Paper and Threads

Last week I painted on a Chinese White watercolor underpainting on Bainbridge Hot Press Illustration Board. 

This is my portrait of our model, a dark-haired and stubbly face guy in a motorcycle jacket.  I painted the illustration board with Chinese White mixed with water, did a very light simple sketch, and then did all of the painting with a #10 round brush on the underpainting, even the lines of the eyes and nose.

I missed the class demo when I was away, and never understood why we were learning this technique.   

I searched for information about Chinese White Watercolor paint and didn't find much.   

I learned that Chinese White, a zinc oxide, was first used in watercolor painting in the 1830s.  Although the white of the paper is usually used for white color in watercolor painting, Chinese White can be used to add opaque white details, or to mix with transparent watercolors to make them opaque like gouache.  

This is all I found about using Chinese White as an underpainting:   

"Lifting after using Chinese white as a base: Using Chinese white as a base makes it easier to lift and manipulate applied color to create hazy, misty effects, and soft-edged, subtly blended areas of tone. This technique is also known as blottesque. In blottesque, you apply a thin layer of Chinese white to your paper, let it dry and then paint over it with layers of transparent watercolor in the usual way. At any stage, you can lift, scrub or rub off color to achieve the effect you want. You can use the technique all over your painting, but if you do not want Chinese white to mix the transparent color, confine it to a few appropriate areas, such as the sky, to create naturalistic cloud effects. The blottesque technique is ideal for lifting color where you want subtle gradations of tone. It gives more control than basic lifting techniques because both the white of the paper and the white pigment contribute to the lightening of tones. When you lift color laid on a base of Chinese white, the edges are soft and merge into neighboring washes. Exploit these effects for naturalistic skies, and hazy, moisture-drenched weather effects." 

I'd love to hear from watercolor painters out there who can help me understand this technique. 

https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?shva=1#drafts?compose=150f34fe5d5467b4 

Posted by Shirley at 4:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

November and May are the months of the big Impressionist, Modern, and Contemporary art auctions in New York City, and the auction houses schedule previews for several days before the auctions so the public can see and assess the art.  In general, you see art that is being sold from one private collection to an individual building another private collection - and the previews rarely disappoint me.  Sotheby's auction this month included many pieces owned by A. Alfred Taubman and it was a thrill to see the art, especially the watercolors (Winslow Homer, Sargent) and many drawings Gustave Klimt, Egon Schiele).

I  took a class at Quilt Festival last week about "working in a series" and one of the exercises was to rapidly list all of the themes you loved.  At the top of my list was Mother and Child, perhaps in part because it is one of the few series I created in fabric.  These are small quilts in which I explored the many ways I could transfer my drawings of a pregnant nude model to fabric.  Here is my favorite.

At the Sotheby's Auction preview last week, this was one of my favorite sculptures -  Mother, Child, and Apple by Henry Moore.  I would have drawn it except for the constant presence of at least 10-12 people standing around it! 

Instead I painted one of Louise Bourgeoise' Spiders with Eggs (11 inches high) and Aristide Maillote's Jeune Fille (terracotta, 7 inches high).  I loved the spider shadows!

Tomorrow we are going to the Previews at Christies - with sketchbook in hand again! 

Posted by Shirley at 12:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I just returned from my annual trip to the International Quilt Festival in Houston Texas.  In high school I became a seamstress, then in 1980, while living in Texas, I learned how to make quilts.  By 1990 I was starting to dye and design fabric and loved mixing dyes and painting them on silk.  Watercolor painting became a natural extension after I retired.  But I only acquire new interests and don't easily give up the old ones.  This was my 30th annual visit to Quilt Festival where I look at 100s of quilts, take classes, and replenish supplies.

The Houston Convention Center is huge - think multiple football fields, and is now undergoing more building and renovation.  All 3 floors are devoted to this event and the last attendance record I heard, which was several years ago, was 55,000 attendees.

I painted once each full day I was there, and here are my sketchbook pages.  Jane Dunnewold's class was about working in a series, and we had many exercises to do during our 3 hours of discussion.  In one of the final exercises we had to quickly write down lists of words that we associated with colors.  Of greatest interest were the half of the class that hate purple and had lots of bad associations with it. 

My next class required 3 hours of sewing and I didn't paint during the session.  But I did draw one of my favorite dolls from the Hoffman Challenge Doll Exhibit as I walked through the exhibit areas. 

My third day and class was with Judy Coates Perez and we dyed and painted fabric using Acrylic Inks.  Wow!  the textures created were gorgeous, and were very different than those achieved with dyes.  But they also are not completely water resistant, making them better for art quilts that will never be washed. 

Posted by Shirley at 2:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

I attended a figure drawing session at Battery Park City when I returned from vacation..  This weekly free program runs from May 1-October 31, weather permitting.  These are drawings from my last session, when it was cool enough that we moved down to the edge of the water to be in the sun. 

This is a photo of part of the group in the Battery Park South Cove,  The second photo shows the view over my shoulder, with the constant sound of water lapping under my bench. 

I am using one large sheet of watercolor paper for each of these series of drawings.  I sketch with a soluble graphite pencil and then add water with a waterbrush for shading.  Most of these were 10-20 minute poses. 

Posted by Shirley at 8:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I did occasionally sit down to sketch and paint while in Spain - while listening to music, sipping coffee, watching Flamingo dancers, or drinking a glass of wine.  The sites weren't pre-selected and all but once, my husband was with me as we talked and enjoyed our vacation.

Madrid: 

I walked to Plaza Santa Ana one sunny afternoon while my husband went to the gym.  There was a place to sit in a central area among outdoor cafes, each with their own musicians that alternated playing.  The Teatro Espanol was at one end of the Plaza and I sat there enjoying my surroundings while drawing and painting.

My husband and I took a long walk our last day in Madrid, and stopped for a mid-morning cup of coffee.  I was facing several apartments around the Plaza San Andreas, and I loved the combination of colors and the sun vs shade. 

Seville:  We had dinner in our small hotel dining room the day we arrived, and less than a dozen of us watched a pair of Flamenco dancers, a guitarist, and a singer.  The flamenco dancers moved too quickly to sketch, so I drew one of the repeated poses of the guitarist.

Barcelona:

We spent one entire day looking at Antoni Gaudi buildings: Sagrada Familia, Guadi's home and museum at Parc Guell, and Casa Batllo several blocks from our hotel.  After walking around the exterior and interior of Sagrada Familia, I set up front, in the nave, and sketched the ceiling above the altar while listening to someone, somewhere sing Ave Maria. 

We stopped for a glass of wine in a gorgeous plaza, after visiting the Picasso Museum.  While there, a well-known elderly Flamenco Dancer stopped right in front of us, so he and the students made it into my painting.

Posted by Shirley at 1:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)