It's not a fifth grade vocabulary assignment, it's what I feel about the advent of my mom's art website- finally.

My mom's been an artist longer than she's been a mother, more than two-thirds of her life. Her work is varied, but skilled, and has not gotten a lot of exposure because she's buried herself so much in the family business and the art of child rearing.



Well, now she is a single grandmother, still busy with the store, but she is in a time in her life when it is good to dial back that career and just wrap herself in what she does best. So we built her a website- mostly Michael, of course :)


Isn't her work just lovely? Of course, I'm biased- but who wouldn't be?

So, if you have a chance, check out her website. It's called Alla Prima Lady. For those of you not familiar with the art terminology, alla prima is a painting technique in which the layers of paint are applied all at once, in one sitting, while the paint is still wet. This is not the procedure she uses all of the time, but the name has another layer of meaning that I won't go into here.

You'll find a lot of Native American art, as that part of her heritage has long interested and inspired her. You'll also find florals, Americana, astronomy and surrealism. You'll find acrylic, oil, watercolor, and charcoal. Some of her pieces have structure- a shell sticking out of an oceanscape, jewels on a peacock's tail...

It's a big step for her, so stop on by and welcome her to the internet.

All images © 1987-2008 Karen Roncari

Labels: art, artisan, mom, painting, website

Every third weekend in July there is an art fair here in Cadillac. Replete with food, entertainment of all kinds, art ranging from mediocre to spectacular, and fun kid stuff- it is a lovely break in the middle of summer.

Several years ago, my little sister Julie, then just a scrawny teenager, began painting faces for a few bucks a pop. She'd set up a little stand at the art fair, arrange a semi circle of paint pots and glitter applicators, and sit down. The kids would throng the stand, sweaty dollars in hand, and come out decorated with butterflies, cobras, flowers, lightning, lizards, and nearly everything imaginable! I have had the opportunity of helping out on the off-year, making a few bucks while plying the two-dimensional art that I don't often get to.

Its been a while since then- all of us girls have our own kids now. My sis is still thin- but a lovely lady today, the worship leader and a pastor's wife at her growing church. We've missed a few years due to childbearing, work, not being around... but for the most part Julie's been there most every July, painting faces in the hot July sun.

This year I got to help out again. And I learned a few things that I thought I'd share:

1) The most wiggly of children is capable of extreme stillness if they know the payoff is within reach.
I had kids that could not stand still in line, yanking on mom's or grandma's hand while they shimmied and squirmed and knocked my paints over. The minute those kids were in the chair, and received a friendly admonishment to sit still or we couldn't paint their flaming guitar- they were a statue. Some kids try so hard to sit still that their faces scrunch up and they tremble just a bit.

2) This is the closest I will ever get to being Santa or the Easter Bunny.
Seriously, I have never seen kids stand in a boring line for so long other than to sit on Santa's lap! We even had kids stand in the rain! They would wait, studying our sample boards intently, being just about as good as kids can be. Some would wait for well over thirty minutes. I don't think I've ever willingly stood in line for anything for that long, but maybe as a child time meant something different to me...

3) Children are precious.
This is a platitude, I know. I have never been a fan of the mini-human. Sure, I have my own kids, but I have never chosen to be in the company of children- noisy, dirty, irritating little snots that they are. But for some reason I don't feel this way any more. Maybe its maturity, maybe its the simple fact that my own three noisemakers are at Grandpa's this week and I miss them. Or maybe it is just that, in a world full of vileness and apathy and greed and war, there are these tiny spots of innocence where all it really takes to set the world right is a handpainted rainbow (with sparkles, mind you!) on a thin, sticky little arm. Every single child that sat in my painter's chair was a darling capable of melting any hardened heart, if given the chance. There was the young girl who asked me if her painting was 'permnanent', the little boy who wanted a whole-face skull in order to scare his grandparents, the tiny tykes who could barely voice their choice of painting (a cupcake, inevitably), and the very serious little girl who needed to customize every color of her forehead tiara painting.

4) Glitter can cover a multitude of evils.
I have come from an artistic family. My mother is a phenomenal painter, my dad sculpts & draws, my middle sister is a wonderful decorator and has a good eye for color, my youngest sis is an amazing artist, and you regular readers know what I do. So I'm not your average gimpy street fair face painter, with a catalog of one soccer ball, one primary color rainbow, and one unrecognizable puppy. Julie and I have a pretty good repertoire of designs, all using multiple tones, color gradients, and fine detail. However, there is the odd brush stroke that cannot be undone, the line that bent when the arm or cheek moved. There is the lizard leg that went just a tiny bit canterwonky, or the flower petal that reaches out a quarter inch beyond its peers. A good dusting of fine cut iridescent glitter can make it all look better...

5) Our children are becoming normalized to mass production.
Julie and I painted our sample boards ourselves. Although we are the artists on the black canvas boards, and we are the artist on the peanut butter-smudged cheek, there is just not a way, really, to have every five-minute paint job be the exact same. Most kids would pick a painting off the board, then watch us apply it to their arm. Often, a confused look would cross their face when this strand of unicorn hair was longer, curlier, or more aqua than the strand on the board. Very few kids minded, and most were happy to have something unique, for them. But I realize their confusion when I watch a cartoon, or wander a toy aisle. Images of Disney princesses and Bob the Builder pass before my eyes- licensed character that have to look exactly like the next one. Mass conformity is scary. Keep your kids away from it if you can.

6) Incredibly simple things can make a child's day.
As an adult, I have somehow lost my ability to just be delighted. There is always the next thing to get to, a load of dishes to be washed, a bill unpaid, a headache forming just beyond the worries of the day. My favorite paintings to do are face. When you do a kid's arm, they pretty much get to watch it unfold, and are generally happy, but unimpressed with the result. When you do their face, however, they don't know what the heck is going on. They can feel the fine wet bristles tickle their face, they can see Mom's head nod in encouragement, and they can see what shade of yellow I'm using next. But they see the whole work all at once, in a mirror. There is generally the same reaction- an open mouth, glowing eyes, a little gasp. They linger over the mirror, almost touching the still-wet paint, afraid to smudge the little bit of art on their person. It is a moment of sheer delight, and they usually skip away happy. I need to find some things that delight me, and remember to just shove everything else out of my mind and experience that gasp, that uplifting of the shoulder blades, that joy.

I bet you do, too.

Labels: art, art fair, children, face painting, fun, kids, learning, painting