Milkweed ~ watercolor on gesso

SOLD

One more, this time the ubiquitous milkweed pods going to seed. It's a perfect subject for this type of surface because lifting is so incredibly easy. I created the fluff with nothing more than a 1/4" stiff bristle brush.

Watercolor on Gesso

Another small work, this time on acrylic gesso coated 90# Fabriano watercolor paper. I really love working with transparent watercolor on gesso. The paints reacts very different on this surface and if I add texture to the gesso while it's still moist, it creates the opportunity for some interesting effects later on. This is a fantasy floral, no reference used. I find, while texturing the gesso, if I don't have any plan in mind beforehand and simply allow the resulting texture to guide me, I can get more spontaneous results.

Feathers ~ #5

Yesterday I played with my feathers again, coating them on one side with walnut ink and using them as stamps. Afterward I embellished with more ink, Quin. gold and phthalo turquoise watercolor. This one is also a small work, roughly 4" x 5".

Looking Back

I've been looking through some of my past work lately and came across some pieces I actually like. I can see that I've progressed in some areas, stayed stagnant in others. The bane of not attending workshops or the lack of any professional instruction, I guess. I also believe I have not found my artistic voice yet, whatever that is. I can't seem to find a comfortable niche but maybe that's a good thing. I've concluded that I'd rather continue the hunt than keep cranking out the same thing over, and over, and over. Still there's a nagging feeling that I need to land somewhere and find my own style. Can you tell I'm feeling a little lost today?

I've posted a cat (above) I painted a long time ago following an online demo by Jean Haines, the queen of loose style watercolors. I thought it was horrible at the time but now I can see it's merits. I had no idea what I was doing and can still remember how scary it was letting all that water and paint loose on paper. Somehow it all came together to form a cat. Maybe my naivety was my advantage. My fear, my friend back then.

Feathers ~ continued

I'm still at it. This time with a cluster of three feathers, new colors in my atomizer bottles(Phthalo turquoise, indigo and green gold) and more of my homemade stamps. I've got this 'thing' for metallics right now so I've been trying to find ways to incorporate them into my work.

Light As A Feather

Still working in a smaller format, this time with feathers taped to my working paper and atomizer bottles filled with transparent watercolor. I've also embellished each piece with splatters of metallic acrylic but I can't seem to get the acrylic to show up in photos. I even tried scanning but no luck. Colors are off too, unfortunately. Close but no cigar.

Walnut Ink ~ Small Works

I did something I've never done before. I ordered a couple of packs of 8" x 10" pre-cut mats and mountboard and painted to fit the mat openings. I usually work the other way around. I also ordered the mats in black (I don't normally use black mats). I don't usually work this small either but I found a bag of 8" x 10" acetate sleeves I must have ordered a long time ago and wanted to use them up.

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I played with my walnut ink, my metallic acrylics, gouache and torn paper collage. I dipped evergreen sprigs in masking fluid, I poured, I mixed walnut ink with the acrylics (with some interesting results) and generally played "I wonder what would happen if...". Some of my results were better than others but I'm going to post them all anyway.

Making Homemade Stamps for Cheap ~ Frog

Here are my first results. Speedball ink seemed to work best. The fluid acrylic, not so much although my stamp was still a bit wet from rinsing.

Here is my stamp, cut and mounted on a scrap piece of gatorboard. The frog is 2 7/8" x 1 3/8".

I went over my drawing on the styrofoam with a sharp pencil. Styrofoam is so soft this easily left an indented outline to follow.

A drawing, if one is needed. I made mine on tracing paper so if I chose to reverse the image(which I did) I didn't need to redraw. Remember, when you use your stamp the image will be reversed so please keep that in mind when transferring your drawing.

Supplies you will need: styrofoam plates, Exacto knife with sharp blade & glue. A self-healing mat is nice for cutting and some foamcore or gatorboard for mounting your finished stamp. Note: You may need to glue two or more plates together to get the desired thickness of styrofoam. For my project I used two plates.

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I saw this idea somewhere but can't for the life of me remember where or I would post a link or at least give credit.


I've done a short pictorial demo of my first attempt at making a homemade stamp from cheap styrofoam plates. Stamps tend to be pricey and you can never find exactly what you're looking for anyway. Proper stamp making supplies also come with a price tag and, with no craft stores near me, shipping costs as well.

Dead Leaves & Walnut Ink

4/1/2012

I did a little tweaking. I warmed this up with a wash of Quin. gold deep and added some Lumiere Super Copper fluid acrylic.

It's now titled 'Fall-en'

I got out my homemade walnut ink yesterday and some dry leaves I had saved from last Fall. I coated the back of the leaves with masking fluid, then using the mask coated leaves as stamps, I pressed them onto my paper. I had to work fast or the leaves would stick. After the masking was dry, I did my first pour. Next I removed the first masking, did another stamping and then another pour. When the last of the mask was removed I added some phthalo turquoise watercolor and gold metallic fluid acrylic. The result is a bit on the abstract side but I think it evokes a feeling of dry forest floor, possibly tree bark. Anyway, I like it!

Daisy Peeper Quartet ~ Complete

I started this painting last year, then ran into a snag so it needed some tweaking to save it which I put off until just recently. I finally put it back on the easel a few days ago, made some adjustments and hopefully it's now ready for framing. I'll have to do my 'sit and stare' time with it to make sure it all works. This is a full sheet and I rarely work this large so I was praying I could rescue it. The thought of wasting a full sheet of w/c paper makes me feel ill.:( Thank God for heavy body acrylics.

Le Chat Retourne

The title translates roughly as The Cat Returns. I thought it would be fun to translate my usually boring titles to French. It sounds a whole lot better.:D

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I took the reference photo last summer during a hot, sunny afternoon when one of my cats came inside to escape the heat. After downloading the image to my PC I noticed it contained some fascinating shapes, shadows and colors. Amazingly the slice of door on the right and the cat are both white but reflected light(or lack thereof) and surrounding colors inside my home greatly changed the hues of both. Also it was interesting that the cat is casting two separate shadows...forward toward the viewer because of the light entering the window in the storm door and also to the left because of the same light reflected off the white surface of the inner door.

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For a palette I started with the three primaries, in this case Quin. perm rose, permanent yellow and phthalo blue. I later added some tinted gouache and watercolor pencil as well as Quin. violet.

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Note: I hope these images are somewhat close to the originals. I have a new OS and have struggled to adjust the colors on my old monitor.

Snowy Owl

I don't really know what kind of owl this is but I dubbed him a snowy owl because I put him into a blustery winter scene. This was an experiment done on Fabriano 90# w/c paper. Do you sometimes wonder "what would happen if I did this?" while working on a piece? With watercolor that can be an especially fatal endeavor, fatal at least to your painting. A few months ago I purchased a tablet of 90# paper just so I could play 'what if ' and not feel I had wasted my more pricey paper if things failed.

I don't normally finish a painting in one sitting but as I was planning to try something untried I didn't spend much time with detail. The majority of the owl is watercolor, the highlights on the feathers and the gathering snow on the branch, etc. added with white Liquitex heavy body acrylic. After everything was dry I swept a large brush across the scene with white gouache and splattered on some white acrylic snow using an old toothbrush. I had the fore thought to snap a photo before adding my 'snow' so I could show the before and after. Also I cropped the second image differently to alter the format. I think the final needs more snow splatter, IMO. Or... OMG, you ruined a perfectly nice painting of an owl. Thoughts anyone?

Note: Reference photo for the owl courtesy of Steve Haas

Note 2: Steve has informed me that this owl is also a screech owl in what is called the gray phase. Apparently some screech owls are red, some gray but all the same species.

Red Screech Owl ~ complete

I just completed the finishing touches on my owl painting. I didn't do much more with the owl but did tweak the birch trunk a bit. I added another knot and some white gouache to simulate the look of birch bark. Also I was able to get a more accurate photo. My thanks to Steve Haas for the wonderful reference photo as well.

Red Screech Owl ~ WIP 2

Please disregard the odd shadow in the upper righthand corner of the image. I just noticed it. It won't be there when I post the final.

I think this is close to complete. There is still work to be done on the birch trunk but overall I'm fairly satisfied with my first attempt at an owl. I did run into a problem with the background. In a spot near the owl's head my w/c paper grabbed the paint and created a dark 'blob' that I could not blend nor remove so I decided to go much darker in that area to cover it. I feel I was able to balance this by adding an equally dark area to the birch trunk in the opposite corner of the comp.

My palette consists of Quin. gold deep and light red for the bulk of the feathers, burnt umber mixed with indigo for the other markings on the bird. My background is straight DaVinci Payne's grey and the birch bark is made of up of various mixtures of all this palette's colors.

Red Screech Owl ~ WIP 1

I don't normally paint wildlife but a few months ago I saw some amazing photos of various owls taken by photographer Steve Haas of Michigan and obtained his permission to use some of these same photos as references. This is the beginning of my first attempt at a red screech owl and I hope I can do this bird justice in watercolor.

I've chosen to keep the owl fairly realistic, at least for this version. I want the colors to be as close to accurate as I can make them. I may get more creative with the background, though.

Feeeed Us, Seymour!

I had loads of fun painting this one. It's a type of floral I don't recall seeing any other artist render in any medium before although I'm sure some have.

I love Venus fly traps. These little carnivorus beauties are near and dear to my heart. I always had one or two when I was growing up. I loved to feed them tiny bits of raw hamburger and the occasional fly and watch their 'jaws' close around the prey. It was fun to stick my finger in those jaws, too.

For my palette I used vivid green, perylene green, perylene maroon, dioxazine purple, Quin. red, pyrrol red and aureolin yellow. I tinted some white gouache to add a few highlights. I also used salt, a piece of plastic wrap and some splattering to add background interest.

Stalled Out

This past month has not been productive for me at all. I have ideas but seem to lack the motivation to carry them out. This is different than artist's block. It's something else. What, I don't know. Sometimes I never know what is getting in my way until after it passes. Then I look back and wonder why I didn't see the problem before.

Yesterday I did finally pick up a brush and do a quick floral in hopes it would get my artistic juices flowing again. Maybe I should consider doing a painting a day. Just something simple to jump start myself. Maybe I will continue to paint foxgloves until I feel I have mastered them or until I get tired of painting foxgloves.

Idea for a Series ~ Fish Outta Water

I mentioned a few years back I'd like to try painting fish but never followed through. I couldn't find the right fish, I guess. Recently the idea for a series titled, 'Fish Outta Water' has been rolling around in my head and this is a rough sketch of the first possible installment. I doubt it needs explaining but just in case, it's a large school of fish acting as the leaves of a tree. I scribbled(and I do mean scribbled) the cat in last minute. The comp seemed to need another element and cats do love their fish. My current plan is to have fish show up in various out of water and hopefully unexpected places though not literally, of course. :D

HAPPY 2012!

Another year has come and gone and my(!) how fast it flew by. It seems the older I get, the quicker time goes. We now have another brand new year to make of it what we will. This past year has been a mixed bag for me as I'm sure it has for everyone. Good times, bad times. That's life, I guess. In terms of my art life it has been the best year yet with more sales at the gallery than I've ever had and I've enjoyed trying new painting techniques and products. I'm also thrilled to see I have more followers on my blog. It's you, my followers, my visitors and those that take the time to comment that help keep me going. Thank you for a wonderful 2011 and I wish you all the very best for 2012.

Christmas Doodles

I am in such a funk this holiday season it's ridiculous. I realized I'd produced nothing of creative value in weeks so I got out a drawing pad and an array of pencils and have kept them next to me on the sofa. When I get in these moods I tend to spend way too much time in front of the TV so I figured why not keep some art supplies handy and doodle while staring at the idiot box. It worked. Santa cat and his sleigh pulled by a team of house mice was the result. I'm not sure I will develop this any further. I don't plan to create Xmas cards again this year and it's really too late anyway. Maybe next year. Something that I've noticed...people will buy Xmas cards at the gallery during the summer months so I may put paint to this idea and offer cards later in the year.