Category: Heart

hey all 🙂

I completely forgot, in my last blog, to mention that I got this email 2 days before Xmas and what a GREAT early Xmas pressie!

Dear Reina,

 Congratulations! I’m honored and thrilled to let you know that your artworks will be published in the Living Artists of Today: Contemporary Art International. Vol.1 

 I’m starting production next week and book should be printed by end of the first quarter of 2012. 

Have a great Holiday Season!

Kind regards,

Mila Ryk

Publisher – Art & Beyond Studio, inc

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I had submitted a some images to be considered for this a while ago, and it was really awesome to hear back with positive news.I am not one to submit my stuff left, right and center, or ‘spread myself to thin’, I feel like I could go to town all over the internet, uploading my images everywhere, but then there is upkeep and ongoing marketing and it all gets very very time consuming. Having said that, I do dedicate a small portion of my day to this happily, and it has certainly paid off with a number of sales of original, prints, cards, several big commissions and ongoing commissions from regular clients. (Facebook is the BEST, soo many sales thru that alone, but the best thing is meeting such fantastic people and building a relationship with them, both clients and other artists too) Without the internet NONE of this would have happened. I am in New Zealand, literally at the bottom of the world with a population of around 4 million… its not a place you can make alot of $ in the art world.  I am also a busy mother of 2 full on girls and a hairdresser (I work from home), so there is not enough hours in the day for me to be painting 8 hours a days, 5 days a week to produce enough work to sustain an ‘originals only’ selling lifestyle… let alone pounding the pavement putting my art in cafe’s and such… its just not where Im at really. Striking a balance with all these things in my life has been interesting, and I am also totally blessed to have an amazing partner who supports anything I do or dream 1000%.

So! while my kids were away for 10 days with their dad over Xmas, I used the time as productively as I could and finished up a whole pile of stuff as well as doing some ‘practice runs’ for other things…..

first up is this piece:

©Reina Cottier 2012

yes, something different for me! I had been ITCHING to try this style for ages, using a water spray on the canvas first then applying the paint with a sponge and letting it drip and spread with the water around the canvas. This was FUN! I loved doing it, and I will do it again at some point, and or integrate this technique with my other stuff. There was alot of drying time inbetween stages involved, so that was slightly irritating to this ‘I want everything yesterday’ girl, lol! but hey, with a little help from a friend- a fan heater- we got there relatively quickly! (Im not into waiting for hours, its just not part of who i am, if i cant bang out a painting in an hour or 2, forget it! LOL!)

this one is not finished:

Im playing with words directly onto the canvas (like “Evolve-last post) rather than Photoshopping them on as i normally do. Also integrating my BELOVED stencils (can you tell??? hehe) with the word process…. this was very much about the earth below- foliage, forest, land, growth…then the sky, galaxy above,..there is a heart shape up there-unfinshed, you can barely see, but i think it will be cool when its done… i want to maintain the translucent look of it… love that.

this is my practice board!…..

its turned out to be quite a nice piece on its own! 🙂

Its school holidays here for another 2 weeks, we are in summer, so there wont be a whole lot of painitng going on, but as soon as they are back to school, ..Im full steam ahead!

Wishing you all an AMAZING week! be well & happy. Reina.x