No "small" paintings

A few weeks ago I was invited to teach a watercolor workshop at a local high school. The students chose subjects for a painting from their "concentrations", a body of work related to their chosen concepts. The assignment was to find an interesting perspective for subject placement that would feature cast shadow shapes within the composition. Since watercolor by nature is a transparent medium, the paint works well to describe the transparency of shadows. We worked on Ampersand Aquabord, a textured clay surface that has many "forgiving" properties for beginning watercolor painters (most notably, the ability to life out and subtract paint and correct errors).
The class jumped right in without fear, worked hard, and created some amazing work.

Katie's man walking



Kayleigh's cleat

Jaclyn's cups

Victoria's self portrait

Vaisha's easel

Vitor's tire

Thank you all for welcoming me into your class, keeping open minds, and allowing me to share my love for painting and watercolor.

No Two Alike

Even if I tried...really, really hard, I could not do the same painting twice. Something is always different the second time. This I love when creating...a painting is after all, original to that moment; how the paints mix and dry, how the water is moving that day, how the brush is manipulated, the mood of the creator, etc. All the factors that work to pull it together, will never be exactly the same. Sometimes I like the first version better than the second, but liking the end product is much less important than enjoying the process of doing, developing an idea, and following the direction the painting takes along the way.

The Space Between

Watercolor on Aquabord

16X20

my chair study

Watercolor on Aquabord

6X8

a garlic a day

A Garlic A Day
11X14
pastel on ampersand pastelbord

Visual Summary

As an artist, one of my tasks in creating a painting is to simplify and translate the essence of a subject as I see it in that moment on any given day. During my pastel workshop this week, we had a discussion on "simplifying," and as one of my students aptly stated "creating a visual summary". The concept seems "simple" enough. However, beginning painters often become distracted with and jump right into painting the details, forgetting that value and form are the "batter and cake" in a painting; essential for it's foundation, success, and "readability".

So, a few tools and questions I use to know what "detail" to include in my visual summary: 1. Begin with a thumbnail sketch. Value sketches are useful in helping you simplify your design into only shape, value and form. 2. Squint your eyes and look at your image. The values in shape and form are the "cake", everything else just "frosting". 3. Which details (usually line or texture) are important to enhance the visual flow and underlying compositional structure? 4. Is the detail important to overall "readability" of the painting? If not, I leave it out. 5. Much of painting is illusion and "special effects". I will often hint at the detail (usually with texture, a few gesture lines, or direction of the pastel application) without actually drawing it in; the viewer's eyes will fill in the rest. For example: in my garlic painting, I use the line of shadow shapes to create movement and flow, visually directing the viewer through the painting ("readability"). The trapped areas of detail and texture (which are really, just less blended areas) at the buds of the garlic also direct (and pause) visual movement. My goal... to support the underlying armature (see previous posts).

One Garlic [breath] at a Time

As I work, I am continuing to balance the variety of "warm and cool" color along with considering value and color perspective as I define the forms and space: lighter values, intensity of color, and warmth appear forward; darker values and cool colors visually recede. I also enjoy the interplay of lost and found edges that contribute to the illusion of "real" and aid the viewer's eye to travel around the painting.

Healthy dose of reality...I mean realism.

I find creating "realism" in a painting helps ground and settle me in the present. Realism on a 2D surface is nothing but "special effects"... i.e. simply drawing with value and color perspective.
For this "breath of fresh - garlic", I have chosen a neutralized complimentary color scheme of "oranges" and "blues". Considering color harmony, I will keep my palette simple, choosing only a few colors within my color scheme that represent a variety in value (lights, darks, and midtones), softness, temperature (warm and cool colors) and chroma (intensity).

Form and value in painting are built by layering pastel of various hues and color temperature. Most often, I will work spatially, working an area as it occurs in space on the 2D plane. I begin with the most distant space and work towards the most forward space. That said, I continuously go back and make minor adjustments to previously worked areas to balance the colors and values throughout the painting. In general within these spaces, I work from dark to light and harder to softer pastel.

Studying the light as it falls on the subject, I first lay in the darker and "cooler" color followed by the warmer darks. I consider this the foundation darks, followed by the lighter, softer color "on top". By accurately portraying these values, form and depth are created (and thus the "special effects" of painting).

Art and Life

I am considering a number of titles that seem fitting for this painting: wild perseverance, solidarity, resolve, fortitude... Just as a subject for a painting is chosen from moments in my immediate world, so is the interpretation- of challenges, triumphs, struggles, and lessons- some stated, some silent. Art does not happen independent from life.
Did you know- a little sunflower trivia? Wild sunflower seeds are adapted for living and can remain viable for as long as 10 years. Sunflowers are also eager to cross species and form hybrids. A bee transferring pollen from one species of sunflower to another could be unwittingly creating a new hybrid by swapping genes. Forming these unions is how sunflowers can spread and thrive in extreme environments, like salt marshes and sand dunes. Ornamental and industrial breeders take advantage of this pliant attitude to create new colors, sizes, oil content and seed size. A domestic sunflower is also known to sometimes bend to make contact with its own pollen, where it self-pollinates.

"just stop the art"

Seriously, how does one go about "stopping the art"? Painting has been my addiction for the past 6 years or so. Though despite my addiction, I have been able to maintain a job, some healthy relationships and find joy in many other things. However, when I am not creating art, I am often thinking about art. The thinking about art has always been there ever since I can remember, only the "doing" began about 6 years ago. So, how now, after a daily commitment to creating, can I just stop...? The concept saddens me. Finding "balance" in life is such an illusive quest.
the poppy
(and dark places)
8X10
Watercolor on Aquabord

Rough Water

Rough Water
16X20
Pastel on Ampersand Pastelbord
I found this type of continuous field composition very difficult to organize into some structure. Which I guess is the point...why would I need to "organize" continual movement? My desire to classify everything into some visual order is a concept very hard for me to push aside when painting. And yet, I probably breathe the easiest, when seeing a subject too grand to classify: millions of leaves and dappled light in the forest, endless water in a seascape, thousands of wildflowers. In the presence of grandeur, the eyes rest and the spirit is quiet.

Open Water

Before moving to Virginia, I lived in southern California. Somehow, living near the beach, the water begins to draw you in. There, I discovered "open water" swimming. When surrounded by motion, the ocean feels alive, every drop moving with some unified purpose.
My intention at this early stage...simply to capture the perpetual movement of the water. My next challenge, organizing the movement.

Black Bear

We're Going on a Bear Hunt

We're going on a bear hunt,

We're gonna catch a big one,

What a beautiful day,

We're not scared.

Oh ,oh! Grass,

Long, wavy, grass.

We can't go over it,

We can't go under it,

We've gotta go throught it!

Swishy swashy, swishy swashy.

OH NO IT'S A BEAR!!!

Brown Bear

This week I am working on a commission for a couple of bear "portraits." Honestly, I don't really think of myself as a wildlife painter, but I just love doing them (and do many of them). Who doesn't love a cuddly teddy bear?

If you ever, ever, ever

meet a grizzly bear,

You must never, never, never

ask him where

He is going,

Or what he is doing;

For if you ever, ever dare

To stop a grizzly bear,

You will never

Meet another grizzly bear.
Mary Austin

The 10,000 People Project

Last October, just for fun, I joined a project hosted by the Art House Coop in Atlanta, Georgia. The concept... 10,000 people would receive a mystery word in the mail and then create a piece of art using that word as inspiration. I was intrigued by the idea, potential, and possibilities. Then I received the word...

"Afternoon Thugs" in Progress

"We fritter away our lives with detail...simplify, simplify." Henry David Thoreau

That statement describes my life well and is easy to recognize but difficult to do [in a painting].
Above, value is doing most of the work simplifying the forms and capturing the essence of the figures. Subtle contrasts create strong light allowing the light and shadow to describe the figures. I kept the palette simple, leaving color vague and earthy. I chose pigments that when mixed would make strong heavy darks, and alone would vary the temperature, transparency, intensity and texture of color in the shadows. Burnt Sienna, Brown Madder, Ultramarine Blue, Manganese Blue, Thalo Blue, Alizarin Crimson.

Two Portraits: Simplified and Unpolished

My intention this week... try something different, hopefully interesting, somewhat unconventional [for me], and non-floral. So I am beginning 2 "loose" study portraits [of my in-laws].
My challenge... simplify the figures as somewhat abstract shapes, use value and color to describe light and dark forms, vary the "lost and found" edges to give the illusion of depth and light, and connect shadow shapes to create unity.

My realization... the subject doesn't really matter, the principles are the same.

Kid's Art Safari at LibertyTown

A few things I learned teaching art camp this week.
1. It is impossible to be toooo silly.

2. 6 and 7 year olds love to smile and laugh.

3. Children have wonderful imaginations. Want to know all the possibilities of creating a map collage (and what to do with it)? Ask a 6 year old.

4. Plan plenty of "extension" activities. Art exploring can be very exciting.

5. It is physically impossible for 6, 7, & 8 year olds to sit still, not talk and giggle, draw silly faces, and not skip. Something like "exploding heads" may result.

One more for the show...

After contributing so much time to the poppies, I just couldn't let this one go. A few days ago, I pulled it off the shelf. With fresh eyes it was easier for me to see what small changes I needed to make and did. Funny how just a few touches can make such a difference in a painting (or maybe it was the fresh look). I am much happier with it now and am reminding myself... the process is more important than the product and I am always learning. Thank you all for your kind comments and encouragement.
Full Glory
22X30
Watercolor on Aquabord

New Work @ Bistro Bethem, Aug 10th- Oct 4th

The posters are up, cards mailed, most of the artwork done (except for a little varnishing, framing, and a few small details), and we have an article "Applause" on page 3 in Fredericksburg's Front Porch Magazine. Maybe I can catch my breath before the Opening August 10th.

"Light in Spring"

Light in Spring

Soft Pastel on Pastelbord

16X20

A light exists in spring

Not present on the year

At any other period.

When March is scarcely here

A color stands abroad

On solitary hills

That silence cannot overtake,

But human nature feels.

It waits upon the lawn;

It shows the furthest tree

Upon the furthest slope we know;

It almost speaks to me.

Then, as horizons step,

Or noons report away,

Without the formula of sound,

It passes, and we stay:

A quality of loss

Affecting our content,

As trade had suddenly encroached

Upon a sacrament.

Emily Dickinson

Settling In...Tulips

Toward the end of a painting (before I start the next one), I am the most unsettled in my life in art. For so long I suppressed the creative spark I felt since childhood. Life just happens and we become so focused on our daily responsibilities. I guess I still hold a little fear that a lag in creativity will stifle that energy. So I am usually about 2-3 (sometimes 5 or 8) paintings behind (at least in my mind). Though reason says I should really take a break after such a long stretch of painting, I am eager to begin and settle into the comfort of the next painting. A little fear of idleness pushes me on.