Painting #219 - Aug 31 - A beautiful day to hang a show and have lunch with a friend!

Well, as you can see, it was a full day, The Tibbits Opera House Gallery (lower level), a part of Arts Alive in Coldwater hung the show "Bare Bones and a Full Moon" today, the plan was to get the show hung and then to have some lunch, then sketch and go with Susan to Hudson so she could get her paintings in the competition she was accepted in, it didn't quite work out that way, instead of the 3 of us (Carol, Susan and I), it ended up just Carol and I, we were late getting the show hung, so that we didn't have time to go to Hudson (Sue had to be in Bronson at 4:00 p.m.), so she canceled out and it was Carol and myself that had a lovely lunch at Applebee's, we then went out to sketch, but alas, we couldn't find people at home to get permission to sketch their barns, 2 places and 2 lovely barns that didn't get sketched, by this time it was 3:00 and we were both tired, so home we went.

Now you'd think that I would have gotten right after my painting, but, no! I decided to take a short nap, these 6 hour nights have been catching up with me, I do have to do one more painting for the show at Tibbits, but I chose a slightly simpler composition again tonight, I had a very busy evening trying to find the photo's that one of my student's loaned me (this is the Alaska photo I painted tonight, she spent 2 weeks up there with her daughter and was kind enough to share her photo's with me, unfortunately, I lost track of where they were, but I did find them, so all is well.

I love painting these long simple landscapes, I got this one done in about an hour, and I love that, and it was fun, I painted the sky first, of course, I'm using the opaque watercolors, so I laid in the blue for the sky then floated in the white and then on top of that the gray for the bottom of the clouds. The mountain range (I believe is Denali), went right in while it was wet, and I just kept moving down until I got it all painted once. I let that dry, and then went in with white for the snow capped mountains and some blue for the small streams, I'm uncertain if the white close to the mountains is snow or water, but it was there. I then put in the pine trees and the short bushes in the foreground, I really like this little painting and I hope you do too.

Painting #218 - Aug 30 - Just checking, maybe getting Old timers desease

When I went into my paint program to set my photo of this one up, noticed that I already had saved yesterday's as Aug 30, duh! I guess I'm loosing it, I know today is the 30th and why did I think yesterday was the 30th, and the number for the one the day before was wrong too, so I was really off, I changed the name on those, and, I hope that I got this straight now.

This painting was started in class today, These Tiger Lily's were behind my old house, I'm not sure if they are even still there, renters tend to think they have the right to change what ever they want, I don't remember doing stuff like that when I was a renter, at least not without asking the Landlord before I did it. Even so, I did get some nice pictures of them, I did a painting in pastels a long time ago, and this is the first since, that I've attempted. When there are so many blossoms all growing together like this, it makes it difficult to keep them straight, I think this one reads ok, I did have to just fudge some of the shapes in the background though. I have always thought these were Tiger Lily's, but my friend Edith thought they were a variety called Turks Caps, but we have since determined the difference, the darker stamens are the Tiger's and the lighter ones are the Turks.

When I started this one, I just went in and put the orange for the blossoms, the green stem and then leaves, when that was laid in I put the stamens in (the best I could), and went right into the dark for the background, I really wanted to punch up the contrast. After than it was a matter of determining what colors would work best to get the shadow, and then the dots for the petals, I had some reds added to the orange to punch up that drama, but there were also some very muted violets that I put in to help with the softer shadows, all in all, I like this little painting, and I hope you do too.

Painting #217 - Aug 29 - Some days, I just don't know what happens to the day!

Today just evaporated, it was 9:00 p.m. before I knew it, I was busy, but not terribly busy, my neighbor came by a couple times, I did knit a little, I watched a movie, and other than that, I just can't remember what else I did that was so important that I couldn't get to the painting before 9:30, so, as a result, I chose a photo that my friend Carol gave me, of course most of you will know this is Niagra Falls, I haven't been here since I was 18, but she took these photo's a few years ago, this is the first one that I used, she was so kind to share with me. I really didn't think I would ever do the Niagra Falls, they just didn't inspire me, that is until tonight, I felt that I could paint this and do it justice.

I wet the Aquabord all over, then while it was damp, I floated in the blue for the sky and then some pink for the horizon. While it was still wet, I put in the tree line on the far bank, I just let the edges of the trees fade away to indicate the mist, when I got the rest of the darker colors in, I then went in with some white to highlight the mist, especially on the falls and near the foreground rocks, since this is such a famous falls, I decided to put in the power plant across the water on the Canadian side (at least I think it's the Canadian side, I'm not sure now). I reinforced the darks and finished this up in about an hour, I really like this little painting, and I hope you do too.

Painting #216 - Aug 28 - Another busy day, seems the way of things lately

So, I really painted my blog painting for today first, I was so tired (still- did I mention yesterday that I had a short night, on top of going to this paint out which was a bit over 2 hours away), well, I don't think I've caught up yet.

Sundays are always spent with my husband, shopping, and so on, then we had an anniversary party to go to and I had this painting to finish and another one to do, so I finally got to the painting part, but was so tired, I wasn't sure that I'd be able to do it, I am sure you are going to think, "what was she thinking", throwing in that winter scene, well, sometimes I just like to paint winter scenes, this one is only part of the whole, I narrowed it down to the barn (or garage), and the drive plus all the trees, I really got into it, I was tired when I started and was even considering not working on the painting from yesterday, that I needed to finish, but by the time I got the winter scene done, I was just into the painting thing, so the painting got done. I was originally going to do negative painting in the foreground, but I re-thought that, I wanted to paint the leaves in instead of painting around them, so I decided to do it this way, at the last minute, I also decided to put in the Tiger Swallowtail that had been flitting around all day (I'm sure it was more than one, I almost put in one of the white ones that was there too, but decided to just stick with the yellow ones). There were several swallowtail butterfly's a couple of dark ones (both different varieties), but I didn't want to put in just any old colors on it, I wanted to be as close to the actual butterfly as possible, I chose the tiger one because I had a photo of one of those and I could give it a bit of reality, I like both of these paintings and I hope you do too.

Painting #215 - Aug 27 - What a day

My friend Susan convinced me that we needed to go to this paint-out/art walk over by Lake Michigan, what a nice day, sold a few paintings and managed to get almost 2 paintings done, wow, did I talk, and I'm amazed that I got as much done as I did. I'm going to show you 2 paintings, but the first one is the only one that's done, it's small and the other one is an 8" x 10", but I was so exhausted when I got home that I didn't have the energy to finish the 2nd painting, I was painting it there, and some of the people that I met there may come here to see if I got it done, and I'm about 1/2 done with it, I did paint on it when I got home, but there was no way that I can get it done today, but I wanted anyone who was there to see how it's progressing.

I did the small one first, it's pretty much the same place, just a bit different view. I was really sitting among the weeds, this was at a Nature Preserve, and portion of the sales go to help finance it, so I chose this site because of the purple flowers, I have since found out that they are Iron Weed, I've never heard of that before, I thought it was some version of a thistle, but, not so. The second part was of a nice tree that was close by, and of course the flowers, we were watching butterfly's flit around, it was very nice, a bit hot, I was in the direct sunlight, I probably should have brought an umbrella, oh well, maybe next year.

These paintings are done on Ampersand Claybord, a product that can be used for multi-media, some people scratch into it, but it's a wonderful surface for watercolor, I love the way the paint just puddles when there is a lot of water present. I still have about 1/2 of the 8" x 10" painting to do, I need to finish the tree and the weeds in the foreground, I will finish it tomorrow, I like this little painting, and I hope you do too.

This is the painting that I don't feel is done, I will finish it tomorrow, and I'll attempt to do another small one so that I keep myself honest, with the blog painting a day theme.

Painting #214 - Aug 26 - it's going to be a short night

Well, I have about 2-1/2 hours in this one, I didn't get started with it until about 9:30, well, you are probably wondering why, well, I had to pack my car, my friend Susan thought it would be a good idea to go to an art walk over by Lake Michigan tomorrow, so, since I'm usually up for most things in the art related field, I decided that it might be a good idea, even though I should have painted earlier, it's been a busy day, my insurance man was here, and I had to frame a painting for my neighbor's birthday (a gift), and then pack the car, so, now I'm done, and since it's after 12:00 a.m. and I have to get up in the morning by 6:00, I'd better make this short.

I painted this same composition many years ago, in pastel, it was a gift to my Mother, and now I own it again, but I really enjoy negative painting, and this particular photo presents itself with lots of negative painting. It looks complicated but it really wasn't too bad, well, I'm making this short, so, I really like this little painting, and I hope you do too.

Painting #213 and 213-part 2 - it's a two for one again.

I know these are small paintings, and small paintings are not the only thing that I want to do, but, when you are so busy, and you only have a couple of hours to paint, then you have to downsize, these paintings were done in class today, the first one, the landscape, was the first one, it kind of rolled off my brush in about an hour and 15 min., the second one, took about an hour (with about 15 minutes of that at home).

The flower, was a small demonstration for one of the Thursday girls, she was working on this blue flower painting and her flowers were all the same shape and not touching plus other things, like outlined and various other kinds of stuff, so I decided to do a small painting to show them what I would do with this same flower and how messy it would look when it was first started, and how I would fine tune it. The flowers had lots of dew drops all over them, well, way too many dew drops in my personal opinion, so I just put in 2, so, all in all, there is only about 2 hours and a little more for both of these paintings, I think I'm getting faster now.

The landscape was a photo taken on one of our Northern trips to the North Shore of Lake Superior, the first of October, there was ice on the rocks and in the water, but I didn't think I could pull that off so I left the ice out. there was a big chunk of it on the foreground rock and some in the middle, but it was difficult to tell that it was ice, so I just smoothed it over, my choice. I really like the shapes of the rocks, and the water, actually, I like the whole thing, it was fun to paint, the flower was also fun to paint, I like these little paintings and I hope you do too.