Last weekend I attended a 2 day mixed media encaustic workshop at Coast Collective taught by Tony Bounsall. While I have dabbled with encaustics, I have not really experimented as extensively as I wished. The workshop gave me the hands on experience and the expertise of the teacher and the example of the 6 other students for inspiration. And that’s why I take workshops – for the experience, the inspiration, the community and the connections. The connections have to do with connecting back to myself and my art process as well as connecting to others. My experience was especially rich – I was invited to a local weekly art gathering in my rural neighborhood described as ” a space for anyone to come and either work on their own projects, with company, or try something new. This is art time, social time, play time, learning time…” and I also found (again nearby) a program to help me get fit that is clicking for me – it’s called Nia and is “a practice that draws from martial arts, dance arts and healing arts” which I experienced as a lot of movement, stretching and sweating.
Back to the encaustics – I also used a propane torch with my pieces in the workshop as opposed to a heat gun, which was what I was using before. I love the torch! I feel like I have more control and things don’t blow all over the place. I did have to be careful I didn’t set anything on fire and I was fairly successful, just a light scorch on the edge of some tissue paper.
Part of my encaustic experience: 3 test panels
Catch up: I’m still working on revisions to my poems and hope to have something I can submit in the next few months. I have clay projects on paper but not yet in my hands and I will still be experimenting with encaustics. A busy spring, leading into a busy summer with my daughter’s wedding in August.
It sounds like a wonderful and valuable experience!
I love your panels. It’s hard to believe they need more work. They’re gorgeous!