CHARLOTTE'S KITCHEN

Back to an oldie... painted many years ago and inspired by the intrigue of glass and reflections. Yesterday my camera was mistakenly left behind as I headed home from my week of grandchildren-sitting/spoiling, so there will be no new paintings on my blog this week. Or next week.

During the week of April 12th, look for updates of the workshop being held in Indianapolis, by the Watercolor Society of Indiana. By then my camera will be back, and the events of each day, including some of my demos, will be posted. We will be exploring the exquisite possibilities of creating paintings using masking tape and watercolor! There's still time to sign up - see the right hand side bar for details.

Check out the May 1st and 2nd YUPO with FLUID ACRYLICS Workshop to be held at my studio, also taught by me. Would love to see you there if you can join us! It will be full of color, texture, and great creative possibilities as we use the acrylics on YUPO.

Be back in two weeks. Until then, happy painting.

"CHARLOTTE'S KITCHEN" Transparent Watercolor on 140#CP Arches, 11 x 17" Collected

READY TO WRAP

Finally, my younger brother and sister-in-law's Christmas present is ready to wrap. What fun it's been to paint eleven bottles of wine in full color, actually twelve if you count the smidgen of one on the lower right. For that last whole bottle on the right, step by step detailed photos are posted below. What follows is an attempt to describe the process.

This first smaller photo shows the bottle with gray miskit preserving the whiter shapes/reflections on the bottle. The bottles seen to the right, with Kroger's prices below them, are my photo reference, with the middle bottle being the one to focus on for this drawing.

You can see a pale warm wash that was previously applied over the whole paper after the miskit was in place. Notice the pencil detail of the shapes, based on the light, medium, and dark value shapes of the surface of the bottle.


This photo shows the medium light to medium values painted in the appropriate shapes. Using lifting pigments like cobalts as well as earth pigments makes blending easier to do later. Cobalt Violet Deep along with Transparent Pyrrol Orange and Lunar Earth were the main colors for these light to medium value shapes.

The neck of the bottle shows the dark values just painted but not yet blended in. All the edges are crisp and sharp at this point and won't be softened or blended until the entire connected dark area is painted. Even if the paint dries, it'll be easy enough to blend colors that are this dark into those medium shapes that were previously painted.

This shows the pattern of darks from the neck of the bottle down to the label, still with mostly hard edges. Check the photo reference right next to the bottle to 'see' why shapes were painted as they are. Though the painting's not completely accurate, the shapes are close enough to work.

Colors used to create the darks include puddles of Quinacridone Burnt Orange, Transparent Pyrrol Orange, Quin Magenta, Indanthrone, and Ultramarine Turquoise, all from Daniel Smith in Seattle. The mixture is not just one puddle, but several that may be a bit bluer on one edge or more magenta on another edge. (Is bluer a word?)

I mix the colors together very little in the palette, preferring that most of the mixing happens as they meet on the paper surface. Also, my brush is not rinsed between colors to avoid lightening the puddles with water.

As soon as I took this photo, I could see in the small screen on my camera that the darks were way too light in many areas. At this point, most of the shapes have been blended, softened or left sharp, according to what's observed in the photo reference.

The miskit is still on the paper but will be removed soon to reveal whites and lights. This is when I often think the painting is lost. Nothing has any snap, and it looks pretty messy.

Although the wine bottle was brownish, I choose to use several colors to create that dark brown. Certainly one brown color could have been used and lightened and darkened as needed. But by using several colors mingled together, a bit more excitement is created in the painting than if the bottle had been only one brown.

More darks have been added now to help give the bottle a lot more dimension. Often it's the lack of strong darks that cause paintings with reflections to lack any luster. Observation of where those darks are located and just how dark they are compared to other shapes is critical, as is whether they have sharp, soft or lost edges.

It's been said that the most important tool that any artist can have is eyes to see. Being able to observe and notice shapes and values and edges makes painting glass and reflective surfaces a whole lot easier. It's almost like putting a puzzle together, piece by piece. Just making each specific shape have the correct value with the correct edges will get the job done for sure.

Finally the miskit's off. It's important to wait until you're sure that you won't have to paint in that area again, and of course, the paper must be completely dry before the miskit is removed. Miskit is about like using WhiteOut. It leaves a sharp, defined, non blended edge that must be dealt with.

For this painting, the miskit shapes were softened with a thirsty, but damp, flat brush, and color was lifted from those edges into part of the white shape. Care was taken to keep paint off of the center of the shapes. Adding even a little bit darker values to those whites would lessen the impact of the dimension of the bottle. A few spots needed to be even softer, so I used a stiff scrubber brush along with a drop of clean water to gently loosen or ''erase'' the paint where necessary. Blotting each spot with a white tissue took care of the excess water and loosened paint - see next photo.

Finished. After stepping away from the painting and seeing it reversed in my overhead mirror, I decided that the whites on this particular bottle were too white. A gentle swoosh of clean water over the whites took care of the starkness of those whites.

White is the first thing we see, especially on watercolor paper, so the whites need to be in important areas. These whites on this particular bottle were close to the edge of the paper and pulled the eye almost out of the picture. Until they were toned down with mostly clear water, they were strong enough to rob the focal area. The three thin, gentle curved lines were lifted with a thirsty flat brush, since I goofed and painted over them earlier.

Reflections are not hard to do - as long as you use your observation skills. This whole painting was painted with my favorite 1" flat brush, except for when I applied the miskit. Careful application of miskit is crucial so that the white shapes have fluid edges, not scratchy ones. I use a rigger 00 size and rinse it in Goof Off when I'm done. After the Goof Off dissolves the miskit, the brush is rinsed in Dawn Liquid Detergent then rinsed in hot water.

Now to get the gifts wrapped and ready to go........ The title of the painting is Kevin's Domain, and it's bigger than the last bottle painting - about 20 x 14", on 140# Arches cold pressed. I think he and Gail will love it!

REFLECTIONS ON BOTTLES

Painting reflections is a lot like doing a jigsaw puzzle. The picture finally comes together when all the pieces are in the right places. Each shape must be the correct value with the appropriate edges around it, and VIOLA! Reflections emerge.

This wine bottle is nearly complete and the next one is started. An overall wash of mostly warm colors was painted on wet paper after all the white shapes were miskited. My miskit is gray - Pebeo Drawing Gum, my favorite miskit because -
* it flows on easily
* it's visible once it's on the paper so I can see where I've already applied it
* the jar has a concave lid to pour a small quantity of miskit into so that the bottle can be closed up quickly, preventing it from going bad too soon
The next photo shows another wine bottle only partially done. Two Sundays ago before I had surgery, I was sneaking around our grocery store trying to get good pictures of wine bottles. I should've asked permission, I suppose, but 'Thank You, Krogers,' anyway.

Now for an afternoon of painting... and watching the wildlife on the deck...

BACK HOME AGAIN IN INDIANA

This 15 x 11" painting could have been painted much bigger and on YUPO. It was finished just before I had my left knee replaced two days ago. The next painting will be of wine bottles.

During my classes' Christmas parties, I usually paint demos for them as entertainment of sorts. Last week, Thursday night's class wanted to see how to paint glass, so this is what caught my eye to paint. The photo was taken a couple of summers ago at Lynne and Jamie's house on the lake and shows the wonderful shapes of their window reflections in several areas on the bottles.

Painting glass is really so very easy. It's all about the shapes and value changes on the surface of the glass container. Creating the right edge with the correct value on each shape on the glass will get you there every time. It's almost like paint by number. The hard part is to NOT paint the glass bottles, but to just paint the shapes on them, with the right edges, the right values. You never really paint the bottle, only the shapes on it. Hope that makes some kind of sense:-)

Update: Surgery went incredibly well, and we were back home 35 hours later. This morning while making my way over to the computer with coffee in hand, I dragged the walker with my other hand. I guess I need the walker in order to be safe... and I do keep using it, but I can amazingly walk without it already. The hard part is taking it slow and easy. This surgery/recovery is just incredible, and I'm so very thankful for God's blessing of not having any pain today and recovering this fast. Dr. Michael Swank is an awesome surgeon, who warned me repeatedly that this total knee replacement would not go as well as my the one in August 'cause my body wasn't really totally ready for another surgery. But it's going even better! Thank you so much, God, and thank you, Dr. Swank.

"KASEY'S CACHE" Transparent Watercolor on 140# Fabriano Artistico 15 x 11" COLLECTED

VACATION

Several years ago, three other watercolorists and I spent a week right on the ocean in Maine. Barb had rented a wonderful old cottage for us to enjoy near a very picturesque fishing village. The deck of the cottage was about 12 feet from the edge of the ocean, and we were in a wonderfully secluded cove. Paradise!

This was the view from where I sat painting each day. Watching the tide come in and go out, watching the continuous display of beautiful skies and sunrises, as well as seeing another part of the world never fails to inspire me to paint. The rocks or boulders were worn from eons of waves hitting them, and they were still enormous.

All my life people have told me to paint what I feel, express myself, say what I want to say. Great... except I never had ANY idea what I wanted to say. If I knew, I would've said it out loud.

In Maine that summer, I finally realized that painting lets me express what I want to say in the very best way that I can express it. Painting is my voice to help me know what I'm feeling and experiencing, and often, it's while I'm painting that I get in touch with feelings that I had no idea were there.

Anyone else like that? You have no idea what you want to convey or express until you've got it down with paint on paper. Then maybe you finally know what it was you wanted to 'say.' Probably if I knew ahead of time, I would just say it out loud and not paint it.

"VACATION" Transparent Watercolor on 140#CP Arches 11 x 7" COLLECTED

FIREWORKS

All day long, actually for the past week, we've been hearing the sounds of firecrackers and other fireworks being shot off to help celebrate our nation's 233rd birthday. Fireworks are really tricky to paint with watercolor, so here's my effort for celebrating - a rendition of a gentle evening at the lake with a beautiful red, white, and blue sunset, without fireworks.

This is a very small (for me) watercolor done as a demo many years ago in one of my intermediate classes. With the exception of painting the little duck in after it dried, this landscape took about ten minutes to create.

The focus was to let the water and paint do as much of the work as possible. Using the paint brush to deliver the paint to the paper, then getting out of the way, was the hardest part.

It used to be so like me to want to mess and play and touch up, and it was way too easy to overdo a good thing. But it's so true that watercolor does its best when it's allowed to flow and mingle on its own.

Happy Fourth of July, America!

"CELEBRATION" Transparent Watercolor on 140#CP Arches 11 x 7" COLLECTED

FINISHED YUPO

This was the first big painting I did many years ago on a full sheet of heavy weight YUPO - 40 inches long by 26 inches wide. All the weights of YUPO are the same exact surface and accept the paint the same, but since YUPO doesn't absorb water at all, no matter what the weight is, it never stretches or warps like regular cotton watercolor paper does when it's wet.

I prefer the heavy weight over the lighter YUPO just because it's easier to handle. The light weight YUPO is very flimsy, so if I move the painting at all while I'm working on it, I have little control over how easily the paper flops around. Medium weight YUPO is ok to work on, too, and recently I've used the fairly flimsy translucent YUPO. Because you can see through what's called Transparent YUPO, it's easy to trace a drawing through it onto the surface.

Did you know that if you erase on YUPO, the eraser makes an invisible mark that won't ever accept paint? Using watercolor pencils - Derwent brand is best - works well for drawing on YUPO because you can 'erase' mistakes with a moistened tissue.

These colorful 'boats' in Maine were so vibrant in all that marine wilderness, that I knew they'd become a painting on YUPO. Anything with dancing colors looks extremely good on YUPO, since the colors stay put, never fading on the paper. Often, on cotton watercolor paper, the colors look spectacular while they are wet, then once the paint dries, the color looses it's pop. (Can you tell I'm very partial to all the good qualities of painting on YUPO?)

Whatever we paint on, the most important thing we can do is to 'tell' others what's important to us, how we see the world in our own special way. The materials and techniques we use certainly affect how we express ourselves, but being an artist involves creating something that lets others see our own personal point of view. Otherwise, we're just decorating the canvas or paper with some nice colors, textures, and shapes.

One of these days, I'm going to order a whole roll of YUPO. Imagine how big those paintings will be!

"FRIENDSHIP COMPLETED" Transparent Watercolor on YUPO, 40 x 26"

YUPO AFLOAT

Pulled out of the archives, this painting was practice for a bigger one and painted while I had my reference photo in front of me. In early fall, eight of us from three different classes will be painting in beautiful Italy, and we'll be painting from real life, not photos.

Working outside on location has some strong advantages. The emotion of the moment, the inspiration, the smells, the breeze, the sun, the action, our reaction, all of it is there when you paint on location. Somehow it adds to the energy in the painting. We'll sure experience it this fall - can't wait!

"WAITING IN FRIENDSHIP" Transparent Watercolor on YUPO, 14 x 10"

PAINT ALONG

Several artists in my classes have expressed a desire to be able to paint along with me rather than create their own work, so this Wednesday night I'm starting a class that will help those artists feel more secure about painting. This harbour scene will be the first thing we paint together, and I know that even though everyone paints the same thing, we'll have a dozen different paintings when we're done.

Painting along with the instructor can be very beneficial to help an artist learn special techniques and skills. The danger in attending paint-along classes too long is that many people get very comfortable and satisfied creating successful painting copied from the teacher, then find it quite frustrating to paint when they try it on their own. As long as artists are learning new techniques and processes (not repeating them) it seems that the paint-along process can be justified.

When someone helps each step of the way, results can be almost guaranteed. Painting your own original masterpiece should be as easy - we wish! It's also a lot easier for me to teach a paint-along class, but the satisfaction factor is much higher for me as a teacher when I see artists have successful results while working on their own original works and inspriations. There's just a lot more frustration and struggle they have to wade through to get to that success.

Either way, teaching is a lot of fun, and I wouldn't change my 'job' for anything. It's amazing how much 'work' art can be and how much work that teaching art can be. But it never really seems like a real job, even though it's work!

FYI - I did screen out several people who wanted to take the class. They weren't allowed because they no longer need to copy a teacher to learn what they need to know, and I knew that this new class would actually hold them back as well as stifle their own creativity.

I'll let you know how Wednesday evenings work out.

"MAINE EVENING" Transparent Watercolor on 140# CP Arches 15x 11" COLLECTED

YUPO FLAG

Painted several years ago, this YUPO painting shows the patriotic leanings of a business owner in our town. Soon after 9/11, he had one of his semi cabs painted to resemble a waving flag, and it gets a lot of attention. After capturing the truck on film (in the days before I had a digital camera,) I knew I wanted to paint it.

Because watercolor on the plastic YUPO surface stays exceptionally bright, I was able to capture the intensity of the colors on my cropped version of the cab of the truck. I liked the abstract shapes within the realistic reflections. The painting now belongs to the truck owner:-)

"ALL STAR SALUTE" Transparent Watercolor on YUPO 26 x 20" SOLD --- Giglee' prints available

ICE STORM INSPIRATION

" THE BIG ICE STORM" on Arches 140# HP 18 x 30"

The reference photo on the right shows many more branches, etc. than in the painting. Artistic license is important to use so that the reference photo doesn't become the 'boss' of the painting.

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One of the classes wanted to know how to paint 'ice.' We had a really long lasting ice storm this past March. Every day for seven days I snapped photos, thinking I shouldn't take more... but each day was even more beautiful than the last. I couldn't resist.

Choosing a reference photo and cropping it using the Phimatrix program I'd purchased, I was inspired to teach the class how to paint ice. Of course, all we could paint were shapes, edges, values and colors. But they looked like ice when we were done:-)

The phimatrix system is a great tool to help an artist find the ideal focal point for a painting. The site's listed as one I visit often (on the right hand side of this blog.) Check it out at http://www.goldennumber.net/ It's good reading and awesome info for an artist. From that site, I'd purchased Gary Meisner's Phi Matrix program (inexpensive - $14.95 download and so easy to use!) which helped me find the ideal center of interest.

The upright branch divides the top of the painting into a 'phi' proportion, making the right hand side .618% of the whole width of the painting. Right at the bottom of that branch, where the redbud seed pod hangs down, is an ideal focal point. Putting sharp edges and strong contrast of value and color there helps to grab the viewer's attention. Hopefully you felt a 'brrrrrrr' when you looked at the painting.