Henri Matisse

An excellent BBC documentary about Matisse. So inspiring!

http://youtu.be/Ob8FWxrKVZY

Career Builder 101

Great tips about how to build an art career: http://youtu.be/6WA0KecvP-g

Tips I like:
1. The more comfortable you are with yourself, the more comfortable you are about putting yourself out there, the more successful you will be.

2. Hit them up four months later. Just keep hitting them up. They're gonna see that you are hungry. As long as your work grow every time you hit them up, eventually they will give you an opportunity.

3. You should be able to explain your art in a nutshell. 

How to Show Your Art at Galleries

A very informative article about how to show your art at galleries,

On Commitment
"They're aware that the payoff is not always immediate, and that if they're going to invest time, money, publicity and wall space in your art, they want to at least see some promise for an evolving, engaging and ongoing narrative. In other words, they look for signs that you're serious about your art, have some sense of a game plan, guiding principle or philosophy, and are committed to being an artist and showing your art for many years to come. There's hardly anything galleries hate more than to back artists who suddenly decide to do something else with their lives and poof off into the ether forever. Vanishing artists and one-hit wonders do not make a gallery look good."

On the Artworks
"They want to hear your whole story, not just today's headlines, but where your journey is taking you, and what drives, motivates and inspires your creative process. Do you have more than one idea? Do you have a vision? Is that vision clear and well defined and articulated? Are you breaking new ground, exploring new territory? Or are you rehashing the past, stuck in a rut, stagnant or backing yourself into a corner? Are you productive and serious about spending time in the studio? Most importantly, do you have a significant body of current work that is complete (or nearly complete), fresh, original and HAS NOT been shown or exhibited elsewhere... or if not, are you capable of creating one by a to-be-determined date or deadline?" 

http://www.artbusiness.com/how_to_show_your_art_at_a_gallery.html

Monotype Printing

Slowly but steadily, I put the negative print I just created through a heavy-duty press while man-powering the machine. I have never felt a stronger connection and intimacy with my artworks. Maybe it is in our nature that the more difficult the process is, the more we appreciate the result.

The negative print is sitting on top of a light box

Negative print of a snowy birth forest

An exciting aspect of monotype print is that you can only get one original copy out of  a negative print (I'm not talking about putting the original print through a copy machine). Once you print it, all the paint on the plate is gone. So no matter how attached you are to the result, you just have to keep moving forward and building on previous images.

Catherine lent me a book about monotype printing at the end of the workshop. I guess I always gave people an impression that I have not learned enough :)

Learn to Paint in One Day

The workshop truly was fun, as long as you don't care about getting messy.

Orange is the new black

The rock&roll superstar Olya Losina

We all became kids at that moment

To find out more about the "Learn to Paint in One Day" workshop I attended, click here.

Whistle Down the Wind

My latest multi-media painting, 4'x6' on panels. "You do your best work when you have nothing to loose." Olya said. Yep, don't think too much. Just work and play.

"Whistle Down the Wind"
4'x6'
multi-media on panel

Workshop

I learned a lot this Saturday attending a workshop taught by German artist Catherine Edlinger-Kunze. Catherine is a very kind and warm person and also an excellent teacher, and her art is astonishingly beautiful.

Picture of Cathrine teaching

The first half of the workshop was devoted to drawing a live model, especially how to draw a gesture in just a few strokes. To illustrate body movement, Catherine took out a white sock with two tennis balls on top of one anther in it. A black center line is visible in the middle of the white sock. We all laughed at this seemingly funny object. "The tennis balls represent the torso and the pelvis." She said as she twisted the balls in different directions. "Look what happened to the center line." Then we started drawing having the image of the tennis balls in mind.

sketch by Layla Wu

I'd never had an easier time capturing body gestures just by understanding how tennis balls move in a sock. "It's important to understand how body parts function." Catherine said, "there's so much more you can show about what's going on with the body." Drawing outline is good, but understanding how the bone structure inside connect with the muscle and the skin took my gestural drawing to a different level.

We moved on to painting a little past noon. Catherine meant to push us all out of our comfort zone but I felt very comfortable in the whole process thanks to my mentor Olya Losina. I never thought I'd be able to paint a figure merely out of my imagination. Catherine helped me every step of the way to solve issues such as the drawing of the feet and the hand. This is what I got after three hours of work.

painting by Layla Wu

It still needs more work but I'm very happy with what I got so far.

Study for a Painting

I brought in a canvas with an underpainting full of eggshells to Olya's class. One of my classmate gave me a firm handshake for the first time since we met "Congratulations for coming up with such a good idea."

I wanted to create a painting/drawing of feet walking on eggshells. To help me visualize the idea, Olya lent me a hand mirror and a small lamp with orange floodlight. Here are a few samples of my feet's "beauty shots".

Each picture screams a story. I told Olya I really liked the last few poses with the feet leaving the ground. "Of the person is leaping," Olya said, "because underneath his feet are eggshells!" Now everything makes perfect sense.

Bill Sharp

I fell in love with Bill Sharp's artworks and felt so inspired! Every little mundane object becomes so extraordinary with his magic touch.

http://billsharp.wordpress.com/

"On the Carpet"

Bill Sharp

"Blue Pitcher with Lemons"

Bill Sharp

Hush Hush

This is my first time taking part in the north county drawing group at A&C Studio. Catherine was very nice and introduced me to a new color called "Cerulean Blue Chrome". She used this color in many of her paintings along with burnt sienna. The studio was filled with the smell of fresh coffee and beautiful light music. The model was lit by warm light from the left, pale studio lights and blue skylight from the top. Three hours went by in the blink of an eye.

Hello Goldfish

A painting inspired by the fish tank we set up over the weekend. I found myself obssessed and unable to stop staring at those poor frightened goldfish. "In a month, " Monk said "they will swim to the top when you get close." "just like the movie! " I yelled excitedly " in "Children of Heaven", when the boy dips his feet into the pond after failing to win a pair of shoes for his sister, a group of goldfish swim to the top and surrounded his blister-covered feet as if caressing them and soothing his pain.