Friday, June 23, 2017

Fingerpainting in Art Class


Have you ever heard of Iris? If not check her out.  Click HERE for Iris Scott website I let my middle schoolers watch a video on her via Youtube. It is a lot harder than it looks. Give it a try these are a few from Q4 on my spring wheel session.







Though most of us have some experience with finger painting, it is usually a hobby left back in pre-school along with nap time, but Iris Scott has resurrected it in a beautiful way. After deciding to dramatically decrease her cost of living so that she could find time to paint every day, she moved to Taiwan and did exactly as she planned. But one day all of her brushes were dirty and she needed some yellow flowers, so rather than go outside in the excruciating heat, she used her fingertips and reached that a-ha moment that this is what she would do for the rest of her life. Wearing disposable gloves, Scott uses her fingers with oil paints on canvas to create vibrant, textured paintings with movement and depth. Her Thailand Collection was just on display at Cole Gallery in Edmonds, Washington. We hope that you will enjoy our interview with Iris Scott after the jump, then see more of her work on IrisFingerPaintings.com and Facebook.


VN: Do you find finger painting easier than using brushes?
IS: Definitely. I’ve been doing this for three years and it just keeps getting easier. The benefits of finger painting is that I don’t have to clean all that surface area created by hundreds of bristles in a paint brush….instead I just wipe my fingertips clean with a paper towel. I can switch between colors faster without the pain of traditional brush cleaning, plus I can paint with more than one point of contact. So the process is really just far faster than traditional brush painting…..I don’t understand why it’s not far more common?

VN: Tell us about your upcoming show (where, when, what to expect).
IS: My upcoming solo show opens on March 18 at Cole Gallery in Edmonds, Wa. Edmonds is a lovely little seaside town just North of Seattle. We will reveal the Thailand collection as well as a few new Seattle pieces on opening night and the show will run one month long.

VN: What advice would you give to an artist at heart who can’t seem to find the time with work and other obligations?
IS: My advice to an artist that just can’t find time to work is to MOVE. Yep change your location and cost of living. Cost of living is the biggest obstacle to overcome. Move to a part of the world that you can afford to live a whole year and just paint. Chances are you’ll make great leaps in your artistic abilities if you dedicate that much full time to the skill.

VN: What brought you to Thailand?
IS: The promise of colorful scenery and interesting painting ideas. I went to Thailand to go shoot ideas and bring them home like one might do on a Safari.

VN: Do you still teach?
IS: I left teaching 3 years ago once the sale of my paintings could support me.

VN: Where are you living now?
IS: I’m from a small town just outside of Seattle.

VN: When did you get into art, making a living out of it?
IS: I really truly dove into full time painting while living in Taiwan 3 years ago. The cost of living was so low that I could afford to just take a year off and paint around the clock. Once I started painting more than 40 hours a week I was able to improve drastically and began considering the feasibility of turning painting into my profession.

VN: What is it that you like most about oils?
IS: That they dry very very slowly.

VN: Is there anything else you would like our readers to know about you?
IS: I will leaving the US again to go on another “Ideas Safari” on March 20, this time to Nicaragua. A little bird named Ooi told me I would find lots of painting concepts and colors in that part of Central America. Armed with a digital camera and an experienced travel companion I will return by May. Hope to have the Nicragua collection complete by August 2013.
On behalf of Visual News, we would like to wish Iris Scott safe travels to Nicaragua and look forward to seeing the highlights from her trip after she completes her newest collection.

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