Yesterday's Progress

Well, there is a slight outside chance that I am getting better at this watercolor card thing.  I can't post the pictures since they will be a surprise but I think they are getting better and I am certainly getting freer with the paint--not as tight as at first.

Took some photos yesterday that I hope I can use.  Today, I am going to try a  little Japanese watercolor as well.  And just maybe, since hubby is cooking today, I will start on the acrylic!

Yes!

No one reads this anyway. Soooo.....

And that's not Eeyore speaking, either.  I would be shocked if anyone stumbled on this thing in blogdom, or whatever you might call that nebulous "kingdom of the blogs".


At any rate, if just for myself, I decided to get going on this. It will keep me honest. It will keep me looking for the next project and I hope it will keep me sane.

Since last here, I have been to Alaska and back, to New Mexico for an icon workshop at Our Lady of Guadalupe Monastery in Pecos (it was awesome) and to Italy and the Panama canal, and Peru.  Plus the usual travelling to see/move family in various US locations.  Yes, I have been in cars, boats and airplanes almost more than my studio.  The last trip to Florence and Rome almost forced me to throw out my paints, brushes and pencils and take up watching TV professionally (if you can do that).  Michelangelo, Raphael and Fra Angelico.....are......wonderful and discouraging all at the same time.  In my recent reading, I have discovered, though, that just like me, they practiced, studied and learned from others.  Not really too much different even with their uncommon and wonderful brilliance..

So, my current project?  I am making a set of cards to give at Christmas, all handpainted watercolors and all different.  I am throwing out about 50 percent of my work, but honestly it forces me to practice in a number of (consistent) ways and take challenges I wouldn't otherwise take on. And I think I am improving.  So, all in all a good thing to do.  As things transpire, I hope to do a better job of recording problems/thoughts/exasperations here.  

Getting back to this....

Ok, so I've been There and Back and am preparing on another trip, this time to Alaska.

Quite a bit of drawing, painting and heart searching has gone on since then.  I don't know about any other artists out there, but sometimes I have had the feeling of "Why do I do this? What good does it do?"  I can't help but look around the dying world and wonder, as I stand before my easel day after day, safe in my cocoon and think about what my actions do for anyone. And that sort of thought pains me, because I also believe that G-d put us on earth to help others.

I was thinking about all this when on a parallel action, I decided to paint an icon of a kitchen saint.  I am Roman Catholic but I have been reading about the Orthodox Church, and have even visited two, and have greatly admired the beauty of their churches. The theology behind the icon is something quite beautiful and also different, I find from what I have been told (I am beginning to realize that often, one group has exactly the wrong take on another, often in interesting ways).  It is a "window to heaven" and the people are stylized precisely because we really can't paint them as they are now. At least, that is my understanding.

But my cooking needs help and I thought about the advice of an Orthodox lady on the Ancient Faith Radio that I often listen to--cooking is not mundane but sacred and that she had a icon of St. Euphronysus in her kitchen to look over things with his prayers. 

Hmmm, I thought. So thinking I was tempted to order an icon online, but I had this block of wood in the garage that was doing nothing but holding down the floor. I have acrylic paint. So I thought, why not?

The results, for my first icon were better than I could have hoped for. Furthermore I found it fun and challenging, even though I didn't know what I was doing, and am very sure it was done with many mistakes.  But he sits in my kitchen now, my friend from Heaven,  overlooking my cooking and sweetening my creativity.

It started me thinking.  I had spent the last year helping teach in a Bible study at our local parish.  It had been hard work, and more difficult because sometimes leadership doesn't understand how important such teaching is. But words are words and once said they go off into the air and are lost, unless the Holy Spirit makes them live in a person's heart.  How much better, I thought to take that time and make something that SHOWED people, through an implement both of prayer and art Who it is that made us and how He loves us. It was then that I realized I wanted to be an iconographer.

So thanks, AFR and all the Orthodox out there. And no, there is no Orthodox church in this town. May G-d grant its arrival.

Thoughts on Traveling South

I am heading south, way south, to South America, specifically Argentina, Chile and Uruguay this Sunday.  I have never been where I am going and in a sense I feel as if it were a marvelous and uncertain adventure.  I go knowing only a little Spanish, so although I go with my husband, who knows a great deal more, the lack of understanding of the people around me is, in itself, is a bit daunting.

I had never thought to go here. In fact, I had never thought much about these places until my husband set up the trip. So I feel it has G-d written all over it, just because it is not on my "bucket list".  I do not know what I will find, or who I will meet or how it will change the way I look at things.  I do know that it is one more step on the journey, one more rung on the ladder leading Home. It is a place I must go and a thing I must do. So it has prayer written all over it too.

And this part of South America is a beautiful place.  I have seen some pictures and I am taking new journals full of watercolor paper, and new drawing pens, watercolor pencils and hope that, after a month and a half of artists' block, I will be able to free things enough to create--something, even if it is just a new friend.  It is funny how opening a sketch pad seems to open people up to conversation.   There is a certain fascination people have with art-in-progress--and in this case, I may be at a disadvantage with my remedial Spanish, so the art may just have to speak for itself.

It is now Autumn....

Even though I have been absent from this spot for several months, I have not been absent from my studio.  It is Labor Day, and since we were using this day as a "staycation", I thought I would work in the studio on a piece for my daughter.  She had wanted a pastel like Degas.  She didn't get it, but I managed to pull off a good picture and although I am reluctant to show it, it represents another milestone.

In other words, I was please with the whole piece this time.

And that is rare.

We will take it in tomorrow for framing. Now, I will think more about pastels to supplement my watercolors.
 

Offering for Ash Wednesday

Usually, trips are a great catalyst for me and I come back, if not brimming with ideas, then at least having a few pop into my head.  In this case, I went to an art fair in Boca Raton, and met a very nice (and I might say from his paintings, accomplished) artist who had a piece which was charcoal done on canvas and fixed with the usual fixative.  I had not heard of such a thing (being  ignorant and at the beginning of a steep learning curve) and so decided when I got home to try it.

This was the result.  It is called "Are you so sure?"  I really like the charcoal on the canvas idea, but not sure yet if it is durable enough.  I have put fixative on it and will see how it holds.

 

Sometimes Bigger is Better

I just finished a watercolor, a much bigger version of one I have hanging in my dining room.  The one there is a favorite of my husband's and it was his idea to enlarge it.  I hadn't done it for two reasons.  First, could I pull it off again?  Second, it would require an expensive frame and matting if I did pull it off.

However, everyone is gone and I decided to take paint in hands.  After a trip to the local craft store for a ginormous piece of paper this was the result, and the effect I sought in the first picture actually came to life in this one.

 So, sometimes bigger IS better!

In Praise of the Slow.

I have always, always been what you might call a slow person, who likes to take the time to deliberate before doing.  Indeed, if you rush me, as my mother always (many times rightly) tried to, I will misplace or lose or forget something.  It is one of those limitations I live with;  I can "rev" up, so to speak, but it always makes me tense and nervous.  Needless to say, in this country where the premium virtue is haste even in places of contemplation (!), I have often been the slower car--you know the one--who is taking their time while everyone else is rushing to the fire. 

So imagine my delight in finding this link called Slow Painting.

http://slowpainting.wordpress.com/

It isn't just about "slow art", but slow architecture, slow cooking, slow living.  I hope you slow people out there will enjoy it as much as I have.

And take your time.

Christmas Card

I really was going to try another technique and still may this am before I have to start cooking (and cooking and cooking--artist in the kitchen today!).   But instead, the brush had different ideas;  I went with them, and offer you a Christmas card this morning.  May you have a blest Christmas filled with light and beauty and peace.

From Small to Large

Here's the latest. Its unfortunate shadow at the top is due to a) it is a watercolor sadly in need of a frame, so I have it pinned to my wall but b) I ran out of pins so c) because I stole some from the picture above, d) the picture above is casting a shadow.

I did a lot (17)  of sketches the last time I was in NM, but this is the first I have tried to enlarge.  It is outside of the town of Abiqu, along the Chama River, not far from the Christ in the Desert Benedictine Monastery which I was fortunate enough to visit for the first time. This is Georgia's country all the way.  I think it is the best kept secret in the United States, because the cliffs are colorful, moody and grand, the silence palpable, and the sky incredibly, unblinkingly New Mexico blue.  And the painting itself is technically much better, not overworked, not saved from the grave like my last offing.

From time to time, I start wondering why I do this--paint, I mean--and why I am so passionate about it.  After all, I am not going to be making millions in the wild New York (yes, I read the WSJ) art market.
And I am not sure my paintings say anything anyone else's don't.

The anwer is simple:  freedom to express what I see, as one of G-d's creatures. And I am blessed by G-d to have the option.  As a notebook I have says, "Pretending to be a Normal Person day after day is Exhausting".  Hmmm, and what IS normal, anyway??

Finally

I should call this Much Ado About Nothing. It has taken me about two hours to get this picture downloaded only to find I could do it much more easily. Ah, technology, where we "save" time. I accept this as something I needed to know. *sigh*

Enough grousing. I decided to share the painting of my flower garden--the reworked and re-reworked version (who says you can' t rework watercolor?--and the result is not bad, at least in my estimation, considering where this piece came from. (as in trash heap). I am tempted to try again, maybe in different colors, just to see what will happen.
More later. Must get to work.

Not Quite There

I just read my last post and realized that I had given my art her head and she had galovanted (is that a word?) down a different path.  Flowers, however are key.  As I looked again at Georgia's "Black Holly hock"  I was again taken by the stark richness of it all.

My adventure into flowers has been quite different (and I can see right now that I am going to have to learn to get some pictures up!)

1. First, I had had NO, repeat NO intention of doing flowers at all.  It just came to me after an attempt to do an abstraction of a sky the other day.  How I love Winsor Blue (red)!.

Unfortunately, as a sky, it just didn't work.  I did my usual thing of getting everything nice and medium with no contrast.  Fail.  I took out the charcoal to see if adding contrast in a redo would work.  Double fail.

2. Impressionistic.  I had looked at the sky...and saw....flowers everywhere. Everywhere!  I put on Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 23, second movement (a slow, mournful Mozart, if you can imagine), and began to paint in details; the results were, well, mixed. 

A couple of great tulips, roses (white with Winsor blue shadows) and poppies, and a garden path, but that charcoal did absolutely nothing for the piece.  I am faced with:

3.Redoing.  This is OK.  If Georgia could repaint a mesa three hundred (300) times, I can repaint this once.
Problem:  I am scared to try because how will I get that constellation of shapes again?  It IS, I must remind myself an EXPERIMENT, not Van Gogh I am ruining.  Just a piece of paper...Just a piece of paper....just a piece of paper....Unfortunately, in my real other life, people are being somewhat critical of everything (not YOU dearest), and times are, shall we say, stormy. (Ha! Does that make me an Artist now?).  I can see them all--ghosts standing in my studio, looking over my shoulder, making snide comments.  Need to leave the criticism where it belongs--a very big trash barrel outside the Solar System.

4.  Editing.  Yup, get out the scissor and judiciously cut out the worst of the charcoal offense.  Not sure this will work, but may give it a go.  Anyone need artistic bookmarks????

I will probably do all of these. 

And my ideas?  Not even sure what they were, but right now, have a desert piece on the board, and am working on People with the idea of going Icons.  In this case, it is a matter of using a pile of very small frames a friend is donating to me.  Form follows function. ;p

She's BAACK! from New Mexico

Yes, yes, YES! I am back--camera full of pictures, head full of more and heart full of Georgia O'Keeffe. This trip I finally got to see her work.  The real deal.  The textures, the colors, the life.

I say that my heart is full of Georgia O'Keeffe, which is a bit, I guess, off the wall. I would have said so too until I saw the Black Hollyhock with Blue Larkspur, a work that no photography or print process seems to copy true to color.



This thumbnail does NOT give the full affect of the actual painting which is actually quite large, full of the rich colors and textures of oils, and well, a stroke (pardon) of genius. But there was something else there-- a spiritual quality that made me feel as if I was looking into the Heart of the Creator. And although this is not something readily admitted, I admit it now--inexplicably, my eyes brimmed with tears.  It was one of those few moments in life where an overwhelming sense of awe had left me motionless and speechless.

I can only hope for a reaction like that to one of mine.  If it ever happens, it will be by G-d's good grace.

More later.  I have to catch up ALL that I learned--and talk about some new projects!

This week's tips

So I spent what I would call an almost gluttonous day of painting on Tuesday. Did four demos and only one really didn' t turn out that well, which made it a very, very good day.

So this morning before I go to the studio, I thought I would share my discovery notes here.

1. Simply, simplicity rules.  Did a demo in Paynes' gray and burnt sienna of a ghostly moonlit lake. Graded wash on either side.  Later, I expanded it to a larger piece of just Payne's gray and the biggest (2 inch) flat brush I possess.  Wow, does that brush do good foliage!  Loaded with the gray, dark on the edges getting lighter in the center, and felt good about that.

2. A primary wash of yellow cad dried by blow dryer (I always was impatient!) really did a nice job of adding interest to the sky and brightening the piece.  Though I didn' t completely like the  picture (read Fail!) I liked the effect.

3. A mountain lake scene with wind and aspens turning. The original demo was in oil and the waves didn' t look quite right.  I consulted memory (I have been studying water for about five months now) and other pictures and made the shadow of the wave and enlongated triangle instead of the little u-shaped dip.  That was much better.  Also, my mountains and lake were too flat so used an exacto knife to create highlights and aspen tree trunks on the dry paper. That worked well.

4.Final demo an autumn scene with backlighting  from the sun.  Sky was yellow except where the sun peered through the trees where I left it white.  Not enough contrast in the pic as a whole, but the backlit effect worked well.

So, off to the studio.  I just hope I can remember all this.

After weddings..there is....ART!

Well, between weddings and guests and grownup children (bless you guys!), I have been absent from this blog for a good while.  Since my last posts I have completed (and had expensively framed since I don' t trust myself) a large New Mexico watercolor:  Mountains and sky, sky and Mountains.  Ah, home.

I am putting it above the fireplace.  The previous work over the fireplace was a Herd, which went to my son and his new wife as a wedding gift.  They have enshrined it  about their own fireplace, and it is a beauty.  While I was waiting for my own work to be framed, it smuggly gazed down on me as if to say, "Top this!"  which, of course, I can' t.  But never mind.  It is at its new home and my work, now magnificently framed, is ready to take its place.  And I don' t think it looks half bad.

Since that painting, I have framed another myself, and done a few sketches down in the Hill Country around Llano and Mason. And read a bit here and there.  My next painting trip is a week in NM, which I am looking forward to.  My husband will fish (of course) and I will paint (of course).

Still, the books with their demonstrations seem to be doing some good, and I am also acquiring skills as a drawer, even though I haven' t done a detailed drawing for its own sake in eons, until this morning.  I think I am finally getting so I can "see" and simplify.

The main thing is, through all the craziness, not to give up even when time and failure loom, but to go at it again later or start all over again.

For whatever it is worth.

Autumn Thoughts

I just returned from all my painting getaways of the summer--one to Montana which was somewhat successful and one to New Mexico which was better, largely because I am starting to get a better grip on watercolors for sketch and also some compositional things I have been reading about but need to be practiced.

1. First, paint sketches SMALL. I have been taking a big sheet (15x11) and ruling it into six smaller rectangle which does away with the problem of "what to put there" in that vast space.  For a beginner, it makes things easier to control because the space is easily filled and also lends itself to sketches of small things, like flowers much better.  And more control means less frustration.

2. I have found high quality half pans to be better than the tubes of paint which, when you are on the go and must move quickly, are more convenient and more easily transported since they are less messy.  There are problems with the little blocks: they can get dirty easier and it is a bit harder to get concentrated color.  But the contamination can be taken care of by paper towels and care and the color by using less water and layering colors.

3.Use much less water.  Water can be used to great affect, especially when trying to make a mist or a cloud in a hazy, for example, but should be used with care.  Having a paper towel handy to help with excess BEFORE putting brush to paper really helps with control.  Again, this also controls FRUSTRATION!

4.Don't necessarily use the colors that are in front of you.  Simplify the palette, intensify the shadows.  I was doing this solely  on value until my last trip, when I discovered the value of complimentary colors.  After all, when it is on the wall of my studio, no one is going to say, "But the colors of that sunset were gray and purple not orange and blue!"  It is a fallicy to be hemmed in by people who judge your work primarily on how well you copied what you saw.  Form is most important in illusion and contrast is what gives form.  Go for CONTRAST.

5. Remember that things in the back are smaller and less well defined than things in the front.

6. Make your focal points in sharply defined relief as well as highlighted by color. In other words, SHARPEN the focus of the points you want the eye to travel on. The rest can be fuzzy and not as detailed, but the best composition can be ruined by not showing the viewer what it is he is supposed to be looking at.

7. Finally, Simplify!!!! You really don' t need all those leaves on that tree to get the idea across.

I'd say that's a pretty good list for a summer.  If I am sharing this with anyone out there, may your days be filled with light, and your mind be lost in color!

Have Paint, Will Travel

I am leaving for an overdue and much looked forward to vacation in Montana soon which is going to give me the opportunity to see family and (secondarily, of course) do some plein aire sketching that I have been reluctant to do as the summer grinds into its hottest time and the grass (along with all else green) shrivels into a drab brown.

This means I need to take my paints with me (along with brushes, canvas, garbage bags, box for wet canvas, paint clothes, hat, sketch book, pencils, erasers, etc, etc.).  Needless to say, I either need a gigantic suitcase (which I have) or I need to scale back.This is always a difficult choice for me because this problem, especially of taking so much equipment would be much less if I took watercolors or acrylic. I have not ventured into watercolors that much, but when I have, I found them, at least for my beginning level, not as fast nor as free as oils.  They are thoughtful paints, where the placement of color must be more deliberate (at least that is what I am gathering) and planned.  Of course, it also plays to a strength of mine which is drawing.  I don' t seem to struggle as much with that, and of course, that could just be that there is an emphasis on values rather than color which simplifies my choices emmensely ( and I DO need to keep it simple!).

I found this website for watercolorists that might just be on my level, since I have no pretense that I am any good at this.  Most books glide over and make watercoloring complex;  in my experience, the books I have seen are more galleries of what I could do if I were experienced enough (which I am not)  I have found them frustrating.  This website, however, starts very simply, in a sort of kindergarten, A B C manner. 

http://www.watercolorpaintingandprojects.com/basics/basics.html

I don't  really know much about the person running the website and haven't ordered any of the projects, so can' t vouch for them.  But I am enjoying the simple explanations, and post it with the idea that it will help another struggling beginning watercolorist.

Ah Ha!

Well, after reading more and drawing and painting two more sketches on my "commission"  I realized that:

1. It is helpful to shut down the analytical brain functioning.  I did this by putting on  Gordon Lightfoot ballads which helped keep my "left brain function" busy so I was freer. I have tried classical music and contemplative music, but the effects were not as good.

2. A detailed charcoal sketch was helpful for me to grasp light and dark.  This works in the studio, but I am not sure it is a good move outside, where the light quickly changes (as well as the scene).

3. The sketch, quickly done, is not tight (I would say "uptight") and fussy but full of life.  There were defects, of course, but it was greatly improved.

4.  Practice makes perfect!  I suspect we watch PBS, then wonder why we can' t do what the artists do.  Well, they probably don' t do that either, but have years of visual memory and hours of prep time involved before taping (I can' t imagine going on nationwide TV without some prepartion!).  So people think it is magic, but it is nothing but lots of hard work. I plan to complete an hour's sketch each day, sort of like I practice my guitar.

All this greatly encouraged me yesterday. Nice to be painting again!

Finally Getting an Idea

I have been commissioned by my son and his fiance to do a painting of the tropics.  Ok, so that's no big deal.  But the fact that they asked was enough encouragement for me, and I have been working on the project with considerable care.

The paint will be one of their favorite places, an idyllic albeit generic Carribean beach.  I finally had a small painted sketch of what I wanted to do last week.  Since, I have been playing with different types of pigments and have decided, once again, to venture another underpainting and layer the paint until I have achieved the effect I want.  Part of that is that although the sketch I did was satisfactory, it lacked the luminence of the ocean there.  It is a tall order they have given me.  I have no idea if I will pull it off, but, armed with my new selection of transparent pigments, I am off tonight on another painting adventure.

I have a sign here at my desk which says. "Do one thing every day that scares you."  This scares me.

Hoping "Artist's Block" is over

Well, I am not sure what you call it, but I call it that.  No ideas; brush does the opposite of what I wanted, etc, etc.  This has been going on since I tried my first showing.  Since that showing was less than successful, I'd say that it is a miracle I didn't give up and go back to, say, writing, which is another dicey, block prone art.

But tonight, as I reworked a piece I started several days ago, it seemed to fall into place in a sort of surrealistic way that I am inevidably attracted to. There is something about impressionism and surrealism that I really can't shake.   This picture was made 1000 times (at least) better by the use of dark and light and a disregard for the middle values.  I say disregard, but the painting does have them;    it is almost impossible for them not to show up when the other two are in place.

I am hoping against hope that the use of strong contrast is the answer.  I have been sick of the mud I seemingly always made with paints that was glaringly absent from the charcoal drawings I have been doing. 
There may be other reasons why the charcoal seems  to be almost magical while with paints I am a slow plodder, but the contrast is definately one that is vital to a good picture.