March 19, 2013 March 19, 2013

I enjoyed working with the Caran d’Ache crayons so much that I decided to do an actual painting. I just bought four pears at the market and thought “perfect subject”.

One Pear

This Bartlett pear had beautiful color but an odd, squat, rounded shape…but color was the thing and the shape didn’t matter. I got the texture by using the crayons, spraying with a squirt bottle and then letting it dry with plastic wrap on top. I was learning how to control the process a little by the time I did my second little painting (added a Red Bartlett pear). Both are on Liquid watercolor paper and the square one is 5″ X 5″ and the rectangle is 5″ X 7″. This was fun and the Caran d’Ache colors just seem to bloom when sprayed with water becoming very vibrant.

Two Pears

 

 

 

 

 

March 13, 2013 March 14, 2013

I have started a new round of color stability testing. It includes a retest of the results that were questionable when I did my review this week. I also added 40 Caran d’Ache watercolor crayons that I bought after my Warren Taylor workshop. I really like working with them. They give a rich, creamy feel and look. Very soft and deep. I just added the new samples to the study that I had in process and intend to keep the both studies in bright sunlight. Now I wait….

Mew Color Stability Study started 03132013

March 8, 2013 March 8, 2013

Wow! January 24th to March 8th, something like six weeks, what happened Linda? To make a long story short; four tax returns, two large boxes of files to sort and make decisions about, and (so far) six feet of files to be shredded. And I’m still not done…

Two weeks OK I was so unfocused and brain fuzzy from sorting and shredding that I made myself get back to art. I started working on a second Indiana Autumn painting. Unfortunately (or fortunately?) I decided to paint on a surface I was unexperienced with using. I had purchased plate surface illustration board for the Cheng Khee Chee workshop and decided to give it a try. I understood that the surface was hard and slick and that the paint would not be absorbed so I worked on small sections and allowed the paint to dry thoroughly between painting sessions. My usual style of abstract painting allows me to work with a high degree of freedom and spontaneity. It allows my colors to merge and to play together and that is part of my inspiration. It took me two weeks of working on this painting to get finished and the painting has some good stuff and some bad.

Indiana Autumn

One of the things I struggled with while painting the Indiana Autumn paintings is that Indiana autumns are all red and gold – there is not a lot of diversity in the values you see. I was really unhappy with the darker sections at the bottom of the painting where I tried to introduce some deeper values. Anyway, I am currently thinking about cropping the painting to save some of the good parts and discard some of the bad. I am playing with cropping on iPhoto and here is one possibility.

Indiana Autumn – Cropped

I don’t know how much more time I will spend on this. I still have lots of files and shredding to deal with. And I want to get back to Barry’s lessons. I did make the improvements he suggested and I did start some compositional drawings before I got distracted by my administrative responsibilities. I guess that’s LIFE!

January 18, 2013 January 18, 2013

I have decided to spend more time trying to develop my ability to paint realistic watercolors. I won’t give up painting abstracts, which I love, but I feel remarkably clumsy when it comes to realistic work. Before my workshop with Cheng Khee Chee I did a drawing to take to the workshop. I did not use it because it was on 9″ X 12″ paper and was really too small for the processes we were using. This week I worked on this painting and the results are below.

Ruins 1 – 140# HP Arches – 9″X12″ Watercolor

 

This composition had a difficult challenge – the major movement is horizontal and vertical. I used the cypress in the background, the diagonals in clouds and the subtle diagonal placement of the red flowers to add interst.  I am not happy or unhappy with this painting. It is a good starting point for the year.

When Ken and I lived in Germany for six months we were in awe of the ancient ruins and the commitment to preserve history and heritage. It was evident in every country we visited. That was my inspiration. I tried to show the freshness of nature against the beauty of past civilizations (the work of man).

January 13, 2013 January 13, 2013

Another page of sketches from Gulf Shores. I was amazed at the color diversity I saw looking at Heather’s shell collection this year. I have never seen a green shell when collecting in the past. I also have never seen the fragile beauty of the tiny shell with the purplish stripes. The green, purple and pinkish/gray shells were all tiny, fragile things – obviously not drawn to scale. I was just trying to capture the general shape, color and direction of the stripes and blotches. I really mangled the purple stripes which were a delicate purple/magenta color much lighter than shown. Oh well – I was on vacation… I’m always too hard on myself. It’s our nature, isn’t it?

Just a quick note about the BP Oil spill. Workers were on the beach two days during our visit searching for and cleaning small blobs of oil from the beach. This activity ended while we were visiting Gulf Shores. I did not see any oil in evidence but my son-in-law saw two small blobs. The birds and fish and dolphins appear to have recovered but I thought you would find it interesting to know that BP continued to fund clean-up until January 2 or 3, 2013 and that it has now stopped. I hope the municipal areas continue to monitor the situation since this was such a massive environmental disaster. Again, I must be honest – I didn’t see any problem during my visit. Here are my shells:

Gulf Shores Shells

January 11, 2013 January 11, 2013

I took my three daughters and their familes to Gulf Shores for the holidays. Ken and I loved Gulf Shores. When I worked on my MBA, Ken would pick me up after my last final in December and we would start the 12 hour drive to the sandy beaches. Our anniversary is in mid-December so we used these vacations as a time to celebrate. The most interesting story I have from our time there was about the native’s reaction to snow. One December we were staying at the State Park in Gulf Shores (buildings destroyed but hurricane Ivan, I think) and they had their first snowfall in 15 years. The response to less than an inch of snow was very dramatic…schools closed, servers sent home, road crews responded…for someone from the snowy north pretty extreme stuff. I’m not making fun but we did enjoy the reaction – after we found somewhere to eat dinner!

My daughter, Heather, was the shell collector on this trip. She walked on the beach every morning looking for specimens that she did not already have. I have never found crabs on the beach before but she found three whole, unviolated specimens. The birds had not had time to peck them to pieces yet. I used one of her finds for this sheet of sketches. The page includes gestural, contour and colored pencil sketches. Very fun to do.

Sketches and colored pencil drawing – Gulf Shores

January 9, 2013 January 9, 2013

The last few weeks of 2013 were very rough for me and I didn’t seem to be able to create during that period. One thing I realized is that I do my best work when I am heavily invested in the subject…and the subject can be anything. I am an Indiana farm girl and one of my life long sources of enjoyment is the beauty of an Indiana autumn. I mentioned this earlier and the ATC’s I created for family in 2012 were all inspired by the glorious, glowing Indiana fall leaves and our juicy apples with their reds, golds, yellows and oranges. I also did one of my abstract paintings during late December. It was inspired by the joy I feel when walking through the woods on a Indiana fall day. Sunshine warming my back, breeze cooling my face,  colors delighting my eyes. I get a feeling of peace, calm and rightness with the world. I hope you feel the same.

Indiana Autumn 1 – Half sheet 300# Arches and Watercolor

October 23, 2012 October 23, 2012

We have storms blowing in and rain is pounding outside. Seems like a good time to show you the second little painting I did from a monoprint in Cheng Khee Chee’s workshop. I explained the technique in my last post. Here is the second monoprint I did. Both monoprint 1 & 2 are small – probably about 6″ X 9″.

Monoprint 2

With these colors and the textures and shapes in the middle, I could see a flower garden so that’s what I decided to develop. I did positive and negative painting and also used colored pencils. If you need to lighten an area the unsized paper will swallow watercolor but colored pencils will do the job. Here is my flower garden.

Monoprint 2 – Finished

I actually wanted to spend more time working on this but I had reached the point of diminishing returns. Probably back to my ATC’s. Enjoy some summer on this sodden Fall day!

October 21, 2012 October 21, 2012

Something a little bit different today… In the Cheng Khee Chee workshop he taught a technique that uses a monoprint as the basis for a painting. You paint thick, relatively undiluted watercolor on a shiny white masonite surface and then place a piece of japanese paper (he uses unsized Kozo paper) on top of it. You can lift it and if you don’t get enough transfer put it down again and spritz with water. You then mount the damp monoprint on a piece of masa and let it dry. Then you LOOK to see what you can find.

In this monoprint I thought I saw the sun peaking through a forest so that’s how I developed the  painting. Again I used watercolor and colored pencil. I did a rough outline on the paper before starting to paint but I wanted to be careful with the paper. I’m not sure how fragile it is. I did find out that the unsized paper is very absorbant. It was really fun to work with. Very different. Here’s the final product. At least final…for now!

Monoprint 1 – Finished

October 19, 2012 October 20, 2012

The maple leaves are falling fast and soon they will gone. So sad because this time of year is absolutely beautiful in Indiana.  I have finished two more maple leaf ATC’s. It has been fun to play with the compositions and to choose a new leaf for each piece. These are on watercolor paper and are a combination of both watercolor and colored pencil. Such fun! I will have to explore the neighborhood to see if the oaks have much color this year. Some years they have beautiful, rich greens and reds and purples but they don’t have the glow and fire of the maples. Enjoy this slice of an Indiana Fall.

Maple Leaf 4 – ATC

Maple Leaf 3 – ATC