↓
 
P.T. Artist Sandra Stowell

P.T. Artist Sandra Stowell

Creating my artwork, work in progress & new work.

BlueCrystalShipwRose

Category Archives: My Art

Post navigation

← Older posts

Casting the Bird is Back

P.T. Artist Sandra Stowell Posted on October 22, 2025 by ptartistOctober 23, 2025

A few days and many hours later, casting the bird is back on track. At least I think it is. My new plaster mold is cured, sealed, and I have put it to use. I cast Fat Baby Bird #16 very hastily late in the evening, and it was not well done. I did prove the mold is good, and I do have another bird that I will count in the edition, but … this poor bird is somewhat wounded.

Truth is I did a poor job of it. I did not mix enough cement, and I tried using a “slip” before filling. I should have pre-measured everything and had a good set up so I could work faster. RapidSet cement is true to its name. The product thickened quickly, and I ended up with several conspicuous voids in my cast.

I could certainly have patched and painted these so that no one would be the wiser. However I chose a different solution: Fat Baby Bird #16 is “Wounded Baby Bird”. I chose to make these voids more conspicuous rather than less so. Now Wounded Baby Bird is painted in raw Sienna with silver highlights, and the voids feature black or red glitter or gold paint. Here is #16 before and after full color. Should I touch up the black glitter with a bit of silver? The the black seems a bit stark. Here are three views of Wounded Baby Bird:

Before paint

Fat Baby Bird #15 sits pretty below, in front of my studio. With a vivid three tone paint job plus a silver beak, he/she is hard to miss. I will keep her/him right here in my yard for a bit:

So for now, #15 and #16 are happy enough here at the studio. But perhaps someone will want to take them to new homes soon. My baby bird adoption fee is a mere $200.

Casting the bird is back on track whenever numbers 17-25 are wanted. My limited edition will stop there.

Share
Posted in My Art, Sculpture | Tagged casting the bird, mold, sculpture

Update on Casting the Bird

P.T. Artist Sandra Stowell Posted on October 16, 2025 by ptartistOctober 22, 2025

This update on casting the bird is about relearning lessons learned! I am not methodical, I don’t track, write down, or review all the steps, tips, and lessons learned from my endeavors in art or life. And of course that can create trouble!

Before I made a new mother mold for my Fat Baby Bird, I did briefly review the process. But sadly I didn’t think it all through carefully enough! The outer mold failed when it leaked resin. I had two options for the remake: use the original stone carving with my still intact silicone mold, or use the new resin cast to support the silicone mold.

Foolishly, I chose the most convenient option: the resin cast. I pulled the silicone mold over the resin cast, instead of cleaning up and drying the original carved bird. Since the resin has leaked in the casting, it is about 1/5 shorter than the original and of course the silicone mold. So I added a bit of oil based clay to fill the bottom of the mold, and built my new plaster mold over that.

This was a mistake! I took the time to dry the plaster fully, coat it with oil based polyurethane, then rushed to make two cement casts without examining the first one carefully. It was only after I pulled the first one out of the overnight water cure that I saw the problem. My new mother mold was fatally flawed. My casts had misshapen heads, and I needed to make another rigid outer mold!

Here is the flawed mother mold, and the flawed cast, after I whacked them with a sledgehammer, which was somewhat satisfying…

The broken bird will not be part of the edition, but may become an amusing installation, TBD.

So now I have made a new plaster mother mold, using the original stone as the base. This was still problematic because the stone is mounted to a base, which crowds the silicone mold but this should be a small issue that I can correct readily in future casts. I have yet to use my new mold however, I may be a bit afraid to do so!

As of this post, I have made fifteen good casts for my limited edition from the Fat Baby Bird limestone sculpture. I still hope to complete the planned edition of twenty-five. And that is the update on casting the bird. Stay tuned to see if the new mold will be a success.

Note: it may be telling that I do not find any photos of my flawed castings prior to destroying them. I was so disappointed, and not at all proud of them. So apparently I did not document my error. So much for even trying to learn from my mistake…

Share
Posted in My Art

Casting the Bird

P.T. Artist Sandra Stowell Posted on September 26, 2025 by ptartistOctober 22, 2025

I sold the last finished, and favorite, Fat Baby Bird cement cast during Studio Tour this year. Two more Tour visitors expressed an interest, so I cast two more recently. Numbers 12 & 13 of the planned limited edition of 25 are sold. I sold Number 12 was sold to a Tour visitor after my follow up email, and then sold #13 to a new friend. I love this! Thank you art buyers!

This is great for me, but the problem came when I decided to try an epoxy resin cast. It has been far to long since I cast anything, and forgot some of the hazards and tricks! Resin will leak from the smallest crack.

My quick dry acrylic cement is pretty trouble free, but my glove mold has a 2 inch opening seam that did not fully contain the resin. The resulting cast is actually fine, although my blue resin Baby Bird is 1/2 inch shorter than my cement versions. The problem is that the resin leaked, then hardened on the plaster mother mold and the packing used to stabilize the cast. So I had to destroy that rigid support mold in order to extract my cast. This meant a lot of work and significant delay before I can make another cast!

My new mother mold is complete, but the plaster is not fully cured yet. Then I want to seal it with polyurethane before I use it. And although I do plan to make another resin Fat Baby Bird, I will take some precautions! Using cling wrap around the silicone mold might do the trick, along with ensuring the mother mold is very snug. It is also important to seat the silicone mold fully on the inside. Then I will hold my breath until the resin is cured, metaphorically speaking of course!

Casting in Resin

I really do love the blue resin Fat Baby Bird #14. The trick was to make it hollow, which allows more light to pass through. And when I place it on an LED base (at right) it really glows. I can place a translucent colored disk over the LEDs to give the bird a subtle hue at the bottom. I have tried yellow and purple paper so far; now I want to make a set of disks with more saturated colors for the purpose.

The image at right is an “artsy” photo of the remains of the plaster mother mold!

Share
Posted in About my art, My Art, Sculpture | Tagged casting the bird

The Flute Player and the Field Worker

P.T. Artist Sandra Stowell Posted on September 25, 2025 by ptartistSeptember 25, 2025

Some figures emerge, slumber, then reappear in my work. When they reappear they are generally quite different: in a radically different context, in different material, or with very different mood. Most of my imagery emerges from my subconscious, but I have used well known symbols from various cultures in the past.

Long ago I drew a simplified version of the flute player who appears in rock art around the Southwest USA. I did this to create a few silhouettes in wood that became a gift for my mother, and for other family.

Recently I repaired and scanned one of wooden flute players, and used this scanned image to make a couple of collages.

I have also experimented with a new material in an old cast of my draped field worker figure. And I found a home for him, lifting a fallen planet! This background is an old linoleum print that did not have enough value as a stand alone work.

So here are the Flute Player and the Field Worker: my most recent collages.

Share
Posted in My Art

Fire and Ice

P.T. Artist Sandra Stowell Posted on August 12, 2025 by ptartistAugust 12, 2025

Many of the people that I know are stressed and full of angst, but not from things we experience directly. Rather it is because we hear about so many terrible happenings around the world, and ever closer to home. Here on the west coast of the US we are experiencing a several year drought. And this brings summers of wildfire. We live in a world of fire and ice.

My art will always contain some aspect of my life: my fears, hopes, history and more. These two pieces are about fears, nature, and more. There is the horror of a forest fire, but there are some elements of hope and the promise of new growth. There there is the ice that may form a protective shell around our hearts, or it may provide a pond to skate on.

So here are Fire and Ice:

These are mixed media work that can be labeled as collages. The added elements layered over the paintings are more than finishing touches; these elements are intrinsic to the artwork.

At left my wildfire painting evolved but never quite satisfied. So there are many layers of paint, under collage elements that were added over a time. This work evolved over a couple of months; I returned to it again and again. I may yet add a bit more wildfire smoke to partially obscure the circular windows to worlds without fire…

At right, the ice formed more quickly! My palette knife smears of green, gold, and silver over blue evoked water. My stash of acrylic fragments from disassembled yard art became the ice. The running figure is cut from an old photo etching. Will she escape, or is she already trapped?

Share
Posted in My Art

Are These Subtle Changes?

P.T. Artist Sandra Stowell Posted on August 10, 2025 by ptartistAugust 10, 2025

I needed to correct something about a “finished” artwork. It was really bothering me, although I wasn’t sure why. I just did not quite like it, however much I wanted to. The individual elements seemed mostly OK, but… it wasn’t working for me. So I made some changes; are these subtle changes? Or not so subtle?

Here is the Before and After my changes:

The light is probably different for these two photos, so you may find the color and contrast difficult to compare. I did mute the background pattern colors considerably. The color and contrasts on the figures is mostly the same, although a bit different where I carved away portions of both figures.

The primary changes are:

  1. For the the background I muted colors & contrast, removed one distracting dimensional element. I did add a soft new element to the drawing.
  2. On the left figure I removed a lot of the draper around the head & shoulders, and worked into neck & rib cage a bit.
  3. On the right hand figure I reduced the size of the head, and gave him a shard of glass to hold/offer.

For me, this fixed two problems: first that the figures were did not fit well on the panel, being too large and too close to the top. And secondly the background was too dominant and distracted from the featured figures.

I like it much better now, but I won’t know if this piece is really satisfying until I live with it for some undetermined length of time!

Share
Posted in My Art

Things Change

P.T. Artist Sandra Stowell Posted on August 2, 2025 by ptartistAugust 2, 2025

Here is my new finished collage: Flute Player with World Tree. I started with an arrangement that I planned to stick to! And I planned to stay with the basic white paper background in the mock-up seen on the right. Well that didn’t happen! I changed the color scheme and a few other things along the way, of course. The finished work is on the green background at left. Always things change!

It is fixed and final now, after a good deal of struggle, so I guess I will like it better! It does seem more finished, balanced, and better fitted within the overall dimension. The paper parts are mounted to a painted board, and the whole is an awkward dimension of 15″x22″x5/16″.

I sometimes like to think that I know what I am doing these days, after so much practice. But it is quite the opposite! I still make just as many mistakes, and often almost destroy a piece before salvaging it. All I can really say is I do get most of my work completed to a satisfying state that I am not ashamed to display. And I absolutely get immense satisfaction along the way. What more can anyone ask of life?

Of course I also experience plenty of frustration, and make a lot of mess. I am not making much progress tidying up my studio, but making is much more fun!

Share
Posted in My Art

About Mounting Collage

P.T. Artist Sandra Stowell Posted on July 29, 2025 by ptartistJuly 29, 2025

I just answered an online question, and decided to save my own reply about mounting collage. This is a brief how-to adhere, seal, and mount paper collage work.

But first a peek at my most recent collage efforts in the studio. The first piece below is now complete. The next one is ready to assemble, but I dread taking it apart in order to glue it down. Note that all of the parts used here are my own work…

Here is the “how-to” information:

I usually use Lineco Neutral pH PVA Adhesive to attach paper to paper. I generally seal with Krylon clear sprays (there are other brands that are fine, maybe better!). You can use flat, satin, or gloss; gloss is best if you have metallic paint or glossy paper that you want to keep that way.

Heavy matte medium works well for attaching thicker papers to a sturdy watercolor or mixed media paper, but I do NOT use it for thinner papers unless I have already mounted the background paper to a backer board.

I do use heavy matte medium for attaching a background paper to various stiff mounting boards; the medium gets applied to the board rather than to the paper.

Once a finished piece is sprayed with sealant and mounted to a board, I may brush on a thinner matte or gloss medium. I seal it with at least two coats of spray first. This is best when the piece is more dimensional and I want a heavier seal, or for work that looks OK with visible brush strokes. I stick to spray for more delicate work.

BTW the trick that I was taught for mounting to sturdy art boards, masonite, wood panel, etc. is really useful. Apply a heavy gel acrylic medium (not the thinner liquid medium) to the board first, And if the paper you are attaching is NOT super thin “rice” or tissue paper spray the back of it lightly with water, then apply! IF done carefully this gives you a tiny interval of float that allows you to reposition it if necessary! It is very helpful if you are trying to line up larger pieces! There is, of course, a video on YouTube… ?

Digital Creativity for Collage

Two colorful digital variations of the flute player

These colorful flute players were printed just for fun, but are now parts that I may use in a new work someday!

I scanned an 18″ wooden flute player that I made previously for my mother. She was very fond of Southwest imagery and history. For these new works, I printed this scan almost full size to use in the two collages above.

For these two very colorful versions, I created a digital pattern from an interesting photo. I used that to fill my flute player shape in two different colors.

Share
Posted in My Art

Collage or Mixed Media?

P.T. Artist Sandra Stowell Posted on July 23, 2025 by ptartistJuly 23, 2025

Definitions elude me: collage or mixed medai? I have no idea when to say collage and when to say mixed media! And really does it matter? Not in my book…

So I am working mostly with paper at the moment, using parts of my original artwork. Some are digital prints, some are hand pulled prints, some are acrylic and/or watercolor paint. I cut, mix and match, add more paint, and draw a bit with art markers and colored pencil to blend and touch up after messy gluing or matte medium application. Is this collage?

I never do the most ambitious traditional collage. By this I mean the style of collage using small colored and shaded scraps to build an image. I tend to start with images I like, or an abstract background that I like, then add pieces for a mostly abstract finished work. Perhaps this is better described as mixed media, but is accepted in some collage art groups as collage. And that is fine with me.

So here are two mixed media / collage works, plus the digital foil of the one at the left. The first piece is based on a local fountain statue (the Haller Fountain, Port Townsend), and here she looks out to a puzzling sky with multiple moons. I participated in a small local history & art book about this fountain many years ago.

The center image is a collage featuring an older linocut print, a scan of a found owl feather, and three cutouts of paintings, over a painted backer board. The dragon-like linocut is based on an interesting driftwood log.

Share
Posted in My Art

When is Finished?

P.T. Artist Sandra Stowell Posted on July 15, 2025 by ptartistJuly 15, 2025

When is finished? These four quite different mixed media pieces may all be finished, if I can just keep my hands OFF them! Sometimes I don’t know when to stop.

At least I have some work happening in the studio, although much of it is continuation and completions. I am using older works as parts, or collage elements, and then spending a lot of time on presentation. It all feels so unimportant, but I think I need to persist in order to get to something more significant. Nothing is coming easily just now.

Share
Posted in My Art

Post navigation

← Older posts

Pothole Photo Books

Contact me to buy Volumes I or II
I sell my art directly with affordable prices: galleries cannot do that. Art prints are available from me & at the links below. Please do contact me with questions!

Browse My Art

  • My Art Gallery
  • SandraStowell.com More!
  • The Surprisingly Artistic Potholes of Port Townsend Photo series

Buy my Art

  • Art at Saatchi Online Select originals & prints.
  • Photo Books Volumes I & II of The Surprisingly Artistic Potholes of Port Townsend

Contact me

  • Contact Me Email me!

Recent Posts …

  • Casting the Bird is Back
  • Update on Casting the Bird
  • Casting the Bird
  • The Flute Player and the Field Worker
  • Fire and Ice

Browse by Category

  • About my art
  • Craft Projects
  • Designed Products
  • Digital
  • Drawing
  • Ephemeral
  • Exhibitions
  • Experimental
  • Hidden images
  • My Art
  • Painting
  • Photography
  • Printmaking
  • Ramblings
  • Sculpture
  • Sketchbooks
  • About Making Art
  • Artist Statement
All images copyright Sandra Stowell unless otherwise attributed - Weaver Xtreme Theme
↑
Share