Preparing for my Solo Painting Show in October...

I've been wanting to paint my own tarot deck for about 10 years, and I've decided now it the right time! I have a solo painting show at Sacred Rose Tattoo in Berkeley in October, and I'm going to paint the tarot deck for this show. The plan is to also offer a printed deck as well from the paintings in the show. Eventually I'd like to make my own conceptual deck altogether, based on the divination I've done in my practice..but I think starting off with a more traditional deck is ambitious enough for now. As a seer, a clairvoyant, I've learned that I don't need any tools at all to "see", even though I've used many and studied even more. So now it will be a challenge to create cards that resonate with me and also express the essences of each card without being so crammed with symbols and information that they lack any visual imapact. This will be a truly exciting experience and I expect the creative journey to be quite an adventure. I intend to include drawings in the show pieces as well, and perhaps some type of documentation of this process in the form of anecdotes. We shall see...pun intended

New Bleeding Heart Clutch in my Etsy Shop

Blood Milk Jewelry

The past few years I've been painting, studying ancient magickal arts, training my clairvoyance, etc, and recently decided to come out of my cave and present my paintings and new music to the world once again. Davide, the most thoughtful person I've ever known, wanted to mark the occasion buy surprising me with a very special gift: a Black Blood Claw Necklace by Blood Milk Jewelry.
I'd found the Blood Mikl etsy shop a while ago, and I've been pouring over her designs ever since. I am so impressed by the craftswomanship, the detail, the boldness and feeling of antiquity in each piece. Check out the Blood Milk Shophere

New Pyramid Necklace in my Etsy Shop..

Giclee Prints For Sale!!!

Giclee Prints of my original oil painting "Calling In The 4 Quarters" are now available in my etsy shop! Fine me on Etsy as Karyn Crisis Secret Arts, or type: karyncrisis.etsy.com!!

New Leather Items for sale on Etsy

I am receiving alot of queries about the White Skull Bag below..It's already sold, but I am taking custom orders, so do contact me if you'd like to order a similar one. Custom orders take 3-4 weeks.

Work In Progress Update

Photos coming tomorrow...So as much time as I've devoted to studying pigments and their properties, they can still be so surprising! With my new series of paintings (starting with "Calling in the Four Quarters" which is the orange background/birds/witch with energy coming out of her hands) I'm using a bastardization of the Verdaccio technique. For that painting, I chose Terra Verte and Burnt Umber/ Sienna for the underpainting, and I used Titanium White with walnut oil for the skin layers. Walnt and safflower oils are the best for whites and light colors because they don't yellow over time like linseed.
But..for thiis next in-progress work, the Shaman with Wands, I wanted to use the more traditional Chromium Oxuide Green and Flake White Replacement. True Flake White has lead, so I chose the alternative by Gamblin. Gamblin's an oil paint brand started by an artist with the purpose of re-creating alot of Old Masters mediums without the toxicity (or to a lesser degree). Flake White Replacement is described as a "warm, ropey white that gives skin tone its glow".It may sounds odd to think of an opaque white that "glows", but it's really true: this flake white replacement is ropey, gooey, thick, and it really glows. It's a pleasure to work with. BUT, I have notices some sinking in, so I've had to add more layers than expected. And the COG is so much lighter than TV. I've decided I prefer TV for the underpaiunting green tones, but the COG is lovely for blending on top of the white, as it has an eery glow to it.
And white FWR is delicious to work with, and settles in nicely, be warned..it continues to settle! And I'm a bit nervous, because the blob on my paint swatch palette has turned a creamy light yellow...so I need to figure out what is going on there! I rarely use whites..while it's the most commonly bought paint for most people, I mix with greys and other ochres and nickels and naples..but for these paintings I need particular white affects..and while I've found the brightest and, in my opinion, most archival whites, I'm yet to decide what will be my warm white of choice. We'll see what further testing of the FWR brings, and while I have Old Holland's titanium white to try out, it just makes no sense to me to use any white with linseed oil, no matter how underfined..and that's the problem with FWR, the linseed oil. So...looks like the next logical choice will be Sennelier's Titanium White, which is made with safflower and whose TW is supposed to be the "most opaque". Not such a fan of just straight "TW", but I'll have to give it a go and see how that pigment settles.