Featured Artist of the Month for March 2011; Pat Pitingolo

Welcome Back

In today’s post I would like to introduce our Featured Artist, for March 2011;

Pat Pitingolo

I discovered her work thanks to Art Journalling magazine by Stampington, which is where I first saw her amazing pages. For those of you who haven’t yet found Pat, here is a little more about her and her work.

Who you are: 

Pat; Hi. I’m Pat Pitingolo from Lost and Found.

Lost n Found Pat Pitingolo's blog.

Where you are (which country you are based in)?

Pat: I live in the US in the Midwestern state of Ohio.

What you do:

Pat: By day I work as an office assistant at a small, liberal arts university. The rest of the time, I am a wife, mother, friend, and maker of things.

What got you started in your creative journey?

Pat: I’ve always had the desire to make things. My mother was a big influence as she was always knitting, crocheting, or sewing late into the wee hours. As a child I preferred craft kits to dolls or toys. In school, I spent more time designing the cover of a report than writing it! I majored in art in college and worked in advertising and design before devoting most of my time and energy to raising a family. For many years my creative outlet consisted of making Halloween costumes, home decorating projects, and participating in mail art. When my youngest went off to college a few years ago, my creative life blossomed. I started taking art classes, experimenting, and blogging. I found some creative friends and we meet regularly to learn new techniques and generally inspire and encourage one another.

What inspires you: 

Wilderness1 by Pat Pitingolo

Pat: Everything! My motto is: I never met an art form I didn’t like. I’ve dabbled in journaling, lettering, altered books, book arts, painting, collage, assemblage, mosaic, sewing, quilting, felting, and more. I enjoy looking at art as much as I do creating it and the internet is a wealth of inspiration. If I had to choose what inspires me most, I would probably say words, color, geometric shapes, outsider and folk art, and anything made with found objects.

If money,time and obligations were no object, what you would most like to do?

 

 

 

Blur1web by Pat Pitingolo

 

Pat: I would spend ALL of my time exploring art. I would travel the world taking classes and workshops, meeting artists, and journaling about it in my own handmade journals. I would also have my own art gallery filled with artwork that I discovered on my travels.

What do you enjoy most about your creative work/life?

Pat: I enjoy the whole creative process. It absolutely thrills me that something can be a tiny spark in your mind one day and a tangible object that you can touch and hold and share another day. I love that concept and everything that happens between the thought and the finished piece. I enjoy getting my hands dirty and sticky playing with paint, glue, paper, and fabric. The greatest feeling to me is when inspiration strikes and you have to drop everything and follow an idea to wherever it leads. Art is one giant adventure and I never want the journey to end.

Links

To find out more about Pat and her work, please visit her blog and website, details below. 

• I invite you to visit my blog, Lost and Found, at http://patpitingolo.blogspot.com/ as I appreciate your visits and comments. I hope I can inspire you to try something new or discover your own inner artist.

Thanks to Pat Pitingolo for being our Featured Artist of the Month for March 2011.

Happy by Pat Pitingolo

Best wishes and thanks for reading, see you soon

Billie 🙂

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Lyra Watersoluble Wax Crayons; Review

Welcome Back

In today’s post I would like to share with you the results of my adventures with Lyra Aquacolour Crayons. I wanted them for Art Journalling as they looked an excellent way of achieving bold layers of colours and have the advantage of giving a crayon or paint style of finish.

Tin of 48 Lyra Aquacolor Crayons

 

Purpose

Lyra Aquatones are a watersoluble wax crayon. You can use them as they are for a wax crayon effect, add water over a coloured area for a colour wash like water colour. Alternatively you can use a piece of scrap paper as a pallet and scribble colour on that and then use a damp brush to pick up the colour to enable you to apply the colour with a smaller brush to more detailed areas.

Pros/Cons

Pros

• Paper covered crayon, so you don’t get messy unless you want to.
• Portable, a great way to have a large selection of colours if you want to create on the move.
• Excellent quality of crayon. They are velvety smooth to use and the pigment blends beautifully. These crayons seem to allow a little more time to blend than other brands.
• Excellent Pigment content; lay down large areas of colour and vary the depth of colour by how hard you press the crayon to the paper.

 

Cons

• Not yet found a source of individual crayons, to replace ‘favorite’ colours later on.
• Being wax, don’t leave them in direct sun or near radiators 😉 They will melt left in hot conditions
• Due to the wax content, if you are using them for a background to stamp over it is better to stamp using a pigment ink and heat set. I found the dye inks resisted in some areas where wax was still present after blending out with water.

 

Value for Money

Excellent! I bought 48 crayons in a set in a tin box for £32.99. (Correct at time of writing May 2009).

Inside view of the Box of 48 Lyra Aqua Colours

 

Would I buy them again?

 Yes

Comparison to similar products

I have done a side by side comparison of Lyra Aquacolours with Caran Dache Neocolor II, which are also water soluble wax crayons. Lyra’s compare very well, they are just as good for pigment quality and density as the Neocolour IIs.

Although the advantage of the Neocolour IIs in the long run, is that they are available individually in many art shops as well as online. I suspect that unless I find a stockist of individual Lyra Aquatones, that as the Lyra crayons wear out they will be replaced in the set with their Neocolour equivalent.

As for getting the hang of them, like all products of their kind; it is a case of using them with different papers and varying amounts of water until you achieve the result you are looking for. 

For a water stable finish apply a layer of crayon then go over it with thinned gesso. This will lighten the colour but does mean any subsequent layers you apply on top are not disturbed. I saw this demonstrated  on a video by Millande on You Tube.

 

Links

Joanna Sheen

Lyra Aquacolours on Joanna Sheen’s site

Caran Dache

Caran Dache Neocolour II Crayons

 

Best wishes and thanks for reading, see you soon

Billie 🙂

 

***UPDATE*** 16 July 2009

Do check out the comments under this post before you make your final decision. Liesan has been using these Lyra crayons for longer than me and has discovered they may not be as light fast as the Neocolor II ones. I’m using them within a book, so it wouldn’t be a problem for me but if you want to make a piece of art that will be on show and in the light all the time it would be more of a concern. 😉

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