It’s been awfully rainy ’round these parts lately, perfect weather for cozy-ing up in the studio with a hot mug of coffee, bringing some new friends to life on my canvas.

I brought my “real” camera & a tripod down to the studio, so I’m going to try snapping some progress photos along the way. I’d like to figure out how to make a quasi-time lapse video of my painting. I say “quasi” because I keep moving the camera around, so it won’t exactly stitch together seamlessly! May have to try that another time…

What’s your favorite miserable weather activity?

Another cute kitty portrait is also in the works. This one would look adorable paired with either Theo, the Siamese or my little white Chihuahua, Elroy:

Even in their not quite finished states, the pictures don’t do these paintings justice. I tend to finish painting late at night, so of course that is when I snap a picture with my phone. I really need to take more pictures with my actual camera & decent lighting. Oh, the convenience of apps like Instagram and instant emails to Flickr! They’ve made me quite lazy.

I finally managed to steal a few days from my hectic summer market schedule to devote solely to painting & it has been heavenly! Here’s a sneak peek at the end result, a new painting that has me quite smitten.

This new piece is a bit different than my usual style; I took a life drawing class this summer & I think that had an effect on the way this mysterious brunette’s features took shape. I really enjoyed pushing the paint around, playing with lots of layers & glaze & little abstract details in the background. There are small feathery strokes that look like tiny leaves along the right side & the bottom – the kind of brush strokes that make you want to run your fingers along each painted mark. The picture really doesn’t do her justice!

Alas, it is back to the markets this weekend for me, so I’m methodically assembling postcard packs & making lockets in preparation. I certainly don’t *dislike* doing that sort of work & I truly love all of the fun trinkets that I make featuring my artwork. But lately there has been a lack of balance in my studio where the making & selling of products has been 95% of my time. The act of creating new characters & of painting pictures has been sorely missed! It will be interesting to see who else springs to life over the rest of the summer.

Since the sun has (finally) come out to play on the west coast, I’m looking forward to some hot summer weekends ahead where being outside at the markets will be a joy. A thermos of iced tea, some fresh blueberries…perfect!

Saturday, August 6th ~ Robson Square Market
under the dome ~ Robson @ Howe
12-5pm

Sunday, August 7th ~ Britannia Artful Sundays
Commercial Drive @ Napier
12-5pm

She still needs to be scanned & properly varnished before I can offer prints or the original for sale, but soon enough she’ll be in the shop!

This particular painting & my disrupted process as of late has got me thinking about a question I get asked fairly regularly – how long does it take to complete a painting?

In this case? About a year.

The painting itself was completed in the span of 3 days. I did the background on 1 day. I painted the bulk of the girl & the crow the next day & then added more shadows & highlights & finishing touches on the 3rd after I’d had a chance to see it in the daylight.

But that doesn’t include the sketching part of the process. I’ve got a sketchbook full of bird girls, sisters of the very first Caging the Forest Bird. That doesn’t include the time to research source material. The internet certainly makes it easier to find pictures of things like crows, but I usually prefer thumbing through the illustration archive books I have collected that show detailed etchings of various animals. That also doesn’t include the years of practice & classes & study to develop my style. And I’m just starting out in my career! For a full time artist who’s been working for 20 years, it is the sum of his experience that is poured into each new work.

How many hours it takes to make something is often called into question when determining cost, especially with craftspeople. I think sometimes we forget all of those other hours, days, years spent allowing the perfect blend of ingredients to come together.

(For the record, I am in no way saying that my work is some kind of “perfect blend”. I love what I do & feel incredibly grateful that I get to do it for a living, but I’m fully aware that I’m still learning & growing as an artist. It’s just one of those art questions that pops up often enough that even *I* can recognize how infuriating it must be, especially to the Picassos of the world whose work can be deceptively simple.)

I finished up my tiny painting for The Pocket Show tonight & it felt incredibly good to dust off my paintbrushes. This summer has been filled with plenty of work, but it’s been either the locket-making, market sort or packaging orders/off to the post office kind. This is precisely why I enjoy signing up for group art shows. There’s often a theme & there’s always a deadline, which means I get to put painting at the top of my TO DO list. Hopefully one day my life will be structured in such a way that creating art always comes first. A lovely dream!

On to the show! The Pocket Show is a HUGE group of artists (close to 100) exhibiting some very tiny art – nothing larger than 4″ x 4″, to be precise. I have a bunch of ideas sketched out in my sketchbook (thank goodness! one does start to worry when it’s been a while…), but the small size restriction meant saving some of my ideas for larger canvases. Since I planned to work on a 4″ x 4″ wood block, I decided to go with a more illustrative style & really enjoyed drawing on the wood in detail. I will often do a vague sketch, but then go over all of the lines with paint, completely obscuring them. I’m quite pleased with the way my girl turned out & hope she’ll fit right in at the show.

Only Dates Men With Beards
graphite, acrylic on wood
4″ x 4″ x 1.5″

For more details or to RSVP for the show’s opening, check out the Facebook event page.

The Pocket Show
156 West Hastings (@ Cambie)

Opening night:
Sunday, September 5th ~ 7:00pm to midnight

Show runs until Sept 18th

Opening night of my show was on Friday, but if you missed it, the work will be displayed until the end of June. It’s kind of a strange space – the Plaskett Gallery is inside Massey Theatre, which puts on plays and performances and is in the same complex as a large high school. The night of my opening was a performance of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. So the gallery was very busy, then the show started – and everyone left! Well, except for me and my lovely supporters. A huge thank you to everyone who came out for my show. An even bigger thank you to the folks who bought me wine! hehe

Highlight of the evening – I was literally *just* remarking how stylish this older woman was in her peppy swing coat and high heels when I overheard her say (complete with dramatic hand gesture), “Well! I can tell you right now I wouldn’t want ANY of these!”

Bahahahaha! My jaw dropped & then I burst out laughing. She had no idea I was the artist & admittedly, she only looked at my Alice in Wonderland series, which are definitely more surreal & not everyone’s cup of tea. Still. So freaking funny.

Now that the show has opened, I figured I’d take the rest of the weekend off and finally get a chance to sleep in. Unfortunately, 9 a.m. instead found me hauling my butt to North Van so I could jury for a summer market. The good news is – I got in! The bad news is – the summer markets are coming up so quickly that I don’t see a day off coming anytime soon. Oh well! At least I can start working outside in the sunshine soon.

For a price list or information on purchasing one of my paintings, feel free to email me directly: acageybee@gmail.com

If you want to see more photos from the show, I uploaded a bunch to Flickr > here.

Finishing up a new painting tonight inspired by the book Where the Wild Things Are. I loved the book as a kid and wasn’t at all disappointed with the movie adaptation, unlike some other recent children’s books that have become blockbusters. Ahem, Mr. Burton, I’m looking at you.

While I thoroughly enjoyed painting those terrible yellow eyes, I did run into a bit of trouble while painting the edges of the canvas. I usually paint the edges a dark brown or whatever color works with the painting, so that you can hang it without necessarily needing a frame. Easy enough -except when you DROP the canvas on the floor. Face down, of course.

Fortunately it was *just* about dry, so I didn’t have a total mess on my hands, but I did spend a good long while picking dog hair out of
the monster’s fur. I was tempted to just leave it in there to add to the authenticity. Hehe

I got a new copy of the book a few months ago, an annotated collection with both Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass in one book, plus lots of odd little footnotes and interesting blurbs. Every few pages a new note goes into my sketchbook under painting ideas – walrus & the carpenter, caterpillar, drink me. I have pages and pages of sketches, but this month I finally started painting and I’m tickled with the results so far.

With the Tim Burton movie coming out in March, it was high time for me to get busy on my Alice paintings. I love Tim Burton and I’m so excited to see what he does with the story, but at the same time, I don’t want his version of Alice to influence my own paintings. Influence and inspiration are a tricky bunch.

We’re all influenced by other artists every single day. Even if you never set foot in a museum or gallery, art is everywhere. From movies and tv, to the graphic designers working on ad campaigns to the packaging you see at the grocery store – it’s unavoidable. And for the most part, that’s just fine. But with this…I don’t know. I’d almost like to do two sets of paintings – one pre-Burton and one post. Would make for an interesting experiment, no doubt!

Chances are I won’t have time for that little experiment though because I’ll be busy co-organizing a local Alice-themed art show (and tea party, of course). The details aren’t quite finalized yet, but I’m going to be putting a call out to artists very soon and my brain is bubbling over with ideas. I’ll need a costume too. Oh, this is going to be such fun!

Who’s your favorite Alice character?

I came home with fully recharged batteries and promptly began to push the paint around. I’ve been thinking about painting a skunk ever since my encounter with one a few months ago, but hadn’t sketched his companion until a few days ago. Happily this little gal popped up in my sketchbook and eventually sprang to life on my canvas:

She hasn’t told me her name yet (nor the name of her odiferous pet), but I expect she will soon. She still needs a coat of varnish and a good scanning before she’ll land in the shop, but keep your eye out!

I’m taking part in a group show opening this Friday at the Jem Gallery here in Vancouver. It promises to be great fun with a “Naughty, Not Nice” theme and art that is cash & carry, just in time for your xxxmas shopping. Heehee!

Since my girls tend to be more cute than sexy, it was an interesting challenge. I knew right away I wanted to paint a strong female icon, and give her the Cagey Bee treatment, of course. It ended up being a lot trickier than I would’ve guessed. I settled on the pulp era pinup girl style and came up with this sassy babe:

In the end, I’m really happy with the way she turned out. I’m not sure if she’s instantly recognizable, but I think she captures the sassy spirit of Bettie and the other pinup gals of that era. I’ll be coating her with varnish tonight and then she’s off to the gallery. If you’re in downtown Vancouver, go take a peek!