Important Note to my Lovely followers

Hello friends!

Some happy and sad news today...

I am leaving next Wednesday to serve a mission for the LDS Church. (That's the good news!!)

As of today, I will discontinue updating the blog and Facebook page, and will be closing the etsy shop on Tuesday of next week until September/October of 2014.

Keep browsing, and leave me comments/suggestions, but know that I will not be updating or checking the blog for comments until I return from serving.

I thank you SO very much for your support, love, and help.
It is extremely validating to an artist to know that their work and their style is appreciated (we'd keep painting, even if it wasn't, but when it is, it's AWESOME!!).

Thank you for everything and for loving my art.

Best wishes to you this coming year and next.

See you in 2014!

  -- Nicole

Hermana Laudie

As many of you know, there are THOUSANDS of women missionaries for the LDS church.

Some of these future Sisters have been posting highlights of other future sister missionaries on their blogs... check them out. 

I was actually featured today, but look through the archives - there are some amazing stories and uplifting experiences!!


Read the spotlight HERE.

Mission Countdowns

Well, there's currently an LDS Missionary craze...

and I'm one of the 'crazed' haha!!

So, the newest addition to the shop is *DRUMROLL*:

https://www.etsy.com/listing/124355528/personalized-lds-missionary-countdown

PERSONALIZED MISSION COUNTDOWN CHARTS!

Yay!!


Only $5, and you receive a computer file that allows you to print the chart AS MANY TIMES as you would like.

Know a missionary? Someone with their call? It's the perfect gift...

Check it out, if you have the time :)

I mixed it up a little... haha

So... I decided to see what would happen if I digitally combined two paintings in various ways. And, this is the result:

I think it's quite fun, probably more fun for me than for the audience, as I am the artist and I know the processes and differences that went into each of these :)

Anyhow, enjoy!! I might explore with better quality images and different pieces later...

Just Playin' Around

Well, I've been having fun with my camera lately... 

so I thought I'd post a couple photos to let you see what I was up to :)

Faces faces faces

So... I have this weird thing with faces lately... 

Abstracted, color-infused, kinda posterized faces. 

Don't ask me why. 

It's probably an artist thing: you just find something that appeals to your inner self, and you run with it until you figure out what it is that appeals to you about it, and then you take that and move on to better things.

Anyway, I decided to get on Gimp today and mess with some photos, which I thoroughly enjoyed although I felt they took too long (only about 20 minutes each, haha, talk about impatient). 

I'm thinking of using them as inspiration or references for some oil paintings. I used the same method to paint the photos that I use to paint with oils, so it was a nice little experiment "converting" manual skills to the digital sector of art.

I hope to take it a little further, but for now, I might mess around more with other faces :)

Any thoughts?

BEST OF 2012

Well, 2012 was an awesome year, art wise. Non-art-wise, too, but since this is an art blog... I'll keep that to myself.

Here are some of what I consider my best works from 2012. I definitely learned a lot this year, but had less 'finished' pieces than normal, so that was a little weird, but overall, I'm pretty happy with what I've discovered.

Feel free to comment, critique... I am open to all ;)  Enjoy!

2013!!

Well, the first painting of 2013 is officially up, and the new tab is there, too!!

And now, I will introduce *DRUMROLL PLEASE* the first painting of 2013:

"Mandala in Green, Purple, and Blue"

Background? One day I randomly felt like painting a mandala, and so I did. Pretty simple.
I'm probably going to do the same design but with different color patterns for the sake of exploring the effect of colors of a close proximity on each other and on the actual perception of the elements of the design. It should be fun, but a little bit of a pain in the... behind.

That's because mandalas (at least the way I learned how to make them) are created by taking either a sixth or an eighth of a circle (like a piece of pie) and creating a design on it. Then, you transfer this design to another paper by tracing one side, flipping the pattern, and tracing that side, then flipping it over again, all the way around the circle. Then, you shade it, paint it, whatever. All that tracing and flipping and painting seriously tests my patience ;)

The one I painted is extremely simplified compared to some mandalas out there: I'm pretty lazy. Maybe someday I'll get around to painting a really intricate one... but the problem is that I care much, much more about the color than I do about the form. Since I'm still learning I should really focus on form to get the concept down, but I'm not THAT self-disciplined.

Anyhow, I'd like to explore more with 'em. We'll see, I suppose...