New year, new way of doing things.

It took a while to get everything set up but my blog is moving to my webpage so this one won't be updated from here on out.  Unfortunately different providers don't talk to each other but the change was necessary to work smarter, not harder.  I hope you will continue to follow what's happening with my work by using this link:

http://bonnywagoner.com

Click on the blog link. While you are there, feel free to browse the other sections. 

If Instagram is more your speed:
https://www.instagram.com/bonnywagoner/

I appreciate your support over the years.  
Thank you.

Spring stickers!

If you are like me seed catalogs are coming in the mail and spring fever is starting. I’ve been playing with stickers. 😁 Oh my they are lovely! Premium vinyl stickers.  Will stick to almost everything, won't wash off or fade.  Limited quantities: https://bonnywagoner.squarespace.com/mystore/unique-finds  

If you are local, they are also available at the Real Deahl Gift Shop in St Helens.  

In the blacksmith's shop at Fort Vancouver

 

Many years ago I created studies in colored pencil and always intended to go back and paint it either in oils or acrylic. I never got around to this one but I was revisiting my old drafts and decided to use one of the rough drafts to create this watercolor painting. Along the way I figured out old rough drafts are like old notes... we get better over time at recording necessary bits. While I feel like there's a lot of missing relevant information for me creating it today, it was nice to close the loop on something started many years ago.

If you were able to visit the historic Fort Vancouver site today (in Vancouver, Washinton USA) you would notice sometime between when I created the rough draft and now - they decided to paint the walls white. I've seen a lot of blacksmiths shops across the country and to be honest with you I've never seen one with whitewashed walls. It would have been excessively expensive to do at the time and if it didn’t make money, they didn’t do it. So it was a conscious decision on my part to use the information I recorded thirty years ago for this piece when it was in its original state.

Because I wanted to create a sense of stepping back in time I used just two colors to create this piece - burnt umber and prussian blue. Watercolor on cotton paper.

FORT VANCOUVER - The Pharmacy

 

A long time ago I created a series of colored pencil drawings of Ft Vancouver, a National Park replica of the original fort located in Vancouver, WA. Initially I was only using colored pencils to work out my compositions before I painted them on canvas.  Along the way I found I really, truly enjoyed working with colored pencils and stopped at the drawings.  

Way back in the way back I couldn't figure out a way around the texture of the paper peeking through the colored pencil.  It is a common problem by the way - still is especially for newbies. Although small, it is a very visible imperfection - especially when the image is scanned. I tried all kinds of solutions, different papers with different surface preparations and different techniques to try to resolve the obvious problem. There was talk of using graphite to fill in the hills and valleys in the paper. It just muddied the colors. Some folks resorted to using chemicals to dissolve the colored pencils on the paper. I resisted because in my opinion they didn't offer a stable solution to the problem and there was the issue of working with toxic fumes.  My solution at the time was to work enormously large and reduce the image for prints and whatnot which reduced the obvious problem in the piece. Working in colored pencil is always labor intensive but having to work larger made it even more so.

Fast forward a couple decades and I'm revisiting the project because I happen to really like the subject matter and I've always wanted to solve the original execution problem I encountered years ago. There's an obvious work around - create a watercolor underpainting and then colored pencil.  It is by far less labor intensive than straight up colored pencil and the results are spectacular.  Once I learned about the dry brush watercolor technique I've been wanting to work in just watercolor whenever possible because it's much faster than anything in colored pencil and when done right, the dry brush technique creates similar results as a good colored pencil piece.  

So this is one of the experiments. All watercolor pigments have staining/nonstaining properties and different opacity indexes.  I am trying out my Holbein watercolors because I needed to test specifically the brown range.  I know from experience my Sennelier brown watercolor sits on the surface of the paper and I've discovered it is easy to accidentally lift it.  Handy when that's the desired technique, truly annoying when it's not.  For this image and several others I have planned I know I need to go dark as in lots of layers for a deep intense dark so I put the Holbein paint through its paces. I still have to figure out some quirks but I'm going to say so far, it worked out well.    

You might be wondering (or not) why no posts of late.

There are two real world reasons.

One is my New Years resolution. PS - I don't believe in New Years Resolutions but it happens to coincide with the start of the year so I will give it that commonly understood annual routine. Every year I review my business plan (I know, weird for an artist to say). Normally I do this in December but after 2020 I was having a hard time figuring out what in the world 2021 would look like because my crystal ball seems to be on the blink lately. Just the mention of 2020 and everyone nods in an unspoken understanding.  So I decided to focus on the nuts and bolts of the behind the scenes because there is a lot of what I had assumed was necessary overlap in tasks, often duplicating efforts on different platforms. And of course there is a natural resistance to some of this because it means letting go of something old, often familiar, in favor of new, maybe not so familiar until it's examined from the work smarter not harder paradigm. Stay tuned for the reveal to come soon.

The other is I tweaked my knee. I've been gimping around, getting utterly lousy sleep and hoping it heals without having to drag myself in to the doctor to look at it (my resistance is going where sick people go during a pandemic). The good (make that great) news is every day is better than the day before so it's on the mend and I'm getting around a lot better than I was so as it turns out it's a mere hiccup in the giddiup. Anyway, stay tuned. I'm working just as fast as I can at the moment (which admittedly isn't all the fast just yet but making progress).

New store in the St Helens area

My postcards of St Helens are now available at:

The Real Deahl Giftshop

234 N Columbia River Hwy, St Helens, Oregon

The Timberline Lodge mailbox

 

I am excited to announce another Timberline goodie available!

I woke up early one of the mornings I was staying at Timberline Lodge and went out to draw. If you look the mail boxes up at Timberline they will often show the exquisite brass boxes located by the current giftshop. Rarely does anyone notice the hand carved mailbox created in 1937 to collect outbound mail with what appears to be the original lock (if not, it's close). The door is fashioned out of recycled pounded steel.  

Timberline used to have their own post office so the stamps would be cancelled with a Timberline stamp. Now all the mail is cancelled Government Camp but you can leave mail in this box while you are at the lodge and it is still collected every day. 

There is an annual tradition where folks come to the lodge and send their holiday cards from there. Each year we see families working together to address and mail their cards from this historic spot. It's a generational tradition.

Click here to purchase on Etsy. You  can print it out and color it or you can put it in a frame as is.  

The newel posts at Timberline Lodge: sticker sheet

I love the newel posts inside Timberline Lodge. There aren’t anything like them anywhere. Each one features a different bird or animal of the Pacific Northwest. I drew them all. Now you can download stickers of my pen and ink drawings featuring each unique newel post and instantly print them on your home printer. They are on Etsy where I am the shop named Scenic Roads.

Click here to go to Etsy.

Whirly magnets

As a kid we called them whirlies or helicopters because as they twirled in the wind like magic falling from the maple trees in the autumn breeze. As an adult I collect them to paint because they are really quite beautiful.  This is a watercolor painting of one of them I had made into a magnet.  The black in the background is just a background.  The magnet is die cut to the shape, measures roughly 2-1/4" x 3", printed on durable magnetized vinyl.  Click here to start or add to your collection.

Last home portrait finished

Watercolor on 140# Arches hot press watercolor paper using a combination of Sennelier and Holbein watercolors because each brand seems to have strengths in different areas. I also have to admit, I had to resort to using a white colored pencil for a dab of highlights that I just could not manage with even my smallest brushes so technically this is a mixed media piece.  

I was watching a demo on watercolor this afternoon and it occurred to me I should probably point out in order to get this kind of detail in any given piece I rely heavily on the dry brush technique.  What that means is I typically remove excess water so I'm applying pigment much like I would with colored pencil - only it's faster and covers the paper more completely.  It took me forever to figure it out because it's not commonly taught anywhere versus the wet applications. 

I'm now caught up on my backlog of home portrait commissions but there's no rest for the weary.  Moving on to my next project. Stay tuned.  

Another home portrait finished.

 

Watercolor on Arches 140# cold press watercolor paper.  

Normally I paint with Sennelier watercolors.  I actually only own eight tubes of Sennelier paints - their introduction starter set.  You can imagine how much mixing goes on to get the color range needed for any given painting.  I have to admit it has been a great experience for working with a limited palette because the by-product is all of my paintings have a similar color thread between them as if it was intentional.  

On this painting I dabbled a little with some Holbein watercolors.  It all started because I'm not sure I like the yellow I have in my Sennelier set.  It's a little to opaque for my liking which is a weird thing to say about transparent watercolor but it is what it is.  Maybe it's a solubility thing.  Either way, it's the first time I played with Holbein and I was very much impressed with it so far.  

The railings at Timberline Lodge

 

This is a colored pencil drawing featuring the end of a railing at Timberline Lodge. Installed years after the lodge opened for safety reasons, they blend in with the original architecture featuring masterful twists ending in pinecones on the ends. These railings are mounted throughout the stairwells and attach to those newels.  The original piece is drawn on black paper using archival quality pencils.  I've made the image available to print on your home printer via Etsy.  Just print it and pop it in a 8" x 10" frame. 

The mountain is calling prototype

 

Working on a design for a sticker or magnet (or both).  

Happy holidays!

First of all, thanks for tuning into my blog.  This year has been one of those super challenging years when I thought I had everything planned out only to have all those plans turned upside down during the pandemic.  It actually turned out to be a good thing because it opened new opportunities that I would not have been looking for had it not been for this years events. As a kid my mom used to tell me when times seem dark, look for the silver lining. 

These are the brushes I work with pictured with a pen for size comparison purposes.  Well there you have it, the secret behind all of my paintings... along with cotton paper (hot and cold press) and excellent watercolor paint.  Everything I use is archival quality.  

Hopefully it won't be too much longer before I can get out there traveling to our national parks again and back to working on the series I had started before all this bruhaha started.  I'm working on a plan A and plan B (and a plan C just in case) for when it's possible to go safely.   

Stay safe and think positive. 

Another home portrait commission

 

I had several home portraits in various stages of completion so I’m trying to finish them before the holidays - making for LONG days. Watercolor with gouache highlights on cotton paper.  

For the holidays

The colors are not actually this "perky" - my scanner seems to be having issues with the green/red combinations and is skewing the colors. I tried taking a picture of it with my cell phone and decided it must be those particular color combinations that are a challenge because that version is way off too on the other end of the spectrum. I thought maybe it's the inside lights. Nope, even outside it's off too. It's really not neon-ish green, nor does the red jump off the page like this. So consider this a facsimile. Watercolor commission for the holidays. 

#watercolor #homeportrait #bonnywagoner

Timberline coloring books special

All Timberline coloring books come wrapped ready to gift. 

A simple feather (experiment)

I’m watching my daughter’s chickens while she moves to her new place and gets everything set up. I have been collecting the miscellaneous feathers they leave behind in their coop. I decided yesterday to test drive some new Holbein watercolors that I’ve been putting off opening because they are expensive so even deciding what to use them on has been a challenge. You know the thought processs, save them for something special. The other side of the argument is what if they aren’t as great as rumored they are? Well it occurred to me I have the perfect model to put the paint through its paces. A feather. The reason to test paint is different manufacturers use different binders which makes the pigments behave in sometimes unexpected ways so this was a test to see what it will and won’t do and how far can I push it for the results I want. So far I'm liking them. 

Winter Solstice

 

I think most folks assume grey is a depressing color. I don't. Because we have so many grey days I took on the challenge years ago to work with it and discovered there is a unique distinctive element to the color range. I don't know how to describe it other than it's a complicated quiet. This is the Columbia River out where I live. On the days the wind is still the river turns into a mirror.

"Winter Solstice"
4-1/2" x 12"
Colored Pencil

Click on the image to view a larger version.

Available as a blank notecard. 

#greyday #reflections #coloredpencil #winter #solstice #wintersolstice #columbiariver #oregon #landscapes #drawing #notecards #bonnywagoner

Letterpress printed card

The tactile effect from the letterpress print process is simply luxurious on heavy textured cardstock. It's printed in elegant copper ink. The finish of the paper is perfect for writing short or long notes using a ball point, marker or traditional ink pen. The card comes with an elegant neutral green envelope - perfect for mailing. 

This card measures 5" x 7", blank on the inside so it's perfect for any occasion. Printed for me by Letterpress PDX (the best). 

Comes in sets of five.  
https://bonny-104051.square.site/product/new-the-pinecone-card-set/97?cs=true

Also available as a single card.
https://bonny-104051.square.site/product/new-the-pinecone/96?cs=true