Picture of the Week: Cheryl Holz's Collaged, Mixed Media "JANUARY SYCAMORE"...Check it out

Above, is the first of the series -- hopefully many more to follow!

“Naturalists Conversations 1 -- January Sycamore”

 8”x 7”x 1.5”

Paper, ink, pastel, acrylic, and book pages on birch panel. 

 Reach out if you're interested!

From Cheryl's recent newsletter:

"As you know, some of my processes can take anywhere from a couple days to a couple months to complete, so I felt like I need some direct painting, collaging, and mark making in my future to balance it out. I want to have pieces I can “have a conversation with” every day in some way. I was trying to figure out a format for these, and I came up with the title for the series of “Naturalist Conversations.” 

Pretty much all collage fodder that makes it into my studio is nature related in some way, so I know that will work its way in. But I went even further and decided that each piece would include a page from my favorite conservationist’s book, Sand County Almanac, where Aldo Leopold chronicles what happens month by month as he restores an over farmed piece of land in Wisconsin. If you haven’t read it, I highly recommend it! 

If I’m going to make one, I might as well make three. Rarely do I work on one solo piece at a time. Then the pieces will be sure to relate to each other as I’m using the same batch of mixed inks papers, etc. and in the same state of mind.

I also let January determine the imagery. I started looking through my photos of trees in the winter. I love being able to see the different branching patterns of different varieties of trees. Sycamore has become one of my favorites, so I chose that for the first piece I fleshed out." 

CHECK OUT THE ART BEAT BUZZ NEWS PAGE FOR INFORMATION ON CHERYL'S UPCOMING CLASSES AT HER AURORA, IL ART STUDIO