The Encaustic Center

Deanna Wood and Bonny Leibowitz are proud to announce the opening of The Encaustic Center in Richardson, Texas. Our focus is sharing the beautiful art of painting with wax in all of its various forms.

The Encaustic Center offers beginner and intermediate workshops and studio workdays along with special events such as demonstrations, exhibitions, guest artists, supplies and our big Grand Opening May 15th!

Check out our website to see more information on classes and events going on at the center.

If you're in the area, I hope you can make it to the Grand Opening on May 15, 7-10 pm. There will be artists from TexasWAX/Dallas doing encaustic demos, music, and more.

Workshop schedule:
$100 (includes all materials)
April:
Thursday, April 30 - 9:30 am to 3:30 pm - beginner workshop with Deanna
May:

Saturday, May 2, 10:00 am to 4:00 pm - beginner workshop with Bonny

Saturday, May 23, 10:00 am to 4:00 pm - intermediate workshop with Deanna

Thursday, May 28, 9:30 am to 3:30 pm - beginner workshop with Deanna

See Deanna's work at www.deannawood.com
See Bonny's work at www.bonnyleibowitz.com

The Encaustic Center
580 W. Arapaho #271
Richardson, Texas 75080

directions

www.theencausticcenter.com

Connection

(a version of this is also posted on Make28)

During yoga class the other day, my teacher was talking about the theme for the week - finding the extraordinary in the ordinary. She said something about "connection," and that stuck with me. During the rest of the class, I thought about the concept of connection as it relates to Make28.

Make28 is a project that was dreamed up by my online friend, Consumatron. He set a goal for himself to create a video every day in February, and he challenged everyone to join him by making something every day as well. So a few of us joined in and have also been making stuff - food, paintings, videos, drawings, journeys, enemies, music...

This project has created many connections, the most obvious being the connections we made with each other. I've really enjoyed seeing what everyone's made, how they interpreted the concept of "making," and glimpsing a little bit of everyone's creative processes. I love to see how other people work, create, and solve problems, even in different disciplines.

In Fearless Creating, Eric Maisel mentions the importance of getting together with other artists. "If you are a novelist, when do you meet with painters, dancers, musicians, and filmmakers to talk about your mutual concerns? When do you meet to discuss selling art, managing depression, or surviving as a truthful witness in America? My estimate would be never. This is really too bad. ...you will surely suffocate if you live in a vacuum."

I think projects like Make28 can be an important part of a creative life, creating connections with others working on different things, but with the same goal.

During these 28 days, I've also made some less obvious connections. Just the act of sitting down and making something every day has helped me to connect more with my creativity. Even if what I made wasn't that great or if it's not related to bigger things I'm doing, I know that what I'm making now will inform something else that I make in the future.

Here's a collection of the things that I made during February:

You can see more in my Flickr set. And the whole Make28 Flickr pool.

How do you make creative connections?

Oh, and Make28 will continue, so feel free to join in!

Creativity

Being part of the Make28 creativity challenge, has made me focus on making something every day. And that's got me thinking about creativity and all its forms.

So I've been extra sensitive to information about creativity and of course, I start seeing it everywhere, or at least I start paying attention.

I thought I'd share a couple of videos with you. They've been making the rounds, but perhaps you haven't seen them yet.

This is from Atlanta based editorial photographer, Zack Arias:


And this is a TED talk by Elizabeth Gilbert:


I'll be posting more soon.

Happy Valentine's Day

Make something!
make28.com

Make 28

One of my online friends, Consumatron, has started a "make something every day" challenge for February, called Make 28:



So watch the video for inspiration and then make something. Anything. And then send him a link to what you make. Go to consumatron.net and leave a link in the comments. Send him an email at consumatron at gmail.com. Or follow him on Twitter.

Here's a preview of what I've been making so far:


You can see more on Flickr.

So what are you going to make?

Whine of the Week

I've been unmotivated and even more prone to procrastination lately. I've been complaining about it and moping around and procrastinating even more. But of course I know what I need to do.

I guess it always goes back to fear - fear of failure - fear of looking stupid. I always let my perfectionist tendencies get the best of me. I want things to be right, and if something can't be perfect, then I tend not to do it at all.

Blah blah blah...

So I'm hoping that maybe posting about it will help snap me out of it!

Exhibit in Oklahoma!

reception at the Leslie Powell Foundation Gallery, January 10, 2009

I can't believe I forgot to post this!

My solo exhibit, Seeking Shelter, is on display at the Leslie Powell Foundation and Gallery in Lawton Oklahoma until February 28, 2009.

It's probably the last time I'll exhibit this work all together in this form. I still want to continue this series, but I don't know that I'll actively pursue exhibitions with it any more. It's already been in several venues across the country - Kansas, Georgia, Iowa, Nevada, and 2 venues in Oklahoma.

As you can see from the first photo, I installed a miniature version of my hanging spiral tornado. The full version includes almost 200 small tornadoes. This one only has about 30.

If you're near Lawton, please stop by and check it out!