Be Mused Art » Work In Progress

Drawing and Painting

Melia — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 06:52:07 +0000

I have been busy. Lots of late nights sketching, inking and painting. Every moment seems to be spent creating. I take my daughter to swim classes and I draw, I take her to the pool, and I ink, sitting in a restaurant with my watercolors while waiting for dinner to arrive. Really at some point I am going to need to get more sleep. But in the mean time if you want to keep up to date with what I am working on, check out my facebook fan page.

Well, it is nearly 2 am here, so I better try and get some sleep. There are swim classes in the morning and my son’s birthday to celebrate.

A New Pirate Mercat Sketch

Melia — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 06:13:23 +0000

Still adjusting to this whole Linux thing. I think I like it, but some of my existing hardware doesn’t. Poor James is having to walk me through scanning every time, cause it doesn’t always recognize the scanner. And considering I want to scan things at 1am, it isn’t making for a happy husband.
Anyway, he did wake up and set things up to scan this whimsical little mercat. You will notice that the scan has more detail than I have been doing lately. This is because I found a larger sketchbook to work with, so more room for details. Tomorrow, I will have to start painting. Right now, I need to get to bed since I have an appointment in just 7 and a half hours, and much to do before that in the morning.

Kitties! And Dragons too.

Melia — Thu, 27 May 2010 04:20:48 +0000

I just realized that I haven’t posted the promised completed paintings that I showed you the line drawings of a few days back. Well here they are in full color for your viewing pleasure.
Also I have a new sketch that I have been wanting to share. I had to wait until the scanner was hooked up to the new computer to show it off. But once again life with a kitten is showing itself in my drawings. When I can get around to actually painting this one, those round things on the hat band will be gears, except fo the one that is obviously a pocket watch. Then of course there is always the squished fairy. I really don’t know which I want to paint first….

Mommy Fairy Cat – WIP

Melia — Fri, 07 May 2010 21:48:19 +0000

This took all day since I spent a lot of time caring for little kitten of my own. It really is like having a baby in the house again. Maybe I can start painting this once J gets home, or maybe I will just go to bed early.

New Fairy Cat bookmark Design

Melia — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 22:33:26 +0000

Well, this is my next project. Took all day just to get to this point and it is only 3×9 inches. I am hoping to get it painted so I can make some bookmarks from it before Friday.
Why Friday? Why this weekend is my first outdoor art festival in a couple of years. If it goes well, I might try and talk J into doing more of these again. If I rent a tent, I can get by without a van. Which is good, because the old van bit the dust and we have no plans to replace it.
Anyway, if nothing else, I will get some bookmark pages for folks to color to have at the festival, as well as coloringbooks, original art, prints and other fun things. So Saturday stop by the Thrill of the Grill festival in Plano and get yourself some art.

Where Ideas Come From

Melia — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 21:34:56 +0000

I am not sure about you, but when I see a piece of art that I like, one of the thoughts that goes through my mind is “Where did the artist get that idea?”. When I look at my own art a few weeks after it is finished, I am not sure where the idea first sparked. Usually it all comes together just as I am about to go to sleep at night, and I get right back up again and sketch it out- much to my husband’s annoyance. And many times when I decide to sit down to do a painting, I go through my many sketchbooks to find something that inspires me. By the time I get around to that point, I have no clue what inspired the first sketch. I do them having lunch, when I sit down at the Museum when my feet are hurting, sitting in the car waiting for my daughter to get out of school, mindlessly sketch while talking with friends. Lots of little bits of visuals and sounds seem to make their way onto the page as images.
But today something came together while I was on the phone with my great aunt. First I started using my pencil to follow the lines of a flier I picked up at the Dallas Museum of Art just keeping my hands busy while I talked. Then I picked up the sketchbook next to me and it became a Dryad. Just to give you an idea of the leaps I made while not really paying attention to my pencil, here is the flier and my sketch.

Flier from the Dallas Museum of Art

[caption id="attachment_716" align="alignright" width="182" caption="Dryad Sketch"][/caption]

My Lady’s Fairy Cat – Next Painting

Melia — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 22:19:52 +0000

Well here we have my latest drawing from my sketchbook. I went ahead and inked it in the sketchbook to make it easier to use my light box to transfer it to watercolor paper. Some cropping will happen, since it is going to be a 5×5″ watercolor painting.

The beginnings of a Toile Pattern

Melia — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 02:23:39 +0000

This is the start of a toile inspired drawing. I am having some trouble coming up with what I will put inside the wreath of lotus. Hopefully I will have something in the next couple of days. I am thinking something a bit crazy for Toile would be fun. Maybe a mercat or fairy cat doing something very toile-like

My next project – Steampunk Mercat

Melia — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 04:19:29 +0000

Okay this is the rough sketch of the mercat with the crashed steampunk style submarine. I really enjoyed designing the sub. Next time I will need to design the full thing, but it will just be fun.
As you can see, when it got inked I made a few minor changes, which usually happens. I really think that once I put pen to paper the art begins to evolve and become itself, with me just being a tool to uncover what it wants to be. of course next is the color. The metal sub should create an interesting challenge.

Pirate MerCat Bookmark Design WIP

Melia — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 19:22:38 +0000

I know I haven’t posted in awhile. I had been working on an angel pet portrait that was commissioned. Due to it being a gift for someone, I didn’t think it would be nice to post my WIP of it. But I will be sure and post the final painting after Christmas, cause it is awesome.
Here we have the beginnings of a new bookmark design. I am painting this little pirate mercat in watercolor. I hope to finish it in a couple of days, but DH did get me a very early birthday present of Mario Cart….