January's Member Meeting Info and Other Interesting Bits

Member Meeting:

This is a reminder that our first meeting of 2012 is next Sunday, January 29th at 1:00pm at the Golden Public Library, 1019 10th Street, Golden, CO 80401. Libby Kyer is going to give a hands on demonstration of how to use the RMSBA blog and the ASBA website for your art. You may bring your laptop if you want to, but it is not required.

Refreshments will be provided.

RMSBA dues are due!. They need to be sent to national by the15th of February in order to have your name listed in the ASBA member directory. You can bring them to the meeting next Sunday or mail them to Terry Ruiter. Please provide any changed contact information as well.

If you have any artwork that you would like to share with the group, please bring it! A time will be provided after the demonstration for "Show and Tell"!
There are so many things happening within our organization! I can't wait to tell you about the events that are in store. I'm excited to see you. Please come!

Wasatch maple seed pod, graphite on paper, Julie Ann Terry

Congratulations!
Dorothy DePaul and Susan Rubin had artworks accepted in the Colored Pencil Society of America's 8th Annual "Explore This!" exhibition, which will be shown on-line at www.cpsa.org starting on February 1st.  Their images are featured below. 

Mesmerize: Echinops tjanschanicus, Globe Thistle, colored pencil, Susan Rubin

Flowering Cactus, colored pencil, Dorothy DePaulo

Fixing is Fine

Heidi Snyder shares this saving moment with us: Heidi's cardinal pair featured in a previous post, pictured above to remind us of the color saturation, is colored pencil on film, but she often uses Derwent Inktense pencils on the back of the film to augment color. With the cardinal pair she actually goofed big time! She underlayed the film with dark paper to provide background, so she wanted to use white acrylic painted on the back side of the cardinals to allow the cardinals local color to be bright and pure.

She tells us: "Done it before, no prob, but I didn't pay attention and slopped the acrylic on the front instead of the back, totally ruining 2 perfectly nice birds....After I got done cussing in 3 languages I scraped off the acrylic from the front, redid the birds, then put the acrylic on the back. Needless to say the acrylic I used was permanent! Luckily my razor blade was dull, so no tears on the Mylar (my beloved Mylar). Long live drafting film!"

Brochures
The RMSBA is reaching out to the public, seeking supporters for the genre of botanical art and members. To that end, we're designing a new brochure that will provide information about our organization, about botanical art in today's world, and about applying for membership. In addition, business cards with contact information for the organization will also be printed.

You're encouraged to take a handful of brochures with you when you exhibit, demonstrate or teach botanical art! Contact information to get brochures in a timely fashion will be published as soon as the brochure is available.