The unadulterated chickadees

I decided to upload the chickadees that weren't tweeked in Photoshop.  Still not great, but it may be more pleasing to the eye.  The "real" colors are somewhere between this post and the last one.

Another experiment

I took a class on Saturday in which everyone was using the same reference to paint chickadees, so of course, I wanted to do something different.  I changed a photo of some chickadees and painted the birds in the style the instructor was teaching.  My little chickadees were HORRIBLE! 

When I get to that place that I give up on a painting, I figure, what the hell, and start "playing."  I pulled out the foam stamp we made in Myrna Wachnov's workshop, and imprinted my little chickadees with the block.  Interesting, yes.  But worth resurrecting, I don't think so.  Still, it was a fun way to "blot" out my mini-disaster.

I Photoshopped to sharpen the contrast, and tweeked the green a little, because my disaster IS greener than the photo turned out.  I know, not my best, but it was a fun!  Maybe I shouldn't have posted this one.  Oh well.

Azaleas

I took a photo of one of my clients' azalea bush the other morning, because it was just after a gentle rain, and the sun was shining, causing the raindrops to twinkle on the blossoms.  I love the photo as a photo, but I wanted to paint more the impression of the blossoms than a botanical image [frankly I haven't the patience to do much detail!].  I also wanted to practice with the lizard lick brush I bought for Myrna Wacknov's workshop in Portland [in April].  I haven't mastered the brush yet, but it was fun trying.  Back to the drawing board! 

Poppies live a short life but a bright one

I have a few wonderful random poppy plants in my garden, and love the virbrant reds and oranges when they bloom.  I rush to take photos of them, because the blooms fade and the petals fall so quickly.   Here's a photo "posterized" in Photoshop to help me see the larger value shapes.

After experiementing with some fluid acrylis on Tyvek, I created a dead dull mess of a poppy, so I just had to redeem myself a bit, and quickly did a couple of acrylic 8 x 10s to get my groove back.  The renderings aren't that great but the colors make me smile.

How time flies

It's been more than six weeks since I made an entry.  Although I'd rather be painting [!] I have been busy putting my house on the market, listing other properties, and teaching classes, all of which allow me to paint.

Aside from all of that, I "lost" my blog for a while as a result of email and connectivity issues, but am sort of back on track.  Hopefully, I can get back to making blog entries more regularly because, most of all, it will force me to paint more.

So, here is one of my most recent people paintings. Have been working different and unusual croppings and compositions in my classes, and liked the outcome of this one.

This is a little watercolor I did of Brian when Brian and Judy were sailing with me in the San Juans in 2008 ... on Brian's Birthday and Judy and his anniversary.  A toast to them both!

Below is another one I did of Brian in gouache for an earlier class. I obliterated a bad painting and painted over it with the gouache a la Alex Powers [inspired by lessons in his book, "Painting People in Watercolor"].

Workshop Two with Myna Wacknov

Coincidently the timing of the two workshops I attended this month was great in terms of visiting family and painting with terrific artists.  I was in Portland last week for the Oregon Society of Artists [OSA], who sponsored the three-day workshop with Myrna Wacknov [Myrna Wacknov's Blog], whose work has excited me for quite some time.  I have been following her blog, and have seen articles and images about her work in art magazines.  And, I met her at Kanuga where she was taking a workshop from another artist. Myrna is a fabulously creative artist and a lovely forthcoming person to boot.

She uses all sorts of methods, grounds, and styles to create mood, emotion and attraction to her uniqely painted images of people.  As she explained several of her design styles, she said that she "starts with the traditional, then 'plays around.'"  As I am, Myrna is a great believer in artists DRAWING, and not copying.  What's the point? 

The copying we did was a way in which she creates the image she might use, then draws it on tracing paper, and then transfers her DRAWING via a watercolor crayon, to "good" paper. The paper can be a good watercolor paper, or a piece of paper with either diluted matte medium, or gesso, or both, on it, which makes for a tricky start if one hasn't worked that way before!

Myrna also showed us several ways to interpret source material, including using pen, crayon and stamps, which I thoroughly enjoyed, but my favorite is the use of Tyvek "paper" for painting.  LOVE it!  The painting I did on Tyvek was of me, using a high contrast image [tweaked on Photoshop] with fluid acrylics!  Am not too sure of the outcome, but the process was fascinating!

Again, workshop paintings don't always work in terms of "frameable" paintings, but learning the processes are always worth the price of the ticket.    Can't wait to attend Myrna's five-day workshop at OSA in January!

The icing on the cake, literally and figuratively during my Portland visit was to spend the weekend with family to celebrate my granddaughter's sixth  birthday.  I am pretty confident she had a special full weekend with lots of loving and lots of gifts, and I know I had a great time watching her!

Am Back!

After two different workshops and two special visits with family [on both coasts], my batteries are recharged and I'm ready for lots of artmaking and sharing of wonderful lessons learned this past month. [Will post about Myrna Wacknov's workshop later today.]

The first workshop was for five days at the Kanuga Watercolors Workshops, in Hendersonville, North Carolina, where a dozen first class watermedia instructors hold classes in a "campus" setting. What a wealth of talent!

I chose to take Nicholas Simmon's workshop [Nicholas Simmons' Blog], which was watermedia and innovation on steroids. I have fallen in love with fluid acrylics, and learned several ways to work the medium.

I'll say right here, my caveat is that I don't believe any of my best work comes from workshops, but certainly the things I learn from them are life-altering, and truly add to my own art experience. So, I did two pieces in Nick's workshop that are not anything I might hang in a show, but I LOVED what I learned doing them.

For the first piece, we "threw" paint, then sketched a design, integrating some Asian characters loosely based on a few symbols Nicholas shared with us. We masked the characters and other bits of our designs, then poured some more paint. What a hoot! We finished those with a few details and then had the "Great Reveal," removing the masking from the characters to complete the pieces.

Nicholas was very generous in sharing his secrets and process. Lots of hair dryer use and lots of tipping and spraying. Lots of stories and kudos to other artists. I like that about Nicholas and most artists I have met or seen ... very generous with hints and tricks, and gracious about other artists' work.

One of the reasons I chose to take Nicholas' workshop is that he uses Photoshop as a tool in composing and manipulating his work. Although I have been using Photoshop Elements for years, I learned many other ways to use technology in my own art.

For the week at Kanuga, I was a "commuter," because I stayed with my sister, Jodie and her husband, Tom about five miles from the campus. It was the best of all worlds, as I was immersed in art each day, and had lovely visits with Jodie and Tom in the evenings at their lovely home. Jodie and I were able to catch up and paint together as well.

All in all, it was a terrific workshop, and I HOPE I can do it again next year! I have already chosen the instructor I would like to work with!