- In this edition of "ARTEFFECT," vibrant watercolor inspired by nature.

(gentle music) - [Rhiannon] I like to do kind of realistic paintings, but also with a sense of whimsy.

(light upbeat music) - [Beth] Cozy portraits.

(bright music) - I like that people are a part of my work.

I never thought that people would be as weird as me, and I love that they wanna just get on board with this strange, cozy train.

- [Beth] A singer-songwriter with a bossa nova sound.

♪ 'Cause who are you went and hid ♪ ♪ 'Cause I know just what you did ♪ And mosaics from desert treasures.

- [Elizabeth] I feel that the reclaimed materials I use add character to the peace.

(light upbeat music) - It's all ahead on this edition of "ARTEFFECTS".

(upbeat music) - [Announcer] Funding for "ARTEFFECTS" is made possible by: Sandy Raffealli with Bill Pearce Motors, Heidemarie Rochlin, in memory of Sue McDowell, and by the annual contributions of PBS Reno members.

(upbeat music) - Hello, I'm Beth MacMillan and welcome to "ARTEFFECTS".

Let's explore the artistry of Rhiannon Wolfe, an artist whose love for nature and animals shines through each piece.

Using watercolor and colored pencils, she brings life to her subjects with vibrant, unexpected colors that still feel naturally connected to the world around them.

(birds chirping) (gentle music) (light upbeat music) - My name is Rhiannon Wolfe, and I am a local watercolor artist.

I like to make my art quite colorful.

I just love colors.

I find myself very drawn to the color purple.

Quite often I'll go to a painting and be like, "All right, no color purple in this painting."

But it often comes through and you'll notice that.

My ideas stem from going out into nature and being out in the beauty of the natural world, just seeing the changes in the weather, the moods, the storms.

Sometimes I'll play an air paint, or see a cute animal running by and be like, "Oh, I need to paint a squirrel now", or something like that.

I like to do kind of realistic paintings, but also with the sense of whimsy.

Like something that you'll have to double take and be like, "What?

There's a hedgehog and a spaceship going to outer space."

Like, quite often I'll be at a farmer's market or something with my art and I'll hear somebody giggling and somebody else, and I'll have to ask, like, "Okay, what image was it that elicited that emotion?"

(light upbeat music) I've always been interested in art.

(light string music) My background is actually in ancient and medieval history, and I decided to try and meld my historical learning with art.

And I took a course in Vienna at the Vienna Academy of Visionary Art, and this was a course with Aloria Weaver and David Heskin in painting like the old masters.

We spent three months painting two paintings.

One was an egg tempera and the other was an oil painting, and they were both self portraits, but one of them, the egg tempera, was reversed.

So it was quite interesting painting your face, but backwards.

So recently, I have chosen watercolor as my medium.

I took a solo road trip to New Mexico.

And I drove all the way from Reno to New Mexico and I brought my watercolor paints along with me.

And I was visiting all these national parks and exploring and out in nature, and watercolor paints were really great for traveling.

They're small and compact.

The first ever event I did, I didn't have any prints or anything.

And I was just sitting there, live painting, and somebody would come up to me and be like, "Hey, can you paint a giraffe for me," or "Can you paint my pet?"

And so I was just sitting there and painting frantically, like, "Oh, here you go."

One day I'd like to go back to oil painting once I'm more established and have a studio and more grounded.

But, right now, watercolor really works.

(bright music) With my watercolor painting, I'm actually quite precise.

A lot of watercolor artists, you know, paint wet on wet and really let the paint flow.

But I found myself, like maybe it's from learning to paint with egg tempera, but I really like to do small brush strokes, sometimes layer upon layer in fine detail.

It's really important to me to keep the colors vibrant and vibrating with each other.

I start with thin washes, and then gradually build up the detail over time.

Sometimes it can take a long time just building layer upon layer, and you've got to really think about the colors that you're layering so it doesn't turn into mud.

Through my artwork, I hope to show people that animals have feelings and thoughts and emotions just like we do, and that there's such beauty in the natural world.

And I've been vegan most of my life, so this is something that's really close to my heart.

It's really important for me to be in a good mindset and head space to create.

And then, the creative energies can really flow.

And a beautiful day like this, where the sun is shining, I find very inspiring.

(bright music) (geese honking) - To see more of Rhiannon's artwork, follow her on Instagram @RhiannonWolfeArt.

Up next, artist Kristin Skees works in a variety of media.

Combining experimental fibers with photography, she approaches art in an imaginative, quirky way that has led her to being shown in multiple collections.

We head to Virginia to find out more.

(playful music) - So, I knit cozies for people.

Think tea cozy.

(fanfare music) Like a British tea cozy.

Just a warm covering to keep something warm and snugly, but my cozies are a little more aggressive in their cozying.

(laughs) They are full body coverings that covers most of their identifiable features.

The legs, they're almost always bare because I find that hysterical to feel like people aren't wearing pants under the cozy, and I also think knees are kind of funny.

(playful music) I love art history in general, so I was really inspired by portraiture painting and estate painting with people showing off their estate by posing in a painting.

And so I thought of these very constructed, very posed, very formal photographs, and that's how I kind of began to think of them not as cozies but as cozy photographs.

So, for me, the photograph is the piece.

The cozy is a part of the piece.

Through that, I kinda have this conversation with them about how they present themselves to the world, what's important to them, and how we communicate to an audience who they are as people.

(bright music) It started with my friends and family because they are very willing to go along with my ideas.

Oh, yeah, there you go.

Yeah, there you go.

My crazy artist things that I come up with.

(upbeat music) So they're used to that.

This is very first of the series, and it's my mother and dad.

And basically how it went was, "Mom, Dad, can you tow your Airstream to the Walmart parking lot and stand in these knitted things for me?"

"Okay, fine, I guess."

I had planned their cozy colors to coordinate and also go with the silver of the Airstream a little bit and feel a little mid-century in palette.

I wanted you to know where they were and I wanted the mountain landscape in the background.

And then, this yellow stripe up front is just a nice pop of color.

This was kinda at the height of that, like a culture of RV, people who would camp out in Walmart's, which felt very Americana to me.

It just felt like a portrait of a certain segment of America.

And now, every time this is shown in a gallery or I sell a print of it, my dad asks for a commission.

I'm like, "That's not how this works, but thanks."

(laughs) (light upbeat music) Once I had done a few and people saw the photographs and saw what I was doing, I had some requests,.

I have other friends wanting to be a part of it.

Usually it's somebody I know and have a wonderful idea in mind for them.

This one was particularly made for the Alabama Theatre in Birmingham.

It was my good friend Pat who I worked with, and she always had cargo pockets full of stuff so I couldn't imagine making a cozy that it didn't have pockets for her.

So, that's how that design decision came about.

But I also do cozies for people who I've never met before until we have a conversation about the cozies, and I'm excited about them or they're excited about me and we have a really interesting dynamic and we can do wonderful photographs that way.

So it's grown and sort of changed over the years.

If I cozy you, it's meaningful to me as a person to be like, "I wanna cozy you," because it means you're sort of important in my life.

This is one of my newer photographs, "Jay in the Dismal Swamp".

And it's an interesting story.

We went and scouted this location, clouds were puffy and perfect and the sky was blue, and we had this beautiful horizon line and I thought that would be a wonderful shot.

And then, I knit the cozy, we go out there.

The sky was overcast and moody and cloudy, and where I had framed it up, it was much flatter.

It was on a dock, and they had replaced the railing and it was just not the same shot and I was very disappointed.

And at the last minute I was like, "Go stand on this boat ramp."

And I saw this corner and I saw the trees and I saw the really dramatic clouds, and I think this photograph is better than what I imagined it to be, and I love when that happens.

I think this one just has so much drama, the way the light is hitting and the cloud.

I do love this photo.

The way my projects come together sometimes feels more perfect than others, and I think this one, just all the elements wound up being there for me.

(gentle music) (bristles scratching) So the actual sitting down and knitting is when I get to go to my studio.

I can't even really listen to music or podcasts or anything because I have to keep count.

So it's a lot of setting up the machine, which, she is old and finicky.

So I have to oil her down with WD-40 before we begin and make sure she's ready to go.

The stitch pattern is pretty unique.

It's something I develop early on in the series, and it's like two stitches, skip a stitch, one stitch, skip a stitch, two stitches, and it's just something I made up.

I liked the pattern, I liked that it was a little, had a little gap there and created a vertical stripe.

So that is, in everyone, is always that sort of three stitch pattern.

And then I have to do the threading and make sure it's just right before I start knitting.

(soul music) I start it the same way every time.

(bristles scratching) I have a very specific pattern to begin with.

I do sets of 20, and I always start on the same side because I do have ADHD and if my mind wanders and I lose count, I have to kinda start all over.

So I have a clicker and I have a system so that I keep myself on track.

It's very meditative, just emptying my mind and counting is nice to do.

Anytime my mind wanders, I am in trouble, so I have to, it is very much a practice.

(soul music) So that's the second half.

Well, I'm always happy to have, like a whole conversation and see what kind of interesting things we can come up with 'cause it's so fun.

And I enjoy talking with people and working with people and I like to facilitate these experiences.

I think it's memorable and interesting, and I like that people are a part of my work.

I never thought that people would be as weird as me and I love that they wanna just get on board with this strange, cozy train.

(bright music) - See more at kristenskees.com.

And now it's time for this week's art quiz.

Which famous artist is known for painting water lilies that beautifully reflect the natural world?

Is the answer: A, Claude Monet; B, Vincent van Gogh; C, Pablo Picasso; or D, Georgia O'Keefe.

Stay tuned for the answer.

Now let's take a music break.

We'll take a trip to Ohio and hear a performance from singer-songwriter Meg Paulsen.

Inspired by the Brazilian music of the 1960s, she has a compelling bossa nova sound that has developed since dropping her first song in 2015. have a listen.

(bossa nova music) ♪ I keep it in a bag for later ♪ Use it whenever I want ♪ Somehow manage to keep my composure ♪ ♪ And keep my punches nonchalant, oh ♪ ♪ I'm no good with money ♪ You're no artist with truth ♪ And if it ever gets to that point again, yeah ♪ ♪ Well I know just what you'd do ♪ ♪ Yes, I do ♪ So you can throw the rest of it in a bag ♪ ♪ 'Cause who are you went and hid ♪ ♪ Yes I know just what you did ♪ I hear you crying for a virgin savior ♪ ♪ Like you're burning on a stick ♪ ♪ 'Cause you know just what you did ♪ (bossa nova music) (trumpet ripping) ♪ So we can throw the rest of it in a bag ♪ ♪ 'Cause who are you went and hid ♪ ♪ Yes I know just what you did ♪ I hear you crying for a virgin savior ♪ ♪ Like you're burning on a stick ♪ ♪ 'Cause I know just what you did ♪ ♪ So reckless with integrity ♪ It seals the sweetest part of me ♪ ♪ In a chasm within ♪ Guarded by my sins (bossa nova music) ♪ So throw the rest of it in a bag ♪ ♪ 'Cause who are you went and hid ♪ ♪ Yes I know just what you did ♪ I hear you crying for a virgin savior ♪ ♪ Like you're burning on a stick ♪ ♪ 'Cause you know just what you did ♪ ♪ You tell me baby you think there's hope ♪ ♪ For us, oh God forbid ♪ 'Cause you know just what you did ♪ ♪ And I was raised to finish what I start now ♪ ♪ But on this I'll call it quits ♪ ♪ 'Cause you know just what you did ♪ ♪ Baby, you know just what you did ♪ ♪ Baby, you know ♪ Just what ♪ You did (light music) Learn more about the artist on Instagram @meg.or.megan.

And now let's review this week's art quiz.

Which famous artist is known for painting water lilies that beautifully reflect the natural world?

Is the answer: A, Claude Monet; B, Vincent van Gogh; C, Pablo Picasso; or D, Georgia O'Keefe.

And the answer is A, Claude Monet.

For our final segment, meet mosaic artist Elizabeth Wright.

she creates mosaics with stained glass, rusted metal, old wood, and anything she can get her hands on.

The result is a beautiful mosaic with great texture and meaning.

(light upbeat music) - Mosaic art is anytime you take smaller pieces of a hard material; glass, tiles, stone, to create a picture or an image with those items.

So anything in that description is considered a mosaic.

I don't think I'm a typical artist in that you don't look in mine and go, "Oh, she does this one thing."

That's what absolutely pulls me into mosaic is that I can go in so many different directions.

But I use rusty things I find in the desert; dishes, pottery, beads, stone.

The biggest thing I use is cut stained glass.

(light upbeat music) The first thing I think of is, what substrate am I gonna put it on?

And that substrate is the bottom.

What am I gonna create it on?

We were out in the Santa Rosa Mountains in Nevada, and I found this big deposit of these flat rocks and I was like, "Oh my gosh!

These are going to be perfect for mosaics."

But then, I get down to my little pieces I'm nipping.

So I hand nip, nip, nip, nip, cut, cut, cut, cut, cut.

I'm gonna use silicone to glue those pieces down, and then I'm gonna tape it off.

Here you have this beautiful piece of art you've created and you're gonna take a black route and you're gonna smother the whole thing of your beautiful piece you've created, which is a little unnerving.

And then you clean and you clean and you clean and you clean.

The cleaning will be toothpicks and Q-tips.

You wanna get everything out so you can see every piece of glass in that piece.

So, it is a little crazy when you see this process when I'm doing that, but it's very meditative.

And it's, you know, I get some good music going and it's just, I can just get lost in what I'm doing.

So it's a wonderful way to relax.

(light upbeat music) (light music) "Cutty" has over 50 colors of glass.

To get the shades and all of the inspiration, I actually have to mix the glass, you know, almost like a painter where if I put two colors of glass next to each other, they will start to give the illusion of another color.

And "Cutty" also has seven different colors of grout.

And I took the time and you have to tape it off, grout one section, pull that off, grout the next section, tape the rest of it off.

It's a really intensive process.

(light music) I like that as my art has evolved, I use reclaimed materials literally in everything I do.

It's not about the economics of it.

I feel that the reclaimed materials I use add character to the piece.

So, let's say I wanna make a sunflower.

You know, you could put it in a simple frame and that's okay, that's okay.

But to put it in with a rusty piece of metal we found out in the desert, and then to put it on an old piece of barnwood just makes that sunflower so much more special, and it makes it where you can envision that sunflower near an old barn or out in a field.

It's amazing, the rusty things we have found in the desert and you're like, "What is this?

What was this?"

But what I see coming from this is, you know, I can see it in my mind, I see something happening.

And it's not just what people think.

You don't just smash dishes and glue 'em onto something.

Not to make it art worthy, you need to actually cut those into shapes and create things, and it makes a beautiful, colorful piece and I think people really are like, "Wow, those were old dishes," and they can see that.

(light upbeat music) But I just think it's also environmentally a good thing to do.

If I'm taking something that's just rusting away in the desert, and why not?

And that adds something in its character, and I'm also just taking some garbage out of the desert and I'm making something out of it.

It's amazing when you put some cut stained glass and some beads, and it just turns it into this old thing you found in the desert into something very beautiful.

(light upbeat music) - See more at elizabethwrightmosaics.com.

And that wraps it up for this edition of "ARTEFFECTS".

If you want to watch new "ARTEFFECTS" segments early, make sure you subscribe to the PBS Reno YouTube channel.

And don't forget to keep visiting pbsreno.org to watch complete episodes of "ARTEFFECTS".

Until next week, I'm Beth MacMillan.

Thanks for watching.

- [Announcer] Funding for "ARTEFFECTS" is made possible by: Sandy Raffealli with Bill Pearce Motors; Heidemarie Rochlin; In memory of Sue McDowell; and by the annual contributions of PBS Reno members.

(light upbeat music) (lively music) (lively music continues)