J. Wall's Creations

Our good friend, Jeffrey Walls was born on the Eastern Shore in Dover, Delaware. He grew up in Sudlersville, Maryland and also lived and worked in Washington, D.C., for a number of years. He eventually relocated to Southern Virginia.

With a Master’s Degree in Engineering, he has always been involved in drawing, design and development.

Over the years, he began applying his talent to various media and crafts. He has won several awards for quilt making and quilt pattern design. He has also developed a knack for wood crafting and painting on wood, as well as leather crafting and other craft media. Most of his work is inspired by nature, particularly by an interest in birds and wildlife.

Please visit Jeffrey's website and his Facebook page and let him know what you think of his work. He is always looking for comments and suggestions.

Here is one of his beautiful quilt creations.

Artworks by Julia

Julia Sweda is a Tile artist offering custom wall tile murals, decorative tiles and kitchen, backsplash, bathroom or shower tile art that are original, unique and made-to-order.

Every tile is custom hand painted on ceramic, porcelain or glazed clay tiles. Julia's tile art can also be used outdoors because it will never rub off, wash off, fade or be affected by heat. Decals or photo transfers are never used.

Julia uses her artistic eye and years of experience, along with her client’s input, suggestions and ideas to create beautiful, original decorative tile art and ceramic tile murals.

Please drop by her website and take a look at her stunning work.

"Red Mountain"
Phoenix, Arizona
installed

Leslie H. Evans: Artist

Leslie is self-taught and created most of the images on her website using colored pencil. However, after completing a recent piece that incorporates both colored pencil and acrylics, Leslie has decided that she might like to concentrate more on the latter medium in the future.

Leslie has enjoyed success both here and abroad with media specific international exhibitions sponsored by both the Colored Pencil Society Of America (2011: Exceptional Merit Award) and its British counterpart the United Kingdom’s Coloured Pencil Society (2007: Picture of the Year).

Leslie has also done well with open media competition in the wildlife genre, including a People's Choice Award (2010) from the David Shepherd Wildlife Artist of the Year competition and an Award Of Excellence (2009) from the highly esteemed Society Of Animal Artists.

In addition to being a multiple finalist in the Animal/Wildlife category of Artist's Magazine's annual competition, Leslie has had a piece featured on the cover of Florida Wildlife Magazine (2009) which subsequently won a Charlie Award (2010) from the Florida Magazine Association for Best Illustration.

Her work has been on display at the San Diego Natural History Museum (San Diego, CA), the London Mall Gallery (London, UK), the Wildlife Experience (Parker, CO), the Dunnegan Gallery of Art (Bolivar, MO), the Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum Of Natural History (Norman, OK), the Rolling Hills Wildlife Adventure (Salina, KS), the Green Acres Art Center (Cincinnati, OH), the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum Art Institute (Tucson, AZ), and the Charles W. Eisemann Center (Dallas, TX).

Currently, Leslie is a signature member of the Colored Pencil Society Of America, the Society Of Animal Artists, and Artists For Conservation.

Please check out her website and Facebook page. Her work is exceptional!

New Artist's Link for Shafranski Art

Mark Butler

Mark was born and raised in Southeastern Oregon near the Idaho border and began drawing at an early age. While growing up, he spent a great deal of time camping and fishing in the mountains of Central Idaho, which is where he developed his love of nature.

By age thirteen he had taken up bird watching after going on a few outings with a friend whose brother was working on his Biology thesis. 
It was at this time in his life that he combined his love of art with his love of wildlife. 

At the age of sixteen he joined the Treasure Valley Artists Association and was their youngest member.

Mark works primarily in Acrylic on Clayboard.  This allows for a high level of detail and color.  He also works in graphite, pen and ink and colored pencil. 

Mark continues to enjoy bird watching and has had the privilege of birding with David Allen Sibley, noted author of the Sibley field guides.
   
“My goal as a wildlife artist is to capture the beauty of nature.  I paint what I see. To me nothing is more artistic than nature's perfect form.  I work from photographs, mounts, and field observations in order to accurately portray my subjects.  I combine realism with subtle impressionism to create the feeling of depth in my paintings.”

Mark’s painting techniques are self-taught. His favorite surface to paint on is the original smooth Clayboard because of its lack of texture. By using the smooth Clayboard, he is able to paint as much or as little detail as he wants.

Check out Mark's Facebook page to see his stunning work. 

New Artist's Links

Over a period of a few days, I would like to discuss some of the artists that we have recently shared links with on our website. All of these artists are very successful in their respective forms of art. We hope you will enjoy reading about them and seeing some of their stunning work.

Yvonne Herd Arrowood

Yvonne Herd Arrowood is a resident of Greenville, SC and is primarily an oil painter, specializing in portraits and Old Master reproductions.

Her love of art started at the early age of three and she has never lost the excitement she feels when beginning a new painting. She loves color and shapes, shadow and light, human faces and paintings that create an emotion or tell a story.

When Yvonne was a child, Robert L. Bruns, a portrait painter and dedicated teacher, gave her two weekly classes with the adults in exchange for cleaning his studio. As a “shop-girl/apprentice”, Mr. Bruns patiently answered Yvonne’s many questions.

As an adult, she attended Covino's Old Master workshops. The discipline and structure of the classical academic method presented at the workshops complemented the excellent foundation that she received as a young teenager from Robert Bruns.

Growing up in Greenville, South Carolina, Yvonne attended Wade Hampton High School. She entered Central Wesleyan College (now Southern Wesleyan University) in 1965 and began a major in Biology and Chemistry. In 1968, she transferred to USC, graduating with honors from the College of Pharmacy in 1971.

After graduation, a pharmacy career and rearing three sons left little time for any art other than that which was conceived and executed in the mind. When the time came that she could return to “artistic pursuits”, her own personal “renaissance” began as she directed her study toward the concept of being taught, rather than intimidated, by the “Old Masters”.

Included in Yvonne’s portfolio are original portraits and reproductions of works from Botticelli to Bouguereau. Portraits include those of University of South Carolina professors Joseph LeConte, Dr. Robert Beamer, Dean Julian Fincher, and Dean Farid Sadik.

Yvonne has been the solo artist in many Carolina shows and her work has been featured in Cape Fear Arts Alive, The Greenville Journal, the Catholic Miscellany, the Palmetto Pharmacist, Southern Wesleyan University’s Focus Magazine, The Spalding Farm News Letter, Greenville News’ City People and WYFF TV.

In October 2004, Yvonne expanded her horizons by becoming a Louvre copyist. Continuing to study the masters, she painted on site in September 2005 at the Accademia Carrara in a Sister Cities International exchange between Greenville and Bergamo, Italy.

In October 2005, Yvonne again had the opportunity to paint at the Louvre, while her copy of Vouet’s Allegory of Wealth was on exhibit at the 2nd  Salon des Copistes du Louvre. Her copy of Vien’s “Sleeping Hermit” was included in the 3rd Salon in March 2008.

Yvonne’s version of Raphael’s Madonna Della Sedia was displayed at the BJU Museum and Gallery in an exhibit with her favorite childhood painting, Ribera’s Ecce Homo. The exhibit, Artspeak Demystified remained on display from March 2007 thru July 2008. During the final months of the exhibit, Yvonne was privileged to finish her own copy of Ribera at the museum, while her Madonna della Sedia hung on a wall a few feet away. .

In 2008, Yvonne combined business with pleasure as she painted on site at the BJU Museum and Gallery, copying portions of Boeckhorst’ Adoration of the Magi for an educational exhibit at the Museum and Gallery at Heritage Green. Her painting of Rembrandt’s Artist in His Studio was also exhibited concurrently at the same museum from April 2008 thru July 2009.

Christ in the Storm on the Sea of Galilee

Arrowood 2001 after Rembrandt  1633

Oil on Canvas 63” x 50”

A New Drawing!

My pen and ink drawing of the mare and foal is now finished! This one will be located in the Western Gallery on our website. The original is for sale, as well as, signed and numbered limited edition prints and note cards.

Please leave some feedback on our blog or on facebook. Let us know what you think.

Where do you get the packaging supplies?

When we decided to start Shafranski Art, we knew we had to have the kind of packaging supplies that would reflect a certain amount of seriousness and professionalism. We had a basic idea of what we needed but neither of us knew where to go. My wife did multiple searches but couldn’t find anything she liked.

We ended up in West Greenville at a small art show one Saturday and hit the jackpot! We met a local artist, Tom Stewart, who draws wonderful architectural pencil drawings. We started asking lots of questions about his printing and packaging. He very patiently answered them all.

We use Tom’s printer, Metro Reprographics, and have always been very pleased with them. Our mats are typically purchased from mister art. For a $25.00 annual fee, we can get some awesome prices! The fee is very much worth it! We purchase our backing boards for the prints and the bags for prints, note cards and bookmarks from clear bags. In a crunch, we have been known to purchase mats from clear bags, too. Everything we use to package our products is acid free.

Tom said he likes to help artists that are new to selling their artwork, whether on line or at art shows. So….  A HUGE thank-you to Tom!

We make it a point to try to pay it forward. We are very willing to answer questions that an artist or budding artist might have. This can be a tough business to get started in so if we can help in any way, let us know!

This is one of Tom's awesome drawings!
  

What type of paper do I use?

Through trial and error, I have done a lot of research into the best paper to use for pen and ink. I have tried a selection of illustration paper and boards, and different kinds of bond papers in differing weights, always white.

At present, my paper preference is a smooth 108 lb acid-free paper. It is made by Borden & Riley and is their #234 PARIS BLEED PROOF paper for pens.

This paper takes ink very well but I can’t  find it locally, so I order from dickblick.com. It comes in a variety of sizes, including rolls. I don’t use the rolls because my art work is not large enough.

When I started adding a little color to some of my work, I was a bit concerned about how the paper was going to take it. So far it has done very well.
 
I would suggest that you experiment with paper selections. It could be that you find something better for your type of drawing.