New Work: Opera Owl

Sometimes we love the work we create, sometimes we learn from it.  With Opera Owl, a little of both.  I spent my entire weekend working on a gorgeous (I hoped), Barred Owl, or Laughing Owl I like to call them which they were named because of how they sound.  Last year's owls in the attic, were Laughing Owls and I could hear them, sometimes, in the trees above, late at night calling to eachother.  So, I anticipated creating an awesome owl painting.  First, it was cold in my house and I wanted to stay warm on the couch (aka weird perspective owl), and I was watching the first season of Walking Dead (aka really weird perspective owl).  Anyway, I kept going, I refused to give up an entire weekend of work.  I ended up learning and now I have a print I love - Opera Owl.  It was dicey (and sort of funny) for awhile. 

A Gallery Of Sorts

I just added a new shop - supposed to be a gallery - for the paintings I do to create fabric designs, book illustrations, and just for the things I like to create! This little mini-Etsy reveals a sample of the 18 active listings now in my shop. Where is it? Etsy.com! I haven't had any luck with the basement (detached) studio idea, and what was in my yard for fair weather art shows has been torn down. It is my hope that this shop will not zero out as all the other things I've done online have been determined to do. But the google analytics number has been compromised. I know you care and it is reciprocated!! Please do visit the shop: RavenArtGallery for a closer look or something to buy. 

Original paintings are priced with hourly painting/drawing, art supplies, and the cost of listing and promotion, shipping, and packing - so they are more pricey as they are a 1 time, artist signed, deal. Most are available in prints, which do not take as much time to create (reproductions of the originals), so their price is based on creating the print - ink, paper, processing - and shipping, framing, matboard, and retail listing.

My newest product  is a little twist on the older banners that many people already have. They are a little piece of artwork on a banner, rather than a canvas. Custom orders are accepted. There is the usual assorted oddity that I am known to create - especially at odd times, for me, like these. Gnomes, owl dolls, and my new Yoga Mat Sack kits. Retro Apron Wrap Dresses are something I have been working on, but am not quite able to yet provide for the shop.  They are gorgeous colors and designs that I hope to be able to stock in the shop by summertime.

Celebrate Spring with a new banner for your home, or art on eco-canvas. Shop Raven Art Gallery

Colored Sketch Speed Drawing

Here is SNOW - a character I've dedicated to my son Jeremy- for a picture book, Owl Skate.
Sorry its a little long, but you guys asked to see me work from the blank paper to the finished product rather than starting with the sketch complete as I often show. I'm not sure I will make a color page, so tell me here, in comments, if you want a color page made. Thx. Don't forget to subscribe.

FREE Printables - Bookmarks for Wise Birds

These bookmarks are printable, share-able, and one is even color-able.  I created them with Owl art I had done in a previous year for Create Papers, printable papers. However, now I have put them to use as bookmarks, and, they are helping me create owl characters for Owls Skate, due out in 2015.  They are also available to print and copy at Kids Explore Nature, a blog for nature kids.

Fold down center crease and paste both sides, together, for a double-sided bookmark.
If this doesn't print large enough - it is sized 3 x 9" - click here for full-sized image.

Make a Picture E-Book Vlog Series

Let the kids color while you do crafts - find FREE
downloadable color pages from character sketches, HERE.

Wondering what I've been up to in the studio?  It certainly isn't rearranging new furniture!  In fact, I'm so worried about the place that I've been meeting 2 and 3 deadlines per month with projects like entering the Oregon Book Awards and adding Smashwords e-books to my platform.  So, in the middle of all of it, I added a vlog series which shows you what I really do to make an e-book come to life.

Here, a gang of skateboarding owls are sketched out, colored, and given a personality on paper, while I, their author, try to determine just who(oo) Barny, Buddy, Hoot, Sawl, Snowy, and Great Gray are about, what they'd act like, and which skate trick level they'd be at.  Who am I kidding? Owls know all the skate tricks, no risk of falling - or failing.  You can watch them here, SUBSCRIBE HERE if you liked this video for updates to my Youtube Channel. 

My Winter Barn Owl Quilt is a Cheater..

Quilt!  Cheater Quilts are panels with a design on them which can be made into a quilt.  They are called cheater because the steps of cutting and piecing small pieces of fabric to form the design is not necessary.  A huge step is skipped, although the quilting, backing, and other steps are not.  They are not traditional quilting, because they emerge from one fabric printed image - usually in the center. This doesn't mean the edges can't be pieced together to be quilted.

I created this design to be easy quilting that has the look of a more difficult quilt.  Each section is printed on the fabric, though I made it to look pieced on the borders.  Like the snowflake corner details and border moon and trees.  I made the background to simulates hand-dyed pieces.

Quilting by hand or machine then adds artistry to make a blanket or wall hanging, however even the quilting is not required.   It can be hung as a sheet or sewn into various kinds of wall-hangings.

Personally, I like the trees together, so I made a cheater quilt fabric with just the trees, to be available in November 2014.  Winter Barn Owl and Midnight Snowflake backing fabric are now for sale at Spoonflower.

Spun Cotton World

Ravenswood Animals

New work, small world.  The King - spun cotton barn owl; The Merlin - spun cotton and punched cotton merlin; The Duchess - white raven, spun cotton.

Spun cotton animals like this barn owl king.

Inspiration Art Sale - 2013

This Great Horned Owl is now also a papercrafter's paper: Kara Skye Create Papers
available from Scribd.com for $2.99, includes various sizes for download.

Birds, traditionally painted.  Mixed media - acrylic, gouache - on paper and salvaged wood. 

 Originals and prints.

PHEASANT

LIFT OFF! White Egret

Kara Skye

THE OLD CROW

by Kara Skye

These paintings - acrylic and gouache, or watercolor and gouache on paper - will be at my sale, in August, in St. Johns', Oregon.  I live near a wild urban greenspace and the 40-mile bike trail where I often photograph birds.  They are also an inspiration in my painting and fabric design.