This is my beginning work on a new graffiti collage composed with my photos from Italy. I found in Florence down a alley this funny little man braking out of his chains on the wall. The contrast from this newest art form and the ancient architecture of the city struck me as a interesting contrast as a subject matter. I started this on 24″ x 24″ board covered with foam core and watercolor paper as a base. I carved into the layer of foam core starting there applying my breakout man and adding architecture pieces from my photos. I then proceeded to add color with acrylics and some hydrocal pieces to look like parts of crumbling ruins which we did see everywhere in Italy. I will add more color and spray paints to this tomorrow and post pictures at the end of the day.

I am starting a new set of works to add to my recent “Graffiti “series of mixed media paintings. I saw this guy on a wall in Florence, Italy while exploring a back alley. I fell in love with him immediately and will be using him as my main subject matter in my next 24″ x 24″ painting on canvas and board. I will be changing the background wall color a bit as not crazy about the brown. Also will add more graffiti to him and wall will be longer carrying the design more across the work. I like the idea of him “braking out” from the wall and will play this up with textures and also some wall fragments made out of plaster. I will post final work mid August on my website and hope in the future to show these graffiti works together in a gallery exhibition. Four of my works will appear next in a exhibition at Northern Kentucky University Art Gallery in Highland Hts, Kentucky Aug. 23 – Sept. 24th. Opening reception August 26th. I will post times and link on my exhibitions page and also all upcoming showt his fall.

this is one of my latest works based on my reactions and feelings to exploring the 1910 LA Zoo ruins. Graffiti artists have been in these small crumbling spaces and added their art work to the walls. Light filters in in streaks from cage openings causing strange shadows to be cast in the spaces. I crawled through on hands and knees taking pictures as I went from space to space. It was a very strange experience but reminded me of cave drawings. Someday another person in the future might be digging and find these buried ruins and say, ” Wow the 21st century had some wonderful artists in it! I will be doing more of this series so hope you check back to this blog in the coming months.

“Boston Docks Graffiti”

Originally uploaded by joycehillstudio

I have been working on a body of work to do with graffiti for my next exhibition at the Indigo Gallery here in Buffalo opening on June 11th. I have up to this point been workin g with images taken by me while visiting LA this past Jan. Graffiti in LA is everywhere you look but harder to find in Buffalo. In my travels to other big cities I have also found graffiti and have started to examine through my work the differences between the east vs west coast. While in Boston visiting one of my daughters I took a walk along the docks and waterfront there. I immediately was captured by the ropes that littered the docks. Ropes were neatly rolled up with boats tied off and others scattered in random patterns all over the wood thrown aside. I find this visually as a form of linear graffiti. My exhibition in June will have a wall of four 24″ x24″ images to do on this Boston Dock “graffiti”. I plan on introducing lettering in this series too with spray paints also. I hope you come to my show in June but if not these images along with the rest of my work for this show will be posted in the coming weeks. Let me know what you think? Artists love feedback!

Polymer & Resin Results

Originally uploaded by joycehillstudio

Yesterday was my first attempt at adding a polymer resin finish on my work. I saw this process on many works at the recently attended LA Art Fair. Artists in LA go to surf shops and have professionals apply this finish to their works. We have no surf shops in Buffalo. I of course want to try it myself to see if it would be a good finish for my recent graffiti paintings I am working on. The way I work it is not really the best addition to my paintings due to the depth and additions I add to the surface. Most of the paintings with this finish were flat and a even surface where as mine can vary going up and down quite a bit. So yesterday I mixed up this material and tried just pouring it onto the surface of a older painting. I did this as a 50/50 mix and made sure I was in a well ventilated area as the fumes can be dangerous. I poured slowly starting at the lowest point on my work making sure the area was flat and clean. The excess that happened could be cut off after this process. It took about three hours to totally harden on a 24″ x24″ painting and not tacky to the touch. After seeing it on a actual painting I would like a square edge on the sides of the work. This was how the pieces looked in the LA show. They looked like a piece of eighth inch plexi glass was on the top. This means I will have to build a mold so the art sits within it tightly to get this results. This is a continuing learning process and once the mold is made with my husband’s help I will try again. My first priority is to finish the four works I am considering for this coating first. I will post my next experiment in a few weeks. If anyone has any experience with polymer resin please comment or write and share your experiences. Thanks!

DSCN2668

Originally uploaded by joycehillstudio

My recent trip to LA and the LA Art Fair 2010 opened my eyes to some new materials. Many of the artists in California are now finishing their paintings with a thin coat of polymer resin. I was told by one of the gallery curators there that this is done for them at surf shops. This is the same coating put on boards there to protect the wood. The material dries clear and is another way of protecting my collaged paintings without a frame. This practice has been used by photographers before but to my knowledge not by painters or mixed media artists. I am currently working on a graffiti series on a 24″ x 24″ frame with board, watercolor paper and foam core attached to it. My work has always included digging into the foam core, removing parts of it, and inserting photos or collage as the subject matter. I then have added acrylic paints, spray paints, and gel medium building a composition as I go along. The adding of this new material “resin” to the final piece has changed my work a bit. I can not dig down too deep into the foam core as it becomes hard to get a even coat of the resin on top, without bubbles forming around the deepest parts of the surface. I am now just going down a paper depth to add my subject matter. This forces me to explore other ways to get the depth to my pieces with acrylic or collage. I like a challenge! Images and more info on the pouring process of the resin tomorrow on this blog.

Yesterday was a day of exploring my images taken while in LA for subject matter, in my continuing series on graffiti. I printed out more than 30 images in various sizes and papers. I am a collage artist and therefore mix and match my images. It is like a puzzle to me fitting pieces together to get my idea across in the finished work. I look at color, shapes, and textures to put these images together. A graffiti artist with his spray paints approaches a building or wall in the same way. They are stating their feelings in words and expressions with spray paints and I on canvas am doing the same. I am also using polymer resin as a new material over the finished works. This is done on the west coast by surf shops. I am attempting to do this same process in my basement. I will have another blog on this subject in the future. Today my canvas is ready and I will be a starting the next process of adding and subtracting paints and images. I love this challenge.

This photo is one of many I took while crawling through old cages of the abandoned 1910 old LA Zoo. The location in Griffith Park where the new zoo is located was a wonderful trip through some of the best examples of graffiti I have seen to date. I am curious about graffiti and its impact on our lives. The visual impact of letters, colors, textures, and layers is to a collage artist like me a “feast” for my eyes. My daughter Alyssa who lives and works in LA found it for me. I will be starting on Monday my journey as a artist to take these photos and incorporate them into a series of new works for upcoming exhibitions this year. I also while in LA went to many shows the biggest being the annual LA Art Fair. This show I try to always attend as it feeds my need for new techniques on materials to use, presentation, and just what is happening in other art worlds besides Buffalo. I hope everyone on Facebook will check out all my photos from the old zoo and if your not my friend or fan check me out at joyce hill studio mixed media paintings to be a fan or Joyce Hill. I will be posting updates on this painting journey so check back! p.s. encaustics also will be in these new works so see how I approach using it.

Here I am in LA visiting and getting new ideas for my graffiti series of paintings. I love this city and the ideas for works I see everywhere. The city having many “tagged” buildings by gangs makes it very easy getting my creative juices flowing on the subject. This building downtown is a great example for a composition. The colors and shapes on the surface of this building I shot downtown seems perfect to me for my mixed media painting approach. There is no visual written graffiti on the building but plenty of visual stimulation in the colors and textures for me to add a tag myself in the finished work. I will be adding more images here that spark my imagination as a starting point for a great series of paintings.

I am excited to introduce my newest work combining the use of encaustics and collage. This past summer I attended a three day workshop at R&F Encaustics in Kingston, NY to learn about using wax in my work. I am always looking for ways to improve my work. I visit my daughter and the LA Art Fair every year and have seen encaustic as a medium used by artists there. Buffalo, NY has very few artists here using wax. Why, I do not understand, but plan with this series to introduce encaustics to our city. I started out purchasing the tools needed to get started with this process. The two most important tools are a aluminum hot palette and a electric skillet. The palette and skillet I purchased from Target. The palette you use for keeping your mixed colors in metal cups and your composition board warm. Sticks of colored wax, refined bleached beeswax, brushes, and boards can all be purchased from R&F Encaustics or many art supply stores online. You also will need a Wagner Hot Gun and a tacking iron which can be purchased at hardware stores. You began with the set up of all your tools. The grill and skillet must have a temperature gauge on it and both kept at 200 degrees. This temperature must be kept through the work process at all times to end up with the encaustic adhering to the board. I began this piece by having a work station set up on a folded table in my studio. This is a lot of preparation before you began to paint. I get the skillet and hot plate plugged in and up to 200 degrees first then put metal cups(R&F) on the skillet and part of a color stick in the cup beginning to create a color palette. I put my encaustic gessoed panel prepared ahead of time, (optional but like a white ground to work on), on the hot plate and heat it up. When you apply wax you must do a process called fusing and this is done by adding a clear layer of wax so that it bonds with the preceding layer. This is where the heat gun and tacking iron comes in that was listed in my materials at the beginning of this blog. I start by applying a clear coat of wax to the gessoed board then fusing with the gun or iron trying not to overlap your strokes to insure a even surface to work on. I will continue with photos of this process tomorrow. Questions? please leave them.