Finn Having Fun

 

Finn Having Fun 1 
8" x 8"watercolor 

There's nothing like watching a dog who loves to romp in the snow, unless it's painting a dog romping in the snow. During my recent stay in Iowa, I was so lucky to have several walks with this pooch and my good friend, Kelly.

Finn Having Fun 2
8" x 8" watercolor

Another Painting with the Help of Shari

 

Victorian Vignette 3
8" x 12" watercolor on 100% cold press paper

Another painting done with the help of Shari Blaukopf's third demo in her Victorian Vignette online watercolor painting class. She's such a great teacher, and I do learn from following her methods, even if the final results are not my own compositions. 

Breakthrough

 

Victorian Vignette #2 ala Shari Blaukopf
watercolor and pencil
8" x *8 cold press watercolor paper

I love that I feel on a roll with w/c painting. Who knows how long it'll last, but it's a great artist's high in the meanwhile. 

This painting I produced with the help of Canadian watercolor artist Shari Blaukopf's course called "Victorian Vignettes." It doesn't feel a "real" painting of my own since it's a copy I made from watching Shari's demos. Still, I learned so much with this one--primarily the importance of making the initial washes very light and watery. As we all know, I have a tendency to overwork my paintings and (whoops!) lose the transparency. 

I also grasped the importance of saving the darker, more saturated colors for just the final touches/details. See below for my painting before those dark layers. What a difference, eh? As Shari herself said, her own paintings look flat before she adds those final touches. This one did to me, too.

Really, who knew this learning process could be so dang much fun? 

Now. The trick, of course, is being able to apply this kind of learning to one's own compositions. As you can see below, the learning didn't quite translate with this painting of my sister's gazebo in the snow. But hopefully something's getting through to my muscle memory. One of these days, surely I'll feel like I can fly as a watercolorist.

Right? 

The Scales Fell Away...

"Snow"
8" x 12" watercolor on cold press paper

Yes, the scales fell away from my eyes...briefly...as I worked through Shari Blaukopf's online course called "Sketching Winter."

I painted her demos, and then I painted from one of her "extra" reference photos of a woodland near Montreal. I felt good about coming up with this without following a demo. The scene looks very much like a Midwestern woodland. And it happens that I'm spending a few weeks in Iowa, where we recently received a beautiful layer of snow. 

I've gone on to other snow paintings while here, and nothing has worked as well, but at least the scales fell away temporarily with this painting. 

That's the life of a painter-in-development. 

 

Another Crab Cove Tree

 

Cypress at Crab Cove
9" x 12" ink and watercolor
Arches 100% hot press paper

Not in love with this painting, but I am in love with this cypress tree that I walk by every day, sometimes twice. I much prefer my last tree painting of the coastal live oak, which has a kind of pleasing random regularity to the ink calligraphy. I didn't hit that calligraphic rhythm with this one. But what I do like about this one is the way the sunlight falls on the rocks/ground in the center. That part is even better in person, I have to say. 

Crab Cove: The Gift That Keeps on Giving

 

Crab Cove
9" x 12" ink and watercolor
Arches 100% hot press

I've done this one before, but thought I would revisit it while in a Sailor pen inking mood. I swear I'll be trying to represent trees for the rest of my life without really know what I'm doing. But I like this tree, I have to say. And I like what happened to the colors in the background. Because hot press paper is smooth, the paint can sit on top of it, puddling and blending (or not) in surprising ways.

And how very lucky I am that this tree (pretty sure it's a coastal live oak) and the SF Bay are in my backyard. This is my everyday view when I take my walks, and it's just a block from my home. 

Speaking of which, time for the afternoon perambulation. 

Once More to Big Sur

Big Sur, Again
9" x 12" watercolor and ink
Arches 100% hot press paper

I have no idea why I'm stuck on this composition of a Big Sur scene. But it felt good to get out the Sailor pen with the calligraphic nib and ink in some lines. I hoped that they would serve as a grounding structure so that I could be more sloppy with the watercolor washes. They did and I was. 

But the ink feels like training wheels, in a way, and casts the piece into more of an illustration than a watercolor painting. (Nothing against illustration, mind you--there are some wonderful illustrations out there. I just don't intentionally think of myself as an illustrator.) 

Or it makes me wonder if I need to tackle a new learning curve in printmaking, since, lines tend to figure more prominently in prints--though not always. But again, there's so much to learn with watercolor painting that I'm not sure I want to embrace a new medium just yet.

Still trying to find my way. But definitely having fun in the process.