Woods Path again

I've made some tweaking sort of changes in this as I've looked at it over the last 24 hours or so. Comparing this to the last version I posted reminds me of those games where you're supposed to find six differences between version A and version B. So, can you?

Woods Path

Pastel today. It's fun to switch media every now and then and I've had the urge to do pastels for a while now. The dogs love running in the woods and I sometimes take my camera, especially when it's a beautiful, sunny day as it was on Sunday. This a composite of several photos, or it's out of my head, but it's not an identifiable place.

Creek and Railroad Bridge

Today we're having a low 80's, low humidity day, rare for the Philadelphia area. It's also the day 4 of us paint together. Cheryl, one of the other painters, and I took my dogs and hiked into the woods for about a mile to a Boy Scout-built bridge over a small creek. There we sat, feet dangling over the water, sketchbooks and travel palettes to hand. No need to carry water in when you're over a creek! While the dogs chased around, splashed in the water, shook over us, clumped across the bridge and generally had a ball, Cheryl and I drew and painted. Lovely.

I draw in my sketchbook with a brown, fine Sharpie. Then I use paint to wash in colors. Today I felt like I'd gotten a little too caught up in the textures of rocks, RR bridge, leaves, so after the first go, I did a couple of others, simplifying more drastically each time. On the third one, I didn't even try for realistic colors.

Poppies

I painted poppies today, composed from a couple of photos I've taken
of a friend's poppies.

I masked the poppies, stems and buds with masking tape and waxed paper, then spritzed the whole paper. Then I splashed drops of liquid watercolors here and there over the background, laid a piece of waxed paper over it all and used my hand to sort of smear/spread the drops around, turning the waxed paper a couple of times to move the texture around. I think I used a couple of colors of green, ultramarine blue and yellow, one at a time but not waiting for anything to dry between colors. The liquids and the waxed paper are a great way to get a textured background without painting it . . . and who could get that texture with a brush, anyway? I deliberately left the light diagonal across the top and left side.

After that mess had dried (hair dryers are great for impatient people like me), I took off the masking and used regular tube paints to paint the masked areas. The back, dark poppy suggested itself in the background so I let it be painted more red.

Tea for Two

The photo for this painting was taken in Scotland at a general store/tea room/post office in the glen of the River Lyon. We stopped here for something to eat on a Sunday after we'd driven the one-lane road over the mountain from the village where we were staying. I loved the open space on the mountain but it was drizzly and hard to get a photo that encompassed the openness of it.

The drawing for this took me half a morning, what with getting the perspective and all the different elements and shapes. Then so as not to get too lost in the drawing, I painted in the shadows first. I worked for a long time from a copy of the photo that had only 4 values. The color was added over the shadows. It's a good way for me to work, since I sometimes get so caught up in the colors that I lose track of the over all painting.

glazing paint over shapes

Today I tried something very specific, inspired by the work of Donald Holden shown in an article in the magazine "Watercolor" from American Artist which came the other day. I went through my digital photos of Maine and picked some that had big areas of dark and light. I printed several in grayscale and painted from them. The color is built up in glazes using only 2 colors: quinachridone gold in both; ultramarine blue as the second color in one and winsor violet in the other. They're both small, for me: 11" x 7". Comments and critiques invited.

Woods again

I've done a little more on this painting, mostly in the upper left. I could leave it at this point, or I could do some more if more suggests itself to me.

woods abstract work in process

I've been pulled toward doing more abstract work lately, although I'm never sure how to begin (or continue, for that matter). I thought about what I particularly like and woods and trees came to mind. I spent one afternoon at the computer, manipulating the values and colors of some of my photos taken in the woods in Photoshop and ended up printing several of my creations. This painting has been built on one of the photos which is collaged on my paper in the upper left, along with some pieces of another version in a couple of other places. I've gotten this far and now I'm not certain where to go next, so I'm going to live with the painting as it is until it (or someone) suggests the next step.

Flowers and more flowers!

I had a photograph of poppies taken at a friend's house and another friend brought some Japanese iris and peonies for our painting morning today. I first worked in my sketchbook (first picture) with a fine black pen and watercolors then moved to "proper" watercolor paper for the second painting. Now I like the first one better because the poppies in the second look almost like zinnias. In the sketchbook, I drew the poppies with the pen, then just kept adding stuff to make it more interesting. After lunch I did a peony not quite out with some of the irises. None of these was any attempt to paint the arrangement; I used the photo and flowers for reference only.

Another Iris

Our friend Dorothy brought even more irises over on Thursday, our painting day. I took a bunch of pictures of this peach one before she took it home again. This is the result, painted yesterday. It's hard to paint something this abstract. I draw enough outlines to (try to) find my way, then paint the colors and shapes within those outlines while I study my reference very closely. It's easy to get lost! As I paint, it doesn't look like much but a stroke of paint here and there. I have to get back from the painting---way back---to have it look like anything. I usually strive to paint the final color and value on the first stroke, but this time, because of the glow in the flower I painted glazes. That requires the patience to let one layer dry completely before I paint another, not often easy for me.

Irises

We had beautiful white iris in our studio today, courtesy of one of the painters. There were also some rhododendron blooms and some Japanese iris (I think they are called). I drew individual blooms. I painted the purple irises without drawing, first in my sketchbook and then on watercolor paper. I painted the white irises. Then I drew again. It was fun.

Scraping the Bottom

Boats accumulate all manner of stuff on the part of their hulls that are under water which has to be scraped off periodically. I caught the light on this man just right, I think.

Backyard Gardens II

The other day when I painted this scene, all I had with me for the line was a charcoal pencil. The whole painting seemed too cold for a scene from Tuscany, so I did it again. This time when I did the initial wash, I put a warm light over the building facades. Then I used a Conté pencil for the drawing. That didn't put in enough dark, so I got out a brown Sharpie pen for the very darks. I like this one a lot better although I like the way the buildings sort of float above the foliage in the first one.

Backyard Gardens

Another painting where I splashed paint on the paper then waited for it to dry before I did any more. We're back in Italy, folks, where I took a photo of backyard gardens. When the paint was dry, I drew in the buildings with a super-fine Sharpie pen. I couldn't get that quite dark enough, so I added charcoal and smeared it around in places. I hope it gives you the feel of sunlight on flowers and buildings.

Pears and Cherries

It's been a while since I've been inspired by subject material to paint and hence I haven't painted anything I was particularly pleased with. Today I went back to splashing paint on paper, then making something out of it when it had dried. When I don't know what else to paint, or when I'm trying out a new technique, I often paint pears. So that's what I did today in our painting studio.