HEART JOURNEY - POURED PAINTING

In celebration of good news from the cardiologist Wednesday afternoon. The news? That I don't have to return for 6 whole months!!! YAY! I was beginning to think I'd be in there or having tests run every month for the rest of my life - since that seemed to be the norm for this whole year. So now...a time to rest and breathe and get back to living and not worrying about heart issues that need nothing done for them right now other than keeping the blood pressure on an even keel.

This is 1/2 sheet Arches 300# watercolor paper.

1. Poured Pebeo Drawing Gum around on dry paper, drizzling it from a dropper and creating heart shapes here and there and then spritzing it outwards with a spray bottle. Let that dry completely.

2. Spritzed the paper with clean water and poured Hansa Yellow Light (a mix of pigment and water in a baby food jar so easy to pour it on and around). Moved the paper and let the pigment and water run and move. Let that dry completely.

3. Spritzed the paper again with clean water and then poured Quinacridone Rose. Waited for that to dry.

4. Reapplied miskit, creating a few more heart shapes and spritzing it with a spray bottle to move the miskit around. Waited for that to dry before the next pour.

More to come later :)

PAINTERS LIKE COLOR...ANYTHING WITH COLOR

During a recent trip to Shaker Village in south-central Kentucky, Jerry and I both got some photos of the wool. They had it displayed with tags to show what was used to dye it - all organic materials from onion skins, indigo, walnut shells, and different berries and barks. In May, they do the sheep shearing and dying of the wool. I may have to return then...in the spring. And someone has to spin the wool into skeins to use for clothing. That is what this lady was doing, dressed in her traditional outfit and working to make thread out of the wool she was spinning.

I think "the good ole days" might have been pretty tough and pretty busy.

A FEW MORE ATCS FOR FUN

Here are a few more ATCs (art cards which are 2 1/2" x 3 1/2") I've made lately. I decided I need to approach these as I do my paintings - with a good reference photo and a drawing first (on the card). Then think about colors to use or not use and PUT away those Darned Pitt Pens that look so childish and bright and can't be blended, etc. Yep, need to do that instead of grabbing them every time.

I like the one of the Shaker baskets and the hedge apples/osage oranges the best. Drawn and shades with graphite and then Pitt pens for color.

Sitting on the sofa today doing a few while "watching" a Masterpiece Mystery I had taped a few weeks back. Our DVR system allows me to tape so much I intend to watch later...then I never get around to watching it. But this one was good - from a novel by Val McDermid, it was called A Place of Execution. A mystery I could not figure out at all and, apparently, I've read the book...must have been year's ago because I don't recall a thing about it! Either the playwright changed the novel A LOT or my memory for whatever I've read is really shot - could be both?!?

DANCING PETALS - A BIT MORE WORK

I worked a bit more on this painting...still much to do. I think it needs more darks to add oomph but the bg right now is too dull so maybe have to wet it and drop in some blues and greens there. I'd like to have the curved petals leading your eye through the painting, too. I think this photo is a bit brighter than IRL, but it was taken out in the sunroom so sometimes things do seem brighter when taken that way.

FIGURE DRAWING CLASS - NOVEMBER 14

I thought last week's pose was hard...then we had this pose! No one said art was easy...did they? If they did, they were wrong.

A sitting pose, torso twisted, one leg out to the side and one leg bent and, from my position at the easel, very foreshortened. Foreshortening is the Wicked Witch of the West!!! It messes with your mind. You "see" it...but you don't draw it that way. I'm so thankful for my kneaded eraser who does so much work for me. If I could learn to draw with a lighter hand - fine, light lines that shape things until they are about right and then darken - but I have a heavy hand and I may have to work hard to break that habit.

(I started this and wasn't getting it right, not getting the right leg out at the angle and thinning his middle and...well, I finally just started over.)

So...my apologies to Brian, our model, who did a fine job and really held that pose for long periods of time (I think he only took 3 breaks in the 3 hour session!). It doesn't look a bit like him but I will work on it to get the face more correct, using Brian's webpage photo.

Brian models for all the art classes in the tri-state, from the Cincinnati Art Academy to Northern Kentucky University's art classes and everything in between, including studio sessions with artists, one-on-one. He's been doing this for years and knows his stuff.

If you think, "Well he's just sitting there. How hard can it be?" Put yourself in this pose and then hold it...without fidgeting, without moving...for an hour! Then take a 5 minute break, or 10 minutes...and go right back and get in the same pose and hold it for another hour. I can't imagine how many of my limbs would be numb and how my behind would be in pain from leaning like that. Models...good models...earn their pay.

And it was a pleasure to find out Brian's been following my blog for a while :) It's always fun to find out someone has been watching your work and reading your chatter for a while!

Now, off to work on Brian's face so it looks more like him and less like a certain fromer U.S. president!

HEART JOURNAL PAGES

A few more pages from my heart journal. I don't work on it every day or even every week, but come back to it when something strikes me - words from a song, a turn of phrase, a photo or something I see...

AND THE WINNER IS...

The names of those who posted comments on my blog from Sunday to this morning were put into my lucky bowler.

Jerry drew the slip of paper with the winner's name on it. I was going to let Smudge choose but he just would have eaten the slip of paper!

So...

the winner of the watercolor/collage is...

Ginny, send me your snail mail address and I will get the prize out to you Monday morning!

Sorry everyone couldn't win but I'm so thankful for your friendship and continued support for this blog.

For those who didn't win, here is something beautiful...a few evenings ago was blazing like the sun was going to melt into the sky...I had to step out onto the deck and take a photo. And is it just me or does the sun and glow look like a heart?

HAPPY BLOGGER-VERSARY TO ME!!!

Can you believe it? It's my 3rd bloggerversary already! I am busy right now so nothing more to say about that but

THANK YOU ALL for sticking with me, watching my failures and successes (since I've been told I'm brave to share the bad with the good, I'm calling myself brave! haha).

And for a special bloggerversary present and commemoration of your friendship and help along the way I'm going to be doing a give-away of a watercolor/collage on Friday. I will take the names of everyone who posts to my blog this whole week - so that means from Sunday the 8th through today - will put them in a hat and draw one name to win the prize.

I will contact the winner for their snail mail address.

The watercolor collage at the top of this page is what you might win. I started with watercolor and drizzles of misket and then color and lots of paper and ink and words and stuff on this one. And the words are so appropriate for you all - my blogger friends and artist buddies. Good luck to you all! (Painting is 1/4 sheet with 1 inch white edge around it and will be mailed unmatted, rolled in a mailer tube to you if you are the lucky winner.)

Closeups of the words:

Good luck to you all! And thanks again, for your support for 3 whole years!

Now...I'm off to type up the minutes from yesterday's watercolor society meeting in between cleaning the house (it needed it and Jerry's photo group is coming over tomorrow evening for an image review session so can't let the cat hair roll around on the floors any longer).

HANDS AND PETALS

Well, I wasn't satisfied with the hands on this...so wiped it all down again (it's on gold gessoed paper so you can do this without problems) and started over. I really want to carefully shape them and make them look real. I am getting there, using opaque watercolors to build up the lights and darks.

Still some fiddling needed...so before I overworked it and ruined it and had to wipe it all off again, I put it aside and did more work on the Dancing Petals painting. This is it, stage 2.

I've been scattered lately...unable to focus on one thing for very long so switching back and forth from paintings to ATCs to reading in my latest art magazines. Here are some ATCs I doodled while sitting on the sofa watching TV. I'm not crazy about them - they seem childish to me...not artful enough. But maybe it's just a way to get the energy out without working on a painting. I think I need to put the Pitt Brush pens down and go to colored pencil or watercolor pencils instead to get more values and depth.

As you can see, they all are still in the heart theme.