gwenbeads

Quaternion Quilt

2026-04-06T19:34:00.000-07:00

In 2003, I designed and sewed a quilt based upon the Quaterenions group. It shows the multiplication table for this group with eight elements. Today, I am releasing my photo of my Quaternions Quilt under the Creative Commons License: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives

CC BY-NC-ND

You can learn more about this quilt here: https://old.nationalcurvebank.org/quilt/quilt.htm

Tutorial for Beaded Cascade Earrings

2023-04-22T13:34:00.004-07:00

New beading tutorial! Finally!

I call them Cascade Earrings. They’re for those of us who like itty bitty seed beads.

Find it here:

https://www.etsy.com/listing/1446919002/

Learn to Make Geometric Color Wheels with Watercolor Paint

2022-04-25T17:13:00.002-07:00

My new watercolor tutorial on color wheels gives an advanced beginner’s lesson on how to paint artistic color wheels in a full rainbow of colors.

Learn how to paint extraordinary color wheels using just 2, 3, 4 or 5 pigments. The tutorial include 4 projects, explained over 29 pages, including 77 illustrations and full color photographs of 7 paintings that are all explained in the text. This tutorial includes templates for 4 different projects for you to trace or copy.

Start with detailed step-by-step instructions for a painting that uses just two pigments. From there you will learn to mix three, four, and even five pigments to create increasingly complex compositions. There is lengthy discussion about choosing specific pigments for each of the four projects so you can do the projects more than once and get different effects depending upon the colors you start with. If you love colors, you'll love this tutorial on painting color wheels and making the projects.

Tools & Materials: watercolor paint, watercolor paper, palette with wells for mixing colors, pencil, kneaded rubber eraser, brushes: round size 3 and 6 (or similar), cup(s) of water, water dropper, paper or cloth towel, hair dryer, and a way to transfer the templates (discussed in the text).

Don’t just make swatch charts. Make art.

Color Wheels in Watercolor Paint

2020-12-30T16:19:00.002-08:00

My favorite art to make lately has been painting color wheels with watercolor paint. This probably my favorite one so far. It is a color study of five pigments.

Sometimes I include color wheels into larger compositions.

Sometimes I paint little color wheels to test out colors or an idea for future reference. I made this color wheel to test out a very red heavy color wheel. It uses both black and red ink.

I used that color wheel to paint this piece.

I'm making myself a little book of color swatches, including a few color wheel, such as this one.

I used that one to help me paint this piece.

Some of my color wheels use a combination of traditional watercolor paint and mica paint, which looks metallic and flashes in the light. See the rainbow flash?

This color uses two reds, two yellows, and two blues, mixed in pairs.

Same with this one. Plus a cat.

This color wheel also uses two yellows, two reds, and two blue, plus I used colored pencil on top to add the shading.

Thanks for looking at my color wheels. If you would like to purchase one of my original paintings, with or without color wheels, have a look in my Etsy shop, gwenbeads, under the section on 2D art.

Seahorse Shirt Hand Stitched in Cotton Jersey

2020-01-29T23:53:00.000-08:00

I enlarged one of Marty Kenney’s doodles of a seahorse to make a stencil and then hand stitched this appliqué. This became the sleeve of a cotton t-shirt.

I had originally embroidered the seahorse to a front panel. No matter how I looked at it, the placement was unflattering. So the piece sat unfinished for eight months until I decided to move the embroidery to the sleeve. That’s why it has extra seams.

I designed the rest of the shirt to go with the seahorse. I wanted the seahorse to be the focus, the most detailed part, with the rest of the shirt simple, but not plain. After much thought and deliberation, I decided to add a trim to the rest of the t-shirt. Here you can seek all of the trim on the front, back, and second sleeve. A little appliqué like this is not only decorative, but also serves a purpose. It keeps the edge from rolling too much. I learned these sewing techniques from the books of Alabama Chanin.

Stitch, stitch, stitch...

Next I assembled the pieces. The finish on the neckline is my own invention. Learn to sew the neckline here: https://gwenbeads.blogspot.com/2019/12/t-shirt-with-stretchy-noodle-binding-on.html

Since there’s no tag, I like stitching a little doodad at the top back. That way, when I pick it up, it’s easy to tell which side is the front..

Here’s the doodad.

Notice the parallel whip stitch where the sleeve connects to the bodice. I use whip stitch for the sewing and top stitching on that seam to make it stretchy. It’s a lot more comfortable for me when it’s stretchy there.

3/4 sleeve. Long enough to cover most of my butt. Deep neckline.

I’m going to get a lot of wear out of this come spring.

Thanks for looking!

T-shirt with Stretchy Noodle Binding on Cotton Jersey

2019-12-23T11:14:00.003-08:00

I finished sewing a T-shirt for my sweetie for his holiday present. It’s hard to buy him gifts, but he always wears the T-shirts I make him. This shirt is entirely hand stitched in cotton jersey, using techniques I learned from the books by Alabama Chanin.

My sweetie like AV equipment and electronics. So I made this stencil just for him. I appliquéd the design with backstitch.

Here, I used my original binding technique with a jersey noodle. This is the second shirt I’ve made with this edge treatment, and I really like it.

I cut the strips of cotton jersey 1.25” wide before stretching them into noodles. Then I appliquéd the noodle to the edges in two passes as I show in the drawings here.

It’s easy to do this binding on the neckline because you don’t have to ease it like you do with Alabama Chanin’s folded binding, which I find to be a particularly difficult task to do on curved necklines. The fold-over step with the noodle automatically makes the noodle shorter than the finished neckline, making it just the right tightness. Here you can see the fold-over step half done.

So the finished neckline is taught and stretchy. Next time, on the sleeve ends, I’ll ease the noodle a little (with a shorter noodle) because I think it belled a little, and a little taper there at the ends of the sleeves would have been better and could have been solved with some easing.

Thanks for looking. Happy holidays!

Doodle No. 37 Three Cats of Dr. Caligari

2019-12-18T10:43:00.000-08:00

Never be afraid to go full rainbow.

Prismacolor black ink, Faber-Castell Polychromos pencils, Finetec and other mica watercolor paint on Stonehenge 250 GSM 100% cotton paper

4”square

See the flash of the mica.

Sold

Doodle No. 36 Calling Sector 7

2019-12-06T01:55:00.000-08:00

This doodle has more mica paint than the others.

5” square

I thought you might like to see how I layered the colors. The finished piece is bottom right.

Drawn with archival Prismacolor black ink, Faber-Castell Polychromos pencils, Finetec and other mica watercolor paint on Arches 300 GSM 100% cotton paper.

Original available: https://www.etsy.com/listing/708956750/

Thanks for looking.

Doodle No. 35 Rooftop Conversation

2019-11-22T09:42:00.000-08:00

Remember Cat Planet? This is different planet that also has cats. Sure, you can only see one cat here, but there are more cats on the dark side of the planet. The scale in the right should give you a sense of how big everything is.

I did something different with the colors on this one. I had a cognitive shift in how layering colors works. I layered colors on the opposite sides of the color wheel, and I’m telling you, it was pretty dicey there for a while because when you mix pink and green, you get brown. Half way through the coloring, I thought it was almost certainly past the point of no return, a total color failure, At that moment, I took my Kepler dog for a walk to get away from it for a while. When I returned to this drawing, I decided it was salvageable. In the end, I got it right where I hoped it would be when I decided that mixing pink and green was a good idea.

5” square.

Drawn with archival Prismacolor black ink, Faber-Castell Polychromos pencils, Finetec and other mica watercolor paint on Aquarelle Arches hot-pressed 100% cotton 140 lb paper.

Sold

Doodle No. 34 In one hole and out the other

2019-11-19T22:11:00.000-08:00

This shows another version of the Poincaré model of hyperbolic space with microbes, space junk, aliens, and a few plants.

Some are real.

Some imagined.

Some are totally unbelievable.

I’ve worked in these colors before.

I suspect I’ll use them again because they match the furniture.

5.75” diameter circle.

Drawn with archival Prismacolor black ink, Faber-Castell Polychromos pencils, mica watercolor paint on Stonehenge 250 GSM 100% cotton paper.

Sold

Doodle No. 33 Tribert Makes Thymine

2019-11-04T12:52:00.000-08:00

The design of this is based upon the Poincaré model of hyperbolic space. Ask a mathematician about it. It’s probably their favorite model of hyperbolic space.

5.75” circle

A lot of people photograph their oakk in brings of flowers with real flowers. I don’t paint flowers. So I thought these Polyhedra seemed appropriate.

NFS

Thanks for looking.

Doodle No. 32 Adam Explains How Holes Work

2019-10-29T12:36:00.000-07:00

These weren’t the colors I thought I would get, but in the end I’m happy with how they turned out. It took a lot of layers of colored pencil to get there

This piece is for someone who likes old wooden furniture and modern art. It would look nice in a fancy guilded frame.

6.5” by 9.5” oval

Not for sale

Doodle No. 31 Adam Makes an Atom

2019-10-27T12:16:00.000-07:00

This is what happens when I let Melanie Schrader pick the colors.

Mike Ryan pointed out that the atom has three electrons, so it must be lithium. He cares for bipolar. Here is a detail of Adam and his lithium atom and the flash of the mica paint.

4” square

Prismacolor black ink, Faber-Castell Polychromos pencils, Finetec mica watercolor paint on Stonehenge 250 GSM 100% cotton paper

NFS

Doodle No. 30 Too Many Holes

2019-10-21T20:33:00.001-07:00

In Doodle No. 24 Six Holes, I asked, “How many holes are too many?” The answer I was given was infinitely many. So then I spent the next several days trying to figure out how to draw infinitely many holes. The answer lied in the Poincare model of hyperbolic space. Here, I present “Too Many Holes.”

5.75” diameter circle.

Drawn with archival Prismacolor black ink, Faber-Castell Polychromos pencils, Finetec mica watercolor paint on Stonehenge 250 GSM 100% cotton paper.

Sold

thanks for looking.

Doodle No. 29 Green Hole with Shrimp

2019-08-07T00:53:00.001-07:00

If you ever visit a green hole, be sure to get a souvenir while you’re there.

Someone challenged me to draw a black hole using a tiling other than the regular square one. That’s why there are triangles. Plankton and 2D RNA structures decorate the surface. The gold planet and most of the little dots shimmers in the light with mica paint.

4” square

Prismacolor black ink, Faber-Castell Polychromos pencils, Finetec mica watercolor paint on Stonehenge 250 GSM 100% cotton paper.

Original available: https://www.etsy.com/listing/704139530/

Doodle No. 27 Bunny in a Triangle

2019-08-04T22:57:00.001-07:00

Bunny spends some time in a Sierpinski triangle thinking about lunch.

3.5” by 5.5”

Prismacolor black ink, Faber-Castell Polychromos pencils, and mica watercolor paint on Stonehenge 250 GSM 100% cotton paper.

Original available: https://www.etsy.com/listing/716925693/

Doodle No. 28 Moth Fractal

2019-07-31T11:21:00.000-07:00

3.5” by 5.5”

Moths and a few copies of my dog, Kepler, inhabit a #fractal. The lizards and other doodles along the sides and top are very much in the style of Marty Kenney.

The last several pieces I’ve done have a lot of coloring, a lot of pigment. This time I tried to use light colors with a lot of white, in part, to see if it would take less time to color, and it did! I’m sure I’ll go back to my saturated colors though. I love color, but this pink is nice for a change.

Drawn with archival #Prismacolor black ink and Faber-Castell #Polychromos pencils on #Stonehenge 250 GSM 100% cotton paper.

Original available: https://www.etsy.com/listing/717151343/

Baroque Cube Earrings tutorial

2019-07-10T15:17:00.000-07:00

Itty bitty beaded cubes to hang from your ears.

Make your own.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/250952884/

Doodle No. 26 Rainbow Alternating Steps

2019-07-08T14:51:00.000-07:00

The rainbows came back. They always come back if you wait long enough.

The image is 3.4” by 5.6”

set it in a 5” by 7” black mat.

Prismacolor black ink and Faber-Castell Polychromos pencils on Stonehenge 250 GSM 100% cotton paper with a bit of mica paint for metallic details.

Original available: https://www.etsy.com/listing/701553350/

Doodle No. 25 The Devil’s Staircase

2019-07-04T07:27:00.002-07:00

The young cashier at the paper store convinced me that I really needed to open an Instagram account. And so I did. I’m planning to use it to share my artwork. So, now you can follow me there, if that’s you’re thing. https://www.instagram.com/gwenbeads/

The Devil’s Staircase (AKA, the Cantor Function) is a weird fractal function that I studied in graduate school. What I seem to remember the most about it is how to draw it.

The colors were inspired by a Vincent Van Gogh painting “Bedroom at Arles” from 1888.

The image is 3” by 5”.

Prismacolor black ink and Faber-Castell Polychromos pencils on Stonehenge 250 GSM 100% cotton paper.

Original Available: https://www.etsy.com/listing/714190667/original-art-illustration-devils

Yip yip!

Doodle No. 24 Six Holes

2019-07-01T12:44:00.000-07:00

How many black holes is too many black holes?

This is one of the largest pieces in the series so far. It certainly took me the longest. The image is 7” by 8.8”.

Here you can see how the details of silver mica shimmer in the light. I quite like the effect.

Original Available: https://www.etsy.com/listing/713983113/original-art-illustration-six-holes-ink

Doodle No. 23 Pythagorean Tree and Me

2019-06-29T11:31:00.000-07:00

Image size: 3.8” by 3.8”

Drawn with archival Prismacolor black ink, Faber-Castell Polychromos pencils, 23.5 karat gold paint on Stonehenge 250 GSM 100% cotton paper.

Sold

Doodle No. 22 Bunny and Owl

2019-06-27T15:17:00.000-07:00

The image is 3” by 3”.

The paper is 4.5" by 4.5".

Drawn with archival Prismacolor black ink and Faber-Castell Polychromos pencils on Stonehenge 250 GSM 100% cotton paper.

Sold

Doodle No. 21 Alien on Picot Fence

2019-06-25T18:02:00.000-07:00

Doodle No. 21

Alien on Picot Fence

Get off my lawn!

Some color schemes come easily to me. This was not one of them. I colored until I could color no more. Then I added 23.5 karat gold paint.

The image is 3” by 3”.

Drawn with archival Prismacolor black ink, Faber-Castell Polychromos pencils, and 23.5 K gold paint on Stonehenge 250 GSM 100% cotton paper.

Original available: https://www.etsy.com/listing/697178098/

Doodle No. 20 Tribert’s Network

2019-06-17T21:14:00.001-07:00

Tribert got a new antenna for his network in hopes of picking up owls. So far, so good.

Some color schemes come easily to me. This was not one of them. All of that red didn’t help.

Image size 2.7” by 2.7”

Prismacolor black ink and Faber-Castell Polychromos pencils on Stonehenge 250 GSM 100% cotton paper

Sold.