Welcome to Nita Leland's Exploring Color & Creativity Web Site Jenna is almost six and starting kindergarten soon. Another milestone in watching her grow up. Daniel just turned a year old last weekend. He's a handful, but very even-tempered and funny. Check out this mosaic of colorful artwork that my watercolor class did earlier this spring. We're exploring some of the concepts in my new book, Confident Color, coming out in September. Their response to this exercise was awesome. Confident Color, published by North Light Books, is 160 pages with 85 Try-it Activities in a spiral-bound hardcover format that stays flat for studio work. I've selected the work of 52 contemporary artists in a variety of media: acrylics, colored pencils, oils, pastels, watercolors, collage, mixed media and fibers to illustrate important color principles of harmony, contrast and unity through color schemes. Seven artists contributed detailed step-by-step demos of their color processes, including using a computer or a sketchbook for preliminary studies and mingling colors to select the best palette for a painting. Click on the Confident Color image for a pre-publication offer of a signed copy and free shipping, available only on this Web site. Photoshopping with The New Creative Artist--Check out this recent entry on my blog, then view a few pages from the book. The spring display of wildflowers in the woods was excellent this year. We've had a lot of rain, so as we move into summer, everything is lush and green. It's so restful to look out the kitchen window and watch the birds and squirrels. If you haven't already visited my woodland project, start here. Please visit my art blog and let me hear from you. Subscribe to my Blog with Bloglines, a newsreader that shows when the blog is updated. Bookmark this page and come back to see what's new.

Art Quote One can have no smaller or greater mastery than mastery of oneself. Leonardo da Vinci

Here & There on the Web Daily Painters Art Gallery is a juried site with some awesome art on it. I certainly admire artists who have the dedication to do a new painting every single day. Art Festival Guide is a good resource for equipment and listings of art fairs and exhibitions. I love this blog: History of the Color Wheel. I wonder why? Please bookmark this site: snopes.com and check it before forwarding messages circulating on the Internet. The site researches urban legends, virus threats, and political chicanery. You might save yourself some embarrassment if you investigate before you forward false messages. Put Shakesepeare and baseball together and you'll have a good time. Here's Wayne and Schuster's script. Inflation calclulator is an eyeopener, for sure. The Learnlist is a simple resource for graphic designers, illustrators, web designers, developers, basically anyone creative! It lists the best websites and books available to help you learn something new, along with rankings. 411us.info is a comprehensive search site for up-to-date information all over the Web. Key in your zipcode and you can search for news, weather, TV programming and much more. artquotes.net is another good resource for inspirational quotations. Active Music Therapy for Parkinson's Patients interests me because of two family members who have Parkinson's. Another program that intrigues me is Nia, a beautiful movement fitness program involving graceful dance and music that I experienced with my friends in Canada recently. Catherine Whipple's Self-help healing arts journal is packed with inspiration and creative ideas.

Browse my Shopping Mall for booksellers, art, craft and office supplies.

Art Product News American Science and Surplus has a funky catalog that has unusual items and art and craft supplies. Browsing the online catalog is fun. Now that full-spectrum fluorescent lighting has become all the rage, there are many sources for the bulbs. I've been replacing my Vita-Lites with General Electric Sunshine F40. The bulbs are 5000K, not the 5500K of the Vitalites, but with a CRI of 90, they seem to do the job as well. The manufacturer claims 9 years of life for these bulbs. If you hate cutting mats, here's a source for pre-cut and custom mats: Matcutter.com. MAToMATic allows you to upload your photos or art images and select mat colors, mat liners and frames--even see how the finished picture will look on your colored walls. The home site for MAToMATic is Matshop.com.

Artists Read... Create Better Paintings is a quality e-zine for artists that has two components. One section is free, offering tutorials and articles and the other is by subscription, with more in-depth content and art. Editor Jennifer King has produced a quality magazine, worth checking out. A complete list of recommended books is on my Awesome Book List. I've read all of these books and have found something useful in all of them, some more than others. If a book isn't on the list, then I haven't read it or didn't think it very useful. Go to Books Online to download free books. LibraryThing is a neat site where you can catalog online to keep track of the books you read or own. What a useful tool! I hate it when I pick up a book to read and realize after the first few pages that I've already read it. New reviews of The New Creative Artist: A Guide for Developing Your Creative Spirit, are appearing here and there. Read these reviews to see how people are using the book for inspiration, motivation and just plain fun. I'm moving my art book reviews to my blog, where it will be easier to post them as I read them rather than setting up a section with several on my web site. Here's a blog entry with three reviews on books about pouring watercolors. Past reviews are archived at Mini Book Reviews. Best Book Buys compares prices on books throughout the Web. Here's my list of 25 favorite art books on Amazon.com's Listmania. Use Book Sale Finder to locate events in your area. Here's a great list of books on creativity. Thanks to George Bussinger, Jr. of McCallister's Art Store for the use of books for some of my reviews. Amazon Canada

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