Category: Blog Posts

JordanCon Bound + Art Show Preview

I’m headed to JordanCon in ATL this weekend, which is one of my favorite local fantasy-centric conventions to attend.  The Art Show there is so warm and welcoming and I’m excited to share more of my Birthstone Goddesses there this year!  

My body of work grows and grows, this year’s showing at JordanCon now including a selection of the designs I created to be used as header images.  I haven’t added prints of these designs to my online shop (yet), so in-person events are the only place to buy them until I have finished rolling their print offerings out (slowly, but surely!):

I’ll also be showing off the original painting of Lady of September as my centerpiece this year!  She looks so stunning in the new frame that my Patreon Patrons helped me pick out last year.

I’ll also be displaying two of the limited edition masks I created for my Birthstone Goddesses, the mask of February and May!  Here they are as photographed by the talented WinterWolf Studios.

Finally, you can see a video of some of the mats I’ve embellished with ink and gold here:

Convention Inventory

For those attending this show who may be considering adding something to your collection, here’s a rundown of what I’ll be offering at JordanCon this year:

 In my gallery bay:

  • The framed original of “Lady of September”
  • Hand-Embellished Prints of 7 of the Goddesses
  • 4 matted open edition prints of their header designs
  • 2 of my hand-tooled Limited Edition leather masks

In the Print Shop:

  • 8×16 prints, 5 prints per Goddess representing each month of the year!

Unfortunately, I will not have a dealer’s table this year, but the Art Show staff will be happy to help you out with purchasing my art.  

You can also still come say hi to me in person at the panel on Livestreaming for Artists (Stream A Little Stream) which I will be co-hosting with fellow artists on Friday at 2:30 pm.  Feel free to come join us and/or chat me up after the panel!

—

If you cannot attend the show, I’ll be adding any unsold items to my Art Nouveau online shop, with the hand-embellished mats being made available exclusively through my Patreon Secret Shop. 

I hope to see some of you there!

Re-branding the Ladies of the Months + Project Roadmap!

My astute fans may have noticed I’ve begun referring to my Ladies of the Months intermittently as Birthstone Goddesses over the past few weeks. I’ve had some major revelations happen while prepping my project for a wider arena (ie. Amazon).

“Ladies of the Months” as a title was getting a lot of strange looks!  Some of the misunderstandings about the title have led to some interesting questions, including, but not limited to:

  • Does this have to do with menstrual cycles?
  • Does this have to do with erotic coloring books?
  • Does this have to do with erotic calendars?

Silly, you may say, but if the title of a project requires a lot of further explanation, doesn’t make a good impression, and is too generic to be easily found via search engines, there is a problem!  This is why I have opted for a couple of changes.

Re-Introducing the Birthstone Goddesses!

From this day forth, the LADIES OF THE MONTHS will be called the BIRTHSTONE GODDESSES.  Each individual Lady will still be the Lady of January, etc., but the set of birthstone ladies as a whole will now be referred to as BIRTHSTONE GODDESSES so that it is easier to understand and put out there in the world.

Who are the Gemstone Goddesses?

I’ve had a great number of requests for Art Nouveau styled Ladies who do not correspond to any birthstone, which got me thinking.  Why limit this series to only birthstones?  I have renamed the entire series to Gemstone Goddesses so that at some point in the future I can come back and add more without restricting myself!

Wouldn’t you like to see a Lady of Sunstone or a Lady of Moonstone?  I know I would!

The BIRTHSTONE GODDESSES will now be a subset of the GEMSTONE GODDESSES series as a whole!  Wherever you see the Lady of Eternity pictured above, she now represents both of these series who are now ALL part of the same endeavor to bring the beauty of Art Nouveau to the world through these thematic creations!

Where to Find this Project?

Now that my project has been undergoing some title changes, my social media outlets dedicated specifically to this project have been changed to match.  Please update your bookmarks:

Where Do We Go From Here?

Now that we have a brand new name and a whole ambitious set of items on the horizon, it was time to get this project organized!  Check out this roadmap I’ve created for the rest of the Birthstone Goddesses project in Trello.

(Click here for a closer look at the Birthstone Goddesses roadmap)

The biggest change to the agenda is that the wall calendar has been moved up to next year so that I can create some of the fun add ons like Enamel Pins that can be bundled with it.  I also wanted to make sure my Kickstarter launches were reasonably spaced out so as not to overwhelm everyone.

This Roadmap is subject to change, but we have a good place to start to make this huge endeavor more doable.   We’re going to make great things this year!  

Are you excited? I KNOW I AM!  I’m especially hyped to get these pins out (I’ll have some sneak peeks of the designs I’ve been sketching soon!).

Coming next – I’ll be announcing the new streaming schedule so you can drop in on me while I’m working on making all this magic happen!

Thanks for hanging with me through thick and thin, Patrons and Followers.  You are the best!

♥
– Ang

Re-branding the Ladies of the Months + Project Roadmap!

My astute fans may have noticed I’ve begun referring to my Ladies of the Months intermittently as Birthstone Goddesses over the past few weeks. I’ve had some major revelations happen while prepping my project for a wider arena (ie. Amazon).

“Ladies of the Months” as a title was getting a lot of strange looks!  Some of the misunderstandings about the title have led to some interesting questions, including, but not limited to:

  • Does this have to do with menstrual cycles?
  • Does this have to do with erotic coloring books?
  • Does this have to do with erotic calendars?

Silly, you may say, but if the title of a project requires a lot of further explanation, doesn’t make a good impression, and is too generic to be easily found via search engines, there is a problem!  This is why I have opted for a couple of changes.

Re-Introducing the Birthstone Goddesses!

From this day forth, the LADIES OF THE MONTHS will be called the BIRTHSTONE GODDESSES.  Each individual Lady will still be the Lady of January, etc., but the set of birthstone ladies as a whole will now be referred to as BIRTHSTONE GODDESSES so that it is easier to understand and put out there in the world.

Who are the Gemstone Goddesses?

I’ve had a great number of requests for Art Nouveau styled Ladies who do not correspond to any birthstone, which got me thinking.  Why limit this series to only birthstones?  I have renamed the entire series to Gemstone Goddesses so that at some point in the future I can come back and add more without restricting myself!

Wouldn’t you like to see a Lady of Sunstone or a Lady of Moonstone?  I know I would!

The BIRTHSTONE GODDESSES will now be a subset of the GEMSTONE GODDESSES series as a whole!  Wherever you see the Lady of Eternity pictured above, she now represents both of these series who are now ALL part of the same endeavor to bring the beauty of Art Nouveau to the world through these thematic creations!

Where to Find this Project?

Now that my project has been undergoing some title changes, my social media outlets dedicated specifically to this project have been changed to match.  Please update your bookmarks:

Where Do We Go From Here?

Now that we have a brand new name and a whole ambitious set of items on the horizon, it was time to get this project organized!  Check out this roadmap I’ve created for the rest of the Birthstone Goddesses project in Trello.

(Click here for a closer look at the Birthstone Goddesses roadmap)

The biggest change to the agenda is that the wall calendar has been moved up to next year so that I can create some of the fun add ons like Enamel Pins that can be bundled with it.  I also wanted to make sure my Kickstarter launches were reasonably spaced out so as not to overwhelm everyone.

This Roadmap is subject to change, but we have a good place to start to make this huge endeavor more doable.   We’re going to make great things this year!  

Are you excited? I KNOW I AM!  I’m especially hyped to get these pins out (I’ll have some sneak peeks of the designs I’ve been sketching soon!).

Coming next – I’ll be announcing the new streaming schedule so you can drop in on me while I’m working on making all this magic happen!

Thanks for hanging with me through thick and thin, Patrons and Followers.  You are the best!

♥
– Ang

March Wrap-Up: Health Updates, MOAR Coloring Book Updates, etc.

Happy weekend, all, and hello, hello to all the new folks who hopped on board my Patreon this month during my pledge drive!  Here’s my monthly update post to sum up what’s been happening around here in March.

I have happy news that my husband finished his radiation treatments in March!  His prognosis is a good one and in a few weeks we have a follow-up to learn how effective these treatments have been.  For now, we’re just breathing a sigh of relief and hoping that things can start getting back to a boring state of normal around here! (If I keep saying it, it will happen, right?)

Coloring Book Updates

Another major item I’ve been working on this past month is making a standard edition of my coloring book available to the masses!  This has proven more challenging than I anticipated, however.  

I was going to simply release a version of the book through Amazon’s printing service, but a good opportunity came up that would allow me to print a better quality version myself, so I’m currently negotiating this publishing path.  

There’s a LOT that goes into applying to be a vendor on Amazon instead of merely applying to be an individual seller, as well as printing considerations you must abide by.  Did you know that if your barcode isn’t scannable through your packaging or that if it is placed incorrectly that your book could be rejected and/or a vendor could be fined by Amazon?  No?  Me neither!  

I’m still doing research so I can make sure I do this right!  I’m hoping that when I’m done that it means my book will be available on Amazon for the easiest buying experience and that I would have even more reach than I would on my own!

Posts You May Have Missed This Month

New Additions to My Digital Library

Upcoming Appearances

April 26 – 28 – JordanCon 2019 – Come say hi to me in the dealer’s area and check out my original paintings in the Art Show!

—

With a sick hubby still suffering from radiation after effects and other backend tasks (preparing for taxes, getting my Patreon ready for Backerkit integration, etc.) I don’t have a lot of art to show from March, but I’m hoping to change that in April!   

Thanks to everyone who has been here even during the lean art times.  It really makes a difference in our lives, especially during these trying times which we’re hopefully coming out of now!

Much love and inspiration!

♥ – Ang

Ang’s 2018 Summary of Art

The end of the year and the beginning of a new year is always an introspective time for me.  It’s that time where I look back and take stock of where I’ve gone and look forward to where I’m going!  I wanted to take you all on a tour of this year’s greatest hits.  It’s been a pretty prolific year for me, artistically!

JANUARY – Anko’s Determination

 

Anko, my Warlock Tiefling who loves to bake, came onto the scene a few years ago for my husband’s Dungeons & Dragons campaign and I’ve loved watching her grow from meek young girl to a strong capable mage.  This image represented a pivotal moment in her development where she and the party faced off with an enemy that had no regard for innocent lives.  Anko learned to fight for what she thought was right and that she was more capable than she realized!  The resulting drawing of this moment flowed out of my pencil without much effort and remains my favorite drawing of Anko.

FEBRUARY – Lady of October Thumbnail Sketches

The next few months were consumed with research and study for the Lady of October, starting with her thumbnail sketches. This Lady was a bit different from her sisters in that she was much more mystical.  I agonized for a long time making a composition that was different enough from Lady of November, who also had a similar holiday theme in the Day of the Dead, while this Lady is more Samhain.

MARCH – Lady of October Fashion Design

More Lady of October! She was a unique challenge with her billowing sheer outfit and I deliberated a long time trying to nail down her look.

APRIL – Lady of October

The Lady of October finally arrived!  I experimented with gray inks for the first time with this piece trying to find a way to create mist and subtlety with pen and ink.  She also marked the completion of the Ladies of the Months main series of paintings, one of my major accomplishments for this year!

MAY – Ladies of the Months Headers

May was a prolific month!  I Kickstarted the Ladies of the Months coloring book while feverishly creating all twelve header images to boost the campaign.  It felt good to take the completed designs for the Ladies that I had agonized over for years and just have good fun with them!  Lady of December’s header was my favorite from the bunch, but you can see all twelve here.

JUNE – The Lady of Slaughter

Created for a Patreon request, this sketch allowed me to draw on an old love for Egyptian mythology that I had never really expressed in art before.  It felt good to return to these beloved stories from my childhood and indulge in that old love!  

JULY – The One Who is Above

The Egyptian sketch requests from my Patreon Patron continued resulting in some of my unexpected favorites from this year!  You can see the whole triptych of Egyptian gods here.

AUGUST – The Rose Seelie

This month saw the creation of the Rose Faeries, my pair of cards for the Olde Fae card game based on Old Maid.  It also marked a glorious return to creating more fantastical images, which I had been sorely missing!

SEPTEMBER – Fury of the River Goddess

Sometimes those quick sketches just work out!  This request for a Patreon Patron’s river goddess made me realize this is the kind of thing I want more of in my RPG/Game portfolio and also showed me what strong shapes and contrast can do in a composition.  The rest of this month was spent converting the Ladies headers from the previous month into line art for the coloring books extra pages.

OCTOBER – The Little Ladies of the Months

October was another flurry of productivity creating extra art for the coloring book!  Lady of September here was my favorite of the bunch as I felt had the best balance of a dynamic pose and filling up the space of the medallion in an interesting way.  You can see the whole set of twelve Little Ladies I created during this month here.

NOVEMBER – Anko’s Determination (Colored)

I realized during this month that I had fallen into a slump.  I was really burnt out after working on so much material for the book and it had been a very long  stressful year with my husband’s cancer diagnosis in August and hospitalization for heart problems in February.  Whenever my morale is low, I turn to games and original characters who always lift my mood.  After spending several months ignored, Anko finally got her first ever colored portrait!

DECEMBER – Exalted Secret Santa

The burnout slump continued and I’ve been trying to take it easy this month to enjoy life and family!  Doing the Exalted Secret Santa every year has been such a fun way to connect with one of my favorite fan communities and cool tabletop universes. It’s always exciting to see how my partner interprets my characters, as well!  You can see what my Secret Santa partner did for me here.

Finally, here we have a montage of nearly all the art I created in 2018!

 

What’s Next?

It’s funny that while I was very productive this year, I still feel like I didn’t do enough!  There were a lot of days spent forcing myself past those mental slumps feeling like everything was a disaster because it was supposed to be easier or finished long before it was or I wasn’t ‘strong’ enough to work past my mental blocks and tiredness to make more than I did. 

I have to remind myself that I am not a machine and that sometimes life is going to get you down.  It’s ok to spend your time with loved ones instead or work on a personal piece to make yourself feel better.  In the end, well-being is more precious!  A hard lesson for this workaholic who was always taught that my self-worth lies in my productivity levels.

Next year, I’m very much looking forward to exploring the more conceptual paintings I have planned for the Ladies and diving deep into that fantastical element I’ve been hankering for in my work!  I also want to get back to studying more, as I feel I’ve really let my fundamental skills languish.

I have a lot of exciting art goals for 2019, but I’m going to save those for a New Years post!

I hope you enjoyed the tour of this year’s work!  What was your favorite piece of mine this year?  Did you create any favorite pieces of your own?  Let me know in comments!

Much love and inspiration!

– Ang

[VIDEO] Studio Hangout OCT 2017 – Kickstart Art Review, Inktober, and My Favorite Author

Check out my latest wrap-up video for October. I fear with every video I share, the more of a dork I reveal myself to be!

Featuring the following things:

– My thoughts on the Kickstart Art seminar with Stephanie Pui-Mun Law and what revelations I had from it.

– An epic level geek out about Kushiel’s Dart which I was nearly hesitant to share online, but it’s on the internet now.  Oh well!

– Pumpkin Spice shenanigans.

– Plus aaaaart!

Various Art Nouveau artist of lesser acclaim.

Did You Know? Unknown Nouveau

If you’ve been enjoying my Ladies of the Months series thus far, you might also enjoy the series of articles I’ve been writing here on Patreon called Unknown Nouveau.

While Mucha is one of my strongest influences on this series, there are so many wonderful artists who emerged from the Art Nouveau movement during its prime between the 1880s and 1890’s.

The Unknown Nouveau articles focus on artists from the movement you might not have heard of, many who are also female artists who simply did not get the same attention as their male counterparts. I wanted to feature some of these lesser-known artists, as well as inspire and educate myself along the way.

You can start browsing my current Unknown Nouveau articles here.

Enjoy and let me know if you’ve heard of an unknown Art Nouveau artist who you think I should feature OR if you discover someone new from the articles who you think is amazing!

MINI TUTORIAL: Art Nouveau Hair

I did a panel on how to draw Art Nouveau style hair at JordanCon this past and thought I’d share the info and results of what I drew there live!  

DISCLAIMER:  This is by no means the definitive guide of Art Nouveau hair, but my own interpretation!

Inspiration Sources

If you want some gorgeous hair to get your creative juices flowing, check out the art of Alphonse Mucha and any number of the artists I’ve mentioned in the Unknown Nouveau article series.  I also have several favorite study sources up at my Art Nouveau resource page.

Before You Begin…

Think about your concept.  Art Nouveau isn’t all pretty ladies and flowy lines. Much of it has deep symbolic roots.  What visual elements or symbols could you tie into your piece?

Art Nouveau at its visual core is about flowing lines, graceful curves, and aesthetic design, in addition to the spiritual and symbolic roots of the movement.

Source: I used an image from this evocative set of stock art by ArtReferenceSource  as a base for the figure in this tutorial.  Check out the rest of his gallery for even more amazing poses for use by artists!

The Bad Example

I made this bad example by randomly drawing lines (and even then, it was really hard to make that beautiful base pose look bad!).  I consider this an ineffective use of the Art Nouveau style because it is directionless, does not serve the compositional flow, and generally just looks a mess! 

A Good Example

Now this is better!  You don’t necessarily have to have the hair of a figure flowing out everywhere in your composition.  This approach shows that you could have a more subtle stylized and graphic take on the hair where it has become more of a decorative shape than a realistic object.  

Perhaps she is a river goddess and her hair has become the flowing waters?  Perhaps she is a volcano goddess and her hair has become lava flowing down the mountain?  Weaving the hair into your background elements is one way you could bring in interesting visual elements and symbols!

Another Good Example

Here we have a more traditional take on Art Nouveau hair where the lines of the hair all curve back into the face, the heart of the piece, in this case.  Nearly every line in the image is smooth, curving, and gentle.

I’ve also abstracted the ends of the hair into curly decorative strands, which is another very specific quirk of the Art Nouveau style that you’ll see Mucha and his students use a lot.  These curly ends add a decorative touch to the hair that’s a bit more interesting than just ending the hair.

I’m sure I could write more about this topic, but I’m ending this tutorial here before it becomes a book!  I hope it gives you some basic ideas of what to do with your Art Nouveau style hair.

Do you have any favorite examples of Art Nouveau style hair? Share in the comments area, as I’d love to see them! 

Unknown Nouveau: Jane Atché

Featuring another unsung artist of the Art Nouveau movement, French artist Jane Atché .  I couldn’t find much about Atché, other than that she was a pupil of Mucha, Jean-Paul Laurens and other artists while studying at the Julian Academy of art in Paris.

The influence of Mucha definitely shines through with her decorative and compositional flare.  Atché brings her own sense of fashion and elegance to her figures.  I only wish I could find a broader collection of her work!

See more artists in this article series here .