Linda Mahoney Art

I took a break from the colored pencil paintings I am working on to create a 20x16 collage on a birch panel. I used some highly textured papers on the dove and wings of the angel. I had purchased some handpainted papers from an artist in Florida recently who was trying to raise money to help a friend avoid bankruptcy and I was able to incorporate some of the papers from that purchase. I wasn't happy with the hair on the angel and ended up using papers from a magazine and like the mixture of patterns I found. There are handpainted pages from the Bible worked into the collage in many places. Actually, there were even more of them on the wings of the angel, but I thought the color too dark and ended up covering them with thick, handmade paper. The next photo is a closeup of the detail. I have two colored pencil paintings I hope to finish by the end of the month so that I can enter them to the jury for the annual international colored pencil exhibit. Peace & grace, Linda

(You can click on the photo for a larger version of the picture.) This colored pencil painting was actually finished a week ago, but I have been waiting for a decent day to get a photograph of it. I prefer to take photos of the artwork outdoors but ever since finishing it has been very dark and overcast or the wind has been blowing like crazy. Today there was nice light and less wind, so I took this outside and got a photo of it. Hope you enjoy! I'm already at work on redwing blackbirds with roses. I've managed to get some good shots of the Eastern bluebirds this past week, so they will be appearing soon, too. I was able to work outdoors on this painting several days and enjoyed the great natural light and pleasant weather. All the best! Linda

I completed this colored pencil painting yesterday, photographed it and uploaded it, along with the cypress tree painting, as entries in the CPSA 2009 Int'l Exhibit. Last year was the first year they accepted digital entries, but I didn't enter last year. It was nice not having to deal with taking slide photos with the 35mm camera, but on the other hand, what I see on my computer monitor is not what I see when I look at the actual painting. Then, how do I know what the judges will see on their monitor? My colors look washed out to me on my monitor. Since the judges only get one impression of your work, that feels risky to me. If I had better techie skills I suppose I could calibrate my monitor, but alas that is not my forte. So I continue to muddle along. I used some of the Neocolor II crayons when working on this picture along with heat. I didn't discover that combo until I was almost finished. Now I am anxious to give that another try. I took over the glass topped range ...