As you may have noticed I LOVE color and lot's of detail in many of my paintings! I like to create work that instantly attracts a viewers eye and with color and detail keeps them entertained past a fleeting glance. My latest painting, "Land of Wonder" has a lot of color that makes you think of candy, and so many nuances within the design elements, from little hearts and swirls to dancing arrows and slashes of paint placed perfectly throughout. The larger elements such as the trees of brilliant red with vibrant gray leaves, to the turquoise moon and emerald green mountains, are set against a sky of blues and purples that fade into one another as they float across the canvas. This painting was created on an oversized 36"x48" Genie Canvas and will be a conversation starter wherever it is placed, whether it be a foyer, a bedroom, living room or office, and it will will add a burst of color and fun! I hope you enjoy seeing the progress it took to create this painting, it's always fascinating to see how an idea sketched out comes to life on canvas. Click on any image to see larger, and visit the Shop page to purchase and see room settings.
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I have several great giveaway opportunities for all of you to start the New Year off right!! First, fashion and lifestyle blogger Aroon Melane is doing a giveaway on her blog featuring two fun little products with my art from Deny Designs :) Visit her Blog and scroll down the page to see the rules for entering to win this colorful pouch with my original painting "Color Blast" and one of my chevron pattern designs on a tabletop frame. In addition, Aroon Melane, myself and 24 other lovely ladies are doing an Instagram Giveaway loop! So, not only do you have the opportunity to win the following items from me, but you have the chance to possibly win something else instead! The odds are pretty good on this one, don't miss out! My Instagram account is under: @madartstudios just look for the post about the Loop Giveaway for all the instructions on how to enter, it will be lot's of fun!! It is only open for two days from January 1st at 11am EST, and will end on January 3rd around 11am EST, winner will be announced on Instagram. Here is what you can win from me in the loop giveaway, an 8"x10" signed "Aqua Burn" Print, a "Peacock Princess" pouch, a blue and black striped tabletop picture frame, a 2015 Inspirational Calendar and the most beautiful little bamboo jewelry box featuring my "Winter Sparkle" painting. This is a great haul of fun little goodies featuring my art, good luck and HAPPY NEW YEAR!!
I've very much been in the mood to paint cities and iconic landmarks from around the world, so naturally I'm drawn to adding maps into my current art repertoire! I painted one all original map painting (see here), and then I had the idea to also create some digital collages of maps from my original paintings, manipulated in Photoshop to create a unique piece of art, perfect for prints and lot's of other fun products. I started with my three piece acrylic painting "The Beauty of Color" that I painted several years ago that is bold and vibrant and I thought would look great overlayed on a world map. I then chose a hand painted gray background to use as the oceans just to give the background some texture. As I was stitching together the images onto the map, I decided to play around with the hues and came up with several more stunning and vibrant color combinations! It's so amazing how digital manipulation can allow us to take one piece of art and turn it into something completely new, it's fun and pushes my creativity to a whole new level. Here are the original "The Beauty of Color" Paintings and the gray background before I digitally collaged them into the images below. The colors were changed along with the saturation and opacity to create the most complimentary color schemes. Click on any image to enlarge. Which one do you like best? Products you can purchase with one of the images above, there are also prints, phone cases, cards and more to come from my Society6 Shop!
My artistic journey began in the bush of Alaska, one of the most remote parts of the planet. I grew up in Meyers Chuck, AK a tiny fishing village 35 miles North of the first Alaskan city, Ketchikan. The only way to get to Meyers Chuck is by float plane or private boat, and each home has it's own source of power via generator and/or solar wind power, with heating by way of firewood; and when I was growing up we did our homework with light from kerosene lamps. Some of the time me and my four siblings were home schooled as we lived outside of Meyers Chuck, approximately a 25 minute skiff (small open boat) ride away from the one room schoolhouse. Growing up in the Alaskan bush with only my four siblings (1 sister, 3 brothers) to play with, it was often my paper and pencil that I turned to for enjoyment and something different. I would sketch everything around me and anything and everything that popped into my head. Whenever someone would purchase a gift for me it was always art related, whether art supplies or art how to books and even books of famous artists or fairytale books artists I loved had illustrated. This fascination and love of art has never left me, even when I was in college studying Political Science for six years and then teaching high school and eventually working with my husband building custom homes in Florida, my dream of focusing solely on my art never left me. It wasn't until the early 2000's when I started doing some custom murals in the Orlando area that I started to really feel the itch to make art a full-time career, so I dabbled in different ways of making money with my art for several years and one day decided to list a painting on eBay and was flabbergasted when a bidding war ensued in the last few minutes! That was it, I was hooked and started painting more and more and honing my skills while selling part-time on eBay, it wasn't until late 2007 that I really embraced my dream career and started selling and licensing my art full-time, and I haven't looked back. This is the most rewarding, inspirational career I could have ever dreamed of, and it all started in the wild, untamed bush of Alaska. I recently sketched out some new designs to paint to add to the Alaskan collection, as all of the originals in the series have already sold, so I need to add some new artwork. Keep an eye out for the full version paintings of these sketches coming soon! These designs were both sketched while visiting my Alaskan cabin, see photos below of the cabin and more beautiful Alaskan images. My husband and I now have our own little piece of Alaskan heaven and visit there several times a year, and my husband is also a commercial Sea Cucumber diver in the fall months; crazy, considering he was born in Jamaica! One never knows where life's journey will take them, so embrace every opportunity and find the time to pursue your dreams and follow the journey that your heart leads you. Mine invariably leads me back to Alaska time and again, it will always be "Home". My licensing partner and print publisher Pixels.com is now offering throw pillows in a variety of different sizes with all 776 images I have available through them! Below is just a sampling from my abstract gallery, but there are many more designs with lot's of different subjects, styles and colors to choose from.
When you go to my Pixels Gallery and click on any image, simply select the pillow icon on the middle right of the page; If the image isn't a square image you can click on the large pillow that pops up with the design and by clicking and holding your mouse you can adjust what part of the image you would like displayed on the pillow. These are double sided, so the image on the front will also be on the back. This is such exciting news, many of these images have never been offered as pillows before and will give you so many options to dress up your home with unique art that is vibrantly colored and fun! In addition to pillows you can purchase all of these images as prints (canvas, framed, metal and more) along with greeting cards and phone cases. As someone who LOVE's to travel, and dream of traveling to every corner of the earth some day; creating a new collection of map paintings to compliment my Cities of the World art, seemed like the perfect new collection! My first painting in this new collection is a vibrant, colorful painting depicting the world with each country richly colored in deep, vibrant hues of the rainbow. I didn't purposefully color the countries specifically, I just went with what felt right and seemed to compliment each other, with the exception of the State of Alaska, which is painted in a brilliant shade of purple and violet. The reason for this, is Purple is my favorite color and I grew up in Alaska, so I wanted to give it particularly special meaning. The original "World Map I" painting was created with acrylics on a thick archival, acid free paper - 13"x18" that will need to be matted and framed. If you are looking for a larger copy of the painting I do have prints available up to an oversized 45"x60" framed or canvas prints HERE along with cards and even phone cases. It's always fun to see the process by which an original piece of art comes to live, so here are work in progress pics to enjoy :)
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