First Oil Painting

I decided today to clean up my studio/office because my mother is coming in a couple of weeks and I don't want her to see the mess. I ran across some old paintings of mine and thought I might start photographing them to try to get them in some kind of chronological order. I made a slide show of my watercolors in Adobe and it was a fun look, so I am going to try to do it with all the stuff I have done and see what happens.

No painting today, but this is the first one I did with Cheeko Douglas. She is such an inspiration. I don't believe anything could rival her passion for painting. She told me she paints 24 hrs a day, "I paint all day long and when I sleep, I dream of painting." I wish you could have seen the way her face lit up when she told me that. Anyway, she helps us a lot when we paint. She shows us how, then steps back and sets us free! Here is my effort.

Happiness on a Table

I have I think, finished. I redrew the picture with the help of the photograph. That helped me see what I wanted and narrowed my focus and eliminate the entire world, which is what I tend to do. This satisfies me more than the first one, but; I wish I had done as good a job painting the agave. Something wrong happened with the paint mixes. Oh well, it is just paper.

Trip to Nashville

My trip to Nashville in March was fun and a challenge. I worked in oils, watercolor and acrylics (I am now more intrigued). I worked in color theory in the oils and am facinated with the huge assignment of painting all the color combinations in a full spectrum pallette. I have been working on them for about 2 months now and am getting them completed. Will show some of them later.

In watercolor, I painted with Kathie George, a long time favorite teacher of mine with whom I have been taking yearly workshops with for about 9 years (we think). I am submitting my finished Koi, her design, on Ginwashi rice paper. We did a batik on that. I finished it off with a rubbing of a TJAP stamp (pronounced chop) that is used in Bali to stamp batiks using an irridescent gold oil pastel crayon. I brought the finished piece home and brightened the colors some.

To go back to the project of painting reflections on the table, I am going to redraw and repaint. I thought that what I was looking at was so different from what I was actually looking at, so I will do a redrawing and repainting. I am going to use the picture to help get a better contour drawing to get started with on paper, then trace my drawing onto watercolor paper. That should help with all the erasures. Meanwhile here is the image of what I saw (I added a few things to the setup).

2 point perspective drawing

Ok, I knew that I would need to redraw the table. So I started on trying to get that right from the start. I did a 2 point perspective drawing so I could show the sides of the table which I wanted to paint the darks in. I first did a one point perspective where the table was wider at the front and narrower at the back but it still looked tipped south too much. Then I tried a 2 point and realized that I needed to make the angles at the back closer to the horizon to keep it from looking as if I were standing up looking down, so I raised it. Now I realize that my angles need to be narrower to get the table to stand up more. I will play around in my sketchbook till I get the right angle of view before I am satisfied. If I do get what I like, I will post. But for now, here is the more correct version. I am waiting to hear from Cindy to see if I can post her instructions. She has answered and told me next steps.

A small task

Today while sitting on the porch with my husband, I decided to try to paint the reflections on the coffee table. I had just bought a new bowl that I was anxious to paint and it needed company, so I brought the agave to sit beside it.

I was trying to draw the table (as evidenced by the folk art rendering), when I finally got it! Drawing the negative spaces helped me to render some of the shapes. Now, I know you are thinking, HUH? Believe me, I am okay with showing my poor starts and stops, but the important thing is the learning part...I GOT IT!! Finally, but not in time to do a good enough drawing. That's ok, I will keep trying to draw these confound objects that I have trouble with.

I spoke to my art teacher (Cynthia Mask, Auburn University) today and she is going to help me paint the reflections on the table, so this is not finished, just at a point where I could take some help. She is going to help with words--via email. This is going to be fun to do. I am sending her my blog for her to get a good look at the progress so far and she will tell me what needs to happen next. Stay tuned for the next one.

Jacsha Heifetz performs

I love to hear him playing his violin while I paint along. I learned to love him from my husband, who is a giant fan of his.