A Watercolor Request

I have a student who requested a cardinal project. She wants to paint a gift for a friend and her friend loves cardinals. So, here it is. Male cardinals are not my favorite birds to paint. While they are colorful, they are pretty much one color and it is challenging to create his form. The female cardinal, while not as bright and cheerful looking as the male, is actually much more fun to paint.

A New Watercolor

It was time to work on a watercolor or two. I have students who need projects to work on. So, I put my pencils down and picked up a paintbrush. Here is a new watercolor--spring tulips. This piece is 9x12. It is painted on 200 pound cold press watercolor paper using MaimeriBlu paint.

A White Poinsettia

At our last watercolor class for the season, we painted a red poinsettia Christmas Card. While I was giving the preliminary instructions, one of my students asked what you should do if you wanted to paint a white poinsettia. While they were working along on their red flowers, I decided to paint my sample with a white flower.

You might remember from previous discussions that white is not white. In order to give a white object form and dimension, you must use color. Also, the original design for this card had no background. It did not need one. However, a white poinsettia on white paper will disappear, so I added a background.

You can see that the colors I used on this piece were Ultramarine Blue, Violet, and Gamboge. The leaves were developed with Sap Green and tints of the other colors were added. There is no doubt that this poinsettia is white. But just look at how colorful it is!

Theodora is finished

I have a small class of three ladies every Tuesday morning. They are learning to paint with watercolor. They used to come to my continuing ed class at the college, but those classes are not filling any more, so they come to my home. The first piece we worked on since we started these classes is a piece I call Theodora's Tea. I created this painting several years ago. It was the very first pattern packet I designed and developed myself. Even though it is a few years old, students still love to paint it and it is a charming little painting. Here is Theodora.

HOOT

Last week was the annual HOOT (Heart of Ohio Tole Painters) convention. It is held in the Columbus Convention Center and is a very large gathering of decorative painters. At HOOT, you have the opportunity to take a variety of different classes in different mediums. There is also a trade show where you are able to meet with some of the artists/teachers, see what various vendors have to offer, and purchase virtually everything you need and a lot of things you didn't know you needed. I took a number of different classes. The next several posts will be devoted to showcasing the class projects from the classes that I took at HOOT.

The first piece is a watercolor taught by Gayle Laible. This was a 4-hour class and the project was completed well before the class period was ended.You will note the leaves on the upper left of the design. These were done using negative painting. That is, the leaf was not painted directly. Instead, the background around the leaf was painted causing the leaf to be revealed.

A Watercolor Demo

Saturday I spent a couple of hours at the Pat Catan's store in Hermitage, PA, doing a watercolor demonstration. Pat Catan's is a regional art and craft chain with stores in Ohio and Southwestern Pennsylvania. I will begin teaching watercolor classes there on June 18. There were a couple of people who not only stopped to see what I was doing, but also expressed an interest in taking the classes. These will be weekly classes lasting 3 hours each Monday. My plan is to teach from now until sometime in October and then take a break until sometime in March. That way I don't have to worry about the winter weather issues. Here is the piece I painted during the demo. I think you may recognize the rose. This version is painted on a 4"x5" sheet of 200-pound watercolor paper.

Watercolor Class

This weekend I will be teaching a watercolor project. The piece is called Standing Watch. It is from a photo taken by a marsh near our old home. I grew up in Delaware and we lived for a number of years in Maryland. These areas are flat and you have coastline, so there are swamps and marshes--after all, you are near the water. When we moved to the mountains of northern Pennsylvania, I was amazed at the number of marshy areas you find in the mountains. In any event, one day we were driving by the marsh and saw a white heron standing in the water. This is my interpretation of that photo.

Same Design, Different Media

I was continuing the clear out and set up of my studio when I came across a pair of ballet slippers. These slippers were given to me so that I could use them to set up a design for a painting. The original plan was to do an oil painting for my niece who was studying ballet at the time. To thank the young lady who gave me the slippers, I did the same design in watercolor for her as a gift. I did not think to take a picture of that piece, but she was thrilled with it. After a couple of years passed, I did another version of the same set up in watercolor with a different kind of background. The photo of the oil painting was taken with my old camera, so I must apologize for the quality.

The photos below show the original photo from which the paintings were done, the oil painting. and the most recent watercolor. The point of this exhibit is to show that you can take the same design and use it a number of different ways. In addition, this same design could be executed in pastels, acrylics, or graphite/charcoal. It could be painted on gesso board (like the oil), or on a box, a piece of furniture, a wall, or any other surface as long as you selected an appropriate medium. The background can be altered in a number of different ways as well. The size could be changed. All of these pieces are approximately 9x12, but it could be reduced to miniature size or enlarged to life size just as easily. Use your imagination and see where it takes you. I think I feel an urge to do another still life set up using these slippers.

Oh, Joyous Happy Day!

This has been a wonderful day. The weather has definitely turned warm enough to call it spring and we have sandal temperatures.

Today I took some paintings to one of my galleries. I like to periodically change out paintings that have been on display for a while for new ones. While I was there, someone came into the gallery and bought one of my paintings right off the desk--it never even made it to the wall! It is always nice to sell a piece, but it is especially nice to sell a piece that quickly and to meet and talk with the person who bought it.

Montreal Hotel

Watercolor, 4"x4"
SOLD

Red Hat Birthday

"My Red Hats" watercolor
4" x 5"

Every year on April 25, the Red hat Society celebrates its birthday. And so, to all my Red Hat sisters (yes, I am that old), I wish you a Happy Red Hat Day!

Chickadees

One of my favorite birds is the Chickadee. I love how they hang on the feeders and the suet cakes. Their flight pattern is also fun to watch as the swoop and flit from place to place. This watercolor painting is from a photograph taken in my backyard. The background snow is created using salt.

Working from photos

For many of my paintings, I start with a photo. Usually this a photo that my husband has taken on one of our trips (he is a wonderful photographer) or one that I have taken with my digital camera of a still life set up. On one of our visits to the Eastman House in Rochester, New York, my husband took this photo of a green orchid. I used the photo to create a watercolor painting.

What color is white?

My studio hoe-out is coming along nicely. Most of the boxes have been gone through and I've given away and thrown away a lot of things I don't need anymore. I've been looking at some of my projects and came across a white rose painted in watercolor. I thought you might enjoy contemplating the matter of how to paint a white object. Here is my rose.


There is no question that the flower is white. But without the use of other colors to create shadows, depth, and highlight, the painting would be flat and uninteresting. The purples and blues in the background dictated that the detail colors in the rose needed to be purples and blues. You will notice a few places on the outer petals where the sunlight is glinting with a yellow cast.

Here is another white object painted in Genesis Heat-set oils. This is the County courthouse tower during a fireworks display. In this case, the shadows are a the grey-blue-black of the night sky. The tints are the reflections of the colors of the fireworks.

So, what color is white? Any color you want or need it to be. The one thing that is certain is that white is colorful.

Another multi-use design

As I mentioned the other day, many times I develop a project in one medium and then decide to use the same design in a different medium. Here is another example. The original was drawn from a still life setup. Then I developed it as a watercolor to teach in a 9x12 format. Finally, I redeveloped the piece as a 2.5"x3.5" Genesis piece. The miniature was juried into the Miniature Show in Chambersburg, PA, in November. I was obviously very pleased with the result.

Multi-use designs

Sometimes I find that a design may work well in several different mediums. The very first project I ever developed was a watercolor painting of an old enamel teapot and lemons. It started as a project for a drawing lesson. My teacher had an old enamel teapot and set it up as a still life with a couple of lemons--a very simple set up. I decided to paint it in watercolors. Several years later, when I began to paint with Genesis Heat-set oils, I used the same design. The original was a 9x12 watercolor. The Genesis piece is 4x6. I have taught both the watercolor and Genesis versions of this design several times. Now, I am thinking about using this same design in a watercolor batik technique that I learned from Kathie George. I have gotten a lot of mileage out of this design.

Happy President's Day

I taught the first of the classes for the seniors today. They loved the little project and the director was pleased that it was something that everyone could do. She said they were a little worried when they found out that I was going to do watercolor. It is always fun to see how 12 different people can take the same 4 colors with the same instructions and get completely different results and all of them equally wonderful in their own way. I have not been working on anything new for a couple of days--just trying to finish up unfinished things. But here is a photo of a watercolor I hope you will enjoy. This was painted from a photo my husband took in the park in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, Canada, a few years ago. The sleigh was just parked against a tree at the edge of the park.

Class for Seniors

I have beeen asked to participate in a series of classes at Senior Centers and homes starting next week. This program is called a Taste of the Arts and is sponsored by the Meadville Arts Council in Meadville, PA. There are a total of 8 locations. I will visit a different location each week for 8 weeks and hold a 1-hour class. Here is the project I've designed for these classes. It is a little 4x6 watercolor. I will put the design on the paper with masking fluid prior to the class. The seniors will be given paint, water, and a brush. We will talk about creating puddles of color to paint from and they will be instructed to put whatever colors they wish on the paper so that the whole sheet of paper is covered. Once the papre is dry, they will remove the masking fluid to reveal the painting. I will mount this on top of a piece of mat board rather than cutting mat openings. I am told there will be between 20 and 25 participants each week. I hope they will enjoy the project.

A winter painting

We have had snow just about every day in western Pennsyvania for weeks. It is cold and miserable. Even the dog doesn't want to go outside. We don't even have any birds visiting out birdfeeders--we think they all decided it is too cold to stay here. Our only wildlife visitors are a group of 4 deer who come down into town several evenings a week to forage. I am in my whiney winter phase right now and looking forward to a bit of warming that must come soon. Here is a watercolor of chickadees on a suet feeder in a snowstorm. It makes the dreary winters days seem a little more cheerful.

Miniature Paintings

I have been busy this week doing everything but painting. But while I've been doing what needs to be done, I've been thinking about new projects to start. There are a lot of show and conventions deadlines coming up and much to be gotten ready. One of the things I most like to paint are miniature or very small format paintings. This one is one of my very favorite paintings. It is 3.5x4.75 before the mat and frame. The work is called Williamsburg Bottles. It was developed using a photograph that my husband took in one of the historic homes in Colonial Williamsburg.

Retreat Report

I'm back from Ohio. The Buckeye Tole Painters retreat was a pleasure. I had small classes for both of my projects, but everyone was happy with their results and that is what counts. I had an opportunity to meet some new friends and build some new painting partnerships. The trip was well worthwhile. I had taken an extra, tiny project for the watercolor class just in case we finished the published project early. It turned out to be a very good thing because there were no electrical outlets in the classroom so we could not use hairdryers to move our piece along. Instead of sitting around waiting for paint to dry, we worked on the second little fun project in between steps on the big project. Here is the Simple Sheep project that we did as an extra freebie. The sheep were created by applying masking fluid to the paper using a small piece of cellulose (kitchen) sponge. Then the sky, grass, and brick wall were painted in before removing the mask and finishing the sheep. It was a fun little project.