Diane Clancy's Art Blog

With this painting also I always think of Alice in Wonderland. To me, this is like being small and going into the forest of the vases and teacups. Hence Alice. I hope you enjoy it. I have always wanted to create lots more of these because I love them. I think it is very true that who and how one is at any given moment determines quite a lot about how art comes out. So I have always been concerned that new ones wouldn’t really go with these two … and I can hear you now … do them anyway!! You are right of course … who cares if they match. I have a gigantically (for me) large one almost done … just needs a few tweaks. It has gotten somewhat damaged but might be redeemable anyway.

Bottlescape I, Pastel © Diane Clancy

I need to keep using the nebulizer .. juut have to accept that fact for now. Tomorrow is the big day when the AWE project goes up!

~ Diane Clancy

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I always think of Alice in Wonderland with this. To me, this is like being small and going into the forest of the vases and teacups. Hence Alice. I hope you enjoy it.

Bottlescape II, Pastel © Diane Clancy

I am very tired and also not breathing as well again. I am back with the nebulizer. So I just have to realize that I do need it at least every couple of days for now. That’s ok.

~ Diane Clancy

Happy Valentine’s Day, Everyone!!

This is part of the One World, One Heart give-way. The prize is one 6 pack of these cards. The size is 4.25 x 6″ and they are professionally printed. These are my cards – I am thrilled so many of you wanted to win these cards … I will have all the different images up so you can see them again. Near the top and at the bottom of the post there is an opportunity for you to purchase the cards (identical button) at a discount if you really want to take them home with you, but didn’t win. SO … here it goes … drum roll please …. drums banging away!!! And the WINNER IS …. Melissa of Altered Faireys. Congratulations, Melissa!!

Conundrum I, Collage © Diane Clancy

Reflections in Blue I, Pastel © Diane Clancy

Reflections in Blue II, Pastel © Diane Clancy

Mother Watching All, Oil © Diane Clancy

Sight, Collage © Diane Clancy

Conundrum I, Collage © Diane Clancy

To thank you for your interest and participation in the give-away of these cards, I am giving you a sale price of $12.99 which includes shipping and handling for these 6 cards. If you would like to purchase this pack of 6 cards (4.25 x 6), please use this PayPal button. PayPal accepts lots of credit cards – you do not have to have a PayPal account to purchase. Anyone can buy – you didn’t have to participate – you just got lucky!! ~ Thank you!!

Late update … I found myself in a Valentine Treasury … here is the post in my other blog that showcases this Treasury.

~ Diane Clancy

Technorati Tags: One World, One Heart, PayPal, Treasury

First of all, Chris O’Byrne and I have a project we have been working on .. he wrote a post about it today … I hope you will read his post and check out our new project!!

Kara Jones of Mother Henna had a post a few days ago about the One World, One Heart GiveAway. I had never heard of it … I think thi sis the second year. Lisa Oceandreamer OWOH has a blog here which lists all the blogs involved and gives the details.

Conundrum I, Collage © Diane Clancy

Lots and lots of blogs are giving away items – to show love and build the blogosphere. So once I knew, how can I resist? My give-away will be one set of the cards that I had been telling you about in the marketing story – and we will get back to it.

Reflections in Blue I, Pastel © Diane Clancy

You have until February 13 (at least at most blogs) to leave your name and join in each blog’s give-away. If you want to win the give-away, leave enough information for me in a comment to this post so I can get a hold of you.

Reflections in Blue II, Pastel © Diane Clancy

Make sure your email address is a valid one and not one of the no-reply ones. Please do not leave sensitive info like your address or phone .. I can get your address when you win!

Mother Watching All, Oil © Diane Clancy

I will accept all entries until 9 pm eastern time on February 13and then the winner will be announced on February 14 … and then your gift will be coming your way!

Sight, Collage © Diane Clancy

Here are more details if you would like to participate. There are tons of blogs participating … so gone on over and check them out! I know I plan to!!

Anticipation, Collage © Diane Clancy

The prize is one 6 pack of these cards. The size is 4.25 x 6″ and they are professionally printed. I look forward to seeing who wins!!

~ Diane Clancy

Technorati Tags: Chris O’Byrne, Kara Jones, One World, One Heart GiveAway, Lisa Oceandreamer, blogosphere, marketing

I have been sharing my story about the process of exploring marketing my artwork through selling cards to get to licensing my paintings so that many people can enjoy my vibrant and uplifting work. You can read about other parts of this journey in recent posts starting here. This is one of the cards from this printing that I did. I have many left if you would like to own some of them.

Reflections in Blue I, Pastel © Diane Clancy

So I now have 6,000 cards arriving at my home (which also doubles as my office) … or should I say, my office which doubles as my home. They are not nearly as overwhelming as I was afraid … whew!! And one of the cards was not printed well color-wise. It was too far off the color of the painting … and more importantly, the color of the file that I sent them. If you prepare your file wrong, it is your problem.

But they promise printing within a certain color tolerance. So I called them up. One that felt was very much within tolerance (and I could live with that). But the other one was clearly out of the tolerance range. So they very quickly and efficiently reprinted that one card. Of course, I now (and still do) have 1,000 cards with the wrong color and I am still not sure what to do with them. Modern Postcard was great about reprinting – very respectful and the replacement cards came out GREAT!

So now what? I gave Vision Works the cards they ordered and figured out how to make up an invoice. Now what? I got ready to get in my little car and start to go out and beat the pavement to see who else would like to have the opportunity to have my beautiful paintings in their stores and homes.

The journey continues …

~ Diane Clancy

Technorati Tags: marketing, cards, licensing, color tolerance, Modern Postcard

I have some news that is exciting for me!! And I think it will be great fun for you to look at – whether or not you purchase anything. I have finally gotten the CafePress Shop (www.cafepress.com/dianeclancy) set up and open at last!! I would love if you would stroll over and look at what I have done. This is one of the paintings that is on tiles, totes, mugs and more. I just am so excited!

The Hideaway, Pastel © Diane Clancy

Thank you for the great feedback I have gotten today … I appreciate it greatly! I am sorting through what people have said … as I will be making decisions soon.

What are you up to?

~ Diane Clancy

Technorati Tags: CafePress, feedback

The last few days I have been talking about my balance between the creative process and marketing. The two most important pieces of all this are – my creating because I love making art and – my collectors (this means you) acquiring my art. I need to remember that all the other parts of the processes are focused on these two goals – creating and collecting.

Bottlescape II, Pastel © Diane Clancy

Besides my site, I now have two online stores Etsy and ArtFlock. I think I will probably start an eBay store too, but I haven’t done that yet. I am still checking out to see if it makes sense. (Comments are welcome – please share your experience with me and others who read this blog.)

The next big step for me to take is licensing my work to various companies who would like to use my images on their products. I have a friend with experience who was going to help me sort through which places would be most appropriate for me, but unfortunately life has sent her some twists and turns that make her temporarily unavailable.

I have quite a long list of companies who look for artists in order to license artists’ work. I have also done a lot of looking on the web researching different licensing companies. The licensing process has actually changed greatly over the last several years. In some ways it is a little simpler now.

It is getting toward time to figure out which ones to target. You can see that the place interested in “Bottlescape II” and “Flowers IV” (yesterday’s image) may well be different. But they are not the companies who are going to want my Goddess series. This is the stuff I have to sort out.

It feels more concrete and manageable telling you about it and allowing you to share in this process. Thank you for being part of my progression.

~ Diane Clancy

Technorati Tags: balance, creative process, marketing, collector, Etsy, ArtFlock, eBay, licensing, Goddess

A couple of days ago I showcased a pastel version of this painting in the post The Empty Chair – Pastel. The original pastel was created in the slide room – see the post Creating Inside and Out if you want to read about this creative process. I thought it would be fun to create the same image in different mediums – so I did.

The Empty Chair – Acrylic © Diane Clancy

It is interesting to me to see the differences. The blues give dissimilar feels – the blue in this acrylic painting lets light into the picture. I see a distinct time of day in this image … there is a lot of light flooding into the space of the empty chair. The emptiness doesn’t feel forlorn to me as the other one does.

The use of color rather than just the mediums themselves give them some of their variety. This woman looks more seamless to me instead of shadowy. Remember, the other painting was created in the slideroom so I didn’t have as much control over the materials. Chance played a much bigger part.

But, to me, it looks like the same artist painted these even though the color and feel is distinctive. (Yes, I know I did.) I know which of these two worlds I would prefer to enter into …

~ Diane Clancy

Technorati Tags: pastel, creative process, acrylic, color, translation of mediums

“The Empty Chair” is another pastel that was created in the slide room. You can read about the details of this creative process in the post Creating Inside and Out. I also have an acrylic version of this painting that I will showcase in the next couple of days.

The Empty Chair – Pastel © Diane Clancy

It is interesting to me to see the difference in images when I put them into different mediums. My teacher, Michael Coblyn, used to talk about how each time one takes an image and translates it to another medium, it is important to see it as a new painting.

He encouraged us to not get caught up in trying to duplicate the image but instead to look at it as a new creation. This thinking has been incredibly helpful to me as I have taken my paintings created in traditional mediums and translated them into digital paintings.

After I created this pastel, I took a good hard look at it – and it was very striking to me. That empty chair in the window is very poignant to me – it feels very lonesome. I was caught in just creating and then stepped back and feel that there is a lot of power in this image.

~ Diane Clancy

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I was thinking about Matisse when I was creating this pastel painting. Many people have asked me where I have gotten my (they say) unusual sense of color. At one point my mom and I pulled out all the artwork we 4 children had made to sort out whose was whose.

Woman and the Sea, Pastel © Diane Clancy

I was amazed to see that my color sense was already fully developed as a child. I remember painting a pink bunny in a pink field in the 4th grade. The pinks were intense and many different variations closely related. But I was surprised to see that the rest of the pictures I created were also true to my future sense of color.

Each of us as children had a very disctinctive flavor to our creative process. Mine was easier to tell apart from the others, but we were each individual. What fun my mom and I had as we went through these memories. How I wish she were alive and healthy today!

Matisse’s paintings inspired my spiraly and curlycue things … I used to make afghans and quilts with these kind of color combinations. Afghans are one place I could play and explore color with freedom. Thank you for joining me down Memory Lane.

- Diane Clancy

Technorati Tags: Matisse, pastel, color, creative process, quilting, inspiration