Watercolors!

With Golden's Absorbent Ground you can make any surface into a watercolor surface. I do not primarily work in watercolors, but have been experimenting recently in using them on this Absorbent Ground, and combining with my acrylics and collage. Here is a video demonstrating Qor Watercolors on Absorbent Ground. You can win a set of 24 Qor Watercolors + a jar of Absorbent Ground + FOUR 6"x6" cradled wood panels. Buy raffle tickets here. Proceeds benefit Rupert Village Trust, a community building project.

Portable Art Studio

It's summer here in the northern hemisphere, and time to kick back a little, take things a bit slower or easier (anyone who knows me is going to roll their eyes at this - yeah right!). For me it's more challenging in the summer to delve deep into a series of paintings, because I get interrupted and distracted easily. Neighbors stop by, I have construction going on, gardening, more bike rides because of the longer days. So I put together a little kit of art materials that you can pick up for quick, easy, fun art. Art Lite. In Small Bites.

A page spread in my little sketchbook, using most of the materials in my Portable Art Studio

You can put together whatever materials you are comfortable working with, just as long as they don't include acrylic paints and mediums, which require some set-up and clean-up. The Portable Art Studio features materials that are easy and convenient. You can probably put together a kit from things you already have in your studio. Here are my picks:

A small set of pan watercolors such as Sakura Koi Watercolors
A small set of water soluble crayons, such as Caran d'Ache NeoColor II
Water brushes
Small scissors and a glue stick (any type)
A small-ish sketchbook paper that will take watermedia
Card Stock: this works great as an inexpensive substrate for small collage. Get it at any office supply store.
Some paint markers. My favorites are Posca Markers in a couple of sizes
Micron Pens or other fine permanent felt tip pens (not Sharpies)
A good selection of collage papers in a variety of colors and patterns. Include found text, your own painted papers, decorative papers, maps, junk mail, etc. Variety is key.

Have fun with your Portable Art Studio!

Lucie's New Class on Skillshare

I posted the preview of Lucie Duclos' new class a couple of weeks ago. Now it is available on Skillshare. Click here to see it! It is a fun little demonstration of watercolor, called Watercolor Field Trip. Here is what I did in my sketchbook using Lucie's technique and inspiration:

I did not use all of the techniques Lucie demonstrates, but a few. I found this to be a very accessible introduction to watercolor, a way to explore the material without the pressure of making something you want to frame. Enjoy!

I used Koi Watercolor Pocket Field Sketchbox, 24 colors
Sakura Micron Pens
and for the white lines, Posca Paint Pens

Golden Artist Colors Conference

Just heading back from the "Golden Gathering" in Florida, where I got a fresh dose of information on Golden products, but so much more!  Re-connecting with colleagues, meeting artists from all over the world, taking workshops and attending super informative talks and demos. Here are a few pix.  I'll put together more posts when I get home, with more links and video. 

Here is me (orange T-shirt, gray hair) in Adria Arch's class on teaching intuitive painting.  She is right up my alley, and gave me some FABULOUS ideas for improving my teaching.  We did some really fun exercises that got us painting immediately, totally engaged in the process, without thinking and agonizing.  She got us to tap into that direct line between intuition and process.  I will be trying these in upcoming workshops.

Here are a few things that came out of one of Adria's exercises.

The venue wasn't too shabby, though it was not this sunny. 

I took a watercolor workshop with Bianka Guna, in which we used Golden's new Qor watercolors.  Yes, that is Q  O  R, Qor, pronounced "core".  So I'll be experimenting with them in my studio and share with you.  The colors are intense and rich, and they work beautifully on many different grounds and substrates.

Here is Bianka.  She is an engaging teacher, very entertaining as well as knowledgeable.

This is one of the collograph plates I made in Shari Pratt's workshop.  I have some better pix, which I'll share in a later post.  We used all kinds of textural materials and many of Golden's texture gels to make printing plates. 

Then we printed using OPEN acrlyics, which have a long long long l o n g drying time. They are great for monoprinting because you can take your time working the paint into/on the plate.

Melanie Matthews

One more person I want to introduce you to (if you don't already know her) is Melanie Matthews.  I attended her slide talk on using Pinterest, and found her to be one of the most generous artists I've met, in terms of sharing information.  Funny, fun, a GREAT presenter.  I would take a workshop with her any day.  Check out her Pinterest Boards and follow her.  OMG, what a wealth of carefully curated images she shares.

Lucie DuClos, who has taken several of my workshops, is now busy designing fabric and other products on Spoonflower.  Spoonflower is a print-on-demand site where you can create designs and have them printed on fabric, wall paper, gift wrap, and other products.  It has allowed Lucie a fabulous outlet for her constant flow of creativity.  She has been chosen as one of eight finalists in a design contest, and her submission is gorgeous!  Take a look:

 

 

 

Here are a few things Lucie has done in my Monoprint Collage workshops:

Here are some watercolor floral pieces Lucie has done in Carla Sonheim's flower workshops.

 

Thanks for visiting. Hope you find some inspiration in this.

Sketch-In and Sketchbook Practices

Since The Sketchbook Challenge began last January I've been thinking about how I use and don't use a sketchbook. What is a sketchbook? How do artists use them? How is it different from an "art journal"? These are questions I've pondered over the year without forcing any answers.

To express your thoughts on the topic, click here to take a brief survey.

At Ink About It over the weekend, Sue Bleiweiss and I conducted a Sketch-In. We did lots of drawing exercises:

Then worked with watercolor, experimenting with materials:


And working from still life:
On the second day we painted papers:

Using various brands and types of acrylic paint:
Look at us all having FUN!
Here I am demonstrating something brilliant, I'm sure:

And this is Sue Bleiweiss with Lori, one of the owners of Ink About It.
Then Sue gave us a great little tutorial on making a quick and easy hard-cover book. She brought book kits for everybody, and people used their painted papers for covers and end-papers. What a creative and productive weekend! Check out Sue's free projects to find this book tutorial and many others.

A couple brush and pen drawings

I was playing with the watercolor and pen drawing practice from last Friday, so I thought I'd share a couple of the resulting images.

This one is my dog, Zeke. I wanted to add a little more detail, but he moved.



This one is my Bad Hair Day self-portrait. I really don't look that somber most of the time.



April is my month to post the theme for the Sketchbook Challenge, so don't forget to look for it on Friday. I will copy the post on this blog next week, as Friday this week is another drawing practice tutorial.

I've just put my FIRST ONLINE WORKSHOP up on my web site, Unlocking the Secrets of Color. It is open for registration now, and begins May 4. It consists of six sessions, one per week, and I expect we'll have a blast! The next workshops to appear online will be Scribble Collage and a Drawing Practice workshop (similar to what you've seen in my Friday blog series, but much more fleshed out). Please e-mail me or post comments if you have suggestions or requests for online workshops.

Contours with Brush and Pen

Welcome to the third of my Friday Drawing Tutorials. You've probably all heard of contour drawing: you look at the object as you draw it, only glancing down to your paper occasionally, and draw its outlines. Pretty straightforward. You can do just the very outer edge of the object, or some of the interior lines as well. The key to contour drawing is to SLOW DOWN, take your time, let your hand and your eye coordinate their movements. Use a pen. "Mistakes" are part of the experience.

Here is an early attempt at a contour drawing of my chair:


After this drawing I did another, adding some of the interior lines:


You'll be amazed at how quickly your powers of observation increase when to take a few minutes once in a while to do a contour drawing. Here is another chair I did adding a bit of cross-hatch shading:


To make it a little more juicy, try doing a contour drawing with a big, wet watercolor brush. This makes you see the contours more generally, less in detail. After the watercolor dries, try a contour drawing of the same object in pen on top of the watercolor. Here is my spray bottle:

And a jar of brushes:

In the above two examples I tried to keep the pen drawing and the watercolor drawing together, so I fudged a little on the spray bottle nozzle while drawing in pen. In this self-portrait, I did the contour in watercolor, then the drawing in pen over it without trying to coordinate it.

Try both. See where it takes you!

Letting Go of Looking Good: Blind Self-Portrait

If you’ve ever taken a drawing class, you are probably familiar with the idea of drawing what you see with your eyes, not what your mind thinks you should see. In other words, really look at what you are drawing and respond to that, rather than some mental notion of what the object is. We could all draw a coffee mug, for example, from an image in our mind. It is a different thing to really look at a particular coffee mug and trace its outlines. Drawing from imagination or memory and drawing from seeing are two different things, and practicing the latter will enhance your skills at the former.

In order to draw from seeing, we have to let go of any desire we you might have for the drawing to look like something. Paradoxically, that desire – that attachment to our idea of what something should look like – only gets in the way of seeing. Here is an exercise that will help you Let Go of Looking Good:

You will need:
Paper that will accept watercolor, several sheets
A white crayon
Watercolor paint, any color
Paint brush
Mirror
Cheap drawing paper or a sketchbook
Pen of your choice

1. First establish that this exercise is for your eyes only, unless you decide to share it.

2. Remember to approach the exercise with a sense of inquiry, not with a particular goal. It does not matter what the result looks like; what matters is that you approach it honestly and wholeheartedly.

3. Set up your mirror so you can see your face.

4. Slowly and carefully, draw your face with white crayon on the watercolor paper without looking at the paper. Look at your face in the mirror only. Take your time.

5. Brush water over the drawing, then paint over it in watercolor to reveal the drawing. Put it aside to dry, and repeat the process.





6. After a few blind self-portrait drawings, try a few with pen on the drawing paper or in your sketchbook, both blind and looking at your paper. Even when you are not doing a blind drawing, look more at the subject (your face in the mirror) than at the paper.

Making self portraits, for me, is one of the most effective ways of practicing letting go of looking good. This letting go not only helps you to see better, but it cultivates acceptance. Sometimes it is hard to accept how age affects how we look. We’re tempted to leave out that wrinkle or make our eyes look bigger and more youthful. Resisting this temptation not only encourages acceptance, but will result in much more beautiful and interesting drawings.

More Blind Scribble

Thanks for all your comments of my blind scribble drawing practice that I posted on Friday. I thought I'd share a few painting-collage-drawings that I did based on this practice. I began each in this series with a newspaper collage background, just to add some text and texture.

In this one, I followed the newspaper collage with a blind scribble in black oil pastel, then another one in a terracotta oil pastel. I painted with acrylics, being guided by the structure imposed by the collage and the scribbles. I stamped the Q's, and then went over the scribbles to give them more visual weight.


In this one I painted acrylics over the newspaper collage, and then did the blind scribble with a water-soluble graphite pencil. Next came the white crayon scribble, not blind, and watercolor in sepia and pthalo blue. I emphasized the pencil scribble with black oil pastel, then added the red in acrylic. I love that red!


Here is a page in my sketchbook in which I did two half-blind drawings of crows in water-soluble graphite pencil. By "half-blind" I mean I was looking at a picture of a crow, not at my paper, and then towards the end of the drawing I did look at my paper so that I could make a closed shape. Sort of like cheating just at the end. But this process does result in really interesting shapes!


To use these crows in a collage-painting, I first traced them both onto white Art Tissue paper (not wrapping tissue, which has a shiny side) in fine point Micron pen. Then I cut them out, roughly, and applied them to this collage-painting, PEN SIDE DOWN, using acrylic matte medium. This is an adaptation of a technique I learned from Jane LaFazio. The tissue paper practically disappears so that you are left with the drawing layered onto the collage.


Trying to incorporate drawing into my collage-paintings is an ongoing process, and doing these series of studies in my sketchbook or on small sheets of paper is immensely helpful. Thanks for visiting!

PS: I decided to change my picture in my Profile. This one is more realistic, and more recent.

Friday Drawing Series

Drawing Practice



Welcome to the first installment of a series on DRAWING PRACTICES, which I will be posting every Friday for six Fridays. It’s not a step-by-step how-to-draw course, as much as a series of suggestions for keeping your drawing practice alive.

Blind Scribble

The Blind Scribble is a good place to begin if you are either new to drawing or haven’t done it for a while. Maybe you paint, collage, sew or make assemblage with abandon, but drawing, for some reason, intimidates you. Even if you draw on a regular basis, this first practice brings you back to basics.

You need:
Paper
A pen
Other drawing materials (optional)

Put the piece of paper in front of you on your work surface. Place the pen somewhere on the paper. Close your eyes. Draw. Just move the pen around, slowly exploring the paper. Focus on the sensation of moving the pen over the paper. Now try different kinds of lines, still with your eyes closed: try wavy lines, saw tooth lines, broken lines, smooth lines, jagged lines…. Move faster, move more slowly. When you’ve had enough, stop and open your eyes. Get another sheet of paper and repeat the process.

Ways to vary this exercise:

Draw to music: draw to slow, melodic music; draw to fast rhythmic music; draw to music you hate; draw to atmospheric, non-rhythmic music. Keep your eyes closed and give your whole being over to the sound and the feeling of drawing.


Switch drawing materials: Change to a brush-tip marker, a crayon, a colored pencil, a thick graphite stick, a piece of charcoal… This one is charcoal, then I brushed water over the drawing.


Make one blind scribble drawing; switch material and make another drawing over the first one.

I used water-soluble pencil for the second blind drawing over the marker original. Then I brushed water over the pencil.


Make a blind scribble drawing, then, with your eyes open, draw into it or over it with a different material.
In this one I did a blind scribble in white crayon over the first blind scribble, then painted into it with watercolor.
For more drawing exercises, see the Tutorials page on the Sketchbook Challenge blog. I hope you enjoy these exercises; thanks for visiting!

Tearing Pages

In the spirit of experimentation, I tried tearing a few of my sketchbook pages in two, then tearing same blank pages in the same way and switching them. You may have seen my post on the Sketchbook Challenge blog about my Color Collage Pages. I had a sort of break-through with them, and it was a lot of fun. So what could be more fun than tearing them apart?
Very liberating! Here is the purple page, glued to a torn blank page:
And here is the orange and blue page glued to a blank page with some painting and drawing:
I first filled in some areas with watercolor (not my usual medium), then did the drawing BLIND, yes, with my eyes closed, with a gel pen. I opened my eyes to make that top left shape into a chicken. I knew those chickens would show up somewhere! If you are afraid of drawing, try it with your eyes closed. It gives you a lovely sensation of movement, contact with the paper, slowness or speed. Let me know if you've ever tried this, or if you have any other tips for the drawing-challenged. Thanks for visiting.

PS: My new revised web site is up today.