizarre resistance to measuring and creating straight lines. So, while I do a lame job of laying out my grid (or as they say in Britain – I can’t be bothered to create a proper grid), I suppose I am not troubled by the result enough to change. Stubborn Irish girl!

The third image is of me working on my disegno. I cannot seem to get enough darks to make me happy. Also, I think this image of a face (only) emerging from the street is creepy in a cool way. And yes, I was wearing a GREEN turtleneck under my suspenders on the jeans that my sister Amber gave me last August. You just cannot see it since I added the white pullover from Sophie and later, my jean jacket. I also had drawn a shamrock to the left of my Madonna image.

This fourth image was taken when my friend Skye dropped by for a visit while she worked the crowds in centroFlorence, handing out pubblicità for a bar on Via Dei Benci. Note her lovely green wig to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day. I actually did enjoy today, although my body has already started to pay, because I had so many friends drop by to look and give their enthusiastic support. I get a kick out of hearing my name called out in Florence.

This next image of the hands with the face basically done, while the veil leaves much to be desired, was taken around 18:00. I started my work around 14:00. I had to wait for Tomo, one of the top madonnari here, to use my space for a videographer. Claudio is still hoping for enough public support that the madonnari will be able to keep making street paintings in Florence after 31 March 2008. Anyway, my friend Abdu stopped by again and said he really loved this partly done look.

But, I moved past that . . . I quit just before 22:00. The tourists are coming more now, but not enough yet to stay until midnight, as I did in September 2007. This image was taken by another friend of me with my work on Via Calimala.



And finally, I show you the finished chalk drawing. The word ‘takk’ that you see is Norwegian for ‘thank you.’ Besides getting a generous tip from some traveling Texans (Texans have always been decent tippers, from my experiences), a couple of Norwegian music students gave me some Norwegian coins and wrote the word out for me. I told them the money is very cool and I like it, but I took the coins out of the buckets and put them into my pocket so as to not encourage other people to leave money that I cannot buy food with here in Italia. With the US dollar so weak right now, it is better for me to earn what I can in euros to avoid the costly exchange rates.

And, today I received more questions than usual about “how can you wash this away tonight?” So this last image is of my washing my square to prepare it for tomorrow’s artist.

Buona notte! I am exhausted!
And thank you for reading! TAKK. Grazie mille!
Ciao,
Kelly

Melancholia and Innocence

I read today an online article entitled, “In Praise of Melancholy” by Eric G. Wilson. Here is an excerpt that I hope you enjoy:

“Melancholia pushes against the easy "either/or" of the status quo. It thrives in unexplored middle ground between oppositions, in the "both/and." It fosters fresh insights into relationships between oppositions, especially that great polarity life and death. It encourages new ways of conceiving and naming the mysterious connections between antinomies. It returns us to innocence, to the ability to play in the potential without being constrained to the actual. Such respites from causality refresh our relationship to the world, grant us beautiful vistas, energize our hearts and our minds. . . .

Suffering the gloom, inevitable as breath, we must further accept this fact that the world hates: We are forever incomplete, fragments of some ungraspable whole. Our unfinished natures — we are never pure actualities but always vague potentials — make life a constant struggle, a bout with the persistent unknown. But this extension into the abyss is also our salvation. To be only a fragment is always to strive for something beyond ourselves, something transcendent. That striving is always an act of freedom, of choosing one road instead of another. Though this labor is arduous — it requires constant attention to our mysterious and shifting interiors — it is also ecstatic, an almost infinite sounding of the exquisite riddles of Being.

To be against happiness is to embrace ecstasy. Incompleteness is a call to life.”

Read More
http://chronicle.com
Section: The Chronicle Review
Volume 54, Issue 19, Page B11

Anonymous Patron of the Arts

Tomorrow, 11 Gennaio, is my seventh anniversary for taking the art plunge full-time! I have learned so much and I keep learning and growing and thinking. (Most people tell me too much thinking, ma . . . )

This evening I was able to complete the cycle on a wonderful gift that I recently received.
I gave a charming young Italian woman a framed drawing that I had created of her back on 24 October 2007 in Florence, Italy. It was a gift from an arts patron. And she was thrilled. (This image of the three of us – Eugenia, the model, “Eugenia” the drawing, and Kelly, the artist – was taken by Juan Pablo Ruiz.)

An American man who wishes to remain anonymous, and whom I have only met via e-mail, paid double my price + framing for my drawing of a new Italian model named Eugenia. I posted an image of the pencil (black and white) sketch on a grey paper of a seated female nude figure on the 2 November entry of my blog.

My arts patron asked me to frame the drawing and give it to the model as a gift. He wanted to support my efforts in Italia. Wow, that was a new one! Via e-mail, he wrote:

“. . . Your blog is great! I feel a bit like I myself am there in Italy enjoying the experience and fun of you and your new friends. I want to pay back a little, or you can think of it as a very minor benefactor to enable you to continue what you are doing, which is good for you, good for me, good for our country, etc.

Your experimentation with white pencil on black paper is interesting (Mario) . . . Your drawing of Eugenia (drawn Oct 24, posted Nov 2, 2007 in your blog) is quite my cup of tea. Wow. Your talent is really impressive and she is classic goddess. Is it still available? May I purchase it so that you can donate it to the model? . . .Tell her an anonymous American benefactor wanted to spread a little artistic goodwill to Italy.”

When I sounded a bit stunned (you want to overpay and give it away? – my father asked me recently if I realized that I talk too much when people want to help me! ;-) and I suggested that I pay for framing since his offer was so generous, he responded:

“If it's not too much trouble for you, yes, please give it to Eugenia. [Let’s] frame it. It would be a crying shame if it were to be stored in a file or vault. (Although it occurs to me that 50 years from now maybe I'll be telling my grandchildren how I gave away a signed original Borsheim!)”

ha ha – now I have expectations to fulfill! But seriously, the generosity of this art benefactor touched me. And impressed many of my artist friends. We all agreed that the mental boost of such kindness is amazing! And Eugenia was so happy that she spoke way too quickly in Italian for me to understand most of her expression. And she will keep modeling. Thank you, Mr. Anonymous Art Patron from Eugenia and me in Italia!