Faded

Here is a group of pansy

paintings I did, using last years pansies that had been pulled from the planter. Laying them out on the snow, I fell in love with the beautiful colors and shapes they formed. Click pictures for yummy close-ups!

Watercolor Painting - Winter Sky III

Winter Sky III watercolor on Arches 21x30

Crop of Winter Sky III

Hi all.

I absolutely love painting these poplar trees. Sorry, to all you birch lovers, but these are poplars, not birches. The weather has finally warmed up - freakishly warm actually, not that I'm complaining! - so I hope to get out to take some more pics. Need some new trees to paint.

The color was incredibely hard to adjust on these...I think because there are so many different hues and weird mixes... each time I got one right, another was wrong. So I decided to just STOP, and here they are. One cropped for that fascinating close up view.

In trying to make the colors work together and create a unified whole, I remembered Myrna's 'mothercolor', and mixed the colors making sure that each contained a bit of the 'mothercolor'...in this case, W&N Indian Red.

I also tried to keep in mind Edgar Whitney's rule about variety - variety in shape (white spaces), in direction (branches), value (which doesn't show up too well, but it's there), in size (branches), and texture (smooth vs rough). I may not have accomplished all that as well as I could, but at least I kept it in mind while painting, which is a big step forward on my part.

Has anyone read his book Complete Guide to Watercolor Painting? It's fantastic, and I just love the way he expresses himself. I love his passion, and he's definitely not shy about giving his opinions about art, and artists, and what he thinks they should be. Brilliant stuff.

Okay. That's about it. Not much goin' on. Work is...well...it pays the bills. I have about 12 precut mats to fill up. So I'm gonna get painting...

Tell me a story. You know I love the company.

Watercolor Painting - Sticks & Stones VI

Sticks & Stones VI 7x10" watercolor on Arches

The elements in this challenge were - Checkerboard composition (duh...okay, a little obvious...and I put the flowers on the wrong squares) Direction being the dominant element, and lemon yellow as the mothercolor, which doesn't show up worth a damn because when I get the yellow looking yellow, the purple blue color becomes some other uncolor...so you'll have to trust me that the squares that aren't purple are actually yellow.

Well, this is the last in the Sticks & Stones series, as Myrna's January challenge is rapidly coming to an end. It has been fun working with these elements (okay, one is missing here). I've learned so much...especially "THINK BEFORE YOU PAINT". Amazing really...and then there is the "Think While You're Painting" concept...now why didn't I think of that?!

I might take a couple of these and work them up in a bigger format. Which ones do you think would look good? Tell me your faves. If ya want.

Anyway...the weather is beautiful, wish you were here. It's warmed up to a balmy -28C! A person can actually go outside without worrying about instant frost bite. Really lovely. (I hope the sarcasm shows up better than the yellow).

And now...my show is over...(how many nights in a row can a person (not mentioning any names) watch the same movie before they are considered really pathetic? Just curious.)...and it's time to start a new painting. hhhmmm...what to paint, what to paint...

Drop me a line...I like the company.

Edit: PS...For those of you south of the border in Farenheit land...I just checked the temp and it's -30C which is about -22F. Just so's ya know.

Watercolor Painting - Poplar Trees

Winter Sky watercolor 22x30" sold

The bottom two images are crops

Oh glorious Friday! Is it my imagination or did this week last about a month!? Hm...well it's over now...two days of free, free, freedom!

So I think I finished this watercolor painting of poplar trees. There are definitely parts of it I love to pieces, and some parts that sort of missed the mark. I could quite happily lop off a good portion of the tree on the right. Too many straight branches...just doesn't work for me. And of course the color is off...that blue is very blue in real life...but not quite that blue. So, overall I am pleased, and sufficiently ready to set it aside and move on to the next.

I have been reading quite a bit about how to make ones blog more attractive to the search engines. Empty Easel (see link on the right) has some great information on the subject...as well as some other places I visited that I forget the name of. Some of the things mentioned are to use key words in posts, and be repetitive; bold and italicize words; use popular names, such as artists, websites, and clubs, groups or societies (which is why I am going to join some!).

Linking to other sites, and having them link you is another helper. And there is some other more teknikal stuff I have no idea how to do, but will get someone else to help me with.

These things are not going to be miracles, but in time they are supposed to help increase visitors. Oh, yeah, and getting PayPal too.

So these are some things that I am working on. I have a small fear of appearing presumptuous, and acting like I'm "all that"...but that's just too bad. A smart guy I know told me that it's smart to work on marketing your work early on in your 'career'...so that's what I'm doing. (Thanks Ron.)

Still working on Myrna's challenge...cruciform composition, and shape as the dominant element. I'm not really sure what that means, LMAO!! but I'm working on it. I mean, shape...it pretty much naturally occurs when you draw something...so how do I make it dominant? hhhmmm...off to the book shelf...

Drop me a line and tell me a story....

Watercolor Painting - Sticks & Stones IV

Sticks & Stones IV 7x10" watercolor on Arches 140lb CP

Well I am definitely in the grips of the winter blues, but have been fighting bravely against it...lots of chocolate, painting, music....and of course, the meds. Winter will end, and it will be warm again....

In the meantime...here is the third for Myrna's challenge:

Triangular composition (she says she threw that one in just for fun...twisted) ; Texture; and Quin Gold. I think I covered all the bases. It was hard to get the color right...there should be more dark in the flower, but then the background gets too dark. Ah well, you get the idea...just imagine some darks.

I love Quin Gold...it can be just about any color on the orange-yellow section of the color wheel you need...and mixes so interestingly with other colors. I cheated a bit on the texture part...used plastic wrap - never tried it before; it turned out okay I think. Of course, my children think I'm brilliant. Bless their little biased hearts...

Off to bed...drop me a line and let me know what you think...about...stuff.

Poplar Trees - Watercolor

It is hard to tell in the pics, but I have done quite a bit of work on this. Next I will be adding in all the small twigs, and the knots and scars on the trees trunks.

I have ordered my first roll of watercolor paper! I'm quite excited to start a new painting on it. I want to do these trees big. And I want to do a tall narrow one. And I want to do a wide narrow one. Oh so many paintings to be painted. So little space in my livingroom.

Not much else to say. At least nothing pleasant. Off to paint now.