• Extraordinary Clouds: Skies of the unexpected from bizarre to beautiful by Richard Hamblyn
• Weather World: Photographing the Global Spectacle by The Met Office
• Watercolors Skies & Clouds: Techniques Of 23 International Artists
• Artist's Digital Photo Reference: Landscapes edited by Erin Nevius

• Deborah Secor paints a sunset in pastel
• Mark Willenbrink paints the sky in watercolor

In many instance no one knew that original paintings of some of these were ever made! The discovery of these paintings came as a surprise even to Charley's son Brett. "I felt like I was opening a buried treasure chest that had been locked up for more than 35 years."

Old, yellow photo album pages make great acrylic palettes. The pages are light and easily transportable for outdoor painting. You can also spray them with water and scrape dry paint off with a palette knife.

• How to read the rules and abide by them
• What the choice of jurors can tell you about a show
• How to choose works to make a strong, quick impression
• How the jurying process works
• What makes jurors see red
• How to act at the opening or during an interview, once you get in a show or win a contest

Changing your painting format can quickly get you out of a compositional rut. I find that I keep my ideas fresh if I break away from the standard canvas sizes because they lead to traditional compositional solutions. When I go into the field to paint or sketch, I carry a number of offbeat sizes—14x7, 10x17 and squares like 14x14.

• A Painter's Guide To Design And Composition by Margot Schulzke
• Simple Secret To Better Painting by Greg Albert

• a report on the Renegade Craft Fair
• a great artist from Franklin Bowles Galleries
• and a general report on New York City

Drawing what "isn't there" is often the best way to draw what is there more accurately. The voids, or empty spaces, around your subject can be the key to drawings that look like what you see. The next time you draw something, pay special attention to these "negative spaces"—the spaces not filled by the "positive" forms of the object you're drawing.

• The Artist's Magazine November 2006 issue
• All books, magazines and DVDs on drawing

To make a graded watercolor wash, turn the paper so that the part you want darker is at the top. then dampen the paper with a sponge and clean water. Start with a loaded brush of color and stroke rapidly across the top of the paper, moving down with even strokes across the width of the paper. When the brush is nearly depleted, recharge it with paint and start again at the top, stroking across and down until the desired depth of value is reached.

• All watercolor articles on ArtistsNetwork.com
• Watercolor Essentials book with DVD
• Watercolor in Motion book with DVD

• Metropolitan Museum of Art
• MoMA (and the MoMA store!)
• Cooper-Hewitt
• New York Public Library (the building with the lions)
• Brooklyn Museum

Once your portrait training is finished and you're ready to paint portraits for a living, you'll need to assemble a range of sample works. These should include children, adults, a person in a business suit and perhaps a clergyman or a person in academic robes. Paint real people and not movie stars or athletes.

• See all Portrait articles on ArtistsNetwork.com
• Drawing a Portrait from Life DVD
• Expressive Portraits: Creative Methods for Painting People by Jean Pederson

You can see more of Colombo's iPhone sketches at 20x200.

To keep your pastels clean and neat, place them in a container on a layer of rice. This will prevent them from rolling off your work surface and breaking on the floor, and also from acquiring a film of gray dust.

• Carole Katchen in the February 2007 issue of The Pastel Journal
• Painting With Pastels: Easy Techniques to Master the Medium by Maggie Price
• Pastel Painting Techniques by Guy Roddon

“Nobody wants me to do anything, so I’m just doing what I want,” she said.

• The Artist's Magazine February 2005 issue
• Illustrated Timeline of Art History by Carol Stickland

Paint relationships, not things. The immediate effect of a painting comes primarily from values. By getting these relationships right at the beginning, you've nailed the "big look," regardless of what you're painting.

• The Painterly Approach by Bob Rohm
• Simple Secret To Better Painting by Greg Albert
• The Complete Guide To Painting Pictures From Photos by Susie Hodge

Always start a painting or drawing with big shapes and tools—big brush, big charcoal or large graphite stick—anything that precludes your getting prematurely enmeshed in details. Beginning with something big forces you to see the underlying masses and shapes that tell viewers what the subject is.

• First Steps: Drawing And Painting Animals by Bill Tilton
• Mastering Composition: Techniques and Principles to Dramatically Improve Your Painting by Ian Roberts
• A Painter's Guide To Design And Composition by Margot Schulzke

Using thousands of dollars' worth of paint, brushes and paper shipped from New York Central Art Supply in the East Village, Mr. Bleckner, 59, worked with a group of 25 children — former abductees and ex-soldiers — for more than a week at a Roman Catholic aid center. The children made 200 paintings that will be sold at a benefit at the United Nations headquarters next month at which Mr. Bleckner will be appointed goodwill ambassador.

He said that after several days of teaching them rudimentary painting and drawing skills, many began to open up to him and to create work that powerfully expressed their experiences. ... "What this mission accomplished is what I call microcreativity," Mr. Bleckner wrote in a catalog of the children's work. "It is a personal interaction which gives someone the tools to create something that they can be proud of, and which can help them on the arduous path to restoring their dignity and sense of self-worth."

See a slideshow of the children's work here.

When you're just beginning to paint in an impressionistic style in oils, it's useful to exaggerate the color somewhat. On a sunny day, for instance, make the light places brighter than you think they are, then bring the work inside and see whether it looks like a sunny day. If not, exaggerate the color some more.

• See all our articles about landscape painting
  
• Fill Your Oil Paintings With Light & Color by Kevin Macpherson
• Oil Painter's Solution Book: Landscapes, Answers to Your Oil Painting Questions by Elizabeth Tolley

"There’s a challenge of rebounding from economic disaster and from people moving away after the collapse of the steel industry," says Curt Gettman of Pittsburgh's Sprout Fund. "But what was left was a really great infrastructure, a lot of assets, and a city that understands the value of art and that quality of life isn’t necessarily measured in dollars and cents."

No one can help you sell your Warhol fast like Cash For Your Warhol™! Sell your print or painting for cash regardless of the size, price, or condition. Cash For Your Warhol™ has been in business for several months so you can concentrate on moving on with your life.

• Read about papercutting in the April issue of The Artist's Magazine
• Journal Revolution: Rise Up And Create! by Linda Woods

A great way to study wild birds and animals at close range is to attract them with feeders or salt blocks. At my cabin I have both hanging feeders and a platform feeder. These have provided opportunities to sketch hundreds of birds: Goldfinches, purple finches and grosbeaks have all joined the regulars at the feeders. Carolina wrens, summer tangers, indigo buntings and other visitors that aren't even interested in the feeders seem to be drawn by the activity.

• Creating Nature In Watercolor, An Artist's Guide by Cathy Johnson
• More books on painting animals and wildlife
• Post your work in the Plein Air Channel on WetCanvas

• Post your work in the Photography section of WetCanvas
• A-Z Of Creative Digital Photography by Lee Frost

1. Photography is both a craft and a tool.
2. Start small—physically and/or financially.
   
3. Stick with the big brands.
   
4. Fight the urge to think bigger.
   
5. Do your homework. 
6. Hold it in your hand.
   
7. Buy from reliable sources. 
8. Learn how to use it.

Keep a notepad in your car. Then, whenever a potential subject catches your eye, make a note of the location, the time of day and the season.

Carry a camera with you to capture more information on any scene that draws your attention.

To paint like James Abbott McNeill Whistler, group objects into simple silhouettes over the whole page, and avoid adding too many details. Use opaque pigments and a limited palette to create a feeling of weight and mood. But more quickly, since dry opaque pigments are difficult to work with. Focus on contrasts of intensity rather than differences of light and dark, to convey the effects of reduced light.

Don't paint sitting down. Stand in front of your painting with legs apart, brush in fist, as though you're addressing something of great importance. When things stop going smoothly, sit down and try to recall the last time things went smoothly. Then stand up and find out where you went wrong.

Go to museums as often as you can, for so much of what you see in person can't be reproduced in print, and look for such things as how the masters treated edges, determined scale and built their colors.

To create a striking surface texture, Edgar Degas would steam the pastel with boiling water. Depending on the thickness of the pastel layers, the steam might produce a paste, workable with a stiff brush, or a wash that could be spread with a soft brush.

• The latest All-Media Paint-Off is underway on the Forum. The challenge is to create a still life that includes these five objects: a feather, a key, a candle, a scarf and a pen. See all the details here to learn how you could win a $50 gift certificate.
• New merch in our CafePress store, like T-shirts with the new mag logo and a poster of 25 years of Artist's Magazine covers!
• And we've got a secret sale going on at ArtistsNetworkShop.com—get 30% off anything when you use the coupon code ART225. It's good through this Sunday, March 1!

What do you think of my video debut?

Carry a 3x5-inch pad of drawing paper and some kind of ballpoint pen and use it. Get the idea that everything around you, everything you see, is worthy of your attention. It's like practicing the scales. A musician can play incredibly complex compositions, but these basic exercises strengthen the muscles and impulses used to paint or perform.

Don't be discouraged by show rejections. No artist is accepted into every juried show. As in any other aspect of life, there are trends in art that you shouldn't care to follow, but jurors are human. What looks passé may look fresh and exciting in a few years down the road. So hang in there.

• pepperminte (stylized watercolor portraits)
• kelcan (abstract oil landscapes)
• rplowman (collages—I interviewed him for the June issue of The Artist's Magazine!)
• jezze (gorgeous prints—I interviewed her for my book!)

To limber up your imagination, find a quiet spot, shut your eyes and call up an image of something you know very well, perhaps your cat. Take time to let the image form clearly in your mind. Then change it—make the cat another color, give it wings, watch it fly.

"We need a voice that looks broadly," said Robert Lynch, president of Americans for the Arts, a national lobbying group. He is advocating a senior position, not necessarily a Cabinet post. "We are calling for a person at the executive office level who understands there is a National Endowment for the Arts, but also understands the arts portfolio in the Education Department, the State Department—and in addition to the nonprofits arts, is looking at cultural tourism, broadband access and trade through records, movies and videos."

The easiest way to make gray with an opaque medium is to mix black and white. The richest grays, however, are made by mixing complementary colors.

Wyeth gave America a prim and flinty view of Puritan rectitude, starchily sentimental, through parched gray and brown pictures of spooky frame houses, desiccated fields, deserted beaches, circling buzzards and craggy-faced New Englanders. A virtual Rorschach test for American culture during the better part of the last century, Wyeth split public opinion as vigorously as, and probably even more so than, any other American painter including the other modern Andy, Warhol, whose milieu was as urban as Wyeth’s was rural.

Act like a professional. "I don't have to be businesslike; I'm an artist." If you've said this before, you're fooling yourself, and you'll probably be taken advantage of. Successful artists place a premium on professionalism and good business practices.

Hal is living a perfect life. Everyone adores him and everything always seems to fall right into his hands. He's got the looks, he's got the charm and he's got Dali, his new girlfriend. Little does Hal know...his whole world is built around him.

Using the data, they painted what people want. It turned out to be a landscape, with a mountain and a lake, and deer, and a family, and George Washington.

Draw something white. Find a white object, or paint any object pure white, and then, with a strong light source from one direction, draw the shapes and values in charcoal with as much detail as possible. This is a great exercise in studying values, and you might try it as a painting exercise, too.

A sturdy, lightweight drawing board can be made from two pieces of corrugated cardboard. Glue them together with the ridges running in opposite directions. Trim the board to a size that's 1/2 inch larger than the paper you're using, and then bind the edges with packing tape. Secure your paper to the board with four strong paper clamps.

• January: An investigation of airport art sales
• February: My box-making demo video
• March: Maureen on Poussin's intense classicism
• April: My guide to Portland's Alberta Arts District
• May: The orphan works controversy
• June: Guide to using photo site Flickr
• July: Art from junk mail
• August: Children create art for Olympics
• September: Objects made of other objects
• October: Why do we associate genius with youth?
• November: How to get your press release noticed
• December: My art-filled Christmas

The perceived sense of entitlement and Nicole's self-appointed role as family spokesperson prompted Buffett to tell Peter that he'd renounce her. A month later, the mega-billionaire mailed Nicole a letter in which he cautioned her about the pitfalls of the Buffett name: "People will react to you based on that 'fact' rather than who you are or what you have accomplished." He punctuated the letter by declaring, "I have not emotionally or legally adopted you as a grandchild, nor have the rest of my family adopted you as a niece or a cousin." Nicole was devastated. "He signed the letter 'Warren,'" she says. "I have a card from him just a year earlier that's signed 'Grandpa.'"

• Studio tour with New Yorker cartoonist
• William Steig, from The New Yorker to Shrek

Looking for last-minute holiday gifts? The Metropolitan Museum of Art Store is always a good go-to shop. This year I found quite a few gorgeous Asian art items, and it just so happened that all of the pieces were less than $25! So I put together this guide—you can order any of the below items by searching by item number at the store website.

A. Hiroshige Cherry Blossom Christmas Ornament: The design adapts a delicate cherry blossom in the foreground of a color woodblock print by Utagawa Hiroshige (1797–1858). Lovely but short-lived, cherry blossoms are a recurring motif in Japanese art that symbolize the passing of time. Produced in cooperation with the Brooklyn Museum of Art. Silver plate, with hand-applied enamel. Diameter 3 3/4 in. Includes a silver cord for hanging. Item #10-073617: $17.50 each.

B. Flowers and Grasses of the Four Seasons Holiday Cards: The colorful floral design decorating these elegant holiday cards is reproduced from a detail from a pair of early 19th-century six-panel painted screens by Japanese artist Nakamura Hochu. Produced in cooperation with The British Museum, London. 15 accordion-style cards, 15 white envelopes per box. Item #11-068186: $8.98.

C. Fruits and Flowers Bridge Set: The card game of bridge can be traced back to the 19th century, when the earliest known bridge rule book was found. A richly colored fruits and flowers motif is depicted on the playing cards and score pad, which together form a handsome gift set. Produced in cooperation with The Art Institute of Chicago. Double deck of bridge cards and score pad with instructions. Item #11-021854: $19.95.

D. Flowers of Asia Notecards: The notecards are a celebration of chrysanthemums, peonies, poppies, lotuses, and irises delicately rendered by Chinese and Japanese masters, and shown in fine detail. The images are reproduced from works in the Museum's collection by artists such as Kitagawa Sosetsu, Ogata Korin, Utagawa Hiroshige, Suzuki Kiitsu, Utamaro Kitagawa, and Qian Weicheng. 3 each of 12 images, 36 cards per box. Boxed with 38 envelopes. Item #11-067386: $21.95.

E. Japanese Robes Notecards: Details of birds, flowers, and trees decorate these notecards, which feature reproductions of lavishly embroidered Japanese silk robes from the Edo period (1615–1868) that are now in the Museum's collection. 4 each of 5 images, 20 cards per box. Includes 21 envelopes in a keepsake box. Item #11-068350: $14.95.

"Studies suggest that creative people often share more personality traits with the mentally ill than “normal” people in less creative pursuits. One Stanford University study compared patients with bipolar disorder with a group of healthy people. They found that graduate students in creative disciplines shared more personality traits with the bipolar patients than with their healthy but less creative peers ..."

Mattresses are our friends. For years, mattresses selflessly serve our sleeping pleasure. We should all be grateful for our mattresses; after all, most of us were conceived on one.

Why, then, are our mattresses being abandoned in dumps and left to the seagulls? Every year in the U.S. 40 million mattresses get thrown in the trash. Don’t our mattresses deserve another chance?

Architecture for Humanity and Rubicon National Social Innovations invite entrants to create innovative ways of converting used mattresses into useful products.

The competition aims to encourage entrants to form groups capable of creating a consumer product, instructions detailing how to make the product, and a plan for production on a larger scale.

• ASW: With coupon codes listed on the homepage, you can get $5 to $20 off orders over $50 through Dec. 8.
• Blick Art Materials: Through Dec. 8, you can get $5 to $20 off orders over $50 with the coupon code on this page.
• Cheap Joe's: Numerous deals in the sale flyer, and free shipping on orders over $250, through Dec. 31.
• Jerry's Artarama: Save 10 percent on any order through Dec. 9 with the coupon code found on this page.
• Legion Paper: Ten percent of every purchase made in its Overstock Store through Dec. 31 will be donated to the Children's Health Fund.
• MisterArt.com: Half off normal shipping rates for orders over $60 through Dec. 9.
  

29. A Plein Air Painter’s Blog
48. PostSecret
98. Drawn!

To get us in the thanksgiving spirit here at Rule29, we’ve already started drawing our hand turkeys and hanging them on the fridge. But we need more hand turkeys to completely cover the fridge, and we’re asking for your help. Download the template below, use creative magic to draw a sweet hand turkey, and then scan and email them back to us at mail@rule29.com, we’ll post all of the entries below, and one lucky hand turkey will win a $25 iTunes gift card as our way to show our thanks to you. Please have your Turkeys back to us by close of business Nov. 25th or early the 26th.

Like one-liners and knick-knacks? In the video above, The New Yorker cartoonist Mick Stevens gives a tour of his home studio in Florida. You can read more about the magazine's cartoonists on its blog.

Elaine: Come on, we're two intelligent people here. We can figure this out. Now we got a dog and a cat in an office.

Jerry: It looks like my accountant's office but there's no pets working there.

Elaine: The cat is saying, "I've enjoyed reading your e-mail."

George: Maybe it's got something to do with that 42 in the corner.

Elaine: It's a page number.

George: Well, I can't crack this one.

Elaine: Aahh! this has got to be a mistake.

• Bart Healy, Collingswood NJ
• Don Bronson, Clearfield UT
• Tracy Leuth, Bettendorf IA
• Linda Freund, Simi Valley CA
• Marilyn Doerter, Elida OH
• Kurt Jacobson, Anchorage AK
• Loisanne Kelle, Tucson AZ
• April Lopez, Kennewick WA
• Susan Genge, Crawford CO
• Crysteelaurie Abrams

I hope to be able to visit this awesome show, but if I can't make it, the video tour above will just have to suffice. (Not sure if the Velvet Underground soundtrack is included in the admission fee.) Andy Warhol: Other Voices, Other Rooms "sheds new light on the celebrated pop artist and focuses on the ideas at the heart of his work: embracing consumer culture, exploring sexual identity, challenging social conventions, and erasing distinctions between high and low culture."

The exhibit runs through February 15, 2009, at the Wexner Center for the Arts in Columbus, Ohio. Tickets cost $8 for adults, or $5 for visitors ages 13-17 or older than 65. Free to Wexner Center and Warhol Club members, college students with ID, visitors younger than 12, and free to all visitors every Thursday evening and first Sunday of each month.

Cool poster via HOW.

You can watch a preview below that describes Judy Chicago's The Dinner Party, an installation piece in the Brooklyn Museum.

The boxes at right are just a portion of the approximately 1,500 entries we got in our call to artists over 60. (That number's just an educated guess on my part. We definitely got more than 700 e-mailed entries, and I lost track of how many envelopes we received.)

There have been more than 20 studies that suggest an increased rate of bipolar and depressive illnesses in highly creative people, says Kay Redfield Jamison, professor of psychiatry at Johns Hopkins University and author of the "An Unquiet Mind," a memoir of living with bipolar disorder.

Experts say mental illness does not necessarily cause creativity, nor does creativity necessarily contribute to mental illness, but a certain ruminating personality type may contribute to both mental health issues and art.

Three of the elder statesmen of comic books — Neal Adams, Joe Kubert and Stan Lee ... are lending their talents to tell the tale of Dina Gottliebova Babbitt, who survived two years at the Auschwitz concentration camp by painting watercolor portraits for the infamous Nazi Dr. Josef Mengele. Some of the artwork also survived, but it is in the possession of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum in Poland. Now 85 and living in California, Mrs. Babbitt wants the artwork back, but the museum has steadfastly refused to return it.

We're bringing it back for an encore! If you (or someone you know) are a fabulous artist 60 or older, we want to know!

Feel free to nominate yourself—we won't think you're conceited! (But please don't have all your friends, relatives and neighbors e-mail us. This isn't a popularity contest—we only need your name once for you to be in the running.)

And because our intention is to showcase artists unfamiliar to us, we ask those artists who were among the 2008 crop of "Splendid over 60" and/or have had their work featured in The Artist's Magazine within the last three years to give others a chance.

How to enter: Send five to 10 images (on a CD, as slides, or visible on a website) and the artist's name, birth date and contact information (e-mail, phone and/or mailing address). We regret that we can only return materials if they are accompanied by a self-addressed, stamped envelope. Do not, under any circumstances, send the only existing copies of your slides or prints!

The deadline for nominations is October 1, 2008.

E-mail your submission to over60@fwpubs.com, or mail it to:
Artists over 60
The Artist's Magazine
4700 E. Galbraith Road
Cincinnati OH 45236

We ask, too, that you please refrain from calling or e-mailing us to check if we received your submission; we cannot respond to every submission. We will get in touch with the selected artists by the end of October.

Make sure to read the March 2009 issue of The Artist's Magazine to see who makes the cut!