Legion Paper acquires Rising and Stonehenge Brands

Below you will find the Press Release issued by Legion Paper concerning its future exclusive supply of the Rising and Stonehenge Brands. I'm quoting it in full below so that people can be very clear what the company is saying.

Legion Paper acquires Rising and Stonehenge Brands
Legion becomes the worldwide exclusive supplier.

Legion Paper, the leading supplier of fine art paper in North America, acquired the Rising and Stonehenge brands upon Neenah Paper’s announcement of the Rising Mill closure. Legion Paper will continue to supply the papers to the exact specifications to the worldwide community.

“No other company is more suited to develop and distribute Rising Art Papers and Boards,” said Michael Ginsburg, president of Legion Paper. “We created these papers with the mill over 30 years ago and have been actively involved in the manufacturing and new product development as their exclusive distributor.”

Rising Museum Board remains the premiere brand and has set the standard as the preferred choice used by museums, galleries and framers worldwide. Rising Art Papers exceed the stringent standards imposed by the Library of Congress. Stonehenge is considered the finest of art papers among artists of all genres. Known for its versatility and affordability, Stonehenge has crossed all art boundaries to become the favored sheet for colored pencil, graphite, printing, lithography and much more.

“Legion Paper’s active development of these products means that Legion will be able to continue manufacturing the Rising and Stonehenge products to the exact specifications in the future,” added Ginsburg. “Legion Paper is a very proactive company and this acquisition further illustrates the importance and commitment we have made to our customers. We will continue supplying these very important papers with no disruption.”

Legion Paper further intends to bring the Rising and Stonehenge papers to a worldwide market. As this transition takes place, Legion Paper has acquired sufficient inventory of both Rising Museum Board and Stonehenge papers to meet demand.

New York, NY (April 23, 2007)

About Legion Paper
Legion Paper is the largest distributor of Fine Art, Museum Mounting Board, Decorative and Digital Art Papers in North America, stocking over 3500 papers from over 50 mills worldwide. We work closely with our suppliers to develop unique products and have assembled the finest collection of papers ever offered by one company. Legion remains steadfast in its commitment to customer service and the ability to stock our full range in both our East & West Coast warehouses.

My thanks are due to Marc Schotland, Director of Marketing for Legion Paper for moving quickly to dispel any doubts about the future supply of products associated with these two important brands.

Links:

• Legion Paper
• Legion Paper - Press Release (23 April 2007)
  

Technorati tags: art paper, art supplies, coloured pencils, colored pencils, paper

Giverny Trees #4 (I tried again!)

Giverny Trees #4

20cm x 30cm, pastel
copyright Katherine Tyrrell

Some of you will have read "If at first you don't succeed........" about producing another version of a favourite view which has already sold.

Well I got back from my trip and took another look at this - which I'd been working on before the trip. This version is much looser than the ones in the previous post (see if you agree) - and the values and colours are much more as I remember it.

However.......I think I'm still at the "being in two minds as to whether or not to whack in a bit more dark red somewhere" stage. And I'm leaning towards 'Yes' at which point I have to deal with 'Where?' Anyway, I thought you might like to see it. Comments are always welcome and you can always try and stop me wielding that red!

I think I'm going to try and get a bit more pastel done this summer. I sorted out my UK travelling pastel cases before I went up north - but they sat in the back of the car in the end and didn't come out as the weather although very sunny was not always warm in the places I was sketching - and I'm a warm weather pastel artist!

Anybody interested in Monet's garden at Giverny should refer to the previous post for more details or the links below.

Links:

• Map of Monet's gardens at Giverny
• Giverny - details of opening hours
• Transport: How to get to Giverny
  

Technorati tags: art , Giverny , Monet , landscape painting , pastel painting , pastels , painting

Amazon and Moleskine Books have a Clearance Sale - or do they?

It's not often you see a Moleskine for less than the normal retail price - so to see prices really slashed causes jaw dropping on a grand scale!

Check out the clearance prices on amazon.com site for sketchbooks. I'm looking at the price for a large sketchbook which is suggesting a 40% reduction from the normal retail rate. They're quoting $24.99 as the normal retail price (and $19.95 as the normal Amazon rate) and then $14.95 as the clearance sale price - making a saving of just over $10 on the normal retail price.

Now when my jaw drops I start looking at why something is such a good bargain. In this instance the supplier is not Amazon - goods ship from and are sold by Moleskine Books - so watch out for shipping rates in case the reduction is not as good in reality as it seems. It appears that the base rate is $5.99 per shipment plus $0.99 per item. Which seems to me takes the cost to the customer of a single Moleskine back up to $21.93 - which is not looking so cheap to me. Buy a large quantity with friends and maybe you've got a good deal? Bottom line - make sure you do the calculations and are happy with the TOTAL cost before placing any order.

Potential buyers should note this extract about shipping costs from the 'about us' section of the moleskine.cc website.

BARGAIN-PRICED ITEMS
From time to time, Moleskine Books has chosen to make a range of items available to our customers at very low prices. In most cases, these listings represent a fraction of the original cost of the item to us. However, the total amount for these orders which our customers pay includes a reasonable shipping fee, as specified in our shipping policies. This amount does not vary for any of our items. Bargain-priced items incur the same shipping charges as our regularly-priced retail merchandise, and sometimes this is surprising for our customers. We cannot make adjustments to our shipping policies with regard to our bargain-priced listings.

Please see our FAQ pages for further information regarding our bargain-priced items.

I was looking for more information about the company as I couldn't work out who this company - "Moleskine Books" - was. Also bear in mind the lack of data about the background to this company on their website. There are a number of websites on the internet which 'appear' to be the company behind Moleskine notebooks - but they aren't - they just exist to try and sell them.

My large Moleskine sketchbook is one of the two brands of sketchbook which I use when travelling with a sketchbook. You can see how they work with pencil, pen and ink and coloured pencil in my sketches in Travels with a Sketchbook in....... and in particular in those threads associated with Travels with a Sketchbook in the USA.

I'm always interested in a bargain to do with buying Moleskines. If you think you've found a bargain do let me know!

Links:

• Amazon.com
• Moleskine Books - Amazon shopfront
• Moleskine Books
  

Technorati tags: drawing, moleskine, sketch, sketchbook

Art Societies: two new exhibitions

Just a quickie to alert people to the exhibitions of two art societies taking place this week in central London.

Society of Botanical Artists
Flowers and Gardens 20-29 April 2007,
Venue: The Lecture Hall, Central Hall, Westminster, Storey’s Gate London SW1
Dates: Friday 20 April to Sunday 29 April 2007
Opening times: Daily from 10am to 5pm including Sundays
Free Admission
All work for Sale

The annual exhibition of the Society of Botanical Artists started last Friday and closes on Sunday - so if you like botanical art and can get to London this week then do pay a visit. Last year's exhibition was simply stunning - with a very high quality of work on display and I'm sure this year will be just the same.

There are daily demonstrations by artists who are members of the society - including well known coloured pencil artist Ann Swan (on Tuesday 24th).

"The art of botanical painting continues even in the face of enhanced photographic technology and the digital revolution, for there is simply no substitute for the discerning talents of the artist capturing the essence of plant form."

Professor Peter R Crane FRS, Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew: excerpt from his foreword toThe Art of Botanical Painting

Royal Society of Portrait Painters
Annual Exhibition
Venue: Mall Galleries, The Mall London SW1Y 5BD
Dates: 26 April 2007 - 13 May 2007 (closes 1pm)
Opening times: 10am - 5pm including weekends and public holidays. Open to 7pm Tuesdays & Thursdays
Entry is £2.50, concessions £1.50

The Society started in 1891 and has included a number of eminent artists as members - including Whistler whose self portrait is featured in the image. The annual exhibition at the Malle Galleries features new works by Society members but also selected works by non-members.

I'm going to the Private View of the RSPP on Wednesday and will be trying to get to the SBA exhibition on either Tuesday or Wednesday. I'll report back on both later this week.

Technorati tags: art, botanical art, exhibition, portrait

Legion Paper and Stonehenge - updated

Further to yesterday's post about the closure of the paper mill on the Housatonic River which makes Rising Fine Art Papers I've been given some more information about future supplies of Stonehenge fine art papers (and Rising Museum Board and other Rising products) which seem to be under threat.

[Plus see the latest update below regarding an e-mail from Legion Paper received since inital publication of this post]

The manager of the mill - which has closed - advised a member of Wet Canvas that Stonehenge would continue to be 'made' by Legion Paper. I've done a bit more digging as a result and found out the following:

Legion Paper sources fine art papers. It is a wholesale distributor rather than a manufacturer. Legion is the largest supplier of Fine Art, Museum Board, Decorative and Digital Art Papers in North America, stocking over 3500 papers from over 50 mills worldwide. It deals with the manufacturers and mills which produce paper and then sells the paper on to retail distributors who can fulfil its minimum value requirement for all orders.

• Legion Paper are identified as the exclusive distributor of Stonehenge in the USA
  
• To date, Legion Paper has not made any news announcement about future supplies of Rising Art Papers.
  

I believe Stonehenge is probably a trademarked brand name and its production process may well be patented - presumably owned by Rising Fine Art papers Now owned by Neenah Inc). I've certainly always heard Stonehenge referred to as Rising Stonehenge paper - meaning it is branded as a Rising Fine Art paper. If I'm correct, then this would mean that anybody wanting to produce it would need to have a licence and access to the specification for how it is produced.

What's less clear is whether any mills (and if so, which) besides the Rising Paper Mill on the Housatonic River actually produce Stonehenge paper. It's entirely possible that other mills produce it - or may be able to do so in future. Do please comment if you have any useful information to add.

I'm not familiar with Legion Paper. However I'm sure some of my USA readers will have heard of this company. This is a link to the Stonehenge page on the Legion Paper website which provides more information. I certainly found the Legion Paper website very interesting in relation to the range of fine art papers they supply - and I'm sure most readers interested in sources of fine art papers will find brands which interest them here.

A Legion Fine Art Papers press release in July last year about Rising Museum Boards identified Marc Schotland as being the primary contact (with e-mail address) for further information about this Rising product. Maybe a man who can throw some light on what is going on?

Update from Legion Paper (midday 23.4.07.)

I've received a very helpful reply to my e-mail enquiring what was happening from a very nice man called Joshua Levine at Legion Paper. This clarifies the situation nicely - and anybody who's been thinking about having a small anxiety attack can now rest easy!

Thank you for your e-mail. There seems to be a lot of misinformation out there and I appreciate your bringing it to our attention. We will send a more "formal" response shortly, but for now you can rest assured that Stonehenge, as well as Rising Museum Board, will continue to be available in the future (with no disruption in supply). Michael Ginsburg, the President of Legion Paper, created this paper with the Rising mill in 1975. As such, we own the Stonehenge brand name as well as the "formula" for making the paper. It is very much a part of our family and isn't going away!

In your blog, you noted correctly that we are not a manufacturer. We do, however, work with the most of the world's top paper mills to create papers to our specifications (Stonehenge, Lenox, Somerset and Coventry are just a few). (Joshua at Legion Paper)

I'll publish the formal response when I get it. Thanks Joshua!

Links to on-line suppliers of Stonehenge paper

In the meantime, and for future reference for my imminent order of some more black stonehenge - here are some links to the page devoted to Stonehenge paper on various on-line art supplies sites. These may be sites which can advise as to what's happening as to future supplies.

• Dick Blick (stocks sheets of white in all sizes, plus black, cream, fawn, grey, natural and warm white plus drawing pads)
• Jerry's Artarama (stocks sheets in all colours - as above - plus 20 sheet packs, 100 sheet packs, drawing pads and a 50" x 10 yard roll in white only)
• Art Supply Warehouse (stocks all colours in 20 sheet or 100 sheet packs)
  

Those indicating they stock Rising Stonehenge (ie made by Fox river Papers) include:

• MisterArt (stocks supplies in all colours except black plus roll of white - as above)
• Daniel Smith (stocks white, natural, warm white and cream - minimum order of 10 sheets)
  

Links:

• Legion Paper
• Legion Paper - Stonehenge paper

Technorati tags: art paper, art supplies, coloured pencils, colored pencils, paper