Jennifur

Her painting is done.

Jennifur - Part 3

Yup, we are skipping to part 3 on purpose.  I finished a painting of Jennifur last night, really, really, really did not like it, covered it up, and started again.

Here is the current work in progress.  I am still having some troubles with paint strokes.  They's been tight and fussy.  A few minutes before I stopped, I loosened up and just went for it.

While the painting has been challenging, I wish that I would have taken a picture of the drawing before I started painting.  I was pleased with it.

Jennifur - Part 1

Wednesday night, I purchased the Art Byte, Painting Fast, Loose, and Bold, by Patti Mollica.  It talked a lot about nailing value in your painting and provided some good examples.  Kat talked about this in painting class a lot.  Since all of this is new, it's helpful to read and see what different people say about the same concept.  It helps it sink into my brain better.  As part of planning her painting, this artist does a simple charcoal sketch of what she is planning to paint.  She makes this sketch with essentially 3 "colors", dark, medium, and light.

I think this will help me slow down to see and document the values better, so I'm giving it a try.  Here is Jennifur.  She came to my friends, with this name.  Yesterday, I did the outline and started with the shading and erasing.  With limited time yesterday, I didn't get far.

Although, I took my time on drawing the outline.  At this point, her face looks more like a lioness or a panther and I'm not sure why.  This is the reason that I need to keep working on my drawing skills and how to "see" things better!

Essentially this exercise is the same as one from my painting class.  At an early class, Kat had us smudge up paper with charcoal, so that you had a background with a medium value.  After that, we drew an apple by layering on additional charcoal for the dark areas and using an eraser to create the light areas.  This was back when I was trying to get my apples to have an apple-like posture and it really helped with getting the shape down.  It also, of course, helped with the value.

If I keep doing this, and I think that I should, I may need to buy different paper.  The stuff I have does not seem to "grab" the charcoal at all.  The stuff that Kat had us use worked much better.

Columbine

I love columbine flowers, the native kind, the hybrids all of them!  What was fun about this painting was learning how very little of a color you need to get a tinted white color.  It also still amazes me how using value creates shape and nuance.

I'm not as thrilled with the background or the background color.  Also, I wish that I could nail the colors better without having to redo them or having to redo them to get better coverage.  Sigh.

This is on an 8" by 8" black gesso panel.

Whiskers and Eye Lashes

I didn't like what I started to paint today, so I set it aside.  Tomorrow, I'll either finish it or paint it over with black gesso.  In the meantime, I took a scrap strip of paper and practiced a light paint stroke to use for either whiskers or eye lashes on a cat or dog.

Esther

I started this one yesterday, got about half done and had to quit.  I finished it this afternoon.  Today, the colors were mixing up strangely.  They were too wet.  After I was done, I figured out that the paper in the palette that I use (Mastersons Stay Wet Palette) had worn through, so that a lot of water was seeping up.  I can't complain. One piece paper from this kit has held up to daily painting since March 10th.  The kit comes with 5 pieces of paper, so it will be a long time before I have to buy more!

Cats come in so many different shapes, colors, and sizes.   This one has a very, very full and round face.  I used some of the black gesso at the very end, since her collar and the eye liner around her eyes needed better definition.  It's interesting how few little tweaks can help.

Timed Paintings

I would like to develop a fresher, looser style, as part of developing general painting skills.  In all aspects of life, I can get bogged down in the fussy and exact details.  

In painting class, we did an exercise with timed paintings, which helps.  You don't think so much. You do.  It's good practice.  The hubby, who knows about music, said to me, "so this is like practicing scales". Yup, it is.

Here is a series of timed paintings from 05/19 to today.  In the top row, I gave myself unlimited time to draw the pansy, but only 10 minutes to paint.  In the bottom row, I gave myself 15 minutes to draw and paint.  In both instances, the blue background was my second attempt.

These are on paper and each pansy takes up 2" x 2".  This was difficult to do with orange.  With any colors that use a lot of yellow, it takes more than one layer of paint.  Otherwise, things are too translucent.

It was a good exercise and it fit in well with being busy the last several days.  I'm not thrilled with the result, but that's not really the point of the exercise!

Daily Painting 05/15/16 to 05/18/16

Most days, I work on a painting, but don't finish one even though most paintings are only 6 inches square.  If I could speed up, I think it would help with having things look a little fresher and looser, but I'm not to that point.

Here are a couple of paintings that I finished in the last couple of days.  The water lilies were painted from a tracing.  This one is 8" x 8".  I'm going to keep working on water lilies.  I love them!  This painting looks best at medium distance.  Up close, the paint strokes with the flower don't look so hot. Far away, the individual leaves disappear a bit, so I think I could have used a tiny bit more of contrast/value in the greens.  When I make these comments, my aim is to be constructive to myself, rather than critical.  I'm mostly amazed that the things that I paint look mostly look like I intend!!

The pansy was drawn from this picture.  It was fun to draw something where you don't have to be as exact.  Even so, I divided the picture up into 4 equal parts on the vertical and horizontal axis.  I really need my lines.

It's the first time that I've tried a flower "close-up".  It's on 5" x 7" paper. 

Creativity and Me

My first steps into the creative world were through knitting.  I started in the late 1980's, when knitting was hitting a certain level of popularity.  It was nothing like today, however.  Today, there are so many more sources - - books, magazines, YouTube videos, retreats, websites of all shapes and sizes, and, of course Ravelry.

I was lucky to find Kristin Nicholas early in my knitting.  At the time, I did not know her, but I was familiar with her patterns from when she worked at Classic Elite Yarns.  She did a lot of designing and everything else for them back when she was the Creative Director.  I was drawn to the series of small booklet patterns that came out in the last 1980's and early 1990's. My favorite (as evidenced by the autograph) and most used (as evidenced by the tea stain) was and is Outlandishly Happy Gloves. The yarn used in these patterns was Tapestry by Classic Elite.  It was a heavenly worsted weight yarn in the most deliciously, yummy colors.

These patterns provided a template and it was up to the knitter to decide what motifs and colors to use.  There was nothing like this on the market at the time that I ever saw.  It gave me and other knitters the chance to explore creativity within a strict set of limitations.  Also, the projects were much smaller than knitting an entire sweater.  This has a direct parallel to the idea of daily painting with painting often and painting small.

Here is an early glove.  I loved this pair so much that the fingers were re-knit many times, until I lost one of the gloves.  As a side note regarding value in using of color, the pink and orange in the pinky are too close in value.  They sort of fade into each other.  This is another useful crossover from knitting to painting!

I've had the good fortune to meet Kristin and better yet to attend classes, twice at her farm.  She is a whirlwind of creativity.  The second class was in May 2015 and it was a class about fabric stamping. On the second day of class, I played with making a block print.  This required drawing.  I had brought pictures with me as inspiration for the fabric stamping and I decided to use one as the basis for a block print.  The problem was that I was scared to draw.  More accurately, I was absolutely petrified to make any type of mark on a piece of paper in the form of a drawing.  My fear was deep and primal. That day with Kristin's prodding, I did a test drawing on paper, did a follow-up drawing on a rubber block, carved out the block, and printed it.

The world did not end and I discovered that the eraser is my friend.  

I don't think that I would be drawing or painting today if it was not for Kristin's inspiration over the years and, specifically, the class that I attended last year.  Her blog continues to inspire me and she had a wonderful post last week that sparked this blog post.   

There are people, like Kristin or Kat (who taught the painting classes that I took this spring), who start drinking from the well of creativity early in their lives.  For the rest of the us, the well is out there and waiting.  Find a teacher.  Take a risk.  Try something new.    

Daily Painting

It was a busy weekend, so I did not blog.  Here are a pair of pear paintings on paper (could I fit in more words beginning with p?) from late last week.  Neither of them really floats my boat.  I need to work on setting up a better background and spending more time on that.  Also, the pears could use a more visual variety with their values, but especially with their color(s).   Oh well.  Paint and learn!

Also, a friend cut up a 4' by 8' piece of hard board for me.  Now I have lots of panels to paint on, in addition to paper.  I'm really pleased.  I can try out something on paper.  If it's something that I might want to keep the next time, I can use hard board.

Daily Painting - 05/11/16

I paint daily, but have not been posting everything.  Here is yesterday's painting.  It may not look like much, but this one felt really, really good, while I was painting it.

I had very little time, so I grabbed one of my favorite mugs, sketched it and painted it in about 30 minutes or so.  I looked, drew, and painted and did not get caught up in my brain.  Typically, I rework and paint over stuff a lot until I get something that I like.  This one has very few paint strokes, especially with the handle of the mug.  Again, it felt good.

Here's another painting from early May.  This has more rework than the mug.  Still, it looks less fussy to me.

Art 4 Shelter

Tonight is Art 4 Shelter, a fundraiser for Simpson Housing Services.  I painted several paintings for this event.  Submissions are on a 5 x 7 piece of paper.  Everything is sold for $30.  Until you purchase an item, you don't know who produced it.

My perfectionist tendencies when into overdrive for the first item that I painted.  It was a parrot from a picture that I took in Barcelona in 2014.  I painted it something like 4-5 times until I submitted a version of it.

After that I tried to just chill.  Someone will buy these or not.  It's only $30 per painting.  It's all good. 

I traced the water lilies.  

This is my first dog painting.  It does not look as much like the picture as I'd like, but I'm still pleased with this one. 

Last, I painted a couple of over-the-top cats.  After these, I got the cat-thing figured out a little better. Still I especially like the one with the blue background.  It has a sort of a day-of-the-dead feeling to it, or something. 

Second Painting Class

At the second painting class on 03/17/16, we did an exercise where you paint with one paint stroke per color.  You don't have to change the color much, but you did have to change it somehow.  It makes you think more both about mixing colors and also about each paint stroke.

Here is the first painting that I did that night.  I also did an apple that was documented earlier.

Here are a couple of other paintings that I did as "homework" after this class.

Another Cat

Here is my pretty cat, Ella.  Her ears are magnificent, both tall and beautiful.  Given the picture that I was working from, her ears would not completely fit in a square surface.

By the way, Ella's last name is Phant.

I Miss Painting Class

I missing having instruction and guidance in the form of a class.  I felt like I picked up so much from the instructor and from the other participants.  As a poor, poor substitute, here's one solution to a problem that I'm having.  There is so much to learn about and focus on.  Each week in class, there would be a couple of key points or ideas.

Here are some flash cards with a few key reminders.  Every few days, I will switch to looking at a different card when I paint.

Geeky, I know.

Fourth Painting Class and Lot and Lots of Cats

At our forth painting class, we brought pictures and painted from those.  I brought several and decided to try and paint one of my cats, Ella.  In retrospect, it seems silly, but I was terrified to try and paint a cat even though this is one of the creatures that I desperately want to learn how to capture!

Class was on 04/07/16.  Here's the finished result.  At the time, I was pleased with this and I will probably keep this one.  It is definitely a cat.  There is no way on 01/01/16 that I could have even tried to do this.

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Here she is in the next day's painting.

I switched over to a picture of Dorian.  Here is my first attempt on 04/10/16.  Poor thing.  She looks almost canine. 

I tried again a few days later after another painting class.  Kat helped me to better "see" how to capture a cat's nose and muzzle.

Here's the version that started the blog, which was painted on 04/25/16.

Here's yesterday's version.  I like the eyes a lot in this one.

As cringe-worthy as it can be to post some of my first attempts, it is enjoyable to watch things take shape!

Daily Painting - 05/07/16

I've still been painting each day.  Most days, I get started with a painting on one day and finish it the next.  This is one that I did tonight.  I really, really want to have a greater lightness and freshness, which hopefully will come in time as I gain practice and experience. This is the fourth time that I've painted from the same pictures and I do see improvement each time, so I'm not complaining.

I also know and adore this creature and I think that makes it harder to paint her.

Third Painting Class

At the third painting class, we did timed paintings.  We had 10 minutes to sketch and paint an apple. The time flies by.  You are trying to get shape and color in such a short period of time.  It was stressful, but fun.  We divided our painting surface (an 8" x 8" piece of hardboard) into 4 equal spaces and did 4 different timed paintings.  Each time, we changed the position of the apple.  The first one was in the upper left-hand corner and I went counter clockwise.

Here are two more sets of timed paintings that I did in the week following class.

This helps keep things fresh and loose.  This week, I think I should do a couple of timed paintings.   Maybe sketch a cat and give myself 30 minutes to complete a painting.  I've been getting really fussy and slow.

Seven Apple Paintings

After the first week of class, I went out and bought some produce, including an apple, an orange, a lemon, and a lime, so that I would have things to paint.  I painted the same apple 7 times before it all finally clicked.  

The first 3 times were before the second night of class.  These paintings are amusing.  The beginning ones look like an adolescent boy with really, really bad posture, who has been transformed into an apple.  He is having a bad day and is all slumped in on himself.  On a positive note, I finally was leaving some black gesso background showing through.  Prior to this, I was covering every bit of space with paint.  

At the second night of painting class, we did an exercise where you used one color per brush stroke. You don't have to change the color significantly.  This makes you think more about your brush strokes and also helps with mixing colors.  Yes, I did bring my apple to class.  Here is apple painting #4.

For homework after this class, I painted the same apple for the fifth and sixth time.  Both of these look more apple-like.

The seventh time was the charm.  I painted this on 03/20/16.  Fortunately, I painted it on hard board, rather than paper.  It's hanging in my kitchen and it makes me smile.  When I look at it, it reminds me of this first time that I was able to make the connection between seeing something and representing it in paint.  

1st Week of Homework

Since the first week of painting class, I've been trying to paint every day.  Here are some of my paintings after the first night of class.  It's hard wanting to have more skill than you possess. Whenever I completed a painting, the critical thoughts came very easily.  In particular if I was painting on heavy paper, I started making myself write one positive comment on the back of each painting.

For the orange, I wrote "like - the orange colors".  For the lime, I wrote "there are light, medium, and dark colors (i.e. values) and there is a shape to this one".