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.