Gallery

Holly Days 2023 at The West Woods

Events, Gallery, Midjourney Images, Photographs, Portfolio, Suncaustics / By

(posted 11/15/2023)

On November 3rd & 4th, I was busy selling my art and jewelry during the Holly Days Artisan Boutique held at the West Woods in Geauga County, Ohio. I have done a couple markets per year since 2021, and this was another success!

The event ran a few hours on Friday evening and most of Saturday. This was the first time I used my new gallery wall (a white folding pegboard) which held many of my original pieces on cradled wood canvas. The table was then freed up to hold a few more larger works, some jewelry, and a white lighted tree decorated with ornaments.

All around me the other vendors had beautiful displays of some art and lots of Christmas themed decor and candy. It was great to get the holiday season rolling so soon after Halloween. My husband was kind enough to come along and help me unload, set up, and make small talk with everyone. He even picked me up a delicious burger from Manna Food Truck at the end of the night. He’s a trooper and I’m always so thankful for his help!

I debuted all thirty-one birds of the Birdtober 2023 project at the event and sold twelve of them. I even got some orders for more ornaments including a bluebird, two herons, and a monarch butterfly. Since I was asked to create these birds, I decided to list them on Etsy – currently there you can find the bluebird, the blue heron, and the hummingbird in the Ornaments section of the shop. They are made to order so if you want them for gifts, get your orders in soon!

I ran another art giveaway at this event. Two of those who signed up for my email updates got the chance to win their choice of Birdtober ornaments. One winner chose the common tailorbird, and the other chose the goldfinch. I sent those out this week. If you’re interested in getting my studio update emails (about one per month), click here to sign up. If you change your mind, it’s easy to unsubscribe.

Art that Sold

The art pieces that sold at Holly Days were quite varied in subject and process. Following is the bulk of them with a comment on each one – they are in no particular order.

“Woodland Raccoon,” 8×8 in. wood canvas. This is the 2nd or 3rd version I’ve done. People fall in love with the face of this masked creature.

“Generations,” 10×10 in. wood canvas. I like this one so much I want to do more versions of it in the future. Ever since I read about “Hibaku,” the ginkgo has been a favorite tree of mine. Click here to read more about Hibaku.

encaustic wax painting ginkgo leaves

“Hinterland No. 7,” 8×8 in. wood canvas. This is not a picture of the exact one that sold, but it is another one of which I’ve made multiple versions. I like to place the fox in different settings and keep it somewhat transparent and ghostlike.

“Lilies of the Valley III,” 8×8 in. wood canvas. This is a piece done with Midjourney AI. After covering it with wax, I embellished it with some oil pastel. I did a similar one which is quite popular on Etsy.

“Orphic Landscape I,” 10 in. round wood canvas. This was an encaustic painting I did using a Midjourney AI image as a reference. A lot of AI looks surreal and I think that aesthetic comes through clearly in this one.

“Summer’s Edge,” 8×10 framed. This one was hard to let go. It ended up selling before the show even opened! I absolutely love making suncaustic works and plan to do many more – they always seem to bring out the best of my creativity.

“Moreland Meadow No. 8,” 9×12 in. wood canvas. This landscape always made me think of Ireland since it somewhat mimics the colors of the flag. It’s got some gold and it’s just about to reveal a rainbow. Moreland Meadow was a favorite place of mine that was captured in a few photos in 2020.

These last three on 6 in. round wood canvas were part of a Female Bird Series I did last year. I painted them with watercolor, then covered them with encaustic medium.

As always, I’m very happy when people stop by and look and ask about my work. I’m so grateful to those of you who liked my work enough to take it home. If you ever see a piece you’d like me to recreate, or have a request for something new, please reach out to me via email: rachel@wolfpupstudio.com

Encaustic + Cyanotypes = Suncaustics

Cyanotypes, Gallery, Inspiration, Portfolio, Process, Suncaustics / By

(posted 10/14/23)

You’ve probably learned one of my favorite combinations in the studio is cyanotype plus encaustic. I refer to them as my “suncaustics” since cyanotypes are images developed with sunlight. I dedicated one of my first blog posts (linked here) to the topic of cyanotypes. Over the last couple years I have successfully used a few different techniques I’d like to share. As with other encaustic mixed-media art, the variations of these two media put together can really be mind blowing!

This piece began as a photo I had taken looking up at some trees in the spring while on a Girl Scout hike with my daughter’s troop several years ago. I made a digital negative of it and printed it on a clear plastic sheet, then made a cyanotype. After covering it with encaustic medium, I applied some orange and yellow alcohol inks to the surface, then fused it with heat.

The next piece was created with another negative photo I had taken of some of the plastic net bags used to hold onions, of all things. After I rinsed the cyanotype I knew it had to be an aquatic image since it looked to be underwater. I added an image of a koi on top, layered with encaustic and here’s the result. The man who purchased it reacted with so much admiration for it, I’ll never forget that!

The above pieces were part of the Beachwood Arts Council Small Wonders show in 2021.

This little bluebird began as a watercolor painting I did, then scanned it to make a digital negative. I added some metallic copper PanPastels then fused with heat. I love the simplicity and contrast of the copper, white, and dark blue. It sold at the 2021 Holiday Market at Reithoffer’s Gallery in Auburn Twp., Ohio.

This next piece was sold at a former local gallery MC Studio in 2021. They put out a call for art with the theme of the moon, and I got to work drawing seed pods of a lunaria plant aka money plant. I printed a negative of my drawing to create the cyanotype. After the encaustic medium was applied, I carved some lines and added metallic pastel to give it a pretty moonglow to go with the plant’s name.

The next suncaustic had a very humble beginning. Every spring I like to take a day and create a whole batch of cyanotypes from botanicals I find walking around my yard. Here’s what the sun print looked like as I rinsed off the developing chemicals.

I really didn’t like the print, so I covered most of it with powder and oil pastel. The resulting blue undertones of the green background and vibrant flowers were a wonderful surprise to me when I was done. It sold at the last Nature & Arts Fest at West Woods in Novelty, Ohio.

And this one was pushed a bit farther. I painted over the wax with some pink, green, and gold set in carved lines, then mounted it on another cyanotype image to give it a unique backdrop in the frame. The acid wash blue effect in this piece also keeps it really interesting!

My latest suncaustic was made from one of my backyard prints. I covered the white leaves and some of the background with oil pastel – I love the blue and green combo. Then to put more life in it, I painted some yellow leaf stems on the surface. The final framed piece is listed for sale on my Etsy site linked here.

I can’t wait to see what my mixed-media experiments in the studio will bring in the future – stay tuned!

Preservation

Events, Gallery, Inspiration, Motivation, Process / By

(posted 08/19/2023)

Encaustic medium is made from beeswax and damar resin. When working with the medium, I’m reminded of the connection to nature just by the sweet scent of it. I don’t keep bees, but looking at a photo similar to this one inspired me to pay some homage to the work of the bees.

Photo by pagala on Pixabay

I was not only struck by the beautiful pattern, but by the tones and contrast created with the empty and full cells. It got me thinking how the honeycomb itself embodies so much work and history of the bees that is so beautifully preserved by the structure and the beeswax.

In my studio, I keep boxes of antique books and periodicals which were left in our attic in our house in Windsor, Ohio. My dad’s family were descendants of the original settlers (Griswolds) that came from Connecticut to the Western Reserve in Ohio after the Revolutionary War. My late great great Aunt Sarah (Sade) Griswold was an active member of Windsor’s Historical Society and collected and donated many artifacts to the museum there. She also collected newspaper clippings which look as though they were gathered when she was quite young. She was born in 1886, became a nurse who never married, and lived to be 100! When I was a kid I used to poke around the attic and remember seeing many dusty letters, postcards, books, and photos but never really studied them. Now I take the time to really look at what Aunt Sade and my grandparents collected and think about why they thought them valuable enough to keep. Perhaps they were just hoarders? Perhaps they wanted their descendants like me to find and study them? I’ll never know.

So this piece began with some of the antique clippings from our attic. I scanned them to create digital copies which were then printed. As I cut the images from the copies, I was immediately placed in Aunt Sade’s shoes, looking closely at each clipping, literally reenacting her process. Once they were cut out, I decided to randomly paste them onto my wood canvas with no organization or reason – I suppose that represents the mystery that exists between her life and mine since I never knew her. I did not take a photo of this part – I really wish I had – but alas my composition will always remain a mystery as well since my next step was to cover the clippings in encaustic medium.

Once covered in the milky, slightly pigmented beeswax, I dusted areas of the surface with oil powdered pastels called PanPastels. I liked how they added to the mystery of what was hidden beneath the wax.

To apply the honeycomb pattern, I had first printed it onto paper then poked hundreds of holes with my needle tool into the surface, as shown in this process video.

The final step in the process was to choose some cells to carve out and reveal parts of the clippings underneath. Even though revealed, the images are still highly unrecognizable, strengthening the veil of mystery.


I called it “Preservation” since the beeswax will help to further preserve the history my Aunt Sade so fervently valued. I’m very happy this piece was awarded by the Geauga Arts Council, placing 3rd place in the Other Media category. It’s currently being shown at the West Woods Nature Center in Novelty, Ohio until October 3, 2023.

Heavy

Events, Gallery, Inspiration, Process / By

(posted 05/19/2022)

I’m very pleased to announce that my encaustic piece “Heavy” has been accepted in to the 12th May Show at Lakeland Community College in Kirtland, Ohio. The show runs from May 19 through July 15. Here’s a link to the Lakeland CC web site where you can see gallery hours along with the option to purchase the pieces in the show that are for sale.

Once in a while a piece will take on a life of its own, and that was really the case here! It began as a playful portrait sketch I did after watching Eschwan Winding create one of her beautiful figure drawings. I did the sketch with white pencil on a black background just to try something different. I liked it, but was not nearly satisfied – I continued to add some oil paint, then encaustic medium. I mounted it to a larger wood canvas, then covered it more encaustic medium, a crazy amount of texture, and then some panpastel matte and metallic pigments. Once the wax was slightly heated again, the oil based paint and pigments set in and became part of the medium.

“Heavy” by Rachel Rivas-Plata. Encaustic on Wood, 11″x14″ (2022)

The results incessantly interest me – the mysterious expression, various textures, bright orange hair against the dark, weathered background. There is also a subtle contrast between smooth and rough wax, and matte and metallic finishes seen as you move left or right of the piece. I deliberately compounded the 2 pieces of wood with the medium to seem as though they were one. She’s a bold and bright figure, and forever bound to some darkness and wounds, both physically and in her neutral gaze. 

I paid close attention to how the piece made me feel rather than how it looked as it progressed, which I find very interesting and gratifying. That signals to me that the art work transcended its physical state.

Here are some process photos and videos.

The initial sketch

The painting in process

After mounting to second wood canvas

Covering with encaustic medium

Texture in the cooled medium from brush strokes

“Heavy” by Rachel Rivas-Plata. Encaustic on Wood, 11″x14″ (2022)

The show at Lakeland’s Gallery in Kirtland, Ohio, runs through July 15, 2022.