Crystal Neubauer, Artist

Thursday, June 14, 2018

Just The Wax - Nothing But The Wax

Just The Wax and Nothing But The Wax

Join me in studio for an Encaustic Wax Intensive workshop weekend, featuring tips and techniques designed to ignite your creativity through the use of hot encaustic wax medium.

Day 1 will be demo heavy, with plenty of studio time for you to practice. The basics of setup, safe practices, and simple techniques will be covered early so even the novice to the craft will feel comfortable as we launch into the exciting possibilities that the medium presents in both a traditional and non-traditional application.

Day 2 will find us expanding the scope and potential of the waxy medium with more demos and plenty of studio time to practice what you've learned and the freedom to interpret to your own style and preferences.

Registrants can sign up for a Saturday or Sunday only option, but the full weekend is recommended to gain an understanding of the depth of the encaustic medium's potential. Demos will include layering, incising, accretion, embedding paper elements and objects, applying surface design, underlayers, texture, color, fabric, 2D and 3D application and more!

Embed paper or objects

Incise lines and details

Discuss and explore alternative substrates and foundations

Each one day class will be jam packed with tips, ideas, and techniques that are sure to inspire, while leaving you with plenty of hands on working time. Projects can be customized and break out demos may be given for requested techniques as time allows.

See details and registration information below:

Explore accretion and layers

Where: My studio in Racine, WI
When: Saturday August 25, Sunday August 26th 2018
Time: 10:00 - 4:30

Supply List:
2" deep (or more) 4" or 6" canvases
Several flat and/or cradled panels - up to 12" on either side
Personal collection of collage elements, fabric, and alternative materials such as cardboard, tea bags, and found objects
small cardboard or chipboard box
toner based photocopies for image transfer (reverse image if text is included)
2" hake or encaustic paint brush
disposable gloves
baby wipes
supplies or material you are interested in combining with your wax

Thursday, May 31, 2018

SOLD OUT—-Ephemera Pack Presale!

SOLD OUT - SOLD OUT - SOLD OUT - SOLD OUT - SOLD OUT - SOLD OUT - SOLD OUT - SOLD OU

Please read the description thoroughly if you are uncertain what an Ephemera/Paper pack for collage and mixed media art would contain.

Due to the length of time it takes to gather the material, separate it, sort it into piles, prepare it and collate, pack it into individual packs, etc., I typically only offer these packs for sale once a year and have a limited quantity to share.

The items you will receive will be similar to what you see in these photos and description, but these photos were taken during a previous purge.

This listing is for one pack of ephemera and collage material for you to use in your own mixed media work.

Each pack contains all unique, original items culled from my own studio, items that I use in my own work every day - which represent over a decade of hunting and scavenging for material.

No reproductions. Thus, each pack may be similar in nature but will contain unique items. The majority of the material is 40-100 years old. A few pieces are new or newer vintages. Packs are 125+ individual pieces of material in a range of sizes, from scrap to full page to multiple page spreads.

Please read the description carefully to understand what the pack you are purchasing contains. I am unable to do special request or customized packs.

Each pack includes a ton of book pages salvaged from at least 60 different sources including or similar to:

Dictionary
Vintage Fiction
Antique School Books - Grammar and Secondary School
Foreign Language
Poetry
Old Legal, Government, and History
Almanac
Typing Manual
Cook Book
Health Books
Math
Religious
Science and Geography
Children's Books
Music
Architecture
Patent Applications
Year Book
First Aid

These pages will include:
Many images and/or engravings - each pack contains unique original images and will be different then what is shown in photos, but of the same quality.
Sheet music and pages
Sections of large maps, or full page maps from books.
Some items in the pack may have the previous owners handwriting or doodling
Several are from the mid to late 1800s

The pack will also include items such as:
Tissue paper or sewing patterns
Vintage Lined notebook, graph, or stationary papers
Envelopes
Pieces of handmade or mass produced paper that I purchased for it's compatibility with vintage papers
Signmakers letters or numbers
Scraps of Book Covers or spines
Greeting Cards
Postcards
Magazine pages
Photographs- may be color or b&w, portrait and snapshots, people, scenery, animals, or inanimate objects, Polaroid or antique, school photos or wedding, etc.

The pack will include a bag of small items such as:
Stamps
Labels
Negatives or Slides
Antique Playing Cards
Miscellaneous scraps and collage bits too yummy not to include

All of the material in the packs are original. Most is 40 - 100 years old and as such may be worn, torn, aged with patina, stained, spotted, wrinkled, crinkled, written on, taped, cut into pieces, or just generally perfect for collage. These are the very imperfections that I seek out when I shop for new material to use in my work and I hope you will enjoy and embrace them too!

SOLD OUT! Thanks for checking!

Friday, May 25, 2018

Date and Format Change for Brush-making and the Art of The Mark

Brush Making and The Art Of The Mark Workshop and Open Studio Event

Saturday and Sunday Dec. 1-2
10am - 4:30pm

Come on out to the 16th Street Studio Open House on Saturday December 1st for a 10am to noon self guided tour through the building during the holiday open house. Meet all the artists and check out the studios. Stop at Chez Bob's on the second floor for lunch, (or bring your own and eat in my studio). Then gather in my studio on the 3rd floor at 1pm to spend the afternoon learning two different techniques for crafting brushes from found materials. *Supplies are included. Focus will be on both the aesthetic beauty of the brush and of the beautiful marks it may contain.

Sunday morning instruction begins at 10am on the art of mark-making - complete and use the brushes from Saturday if you choose. A variety of other mark-making tools and supplies will also be available to use in the class. Through a series of mark-making exercises, learn to let go of the inhibitions that block your creative freedom and turn your intuitive energy into a visual language. These marked papers can be used in your own art practices in a variety of ways, which we will discuss throughout the class.

Follow This Link For Registration

Thursday, May 10, 2018

On SOFA 2018 and Acting On Your Dreams

Hello dear friends!

If you didn't catch it in the last newsletter, or over on Facebook, I have some exciting news to share with you! I have been invited to participate in SOFA Chicago Expo (stands for Sculptural Objects and Functional Art and Design) held at Navy Pier in November each year.

To participate in this show has been one of my long term big career dreams. I’ve been attending as a spectator for the past ten years and every year I take note of specific galleries that I believe my art would fit, dreaming of one day maybe being repped by one and then maybe I would get to see my own art in such an outstanding show. But it was not even on my radar to expect such an opportunity to land in my lap this year!

An international gallery who has exhibited at SOFA since 2000 sent me an email inviting me to show my work with them for this years exhibit- and as a fun little extra, when I looked at my past catalogs to see who they’ve brought before, I found that I had bookmarked their page in the 2010 catalog. Maybe I had a premonition. Maybe it was a prayer I said and long since forgot about, but there it was, a little paper flag waiting to remind me.

Though I am receiving the invitation as a high compliment and affirmation of the work that I’ve done to achieve a level of professionalism in my art, it does require a monetary commitment for the booth fees from me.

I reached out to some of the past artists who have been hosted by this gallery in previous shows and received positive feedback, so I feel comfortable with the terms, but as an artist/entrepreneur every bit of extra has to be earned. There are no funds in the coffer right now for the unexpected, even though the unexpected is this thrilling.

I thought about it long and hard and realized I can’t let myself down by not trying. I have worked hard through so many challenges to get to this point. My heart yearns to see this dream come true.

So I’m going to do everything I know I’m capable of doing to try. I’ve discounted some of my work, and will continue to push registration for my studio events, and find other creative ways to raise the funds, because that’s what us creative types do. When push comes to shove, we buckle down and do the work and give each other a little cheer along the way!

Will you help me? I’m offering a discount on the art in my shop at this link to the tune of 25% off. There are currently multiple pieces from two different series available there. The discount will be calculated on checkout when you enter the discount code: SOFA2018

If you aren’t in the position to buy art, but want to help, can you share the link and discount code and maybe give me a little shout out?

With so much gratitude and love~Thank you

Open Studio/Mini Residency Dates In My Racine Studio

Open Studio/Mini Residency Dates In My Racine Studio

Join me in my studio for a two day mini residency. Open Studio/Mini residency is not a workshop, but an opportunity to work in a community environment on your own project. Each participant gets an entire table to spread out on and has use of my tools and many supplies while in studio, including encaustic wax. No formal workshop instruction is given, but I will be working alongside you on my own projects and am here to answer questions, do spontaneous demos, guide you in completing past workshop projects, and simply enjoy your company and conversation.

**As a fun bonus, some dates will include mini projects with pertinent supplies, which you are welcome to participate in during your residency at no additional cost.

Choose one or two day options.

For questions specific to the setup you need or any tools or supplies you would like access to, please email me at crystalneubauer@yahoo.com

Upcoming Dates:

Monday and Tuesday September 3rd and 4th

Monday and Tuesday November 12th and 13th
Immediately following Guest Artist, Karen Sako's Mixed Media Cold Wax Workshop, participants of this Open Studio/mini residency are invited to continue the cold wax play. Cold Wax and some supplies will be available to use for all Open Studio participants.

*This is an excellent opportunity to continue working in studio for participants of Karen's cold wax workshop, however, Karen will not be present and there will be no additional cold wax instruction during the Open Studio dates.