Mosquito Bite Relief

I'm a bit off topic today. This post isn't about art. But, since we like wildlife art we probably enjoy being out in nature. Some of the down sides to being out in nature are pests like mosquitoes.

Since we moved from our "city" house to our "rural" house we get to enjoy a lot more of nature. Besides a lot more birds here, we also have deer, coyote, fox, rabbits, and beavers. Unfortunately, we also have more mosquitoes.

I need to use a repellant if I spend much time in the yard in the evenings, which I often do now that we have a garden to water. It's not like we're swarmed with mosquitoes here. But if there is even one mosquito around, it will find you.

I don't use DEET. I find the natural eucalyptus repellant works pretty well. But once in a while I miss a spot. And, sure enough, any mosquito around has a radar zeroed in on the one spot I miss. It's hard to get repellant everywhere. There's always some tiny spot not covered. And mosquitoes are determined to find that tiniest spot! It's incredible. I've even had them bite me between my fingers!

So, no matter how hard I try, I get bit sometimes.

It really sucks that mosquito bites have to itch incessantly for days on end. Couldn't they itch for an hour or two and go away? Really!

I have tried many over the counter items to relieve the itching without much success. I've tried hydrocortisone, ointment, Benadryl™ cream, and After Bite®. None of those really helped much.

I once had a bee sting and tea tree oil worked great on that so I thought I'd try that on my mosquito bites. It helped some. But not a lot.

Aloe vera is known for relieving skin irritations so I tried that too. It also helped some, but nothing dramatic.

Then once I put the tea tree oil on and, frustrated with the lack of significant relief, slathered on the aloe vera shortly after. About 5-10 minutes later I felt so much better! The combination of tea tree oil and aloe vera together seems to work so much better than anything else I've tried. For me, at least, there is significant relief within 10 minutes. Within a half hour the itching has pretty much stopped (unless I scratch it again!).

So, there's something for you to try. Of course, it's best if you can avoid getting bitten in the first place. But, no matter how careful you are, it's just not possible 100% of the time. So, if you do get bit, and none of those anti-itch ointments seem to be working, try the tea tree oil and aloe vera combination. You just might notice a difference!

Inexpensive Art Paint Tube Organizer

For a while now I've had my paint tubes in a box on my new workstation. I thought that would work fine since they're all right there within easy reach. But I soon realized it wasn't working well. Somehow, Murphy's Law I guess, the color I wanted always seemed to be hidden somewhere at the bottom of the heap, even though I'd just had it on top a short time ago. I realized I needed a paint tube organizer so I could see all my paint tube colors easily and find the one I want more quickly. Digging through the pile every time was getting frustrating. I needed a better solution.

I didn't have the table top space to just lay them all out side by side. I needed some sort of display stand. I looked around online and couldn't find anything that was really what I had in mind. I'd heard of artists using jewelry door hangers for their art tube but I had nothing to hang it on near my workspace, so that wouldn't really work. I wanted some sort of desk-top rack sort of thing where tubes could stand on end with their colors and labels clearly displayed but couldn't find anything like that on art supply websites.

One day making breakfast, when I was about to toss the empty egg carton into the recycle bin, the idea of it serving as a tube rack came to me. I flipped it over, looked at it, and wondered if cutting holes in the bottoms of the cups would work. Interestingly, it's the perfect size for your standard 40ml paint tube. Here's what I came up with:



It's just a simple cardboard egg cartoon, the top removed and the bottom half flipped upside down, with holes cut out of the egg cups. Now I can easily see the colors on the tube to find them quickly and keep them organized.

And, the best part is, it's free and easy to make!

Eagle Painting Background Revision Progress

I got a bit more done on the background revision of my "too-brown" eagle painting. I darkened the sky a bit from my previous revision. It just seemed more dramatic with a darker, almost stormy, sky contrasting against the eagle's highlights. The golden color of the eagle's neck feathers contrast nicely with the blue sky.


Yes, I really did redo the whole sky from the previous revision, painting around all the feathers yet again! Maybe I'm crazy, but the first sky revision just wasn't exciting enough. I wanted more contrast.

Here's the last revision for comparison.


And here's the original version again.


Tomorrow, more work on the mountains and trees below. It won't be long now, I hope!

Artist Associations

Today I'm just going to rant. Yes, I'm in that kind of mood. Today has not been a good day for a number of reasons and this is just one of them.

I had been a member of several local artist associations in the past when I was living in CA. They were in every city, literally, and very active. They had monthly meetings, frequent shows, social gatherings, photo-shoot and exhibit outings, etc. When I moved to WA I was expecting to find something similar. Sadly, artist associations are few and far between here. I finally did find one local one and joined it.

Finally, I thought, some artists to interactive with!

Yeah, so I thought.

Wrong.

This association (I won't be mean enough to mention the name) appears to be less than worthless. They say they have a newsletter. Three months now I've been a member I've not received one. I emailed about this 3 or 4 days ago and have received no response so far.

They say they have weekly plein-air outings. I've never been notified of a single one so far.

I asked if there were monthly meetings. I'm told, "No. There used to be. But no one came so we quit having them."

Huh? Why? What's wrong with your meetings? Do they suck that badly? If no one's coming, how about changing things around a bit then? You'd rather just throw your hands in the air and give up?

I asked if there is an email alias or forum where I can interact with other members. "No, we don't have anything like that set up."

WTF?

I explained I would like to interact with other artists. I'd like to say, "Hey, I'm going to ___ art show next weekend! Anyone want to join me?" But they tell me there's no way to communicate that.

Is that too much to ask?

I'm like, Ok, what do you offer then? What are my membership benefits?

Well, so far all they offer is a weekly life drawing session ... for $10. Uh...what?? I can get that at the local art supply store. Seriously. They have life drawing classes I can pay for that I don't also have to pay a membership fee for. Why am I paying for an art association membership when I have to pay extra each week to attend the one and only activity they seem to have? Shouldn't that be included as a membership benefit?

I am so frustrated with this group I'm seriously considering asking for my membership fee to be refunded.

Is that unreasonable?

In CA I found artist associations fun, inspiring, and educational. Here I feel like I just bought a dead horse.

Are you a member of any local artist associations? What benefits do you get from them? Are they worth it?

Produce as Artwork

Tonight I wanted to talk a bit about produce ... fruits and vegetables ... in artwork. What made me think of this is the fact that, for the first time in many, many years, I have a vegetable garden. I was out harvesting some of my delicious home-grown produce today and it got me thinking about all the still life artwork I've seen. Much of it is of produce, particularly fruit. I love a beautiful bowl of cherries as much as the next person but, why would I buy painting of it when I already have a lovely bowl of real cherries on my countertop? I see it, right there, in reality. Why wouldn't I rather have art that is something I can't have in my house, like a waterfall, or a covered bridge?
Mind you, I am not dissing still life artwork in any way! I actually like it. I'm just trying to figure out why. It just seems odd to me that I'd want a painting of something already in my house. You'd think we'd all prefer to have paintings we can't have in our house, like landscapes, seascapes, wildlife, trains, planes, fantasies, etc. Yet still life is one of the most popular art subjects, both as what artists create, as well as what collectors buy. Why is that?
Again, I am not saying still life is not good art. I do like it. I'm just wondering why we want a picture of lemons on our wall when we already have them in the fruit bowl on the counter. What is it about such still life artworks that appeal to us so much?
Thoughts?

My Anti-Brown Movement Continues!

Oh, no! I'm at it again! Revising old paintings!

In my effort to eliminate mostly brown paintings I couldn't help but be bothered by my most brown painting of all, this golden eagle painting!


I think when I originally did this painting I was experimenting with a monochromatic color palette. I think I achieved that! Unfortunately, it's not the prettiest palette. It needed a makeover. So I took out some non-brown paints and a brush and went at it today!


The fun part was painting in between and around all the feathers!

Uh, no. I'm being facetious here. It was a pain in the bum!

Anyway, I plan to have blue sky and clouds throughout most of the background, mountains and trees in the lower background, something like this:


What do you think? Is it crazy to revise an old painting this much? Is it better to go just learn from it and move on? Or is it good to go back and right your wrongs?

My Anti-Brown Movement

I have decided many of my paintings from the past just have way too much brown in them. It makes sense. I paint brown animals in brown dirt with brown tree trunks behind them. It should be mostly brown, right?

No.

One of my favorite artists is Julie Chapman. She can paint a totally brown animal without using any brown and, yet, we still see it as brown. I think that's brilliant! I'm not quite sure how she does it. But rather than jump in too deep and try to paint brown without painting brown, I figured I'd start by just painting things that aren't brown, like green grass and blue sky. That's a good start, right?

Anyway, here's something I'm working on that's not all brown. It's a meadow scene with deer, reminiscent of Bambi's mother trying to coax Bambi out onto the meadow for the first time.


So far I only have the grassy meadow and misty morning sunshine. Here's a quick Photoshop mock-up of where the deer would be. As you can see here, we have a doe and two little fawns. One is bold and ventures out onto the meadow with its mother. The other is a little timid and needs some coaxing.


I think it will be a cute scene. But the point I'm actually trying to make here is that I'm trying to avoid an all-brown scene. The background is mostly blue and green. The deer, of course, are brown animals. But I'm going to try to avoid painting them with just brown. Perhaps a more golden hue will contrast nicely against the blue-green background. We shall see. Stay tuned!