Paper and Threads

Yesterday we had a gorgeous day for outdoor sketching and our group met at Belvedere Castle in Central Park.  We had approximately 45 minutes to move to location, sketch, paint, and then gather to show our sketches.  Over 3 hours we shifted position 3 times and here are my 3 sketchbook pages.

Belvedere Castle - from the rocks overlooking Turtle Pond.  I sat in bright sunlight and listened to tourists search for the turtles - both swimming and sunning themselves below us.

Instead of working more on my castle drawing, I sketched and painted another member of our group during the 2nd session.  She had beautiful hair which fell naturally, covering her face while she was drawing.  But I could always see the frame of her red glasses.

We moved to The Shakespeare Garden for our 3rd session and I fought with a painting of a very small purple flower - one of the few that were blooming.   I couldn't capture the exact purple color or show the variation from intense color at the ends of each petal to white in the center.  I tortured these 2 small blooms - and finally said - "I did my best and have lots more to learn."

Posted by Shirley at 2:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Before I decided to enroll in the "Studying Under the Masters" Online class this winter, I bought Veronica Lawlor's book One Watercolor a Day so I could play with loose watercolor exercises during the dark winter days.  It is designed for 42 days (6 weeks) and this week I started the book and did 4 exercises in my 9 X 12" 140 lb Watercolor Strathmore Visual Journal.  Here are exercises from 2 days.

Day 3:  Red Monochromatic Painting of a Dreamscape

I was inspired by a mosaic in the Lincoln Center Subway stop and used scarlet red, permanent alizarin crimson, and these mixed with gold gouache and Payne's gray. 

Day 4:  Color Studies

In this exercise I needed to paint the same still-life using 3 different color combinations.  I used Van Dyke Brown for the Monochromatic painting, Yellow, yellow orange, and yellow green for the Analogous painting, and blue, yellow-orange and a 3rd color which was supposed to be red-orange.  My other mannequin models are a pencil drawing and a vellum paper drawing in analogous colors - just to continue to play....

The rest of the days I painted tulips twice - trying to paint the petals wet-on-wet - and one brushes/paint still life.  We are so ready for Spring in New York City - and yesterday the tulip plants in front of my apartment were 3-4 inches high.  I painted this week from tulip photos that I took last year.

Posted by Shirley at 4:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

I haven't gone to a Figure Drawing Session since my FIT Course ended last semester.  The Holidays were busy and then I started my Silk Dye Painting Class on the night I always went to the Society of Illustrators.  So I was a little apprehensive about attending a new drop-in location on Friday afternoon, but my friend Judy paved the way. 

They have 3 models who rotate the different sets of poses.  The first model did 20 one-minute poses.  YIKES!  These have never been fun for me - and she struck such bizarre poses that in the middle I just drew her head.  If you look at the right of these heads you can see that she literally threw herself on the floor and lifted up onto her shoulders with her feet in the air!

I already sketched the 2nd model 3 previous times - two at the Society of Illustrators and once in my FIT class.  Familiarity, however doesn't necessarily make it easier. 

Here are 3 five minute poses of Blaine - and one 20 minute long pose.

The 3rd model did some of the longer poses.  Here are 2 ten minute poses - and then one of approximately 15 minutes at the end of the session.

All drawings were done with a Derwent Sketch and Wash pencil - so I could add water if I wanted to after the session.  There are on large paper and were photographed, not scanned.

Posted by Shirley at 2:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I decided to end my Studying Under the Masters Class after 8 weeks.  It was WONDERFUL and I learned so much more about using my watercolors and my palette - much more because I learned it on my own through trial and error.  The 9th apprentice and artist didn't interest me at all, so now I'm back to other projects.

I needed another new watercolor sketchbook and finally had time to make it.  I overdyed a monoprint I didn't like and then added a screen print of one of my figure drawings that I made into a thermofax screen.  This is a drawing of a pregnant model that I used before for other projects.  This is a 48 page, 140 lb cased-in watercolor sketchbook, made using my standard method.

I haven't talked much about my Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT) spring semester class.  I am taking silk dye painting and we are learning many techniques on one 36 X 36 inch piece of silk.  In our second class we mixed a full range of dye colors from our 3 primaries plus black and now we refer to it as a general guide for all of our subsequent painting.  Here is the grid created with gutta and then "painted" with the dye colors we mixed. 

The second vertical row has our 3 primary and 3 secondary dye hues.  Row one has tints of those (diluent added to lighten).  Rows 3 and 4 are classic complementaries of the primaries and secondaries and their tints, and Rows 5 and 6 are their shades (black added to darken) and their tints. 

We've used many types of resists to make butterflies and flowers (gutta, wax and water soluble),  and played with salt and alcohol effects.  They are all on the left side of the silk.

We are now working on "grounds" of wax or gutta/turpenoid and painting leaves.  These are above and below the color grid - and this picture was taken before class this week before I finished my leaves.  At the bottom is a textile design I made using Tjantings, stamps, and several layers of wax and dyes.

The right side of the silk now has a self-portrait I "painted" on the top and will have a stamped textile design using thickened dyes on the bottom section to finish this piece next week.  Then the dyes will be steamed and the wax removed.   In two weeks we will start another project for the second half of the semester. 

Although I have experience with many of these techniques, I am still learning so much - and love being in a surface design studio for 4 hours each week! 

Posted by Shirley at 7:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

I am a self-taught watercolor artist  I tried some watercolor painting in 2003-2005 with student grade pan watercolors.  In 2005, I bought Winsor Newton artist grade watercolors in primary colors (warm and cool), and changed my very occasional painting habit into a quick daily sketch/painting in a 6 X 8" watercolor journal - at the same time that I partially retired. 

I follow some wonderful watercolor artists on their blogs, and try to learn from copying Masters.  By transforming oil paintings into watercolor paintings for each of the 8 Masters in this Studying Under the Masters Course, I have learned so much that I realize that my learning style is definitely one of working things out on my own. 

For years I needed to increase the value range in my paintings and I knew it.  And I desperately  needed to learn how to paint deep shadows and bright sunlight.  This week I specifically chose this Edward Hopper painting (Rooms By the Sea)   to copy because it forced me to work out how to achieve that.  Last night I asked Stephanie Lee - our apprentice for Hopper - whether she thought I should use the white paper, or white gouache for the bright light.  She recommended that I start by leaving the paper white, and then adding gouache if needed.

This is the painting with the pure white paper showing the areas of sunlight and I'm pleased.  Hopper's shadows looked like they were even one shade darker than mine when the watercolor dried,   I painted over one of my unerased grid marks on the floor - and it will be there forever - YIKES!

Photos Taken During Painting: 

I remembered to take some photos of "work in progress" and here are a few of them.  They are taken with my cell phone camera - and the final painting, shown above was scanned.

I did an under painting for the areas that would have deep shadows.  Here you can see the detailed drawing and the first under painting with Yellow Ochre and French Ultramarine Blue...

 Then I built up layers of color using the same paint mixtures.

I tested the light and shadow in the far room, leaving the paper white, and making the shadow with Payne's Gray. 

The big shadows on the wall and floor in the Final Painting were painted with Payne's Gray (Wall) and Yellow Ochre + Payne's Gray (floor). 

Thanks Stephanie for choosing Edward Hopper as your Master.  now I need to look at Reference Photos I've taken to work on a painting inspired by Hopper before Monday. 

Posted by Shirley at 1:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)