I’m excited to announce the release of my latest coloring book, Fanciful Fashions. As of this writing, I'm at the last stages of final proofing and adding my special touches and refinements.  As a new publisher of coloring books I took a leap of faith and am offering a free BONUS PDF of all 35 of the illustrations! Purchasers of the book will get a special link to download the file with all the coloring pages. You can print them out to explore multiple color schemes and try new coloring tools—all to your heart's content. View the gallery of Fanciful Fashions illustrations and see for you ..read more

First is a new coloring book coming out next year called, "Textile Designs." Showing above is her artwork from the book.  The book is due for release on April 20, 2016. Next is "Dazzling Dogs," another Dover title. Featuring dogs of all kinds, this one is sure to delight lovers of "Creative Cats" and "Owls" with its whimsical details and themes. It's due to be released June 15, 2016.  FROM "DAZZLING DOGS." THIS DOG LOVES TO DIG UP BONES SO MUCH, HE BECAME A PROFESSIONAL! ARTWORK ©MARJORIE SARNAT * "Interview with Adult Coloring Book Author Marjorie Sarnat" Good questions always mak ..read more

Coloring courtesy of Shelly Durham. Notice the "cool" owl surrounded by the "warm" foliage. Illustration from Secret Garden © Johanna Basford Have you ever faced a clean new coloring page and wondered where to begin? Some colorists just plunge in and let their intuition be their guide. If you're that colorist, it works just fine. Some of us feel less secure and need some guidelines. Here's a formula you can rely on when you're not sure how to begin. Keep in mind that formulas are only beginnings so let yourself bend the rules as you go. Whether you feel you need guidelines or not, i ..read more

My Creative Haven coloring book, Dream Horses, features a horse on the cover with a colorful flowing mane. I used colored pencil, marker, and gouache for that piece. I wanted to create a similar looking portrait with the soft effects and shimmering color that’s achieved by using pastels. Pastels can be challenging because of the powder dust and delicate surface of a pastel painting. Also, the “tooth” of the substrate can affect the ultimate look of a finished artwork. I enjoy working on stretched canvas, but it's not an ideal surface for pastels. So I experimented just for fun. I used a medi ..read more

Kindred Spirits, the newest painting in my Kleo Kats series, was painted using a limited color palette. Painting with a limited palette means selecting the fewest paint tubes possible to achieve the widest range of mixed colors on the visible spectrum. Twelve or fewer colors qualify as a limited palette. Most masterful artists, past and present, sing the praises of a limited palette. Kindred SpiritsMy series of cat paintings, Kleo Kats, are examples of limited palette paintings. Kindred Spirits, the newest addition to the series was painted with “my favorite oil color palette” listed below wh ..read more

Presented by Staedtler and Marjorie Sarnat Jan 1 – Jan 20, 2020 It’s a new year and a new you, and now’s the time to take your artistic skills to the next level. What better than to put new artist materials to use in your artwork, courtesy of Staedtler. Through its generosity, I am able to offer U.S. residents the chance to win one of three amazing prizes:* “2020 GRAND PRIZE” triplus fineliners – A fibre-tip pen set of 20 fineliners makes superfine lines to let you get down to the details Double-ended watercolor brush pens – This 36 pen set consists of double-ended brush pens that are i ..read more

Colored artwork courtesy of Nicole Ziobro. Used by permission. I have a fresh coloring page for you that you won't find in any published book! Click below to start the download. Download Dreamy Unicorn I recently offered this illustration to my Facebook group (you really should join if you haven't already), and members have created beautiful artwork from this page. The gorgeous example shown is by Nicole Ziobro. Each week we have a "color-along", and for this illustration I offered tips for coloring it. I hope this sparks some ideas for your Dreamy Unicorn. Choose your own “dreamy” color pale ..read more

Staedtler’s Triplus Fineliner pens are among my favorite coloring products. I rely on these pens for coloring small details and for creating optical mixes by leaving white space between the marks or by multi-color marks. Now Staedtler offers a set of 48 brilliant colors in the familiar 0.3mm line width. My previous review included the 20 Colors Set, the 6 Neon Set, the 6 Pastel Color Set, and the 6 Earth Tone Set for a total of 38 colors. Read it to learn more details about how the Fineliners perform: http://bit.ly/1QnZkQ7 TRIPLUS FINELINERS LAYERED WITH COLORED PENCILS Detail from Creative ..read more

[Disclosure: I received the product mentioned in this article at no charge in exchange for writing a product review.] This set of six pigment liner Sketch Pens is great for writing, sketching, and drawing and works well for accenting watercolors and acrylic wash pieces, too. The ink is a rich, dense black. The range of point sizes gives you choices between delicate, medium, and bold line weights as you work. The release of ink is consistent and flows beautifully. PACKAGING The Staedtler pigment liner pens come in a durable clear plastic case that's great for traveling and storage. Another ..read more

EXAMPLES OF HIGH CONTRAST: Left, dark subject against light background. Right, light subject against dark background. © Marjorie Sarnat. Original line art illustration is from Creative Cats. High Contrast Creates Drama and Commands Attention Contrast in a composition refers to its darks and lights, regardless of its colors. For example, the color blue can be so dark it appears almost black or so light it appears almost white. In art, the degree of darkness or lightness of a color is called its value. A color can be any degree of dark to light. There are many values between the darkest da ..read more