Watercolor and Ink Paintings

Arts and Drafts festival went really well, it was fun as always. I've painted a few small painitngs specially for this occasion and these two watercolor and ink paintings are the last two from those paintings.

I especially like the profile, it's an experiment gone right. I did enjoy doing other paintings with these lines, but lately it just wasn't cutting it. I wanted to use them for something new and so I did. I haven't even hoped that it would end up as well as it did, but alas.

While at an art show I have talked to a few people that inspired a couple of Tatyana skids, so the insanity of that character will continue.

You can enter to win prints of both the flower and the male portrait.

To enter giveaway you can:

Subscribe to this YouTube channel and comment on this video

Subscribe to my blog and comment on this post

Bonus entries (bonus entries will not count unless you have done one of the above) are:

Like me on Facebook (1 extra entry)

Follow me on Twitter (1 extra entry)

Tweet about this giveaway or post about it on Facebook (1 entry each)

Comment on this FB update

Or join my mailing and email lists by emailing me at armadavolya[at]hotmail[dot]com with your mailing and email addresses (1 entry each)

Ancestors' Spirits Giveaway

Ancestors' Spirits paintings were done in ink, watercolor paint and watercolor pencil. This series was inspired by Native American art.
To enter giveaway you can:
Subscribe to this YouTube channel and comment on this video
Subscribe to my blog and comment on this blog post

Bonus entries (bonus entries will not count unless you have done one of the above) are:

Like me on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/ArtofArmadaVolya (1 extra entry)

Follow me on Twitter http://twitter.com/#!/ArmadaVolya (1 extra entry)

Tweet about this giveaway or post about it on Facebook (1 entry each)

Or join my mailing and email lists by emailing me at armadavolya[at]hotmail[dot]com with your mailing and email addresses (1 entry each)

Please, please please leave separate comments for each entry.

If you like the necklace, please visit http://SatinDollCo.etsy.com jewelry there is great, honestly, Monkey approves.

Flower in the Wind, Abstract Painting

Flower in the Wind is a watercolor and ink painting. It was inspired by music I heard. Simple line patterns I originally imagined took shape in this flower. What I wanted to show is a cool breeze on a hot summer day. Cool colors used for the flower were chosen this intent. For more information about this painting you can watch this YouTube video where I explain it a little better.

   Original $100

  8.5x11 print $20

I just finished this painting this morning. There are times in life when I have no time to paint, this week was one of these. I went crazy about having it finished today because I wanted to keep on posting a video every Tuesday, so I had to finish it. Little challenges like this make it easier to keep on painting no matter what. 

Abstract Painting of a Giant Snowflake, Giveaway and Super Duper Hair

OMG, IT'S A GIANT SNOWFLAKE PAINTING!!! I know, I know, I had a rough few New Years Eves.

The headband is from Rouge and Whimsy on etsy

To enter giveaway you can:
Subscribe to this YouTube channel and comment On this video

Subscribe to my blog and comment on this post

Bonus entries (bonus entries will not count unless you have done one of the above) are:

Like me on Facebook  (1 extra entry)

Follow me on Twitter  (1 extra entry)

Or join my mailing and email lists by emailing me at armadavolya[at]hotmail[dot]com with your mailing and email addresses (1 entry each)

You need to leave a comment for each entry on either this video or on the blog post
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Just a quick Apocalypse Update: It's been 1.5 month since the end of the world begun, don't see that many changes though, other than funky weather that is. Last year it was a lot hotter. Other than that, same old, same old. Was also wondering about the whole end of the world in 2012. How can the world end in 2012 if these 6 last month are going to run out in 2011? Hmm... too many ends of the world in too short of a time...

Winter Night, Watercolor Painting

It's finally done. The Winter Night in watercolor and ink is up for your viewing pleasure. I added another layer of blue-black paint on the background and another layer of cool green on the pine tree. From there I added dark shadows from the branches and snow resting on them. A few dozen snowflakes falling all around. I wanted it to be somewhat realistic but not exactly. To do that I decided to get imperfect shapes nature has to offer for the pine tree and abstract snowflake.


    Buy Print $20

Abstract Painting, The Beach and the Palm Tree

The Beach and the Palm Tree is a painting I did for a challenge. The challenge was to paint ocean/beach. I decided to make it cartoony looking after I remembered all those cartoons about islands in the middle of nowhere I've seen when I was little. A swirl of sand and water on the background is what I imagine someone who is stranded on such island would bee seeing after getting a heat stroke

  Original $100

  8.5x11 print $20

If you would like to hear more about this painting, feel free to watch this video where I describe it in more details

After a crazy day, I was finally able to make this video. Making this video was the real challenge. First I recorded it just to find out that the camera was breaking and was doing some crazy tricks. I went out to get a new one and on the way back almost got pooped on by a bird. Seriously, bird, have some respect. I mean, I'm vegan so that you can live and not be eaten, and what do I get in return? Anyway, when I got home with a new camera I realized that the microphone on this camera is rather bad, but I couldn't handle going out again, so I just worked with what I had. I'll have to get a new microphone some day because this is clearly not working too good. On the brighter side, my cat friend, Cuteness is performing a magic trick on this video, he magically disappears.

Snowflake, Work in Progress is Progressing

Well, This snowflake is going along nicely, even though I had no time to work on it. I'm almost done with this one, just need to add more shadows to the pine tree and fixing the shape of it, give the background another layer and add some specks of whitish blue in the background. I'm really liking where this is going and am thinking about doing another 10 of the same type for every month of the year and making a calender with them.
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Apocalypse Update: Naturally since I'm planning on making a calendar I'm planing on living that long and hoping to have other people around who would want a calendar for the next year. Which also means that next year needs to happen. I'm totally banking on it. It would really suck if it didn't happen.

Alter Ego, Art and Giveaway

Some time ago I wrote a blog post about these super-fast digital paintings I did and how I was wondering if they would sell. Well, I wanted to add some humor to my YouTube videos, so I developed an alter ego named Tatyana. She is a crazy woman with fake Russian accent and she is convinced that she is the best thing that ever happened to this world. She will be the one responsible for these digital paintings. She is so in love with herself that she sells her prints for $1000 each and thinks it's cheap. She is being generous enough to give one of the prints away though to one lucky winner. The print that will be given away is of a painting "The Healing Spirit" that is created on this video.

To enter the giveaway, you need to go to and subscribe to my YouTube channel and leave a comment on this video.

There will be more of this crazy Tatyana every Friday, so stay tuned and catch some artistic craziness. For those who wonder:she is based on the overwhelming ego of some of the artists I've met in my life.

Youtube and Fire of Life

Here is one more youtube video, I haven't shown this drawing anywhere on line yet, so this is the first time it sees the light of the internet. It's about the difference in how people react to illness and how important it is not to give up. I drew this a couple of few month ago and recently I almost lost someone very dear to me because she gave up on herself. She was going blind, almost lost her sight completely a was just waiting to die. Luckily my mom got there in time and was able to intervene in time. Thanks to a surgery one eye was saved, the other might be fixed after the second surgery that will be a little harder. Ability to see with at least one eye however gave her the desire to life again.

This drawing was inspired by someone who is the exact opposite, he fights for his life and happiness no matter how hard it might be.

Snowflake, Work in Progress

I'm getting ready for the busy season. Summer is the best time to do that. I'm about half way done with this painting, just have to finish the pine tree and do the background color. In order to draw the snowflake, I first cut it out of paper, which is very easy and then I traced in onto the watercolor paper. After that, it's all history. Hm... I just thought about doing a tutorial on drawing snowflakes like this...

Apocalypse Update: It just stopped raining. My little garden is growing really fast with all this rain fall. With all the fresh veggies I don't think this world is doing all that bad and I'm sure those leafy greens agree with me.

Namesake Set

Have I mentioned I started selling sets of prints of letters? They are sets of 5 letters. I figured it would be a good gift, so there you go. If only I had enough space on my walls, I would hang my own name there. As of right now though it's covered with artwork of countless artists.

When I first decided to do these sets, I had a little problem. I realized that the background color on some of the letters was a little different from others. Lets be honest, it's impossible to mix exactly the same color. In sets it would've looked bad to have mismatched colored prints, so I had to fix the problem. What I did, was a little GIMP magic. I basically painted a blank bage with a color on the background I wanted and then replaced backgrounds of all the letters with this one. This way all the prints now look like they belong together. It took me a lot of time to do it for each and every letter, but it was worht it.

One of the mane reasons I love GIMP so darn much...
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Apocalypse Update:
It cooled down again... figures, weekends are approaching... It looks like there wouldn't be and beach time for me this week, although... you can never trust forecast. So nothing new really.

In the Middle of it all is Love, Abstract Watercolor Painting and Crazy Kitteh

 

Here comes my second video, In the Middle of it all is Love, plus a little bonus kitty love.

I wanted to poke fun at putting cute adorable animals in the videos and using sex just to get more views. In order to make fun of it, I went ahead and filmed my little kitty friend. He tried to eat me in the process, but it ended well. I ended up getting a lot more views in the first day then I did with the first video. Somehow I think it's because it had "cute kitten" as one of the tags. Surely after Monkey was done trying to kill me, I went ahead and talked about my art, to be more specific, about one painting about love. 

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Apocalypse update: Oh, yes the Jews never had those who enslaved them as slaves and there are people living on the land that used to be Babylon. Since the bible predicts these things and they haven't happened yet, there can't be the end of the world just yet. Interesting, I totally forgot about all the predictions the bible made that haven't come true yet. Well, we have a little over 5 month for it all to happen. If it all does happen and the end of the world will come, well... I guess I'll have to accept my defeat. If all these predictions don't happen and the end of the world comes, then God is a liar and I would still have to accept my defeat because I really don't like the end of the world idea. And if the end of the world never happens at all, then I'll go ahead and scream into the faces of everyone who believed in it "I TOLD YOU SO!!!"

Abstract Beach and the Palm Tree Pianting. Finally Done

This abstract watercolor and ink Beach and the Palm Tree painting is finally finished. I literally just finished it. The paint is drying, so I can't scan it in, but I took this photo. Tomorrow if all goes well, I'll post it on etsy and perhaps make prints of it as well. I learned a lot from this challenge. Every painting slowly but surely improves my skills, but I think this one improved them much more then any other work I did. It's mainly because I did something I wasn't used to. I experimented, tried new things and as a result learned much. Something I was dreading to do turned into something I really enjoyed painting and seeing it come to fruition.Well, now I'm going to make some prints and see about selling them :)
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Apocalypse Update: There was hail today. So much for me wanting to go to the beach... oh well, at least it's not scorching hot and I don't need to water the plants since all the hail melted right in the pots.

Work in Progress, Abstract Watercolor Beach painting

I finally got a chance to put a few more hours into this painting. I'm actually almost done with it, just have to do the water swirl. Today I finished the palm tree and the sand swirl. You can see some of the details of the palm tree here as well as a part of the swirl. This painting is coming out way better then I expected. The added benefit is that I'm trying new techniques on it. I was watching a youtube video yesterday about this guitar lesson. The guy was basically showing that you don't have to always follow the rules, play the same things everyone already have played. You can find your own way. If it sounds good, why not do it? The example he was showing is called "triangles" where he literally was forming triangles with his fingertips while playing the guitar. It sounded great, but you will never find "triangles" in any book or guitar lessons. This is my approach to art. Some of the best artists I've met are self taught. They always stand out, because they do something different from every other artist. They don't use the same techniques. Instead, they develop their own techniques. This is the route I went with this painting. I didn't use watercolor the way it's taught. I used it in my own way. It actually turned into a combination between watercolor, marker and inking techniques. You can clearly see the inking techniques in the was the leaves are colored. What I did was basically mixing paint a lot thicker then you would normally mix for watercolor painting. With a very thin brush I applied it as if I was using a pen. As a result you have these thin ink0like lines on the leaves.

Every form of art, be it performance, fine art, craft or any other form is based of imagination, expression of an idea or feeling, innovation. If we always walk the same walk, nothing new will ever be developed. The techniques everyone is using now have been discovered some time long ago by some artist who was thinking outside the box. Art has no rules, it has no boundaries. Why do we keep on putting those limitations to the way we express ourselves? Do an experiment, do something completely different. There is a good chance you will find a new way to improve your skills through this experimentation. The amount of new recipes I came up  with by accident, the amount of new cool discoveries I've made by messing up what I was originally intending to make. Don't be afraid to do something unusual. Break those boundaries.
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Apocalypse update: When am I ever going to get tired of making fun of people who believe in this nonsense? Oh, I don't know... when the lobster will whistle on the mountain. Or at least croak a few times. Anyway, it cooled down to comfortable temperature here, the air is great, no humid. I think Yahveh is loosing the battle. Hopefully it will stay this way because I really want to go to the beach tomorrow. Get away from the computer so that I can get more drawings done. I might even dress up as a pirate to pastafarians my support. They are doing such a great job. Who cares about football and baseball when you have such epic battle going on? GO PASTAFARIANS!!! GO FLYING SPAGHETTI MONSTER!!!

Palm Trees, and Monkeys. Painting of a Beach

In one of the art teams on etsy we have these challenges. We pick a topic and try to paint it. This time the topic is beach/ocean. Well, I must admit, this was actually challenging. Mainly because of all elements in nature, I never got special attachment with the beach. I lived most of my childhood ether close to the forests or mountains. We had rivers and lakes, but they were small and never inspired that great of an ow in me. I only saw sea for the first time when I was in my teens. The earlier memories were much more important to me as far at loving elements in nature goes. Plus, I'm really not "painting the beach" kind of girl.

After thinking about this challenge for a few days, I finally figured out how to combine this topic with my painting style. I finally cracked it, I'm doing it and I'm loving it. This picture shows it as it is so far, I have to put another day into it before I can say I'm done, but so far I think it's going well.

Now, here is how I managed to get this to the point where I can actually enjoy doing it. First of all I needed to figure out how to do it in abstract, more importantly my style of abstract. I googled "abstract beach" images and saw how other people did it. This started bringing me in the right direction. I figured out what I wanted on the painting plus I got the boost of confidence that I can indeed do it. Then I remembered all those cartoons I watched when I was little and how small islands were depicted in them. This helped me develop it further. Now add a simplified version of my crazy lines and here it comes. Beach painting that is my very own and that I can relate to. Now I just have to finish and hope I wouldn't mess something up in the process.

The whole time I was painting, Monkey wanted to be close to me. After trying to get comfortable on the drafting table where I was painting, he figured there was too much water and paint, plus I was moving things around too much. He changed his position by switching to the table just an arm length away and of all places, he went ahead and fell asleep on the printer.

-Monkey, can you print out last month expenses?
-Mew, give me catnip

Oh, and the spiders... I hate spider... For some odd reason they seem to like the idea of moving in with us though. Killed one of them myself (after screaming like a little girl) and Vincent killed the other (after I screamed like a little girl.) Now, this is how the conversation went between Vin and I after I screamed
-Vincent, there is a spider in the bathroom, can you kill it?
-Nah, it's going to keep the flies away (he has a thing against killing things, even spiders)
-No, it's going to keep me away
Anyway, after threatening to spray the spider with chlorine so that it would die a terrible and painful death without me getting near it, Vincent agreed to catch it and release it outside. Killed it in the process of catching though.

Don't forget about the giveaway btw, it's still on at http://artofarmadavolya.blogspot.com/2011/05/giveaway-of-painting-joy-and-my-first.html

Apocalypse update: Good news, it cooled down a bit over here. It was so much nicer today, I didn't even have to turn on the AC. Though I still have to water the plants myself :(
Darn, this end of the world is very sneaky, you can't even see it coming.
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Update: 3 spiders... 3... One of them snack up on me while I was typing the blog post for From the World of Art. My arachnophobic mind can't handle it. Perhaps this is the way the world will end... it'll be huge aggressive spiders... they will scare us all to death...
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Another quick update, there is another giveaway I'm sponsoring. If you would like one of my Ancestor's Spirit paintings, I'm giving away the largest, the most expensive and the one I like the most. It's an $80 painting, so don't miss out

Fire Butterfly Jewels and a Giveaway

Wanted to leave a quick note about another giveaway I have going on. This one is for one of my letters. It's on Fire Butterfly Jewels where all of it will be nicely taken care of for me, so I'll just quickly retire and get back to my painting... the procrastination will kill me one day...

Almost forgot, the apocalypse... I think pastafarians are starting to loose, because it was way too hot today. and yes, I actually had to water my plants today since the rain never came. It's so humid out, I really wish we had some rain, but alas, Yahweh decided I should suffer for my sins and bake alive. Must be because I worship animal idols. 

Giveaway of Painting Joy and My First Youtube Video

It is finally done, my first youtube video is up and running. Hence the giveaway. As I promised a while ago, it's up for grabs.This Painting would normally be $50, but since I love you guys so much...

The rules are simple, for each entry leave it's own comment here on my blog. Make sure I have some way to contact you (email, etsy shop, twitter, Facebook, YouTube, some place I can send you a message if you win). I will draw the lucky number once my YouTube channel hits 500 views, so the faster it'll happen, the faster the painting will be sent to the winner. The ways to enter are many.

Mandatory:
Subscribe to my Youtube channel and comment on the video. (1 entry) 

Additional:
Follow Armada Volya's Art Corner and From the World of Art (1 entry each)
Favorite Armada Volya etsy shop (1 entry)
Follow me on Twitter (1 entry, please give name in the comment)
Like my Facebook Page (1 entry, please leave name in the comment)
Post about this giveaway and the video on twitter, Facebook, and/or blog (1 entry each, give links in your comment)
Join my mailing list. Email me at armadavolya@ hotmail.com with your mailing address. I don't send emails more then once per month and I don't send mail more then twice a year. Information will not be sold or shared (2 entries, one for email address, one for mailing address. Be sure to leave 2 separate comments)
And just because I really love the print I got, visit Jessica Lopez's shop and tell me what item you like the most there

The winner will be picked using www.random.org
Good luck.
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Sorry guys, forgot to do my usual apocalypse update, so here it is for both days. Yesterday- more of the same. Today- there is no rain, it's horrible, all day it was really hot and then there was no rain... now I'm going to have to water my plants myself... now that's very close to the end of the world as far as I see it.

Crazy Video Day and Nothing to Post

Today was supposed to be my youtube day. I was supposed to work on my first video, get it ready, post it and enjoy. Well... first I found out my microphone isn't doing too good, so I had to run around the mall in search of a new one. Found it. Works just a little bit better, but I figured it's good enough.
Sat down trying to figure out what I have to say. Wrote it all down, practiced. Spent a few hours trying to record, rerecord, rererecord a 5 minute video. And I thought I'd have some time left over to read blogs. It's almost 3 in the morning now and I just finished with the recording part. Will have to edit it and post probably tomorrow. If that's the case, my giveaway for the Joy painting will be posted tomorrow as well.

For those who are wondering, there was a spider on that tree, that's why I have this funny face. Spiders love my, I don't love them back... They love biting me way too much...

Oh and I had something super good happen today. I did a feature on this awesome artist, Jessica Lopez a few days ago on my other blog. Well, she sent me one of her prints and it's beautiful. It looks really good up close, you can really appreciate all the inking she did on it. You can't really see it on the photo on line, but when you see the print itself, the inking is beautiful. She also gave me a coupon to use and to share. It's good for 2 purchases, so if anyone wants it, it's AVBLOG. I was going all out promoting her on every networked I knew today. I think I tweeted about it 3 times. Jessica is so talented, and her work is so good. Oh, I'm too exited, I have to wrap this up before I go too far with this.

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Apocalypse Update: Nothing new, same hot weather all day, same rain at night. Oh and Monkey tried to commit suicide yet again. I went into the other room for a few minutes and all I heard was some woman saying "don't jump, don't jump kitty." He actually wasn't going to jump, he is just living on the edge and loves walking on it too. Crazy little Monkey. If he would've fallen though and I couldn't find him (I don't think he'd die after falling from the second floor) it just might've been a mini end of the world for me.

Life of a Workaholic

I am somewhat of a workaholic. Not that I enjoy working all that much, but it's the stubbornness in me speaking I think. I have this drive to succeed no matter the obstacles, no matter how much time and effort it will take. Because of it I end up working for 12 hours a day every day. My husband is blaming it on my nursing school habits when I had to stay up all night to finish yet another process record (we had to do one every week), to study for yet another test, to pass yet another skill. I don't know, he might be right, but I think I'm just really stubborn. I have been told too many times that I can't have my art as a full time job, that all artists are starving, that I have to get a 9-5, that I will not make it as self employed. Every time I hear that I end up getting more and more stubborn and working harder and harder to prove them all wrong. So far it's been working. It's a slow process, but it's worth every minute I invested in it.

It's hard to remember to stop and enjoy the moment with my kind of stubbornness, but this is what I have my husband for. He "forgets" to wake me up when I ask him to, he arranges pizza and movies from the 60s nights (we have a couple of those a week) and he reminds me that every now and again I should do something like laundry.

My cats remind me to stop every now and again and feed them, hug then, play with them. If I don't get the message, I get the claws.

I believe this drive of mine is a key to success and the reminders to stop and smell the litter box are there to keep my sanity.

What do you think? Is being a workaholic needed to success in small business? Is it a way to loose one's mind? Is that litter box ever going to learn how to clean itself?
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Apocalypse update: It's been a week since this most recent end of the world began. Nothing special today, sunny day with a little bit of rain, I was even able to take some good pictures of my paintings while it was sunny. Doesn't really look like anything changed since the 21st. Monkey is still hunting my feet, Cuteness is still sleeping next to me when I'm on the computer and I'm still writing on this blog. Even my dangerously unsteady balcony hasn't fallen yet.

How to Decorate a Frame with Magazine Pages

Today I was doing everything BUT what I was supposed to do. Today is the day I'm supposed to read blogs, haven't even started yet. What I did do though is talk to other bloggers and arranging a giveaway for one of my paintings. It should be up and running in a week or so. I also got offered to be a guest blogger and do a tutorial. Now I can't even find a link because my mind is slowly melting. I'll post it as soon as I will find it though. Oh yes, and I'm also a regular guest blogger for The Art Inquirer, I'll be writing for it once a week or so. Anyway, with doing all that, 8 hours went by and I have only read one blog so far. On a brighter side, I now have a step by step tutorial for my frames. So, here it is:

Take a frame that has flat front (or top if it's laying on the table).

Take some magazines, cut pages of magazines into strips that would fit well on the frame.

Roll strips of paper into little rolls

Glue rolls onto the frame (I used Mod Podge for it, cover them with Mod Podge to make sure they are glued togather and have shiny look as well as protected from some of that damage.

Frame whatever you wish in them.

This is a simplified version of the tutorial. I'll post a link to the full tutorial as soon as it'll be posted and as soon as I'll find the address of that blog again. I'm too disorganized today...

Oh, almost forgot, the end of the world update... It was nice and sunny all day, then it suddenly got dark and started raining (well it looked more like someone was hosing the windows, less then a minute after it started pouring rain, it also started hailing, large chunks of frozen slush. It didn't damage any of my plants though, so I'm happy. This is not that uncommon here in Erie, I mean, it is Erie after all. It's not even that uncommon in the rest of the world. When I lived in Kyrgyzstan for example, we had hail every spring, not long after all the fruit trees would bloom. Trees got used to this and ended up blooming twice every spring. Nonetheless,  I'll go ahead and say that pastafarians are doing a great job and managed to counteract this Yahveh sent disaster in less then 30 minutes. In less than half an hour the sun came back out and everything looked beautiful again. It's been raining on and off though, but that's to be expected from such epic battle between Yahveh and Flying Spaghetti Monster's chosen people.
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Update: I did it!!! I found the blog where my tutorial will be posted... it's My Hobby Shop. The frame decorating tutorial is up and running