NEW ATELIER ACRYLIC PAINTS!

Finally, the brush made it to my hand and into some glorious new paint! It's been nearly two months since I painted anything at all - long, long time for me, but a 'bug' kept me under the weather and not caring if I painted. Then a box of new paints arrived at the studio with some gorgeous colors made in Australia by Chroma, Inc.

This painting is the first of what will be many acrylic paintings on YUPO using these Atelier Interactive Professional Artists' Acrylics. The acrylics behave like regular acrylic, but can be blended MUCH easier, even after they get dry! They can be re moistened with ease.

This painting is a result of forty five minutes of experimenting to see what would happen. The paint can be applied thickly like oil or very thinly like watercolor washes. The dozen colors that I have are mostly transparent, so glazing added a luscious look to those colors. I can't wait to share these new paints with my classes and see what beautiful paintings they create.

Though this isn't a 'real' painting, (no planning, etc. just impulse and delight,) it was so much fun to play and experiment. There are several unique mediums from the order that I must try next with the paints. Check out their website at http://www.chromaonline.com/.

"THINKING OF OREGON" Atelier Interactive Acrylics on YUPO 22 x 16"

TEXTURES

Almost every artist I know absolutely loves TEXTURE! This class demo was done to show various ways to create watercolor textures in a rural landscape. It was the first of three barn paintings so watch for more.
"DRY FORK ROAD" Transparent Watercolor on 140#CP Arches 22x16"

DOUBLETREE

The landscape outside my Doubletree Hotel last month in Dallas included a 'doubletree' that looked a little like this, twisting and reaching towards more light. This was painted using my 'tape batik' method on YUPO, with fluid acrylics. Lots of fun, especially when so many of the women at the workshop helped 'peel' the tape layers off to reveal the textures of the finished painting. This TAPE BATIK method is one I've developed since the mid 90's as a result of a Watercolor Society of Indiana workshop I attended with Al Brouillette. He used tape randomly to save shapes and create new ones. My thought was, "Why can't I paint a whole painting using tape to create the shapes?" It's been challenging and exciting to develop this process, and I love the fascinating batik-like textures that result.

Check out the new SPLASH book to see Monique Wolfe's results from one of the first workshops I taught regarding this technique. She's an excellent and accomplished South Carolina artist who quickly grasped exactly how to do this.

The painting of the 'doubletree' was done in Dallas for the experimental YUPO workshop there. A new painting is drawn on YUPO and ready to paint.....gotta go.

"DOUBLETREE" Transparent Fluid Acrylics on medium weight YUPO 26 x 20" COLLECTED

CHRISTMAS 2009

My Mother-in-Law, who turned 90 in September, is a fantastic and diverse woman who has lived through many, many changes throughout her lifetime. She tells about her childhood Christmases and the memories of her dad always waiting until Christmas eve to cut down an evergreen. None of the kids would see the decorated tree until Christmas morning, and she recalls that each holiday the tree was tied to the ceiling fan so that the cats wouldn't knock it over!

This year our Daughter-in-Law is making a very special dinner for Grandma GeeGee (my Mother-in-Law) the day after Christmas when we'll all gather to celebrate. My husband has the car packed with gifts to take, but the best part will be being with the whole family.

This painting was done as a commission almost two decades ago and certainly has the sentimental overtones for this time of year. May your holidays be blessed with peace, joy, and love. See you after the new year.....

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

PERFECT DAY

Today's another perfect spring day.... no time to blog. This painting was created maybe ten years ago of a creek near us called Muddy Creek. The creek's small, and the painting's small and was quickly painted. Enjoy your world today and be creative!

"GLORIOUS DAY" Transparent Watercolor on 140# Arches 6 x 9" COLLECTED

A SECOND YEAR OF BLOGGING

This blog is already in its second year now, and I've posted many current works and lots of past paintings. This one is another oldie - painted in a more romanticized look than I normally paint.

Although the water wheel needs rounded out a bit, I do like how the water in the stream looks, and was pleased with the foliage in the picture, too. Painting sharp edged shapes with strong contrasts seems to be what I like to do a lot, as you can see here. This old mill is in Tennesee, and the painting is for sale.

"TRANQUILITY" Transparent Watercolor on 140#CP Arches, 30 x 22" COLLECTED

TRADITIONAL WATERCOLOR

Birch trees were always one of the most asked for trees during the twenty plus years that we owned our nursery business. Painting them is certainly easier than growing them.

This is another older work done for a class demo, this time without use of any reference photos. It's more romantic than I would choose to paint now, but I'm posting it today since it goes with what I see outside. If the grandkids were here, we would make at least one snowman.

The first real 'date' that my husband and I ever had was ice skating on Wildcat Creek in late December, and it looked a lot like this. That was a 'fer piece ago,' too, as my grandpa would've said. (We were a mere 15!) Keep warm.

"WINTER BLANKET" Transparent Watercolor on Arches 140# CP, 22 x 15"

LANDSCAPE COMPLETED

Doing a small --------- My Reference Photo
value study (on the left, done in graphite,) always helps me see how well the final painting will 'read.' There's no color used at all, just black, white, and grays. I can tell right away if my eye is going to move through the painting or not, and if the composition will hold together.

The value study also helps me spot compositonal goofs that could be hard to fix later. This value study took maybe 20 minutes to do, and I used it almost exclusively as my reference when painting. I only referred to my reference photo for final details. Check the previous post of the not-yet-finished Italian painting to compare it to the value study and my original photo, used mainly for inspiration as well as some reference.
"NORTHERN ITALY" completed, on Arches 140# CP 30 x 18.5" COLLECTED

LANDSCAPES

Today's class focused on how to best create a landscape in watercolor. The demo painting is getting close to completion. The lightest, biggest, furthest away shapes were painted first, followed by closer, light shapes, like the water areas. Darker values were added next - the cypress and dark foliage tree line. Details had to wait until medium sized shapes were finished. There's more to do but the basic areas are in. I'll include a value study and the original reference photo in the next post but wanted to get this on line for people who watched the demo today. PARTIALLY COMPLETED LANDSCAPE

After class, all four grandkids painted pumpkins with acrylics, then made prints of their palettes, which turned out very colorful too. However, one of the prints was placed near this painting, the fan was blowing ---- and surprise! I had vibrant magenta in the hills of Italy. I had to resort to opaque white gouache to hide the goof. Worse things could've happened, but it really did bend me out of shape for a while.....