Setting sun

Below is a painting of the sun setting over Lake Erie. The painting is based on a photograph of the marina in downtown Buffalo. The color in the sky is produced with multicolor washes. You start by drawing a line on the paper, making sure that the line is not exactly in the middle of the page (that would produce a static, hence boring, painting). Then you draw a half circle for the sun. You then wet the paper, making sure not to wet the half circle for the sun. Then you add color, which bleeds all over the place because you are using a technique called wet into wet. It is pretty cool. The best way to do this technique is to attach your watercolor paper to a board with making tape. That will minimize the curling of the paper.

A lone jogger at the marina in downtown Buffalo.

Birds... and a guitar player (he's singing to the birds)!

Here are some birds and one guitar player that I've painted lately.

A peacock who, apparently, has not yet spotted his lady love.

Only two swans a'swimming... the rest are in warmer waters...

An owl on a branch in late winter.

Spring will come... eventually...

Here is the great blue heron. We see them where ever there is water... they like wetlands and ponds and rivers... (and I like them!!!)

Here he is... the guitar player...

Back to Basics!

I just finished my last drawing for the Back to Basics online course, through the Strathmore Online studios. The instructor is Earnest Ward.  He is an artist and an adventurer and a storyteller and... in short, everything that I have tried to be... and am still working on being. He is also a very kind and attentive instructor, which I really appreciate. Earnest has a blog, too, which is a detailed and illustrated guide to how he creates his art. You can find it right here!

This workshop has been so much fun. For me, it was a review on how to measure and how to figure perspective. Picking the subject matter for my drawings was very enjoyable. But... those darn ellipses... they are still awfully challenging... and I am a work in progress... one of these days, I'll get them.

Here are the four pictures that I made for the workshop:

The first project was to make a line drawing. I liked the instructor's onion portrait so much that I decided to do one, too! By the way, I haven't eaten that onion yet. It just continues to grow while sitting on the kitchen table.

OK, so here is the infamous ellipse! Arrgh! Well... I'll just keep working at that. Anyway, the second project was to do the line drawing and then add shading to it. This gives the viewer the idea that the object is three dimensional. It is kind of an optical illusion that artists do. We draw or paint on a two dimensional surface and then, through shading and foreshortening and various other tricks, we give the illusion that the item is three dimensional.

I started off this drawing with graphite pencil and then added pen and ink. The cool thing is that I learned how to do stippling, which is the shading that you see here. It's all little dots. Oh my goodness! I really enjoyed making those little dots. It was delightfully mindless. It was so much fun that I actually stippled a little bit too much and had to get rid of the excess with white-out (white out and erasers are always my friends).

So this is the last one. It was done on toned paper (tan) and it is mixed media. It incorporates the following media: graphite pencil, charcoal, white chalk, colored pencil, and wax pastels.

Creating usable art: the tote bag project

I have been part of a Yahoo Groups crochet circle since about 1999. I'm not sure exactly when I joined the group but it was some time ago. It's a small group that has, as its list mom, a lady that we all call "Mommy Lois." It is a term of great affection because Mommy Lois brings so much love and care to a group of people who, without the internet, would be complete strangers to one another. In our group, we do exchanges, we chat about crochet, and we share details of our lives. We have really bonded, and I am grateful to Mommy Lois that she has created such a great group. We have actually become a family through our love of crafts.
So, anyway, we had an exchange with Valentine's Day as a theme. We could use any craft medium that we wanted. I was all excited about this and was determined to create something... but I didn't know what...
all I knew was that it would be a decorated tote bag...
I ordered a plain tote bag from Amazon...
and then I got an idea...
I drew a picture freehand on the cloth, with pencil...
then I embroidered. I had to embroider fast because the pencil marks were quickly fading!
It looked like this.

In effect, you are drawing with pencil and using your needle as a "paintbrush" and your thread as the "paint."

As I continue embroidering the picture, the images start to get color.  The thread that I use is embroidery floss. I use two strands of floss because... um... that's how my friend Ellen taught me to embroider!

 

Once the embroidery is completed, I have what I consider to be an outline. I also added some beads to make the design more three-dimensional.

 

Here is a closeup of the butterfly, with beads to make the wing stand out a little more.

 

I start the process of adding fabric paint to the tote bag. I choose bright colors to make the tote bag fun because it's a Valentine's Day project. In Ecuador, Valentine's Day is called "el dia del amor y amistad," which means the "day of love and friendship." Love and friendship is about happiness and fun!!!

Once I finish the first coat of paint, I add glitter paint to really add to the fun factor because there is little that I think is more fun than a good dose of glitter!

 

So, now, I need to think about the inside of the tote bag. What kind of fabric do I want to use as a liner? Well, I really enjoy butterflies... so I choose this cool fabric. Besides, the fact that it has a snail mail theme and the fact that the words are in French can only help. French is romantic!!! Unfortunately, I can't really remember much of my French. I'd love to be able to speak French!

 

I get the sewing machine out and I start making the lining. In the past, I did all of the sewing by hand and the process was interminable! I am grateful to have a sewing machine and even more grateful that I know how to use it, thanks to Jinni, who taught me how to use the sewing machine.

 

I added two pockets to the tote bag to make it more practical and useful because it is annoying when small objects get lost on the bottom of a large tote bag.

I also added Velcro to the tote bag so that it would close because having all your stuff spill out of a tote bag is no fun.

 

Here is one view of the completed tote bag.

 

Here is another view of the finished tote bag. Notice the little hearts in the corners. I noticed that I had a little bit of red paint in one spot. Since it was too difficult to simply remove the paint, I decided to cover it with a little heart but one little heart looked silly so I added a bunch of little heart... which made it look more like a Valentine.

Happy Valentines Day!

And happy creating!!!

A snowy winter

The weather outside is truly frightful. It doesn't look as if I will be painting outside anytime in the near future. So I continue to make my creations indoors. I've been crocheting, doing embroidery, and painting. In a future post, I will share with you the steps of a tote bag project that I recently completed. But that remains for another day, mainly because the tote bag is still in transit to its new home. I'd like the recipient of the bag to receive it before I post pictures (just in case she looks at this blog, I don't want to ruin the surprise!).  Needless to say, it was a very fun project.
The picture that I am posting today is a water color painting of a snowy scene. That one and the poinsettia painting may very well be my Christmas card design for next Christmas. I am planning on reproducing the cards fairly early so that I can take them to craft shows in the autumn to sell to people who might like to use these as Christmas cards or note cards.
So... Here is the painting!

A snowy night... somewhere... anywhere...

Poinsettias

On Thursday, December 19th, I went to Stella Niagara for watercolor painting class. The theme was poinsettias. So I painted these flowers and glazed the painting with golden glitter paint. Enjoy and Merry Christmas!!!

confused birds?

Well, it's winter and I'm not sure about what's going on with these birds. Why aren't they flying to some warm climate??? Oh well. Here's a watercolor painting.

sunflowers in september

On September 19th, I went back to Stella Niagara for a watercolor painting lesson. The topic of this lesson was painting sunflowers. I decided that I would just paint one flower after the next, and I came up with this design. I like having some of the flowers not fit onto the page because the paper isn't big enough to contain the wonderful nature of the flowers. So... here they are!!!

summertime at Beaver Island State Park

At the end of July, Terry Klaaren came to visit Grand Island. He offered anyone who was interested the chance to take an art class, with him as an instructor. I was happy enough to jump at the chance. Last year, Terry designed a mural, and I was able to help with the painting. That was great fun, so I figured that the painting class would be fun, too.
There were three students. We went to Beaver Island State Park and set up our chairs. Terry provided us with the canvas boards and with the paint and the paintbrushes. I have to admit that acrylic paints never used to be my favorite medium but Terry showed me how to use them to create a representation of the world that I saw around me. He showed me how to blend the colors to get a background that looked distant, yet real.
I finished the underpainting when I was at Beaver Island State Park. Fortunately, I had taken a photograph of the scene so I was able to paint in the details later, at home. Above is the finished painting, which I had framed. 

Mandalas

The word mandala is Sanskrit and it has something to do with circles. Mandalas are made by different cultures to convey messages. Some are designed to be impermanent. They are made with colored sand and, eventually, swept away. That is to give a visual reminder that all things on this earth are impermanent and that they will eventually be swept away.
Other mandalas are meant to last longer. It will take more time for them to be swept away into the mists of time.
Mandalas are ways for people to share visually what is in their hearts at the moment of their making. They can be realistic or whimsical or abstract. There is no right or wrong when it comes to creating a mandala.
Today, I painted a mandala. I was thinking about the earth because it is spring. On the 13th of this month, I planted trees and I was happy to dig into the earth and to place a tree into it so that, eventually, it could give shade to someone. I don't think a whole lot about the future normally but, when I'm planting trees, I think about people in the future enjoying all of that nice shade. I was thinking about bird songs and leaves and sunlight and soil and worms and all of that stuff.
I was thinking about circles and shapes... and painting the negative shapes instead of the images... so I did... and here it is...

My brown earth full of bubbles of life... my mandala

Cherry blossom time in Washington, D.C.

My trip to Washington, D.C., couldn't have come at a better time. I had planned the trip a few months ago and the purpose was to go to the School of the Americas Watch Days of Action (take a look at School of the Americas Watch website).

A few weeks ago, my sister Vivian pointed out that I would be able to see the cherry blossoms! And she was right. During my week in Washington, D.C., I went to the Tidal Basin four times! And not only did I see the cherry blossoms, I had the good fortune of having a painting partner, a professional artist named Deb Van Poolen. Take a look at her website!

Anyway, Deb and I listened to delightful music and we painted. The weather was warm and sunny. Um. It actually got to be a little bit too warm. Is there such a thing as "too warm"? Yeah, well, it was hot. It hit 90 degrees twice when I was in Washington, D.C. I was not prepared for the toasty weather. And the tree pollen was flying around. Oh boy, did I sneeze! And my eyes were itchy! But what the heck! I'd rather sneeze than freeze!!! Hahaha!

Back to the Tidal Basin. The music was great. I especially liked the trombone section from the symphony orchestra. Trombones are awesome. But what I loved the most was a flamenco band and dancers. That was music to inspire creativity. And then, my "feverish imagination" (my teacher in journalism school said that I have a feverish imagination; I didn't have the... um... imagination to come up with that) kicked in. I fell madly in love with the guitarist. Maybe with the music. Or maybe with the guitarist. Oh!!! Spanish classical guitar and art!!! What could be better than that.

We had two painting sessions at the Tidal Basin. I painted three pictures in my (handy dandy) visual journal. Here they are:

I made this painting on Saturday, April 6th. At this point, the trees had not yet reached their peak. Many of the flowers were still closed. I liked the combination of open and closed flowers. The open ones represented the beauty of the season, and the closed ones indicated the promise of beauty yet to come.

I included my hand and the sprig of flowers in this painting. It felt good to embrace the new life of spring like this.

I made this painting on Thursday, April 11th.It was my last full day in the city. The blossoms had peaked just a few days earlier, and they were still gorgeous. This one is a mixed media painting. I used watercolor paint, markers, and acrylic paint to create the scene.

March Madness

I've learned a lot in Robert Joyner's workshop about painting expressively and freely. I'm learning how to interpret what I see to create a painting that feels alive. It has been a challenge, for which I am very grateful. It's good to learn new things. I am so eager to learn, and this workshop, run by Strathmore Online Workshops, has been a great opportunity for me. 

This is the benefit of technology. An artist can make videos and demonstrate techniques, and any number of students can learn those techniques... in their own homes.

So... this is the painting that I made after the fourth and last of Robert Joyner's videos. It is mixed media on illustration board. The media that I used were acrylic paint, artist crayon, and acrylic ink. The title of the painting is March Madness.

The goal of the painting was to show movement. I was inspired by a picture in the sports section of the newspaper.

Experimenting with paper and paint

The paper that you use for painting can be your nemesis or your friend. Nemesis paper curls up. It stays wet for what seems like forever. It rips when you try to scrub renegade color away. It is just evil, rotten paper. You probably bought it from the bargain table at a dollar store. OK. I don't know if dollar stores have bargain tables. The whole store is supposed to be a bargain.
But you get the idea. Nemesis paper is just ick.
Well... there are many different kinds of paper for drawing and painting. Some paper has a lot of texture and that is very desirable for water color but less desirable for pen and ink drawing. Some paper is very smooth. That is desirable for pen and ink drawing but irritating for water color. There's mixed media paper, which I like to use for acrylic paintings.
One of the chief distinctions between papers concerns texture. There are three types: hot press, cold press, and rough. Often, cold press paper is preferred for water color paints because it has texture. Hot press paper is very smooth. If you use too much water, the paper won't absorb it. It will just sit there on top of the paper, being annoying and causing your colors to run together and become muddy. And, not only that, the paper will curl up. Curly is nice if it's your hair but, if it's your paper, it is one big Yuck! The third type is rough. It is even more texture than cold press paper so it is fun to paint on, especially if you want to have a kind of impressionistic effect. If you like photo realism, you might not be as fond of this.
Another characteristic of paper is the weight of the paper. The usual weight for water color paper is 140 pounds. That will provide you with a nice sheet of paper for painting. But, if you're lucky, you can use a 300-pound type of paper. The heavier paper is thick like a board. Don't worry. A piece of paper won't actually weigh 140 or 300 pounds.
So here are three paintings, on different types of paper:

This painting was done on hot press paper. The paper is very smooth. Notice the streaky likes in the purple mountain. That is very typical of hot press paper. Also notice how the paper buckled and is somewhat curly. 

This painting was done on a 140 pound paper with a rough texture. The colors blend more readily with the the rough texture than the smooth texture.  I kept to a limited palette with this, focusing on warm colors.

For this painting, I used a 300 pound board. The was a great surface on which to paint. I needed to add lots of water because the paper was thirsty, as it was with the rough textured paper.

By Jove, I think that I've got it... almost!!!

Last time that I posted my efforts at abstraction, I was completely frustrated. Fortunately, that feeling is past. Robert Joyner is a great instruction. He said one sentence that changed everything for me. It was:
"It doesn't have to be perfect."
Not perfect. That was so liberating!!! I felt free to paint and create, knowing that it was not necessary for me to make the next masterpiece. In fact, if I preferred, I could make the next Mess-terpiece. What could be better than that? 
Here they are. My happy messterpieces. Enjoy!!!

This was actually my second effort. The sea looks a little stormy in this one.

This was my first effort. Boats floating in the water... no people!!

  One more video to watch. One more lesson to do. I'm looking forward to it. This has been a good adventure!
More later!

Bugs and white flowers

In my painting class at Stella Niagara, I learned a technique for painting white flowers in water color. It is to paint a darker background and then to add a little color to the white flower. The white flower would look flat if it were entirely white. When you add just a touch of color, the flower looks more realistic, all the while preserving the illusion of whiteness.

I first drew a scene that incorporated white flowers, leaves, branches, and insects. It's a spring scene that doesn't exist yet in March. In reality, this is what we have. We have flowers! But no leaves! That doesn't come until much later! I was out delivering Pennysavers and I took these pictures.

snow drops grow through the snow!!!

The first color of the season

It's great to see color again.

Here's my painting:

Here are the white flowers and some happy insect life.

Abstract is not me yet but food is...

The second assignment in Robert Joyner's workshop was to paint something very familiar in an abstract background. I watched the video two times. Robert Joyner painted the background in large strokes. Then he let it dry and, once dry, he drew loosely with a paintbrush! After drawing loosely, he demonstrated how to finish the painting with mixed media to give the illusion of the object, without adding lots of details in the hopes of reproducing the object on paper. His object was a ketchup bottle.

All right. So I will admit that I don't love condiments. The bottle was beautiful and it looked like a bottle without looking like a photograph, and the background was wonderfully abstract. It was a marvel. And he painted it so fast!

Could I actually do this? Draw with a big paintbrush? No pencils? No erasers? Arrrgh!

Well... I am certainly ready to try anything. I painted huge brush strokes... and then got to work on the bottle of my choice.

I don't like condiments, but I love salad! Really, really love salad.

Here's my bottle. So loose and free. I'm not sure if I'm bonding with this style yet but it's fun to play with paints and ink and charcoal.

Exploring new styles, making myself hungry...

Exploring abstraction

When I started this blog, I was doing an on-line art class through Strathmore Online Workshops. The workshops are free, although the purchase of Strathmore papers is greatly encouraged. They produce some good artist papers and visual journals, so that is not a bad thing. Strathmore offers three workshops per year. Each workshop lasts for a month and includes four instructional videos. The topic and medium for the workshops is determined by the instructor.

This month, the first of these workshops has started. It is called "Abstract Fine Art Painting with Mixed Media," and the instructor's name is Robert Joyner. He is a professional artist now, but he used to be a ballroom dance instructor. He likes painting roosters. I've never thought of painting roosters but, when I spent some time learning Spanish in Guatemala, I was regularly awakened by roosters. I didn't think of painting their portraits because I was so annoyed by the wake up call. I was wickedly thinking of turning them into soup. But I digress. And how. I went from abstract painting to ballroom dancing to soup...

Anyway, I watched the first video twice. I was clueless the first time. Abstract is not my specialty. But today was the day. Time to paint. I got out my collection of media and played with paint. My goal was just to have fun. So I drew a picture of my right hand (I usually draw the left but I wanted variety in my painting life). Yes, I drew it with my left hand and, no, I'm not left handed... nor am I right handed... just somewhere in the middle.

Here goes... the hand!!!

Can you tell that I am eager for the start of gardening season? I'm grabbing hold of all of those leaves!

Fun little gifts

Today's painting adventure at Stella Niagara was combined with some fun for Valentine's Day. Painting and chocolate and yummy desserts!!! What could be better than that? It was a great day to celebrate art and friendship and sweetness and the color red.

Celebrating the color red and sweetness

The project for the day involved brooches and card sized paper. We could pick one or two brooches and then create a small scene in which the brooch could be pinned right onto the painting.

For my first painting, I chose a brooch that was in the shape of a cup cake. Since it occupied a fairly large portion of the paper, I decided to go a little less realistic with my picture. I turned it into a still life, with a stuffed bear and a Mardi Gras mask. Here is the card, with the brooch:

A Valentine in watercolor and marker

For my second card, I choose a brooch that was a little bottle of champagne. I decided to put the bottle on a shelf with other wine bottles. But then I thought a shelf with wine bottles might be kind of boring. So I added something that you might not expect to see on a shelf of wine bottles. Take a look!

Meow! Um. I mean. Shall I knock these bottles off the shelf, one by one?

These little painting are now on display for the next two weeks at Stella Niagara.
Happy Valentine's Day to you!

The Bear's Tea Party

Now that it's winter, even bears prefer to have their tea parties indoors. So this bear, oddly enough a vivid shade of orange, was ready for a tea party. But first, she had to pose for her portrait. So here she is, with tea pot and tea cup and a nice rug on which she could sit (she doesn't really like chairs).

The Bear's Tea Party, painted at Stella Niagara. In the Stella Niagara cafeteria, there is a lovely collection of tea pots and little tea sets that kids like to use for their tea parties

Modern Art Afghan 2 (reuse, recycle, reinvent)

After I finished my first "modern art afghan," using all scrap yarn, I decided that I had enough left over yarn from previous projects and from donations to make a second "modern art afghan." I discovered, too, that I had a large amount of green yarn, so I decided to use the green as the background color.
For this project, as for the last project, I chose to use a pattern for the squares that had been designed as a group activity in an email group dedicated to crochet. I've been part of this email group for about thirteen years. Even though I've never met any of the other group members in person, I feel that they have become friends. They live in a variety of states in the United States and there are a few Canadians, too. This is the "up-side" of technology... getting to "meet" people with whom you share common interests. Another "up-side" is that my crochet skills have improved dramatically since I got involved with this group. I learned how to read patterns and to crochet with thread and to create designs.
So here are a few views of the modern art afghan:

Here is a view of the corner of the afghan, which includes the border and some of the squares. No two squares are alike.

This is the entire afghan. I added each square as I made them, without regard for arranging them in any particular order, so as to get a sense of randomness in design.

Here is another view. Some of the squares are designed to be dramatic, while others are designed with more of an earth tone feeling.

Here is another view of the entire afghan. This one is a little closer than the first view that I shared.

Each square tells its own little story. Some of the colors pop out from the green background, while others just blend in.