Category: Art

Inktober 2017

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It’s been a while since I’ve posted artworks that are self-indulgent. Last month after our first watercolor workshop, I decided that I would do this year’s Inktober. So what is inktober? From its creator’s website:

Every October, artists all over the world take on the Inktober drawing challenge by doing one ink drawing a day the entire month.

To be honest, I’ve already heard about inktober years ago. Every year I tried to do the prompt, but I never did complete a whole month. So I challenged myself this year to complete the prompt even if I’m already busy with interior & painting works. There’s only one problem: I didn’t like the official prompt HAHA. (Pictured below)

But! There are a bunch of new prompts created every year by different artists so you could also choose from those. I chose relseiy‘s prompt, named #reltober. Here is her prompt:

I thought it suited my style so I chose this. My goals for this year’s inktober were:

  • Finish the whole month. (Even if I can’t draw everyday!)
  • Draw more different flowers asides from sunflowers.
  • Practice my inking/lineart skills again.
  • Practice drawing hands.
  • Self indulge in my anime style & other styles.

Did I achieve my goals? Find out below! You can click each image and it will direct you to its original instagram post.

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Maple Leaf.

Little flowers.

Seashell.

Wind.

Strawberry.

Tea / Coffee.

Planet.

Water.

Sunflower.

Apple.

Snowflake.

Feathers.

Bubbles.

Butterfly.

Succulents.

Mushroom.

Flower crown.

Starfish.

Spark.

Constellation.

Waves.

Dandelions.

Melody.

Moth.

Roots.

Jellyfish.

Plum blossom.

Gem stone.

Vines.

Wisteria.

Lanterns.

Although a bit late, I still managed to finish this year’s Inktober! Since drawing everyday was impossible (during that time I was travelling for interior design work), I decided that whenever I had the time I would draw a bunch of drawings. Props to those who managed to draw everyday! â™Ĩ

Did I complete my goals? Well, I think so! I finished the whole month, practiced my inking/lineart skills by drawing different subjects (flowers, hands, nature), and let myself indulge in trying different art styles. I was so tempted to color some of my artworks using my markers, but I managed to stop myself from doing that because I want it to be monochromatic in my IG feed.

My personal favorites would be: Wind, Sunflowers, Spark, Constellation, and Gem Stone. â™Ĩ What about your’s?

Will I do it again next year? Hopefully!

Katipunan Art Festival

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The Katipunan Art Festival held two weeks ago was the most fun we’ve had as a group! I finally got another charger for my digicam woohooo! High quality and picture heavy post ahead:

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The  January Makers PH team was complete that weekend. Monique was part of the organizer team, so she wasn’t available 100% of the time at our booth. We were seated beside Abbey Sy‘s table where Jean (owner of seamountainco) was also a part of. It was a good thing that our booths were beside each other! â™Ĩ Manning the JanMakers table was Hannah and I.

Our table!

Pictured above is our finally complete table setup lol. We finally got to use Monique’s mesh wire where we could hang stuff. Thanks to our first workshop, we finally had the funds to buy our own table for bazaars. It was also by fate that on the day we went shopping, the table was at 30% off! Lucky! â™Ĩ

Monique’s side of the table.

Her cute 90s candies & chichirya stickers!

Harry potter-inspired food stickers, 90s candies & chichirya stickers in their cute packaging. â™Ĩ

The mesh wire display. â™Ĩ

Hannah’s cute animal cut-it-yourself sticker packs. â™Ĩ

Other side of the wire mesh: my flower sticker packs, seamountainco individual pans, and our logo. â™Ĩ

The center of the table: my individual stickers, home decor (lol), and cute birds.

My postcards. â™Ĩ

Jean also made postcards of her artworks. She also made her own sticker pack. â™Ĩ

An original watercolor painting for sale. â™Ĩ

My original watercolor painting – Magnolia. â™Ĩ

Which was sold to this gentleman. â™Ĩ THANK YOU so much!!! (That’s me in my “presko/pochahontas/buwan ng wika” outfit. HAHA.

It was a good thing that the weather cooperated the whole weekend, albeit a bit rainy in the morning but sunny (and windy) the whole day. It was the perfect weather that provided a big crowd for the booths.

Hello to our neighbor The Republika Shop!

Abbey’s table.

Oh, and I love the fact that some of the sellers were also participants from 10a Alabama years ago. I think some from the organizer team were also a part of it? So this event was a mixture of veterans and newcomers.

Graffiti wall!

I’m also thankful for our friends who visited us during the fair. Thank you for the effort! â™Ĩ

Ruth & Joy visited our table! â™Ĩ

Thanks for visiting Gerard! â™Ĩ

Thanks Ma’am Cara! â™Ĩ (Check out her blog!)

Thank you also to Aira and Shine huhu sorry we didn’t get to take photos.

Until the next event! â™Ĩ

Our First Workshop

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Finally had time to sit down and blog! We joined The Craft Central’s 1st Birthday Celebration at Greenbelt 5 last September 26 to October 1 as January Makers PH. We held our first watercolor workshop there!

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I was honestly terrified teaching a workshop. First, I’m not sure with the basics of watercolor since it wasn’t taught formally back in college. Second, it was my first time to teach students who paid (lol, I had tons of guinea pigs though). Third, I was scared that my students won’t learn a thing from me. Finally, I’m an introvert so I had NO IDEA if I could pull it off.

Me, explaining the color wheel.

Thankfully, my stage muthers/a.k.a. the rest of the January Makers PH team: Jean, Monique, and Hannah were there to help me out the whole time. They helped with the paper cups filled with water, took photos while I was teaching, and also helped with the cleanup after the workshop. They were my support throughout the day. â™Ĩ

Karen, starting with the color wheel.

After the quick introduction, we started with the color wheel. Learning the color wheel is one of the fundamentals. It would help in color choices and also for paint mixing.

Shayne, starting with her sunflower!

Learning how to draw a sunflower is easy. They also joked about my methods. Step 1 is “draw a circle”. Step 2 is “draw a tear drop shape”. Step 3 is “surround circle with a lot of tears”. HAHA.

Busy, busy.

I also let them try my seamountainco palette so they could see the difference with student grade paints to artist grade paints. They also had their own seamountainco dot cards that were included in the workshop. Thanks again, Jean! â™Ĩ

The rest of the workshop I went around to check & guide them one-on-one. Most of the participants were beginners, so I had to check & comment with their progress. Even though I taught them my style of painting, their own style showed through! â™Ĩ

Jade’s painting. | Karen’s painting.

Shayne’s painting. | Celso’s painting.

Katya’s painting. | Paola’s painting.

Gillian’s painting. | Sam’s painting.

My own painting plus Katya’s watercolor paper given to me. Thank you so much! â™Ĩ

The final homework for the students. Beautiful lettering & pouch from Jade.

Overall, it was a great learning experience! I think I still need to improve on conveying my thoughts to people. I hoped my students learned something watercolor-related from me. I heard they learned life lessons from my workshop?!

Thank you to The Craft Central for the workshop opportunity and venue. To my January Maker sisters. To my students. And to my guinea pigs lol I learned something from teaching you guys hahaha. â™Ĩ

Hopefully I could improve some more & organize another workshop. â™Ĩ

Everything Old

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Whew! With so many things happening in real life, I finally had time to sit down and blog. Since I’m still waiting for our photos during my first workshop with the January Makers PH team, I’ll do this post first lol.

A month ago, I found my old Reeves gouache paints. Thinking that it was a waste to throw them out, I decided to use them with my expired paper for practice. Here are some of the artworks that I did:

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Sunflower & Peonies.

I tested my old materials by painting a sunflower first. The Reeves gouache is still usable, but it stinks! I like the brightness of the colors though. The next paintings were of course peonies. Knowing that all of the materials that I used were old, I could practice all I want without any worries of wasting my art materials HAHA.

First and second attempt. â™Ĩ

I posted something about this on Instagram:

When you don’t like your first attempt, it’s always okay to start again. 😁 It doesn’t have to be perfect everytime.

Some hydrangea studies.

Because sometimes its okay to paint with “careless, free, loose” strokes. ❤ The important thing is you enjoy what you’re doing. 😊

With hydrangeas, I was exploring on making looser strokes that would still look presentable. Wet on wet, layering, and my usual style. The third photo was a good study for my latest sticker.

Overall, I’m satisfied with experimenting on old art materials. It shows that you really don’t need high end stuff to make great work. There’s also no guilt of wasting expensive paper for practice haha. With this, let me end the post with their ages:

  1. Paper: Canson 200 gsm watercolor paper cut into smaller pieces. Age: 6 years.
  2. Reeves Gouache. Age: 15 years.
  3. Brush: Faber Castel freebie from the watercolor pencil set. Age: 12 years.

Artworks (July 2017- September 2017)

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Another compilation post! The last time I did this was last May, I think. So here are the art works that are yet featured here on my blog. Picture heavy post ahead! â™Ĩ

An attempt with landscape.

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My cover photo was an attempt at plein air or landscape painting of my client’s farm at Iba, Zambales. I brought my seamountainco set with me, assuming that we’d stop by the beach HAHA. Unfortunately, they were far from the beach.

Left: Practicing hydrangeas again | Right: An attempt at magnolias.

Before & After photo of my phaelaenopsis orchid painting. I turned this one into an individual sticker. â™Ĩ

More magnolia practice. I’m also practicing painting white flowers recently. I like the challenge.

Paper tests by painting sunflowers. The left one is the Strathmore Visual Journal paper. The other one is Hahnemuhle watercolor postcard. Portrait practice using my W&N cotman set. â™Ĩ

Sunflower during another art tambay at Makati. â™Ĩ This is so beautiful in real life! Andrea gave me a sample of her handmade sparkly watercolor which I used for this piece. â™Ĩ

Left: Peony practice on Berkeley paper. I don’t like it, haha. | Right: Peony practice on my Monologue notebook using Mikalaro’s waterbrushes.

Left: More peony practice. I still don’t like it HAHA. | Right: Another peony practice! This was done during another art tambay with friends.

I turned one of my early peony paintings into an individual sticker. Pictured here is seamountainco’s new product: a small tin case that houses 16 handmade watercolors with a separate mixing plate. Its sooooo cute! â™Ĩ

And that’s it for now HAHA. Looking at my artworks and my comments, it seems like I’m way too hard on myself. Maybe its because your worst critic is yourself? I’m still not satisfied with the way I do peonies. But I’m trying my best to improve. I think I’m comparing my current artworks with the previous ones. Right now, they are too “controlled” looking compared to my noob days with “careless, loose strokes“. Sigh. Its hard to find the balance that I want.

But let’s keep trying.

Art in Aura

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A few weeks ago, the January Makers PH team participated in Providore’s pop up weekend market at SM Aura. Due to the bad weather, we were relocated inside near the mall entrance. The usual members who joined were: Jean (owner of seamountainco), Monique (food illustrator), Hannah – who was absent during the event (various illustrator), and I (floral illustrator). â™Ĩ

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We were given a long table to display our products. I think this is the first time that we had a problem with too much space. Haha.

Left: Monique’s various food postcards, art prints, and stickers. | Right: My sticker packs, individual stickers, and post cards. â™Ĩ

Left: Hannah’s best selling Corgi sticker pack, and post cards. | Right: seamountainco’s handmade watercolors in individual half pans, handmade leather notebooks. â™Ĩ

Another view. We’re included in the poster! Woo. â™Ĩ

My loot! â™Ĩ From left: Camera sticker pack by Inkscribbler, Washi Tapes from Tiny Basket PH, Hustle kahit Hassle by Pundesal, Girly stickers and Postcard from Cassykicks, and stamped things from Jean hahaha. 

A huge thank you to SM Aura for inviting us to this event! â™Ĩ It was a good experience for the team. I’d also like to thank those who bought from us ~ â™Ĩ Thank you for tagging me in your photos! I looooveee seeing what you did with my art. â™Ĩ

Until the next event!

Post cards

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Hello again! So sorry for not updating as much as I used to. I was busy with bazaar preps among other things. Now that things have slowed down a bit, I realized that I haven’t uploaded some better shots of my postcards yet here on my blog. So this blog post is dedicated to it! â™Ĩ

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My test prints with my seamountainco set.

This was taken during our dinner at Hole in the Wall.

At Seda Vertis North.

My bloom with Kenneth Cobonpue’s bloom chairs. â™Ĩ

Another Seda shot.

My postcards are 4″ x 6″ sized 300gsm which you can buy as a set or individually through our  Facebook page. Please check them out as our other products are also uploaded there. â™Ĩ

We also sell our products at a cheaper price during bazaars and the next one is this weekend! August 26-27, 2017 at Providore, Upper Ground, SM Aura. You can check our my Instagram page or our January Makers PH Instagram page for updates! Hope to see you!

Pagtitipon 5

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A few weeks ago was January Makers PH‘s third event! We participated in “Pagtitipon 5: Kaligrapiya, Art Tambay, At Iba Pa” held in SM Aura last July 22. The usual members who joined were:  Jean (owner of seamountainco), Monique (food illustrator), Hannah (various illustrator), and I (floral illustrator). â™Ĩ

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This event was a calligrapher & artist’s dream. â™Ĩ All of the vendors were selling calligraphy items, watercolor paint, washi tapes, stamps, and a lot more! They even had a destash station with really good deals. (I’m still sad that I didn’t get the 16-color prang set for 50php!).

The event was a huge success! There were a lot of people who joined the free calligraphy workshops by the artists. We didn’t get to join some workshops because we were so busy manning our booth!

A huge thank you for those who bought our postcards, stickers, and watercolor paint! I would like to thank my blockmates Dustin+Eandra, Ivy, Ruth+Joy who came to visit our event. â™Ĩ See you on the next one!