Trinidad in the news

The President is in Trinidad for the 5th Summit of the Americas, and I wanted to share what a big fan I am of the island! I won The Don Eckelberry Scholarship award in 2004, and have since had many wonderful experiences in Trinidad, and am constantly being inspired by it. The wildlife, the people, the culture, the climate and the food (Doubles for breakfast is one of many, delights)! During my first trip, I spent the majority of time at Asa Wright Nature Center, and was blown away by the amount of bird-life, butterflies and a variety of other animals there. I saw over 100 new species of bird during my first trip to that beautiful island. There is far too much to put on a single blog entry, so expect much more to come...

Photos: Purple Honeycreeper (top) and "89" Butterfly © Beatrice Bork

Dreams of Spring

I thought it might be nice to post the process of this painting from sketch, mid-way and completed. Although this is simplified to 3 steps, I think the process is evident. I actually begin with several sketches of what I'm intending, and then work on making a cleaner and tighter version. When I get what I think is the right placement and accuracy (1) I transfer it onto my watercolor surface and begin to paint (2). In this case I worked on keeping some of the surface of the paper free from any paint, for the snow, and carefully built the layers of watercolor until I reached the desired effect and finished painting (3).

"Dreams of Spring" © Beatrice Bork 2009

One month to go...

It's one month until the opening of my next show. This show will feature Joe Kazimierczyk as well as myself. Joe and I both share a love of outdoors, and thus the show is called "Connections", he will be exhibiting landscapes, and I will have my animal paintings. It will be at Artists' Gallery, in Lambertville, New Jersey through the month of May.

The postcards arrived last week, and the reality of having less and less time is getting apparent. Today's plan is to work on framing and, of course, continue to paint (this will be the basic plan for everyday leading up until hanging the show).

The watercolor, Dreams of Spring, which I posted here is a of an Eastern Bluebird. I equate bluebirds to one of the early signs of spring, although I do occasionally see them through the winter. This piece was done in March, the painting reflects my thoughts that this is that last big snow before spring—its a heavy wet snow that will probably melt fast.

To find out more information on the exhibit go to: Artists' Gallery

"Dreams of Spring" © Beatrice Bork, 2009

Beginnings

Well, here I am, finally after much talk saying a blog could be a good idea. It's a little daunting to see a blank box and have to start writing something, where to start... A brief intro.: I am an artist, specializing in animals and work mostly with watercolor. Being that I am more of a visually oriented person, I wasn't sure how good I'd be at this, but I thought it could be fun, and might be a nice addition to the formality of the web site gallery. I'll be posting images, sharing stories and hopefully having some interactive dialogue... I'm currently working on paintings for a new exhibit in May, and will share more about that in the days to come.

Image: detail of "Surveyor" © 2008 Beatrice Bork.