scratchboard

I just learned that I have been awarded 2nd Place in the Active Division of the 2022 Online Show of the International Society of Scratchboard Artists (ISSA)! “I Will Twine,” a 7″ x 5″ Scratchbord™ is my winner. It is such an honor to be selected for this prize in an organization representing scratchboard artists from all around the world. You can view the show on the ISSA website and see the unbelievably amazing scratchboards. My scratchboard “Silly Selfie” is … Read More

For the next 3 days I will be demonstrating the art of scratchboarding – one of my favorite art activities – during the annual Art Show at Tellico Village (Tennessee). I’ll be sharing my scratchboarding techniques, materials, tips, favorite scratching tools, samples of finished scratchboard art, and works in progress. Many are not familiar with scratchboards and I am often asked about how I get so much detail and drama in my scratchboard paintings. Here’s the chance to find out … Read More

After working in watercolors for recent months I’ve been anxious to switch over to scratchboarding again. I was inspired to create an image with various stages of the wild thistle plant, so full of a variety of textures. Using Photoshop, I combined a couple of photos I had taken of wild thistle growing near my house. Thistle is a plant which often has several stages of growth showing at once, including spiny flower pods, fully opened flowers, and the delicate … Read More

I love scratchboarding and I love chocolate, so I decided to combine the two in creating How Sweet It Is. I painted a big watercolor of chocolates years ago, Decadence, and it has always ranked among my personal favorite paintings. Even though this is a very very small artwork – just 4.5″ x 3″ – it took forever! The image was created with tiny marks into the black surface, slowly working my way throughout the panel. To be able to … Read More

I just heard that two of my paintings have been accepted to an upcoming biennial exhibition called “No Bigger Than a Breadbox.” There were 384 entries and only 67 have been juried into the show, so I am delighted with the news. My black Scratchbords “Locked In Time”, with color added with inks, and “Eye Of The Tiger” will be featured. (You can see the small size of “Eye Of The Tiger” shown in my hand in the photo). The … Read More

Remember the scratchboard “Wee Lad” I last posted about? Well, I messed it all up! Here’s what happened…. I considered this a learning piece, so I decided to continue beyond the black and white stage and add some color. Since I was imagining the little boy as a Scottish lad, I thought it would add to the look to give him blue/green irises. I stratched away a bit more in his eyes to allow the color to show better and … Read More

I’ve just learned a new scratchboard technique for creating smooth transitions between shades of gray. It’s a great improvement over what I was doing. Sheryl Unwin, a fabulous scratchboard artist, was generous to share her methods for both stippling and hatching in a 4-session Zoom workshop. I’ve created “Wee Lad,” a small 5” x 7” Scratchbord™, with her tips. I love my results, but I need more practice to really latch onto this technique. It is rather time consuming … … Read More

  If you are anywhere near Tucson Arizona in the next few months, stop and see a fabulous gallery show of the finest scratchboard art in the world! I am proud to be one of 48 artists included in the 9th Annual Exhibition 2020 of the International Society of Scratchboard Artists, with two of my newest scratchboards having been selected to be among only 40 in the Open category. The exhibition catalog beautifully illustrates the amazing work of scratchboard artists … Read More

    You win some, you lose some. The stakes weren’t too high; I missed out on ‘bragging rights and a free t-shirt.’ But I gained a whole lot more. The International Society of Scratchboard Artists (ISSA) just selected artwork for their commemorative 2020 Exhibition t-shirts… and mine wasn’t chosen 🙁 I created “Anna’s Fairy Duster” with realistic expectations. I knew anything I entered would be a long shot to win, with my limited experience of just two years doing … Read More

  Beautiful ruby throated hummingbirds – the most common species which migrates to Eastern North America – visit our feeders from early April through the beginning of October. I’ve done numerous paintings of them, in watercolor and acrylics, and it was time for me to try one on scratchboard. As demonstrated in my previous post, I created a border design on a 14″ x 11″ black Scratchbord™, using colors to match those I planned to use in the artwork. For … Read More