Tag Archives: watercolor painting

Some Scary Selfies

1 Reply

Took an online workshop recently from Zoey Frank ~~ ‘self-portraits from observation’. It was weeks long – with almost 300 students (critiqued by five or six assistants). I didn’t get around to finishing the one self-portrait I started – just made a couple of smaller studies . . . before giving up in boredom at my composition.

  • 1st composition – too cutsie by half (or two-thirds). Oil on Arches Huile paper. 6″ x 8″.
  • 2d composition. oil on Arches Huile paper. 6″ x 8″.
  • Enlargement of 2d composition, 1st pass. Oil on linen panel. 16″ x 20″..
  • Documenting what I was ‘observing’ in 2d composition.
  • Second pass on the enlarged painting. Not sure if/when I’ll do more.composition, first pass. oil on linen panel. 16″x20″.

I’m now taking a watercolor class with Ed Praybe. He tasked us with doing THREE monochromatic self-portraits during one week – facing front & diagonally to each side. Under the short and specific deadline, I produced these three. Warning – it’s impossible to smile AND paint simultaneously, but . . . here they are anyway.

  • Looking/inclined left. Watercolor. 5″x7″.
  • Head on. Watercolor. 5″x7″.
  • Looking right. Watercolor. 5″x7″

Painting #10 – Cauliflower in Watercolor and Gouache

1 Reply

One of my collectors has bought three of the veggie watercolors I painted last year as a consequence of a workshop with Wendy Artin. And she wants a fourth so she can group them in her kitchen. What to do? A pretty cauliflower was in our fridge so this is how I spent my evening in front of the TV. . . .

I made a few mistakes since I was painting it direct — without a pencil sketch, as Wendy had taught. So I resorted to a bit of gouache so I wouldn’t have to start over!!

SaveSave

SaveSave

SaveSave

Teaching and Being Taught in Lafayette

8 Replies

Last week I taught a one day iPad art workshop to a number of local artists in Lafayette LA and then attended a three-day workshop in watercolor journaling held by Don Getz and organized by my sister Ceci. Another sister, Mercedes, participated in much of the fun, including the iPad session. Since I was so close to home, Ceci and I swung over to Biloxi afterward to visit our dad and his wife and more brothers and sisters.

As for making art while out-of-town, I didn’t paint while teaching. And it was so cold and windy during the plein air workshop that I didn’t do anything of note then either. In fact, after a couple of watercolor/ink drawings, I resorted to my iPad to get something — anything — down before my hands went numb. Though everything is unfinished, I’ll show you the state of play (along with a few photos of what we were memorializing) so you can get a flavor for the beauty of Cajun country. Teaser: we painted the St. John Cathedral Oak, the third largest live oak in the country.

Now Here’s One I Love!

4 Replies

My sweet hubby, busy reading the Saturday papers. A new ArtRage/iPad painting, done freehand, based on a reference photo I made of him some time ago. This one was done using only the watercolor tool, over a light pencil sketch on the bottom layer.

reading the Saturday Post

Pat, reading the Post on a Saturday, with coffee.

More iPad/ArtRage Art – Practicing with the Watercolor Brush

2 Replies

I feel much less comfortable using the ArtRage watercolor brush (and oil painting tools) than I do with chalk, pen, pencil & paint roller. So I’ve been trying to trudge up the learning curve in watercolor. Here are my two most recent efforts:

A flamenco dancer I photographed during our trip to Cuba last Spring:

Dancing in Havana

Dancing in Havana

And a scene from Glen Echo Park, based on a photograph I took a couple of years ago:

Cuddle Up at Glen Echo Park

Cuddle Up at Glen Echo Park during a Cloudy Sunset

Latest iPad/ArtRage Images

Leave a reply

Yesterday, my husband and I got a bit lost in the wilds of Virginia after taking my cousin to the airport. (We’re Marylanders — Virginia is terra incognito to us!) While we meandered toward home, I doodled an imaginary Fall landscape, using the ArtRage chalk tool to capture the beautiful colors we saw.

the colors of Fall in Virginia

Fall Fantasy

Here are some other doodles, made last week while trying to dip a toe into the watercolor tool. As you can tell, I’m not ‘swimming’ yet. Ick.

The Belly Dancer - Back View

The Belly Dancer – Back View

The pale pears

The pale pears

Black Caves, Serene Orchids, and a Cuban Gaudi-Wannabe

Leave a reply

Here’s a blitz through of some other interesting things between Vinales and our downtown Havana Hotel (the Parque Centrale):

— trekking and boating through tunnels underneath the magotes . . .

black cave surrounding small opening with blue sky & magote in distance

View from cave mouth toward a nearby magote.

— lovely orchids and landscapes at an orchid conservatory:

white and lavender orchids

Lovely orchids, not rare, as far as I know.

— and a riot of colorful mosaics, inspired by the Spanish artist Antoni Gaudi, and created by and under the supervision of Jose Fuster (often described as ‘the Picasso of the Caribbean’).

many statues and structures covered with colorful mosaics

Looking down into Fuster’s front yard.

If you want to see more of Fuster’s fanciful creations (now a cottage industry, as they bring so many tourists to his neighborhood), click here.

I made only one painting while sightseeing our way to central Havana. My knees couldn’t take the climb to the top of the orchid preserve, so I sat at the entrance and made this little watercolor of a rusting red wheelbarrow overhung by bright orange flowers.

Red wheelbarrow ‘color-coordinates’ with nearby hanging flowers.

My Gouache Geisha ~~ Cuban Gouache Backstory

1 Reply

As mentioned earlier, in Cuba we painted mostly with gouache for portability. In broad terms, gouache is a type of watercolor paint that makes heavy, strong opaque colors and whites, due to the use of ground chalk or other opaque filler with the color pigments.

I found it a challenge to handle. To gain some experience before the trip, I worked only in gouache at each Yellow Barn class for the semester preceding departure. My first challenge was to paint a lovely Japanese woman dressed as a geisha. Here are photos of her poses, as well as my two paintings.