carolskinger, Author at Carol Skinger

Abstracting the weather channel in watercolor and ink

February 15, 2023

My new work on paper will be on display at Panza- 115 Sedgwick St, Millvale, PA from February 17th-26th, 2023. It’s just for two weekends including evening hours on Friday and daytime hours on Saturday and Sunday. Come see the fun exhibition of maybe 80 people’s work! I’ll be showing approximately 20 paintings on paper, hanging from clips. Sizes range from 9″ x 12″ to 18″ x 24″. Prices will range from $175- $350. This is not a gallery show where people buy things at the gallery so you will need to let me know if you want one. I’ll be at opening and on closing weekend I’ll be there one one of the weekend days for all the hours.

Opening reception Friday, Feb 17th, 2023, from 6-9pm. This will be crowded FYI as there are many exhibiting artists.

Saturday, Feb 18 11-4

Sunday, Feb 19 11-4

Friday, Feb 24 6-9

Saturday, Feb 25 11-4

Sunday, Feb 26 11-4

I love this annual creativity project which happens nationally called Fun A Day, as it’s different than a usual gallery show in that work is not framed, people attempt to work for one dedicated month on something, ANYTHING they wish to explore. I decided to MOSTLY work abstract and MOSTLY play with the colors I saw in the January sky, yet not make faithful pictures OF the sky. In this post I included a couple pieces that are actual pictures I painted of something recognizable. You might see 31 pieces by one person, or many less if they are simply working through January on a few pieces. At the opening you might hear a poet or musician who wrote new work in January to perform. First I was going to call it weather report, then winter sky, then I landed on the weather channel.

Some people will remember the year I did all goat paintings as a theme. I pulled an old one out and added sky colors.

Boyce Park, a great county park in Allegheny County

This last one is one of the first I painted in January 2023. It is sold but I want to include it in the show and then I will ship it. This woman is in her 90’s and she’s taking watercolor lessons on her porch from a dear artist friend of mine, Vicki Powers in Charlotte, VT. I got Vicki started on watercolor in the 70’s after her art major and at the beginning of our long friendship. I loved her photograph of her student and saved it in a file I call ‘future paintings’.

2022 New Work

January 16, 2022

January 2022 begins with some abstract works on paper using archival colored inks

Horizontally divided abstract painting on paper. Above the horizon is mostly blue with white flowing into it. Below the horizon a mostly pale light beige color flows into smaller amount of darker brown. It’s a flowing ‘wet-in-wet watercolor’ style. The painting is done in permanent archival inks. The colored inks separate much like watercolor. The large amount of pigment in the colored inks move beautifully in water before it dries. www.carolskinger.com — Imaginary Landscape 02 by Carol Skinger

Horizontally divided abstract painting in 3 zones on paper. Above the horizon is mostly pale sepia flowing to darker brown, including small bits of bright orange. Next zone at the center area is white. Below the white zone a mostly deep cool green and deep blue color flowing into white area at center. It’s a flowing ‘wet-in-wet watercolor’ style. The media is not watercolor but rather it is done permanent archival inks. The colored inks separate much like watercolor. The large amount of pigment in the colored inks move beautifully in water below it dries. www.carolskinger.com — Imaginary Landscape 05 by Carol Skinger

Horizontally divided abstract painting in 3 zones on paper. Above the horizon is mostly blue with white flowing into it. Next zone at the center area is white. Below the white zone is mostly darker brown with pale sepia flowing into it with small bits of bright orange. It’s a flowing ‘wet-in-wet watercolor’ style. The media is not watercolor but rather it is done permanent archival inks. The colored inks separate much like watercolor. The large amount of pigment in the colored inks move beautifully in water before it dries. www.carolskinger.com — Imaginary Landscape 04 by Carol Skinger

Horizontally divided abstract painting on paper. Above the horizon a mostly pale light beige color flows into smaller amount of darker brown. Below the horizon is mostly darker, then lighter blue with white flowing into it. The white area appears as a flowing white zone in center horizon. It’s a ‘wet-in-wet watercolor’ style, showing much flowing of color into each other or into white areas. The painting is done in permanent archival inks. The colored inks separate much like watercolor. The large amount of pigment in the colored inks move beautifully in water before it dries. www.carolskinger.com — Imaginary Landscape 02 by Carol Skinger

Horizontal abstract painting in blues, reddish brown and an ochre-like yellow on white paper. It’s a ‘wet-in-wet watercolor’ style, showing much flowing of color into each other or into white areas. The painting is done in permanent archival inks. The colored inks separate much like watercolor. The large amount of pigment in the colored inks move beautifully in water before it dries. www.carolskinger.com — Imaginary Landscape 07 by Carol Skinger

Crandy Grant’s cabin on a lake

May 15, 2021

winter scene of a cabin on a lake — Cabin on a Lake watercolor by Carol Skinger

I was so pleased to hear from an old friend from my ski racing years- Crandy Grant.

Crandy and I have kept in touch on social media where he follows my artwork via Carol Skinger Artworks.

In recent years Crandy built a delightful cabin on land his family owned in VT for many decades. He involved the younger generations of his family to help in construction and I feel sure they built some great memories together.

In the beginning of 2021 while the whole country was still dealing with the COVID shut down, I heard from Crandy through my contact page that he’d like to commission me to make a watercolor of the cabin on the lake. I do that.

Crandy is an ideal client: “I have been very impressed with your work and I’m especially fond of watercolors. My preference would be to leave you completely on your own for sizing, colors and however you feel best to depict this scene“.

I have to say I am very lucky that many clients feel this way and I appreciate it.

I made two paintings for Crandy in the end as I got stuck at a certain stage! Wondering how to proceed, I started a 2nd painting showing the cabin in winter. In the end both paintings came together, I sent both and he loved them. We agreed that one day my husband and I will come spend a night or two in the cabin.

It’s fitting that we connected over a cabin. My big experience with Crandy was in 1968 when he and Greg McClallen were the ski coaches for a small band of ski racers from VT including me, and we drove from VT to Colorado and stayed at the Tagert Hut 17 miles from Aspen. We drove out in 3 cars, one of them our VW bus. Parents out there, would you let your 16 year old with 2 month old driver’s license take one of the cars and do this? Grateful to my brave and independent mother!

Tagert Hut, an A-frame was located up a dirt road full of switch backs high above Ashcroft which is on Castle Creek Road. This was June of 1968. The hut was built in 1960 and it was under the care of John Holden in the 1960’s. He and his wife Anne had been faculty members at the Putney School in Vermont and they started Colorado Rocky Mountain School in nearby Carbondale in the 50s. I had been a student there for 8 weeks the previous summer.

When fellow ski racer Bill Farrell and I decided to get up before dawn at Tagert Hut and hike or hitch our way to the only ski race of the summer at Montezuma Basin, I recognized the Holden’s right away when they picked us up. Like Tuckerman’s Ravine there was no lift at Montezuma Basin so we both hiked the course with everyone and studied it on the way to the starting gate. I won! Greg and Crandy’s training camp was a great help. I was trying to move from a ‘B’ to ‘A’ classification and winning that race was the first of several to cinch leap.

Tagert Hut – Colorado 1968

Here is my summer painting of Crandy’s cabin which I started first and finished after completing the winter painting. If you drew a line west from there you’d be on lower part of Lake Champlain and to west of that, Lake George. The low mountains you see are in NY state. I look forward to seeing it.

Cabin on a lake — Crandy Grant’s Cabin in Summer by Carol Skinger

Many thanks for the interesting commission Crandy. It’s one of the things that made my COVID winter of 2021 memorable in a good way.

I was working on one of the paintings when I took a break and watched a (virtual) Red Bench talk via Vermont Ski and Snowboard Museum in Stowe. It was titled Nose Dive- A History of Mt. Mansfield’s Famous Trail. Guess what? The 1967 Jr. National Alpine Championship Downhill on the Nosedive was THE LAST important National or International race on the Nosedive, that cold day in March ’67 when you won the Men’s Downhill and my sister Erica Skinger won the Women’s Downhill (and she won the overall Women’s title). So you both get that piece of Nosedive history.

Love this 1935 photo showing the Nosedive when that’s all you could see, 5 years before the single chair opened.

1935 Nosedive photo Stowe VT — Screen shot from Nosedive: A History of Mt. Mansfield’s Famous Trail

Tips for framing original art and prints

February 9, 2021

Commissioned house portrait by Carol Skinger

I’m going to describe best practices for framing here but caution you that using these methods is expensive. I myself sometimes use these methods for art in my own home and sometimes I don’t. Not everything needs to be handled this way. Not everything needs to last for 100 years. In short, if you have art or prints you have hidden in a drawer because you cannot afford museum grade framing, maybe you need to rethink the plan so you can enjoy the art you own now.

Archival framing methods are the way to go, which means 100% kozo paper hinges, 100% cotton rag, acid and lining free, alkaline pH buffered 4-ply mattes, and conservation glass or Plexiglas.

You can also go with plastic corner mounts and hinge the top matte to an acid-free foam core backing with acid free linen hinges.

There is some back and forth on buffered and non-buffered matte board, but with concerns about general acidity of the air, using buffered matte board is the more conservative method.

I have always found Japanese paper hinges (using rice starch paste) a real pain to work with, so I tend to use a middle ground:

Acid-free linen tape hinges
100% cotton rag, acid and lining free, alkaline pH buffered, 4-ply mattes
Conservation glass or Plexiglas
Acid-free foam core backing

For something that you want to be long lasting as well as reversible (so the owner can have the print or art re-matted later, etc. if so desired) you will want to avoid dry/cold mount methods.

If you insist of entire adhesion to backing for a totally smooth appearance, digital prints should probably not be heat mounted. Ask your framer or reprographics professional. In Pittsburgh, that is Modern Reproductions and Tristate. But lets face it lots of things can be fully mounted.

Pictureframes.com has a “personal frame shop” on their top header. This is a great way to try on mats and frames and you can even select a wall color behind the framed art. You have to upload an image from your computer. Because color can appear differently on a screen than it does in reality I still suggest using a local framer. In the Pittsburgh area I like (in no particular order) Boxheart Gallery, James Gallery , Framezilla , and Panza Frame and Gallery. And I think you should not feel embarrassed to take your big discount coupon to Michaels as well. They have archival and museum glass too.

If you decide to have any of my work framed via an online framing business, you must take the dimensions from my actual art once you receive it and not from my “approximate dimensions” listed for each piece.

Framing is up to you! Yes archival framing is best but expensive, just do what you can to get art on your walls and enjoy it!

21 House Portraits by Carol Skinger

July 29, 2020

A few of my custom house portraits. Contact me for an estimate. I use watercolor and gouache which is opaque watercolor.

Small Mall and art by Carol Skinger

February 11, 2020

lime green tree, yellow, red, orange foliage, yellow building, landscape, delicate painting — Weekend Wanderers at Frick Pittsburgh by Carol Skinger

In January 2020 I completed 21 new artworks, mostly watercolor and gouache and rushed 12 of them to the printers. For the next 90 days I am so happy to say I am one of the new artists and makers who will have work for sale at Casey Droege’s Small Mall in Lawrenceville. My work will be archival glicee prints of these latest artworks at Small Mall at 5300 Butler St in Upper Lawrenceville. The opening is Wednesday February 12, from 6-8 PM. See my new prints here.

All my work created in January was a promise that each artwork would include a sculpture, or what I think is a sculpture. Most of them are in Pittsburgh.

“Small Mall is the concept store for CDCP, an arts business focused on growing Pittsburgh’s art economy. Stop by our experimental retail space to purchase art and design objects from some of the region’s most talented makers.”

Have you heard of the new TRYP Hotel in Lawrenceville? Read more about the architecture and art there. Casey Droege was the art consultant bringing the artwork of many artists to the walls. Monmade was involved too.

I encourage you to sign up for Casey’s eblasts and read about what they are.