We close the chapter on the third round of our People & Places series with a look at the East, Midwest, and an international artist. Marybeth Rothman is known for her fictional biographies and abstract narratives utilizing orphaned, vintage photographs, digital photography, encaustic and mixed media. She lives and works in New Jersey. Allison B. Cooke lives and works in Wisconsin, where she has been teaching at the college level for over three decades. Her paintings celebrate the interplay of past and present, imagined and tangible, that which is lost and what remains. Our international artist spotlight is on artist Belen Millan. Belen was born in Granada, and now splits her time between Malaga and New York. Her “dynamic abstractions” address the interconnections of science and nature from her own perspective as a Spanish-American artist.

Back by popular demand…another in our series of “Ask Richard” blog posts. We sat down (virtually, of course) with R&F founder Richard Frumess to learn a little bit more about the categories achromatic black, chromatic black, and chromatic white, and how we might apply these categories to our own painting practices.

Our third round of "People & Places" showcases a group of diverse and talented artists from the North, South, and West working with R&F Handmade Paints. In the North, we look at artist Cecile Chong. Chong is a multimedia artist who employs painting, sculpture, installation, and video in her practice. She layers materials, identities, histories, and languages throughout her work. In the South, we look at Brad Ellis's geometric, colorful, and abstract encaustic paintings. Ellis's imagery ranges from tightly rendered systematic patterns to loosely constructed, expressionistic compositions. In the West, we look at Flo Bartell. Bartell's methods excavate through layers and imagery to find the stories, scars, and symbols within. Bartell combines encaustic and mixed media in her work.

Artist Nancy Natale’s work is richly complex and unique. Her pieces explore color, geometry, and juxtaposition, “jostling the grid and setting one thing against another,” and often utilize unconventional materials such as rubber from inner tubes and upcycled handbags. R&F is delighted to have Place In The Sun as part of our permanent collection. We reached out to Nancy this week to hear how the last year has affected her practice and what she is currently working on.

After a long career in publishing, New York-based artist Melanie Hulse has turned from words to images. In her artwork, she tries to find the simplest, purest way to express something — to suggest as much as possible with as little as possible. She is deeply interested in the enigma of beauty and in the evidence trail left by numinous and scientific explorations of the world.

Ever the versatile material, encaustic can be modeled, carved, cast, and applied to absorbent materials to build sculptural forms. The wax sculptures of today are often created by applying encaustic to absorbent materials such as wood, fiber, bisque fired clay, and paper mache. We checked in with artists Pamela Blum, Anna Wagner-Ott, and Susan Stover to get familiar with their evolving individual approaches and the techniques they are using to sculpt with encaustic today.

An encaustic pour offers you a quick and relatively easy way to get a smooth even surface. Our latest YouTube video demonstrates two ways to do pours - one that will create a thick surface and a pour-over that will create a flat, thinner surface. Check out the video link below and be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss any of our YouTube videos.

Cuban born artist Humberto Fernandez lives and works in the Berkshires of Massachusetts. Trained as a filmmaker at NYU Film School, he has enjoyed a successful career spanning over 30 years in the advertising industry as a Photographer/ Cinematographer. Three years ago, he met with a friend and fellow photographer who had taken a workshop at R&F. She had been experimenting with images using encaustic on wood.

We continue our series on "Painting the Landscape" in conversation with artists Regina B. Quinn and Cherie Mittenthal. Their paintings share a common appreciation and close observation of the landscape they reside in. They capture the seasonal changes, weather changes, and events that shape land over time.

Artists throughout history have responded visually and conceptually to the terrain and its ever-changing identity. The landscape reveals color, light, condition, culture, and much more. Landscape has been interpreted in many ways throughout history. At times capturing reality with varying degrees of the actual. In other periods giving recognition of a spiritual element, seen exemplified in Romanticism of the late 18th century.

We continue "People & Places" this week with a group of gifted artists from the North, East, and South. We begin in the North, where we are captivated by Tracy Penn's layered surfaces. Tracy's work combines encaustic and found materials, giving a second life and mesmerizing texture to discarded items. In the East, we look at Alteronce Gumby's geometric, colorful, and abstract works. Gumby’s paintings examine culture through the use of color, often packed with rich hue and touch. Shelley Jean lives, works, and teaches in Florida. Much of her artwork reflects the landscape surrounding her. You can feel the ocean topography in her brushwork and use of color.

Don Maynard lives and works in Kingston, Ontario. His art practice includes painting, sculpture, and multi-media installations. Previous public art works include Stand of Birch, Archive and Fallen Star for the City of Ottawa and Wave for the City of Toronto. Maynard shows nationally and internationally. He is the recipient of a Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant and a Chalmers Fellowship. Previous solo exhibitions include Tidal Mass, and Franken Forest at the Agnes Etherington Art Centre in Kingston, and Franken Forest at the Robert McLaughlin Gallery in Oshawa.

To begin the second round of "People & Places" we direct the spotlight back towards creators in various stages of their careers. This week we focus on the Midwest, West, and an artist from beyond our borders. We get to know our paint even better when we see it in action, and there is nothing more satisfying than seeing the results when it leaves our factory and enters your studio.

Energized linework, pale washes, and text are just some of the ways ink can provide unexpected elements to your encaustic painting. You can draw, write, or print directly on the wax as a final layer, or you can add encaustic medium on top of dry ink to create a pale wash and faint lines.

We've been lucky to know Jane Allen Nodine for many years. Jane is University Gallery Director and Distinguished Professor Emerita at the University of South Carolina Upstate where she served as head of the art program for over twenty years. Prior to joining the University she owned and operated a full-service jewelry design and manufacturing company. Jane has worked in a variety of media throughout her career and she exhibits widely in the US and Europe.

Paper glued to panel can create a lovely surface to work on and bring a finished quality to your artwork. If you've already tried this in your studio, you know the results are well worth it. It is important to follow each of the following steps carefully to prevent bubbles from forming, which can be detrimental to a piece of artwork down the road.

Leigh Palmer received a BFA in painting from the Rhode Island School of Design in 1966. He is the recipient of a MacDowell Colony Fellowship and has had numerous solo shows in New York, Massachusetts, and Connecticut. His paintings Interior with Three Pears and Striped Tablecloth with Two Apples, both oil on linen from 1983, are in the permanent collection of the Smithsonian American Art Museum (gifts of the Sara Roby Foundation), and his work is in multiple corporate and private collections, including the National Museum of American Art, The New School for Social Research, and American Bank and Trust.

We've been watching the many ways artists have explored geometry with our materials, which came to light while researching for our newsletter on encaustic inlay. We spoke with two artists, Joe Celli and Penny Dell, about the application of geometric ideas in their encaustic work. Penny visits our studio regularly and works with collaged geometric patterns, often on paper. Joe inlays a multitude of translucent geometric shapes to build a dimensional surface in an almost cathartic experience.

Our latest YouTube video is a demo on how to clean your encaustic paintbrushes using R&F soy wax. Artists ask us what soy wax is for all the time. In this brief video, we share a few tips and easy to follow steps to help you get started.

We continue our series on "People & Places" this week with a group of exceptional artists from the West, Midwest, and abroad. We begin in the West, where we are uplifted by Tracey Adams’ wandering and seemingly effortless line-work and color command, Tracey lives and works in California. In the Midwest, Sarah Rehmer is an artist and educator who teaches regional R&F workshops at La Grange Art Center outside of Chicago. Process is paramount throughout her practice. Finally, Joanna Kidney lives and works in Ireland. Her work is patiently organized and has a captivating weightless quality.