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Stephanie Dalton Cowan was interviewed past Lisa L. Cyr.

This calendar month's Mixed Media Alchemy column presents an heady interview with creative person Stephanie Dalton Cowan, one of the featured artists from my mixed-media bestseller Fine art Revolution . She shares her unique insight as a multimedia creative person and illustrator in this highly informative dialogue. Her innovative apply of materials, surfaces and tools is inspiring!

Free From the By
30" x 40" mixed media with photograph on leather book cover, vintage papers, debossing and oils. © 2007 SDC

Q: Your mixed-media work is so wonderfully tactile with lots of debossing and textural collage. Can yous tell u.s.a. a fleck almost some of the unique tools and materials y'all utilize in your work? Where do you lot observe such wonderful treasures?

A: I have collected all sorts of printmaking materials over the years. I haunt boutique shops and flea markets to detect unique items such equally mitt-carved Indian and African woodblocks and vintage papers. More than recently, I have been drawn to some of the simpler household tools such equally scrub brushes, wisk brooms and pigment scrapers to create linear scores and random textures into my surfaces. I have also started working predominately in cold wax, oils and dried pigments. The cold wax is soft plenty to make impressions into the surface when first practical, and dries to a rich lustrous surface that is similar to encaustic. I like the luminous, ethereal quality these materials offering, which is why I moved away from using gel mediums and acrylics that seemed to have more than of a plastic finish. Although, I have discovered that by adding marble grit (calcium carbonate) to these manufactured mediums I can achieve an organic chalky finish that is like to the feeling of the powdered pigments and cold wax.

Breadth of Absolute
36" x 48" mixed media, book covers, etchings, cold wax, pigments and oils. © 2012 SDC

Q: Do you work in a sketchbook to develop your ideas? Please detail your conceptual approach to picture making.

A: I always have a sketchbook inside attain, several scattered about my habitation and studio. I also continue a small journal past my bed. It seems that a lot of my ideas come to me in the evening, as I'chiliad winding down from the day. These ideas bubble up from many sources, such as poetry books, fine art books, magazines and fifty-fifty my Pinterest boards. Then, I ofttimes sit down in bed and sketch out thumbnail ideas. I also have a lot of inspiration posted on the walls in my painting studio. Equally I begin to produce the actual work, information technology takes on a life of it's own. Information technology may take me weeks or even months to finish a piece considering of the multi-layered nature of my work. I brainstorm by laying down a background of textures and a few layers of paint, then I permit them dry. A few days afterward, I will come dorsum and piece of work into these layers by subtracting and adding texture and more paint. This process continues until I feel I take achieved the correct amount of texture and depth. In the stop, the final work is really near the history that has been created over time. Information technology is an expression of my interaction with the surface and materials. The initial sketches serve more as a goad to begin the process of creating.

Singular Points
xviii" ten 18" mixed media encaustic with photo emulsion lift and transfer. © 2007 SDC

Q: In addition to very tactile traditional media, you too use photography and digital media in your piece of work. Can you talk about how you intermix such polar approaches?

A:  In the past, my fine art pieces have combined digital media such as photography with painted works. But more recently, I have separated the two and created different series. The first series encompasses photo encaustic works that utilize digital photographs that had been modified in Photoshop and painted on top with oils and wax. I start by mounting an archival print onto a wood panel, and so I utilize layers of oil pigment to the surface. Afterward, I apply a few layers of hot beeswax and damar to seal the print which adds dimension to the photograph imagery.

The second series I created consists of abstract works that employ no digital media at all. I piece of work in a collage style, weaving cloth, vintage papers and diverse elements onto the panels. What I take discovered along the mode is that I am really drawn to color fields and the physical procedure of painting and combining elements to create rich surfaces of color and texture. And then you might say my creative path has diverged a bit from my earlier works where I brought together both the analog and digital worlds on paper and console. I am all the same working in a collage surroundings but with dissimilar elements and approaches.

Cerulean Presence
30" x thirty" mixed media, buckram, papers, cold wax, pigments and oils. © 2012 SDC

Q: Can you tell u.s.a. a little bit about your approach to storytelling through the layers of mixed media and collage y'all employ?

A: There is a natural inclination for me to incorporate some sort of narrative in my illustration works, which combine both painting also as digital media. Almost of my illustrations take a figurative focus that guides the viewer along the storyline I am asked to create by my clients. The narratives in my paintings are much more than subtle and ethereal, whether they are photo encaustic or abstruse. I rely more on color, form and surface to express myself in my personal work.

In the Mist
18" 10 48" photograph encaustic – poured beeswax over archival photo montage © 2011 SDC

Q: Y'all are drawn to dimensional surfaces too every bit unique framing elements. Can you tell us more about this aspect of your work?

A:Information technology's true. I do like dimension in my surfaces and texture is very important to me. I program to create some dimensional assemblages with primitive wood carved pieces I have nerveless over the years. I also have a drove of vintage frames that have been refurbished and rebuilt by my husband, Robert. Sometimes these frame patterns act as an inspiration for some of the mark making on my pieces.

Myopic Vision
26" x 22" mixed media and photograph transfer on paper, antique book pages, beeswax and oils in refurbished vintage frame.© 2006 SDC

Q: Describe your creative working environment and how it helps support your distinctive procedure and approach.

A: I have two studios on the lower level of our house that are both quite large and lite filled. The digital area contains a fireplace, sitting area, bookshelves and a parsons tabular array that houses my estimator, scanner and printers. I take a second studio that contains a large Epson 7600 printer, gallery lighting and open wall space that holds upwardly to five 48" foursquare paintings on i wall. The open painting space helps me immensely because I work both horizontally and vertically. I generally beginning working on my pieces flat to lay down the outset layers, then I move the pieces to a vertical position on the wall to written report them from a altitude and to let for more layering and drying time.

Adjoining these two large studios is a third space with a full bath that gives me storage room for my finished panels and vintage frames. There is too a workshop area for Robert who creates all my wood panels and frames. Lastly, at that place is direct access from both studios to a big backyard that is nicely landscaped and serves as a quiet sanctuary and retreat from my workspaces.

Inside the studio, summer of 2012.

Q: What are your artistic influences and where do you look for inspiration.

A: Inspiration comes to me in many forms. I enjoy music, literature, poetry and beingness in nature. I oftentimes find myself inspired after reading or sketching in my journals late at nighttime, which inevitably lands me in my studio in my PJs' laying downwardly a layer or two of pigment on a panel. My creative influences are primarily the Modernists and gimmicky painters. Some of my favorite historical figures include; Matisse, Picasso, Georges Braque, Paul Klee, Georgia O'Keeffe, William Turner, Rothko, Barnet Newman, Jasper Johns, Antoni Tápies and  Robert Motherwell. That is a very short list. There are really too many to proper noun. Additional contemporaries that influence me are artists such every bit Diebenkorn, Marcia Myers, Robert Ryman, Julian Schnabel, Ernesto Berra, and Ciao Fonseca. I also like many of the contemporary illustrators that cross over into fine art, several of which were featured in your book Art Revolution.

Volo
20" ten 30" photograph encaustic paper on panel , commissioned for the Ritz Carlton, Atlanta, Ga. ©2012 SDC

Q: What do you run into yourself incorporating in your piece of work every bit your mixed-media vision evolves?

A: I run across myself incorporating more than architectural elements into my work. I like aggregation and I relish incorporating elements such every bit fabric, vintage book covers and found architectural wood objects into my panels. I am currently sketching out some ideas for my panels that volition hold custom wood carvings that are imports from Bali and India. My vision is to create a custom inset within these panels that will be surrounded by layers of color and textile to achieve the look and feel of a very aged architectural wall or doorway.

Palimpsest
36" x48" mixed media, newspaper, book covers, cloth, house paint, paint and cold wax © 2012 SDC

Q: What are your time to come aspirations creatively?

A: I truly enjoy the illustration globe and I accept been exposed to many heady projects since I began working with Gerald + Cullen Rapp in 2006. I will continue on the illustration path and I will besides continue to produce personal work, expanding my gallery representation. My goal is to find a happy remainder between the 2 worlds, and then far information technology's working pretty well. At that place is no conflict creatively in switching from digital illustration to physical painting. I am really fueled by working in the two unlike environments. It seems to arrange my metabolism and my interests. The biggest challenge is time, which seems to be true for many artists.

Attraversiamo
48" x 48" book covers, vintage papers, common cold wax, pigments and oils. © 2012 SDC

Artist Bio:

Widely published in the commercial earth, Stephanie's work has appeared in publications such as: The Wall Street Periodical, The Boston Globe, the LA Times and Harvard Business organization Review. She regularly produces mag covers for higher pedagogy besides as book jackets, and artwork for opera and theatre posters.

In addition to her illustration piece of work, Stephanie'southward paintings and photomontages have appeared in several major move pictures including: Failure To Launch, The Within Human, I Am Fable, The Happening, Enchanted, Don't Mess with the Zohan, Law Abiding Citizen and Welcome to People.

One of her photomontages created for the Shakespeare play Macbeth is part of the permanent analogy collection at the Guanshanyue Museum in Shenzhen, Prc. She also participated in exhibits with Museums in New York and Israel.

Stephanie has been published in 3 books: Dialogue, The Fine Fine art of Conversation by Mark Irish potato, Art Revolution by Lisa L. Cyr and Masters Collage, Major Works by Leading Artists by Randel Plowman.

Her paintings have been placed in numerous public and private collections, as well every bit hotels and corporate settings internationally. Her paintings hang in the Ritz Carlton, Atlanta, Lowes Hotel, Atlanta, and Madera Hotel in Washington DC.

Stephanie works from her dwelling studio in Metro Atlanta. She is assisted past her 4 legged studio companions Emily and Linus and her married man Robert Cowan, a talented woodworker who creates custom forest panels and handmade frames. Illustration Representation: www.rappart.com and Fine art: world wide web.daltonprojects.com

Muybridge on Linen
eleven" x 14" photo encaustic printed on linen with poured beeswax. © 2011 SDC

To see more work and a step-by-step demo by Stephanie Dalton Cowan, check out Art Revolution , a mixed-media book that is the forefront in exploring alternative, innovative ways of conceptualizing and creating art that is on the cut-edge. Throughout the highly visual volume, insightful and thought-provoking profiles of leading artists and illustrators accompany stellar, multi-media piece of work. The book also provides insight into the historical influences behind contemporary thinking and approaches, investigating the origins of alternative, unconventional film making throughout the decades. In addition, heady splash spreads featuring demonstrations and behind-the-scene looks at groundbreaking artists at work help shed light on signature processes and techniques. There is a rich constructing of media available to creatives today, offer a wide range of possibilities for exploration and experimentation. Art Revolution reveals how alternative, mixed media aesthetics is uniting the disciplines of two-dimensional, iii-dimensional, digital and new media fine art in inventive combinations. For those wanting to venture outside the norm, the volume includes a directory of the manufacturers and suppliers used by the featured artists so that sources for materials, access to health and safety procedures and additional information on anarchistic techniques and approaches are easily accessible. For artists that are looking for an edge, wanting to push their work further, this book is a valuable asset and ongoing source for inspiration.

Artists featured include: Marshall Arisman, Brad Holland, Dave McKean, Barron Storey, David Mack, Kazuhiko Sano, Fred Otnes, Michael Mew, Kathleen Conover, Rudy Gutierrez, Lynne Foster, Lisa L. Cyr, Cynthia von Buhler, Robert Maloney, Susan Leopold, AE Ryan, Matt Manley, Stephanie Dalton Cowan, Richard Tuschman, Dorothy Simpson Krause and Camille Utterback.

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